Thank Heavens it’s Only Once a Year (opinion)

April 2, 2009

You might have wondered why I didn’t post yesterday.  I mean, here I was getting all “caught up” and posting like a mad woman the day before then?

Radio silence.

Yeah, I know.  I probably just forgot or got too busy again, right?

Nope.  I deliberately didn’t post because of the date.  Not because I was afraid that anything I said might be read through the filter of “hey, it’s April 1st – was this a joke?” But because I really, truly, honestly don’t like 99.9% of the stuff I’ve ever seen or heard when it comes to April Fools Day.

I’ve never quite liked it.  But this year I spent a lot of time thinking about why.  For a long time I thought it was because I just wasn’t clever enough to come up with a really good April Fools Day prank.  Then I realized that almost no one comes up with really good pranks.  Usually what they come up with is really mean, nasty pranks that play on the gullibility of others, or mock others, and then use the phrase “April Fools!” to excuse it away as if it were funny.

The butt of these “jokes” usually tries to laugh along with the perpetrator saying “oooh! Good one! Ya got me!” as if to deflect any criticism that s/he is somehow lacking in a sense of humor… but the truth is that no one likes to be played for a fool.

The best reaction I’ve ever seen to well done April Fools pranks or jokes was “Wow. That was amazing.  I totally didn’t even catch that…” and sort of an awestruck silence.  But usually that’s when the joke doesn’t really make anyone look that foolish because everyone missed it… or because there really wasn’t a victim.

This whole thing was brought home to me again when I picked up my daughter from school.  It seems that kindergartners truly get the sense of this tradition better than most.  They do mean spirited things to each other – then say “April Fools!” where they’d normally say “Just Kidding!“

And no, before you go there, my darling daughter wasn’t immune from either side – she ran afoul of her own gullibility and was also more than willing to exploit her classmates’ gullibity as well.  But she did at least ask me why I hated April Fools Day so much.  And she thought about it long and hard when I said “because I think it’s just kind of a way of being mean to each other while making it seem like it should be a lot of fun.”

I do love to look at sites like Google and Thinkgeek.com to see what they’re going to put up.  But part of the reason for that is that I’m trying to spot the joke.  Then I can laugh because I knew going in that there was a joke.  Most April Fools jokes aren’t quite so widely anticipated.  And I can’t help but believe there are a few folks who fall prey to the online pranks and “funny lies” who find themselves feeling embarrassed or stupid for not catching it in advance.  Hence the fool part.  No one likes to feel like a fool, do they?

So why does the “holiday” persist?  It’s ritualized bullying in a sense – but where the victim can’t complain or s/he will be thought a poor sport or mocked worse for having ‘no sense of humor.’  And worse? It’s the bullying of the smarter, not the stronger.  A successful AFD prank indicates that the person who crafted it was more clever than his target – or it would’ve not needed the “April Fools!” reveal.  But what it also indicates is someone who is willing to abuse the trust that the other person has placed in him for the sake of “being witty.”

So I’ve opted out.  You might hear me opine sometimes “it would be funny if…” but I gave up pranking long ago.  Because even when it’s between 2 good friends? It starts being about one-upping the other guy pretty quickly and saying “but it’s all in good fun!” if anyone complains.

So no more April Fools Day participation from me.  Even in blog form.  I think it will be my one day off every year from here on out – no matter what other days I do or don’t post.  Or maybe I’ll just link this post every year right beforehand… who knows.  It’s another 364 days before I have to worry about it again.

That’s me though – what about you?

Do you think I’m over-reacting?  Did you pull the “World’s Best April Fools Day Joke” and want to tell me how wrong I am and why it was funny?  Or were you on the end of one and wished you could say all of this without looking like a stick in the mud?  What do you think about yesterday’s institutionalized “just kidding!” day?

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