I feel like comedy is begging for forgiveness in recent days. It even suspends its acts. “There is nothing to celebrate,” some emphasize in their press releases. As if culture were an excess. As if it were not serious, rigorous and necessary. The pain of the tragedy has left us without air. And without laughter. But it is a mistake to have internalized that laughter is a tool only suitable for festive moments in which apparently nothing serious happens to us.
We still punish the one who smiles at the moment when it seems that it is not possible to smile. In a mourning, in a farewell, after suffering a personal or collective tragedy. We do not understand laughter in the midst of desolation. Although laughter does understand us. The comedian himself apologizes for existing. We have seen it repeatedly these days. Broncano returned to normal broadcasting at prime time and almost had to excuse himself to go back to work. Also in monologues, plays, presentation of documentaries or colloquiums on series.
But comedy cannot fail us in the hardest moments. It evades us, embraces us, relaxes us and, above all, allows us to face the harshness with the emotional intelligence that knows that a laugh at the right moment can be like falling on a trampoline. You still get hit, but the blow is cushioned a little bit. Sometimes, it’s so cushioned that it even helps you jump to your feet. To keep walking. Even if it’s hard.
Laughter and sorrow have never been the opposite emotions we were insisted upon. Happiness and sadness are intertwined. They coexist throughout our lives, but we come from a society that explained feelings badly to us. We were educated to endure suffering in only one way. You even had to theatricalize it by erasing the color of the clothes or you were a bad person. As a consequence, those who whip up tearful sensationalism and feed fears before the pain of others think they are doing an excellent professional job. Meanwhile, the comedians who portray with wise irony the curves of life question whether they should suspend their function. When we need their look. With their empathetic laughter. The one that doesn’t point at anyone. The constructive one. The one that only springs from how we are ourselves. The one that, sometimes, many times, even allows us to catch our breath to make better decisions after the shock of impotence.
In the dismay, whatever the dismay may be, how necessary it is to find an accomplice smile. Your relief can never be secondary. We have been taught to resign ourselves, but we must reclaim the strength of the smile as a form of resilience, as an opportunity that teaches us that we are closer to being ready to move on or as a way to feel less alone. The merchants of hate prefer the opposite: we are more manipulable immersed in irritation and with the possibility of laughing snatched away. If the slot machines in the bars are not turned off, the less we can afford that it is always the culture that must apologize for accompanying us, for inspiring us, for the laughter that made us feel safe. Even if only for a few seconds.
