Why there is at least one american doing a joke about turkey (bird) everytime you post a question about turkey

Question

Something like "Hmm I like turkey on thanksgiving."

I bet they think they have a great sense of humor as they roll on the floor, laughing and pissing their pants, having a heart attack because of their excessive weight.

Answer 1

Did you have any better idea about modern anglosaxonian sense of humour? Their T.V. commedies for the past 50 years use prerecorded laughter in the background so that to indicate when the audience must laugh...

Answer 2

It's also because the turkey apart from the chicken is something Americans associate with a lot especially on Thanksgiving. If you look in the web you will find a lot of jokes about turkey (the bird) that has nothing to do with the country at all. From my point of view it's not that insulting because I know where these guys are coming from since our cultures are somewhat similar, although we are more serious than them and don't joke unnecessarily. A lot of them use jokes or the opportunity to crack one as a conversation tool and an icebreaker for some. At times, the cracking of a joke is taught as a way to capture one's audiences in some instances.

My son is going to Turkey on the 18th and when his grandfather made a lame joke about a turkey costing too much, for a 12 year old, he also thought his grandfather didn't know he was referring to the country. He had to explain that it was a country and of course my baba said that he knew, he was just making a joke about it.

Getting back to Americans, when I mentioned to an American friend of mine that I was going to Turkey years ago, he interrupted me by telling me a very lame joke about the turkey. After my reaction which was telling him that it was very lame (it had nothing to do with Turkey, I think it was, what did the turkey say when the Pilgrims first arrived ^_^) and then he asked about the country itself. Westeners sometimes have the timing for it, but sometimes they don't but it's all meant to make light of the mood of the conversation. Like my dad did.

Unlike those malicious high school which juveniles tend to associate the bird with the country whose aim is to insult a newbie, the jokes said in passing really isn't as bad as one has said. It's just one of the pitfalls of the language and culture barrier. From my experience 8 out of the 10 Americans I know usually interrupt a conversation with, "hey did you hear the joke about...?" or "Knock knock?" and the joke can be anything that crosses their mind when triggered by any topic in the conversation. It actually is one of their endearing traits which often times get misinterpreted.

Answer 3

Part of it's a cultural difference. If, in Turkish, you had a name for another country which in Turkish happened to have a dual meaning for some animal or bird in your language, you might find it funny--even if no one else got the joke. There's probably many jokes and puns in Turkish that would make little or no sense if translated into another language. That, and I would guess that the occasional would-be jokester probably neither knows or cares that you hear that joke all the time, and don't find it funny.

That said, you won't win much sympathy from Americans by insulting them, much less stop the corny jokes. All the forums on Yahoo Answers are fraught with the same repeat jokes/flames/issues, not just this one. If the joke bothers you, ignore it; if the same person spams the forum with it, report them as many times as necessary. Negative insults, if anything, will only have the opposite desired affect--I also think it's fair to mention that I've seen plenty of Turks with "excessive weight", and plenty of Americans who were quite skinny. Does that mean I'm going to make some kind of ridiculous generalization? No... because that would be stupid AND counterproductive.

Answer 4

For the same reason that people find this joke funny:

Q: "Where is Mike?"

A: "Oh he's dead."

They have a lame and unimaginative sense of humour. These are the kind of idiots who keep crap programs like "Dancing with the Stars" on the air.

EDIT: Thank you Leprechaun for making a sweeping generalization saying that all Americans are stupid. Not that I'm American, live in Turkey, and have a bachelor's and master's degree in Turkic studies. Also, if America is such an ignorant place, tell me why so many Turks want to work and study there. Oh, and I challenge you to find 10 gossipy middle-aged Turkish women who do nothing except drink tea, play cards and comment how they're all gaining weight, to give me the correct answer as to the geographic location of Hawaii. Most Turks I know who've never been to the States--and I'm talking about university-educated people here--all think it's near Miami.

BTW, we find names like Ufuk, **** and Gizem really unfortunate. The independent leftist candidate Ufuk Uras has been a source of hours of laughter among Istanbul's expat community.

Answer 5

do not worry my friend. One day they will understand what's the different between 70 millions population country as a Turkey and the some kind of bird turkey.
Do like me tell them . Do you want to past by on Thanksgiving?

Answer 6

It just shows their lack of knowledge in world geography and history. I encountered similar things 40 years ago in USA. Unfortunately it's their education system and mass media. Those educated Americans know quite a lot about the rest of the world, unfortunately a great majority is ignorant in such matters. Besides that, they lack a real sense of humor which I believe is due to the fact that they are a new country, a new nation.

Answer 7

I actually regard the guy as the *God of all Americans* if he knows that Turkey is a country. Frankly, I like people making jokes and being sarcastic but that bird thing is so lame and uncreative. I mean I've never commented on Hindistan (india- hindi=turkey in Turkish) like that.

Answer 8

It is because they have different perspective about humor. Although we are influenced by their culture for at least 50 years- due to mass media, we didn't much develop a word based sense of humor.

I bet you - and sometimes I personally witnessed -that our jokes that make us roll down on the floor doesn't even twitch a muscle on their face.

I also know quite a few Americans with the finest sense of humor so Dear Bariş, lets not fall in to the mistake of generalization which sometimes bring us to our wits end..

Then again, I have to agree with you that the Turkey joke is the lamest that a nation come up with :)

Answer 9

Actually i think it is not about the sense of humor. That is all about ignorance.If you ask 100 Americans to tell the first thing popping in their mind when you say "turkey", 80 of them will say it is a kind of bird.I mean they are not really joking,that's how their mind work.Because that 80 Americans think there's no other country other than theirs on the world.Oh well, ok,they may know the countries the USA invaded.

Answer 10

I also would like to apologize on behalf of my countrymen, I will let all know you don't like the Turkey comments. So they should stop now.

There are you happy now. Remeber ignorance is just not having been taught. It is an opportunity to educate.

Europeans send thier kids to other countries we send them to Disneyland. We learn our geography by who we have bombed and invaded so be glad we haven't learned Tukeye if we don't know where Turkey is at we can't invade it. So I am not gonna tell them where you are at it is our little secret.

I can't tell them all one or two may avoid my advice. But remember ignorance is an opportunity to educate.

Answer 11

I know, it drives me crazy when somebody says that. Especially since I live in America. Growing up in school, everybody would ask, "Where are you from?" I respond to them and say that I'm from Turkey. They crack themselves up with a joke like that, and I just look at them like they're complete idiots...they eventually stopped once they got older and tired of saying it. I thought it was a bit funny, but it gets boring after a while.
Edit: YabanciKiz- I thought I was the only one who hated that show!!! I'm so glad I'm not the only one :-)