Society & Culture Irony

[BarneyBent]

Just want to point out that bloodstainedangel's post is the only actual irony in this thread. Laughing at Alanis Morissette's poor interpretation of irony and even going to the point of calling it ironic (which it is) before misinterpreting the definition of irony yourself and giving an example congruent with Alanis' poor attempts is in all sense and purpose situational irony at it's best.

No. That is bad luck. Irony is a reversal; not a contradiction of expectations. Irony would be if a Jew and a Muslim could not marry because of their faith and without telling one another renounced their faiths and became a Muslim and a Jew (respectively) only to once again find themselves unable to marry due to differing religious beliefs. I.e. They suffer from a reversal of some kind.

And that right there is why your post could have been taken as an amazing troll or a not so amazing fail. Unfortunately the rest of your post and your subsequent defence sealed the deal.

EDIT: While I'm on my intellectual high horse the OP's post is also ironic for the same reasons.

Irony has many forms. You have stuck to one very specific form of situational irony.

Irony can simply refer to situations which are contrary to, or to use your buzz word, a "reversal" of expectations. These expectations can come about because of certain associative assumptions (a soldier dies at war, a road engineer is apt with traffic), and the reversal of expectation is that the soldier doesn't die at war, he dies at home, and the road engineer (I've had a mental blank on the correct term for this job since last night, it's driving me mad!) isn't immune to getting stuck in traffic.

These are not congruent with Morissette's examples, because Morissette's examples have no inherent expectation. You do not expect to find a knife simply because there are lots of spoons, so the absence of a knife is frustrating, yes, but not ironic. You do not expect it not to rain on your wedding day because of something about wedding days. Again, frustrating, annoying, but not ironic. You do, however, expect that if a soldier has died young and has been to war, it would be while fighting, given that war generally leads to the death of young soldiers. For the soldier to die young, NOT at war, but when he is fresh off the plane back home in a much safer and less "young-soldier-deathy" situation, is bad luck, sad AND ironic.

Hmmm, turns out your intellectual high horse was a donkey. What would you call that?

 

[BarneyBent]

Sounds more unfortunate than ironic.

If a solider serving in Iraq requested a discharge from the Army to return home to a safer occupation and was then killed at work that would be reasonably ironic.

Likewise if your surviving solider was hit by a bus with an 'End the senseless losses in Iraq. Bring home our soliders so they can be safe' bumper sticker, that'd be well ironic...

I saw a sign in Dubai on a roadside rubbish bin which read 'Keep Dubai Green'. On the face of it not overly ironic, but given the bin was next to an air conditioned bus stop on a road that basically runs between a series of man made islands a shopping mall containing an indoor ski slope, well you be the judge.

Those examples would be a stronger case of irony, yes, but still, the expectation when a soldier has fought in a war, survived, and has made it back home is that he's now much safer. Whether he requested a discharge or just toughed it out and waited makes no difference to the expectation of returning to a safer environment, and that expectation being reversed.

 

[bresker]

[YOUTUBE]nT1TVSTkAXg[/YOUTUBE]

 

[Scotland]

Those examples would be a stronger case of irony, yes, but still, the expectation when a soldier has fought in a war, survived, and has made it back home is that he's now much safer. Whether he requested a discharge or just toughed it out and waited makes no difference to the expectation of returning to a safer environment, and that expectation being reversed.

You're basically equating irony to anything not matching expectation. I don't particularly rate Mark Nicoski, but if he boots 5 goals tomorrow night and gets us over the line against Melbourne I won't be calling his performance ironic.

If I get stuck in a traffic jam at 6am it's not ironic, it's irritating.

If I get stuck in a traffic jam at 6am having specifically left home early to beat the traffic, then that's another story.

 

[BarneyBent]

You're basically equating irony to anything not matching expectation. I don't particularly rate Mark Nicoski, but if he boots 5 goals tomorrow night and gets us over the line against Melbourne I won't be calling his performance ironic.

If I get stuck in a traffic jam at 6am it's not ironic, it's irritating.

If I get stuck in a traffic jam at 6am having specifically left home early to beat the traffic, then that's another story.

Not really, though I do accept that my initial explanation was probably not well enough defined. This is where the concept gets elusive though.

There's a difference between something happens which is unexpected (Nicoski kicking 5 goals, you getting stuck in a traffic jam at 6am) and something which defies expectation in a nature which is ironic. It can be with a reversal of intention, but it doesn't have to be. I'm going to try as best I can to word it unambiguously.

