Darth Vader Robs Long Island Bank 190
Apparently the destruction of the second Death Star has stretched the Galactic Empire's coffers so thin that Lord Vader himself is robbing banks. From the article: "Impotent Rebel Alliance security forces tell Newsday (paywall) that Vader marched into a Chase bank in Setauket around 11:30 a.m. today. Brandishing a completely unnecessary handgun — as he had the power to choke the oxygen out every teller's throat — the fallen Jedi demanded cash."
Re:WTF? (Score:5, Insightful)
The main reason is that while this world contains some wonderful things in it, it also contains lots and lots of bad stuff. Being able to find humor in bad situations can make life more bearable despite some of its horrors. Laughing at a situation or event doesn't necessarily mean that we'd chose for it to come about, it's a way of trying to enjoy life despite living in an often painful world.
Bank tellers last words (Score:5, Insightful)
a. May the cash be with you.
b. If you shoot me, I shall become more powerful than you can possibly imagine.
c. The power to rob a bank is insignificant next to the power of the force.
Re:WTF? (Score:5, Insightful)
Something can be both evil and funny at the same time.
You're right that it's vile for someone to threaten another person with a gun. It's not that aspect of this which we're all laughing at. We're lauging at someone doing something grave while dressed up as a movie character, and at the irony / apropriateness / etc. of having Darth Vader perform an actual evil act.
Re:How I imagine the call to the tips line... (Score:5, Insightful)
Caller: OK you will need to fly down the thermal exhaust port and fire a Photon Torpedo
PROTON torpedo. Photon torpedos were Star Trek, not Star Wars.
Somehow, I feel ashamed to know that fact, but I couldn't let it slide. ;)
Re:WTF? (Score:4, Insightful)
I'd like to make another point. I think you're facing a dichotomy between what you think people should find funny vs. what (most) people do find funny.
In my other replies to you, I was trying to explain why I think people do find the story funny.
As to whether or not we should, that's an entirely separate ball of wax. But I for one don't have too much control over what I do find funny. I reckon that's largely part of the human condition.
Re:WTF? (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:WTF? (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:WTF? (Score:4, Insightful)
I don't think we have much control over what we find amusing. Is your concern that we're publicly making merry of this situation, and in doing so we seem to be either (a) condoning what happened, or (b) doing something that might effectivly rub salt in the psychological wounds of the bank teller?
Or are you saying that it's in poor taste that we even find this situation funny in the first place? Because I can understand applying "poor taste" to how we act, but not to what our original emotional response (amusement) is to this story. Perhaps instead of saying our feelings are in poor taste, you should say you're "disappointed" or "dismayed" that so many people had a feeling of amusement about the story?
Re:WTF? (Score:4, Insightful)
Having a gun pointed your head is something that I'm sure that teller is liable to remember far less than pleasantly for a long, long, time to come. I'm glad that nobody got hurt, of course, but I simply cannot see this as amusing, and I find the fact that so many people apparently do (including marking me as a troll, above), to be in astonishingly poor taste with respect to the feelings of the people who could have potentially been killed.
I find your lack of perspective disturbing.
Re:WTF? (Score:1, Insightful)
Speaking as a former teller in a badly located bank, it happens a few times a month.
You start to get used to it, and having a funny story to tell certainly helps
Re:WTF? (Score:5, Insightful)
I'd like to make another point. I think you're facing a dichotomy between what you think people should find funny vs. what (most) people do find funny.
In my other replies to you, I was trying to explain why I think people do find the story funny.
As to whether or not we should, that's an entirely separate ball of wax. But I for one don't have too much control over what I do find funny. I reckon that's largely part of the human condition.
I think prescribing what people should find funny would lead to a very bleak world. Humour has nothing to do with morality, except perhaps when it's used as a tool to humiliate others. This is not the case here - and the guy you replied to has no way of knowing how the teller reacted or how he coped with the situation after it happened. In fact, a lot of people find humour a good way to work through traumatic experiences. Whenever I am under considerable stress, or something bad happens, sooner or later I'll find a way to look back and smile. I also think you are talking to a wall here. GP simply lacks the capacity to look at a situation from different perspectives while believing that his own perspective is morally superiour to everyone else's. A trait shared by religious zealots and fanatics, self-indignant extreme-right politicians, etc... ironically, the kind of people you and I would never describe as moral or ethical ;)
Re:Han Solo (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:WTF? (Score:2, Insightful)
Re:WTF? (Score:2, Insightful)
Having your people ruthlessly exterminated by an evil dictatorship arguably isn't funny. But that didn't stop Mel Brooks (who by the way, served in the Army whilst invading Germany) from making fun of Nazis and Hitler. Sometimes, the best way you can get revenge on someone is to laugh at them--paraphrasing Brooks.
Maybe having a gun put in your face can't ever be funny for a teller. Myself, I probably would have laughed right there on the spot, having been in more bleak situations. But trying to quantify what makes people laugh? That's even more ridiculous than Darth Vader robbing a bank.