“The truth is told in jokes.” Romanian saying
When I was in graduate school my best friend put on some significant weight while working on his PhD dissertation. One evening after I got back from my martial arts class, he made a comment about my excessive training and said something along the lines that he was in good shape. I responded “yeah, round is a good shape.” He was of course a bit upset but quickly started adding in more workouts which helped him lose the flab and also be happier and more productive in his writing. Decades later he does century bike rides and jokes about the comment that pushed him back into a healthy lifestyle.
In medieval Europe most courts had a jester, and they were the only ones that could speak truth to power because their keen observations were cloaked in humor.
Satire has been one of the best ways to point out issues, whether it was the Smothers Brothers or Mike Judge’s “Idiocracy”. Humor covers up the bitter pill too many don’t want to swallow, like the spoon full of sugar making the medicine go down because laughter is the best medicine even if it is subtle in its effects.
Often things said in jest carry the most honesty.