I think the difference is that the expectation is based on an association which is separate and distinct from the likelihood of the situation occurring. So with Nicoski kicking 5 goals, he's not a very good goal kicker. It's unlikely because of his goalkicking, and so it can't be ironic for that same reason; the source of irony has to come from a less direct breaking of expectation is perhaps the best way of wording it? It's kind of what I was getting at when I used the word "associative" in my first post.

So with the soldier, the expectation is that a soldier coming home is going to be "safe". Not "safer than before, but still with the possibility of dying". This is the logical, conscious expectation, but it's not the automatic, schema-driven expectation, the style of thinking with which people tend to make quick sense of thier world. So basically, the idea that home isn't necessarily safe doesn't occur to you. It's ironic because, due to the dangers of war, the fact that home could be dangerous in comparison to war is not even considered. It's not a comparison of relative safeties where there is still a recognition that everyday life presents dangers. It is a qualitative comparison, automatic and not particularly logical, in which war is held as the dangerous scenario, home is the safe scenario, there is no middle ground.

To put it in perspective, had the soldier been back home for a few months and then was hit by a bus, it would be just as unlucky, but not ironic, as the context of him having just been to war would not be nearly as strong. The schematic comaprison between home (absolutely safe) and war (absolutely not safe) wouldn't be invoked, instead it would just be "that sucks, buses can be dangerous".

Perhaps you don't experience that automatic, absolute comparison between home and war when you read the example. If so, I guess that's fair enough, I should have used a more well defined example. I plead the time of posting and having a fuzzy head due to caffeine and study. In any case, I know it's the first reaction I have to such stories, despite consciously knowing that dangers exist everywhere, not just war, and for that reason, the irony is apparent.

 

[HarryTiger]

It probably was, what does that have to do with irony?

Are you sure you know what irony is?

I'm sure a large portion of the 521,000 results returned from this google search don't support the notion, however judging by the first 2 pages many do.

http://www.google.com.au/search?hl=en&safe=off&biw=1345&bih=593&q=darwin+married+cousin+ironic

 

[woopedazz]

Hmmm, turns out your intellectual high horse was a donkey. What would you call that?

A correct donkey? One that knows what irony is?

Sometimes when everybody says you're wrong...

 

[HarryTiger]

http://www.oddee.com/item_97032.aspx

Anthony Mesa failed a drug test because, he said, he was medically unable to urinate into a cup under supervision, and he was remanded to a judge in Deland, Fla., to reconsider his house-arrest-only sentence. The curious thing about it is that Mesa, 22, was sentenced to six months in jail precisely for urinating in the bottle of a Mountain Dew (that was later drunk by a customer) and had to periodically take a urine drug test.

And more.

 

[BarneyBent]

A correct donkey? One that knows what irony is?

Sometimes when everybody says you're wrong...

A couple of definitions:

irony - incongruity between what might be expected and what actually occurs; "the irony of Ireland's copying the nation she most hated" - http://wordnetweb.princeton.edu/perl/webwn?s=irony

ironic - characterized by often poignant difference or incongruity between what is expected and what actually is; "madness, an ironic fate for such a clear thinker"; "it was ironical that the well-planned scheme failed so completely" - http://wordnetweb.princeton.edu/perl/webwn?s=ironic

ironic - Both coincidental and contradictory in a humorous or poignant and extremely improbable way - http://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/ironic

Your form of irony is one of many. Mine is still an example, and is in fact probably the far more common example.

 

[woopedazz]

Internet debate time!

You don't get it. Those sources are right. They are exactly what I told you. You have the answer right infront of you -even quoting it- and yet you don't seem to understand what it is saying. A soldier getting run over is not ironic... I don't know how I can spell is out any clearer.

For example, if a soldier was to be sent to Iraq, survive a lot of contact with the enemy, come back home and immediately get hit by a bus, this would be somewhat ironic. The expectation associated with a soldier is that soldiers tend to die at war. However, he didn't die at war, he died at home after surviving war. This contradicts the expectation.

No. It isn't. Let me put it this way: electricians have a slightly higher risk of getting electrocuted in their line of work. Let's say for arguments sake that one of them gets run over by a bus. Flat as a pancake. Completely dead. Correct me if "my" definition (read: every definition you just quoted) is incorrect here, but that isn't actually ironic is it? Now please explain how this is different to your example.

