People use humor for all kinds of reasons. For comedian Mark Critch it was a defense against bullying. He grew up in St. John’s, Newfoundland, the most eastern point in North America.
“On the playground I would use humor,” he recalls, “when a guy would grab you and want to beat you up or bully you, then you could use humor. I remember one time I was imitating the vice principal for some reason, and this bully laughed. And he called his friend over and said, ‘Do that again.’
“So I imitated the vice principal again, and they forgot about hitting me. And I remember thinking, ‘Oh, I get this. OK, OK, now I can use this if I could somehow be their pal by using humor.”
