American TV
While we were in Hawaii we watched some late night TV. There were two things that surprised me. One was the adverts. In Australia it is illegal to advertise prescription drugs, not so in the US. However it must be obligatory to state the side effects. After listening to all the possible side effects I’m surprised they find the adverts effective!
The other thing that surprised me was what Americans laugh at. Some months ago an American celebratory was in Australia and was offended by some Australian humor which didn’t bother me. So I expected American humor to be very politically correct but I was surprised to find this was not so. Or perhaps it was just late at night… My conclusion was that what we laugh at is very much governed by culture.
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3 comments:
Our late night tv is probably not a good place to get a sense of our tv culture! It can get pretty wild.
Yes it is legal to advertise prescription drugs, but it is heavily regulated by the government, hence the listing of warnings and side effects. The thought process on this is that a person will still have to visit their Dr. go get the medication, but if they know the options that are available to them they will be a more informed patient. But really it's just advertising like anything else. It's obnoxious. You would be appalled at some of the ads (or maybe you already were).
As far as what is funny, were you watching late night talk shows? It just depends who it is. Some American humor is pretty coarse, but some of it is not. It's a broad spectrum.
I sometimes find humor from other countries hilarious, and sometimes I just don't get it. I rarely am offended by it. I would guess maybe the person from the US who was there was someone rather conservative to have been offended by something humorous. Some Americans find jokes based on race, gender, disabilities or religion to be offensive, but generally those topics are free game as well.
To make a long story short, yes, what we laugh at is very much culturally determined, but I think there is flexibility in that depending on the person.
My friend Sue linked me to a video of Dave Grant, but she said she wasn't sure how well his humor would translate to an American audience. Of course, I only watched a few segments of him, so it may not have been a good cross section of his humor, but what I saw was hilarious to me, too. So sometimes it does translate well.
Very interesting observation, Susan.
I have some friends in the medical profession who tell me there is a big push from pharmaceutical companies to change the laws to allow these types of adverts in Australia. I certainly hope not. Apart from anything else they are so somber and depressing!
It was a late night talk show that I was watching and to be fair I don't watch late night TV in Australia so I'm probably a bit naive as to what goes on.
I was annoyed with the celebratory who came to Australia and said he was offended by our humour. However his comments may have also been exaggerated by our media, which often happens.
Thanks for your thoughts Erin
I was thinking about this and regardless of where we live it seems that someone call tell a politically incorrect joke on TV at 8pm and people get offended. But they can tell the same joke at 11pm and no one complains. Is it that all the politically correct people go to bed at 10pm(!)?
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