In 1939 the Three Stooges, Moe Howard, Larry Fine, and Curly Howard, toured Europe. The Stooges, all Orthodox Jews, experienced firsthand European fear at the rise of Hitler. On their return to the United States, the Three Stooges filmed You Natzy Spy!– the first Hollywood response to Hitler and the Axis alliance.
You Natzy Spy! came out before Charles Chaplain’s The Great Dictator, Tom Dugan’s Hitler spoof in To Be or Not To Be, and Spike Jones’s song, ‘Der Fuehrer’s Face‘.
In You Natzy Spy! Moe Howard is Moe Hailstone, a paperhanger who becomes a dictator whose ravings are sprinkled with Yiddish phrases. Curly Howard plays both Mussolini and Herman Goring-type characters. Larry Fine is the Goebbels-like Minister of Propaganda. The film offered no deep political or social analysis- it was just pure mockery of the Axis authoritarians.
Authoritarians rely on fear to gain and maintain power. Laughtivism is a non-violent approach to countering that fear with mockery. It’s hard to be afraid when you are laughing. Authoritarians will not be beaten by satire alone, but Laughtivism undermines the very heart of the authoritarian playbook.
As we enjoy today’s funny political memes and comedy sketches, let’s remember to give a tip of the hat to the first modern-era practitioners of laughtivism- The Three Antifa Stooges.
Sources:
https://www.thejewishnews.com/lookingback/mike-smith-column/looking-back-the-three-stooges/article_049138ff-1f94-5952-924e-68acacf45f04.html
https://www.metroactive.com/papers/metro/01.16.97/cover/stooges3-9703.html
https://threestooges.net/chronology/index/1939
https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0035446/characters/nm0240836
https://traviswhitecommunications.com/2014/03/29/laughtivism/
Thanks and a tip of the hat to https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:The_Three_Stooges_1936_(cropped).jpg for the image.
