Alliances in Laughter: What Causes Laughter in Embarassing Situations?

            Imagine sitting in a dentist’s office with a friend, waiting for what seems like hours on end for your name to be called. In the silence, you hear a familiar series of popping sounds coming from the opposite side of the room, which you immediately link to the occurrence of someone passing wind. You may quickly glance around the room in an attempt to locate the culprit, but eventually, you look at your friend, who you find looking right back at you, bursting with readiness to laugh. Though you both laugh in embarrassing public situations such as this, your laughter is caused not by the immediate situation, but by the added situation of an alliance.

            Embarrassing situations occurring in public do not directly cause laughter. This can easily be proven by substituting your friend in the above situation for just another patient waiting to be called. We would all agree that, given the same embarrassing sound and smell emitted from across the room, your reaction would have been different. Being unaccompanied, you may glance up, but even as the unpleasant smell engulfed the air around your nose, you would not laugh. Not only is it impolite to laugh, but presented with just the situation, we can see that it just isn’t funny. Since laughter does not ensue on a normal occurrence of the action, it indicates that the embarrassing situation is not the direct cause of laughter.

            In analyzing the two similar situations in which laughter occurs, and does not occur, it is apparent that the cause of laughter is due to that which differs in the situations. In the situation during which laughter occurs, we see two persons who share a background; in the second case, this is not present. The presence of this group or alliance is therefore the cause of laughter. We can furthermore explain the reason why the alliance causes laughter as due to a sense of comfort and community that arises. In essence, you laugh because you feel at ease in the situation with your friend, as well as because you know that there is someone else who will laugh with you.

            Looking more deeply into this situation sheds light on the reason why embarrassing situations that occur often in public are not always associated with laughter. The answer lies in the true reason for laughter; if a group of persons, who share an intimate background, experience the embarrassing situation of a person outside their group, the comfort they feel surpasses the social protocol to withhold laughter, thus causing laughter, even if the situation is not funny. It is therefore beneficial to keep away from alliances, in war, and more importantly, in embarrassing public situations.