I hate April Fool’s Day.
I started calling it a non-day and skipping school every year by the time I was 14 – and I skipped work when I was older, too – preferring to stay low for 24 hours and slide right into April 2nd, which is perfectly innocent and usually pleasant.
Unless everyone else is pissy because of the day before.
April Fool’s Day is basically a global excuse to be an asshole. It’s teasing on a grand scale.
Granted, some pranks are funny. I’m not entirely a stick in the mud – I like the things Google does, and Marty pulled one over on me this year; I found it hilarious.
But most pranks are just dicky. It may be funny to you to fill someone’s cube with popcorn, but they have to clean it up. It may be amusing to cover someone’s entire car with post-it notes, but it leaves a sticky mess for your target to deal with later.
Seriously, rarely does the butt of a prank feel honored or thrilled or even happy. Occasionally, they’re amused – but more often than not, they’re humiliated, embarrassed, and upset. To make things worse, if they express upset, they’re the ones to blame: they’re accused of being poor sports or having no sense of humor. “Suck it up” is a phrase often bandied about in these situations, as are “no harm, no foul”, “get over it”, and “it was just a joke!”.
This isn’t just crap, it’s epic crap. It’s the biggest, most socially acceptable form of blaming the victim; a world-wide holiday to exonerate and glorify pranksters. A day when those with a cruel streak can bully those weaker than themselves and be congratulated for it.
It reminds me of being in high school, perpetually. The bullies pick on the geeks, and everyone laughs.
Fuck that shit.
When I’m not utterly avoiding the world at large, I spend April 1st being nicer than usual, kinder, more patient, and friendlier. I try to balance out the overload of cruelty with an extra dash of kindness. The world is cruel and harsh enough without the extra addition of a free pass for 24 hours.
Have you read the Connection Manifesto? It tells the story of why there is so much hurt and sadness in the world, and how we can heal through connection.
{ 7 comments… read them below or add one }
I agree with you. With pranks people are just being cruel to the others. It ain’t funny. It isn’t funny for me to even watch when somebody else is being made a fool of. I feel bad for him / her and I usually “spoil the joke”.
Especially, these “jokes” when they tell you that something bad happened to you or to your family. That’s plain cruel to me.
Is your Sun Sign Pisces too?
.-= helen´s last blog ..Ах, морето… =-.
The dick-streak most pranks have are why I’ve never particpated in April Fool’s Day. Not to mention, the origin of the so-called holiday…
Yeah, there are pranks that aren’t mean, but like you said, most people do pull mean pranks. Pulling a funny not-mean prank on someone who’s been mean-pranked isn’t going to make their day any more enjoyable.
I treat it like any other day. I don’t avoid it, but I definitely don’t go out of my way for it.
I just found out that teasing hits me a lot harder than I thought it would (I haven’t been teased in the most distressing manner for a couple of decades, I think, and then it happened just recently) and I’m not sure how to best communicate this to other people.
Crawling under a rock for April 1 sounds like a reasonable plan, if that’s when people are most likely to be teasing you.
This. So very this.
I don’t mind things like what Blizzard does (pretending they’re coming out with fake, ridiculously awesome and over the top products). But most people are lazy, and uncreative, and go with “this really bad thing happened to me” which is just cruel. I start every April first telling everyone not to do that to me because I will believe it completely, and it will legitimately hurt me. This year, everyone was really understanding and protective. I think it’s because I work at geek heaven.
I don’t like April Fools day either. I kind of just skip over it pretending it doesn’t exist despite reminders. Luckily my husband forgot this year >P I don’t mind lying and fooling others with wit/ideas but the situations you’ve described are really…sad.
.-= JESSU´s last blog ..When I grow up I want to be a Treasure Hunter…Purses! =-.
THANK YOU! I feel exactly the same way and have often been known to spend April 1 in hiding.
I’m a firm believer that a good prank needs to be at least as funny to the prankee as it is to the prankster. If we judge the success of the prank on how much fun the recipient has, then we can actually get some fun going!
A friend of mine this year totally rocked that. She announced that she was pregnant on April 1. Everyone does that, so of course most people just laughed at her silly April Fool’s joke and thought that was the end of it. But the joke was that she really IS pregnant! She tricked everyone into thinking she was playing an April Fool’s joke! So, EVERYONE got to have a good laugh, and then congratulate her!
Can others think of prank ideas that are fun for all instead of hurtful? We can take back April Fools Day next year!
.-= Oliver Danni´s last blog .. =-.
:|
I do understand this on a lot of levels.
And the kicker is that April 1st is my bday.
.-= Kayla´s last blog ..Hot and Cold =-.