YUM

      Besides being home with my family, the best thing about Thanksgiving is food (though really, I'm obsessed with food all year around). Thus, it would only make sense to kick off Thanksgiving break properly with food themed jokes.
      While these jokes employ many classic humor techniques, their value lies in what they reveal about the role of fast food in America. Internationally speaking, America has been associated with fast food chains such as McDonald's and KFC as much as it has been associated with Disney and Hollywood movies.
However, Americans don't just eat fast food. A closer look will reveal that fast food is no longer a type of food but a culture. Here are a few texts that present different attitudes towards fast food.
      (541): my math teacher staples burger king applications to failed tests
This is a subtle example of the "sucker joke," where the joke teller employs the superiority theory and laugh at those receiving the failed grade and the teacher's implied belittlement that he/she can achieve little beyond a job flipping burgers. The condescending tone of this joke comes not only from the superiority theory but more importantly, from a new trend where people look down on fast food and people who work in fast food, classifying them as low-class jobs in the service industry.
     (210): Just made hot dog dorito pasta. It happened.
      Individually, these are all iconic American foods. However, piling them together makes for a bizarre combination, which is the foundation of shock humor. But beyond the shock, the joke also subtly reinforces the idea of "the-more-the-better." In reality, both hot dog and pasta are already entrees on in themselves. Yet the person chose to put all these popular junk foods together. This inclination for more is beyond mere hunger, but reflects an inherent greed prevalent in American culture. We like whole sale markets such as Costco and Sam's club because we can buy everything in bigger quantities. In McDonald's, small, medium and large are not sufficient. We need Super Size. Though the greed here is manifested in food, it extends to everything the realm of consumerism covers.
     (757): At McDonald's last night the guy gave you the wrong kind of McFlurry, so you screamed at him, "YOU MCFUCKED UP."
      Similar to the "the titanic is 'syncing'" joke from an earlier post, this text is also a kind of play on words. Upon hearing "McFucked up," we understand that the person means to say that the worker at McDonald's messed up big time. The fact that the prefix "Mc" has become so iconic and so well known that it can be applied to other words and carry over the meaning of "super size" signifies that fast food chains as institutions have influenced America more than the just the food we eat, but our culture.
     Although these jokes are all centered around junk foods in America, they present different views on them, which once again reminds me how even though we can pin down something as "American," it will represent a different side of America to different people. For example, the first joke looks down upon people who work in fast food restaurants because they are not well educated. Yet there are people who feel contempt towards President Obama for his Ivy League education. Similarly, in the second joke, some people may find it to be the most disgusting part of our culture while others may find it epic, admiring the audacity of such a platter.