This note is an update to the article "Unprintable Reactions to All the News That's Fit to Print: Topical Humor and the Media"(Southern Folklore 46:1 (1989), pp. 15-39.) by the above author. You can find the original article in the Newfolk Online Library by following the link on the title in this note, and it is recommended that you do so to place the following in its scholarly context. The author includes a warning, however, that the reader should consider his or her own sensibilities when pursuing this article. This should be considered an age warning: please don't go there if you are younger than age 17.

To date I have encountered only three jokes, the first of which--from Russia--is actually a reversal of a joke that grew out of the Gulf War in 1991:

But I have already found a kind of sadistic jokes about this attack in Internet. For example (sorry my bad translation): at seven o'clock in the morning, 11 September Saddam ( in joke it may be Putin or Miloshevich or somebody else) calls to Bush : "I want to to present my condolences to American people in connetion with this terrible attack...."
Bush: "Attack?? Terror?"
Saddam: "A... sorry, I forgot again about the time zone" [all sic]

In the original joke, the first President Bush calls Saddam Hussein with a similar message. The second joke illustrates a sense of defiance common to most of the humor associated with September 11:

To the Taliban from the American people:
Give us Bin Laden, or we will take all of your women and send them to college.

The third joke offers a solution to the "bin Laden problem" thanks to a genie, a motif that appears in other topical jokes, as discussed above:

Three guys, a Canadian, Osama Bin Ladin and Uncle Sam are out walking together one day. They come across a lantern and a Genie pops out of it. "I will give each of you each one wish, that's three wishes total," says the Genie.The Canadian says, "I am a farmer, my dad was a farmer, and my son will also farm. I want the land to be forever fertile in Canada." With a blink of the Genie's eye, 'POOF' the land in Canada was forever made fertile for farming.

Osama Bin Ladin was amazed, so he said, "I want a wall around Afganistan, so that no infidels, Jews or Americans can come into our precious state." Again, with a blink of the Genie's eye, 'POOF' there was a huge wall around Afganistan.

"Uncle Sam" (A former civil engineer), asks, "I'm very curious. Please tell me more about this all."The Genie explains, "Well, it's about 15,000 feet high, 500 feet thick and completely surrounds the country; nothing can get in or out---virtually impenetrable.""UncleSam" says, "Fill it with water." [all sic]

The first responses to the attacks that I saw were two altered photographs of Manhattan, looking northeast from New Jersey or Staten Island. Purporting to show the rebuilt World Trade Center, the photographs depict a series of five towers with the middle one being substantially taller than the rest. The result is a gigantic sculpture of "the finger" (the "cuckold gesture"), sending the message--one assumes--to the attackers, "Fuck you!" Interestingly, although identical in concept, these two images were created from different original photographs, apparently by different people. (See Appendix C for all images.) A third photograph shows the Statue of Liberty "giving the finger" instead of holding her torch. The caption is, "We're coming, motherfuckers!"

Whereas in the past photocopy lore and oral tradition were the primary means of folk transmission of topical humor, now the World Wide Web and computer technology make it easy for people to modify photographs and disseminate them widely and rapidly. Such is the case with the three images described above, as well as an idealized speech by President Bush and a "letter" to Osama bin Laden circulating online.

In the speech, a defiant and foul-mouthed Bush, exuding machismo and boyish braggadocio, warns bin Laden that his days are numbered. In the second, an author uses the metaphor of playing a competitive game to tell bin Laden that the United States will win the next--and final--round. A different approach appears in "The Bin-ch Who Stole Tuesday," a sing-song poem patterned on How the Grinch Stole Christmas by Dr. Seuss (Theodor Geisel). Casting bin Laden (the "Bin-ch" in the title) in the role of the Grinch, the poem depicts the defiance and resilience of the American people.

Another modified image is circulating with the title "They Found Him!!!!" It shows the wealthy bin Laden as a cashier in a convenience story, playing on American stereotypes of Middle Easterners working primarily in low-paying jobs in convenience stores or as taxi drivers or hotel housekeepers. Finally, an online cartoon depicts the Statue of Liberty holding a tray on which lies bin Laden's head. The caption, "Hell hath no fury as that of a 'LADY' scorned," sums up the defiance and anger pervading the humorous reactions to the attacks on the United States.

The responses to 11 September differ significantly from earlier topical humor. This time we have not been desensitized by repeated exposure to the images of tragedy. The humor growing out of the attacks on America focuses not on the victims, but on the attackers and their supporters. The shift from victim status yields a feeling of power and regained sense of control over one's life. By using the format of a children's rhyme, "The Binch" diminishes bin Laden to the status of a childish bully, making him less threatening. Similarly, depicting him as a convenience store clerk puts him in a position of relatively minimal power. The purported letter to bin Laden reduces the situation to a game, another minimization of the threat of terrorism.

