Pearls Before Swine by Stephan Pastis for February 08, 2025

Maybe they were a bunch of rats. Where’s the Pied Piper when we need him?

Sometimes the most photogenic person, usually a cute child, is assigned the task of rescuing a poor kitten.

Usually they did after the camera cut.

Rats. I was late to see yesterday’s cartoon about the Swasticar cyber truck. I would’ve like to have seen people defend Elon Musk’s Nazi salute live in real time.

I used to watch those “funniest videos” TV shows until it hit me: those pratfalls and smacks in the face were extremely painful and the person may have ended up in the ER.

One MUST not forget to include the badge wearing COWARD of the New York City Transit Police who stood there and watched as the woman in the subway car was set alight and burned to death, OR the badge wearing tyrants who WILL, and DO stand there and laugh as they congratulate each other for beating down a law abiding citizen, as was done to the elderly man with dementia who was violently assaulted and arrested at a Kentucky Walmart for attempting to purchase a case of beer.

Sad, but lots of people today take pictures to put on social media instead of helping, for those like you Rat!

I guess it all started with “Candid Camera” Allen Funt’s TV program.

Remove the “p” in pratfalls and we all get a laugh on a gray vermin of diminished fun when the joke be on him.

I used to wonder if I was the only one upset that people would video someone getting hurt, and wondering why no one was helping.

I often wonder if social services get inundated with calls about moronic parents filming their 2 year olds that they’ve put on scooters to go down hills and play with the traffic or a lake and other such ‘hilarious’ stunts.

It’s called slapstick humor…

Anyone remember the 1964 brutal rape and murder of Kitty Genovese in NYC? Long before cell phones, apartment building neighbors’ apathy was on full display as they ignored her pleas for help! Nowadays we have technology to insulate us from helping others. Not all of though, thankfully.

Try Jerry Springer Midget Fights on YouTube.

People are still on Facebook?? What a waste of time and brain matter.

The same reasoning took a lot of the fun out of reading the Darwin Awards for me too.

I agree with pig on this one.

For gits and shiggles, Our Be❤️ed Count watches videos of Camela’ drunken word salad speeches. Can’t wait for the lawsuit for the unedited 60 Minutes video and transcript to be released. That should be a real knee slapper. Bet Rat would ❤️ it, too. God Bless America!

Because that’s not what we do, Pig. More’s the pity. (I have a dumb phone, so this sin at least I can avoid)

Heard they got it on the 33rd take.

Pig thinks way too much when he doesn’t think…

Those videos aren’t funny.

BECAUSE……it’s only funny, ‘till someone gets hurt. Then, it’s hilarious.

Unfortunately my hubby enjoys them. He used to show them to me until I told him I failed to see the humor in them.

Because they’re sadistic jerks. That’s why.

Pig is so much of a better person than I am.

I too enjoy AFV-esque videos… and laugh a lot.

I agree with Pig. I think most of these have to be staged. Especially the ones of people rescuing a child from an aggressor. Unless the video is some king of stationary building camera, the person filming should be helping, unless its staged.

Not to say, those videos don’t still encourage us to do the right thing.

I’m with pig. Not funny, not fun. Except, maybe, the ‘hold my beer’ showoff failures.

A woman on a bus left the bus and fell flat on her face. All the bus riders just walked away.

Almost everyone experiences some form of Schadenfreude at some point.

me too

Very Freudian…

Schadenfreude is bad karma

No one cares about their fellow man anymore

some of the stuff these people do online and post are stupid.. some are accidents but a lot of them are trying stupid stuff

yeh, the bowling-ball in the face vids are hard to watch

The ones where an animal is floundering around in a life or death situation and the person holding the phone does NOTHING makes me mad. If someone is doing something, they could use the help of the camera man.

Some of these are funny when we can tell all along that it was a ridiculous thing to try. But too many are just painful, not a simple “opps”. Those we can do without.

Take it from me, two years ago I had to fight a hobo who wanted to steel my bike in the Bronx while an enthusiastic crowd jeered and cheered with their phone cameras in hand (to all who got Likes from the spectacle, FU)

OK, I admit it, so do I, but get bored and quit about half way through.

I used to watch Funniest Home Videos many years ago, when it first started…..before it was all staged for the camera.

In “The Comeback” Lisa Kudrow states a law of slapstick, falling on your butt is funnier than falling on your face.

Sheesh. people are so easily triggered these days. Slapstick has been tickling peoples funny bones since we were living in caves. Even primates do it. It’s called a sense of humor.

Do you know it is possible to be a caring helpful individual and still have a sense of humor? Being able to laugh at ourselves is one of humanities greatest gifts, and helps us through hard times; like this time when so many people are out of their minds and live in a black and white world of crucifixion and outrage. Sigh, I’ll be glad when the insanity eventually dies out, or at least eases up a bit.

So do I, Pig, so do I. I cannot understand, why film something instead of helping.

I watch Darwin awards, I never cease to be amazed at the level of insanity. Candid camera, the 60’s version of social media.

Facebook? Not tiktok?

A lot of them are setups and planned idiocy. Yes people get hurt. By trying to become popular.

Although I find America’s Funniest Videos to be insipid I find Vin Di Bona, the producer, to be a genius. The show must cost him little to produce. All the videos are sent to him showing folks proudly exposing themselves behaving stupidly for the enjoyment of other morons who find it humorous while he laughs all the way to the bank!

Someone has to document it for the world.