Is a well-oiled sense of humour the secret to snuffing out right-wing politicians?

Liz Truss’s inability to laugh at herself following a prank by Led By Donkeys is part of a wider trend of conservatives being completely unable to see the funny side of things, writes Ryan Coogan

Look, I get it – nobody likes to be embarrassed. I still sometimes wake up in the middle of the night in a cold sweat, thinking about the time I sang a song to my whole class during an English presentation. No, the song was not relevant to the presentation. Yes, I did write the song myself.

So just understand that’s where I’m coming from when I say: I do have a little bit of sympathy for Liz Truss, who recent found herself the victim of a prank during an event to promote her book Ten Years To Save The West. In the middle of the former PM’s talk, where she expressed her support for Donald Trump and made similarly unhinged Trussisms, a banner unfurled above her head which read “I crashed the economy”, accompanied by a picture of a lettuce with googly eyes. Protest group Led By Donkeys later claimed responsibility for the prank.

When faced with a moment of ignobility like that, it’s important that you respond with grace, humility, and a healthy sense of self-deprecation – and in true Truss fashion, she completely beefed it. Responding to the prank on social media on Wednesday, Truss said: “What happened last night was not funny. Far-left activists disrupted the event, which then had to be stopped for security reasons.”

First of all, “far-left activists”? Led By Donkeys is a collective of middle-class centrist dads whose gimmick is “making fun of the safest targets imaginable”. If they’re far left, then I don’t know what that makes me. Presumably some manner of Soviet super soldier.

Tim Montgomerie, formerly an adviser to Boris Johnson, was right to warn that Truss “would be well advised to learn to laugh at herself”. In many ways her reaction to the stunt really hits on a broader problem conservatives all around the world are having at the moment – they’re completely devoid of any humour, and people are starting to notice.

It’s fitting that Truss was talking about Trump right before the banner unfurled, saying that she hopes he wins and pledging her support, because the former president is kind of the patient zero for this “conservatives aren’t funny anymore” phenomenon we’re experiencing – which is sort of fitting, considering he was the person who introduced a sense of humour to the political right in the first place.

Trump’s first campaign was characterised by a kind of levity that we hadn’t really seen in right-wing politics up to that point. Well, maybe levity isn’t the right word – more of a gleeful, spiteful, bullying mockery. But people were laughing, and that’s all that mattered.

Sure, politicians on both sides of the aisle have always been quick with the jokes – Trump’s opponent Hilary Clinton appeared on Saturday Night Live during the same campaign to poke fun at herself – but what Trump was doing was different. It wasn’t as retrained, or calculated, or polite, or sanitised, or any of the other words you can use to describe the carefully crafted one-liners a politician’s scriptwriter usually comes up with for them. It was more grassroots, built on memes and in-jokes that allowed his supporters to quickly carve out a community for themselves.

Trump effectively positioned himself as a tonic to the “liberal establishment” of scolds and social justice warriors – typified by Hilary Clinton, with her rehearsed soundbites and after-school-special attitude – carving out a place for himself as the “fun” candidate. Sure, it wasn’t as fun if you were, say, Mexican or Muslim, but for his supporters he was a respite from a world that was constantly telling them to stop using certain words, or having certain views, or not liking certain people. With Trump, you could be yourself. He was going to make it legal to laugh again.

Now, was that perception accurate? It doesn’t really matter – any time a liberal or leftist clicked their tongue at a problematic comment, you could look to Trump, who would have a fun new nickname or impression for you to enjoy. And it wasn’t just a US phenomenon – we experienced something similar over here in the UK in Boris Johnson, whose birthday party clown demeanour got him over where his political competency failed him (for a while, at least).

Meanwhile the other side had doomsayers, catastrophising about climate change and talking about how guilty they felt about their class or racial privilege – important topics, for sure, but ones that gave the average voter the ick. After all, who wants to feel bad about themselves? Why can’t we all just kick back and have a laugh?

Now, though, the tables have turned. Kamala Harris and Tim Walz aren’t scolds, here to tell you the party’s over. They’re a fun aunt and a kooky uncle, ready with a cheeky comment or a dad joke – Walz even referenced the famous “JD Vance couch” rumours at a recent rally.

It’s a real reversal of fortunes, with the right now the ones who can’t seem to shut up about race, or sexuality, or politics in general – you know, all the things they used to accuse their opponents of. That’s not to mention all the bizarre conspiracy theories they’ve embraced, which might have been funny at one point but now just seem sad (not to mention annoying). Or the fact that, as Walz pointed out in an interview, Trump makes a lot of jokes, but he doesn’t actually seem to laugh himself – he’s even tried to turn “Laughing Kamala” into an insulting nickname for his opponent, as if he’s completely mystified by the act.

Why the change? Well, because they were always like that, really. That cruel humour that carried them through the past decade was there to mask some very serious, often sinister intentions, and all we’re seeing now is what happens when the desperation for power kicks in and the thin veneer of jocularity slips.

Meanwhile those on the left and in the centre have rediscovered their sense of humour. Conservatives don’t seem quite as scary anymore – they just seem, in the words of Walz, plain “weird” at this point. And voters are picking up on it – the polls are skewing in Harris’s favour, and the Trump camp is spiralling, as he remains totally incapable of summoning that old lightness of spirit that got him elected the first time around.

So if you really can’t laugh at yourself, Liz, there’s no need to worry – the rest of us can do it for you.