Earlier topical humor focused on victims as generic groups--especially gays, African Americans, and Jews. The thousands of victims of the 11 September attacks are not easily categorized. They represent civilians and military, men and women, people of all sexualities, many religions, various races, and approximately sixty nationalities. The attacks were indiscriminate. Since these events were so horrific, represented a real, personal threat, and did not focus on a specific oppressed group, it is not surprising that they did not generate the kinds of jokes we have seen in the past.

In my original essay, I suggested that AIDS lore would shift from jokes to legends to personal experience narratives as the threat of HIV infection became more widespread and internalized. The majority of reactions to the terrorist attacks of 2001 have taken a narrative approach as well. (Interestingly, jokes related to the 11 September disaster seem to have followed the narratives for the most part.) One legend reports that someone trapped in one of the trade center towers above the impact area sturdied himself in a doorframe and survived by "riding" the collapsing building to the ground.

Stories of heroism and survivors, final telephone calls made by airline passengers and World Trade Center employees to their loved ones, and eyewitness accounts far outnumber the occasional attempt at narrative or visual humor. Indeed, various local organizations like the Minnetrista Cultural Center in Muncie, Indiana, and the Fairfax Historical Society in Burlington, Vermont, have begun gathering people's stories of where they were and how they reacted to the attacks. The American Folklife Center in the Library of Congress has encouraged folklorists to record such accounts to be deposited in a national archive to parallel Alan Lomax's call on 9 December 1941 for the collection of people's reactions to the attack on Pearl Harbor. These enduring memories will likely be a more-effective form of stress relief over the long term.

Ball State University
Muncie, Indiana

APPENDIX C
REACTIONS TO THE ATTACKS ON THE UNITED STATES
12-28 SEPTEMBER 2001

The examples in this section circulated on the World Wide Web between 12 and 28 September 2001. All typographical errors and misspellings are as they originally appeared.

For material resulting from the 11 September attacks, I appreciate items sent to me or posted on FOLKLORE (FOLKLORE@listserv.tamu.edu) and NEWFOLK (NEWFOLK@LISTSERV.TEMPLE.EDU) by Alexandra Arkhipova, Camille Bacon-Smith, Ronald S. Bleile, Tom Dillingham, Bill Ellis, Robert J. Goodwin, Susan Holmberg, Bruce Mason, Camilla Mortenson, and Steven A. Swidler.

9/14

I am curious whether anyone has encountered what I assume is a circulating urban legend. A friend of mine--a university professor not given to spreading bizarre stories--tells me that he heard of a man who was trapped on a floor of the WTC above where the plane impacted, so he could not get down. The story is that when the building began to collapse, he held tightly to a doorframe and "rode the building down," walking away from the ruins with only minor injuries.
So may God bless America! Bless us! God bless!

9/14

[One contributor to the FOLKLORE list wrote] for example (sorry my bad translation):at seven o'clock in the morning, 11 September Saddam ( in joke it may be Putin or Miloshevich or somebody else) calls to Bush : "I want to to present my condolences to American people in connetion with this terrible attack...."
Bush: "Attack?? Terror?" Saddam: "A... sorry, I forgot again about the time zone"

9/14

New World Trade Center Design

9/14

World Trade Center Rebuilt

9/18

The Bin-ch Who Stole Tuesday

Every U down in Uville liked U.S. a lot,
But the Binch, who lived Far East of Uville, did not.
The Binch hated U.S! the whole U.S. way!
Now don't ask me why, for nobody can say,
It could be his turban was screwed on too tight.
Or the sun from the desert had beaten too bright
But I think that the most likely reason of all
May have been that his heart was two sizes too small.

But, Whatever the reason, his heart or his turban,
He stood facing Uville, the part that was urban.
"They're doing their business," he snarled from his perch.
"They're raising their families! They're going to church!
They're leading the world, and their empire is thriving,
I MUST keep the S's and U's from surviving!"

Tomorrow, he knew, all the U's and the S's,
Would put on their pants and their shirts and their dresses,
They'd go to their offices, playgrounds and schools,
And abide by their U and S values and rules,

And then they'd do something he liked least of all,
Every U down in U-ville, the tall and the small,
Would stand all united, each U and each S,
And they'd sing Uville's anthem, "God bless us! God bless!"
All around their Twin Towers of Uville, they'd stand,
and their voices would drown every sound in the land.

"I must stop that singing," Binch said with a smirk,
And he had an idea--an idea that might work!
The Binch stole some U airplanes in U morning hours,
And crashed them right into the Uville Twin Towers.
"They'll wake to disaster!" he snickered, so sour,
"And how can they sing when they can't find a tower?"