If they had a heart attack...still not ironic. If they died in a humorous, meth-fuelled, midget-sex bouncy castle accident it still isn't irony. The fact that a person with heart disease is more likely to die of cardiac complications than they are from slipping in the shower is still not irony. Just because something is slightly more likely/expected it doesn't immediately make something else happening ironic... unless it is a poignant reversal.

-49% of the world's population pissing while standing up isn't ironic.
-Waking up with a dead arm is not ironic.
-Twitching your arm to the left slightly at exactly 3pm on the 3rd of July 1997 is not ironic.

I would like to close this debate by quoting some definitions that support my stance and refute yours. They are as follows:

A couple of definitions:

irony - incongruity between what might be expected and what actually occurs; "the irony of Ireland's copying the nation she most hated" - http://wordnetweb.princeton.edu/perl/webwn?s=irony

ironic - characterized by often poignant difference or incongruity between what is expected and what actually is; "madness, an ironic fate for such a clear thinker"; "it was ironical that the well-planned scheme failed so completely" - http://wordnetweb.princeton.edu/perl/webwn?s=ironic

ironic - Both coincidental and contradictory in a humorous or poignant and extremely improbable way - http://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/ironic

Your form of irony is one of many. Mine is still an example, and is in fact probably the far more common example.

 

[HarryTiger]

^^^ Irony!!

Or just being a smartass???

 

[woopedazz]

^^^ Irony!!

Or just being a smartass???

 

[BarneyBent]

Internet debate time!

You don't get it. Those sources are right. They are exactly what I told you. You have the answer right infront of you -even quoting it- and yet you don't seem to understand what it is saying. A soldier getting run over is not ironic... I don't know how I can spell is out any clearer.



No. It isn't. Let me put it this way: electricians have a slightly higher risk of getting electrocuted in their line of work. Let's say for arguments sake that one of them gets run over by a bus. Flat as a pancake. Completely dead. Correct me if "my" definition (read: every definition you just quoted) is incorrect here, but that isn't actually ironic is it? Now please explain how this is different to your example.

If they had a heart attack...still not ironic. If they died in a humorous, meth-fuelled, midget-sex bouncy castle accident it still isn't irony. The fact that a person with heart disease is more likely to die of cardiac complications than they are from slipping in the shower is still not irony. Just because something is slightly more likely/expected it doesn't immediately make something else happening ironic... unless it is a poignant reversal.

-49% of the world's population pissing while standing up isn't ironic.
-Waking up with a dead arm is not ironic.
-Twitching your arm to the left slightly at exactly 3pm on the 3rd of July 1997 is not ironic.

I would like to close this debate by quoting some definitions that support my stance and refute yours. They are as follows:

None of those examples are analogous to my soldier example. Had he been at home for a couple of months before being hit by a bus, it wouldn't be ironic at all, and would be far more like your electrician example.

The reason it is ironic is because of the contrast generated by the event taking place right after travelling from perceived danger to perceived safety. As I said before, it has nothing to do with the actual risk of dying while at war versus dying while at home. It's is all to do with the observer's concept of safe versus dangerous, and this difference is driven to extreme by the shift of the subject, the soldier, from one situation to another, especially one as emotionally charged as war, and the return home.

This transition, this coming home, creates an implicit assumption of safety. This assumption isn't correct, but it's there. The soldier is then killed in what was supposed to be the safe zone; there you have incongruity between what was expected and what actually was.

Now, maybe you don't experience that greater contrast. Maybe I'm the only one in this thread that does. Hell, maybe I'm the only one in the whole damn world. If so, then that's my bad for choosing an example which isn't universably appreciable. It was poor judgement. I put my hand up and acknowledge that one.

However, that merely reflects differing interpretations of situational aspects of the example. It doesn't reflect a misunderstanding of what irony actually is.

 

[bresker]

Also, there's 'dramatic irony:'

Dramatic irony

Dramatic irony is the device of giving the spectator an item of information that at least one of the characters in the narrative is unaware of (at least consciously), thus placing the spectator a step ahead of at least one of the characters. Dramatic irony has three stages - installation, exploitation, and resolution (often also called preparation, suspension, and resolution) - producing dramatic conflict in what one character relies or appears to rely upon, the contrary of which is known by observers (especially the audience; sometimes to other characters within the drama) to be true. In summary, it means that the reader/watcher/listener knows something that one or more of the characters in the piece is not aware of.

