: How to do political humor Most political humor I see on the internet is usually directed towards persons, and the jokes are relatively easy. However, it's pretty much useless, and temporary,

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I am currently working on a book that is a science fiction comedy with a heavy emphasis on political satire. Because of this, there is no way I can specifically target out people in our current era. I could create characters obviously like current politicians, but I am making humor out of ideas not people.

One way to do it (an approach often taken by Douglas Adams) is to take something to the logical extreme. I have two examples of that. First, I have a bureaucratic race to emphasizes the problems of bureaucracy. The main character has to fill out huge amounts of paper to leave a single planet. However, I didn't want to say that bureaucracy is always bad, so I have a race that is entirely unorganized and go over some of the problems that arise form that. Second, (this isn't politics. It's religion, you could do the same kind of thing) many Christians churches today seem to working to make money more than actually doing what their actual purpose is. To show this, I have a planet dedicated to religious sales people. Again, we're not to that extreme yet, but it shows the flaws in the system.

You could also try modelling actual events that you think are ridiculous and try to convince your reader of the same.

Finally, compare and contrast view points. You can do this in such a way that people can see that they hold highly onto the not so important stuff, but let go of the important issues.

As a final suggestion, I would recommend trying to present your ideas in your book. This would make it more interesting. Even then, be able to laugh at yourself.

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I don't know what country you're from or what prime minister you're referring to. Which maybe is good because it saves me from having any prejudice about the question.

"These jokes are relatively easy, because they make themselves" Well right there you highlight that there are two very different types of political humor: partisan and non-partisan.

There are political jokes that you can tell that people from all parties and political persuasions will laugh at. If you make a joke about politicians in general being corrupt, or being attention-seeking, almost everyone will agree with that premise and potentially laugh.

But if you tell jokes about how this particular politician is a moron or evil, people who dislike him will laugh but people who support him will be offended or annoyed. Here in America there's a whole category of political humor that basically consists of saying, "so-and-so is so stupid that ..." followed by something that has little or nothing to do with anything the politician ever actually said or did. It's just a gratuitous insult. I find this sort of humor dumb and annoying whether they're attacking someone I support or someone I don't. But lots of people apparently find it hysterical.

There's a potentially dangerous area of making fun of things that a specific politician said or did, but in a gentle, "we're all friends here" manner. Like U.S. president Gerald Ford once arrived by helicopter to meet a foreign leader, and as he was getting out of the helicopter he tripped and fell down the stairs. He wasn't hurt, so the clip was funny. It was supposed to be a very solemn and dignified occasion and the man tripped and fell. People on both sides could laugh about it, as long as you didn't take it as a starting point for saying "and not only is he clumsy, but his policies are equally clumsy ...", at which point it becomes nasty humor.

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