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This is why the male oriented dating communities call it “goofmaxxing” or “jester maxing” to get good at comedy for the purposes of attracting others.

The need to become funny for literal survival is among the worst of all humiliation rituals that most of us will be forced to do. I want people to be funny because they like being funny - not because they will literally not breed or be killed without it!

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There’s also being funny not quite for attracting others, but for avoiding alienating people one has already attracted. As someone surely autistic somehow, I find myself making frequent jokes because I know my interlocutors don’t want to hear about the subjects I’d really like to talk about, so joking seems the least-offensive and least-effort part I can play in socializing. When I saw Mike Leigh’s 1987 short film The Short and Curlies, about a young man who reacts to every single thing with a little joke, I very much recognized myself.

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