Lindsay Response

I believe that humor about tragic events like the Holocaust and the 9/11 attacks begins to become socially acceptable when the generation that does not remember these events become influential in pop culture.

The majority of our generation does not vividly remember 9/11. We may have blurry memories of watching the news coverage or being taken home from school after the crashes, but we do not remember as well as our parents or grandparents do. Because of this, it feels so long ago, as if it was just another part of American history that we can joke about. Take notice that it is not our parents or grandparents who are making jokes like “Bush did 9/11”. Our generation has put a cynical eye on this event because we feel so distant from it and want to in a sense rebell from the expected reverence.

Almost all of the 9/11 jokes that are popular began on social media, a platform dominated by our generation. We are a generation that expresses many of our emotions online whether it’s on Facebook, Twitter, or Instagram. Because of this, it makes sense that cyberspace would be where certain tragic events begin to become socially acceptable to talk about. In the past, books and films like Catch 22 and The Dictator normalized and joked about the atrocities that occurred in World War Two. Social media has become another platform to express comedy like movies and books.

As our generation, so numb to the atrocities of 9/11, has become more influential in the media, we have normalized and even made humorous an event that that was tragic for others.