The movement to free speech, combined with a growing awareness of discrimination, sexist behaviour and harassment, is a real cultural transformation... The dynamic is mostly welcomed as a historic step forward for inclusion.
But it is also not without concerns about the future of labour relations, especially between women and men. The question of a risk of sanitizing professional atmospheres often comes up: what if tomorrow, we could no longer make a joke at work without risking being caught by the anti-stereotype patrol?
The editorial staff of the EVE web magazine has looked into the question of the place of humour in the workplace and the (sometimes lively) debates that this generates.
Laughter is the characteristic of whom ?
Can we laugh at everything ? " Yes, but not with everyone ," is the readily answered, with a certain simplicity, not to say an unfortunate simplism. Because behind it, this " not with everyone " is barely hidden a principle of exclusion : no misogynistic jokes in front of women, no racist jokes in front of people of real or supposed origin different from the majority, no jokes about gays in the presence of people known or perceived as LGBTQ+.
In short, we could joke " among ourselves " sharing the same codes, the same values, the same definition of the second degree etc. The only way to avoid killjoys who decidedly don't have a " sense of humor " when they are disturbed, or even offended by what others assume as minor gossip or 18th degree that the bottom of the front take at face value.
It still smells a bit of the relations of domination, this right to the good joke of some that sends those who don't laugh back to the sinister sullen sluggishness of bad sleepers !
As early as 1961, Jacqueline Frisch Gauthier pointed out in an article in the Revue française de sociologie that laughter at work was a " social pleasure" in permanent interaction with authority. Formal authority, that of the hierarchy for example, which can be the subject of sarcasm, irony, caricatures. But it is also informal authority when personalities who handle humour with dexterity exert a power of attraction that may be mixed with fear : it is better to laugh with them than to risk one day being subjected to their scathing repartee or to be the subject of their more or less benevolent joke.
Humor is power. Humour has power, and this is all the more so because it addresses the sensitive ( identities, relationships, angry subjects, changes in society, etc.) without going through the argument but by directly colliding with emotions and provoking the reflex reaction that is laughter. Damn powerful to engage, but also to hurt or exclude.
The essential laughter in the workplace
In laughing and making people laugh, as in his previous book Managing with Humour, Lionel Bellenger invites us to place ourselves on the light side of the force. Following Bergson , the author believes that laughter is a " flexibility " of the individual's mind, of the relationship between individuals and of the dynamics of the collective.
With the neurobiologists who have observed the effects of laughter on physical and mental health, Bellenger confirms that we cannot do without laughter at work. As an expert in negotiation, he says that laughter is a lifesaver but also a " solvent " in situations of tension.
Indeed, who has never seen how a general burst of laughter, often in favor of a slip of the tongue or an incongruous situation, lowers the tension by ten notches in more than electric situations.
A telling example: remember the Minister of Justice Christiane Taubira, defending the bill in favor of marriage for all in the National Assembly, while, in the street, sexist, racist and homophobic insults uttered during the marches hostile to the text had made the parliamentary discussions a real minefield.
The tension is at its peak, the Minister is going to answer a question from an opposition MP and the first terms of her speech can be interpreted in an equivocal way. She is the first to realize this and then finds herself seized by an irrepressible fit of laughter. All the benches of the Assembly are contaminated by hilarity. Shared laughter changes the face of the exchanges that follow.
The Minister does not give up on the substance, the oppositions remain entrenched in their position, but laughter has acted as a " solvent agent" of the collective gathered to find a solution to a debate that is tearing French society apart.
Laughter has this fundamentally human property of generating " companionship ", in the Platonic sense of the term : a space of recognition of the other as oneself where discussion is made possible by an agreement on the subject that occupies the group, the other issues being set aside to allow everyone to focus on reflection and the construction of answers.
There is no question, therefore, of depriving yourself of laughter at work. What's more, on sensitive or irritating subjects ! The question remains how to laugh together, in an inclusive way.
For an inclusive laugh
Thinking about laughter inclusive means preserving the power of laughter (making us feel good, uniting us, investing us emotionally in a serious subject – without taking ourselves too seriously) by ridding laughter of power issues.
To understand what we are talking about, let's take the example of mockery. A mark of attention, even tenderness when it underlines an endearing character trait, a format of self-mockery when it is addressed to oneself, mockery is tremendously funny and does its work as a binder when it is expressed in a context allowing everyone to feel integrated and appreciated by others even in their amiable singularities.
But when it is the instrument of backbiting, manifesting itself in the absence of its object, being part of a history of resentment or simply gratuitously for the benefit of the laughter of the gallery, it is fundamentally exclusionary and domineering. Not to mention the fact that it contributes to a climate of latent mistrust that favors the formation of " clans " in which the dramatic triangle quickly invites itself as soon as the supposedly non-aggressive joke has, in fact, hurt.
Let us now imagine a humor less targeted at the person, but more directed towards communities (or sociogroups): the joke fed on stereotypes of gender, age, origin, religious confession, etc. His pronunciation is not in itself condemnable, but in its reception, the differential between intention and impact is at stake.
The best of intentions (in particular, to de-dramatize) in the formulation of a joke about sexual assault or disability can unwittingly produce a devastating effect on the receivers. The author of the joke, perhaps herself moved by the subject, looked for the funny to lighten the atmosphere but it could have poured acid on the stinging wounds of someone who is not at all ready to laugh about it.
So, what ? Is the person who does not laugh, or even cries or gets angry, relegated to the margins of his or her personal deficit of sense of humor ? Or does his voice, expressed by verbal language (" I don't find it funny at all "), by the sudden immersion of his emotion (anger, sadness, fear...) or by the difficult to interpret expressions of his non-verbal (embarrassment, complacent laughter, avoidance of convivial situations...) deserve to be heard with respect ?
Inclusive humor probably goes through this : non-judgment of those who don't laugh and taking into account their reasons for not laughing.
In concrete terms, this means that while all jokes are allowed, it is also allowed not to find them funny. And that this permission must be guaranteed by a prohibition of the laughter of domination. In reality, it is even a question of ridding the space-time of work of all domination.
In this respect, the analysis of the place and forms of laughter in an organization can be an excellent indicator of the existence of relations of domination and the level of inclusion. An environment where laughter is divided into clans united by their " private jokes ", inaccessible to others or even hurtful for some, is certainly less mature in terms of inclusion than an environment where we laugh together, considering the fact that not everyone is in the mood to laugh every day either.
