The Great Laughter

Unless we see as the meaning of life life itself, it is not hard to see all our existence and toils ultimately meaningless. Let's face it: life is tragic; personal fullfilment and social justice often hard to be found. In the end, there are only two ways to resolve life's existential meaninglessness: to let one be usurped by it, and choose self-destruction, OR, learn to laugh about it. To see life as a game it is. Every comedy of holds its portion of tragedy, and vice versa.

Mikhail Bakhtin wrote that laughter "overcomes fear, for it knows no inhibitions, no limitations. Its idiom is never used by violence and authority". Steven W. Gilbert: "Divine laughter is helpless laughter. The recognition that all social constructions are but frail, weak, and finally ineffectual in face of the inevitable regenerative force and movement of the material life force, located ridiculously (ridiculous only when you think about it) in the lower bodily stratum, calls forth an irrepressible belly laugh".

Harry Haller of Hesse's Steppenwolf was redeemed when he learned to laugh at himself. "When you laugh, they can't kill you", stated Perry Farrell on one of Porno For Pyros records.

This Great Laughter will release us, it is our ultimate salvation.