I’m watching America’s Funniest Videos. I just saw a guy who crammed himself into one of those one-piece plastic cars for little kids. His arms were hanging out both sides and one of his legs was out one window and the other was out the windshield area. He started down the hill and hit a dip in the road. The little car nosedived and rolled end over end several times, and this guy had to just endure it because he was wedged in there so tight he couldn’t even be thrown from the vehicle.
You gotta wonder what goes through a grown man’s mind in this kind of situation. Here’s what I imagine:
“You kids today have so many cool toys. We never had cool stuff like this. All we had were tricycles or wagons. I’m going to go for a ride in this thing. What’s that, honey? Sure, I can get in there. Just you watch. This is going to be so much fun!”
There are also the young men on skateboards. Every single time I know what’s going to happen, but when it does I laugh anyway. The kid loses contact with the skateboard, it flips up, the kid’s legs flail open like he’s doing a jumping jack, then the skateboard lands end up at precisely the second the kid crashes down on top of it. With the skateboard pointing straight up at his crotch, the kid gets the equivalent of a karate chop between the legs, and he rolls over on the sidewalk holding his privates and moaning while the other guys around him moan in sympathy and then start laughing.
There’s a lot of humor to be had at the expense of a man’s privates. Every show has videos of toddlers jumping directly onto their dad’s most sensitive area. I can’t understand why, when all men KNOW this area is sensitive, they put themselves in situations that will end up with them curled in the fetal position, rolling from side to side with hands cupped over the injured area, as if trying to protect himself. He should have done that in the first place. Just now two toddlers are taking turns jumping off a couch onto their dad’s stomach. Wonder where this is going?
And how come someone is always holding a video camera at the right time? I’ll tell you. Because the person holding the camera is the mom. She knows what’s going to happen, and rather than warn the dad of the pain he’s about to suffer, she’s thinking, “I know it’s just a matter of time. If I can hold this camera pointed at his privates, he’s going to be rolling on the floor any second now, and we might have a chance at $10,000.”
Tonight they also had bike riders going over jumps. Does any male in America ever make it over a homemade jump on a bike? I don’t think so. Either they break the ramp on the way up, throwing them over the handlebars so that they smack face down on the jump, or they make it over the top of the jump but nosedive on the down ramp, throwing the rider over the handlebars and smacking face down into the pavement.
99% of the time it’s men doing this stuff. This might lead you to conclude that men are just stupid. But that is not the case. Men aren’t just stupid, they also enjoy pain. Take the guy who caught a crab and held it next to his nipple, ON PURPOSE, so it would clamp on. He started screaming in agony as the crab dangled from his second most sensitive body part, and when he tried to pull the crab off, it wouldn’t let go. He finally got it loose, and then DID IT AGAIN. One of his friends was bent over double laughing at him screaming like a girl, and another one was catching it all on video. I have a feeling that guys do this stuff even when they aren’t trying to get on TV.
The women on the show, on the other hand, are usually the victims of some practical joke, or being in the wrong place at the wrong time – like the rotund woman who steps off the dock to climb in a boat, but the guy holding the boat lets it ease away in that instant and she belly flops into the water. Another woman walks in a room and screams when a man pops out of a garbage can wearing a gorilla mask.
So when men aren’t busy torturing themselves, they torture the women. And this is what keeps America’s Funniest Videos on the air.
Men, keep up the good work.