Life is funny if youre willing to laugh
the santa roo makes some noise
men make some noise women make some
noise
all the agendas make some noise
it’s good in it it’s fun men make noise
like women
there’s always one always one who’s like
i’ve had it took for weeks shed i’m
ready for this
women make noise like men what sort of
men are you sleeping with that’s
it’s a weird one i’ll be honest guys i
have no idea what i’m doing up here uh
guys from my council of state
barely talk to frank let alone do ted
talks so i’ve got 15 minutes and three
jerks i hope you laughers
joke one i’m trying to lose some weight
so i recently downloaded a jogging app
where you run five kilometers but it’s
not working because every time i run
i end up at a burger king turns out i
downloaded couch to be
care it’s a joke
joke two i recently wrote on facebook
wrestlemania soon any predictions and
someone commented you’ll never have sex
i’ve since then had to delete my mum off
i just don’t need that negativity in my
life
joke three how can when people without
stigmatism wear glasses it’s fashion
but if i go around in a wheelchair it’s
benefit fraud
that’s it that’s three jerks we’ve got
15 minutes oh god this time left
all right well let’s talk about it i’ll
be honest guys i don’t know how to do a
ted talk without trying to be funny
heck i don’t know how to live without
trying to be funny i have spent the last
10 years trying to be a stand-up
comedian right
i have literally got on stage for the
last 10 years
and told jokes and sometimes it’s gone
well and people
have laughed sometimes i’ve got on stage
told jokes
it’s gone badly and i’ve ruined
granddad’s funeral
it’s not a great place to be right
i learned to be funny at a young age
right for me comedy
is a tool to deflect right i grew up in
a
council estate in a rough area in hull
right and it’s a
it’s a first-class poor council estate
and by that i mean
the best way to sum it up is christmas
these households would have 200 pounds
worth of christmas lights on the outside
but have three pound on the electric
meter you know i mean we’d have some
magical christmases
like whatever you want it’d be bikes
xboxes games consoles trainers
kids on our council states would get
them however february was shipped when
brighton took it all back
congratulations if you don’t get that
bright house reference you’re not poor
that’s how that jerk works right and
growing up in this environment people
fighted for what they wanted
and growing up as a fat nerdy kid i had
to learn to look after myself
and i’m not a lot i’m not a fighter or a
lover sorry ladies uh
so i had to learn to be someone else i
had to learn to be funny i used comedy
as a
deflective technique because let’s be
honest you can’t bully the fat kid
who’s got better fat jerks and is
somehow shagging your mama
just doesn’t happen that way right and
i’ve always
thought this i thought this for such a
long time growing up that comedy is a
defense mechanism
and it wasn’t until something happened
about three years ago
i went to visit my auntie who was dying
and we was in hospital
and i knew she was dying she knew she
was dying and i didn’t know what to say
because i don’t know how to say anything
without trying to make it funny
so i just went to her so what have you
been up to and she went
working through my bucket list i was
like brilliant what have you been up to
and she went i just went to see the
second 50 shades of grey movie
with your mum and that voice
in my head that girl she shouldn’t say
this went yeah say it
i went that’s a terrible choice that’s a
trilogy you’re never going to see how it
ends
do you know what happened she laughed
but it was a good laugh
do you know that left where you go i
should not have laughed at that and then
proceeded to laugh more she told me
jerks back she was like hey
i’m dying you should have a cancer pass
and i was like what’s that mean she’s
like
just use it as an excuse to have a day
off work and go enjoy yourself
it was beautiful right it was beautiful
and i hold these cherry memories close
and that’s made me realize that i have
been using comedy as a defense mechanism
when it’s not you know what it is it’s a
key
it lets people in my heart i told a joke
she laughed
we shared a beautiful moment and i was
like i can’t be the only person that do
does this i’m not there is a whole
generation of us talking about things
and joking about things we shouldn’t you
only have to go on the internet to see
this you only have to go on twitter
on facebook on reddit basically we’re
sharing memes the millennial generation
is sharing memes
we are the generation that go hey where
do you see yourself in 10 years
hopefully dead right and we’re not
saying it
to be macabre or sad we’re saying it
because we want change
and we want to make our voices heard
right we are a generation that has been
labeled as lazy
uh as self-centered and as narcissistic
and i am here at a ted talk
with a microphone that i don’t have to
hold
to tell you that’s not true jed
salisbury
it’s not we’re not a lazy generation
what we are we’re a different generation
we’re we’re we’re confident we’re we’re
forgiven we are
careless we are we are faulted we are we
are
exci actually uh actually we’re not da
cause
most millennials i know aren’t confident
and they aren’t accepting of other
people well they are on the most but
most millennials i know have anxiety and
think the stories are
so it doesn’t quite balance out
all right and where where where did we
get this sense of humor from like where
have we decided that you know these
jokes is how we’re going to deal with
the situation
uh is it is it did we look at the
results of how the climate
is currently dying everything’s going to
did we turn on tv and go this is
awful
yeah we did uh and to quote a millennial
icon
from arrested development tobias
i don’t want to blame it all on 9 11 but
it certainly didn’t help
right because when you think about it we
grew up in a world
where we have seen nothing but the lack
for nothing but
since we live in a post-9 11 world where
we’ve seen war
terrorism on the rise austerity the rich
are getting richer the poor are getting
poorer
and we get our young and what have we
done with it we’ve decided to joke
because at this time when all this was
happening the only silver lining we had
in this confusing time as mass media
lied to us
was that nickelodeon was pretty dope
like to this day i can’t tell you
if the wars in afghanistan or iraq are
just
but i can tell you who loves orange soda
all right and we’re not doing we’re not
we’re not doing these jokes
to make people feel awkward or ashamed
what we’re doing
is we’re talking about our depression
we’re joking about it
where we’re tweeting about it because we
are getting a sense of community
we are saying hey man i’m depressed
you’re depressed let’s have a good time
with it
because when you’re not having a good
time with it it means you’re not talking
about it
and if you’re not talking about it
that’s when it becomes a problem right
and it’s not all doom and gloom honestly
you don’t have like the the millennial
comedy comes from
certain things it’s absurdity it’s
whimsical and it’s self-deprecating
you’ve heard all that tonight right and
it’s fun to have
because who doesn’t want to be
self-deprecating at times because if
you’re owning it
that means no one else can fire it at
you if you’re being absurd
good it means you’re getting you the
attention you want millennial right
it’s brilliant right so i’m gonna teach
you
some things because it’s not all doing
we’re not all doing this oh i’m
depressed and sad there’s some fun
things you can do in life do you want to
hear some fun things
yeah when you order a coffee and they
hand it over say thanks a lot eh
when you’re at a bar or getting on the
bus and the driver’s like single
go you asking
when you’re on the phone to your friends
and they’re like all right i’m going now
go okay bye love you
and don’t hang up because we have
learned something
massively fragility just breaks and they
have to go
love you too so what i’m saying is let’s
not ostracize people from making jokes
right let’s embrace it let’s get on
board let’s do them retweets
uh ladies and gentlemen uh i’ve been jed
salisbury love you
have a good day see you later
you