Why People Get Offended Now More Than Ever12 min read

I’m sitting outside a coffee shop with a few friends and my buddy Kevin starts telling us a story about how he got praised at work for doing absolutely nothing:

Kevin: I woke up and didn’t feel like working. I called into work and said I’m “going through something” and need “self-care.” They immediately became all supportive and told me to take a week off if I needed to.

Jackson: Did you mention how empowering it is since you’ve become in touch with your feminine side?

Kevin: [ignoring Jackson] I showed up the next day and it was like they were in awe. They praised me for coming back to work so soon, and for working so hard.

Charlie: Such a brave soul you are, Kevin. 

Jackson: Hey, when you set the bar so low, people can’t help but be impressed with you Kevin.

Me: Hey Kevin, did they give you a participation trophy for that?

A lady, who was reading the newspaper near us, slammed it against her table in the way one does when triggered:

Anti-Humor Warrior: Hey! There’s NOTHING wrong with participation trophies! 

My eyes shut because they’re too annoyed to stay open. At the same time, Kevin, Jackson, and Charlie’s eyes meet, filled with excitement and anticipation. They know how I am about participation trophies, and now that I’ve crossed paths with the most diametrically opposed person on this, a reaction out of Julian is inescapable.

Me: Relax, it’s a joke.

Anti-Humor Warrior: My son got a participation trophy, and it MADE. HIS. DAY. Shame on you!

I don’t know which is stupider, the fact that she used her five year old (or more like 14) as a pond to win an argument, or the unnecessary dramatic pauses like we’re in third grade theatre class. 

Me: And did you crush it like a good citizen would?

Anti-Humor Warrior: What! No! Of course not!

Me: Shame on you! 

Anti-Humor Warrior: How can you be so insensitive to those who never won a trophy!? 

Me: A trophy for never getting a trophy seems like a kick in the face if you ask me.

Anti-Humor Warrior: Some kids may never get a trophy in their life!

Me: Yep, and that’s the problem.

Anti-Humor Warrior: WHAT?

Me: Rewarding someone for participating doesn’t teach hard work, which makes them less likely to get actual awards later in life. 

If you were passing by, you would have thought that I said something hard to swallow like horoscopes are fake or reality TV isn’t real, because she looked damn near paralyzed after that comment. 

Me: Do you normally go around and police people like this?

Anti-Humor Warrior: I’m standing up for people who would get offended by your words! I know so many people who would be offended! 

Me: So? We are JOKING.

Her face scrunches into a hundred wrinkles, her jaw drops like someone just pissed on her lawn. The word “joking” must have hardwired her brain to get extra offended.

Anti-Humor Warrior: Offending people is verbal abuse! You should be ashamed of the emotional injuries you could be causing people!

Me: Go watch the Disney channel.

Everyone laughs, except Anti-Humor Warrior, who abruptly leaves.

***

I don’t know about you, but it seems like day by day more people get a stick up their ass. The “who can I be offended by today?” virus is spreading quicker than a night at the ratchet strip club. Something called False Humor, which will be explained in a bit, is beginning to take over real, authentic, true humor. 

These people, who get offended by seemingly anything are who I refer to as Anti-Humor Warriors.

Anti-Humor Warriors are people who…

• Cannot take a joke
• Get offended over things that have nothing to do with them
• Get offended if your beliefs are not perfectly aligned with theirs
• Are constantly correcting others
• Always feel slighted by others over insignificant matters 
• Opportunistic at exploiting flaws in others (which are often fabricated)
• Obsess over another person’s word-choice (like “grammar-nazis” but with someone’s choice of words)
• An overall buzz-kill

Perhaps you’ve felt the need to suppress finding humor in situations to avoid offending others. Maybe you made a harmless joke, but someone interpreted it in the worst possible way. You offended them, and now they’ve painted you as an insensitive person. Now it almost doesn’t seem worth it to lighten the mood. Best to avoid making jokes to prevent offending someone, right?

Nope.

Do you really want to be walking on eggshells your entire life, constantly censoring yourself? Well, that’s the direction we’re headed in, and if we don’t stand our ground, it won’t be long before we forfeit our ability to speak openly and freely around others. 

This isn’t a post saying we should all take the time to laugh a bit more. There is a much more serious issue taking root. Anti-Humor Warriors have been silencing, shaming, and attacking others all because they were offended by a harmless joke, and thus far, they’ve succeeded at it. Now more than ever is it absolutely essential to say what you believe. 

