The Wit’s Guide to Persuasion
Or, rattling swell buckets
Persuasion is a three-step dance. But don’t take my word for it, especially when I can summon two of history’s greatest minds as my wingmen: Aristotle and Dick Gregory.
“If you can’t convince them, confuse them.”
— Harry S. Truman
Age before beauty: The Greek philosopher’s rhetorical triangle consists of logos (the appeal to reason, or the actual argument), ethos (the character or expertise of the arguer), and pathos (the appeal to emotion, or think of the children!)
And of course the fourth point of the triangle: Gut-busting gags. Oh wait:
“Humour is richly rewarding to the person who employs it. It has some value in gaining and holding attention. But it has no persuasive value at all.”
— J. K. Galbraith
And there’s the distinction between wit, which can persuade, and humour, which cannot. How do you get from one to the other?
Dick Gregory, perhaps the first Black comedian in the United States to perform for white audiences, lays out a very specific template in his autobiography. First, he recognized that he was likely to elicit pity or hate, both of which would squelch laughs. So he made sure to act “like a star who isn’t sorry for himself.” And then he’d stick to this structure:
1. A joke about himself that played on universal experiences:
“Just my luck, bought a suit with two pairs of pants today … burnt a hole in the jacket.”
2. A we’re-in-this-together joke about race and society:
“They asked me to buy a lifetime membership in the NAACP, but I told them I’d pay a week at a time. Hell of a thing to buy a lifetime membership, wake up one morning and find the country’s been integrated.”
3. And then, a gentle joke about his audience (here, specifically about blackface):
“Wouldn’t it be a hell of a thing if all this was burnt cork and you people were being tolerant for nothing?”
From there, he could talk about anything. “Now you’ve got them. No bitterness, no Uncle Tomming,” he wrote. His one caveat was to avoid sex: “If you mix blue and topical satire, that white customer, all hung up with the Negro sex mystique, is going to get uncomfortable.”
“The difficulty is to persuade the human race to acquiesce in its own survival. I cannot believe that this task is impossible.”
— Bertrand Russell
Of course, persuading someone to laugh is a noble and rarefied goal. Much more common is persuading them to buy some junk they don’t need. The Hidden Persuaders was Vance Packard’s 1955 expose of public relations and advertising, revealing all the tricks those Madison Avenue hucksters were deploying on an unsuspecting nation of consumers who, once they saw behind the curtain, exponentially increased their consumption. Logos, pathos, ethos, all available in zesty ranch flavour while supplies last.
“The public are swine; advertising is the rattling of a stick inside a swill-bucket.”
— George Orwell
How do witty ads work? One reason, as explained by Beryl McAlhone and David Stuart’s classic book A Smile in the Mind: Witty Thinking in Graphic Design, is that “the audience may need to travel only 5% or as much as 40% toward the designer to unlock the puzzle and get the idea.” People support what they help build, and if you’ve met the below ad for Norwegian Airlines almost halfway, maybe you’re already on the plane to Krakow?
“Every fool is fully convinced, and everyone fully persuaded is a fool.”
— Baltasar Gracián
The fool persuades me with his reasons, goes a proverb, the wise man with my own. This, ultimately, is the cleverest summation of persuasion. If we convince everyone that they needn’t change their mind because we already basically agree, then our work here is done, right? Tip: Don’t be fully convinced.
This week’s ReccoMention tastes great!
The best way to deal with those who rattle the swill buckets at us may be to ask long, annoying, tongue-in-cheek questions about the swill. Hence this week’s ReccoMention, available exclusively to my Paid Subscribers ($C30/yr! Cheap!) — and also Jake, who was gifted a lifetime subscription this week.
This month’s Riposte Card is less filling!
Did you know that the artist I commissioned to create a clever postcard this month for my Founding Subscribers (C$80/yr for 12 original pieces of art plus all of the above! Cheap!) is also the creator of this newsletter’s logo? And he also likes to put peanut butter and gochujang on his toast? All is revealed below, and there’s still time to have this glorious piece of art by Isaac King mailed directly to your place of residence!
Quote Vote
“Higgledy Piggledy, my white hen;
She lays eggs for gentlemen.
You cannot persuade her with gun or lariat
To come across for the proletariat.”
— Dorothy Parker
Next week’s issue will land in your inbox on February 29, the rarest of days. We have to celebrate, somehow.
That was Get Wit Quick No. 242, which hopefully wasn’t too vexing for vexillologists. (The flag contains flags, see?) Did the subtitle of the book that started this newsletter – Elements of Wit: Mastering The Art of Being Interesting – persuade or repel the target audience? *slaps roof of car* If you tap the ❤️ below today, I’ll throw in newsletter rustproofing at no extra cost. Shipping and handling extra. Zesty ranch flavour not available outside of the 416 area code.
dear benjamin,
thank you for these as always! love those dick gregory lines, especially this one:
“They asked me to buy a lifetime membership in the NAACP, but I told them I’d pay a week at a time. Hell of a thing to buy a lifetime membership, wake up one morning and find the country’s been integrated.”
thank you for sharing!
much love,
myq