{"id":4126,"date":"2020-01-30T17:10:00","date_gmt":"2020-01-30T17:10:00","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/ciresblogs.colorado.edu\/prometheus\/?p=4126"},"modified":"2020-01-30T17:37:39","modified_gmt":"2020-01-30T17:37:39","slug":"jokes-are-a-surprisingly-effective-way-to-talk-about-climate-change","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/ciresblogs.colorado.edu\/prometheus\/2020\/01\/30\/jokes-are-a-surprisingly-effective-way-to-talk-about-climate-change\/","title":{"rendered":"Jokes Are a Surprisingly Effective Way To Talk About Climate Change"},"content":{"rendered":"\n
\"\"<\/figure>\n\n\n\n

Changing America<\/em><\/a>
by Sophie Yeo<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Matt Winning isn\u2019t an ordinary comedian. He is an environmental economist \u2014 he lectures at University College London \u2014 but he also writes and performs shows about climate change. His comedy routines have caused audiences to break down in tears. Critics love him.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Winning\u2019s latest show is called \u201cIt\u2019s The End Of The World As We Know It<\/a>,\u201d which he performed at the Edinburgh Festival in Scotland last year. Despite his academic background, and despite the seriousness of the topic, he believes that comedy is the best way to reach out to a large number of people and prompt action when it comes to climate change.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cIt elevates the topic,\u201d he says. \u201cThere\u2019s a lot of comedy in my show, but occasionally there\u2019s a parcel where I make more serious points, and I think that\u2019s what life is: highs and lows, humorous and dark at the same time. That\u2019s actually how you can talk meaningfully about this topic.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

As climate change gets worse, and the news cycle becomes increasingly dominated by stories of wildfires<\/a> and melting ice, the decline of nature and increasingly hot temperatures, it may be difficult to trust that levity is an appropriate way to respond to the crisis. Certainly, Greta Thunberg<\/a> has not become the spokesperson of her generation because of her wisecracks.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Yet, there is a growing body of research to suggest that comedy is actually an effective way to ensure that people engage with climate change. Moreover, academics have found that good-natured comedy, rather than the more downbeat and indignant category of satire, may be the best way to make audiences care about the issue.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

While this may be unexpected, it certainly isn\u2019t new. Playwrights have been using comedy to address serious topics for millennia, says Beth Osnes, professor of theatre at the University of Colorado Boulder, who is studying the potential of comedy to communicate climate change.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cOne of the most famous Greek plays is Lysistrata<\/em>, in which there was a sex strike to stop the Peloponnesian War. There was nothing funny about the Peloponnesian War,\u201d says Osnes. \u201cComedy is not something that makes things ridiculous \u2014 comedy has a long history of taking on very serious corruption and things like that.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Rather than just theorizing about the role that comedy might play in communicating climate change, Osnes has helped establish a stand-up comedy course for students, most of whom were majoring in Environmental Studies and who had found themselves depressed by their course of study. The event is called \u201cDrawdown, Act Up!,<\/em>\u201d and is part of a wider university program called \u201cInside The Greenhouse,\u201d which explores creative ways to talk about climate change.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Following the performances, which took place at Rocky Mountain National Park, Osnes and her colleagues surveyed the students about their experiences and published the results<\/a> in the journal Comedy Studies. They found that 90 percent of students felt more hopeful about climate change when engaging with the subject in a fun or joyful manner, and that 83 percent felt that their commitment to climate change action was consequently more sustainable.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

By giving students a positive outlet for their emotions and making conversation around climate change an enjoyable experience, Osnes hopes that young activists are more likely to stay engaged with the topic, rather than failing to deal with their negative emotions and ultimately burning out.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cWe found that it really helps young people process negative emotions around climate change,\u201d Osnes observes. \u201cWhat can help sustain commitment to climate action is the infusion of fun into the process of engagement. If we\u2019re doing something that matches our values and aligns with our passions and it\u2019s fun, the likelihood that we\u2019re going to come back again and again is very high.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

A crucial part of this experiment was that the comedy was explicitly good-natured, rather than satirical in nature \u2014 in other words, the humor arises from techniques like word play, innuendo and exaggeration, rather than a pointed attack intended to shame or expose a target. This finding was echoed in another recent study<\/a> by Chris Skurka, an assistant professor in media studies at Penn State University.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Skurka carried out his study by editing a clip of Jimmy Kimmel discussing climate change and Sarah Palin in four ways: one kept only the informational content, another kept only the humor, one kept only the indignation, and one \u2014 the satirical version, and the one which was closest to the original \u2014 which kept both the humor and the indignation. While Skarka started his research expecting that satire would be an effective means to communicate climate change humorously without undermining the seriousness of the topic, he actually found that the satirical version was the least effective of the four clips.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cWhat we suspect might be going on is that it is possible for Kimmel to use humor to talk about climate change, but when he also expresses contempt or hostility, he may inadvertently come off as abrasive. If he\u2019s just humorous about the issue, he may be able to spark young people\u2019s interest,\u201d says Skurka.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

He also discovered that Republicans were less likely to be amused by Kimmel\u2019s mockery of Sarah Palin than Democrats, providing evidence of what most people already know from personal experience: that comedy is funny until you become the butt of the joke. More surprising was that the gap between political parties shrank during the humor-free segment. \u201cIt is possible for late-night comedians to talk about climate change and even promote Republicans\u2019 perception of climate change risk \u2014 so long as they skip jokes targeting climate deniers and\/or big corporations along the way,\u201d the paper concludes.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In other words, jokes about climate change can be funny. But for the most laughs and the widest impact, the Jimmy Kimmels of this world must crack the right jokes to the right people.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Changing Americaby Sophie Yeo Matt Winning isn\u2019t an ordinary comedian. He is an environmental economist \u2014 he lectures at University College London \u2014 but he also writes and performs shows about climate change. His comedy routines have caused audiences to … Continue reading →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":32,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-4126","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-news"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","publishpress_future_action":{"enabled":false,"date":"2026-07-24 11:26:42","action":"change-status","newStatus":"draft","terms":[],"taxonomy":"category"},"publishpress_future_workflow_manual_trigger":{"enabledWorkflows":[]},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/ciresblogs.colorado.edu\/prometheus\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4126","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/ciresblogs.colorado.edu\/prometheus\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/ciresblogs.colorado.edu\/prometheus\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ciresblogs.colorado.edu\/prometheus\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/32"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ciresblogs.colorado.edu\/prometheus\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=4126"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/ciresblogs.colorado.edu\/prometheus\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4126\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":4130,"href":"https:\/\/ciresblogs.colorado.edu\/prometheus\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4126\/revisions\/4130"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/ciresblogs.colorado.edu\/prometheus\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=4126"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ciresblogs.colorado.edu\/prometheus\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=4126"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ciresblogs.colorado.edu\/prometheus\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=4126"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}