This is a three-post series which is meant to set the record straight on why a true sense of humor is often the solution to many of the challenges we face. After using what you learn in this series, the pay-off will be threefold:

In part one, we will dive deep into why Anti-Humor Warriors unjustly shame others all for having a good laugh. You will learn a highly detailed, intuitive way to discern if someone’s offense toward you is legitimate or not. You’ll gain the vision to see through their guilt-trips and the tricks they play on you. It will feel like a weight has been lifted off your shoulders, as you will be able to laugh freely without restraint, without a need to censor yourself. 

In part two, we’ll cover how a true sense of humor connects us with a type of free-spirited, carefree, joyful energy of life. You will find yourself worrying less and living in the present more. You will discover the therapeutic effects of finding humor in everyday life, and how it fends off anxiety and attracts stillness. An inner-contentment will manifest, as you will feel more at ease living in the moment.

In part three, we will expand on true humor and how this type of unlimited, boundless energy not only offers light in dark times, but also enriches the good moments into the best moments. It’s this type of energy that heightens our experiences and makes us come alive. Small things that get under our skin won’t be important. Daily stressors will be irrelevant. You’ll be less deterred by obstacles and more in touch with a sense of purpose. 

Let’s begin.

False Humor

One big reason why people are losing touch with having a real, authentic sense of humor is due to something called False Humor. False Humor is when someone takes pleasure in another person’s pain. People who indulge in False Humor take great delight in seeing someone else struggle. 

Understand: just because a person laughs doesn’t mean they have a sense of humor. Many people laugh…at the misfortune of others. The truth is, False Humor is nothing but an expression of someone’s disapproval of themselves. It serves as an indirect outlet for that person to release their carefully concealed, yet unrelenting self-disapproval. You can paint a smile on the Joker’s face, but you can’t mask the unhappiness in his heart.

Don’t get me wrong, if someone walks into a telephone pole, I’ll be the first one to laugh. And if I’m the one who walked into the telephone pole I’ll be laughing even harder. Unless some damage takes place – injuries, shatters phone, walks into trap laid out by a crazy ex – then it is entirely ok to have a good laugh. The point here is that there’s a fine line between laughing at a harmless inconvenience vs. enjoying the real misfortune of others, which is the essence of False Humor. 

False Humor doesn’t always require someone to be outwardly laughing – it’s about what takes place on the inside. Anything that brings someone satisfaction at the expense of someone’s misfortune can be classified as False Humor. 

The Ugly Truth

As this pertains to Anti-Humor Warriors, they likely won’t be laughing, not in public at least. The way they satisfy their need for False Humor is by shaming, humiliating, and policing others. This is how they take pleasure in your pain – if they can make you visibly upset, then they’ve succeeded at inflicting discomfort on you for their enjoyment. It gives them a righteous, superior feeling over you – they’ve successfully policed you and take great pride in that.

In The Laws of Human Nature, Robert Greene explains how people show you who they are in opposites. Specifically, when a trait seems a bit over the top, perhaps even performed, it is all but a cover-up for the opposite quality. The person who shows off and talks themself up to others is overcompensating for their low self-esteem. The individual who is always trying to appear smart and constantly corrects others is insecure about their intelligence.

And in this particular case, the Anti-Humor Warrior who comes off as hyper-empathetic by shaming others for not censoring themselves is covering up their apathetic nature. They become the last person you’d think to take pleasure in peoples’ pain, allowing them to indulge in False Humor seemingly without a trace. Who are you to question them for shaming someone who made such an insensitive joke? They’re standing up for what’s right – or so they will make you think.

This is why when Anti-Humor Warriors try to provoke you, and you don’t allow them to get under your skin, it infuriates them – their attempt to delight in your pain has failed. 

Now let’s look at how Anti-Humor Warriors use political correctness as a weapon to attack you with to fulfill their need for False Humor:

When Political Correctness Goes Too Far

When I say political correctness, I am referring to when people unnecessarily censor themselves by trying to perfectly craft their choice of words to avoid offending others. You know it’s unnecessary censorship if it’s a harmless joke or even an opinion you truly believe in that by no means is meant to undermine others.

This is under the assumption that you are coming from a place to have a good laugh and nothing else. Obviously this excludes remarks meant to deliberately hurt, humiliate, and demean people.

Is there a time and place for political correctness? Yeah. In the workplace, being a professional is a smart idea. This post however is particularly focusing on political correctness in social settings.