 

[Ben the Gooner]

No. It isn't. Let me put it this way: electricians have a slightly higher risk of getting electrocuted in their line of work. Let's say for arguments sake that one of them gets run over by a bus. Flat as a pancake. Completely dead. Correct me if "my" definition (read: every definition you just quoted) is incorrect here, but that isn't actually ironic is it? Now please explain how this is different to your example.

If they left work early because there were exposed wires making it an unsafe site, and got flattened on the way, then that's ironic.

 

[ClarkeM]

I see it as a Police Station being a victim of a burglary...

 

[Scotland]

Nathan Buckley leaving Brisbane to join Collingwood to increase his chances of winning a premiership then losing two Grand Finals to Brisbane and winning none with Collingwood - ironic.

Kepler Bradley playing well on ANZAC Day after Essendon lost - not ironic.

 

[emuboy]

Are situations where people cheat death in one incident, only to die in another (sometimes similar) incident shortly afterwards; or who survive two or more similar incidents against massive odds considered irony?

For example:

In 1911, a young stewardess named Violet Jessop was working on the RMS Olympic, when it rammed and severely damaged a navy frigate. Twelve months later, Jessop was again working as a stewardess on the Olympic's sister ship the Titanic when it hit an iceberg and sank in the North Atlantic in April 1912. Four years later, Jessop was working as a nurse during World War 1, and was serving on the Brittanic, the third sister in the trio, when it hit a mine and sank in the Agean Sea. Jessop barely escaped with her life.

Former Richmond and Collingwood player Jamie Tape was diagnosed with cancer in 2002. He fought the disease and went into remission, but suffered a heart attack while driving the following year, and died in the resultant car crash.

Sophie Delizio was severely injured as a toddler when a car crashed into her daycare centre. Several years later, she was run over by a car and again suffered life threatening injuries.

A German tourist stepped out of the Sari Club in Bali in 2002 several minutes before it was destroyed by a terrorist bomb. She then travelled on to Australia several weeks later - and was killed and eaten by a crocodile.

A Perth businessman was working back late in his office several years ago completing paperwork, and had a narrow escape when a fire broke out. In 1988, he had been working on the Piper Alpha platform in the North Sea off Scotland, when it exploded in a freak accident.

 

[woopedazz]

It was poor judgement. I put my hand up and acknowledge that one.

AND SO YOU SHOULD!*










* ...But seriously. You're wrong.

 

[BarneyBent]

AND SO YOU SHOULD!*










* ...But seriously. You're wrong.

No, I'm right. You just don't get what I'm saying, which is fair enough. I thought it would be an example most would appreciate, but it seems most didn't. I was trying to communicate something which has been lost on you and others, and without communicating it effectively, it's no surprise you didn't get it. I see that now.

I'll try one last time to illustrate the point. Take the example in the definitions I quoted where it talks about how it is ironic that a sharp mind succumbed to madness. Ask yourself, are sharp minds and madness mutually exclusive? Of course not. In fact, evidence suggests that greater intelligence is actually a risk factor for madness! The irony is a product of a false association of intelligence with sanity, in the same way that the irony of my example is the product of a false association of home with safety. Mine is slightly different in that this association is transient, the product of a momentary juxtaposition of two extremes. Now, obviously you don't get this association. All I ask is that you recognise that I do.

So with that in mind, the association of home being a place of safety in comparison to war is the equivalent to intelligence being a predictor of sanity in comparison to madness. When one is reminded that the intelligent mind is not a safeguard against madness, irony is produced, just as when we are reminded that home is not a safeguard against death.

I drew a near-perfect parallel to an example which you said yourself was right. If you don't get where I'm coming from after that, then there's not much more I can say.

 

[HarryTiger]

I see it as a Police Station being a victim of a burglary...

Falling out the back of an ambulance, getting hit by one.

 

[ClarkeM]

Fire truck on fire.

 

[Team Mo']

In the OP that definition isn't what I always thought it was. Does that mean like someone who jumps of a building to commit suicide but lives is ironic? I wouldn't have thought so but doesn't that by the definition fit the bill?

I always assumed things like a firemans house burning down or that story of a soldier who goes to war for a few months and dies flying home or on the way home from the airport... But not I'm not so sure...

 

[Quinz]

So it seems the cat was caught by the very person who was trying to catch him.

 

[bresker]

If the OPs soldier got hit by a car and suffered a minor injury, say a broken finger - would that be ironic? No.

It seems that people get caught up in the sudden, violent death element.

If the soldier had got an early discharge because he was afraid of death and was on his way to an interview for a job as a traffic controller, that would be ironic.