The Binch cocked his ear as they woke from their sleeping,
All set to enjoy their U-wailing and weeping,
Instead he heard something that started quite low,
And it built up quite slow, but it started to grow--
And the Binch heard the most unpredictable thing...
And he couldn't believe it--they started to sing!

He stared down at U-ville, not trusting his eyes,
What he saw was a shocking, disgusting surprise!
Every U down in U-ville, the tall and the small,
Was singing! Without any towers at all!
He HADN'T stopped U-Ville from singing! It sung!
For down deep in the hearts of the old and the young,
Those Twin Towers were standing, called Hope and called Pride,
And you can't smash the towers we hold deep inside.

So we circle the sites where our heroes did fall,
With a hand in each hand of the tall and the small,
And we mourn for our losses while knowing we'll cope,
For we still have inside that U-Pride and U-Hope.

For America means a bit more than tall towers,
It means more than wealth or political powers,
It's more than our enemies ever could guess,

9/20

If I Were President George W. Bush's Speech Writer.

By Mitchell R. Robb

Good evening my fellow Americans.

First, I want to pass on my condolences to the people of New York and all Americans that are hurting in this tragic time. You can rest assured that anything and everything that can be done to assure the safety of our country will be done. This is the greatest country in the world and we will get through this trying time. Now is the time for all people to set aside our petty differences and show the world that no one or nothing can destroy the fortitude of the American people.

To the people responsible for today's tragedy, I say this: Are you fucking kidding me? Are the turbans on your heads wrapped too tight? Have you gone too long without a bath? Do you not know who you are fucking with? Americans are so hungry to kill, that we shoot at each other every day. We will relish that opportunity for new targets for our aggression. Have you forgotten history? What happened to the last people that started fucking around with us? Remember the little yellow bastards over in Japan? We slapped them all over the Pacific and roasted about 2 million of them in their own back yard. That's what we in America call a big ass barbecue.

Ever seen Texas on a map? Ever wonder why it's so big? Because we wanted it that way, Mexico started jacking around with the Alamo and now they cut our lawns. England? We sent them packing.

Ask your buddy Saddam about fucking with the good 'ole USA. The only reason he got away the first time is because it's too hard to shoot someone when you're doubled over laughing at them. Our soldiers aren't trained to laugh and shoot at the same time. Now he couldn't stop a pack of cub scouts from taking over his shitty little country.

Trust us, Afghanistan will end up a giant kitty litter box. Go ahead and try to hide, Bin Laden. There's not a hole deep enough or a mountain high enough that's going to keep your camel riding asses safe. We will bomb every inch of the country that harbors him, his camps and any place that looks and even smells like he was there. Hell, we might even drop a few bombs on people that have pissed us off in the past. This is America. We kick ass. This is what we do. Go ahead and laugh now, but the Tomahawks are coming and we will smoke your sorry asses.

God bless America!

9/21

We're Coming, Motherfuckers!

9/26

Dear Osama Bin Laden, et. al.,

We are pleased to announce that we unequivocally accept your challenge to an old-fashioned game of whoop-ass. Now that we understand the rule that there are no rules, we look forward to playing by them for the first time. Since this game is a winner-take-all, we unfortunately are unable to invite you to join us at the victory celebration. But rest assured that we will toast you -- LITERALLY. While we will admit that you are off to an impressive lead, it is however now our turn at the plate.

By the way, we will be playing on your court now.

Batter up.

Sincerely,

The 270,000,000 citizens of the United States of America

9/27

They Found Him!!!!

9/28

"A Non-Violent Solution"

To the Taliban from the American people:

Give us Bin Laden, or we will take all of your women and send them to college.

9/28

THE GREAT WALL --An American Dream !!!!!.Three guys, a Canadian, Osama Bin Ladin and Uncle Sam are out walking together one day. They come across a lantern and a Genie pops out of it. "I will give each of you each one wish, that's three wishes total," saysthe Genie.The Canadian says, "I am a farmer, my dad was a farmer, and my son will also farm. I want the land to be forever fertile in Canada." With a blink of the Genie's eye, 'POOF' the land in Canada was forever made fertile for farming.Osama Bin Ladin was amazed, so he said, "I want a wall around Afganistan, so that no infidels, Jews or Americans can come into our precious state."
Again, with a blink of the Genie's eye, 'POOF' there was a huge wall around Afganistan."Uncle Sam" (A former civil engineer), asks, "I'm very curious. Please tell me more about this all."The Genie explains, "Well, it's about 15,000 feet high, 500 feet thick and completely surrounds the country; nothing can get in or out---virtually impenetrable.""UncleSam" says, "Fill it with water."

9/28

Hell hath no fury as that of a "LADY" scorned!

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