Consider the following problems with political correctness and how it interferes with having a sense of humor:

Political Correctness Is Appeasement

Appeasement is an act of shortsightedness. It’s a short term solution that creates a long term problem. Like giving in to a child’s outburst to avoid a conflict, all that will do is create a monster. The same is true for adults. Appease others, and all that will accomplish is more outbursts, more demands, and more problems. 

Political Correctness Is Verbal Slavery

Censoring your speech just to avoid conflict and appease others is verbal slavery. If you carefully craft every little word you say in hopes to avoid offending someone then you are a prisoner to people’s vague, ever-changing, inconsistent criteria of what qualifies as “offensive.”

Do you want to enslave your speech to another person’s demands? Do you feel comfortable sacrificing having a sense of humor for the sole purpose of not offending someone? Which brings me to the next point…

Political Correctness Won’t Prevent You From Offending Others

The truth is, a person who gets offended by a harmless joke will always find something to be offended by. Anytime you open your mouth you risk offending someone. Heck, some people will take offense just based on the way you look – you could remind them of someone they dislike and they will project those same feelings onto you. 

Sacrificing your sense of humor in hopes to not offend will be unsuccessful – you will be left with no sense of humor while still having offended that person. 

Political Correctness Disconnects Us With Ourselves 

When we center our speech around what will please others rather than say what we believe, we stop thinking for ourselves. This disconnects us from who we truly are, what makes us unique, and what makes us feel fulfilled. 

We begin to shape our self-image around other peoples’ opinions of us – which are subject to change moment to moment – rather than a personal set of standards, beliefs, and principles we choose to live by, such standards that give us a sense of self. Without these standards, we have no backbone when life gets tough, no sense of self to fall back on when people doubt us, no moral compass that keeps us anchored in times of uncertainty. 

*As this post discourages censoring yourself about everything, I’m not saying be a loud-mouth sailor-cursing ignorant little fuck. This is about being true to who you are by saying what you believe, unrestrained, uninhibited.

How To Tell If You’ve Been Inconsiderate Or Not

You do not need to be politically correct all the time to be considerate of other people’s culture, feelings, and experiences. It’s a misconception that you can only choose two extremes: either censor yourself to avoid offending others, or, uncensor yourself and say what you believe, but at the expense of being inconsiderate to other people’s feelings. The truth is, there is a middle ground to this, that you can be considerate to other people’s feelings without needing to censor yourself.

If someone is offended over a petty first world problem – something that causes them to wait five seconds, offended your opinion differs from theirs, angry because your joke wasn’t funny to them – then you did not harm them. Plain and simple.

Here’s a simple way to determine if a joke you made was inconsiderate or not:

Make it a habit to be extra aware of where your actions are coming from. Was that joke you made purely from a place to lighten the mood and laugh or was there even the slightest bit of hostility in it?

We’re not self-aware until we can be honest with ourselves. Do your best to reflect where your words are coming from, but without judgment. This is the best way to know if you’ve been inconsiderate or not – heighten your awareness with honest reflection. If the joke you made was in fact purely to laugh and lighten the mood, then you know you weren’t being offensive.

Principle: Never unnecessarily censor yourself to avoid offending others.  

Humor unites people. Humor helps us get through tough times, and humor enriches the good moments into the best moments. Humor brings people together, eases the stress of everyday life, and keeps us in the present moment. Unnecessarily censoring yourself takes all of that away from you.

Censoring yourself is verbal slavery. Carefully crafting every word to avoid offending someone is enslaving yourself to peoples’ ever-changing criteria of what qualifies as “offensive.” 

Never forget: you don’t need to be politically correct to be considerate of other peoples’ feelings. 

Honest reflection is needed to be aware of our actions and how they impact others. The key to honest reflection is to think about what you said or did without judgment. When we reflect without judging ourselves then it helps us get past the need to feel perfect – a road that only leads to inadequacy – and moves us toward a growth mindset.

Now that we’ve covered the importance to never unnecessarily censor yourself, in the next two posts we’ll dive more into true humor and the tremendous value it brings to your life.

Pitfalls to Avoid:

• Falling for the guilt-trips Anti-Humor Warriors throw at you 
• Caring more about pleasing someone than saying what you believe 
• Apologizing just to appease someone 

Key Takeaways:

• False Humor is when someone takes pleasure in another person’s pain
• Unnecessary censorship is when someone avoids making a harmless joke for the sake of not offending others
• If someone is upset over a first world problem, then it is extremely unlikely that you’ve said something harmful

Taking Action:

Make saying what you believe, and finding humor in everyday situations a priority over pleasing others.