What’s the craziest thing you thought someone said to you as a joke but they were being serious? – 17 crossed wires people can’t get over

Humour can be a tricky beast. What’s funny to one person might come across as the height of bad taste to another. It gets even more confusing when the truth is misconstrued as a joke.

These crossed wires happen all the time, often with hilarious results. Reddit user _lovelyxx wanted to hear some of the best examples of these misinterpreted statements, so they put the following question to r/AskReddit:

‘What’s the craziest thing a person said to you and you thought they were joking but they were being serious?’

See if you can keep a straight face when reading these top replies…

1.

‘When I worked at a grocery store, a customer asked me if we sold tennis balls. I said that we unfortunately did not. He then went on to explain what tennis balls look like, just in case I was confused, I guess?’
-proteinstyle_

2.

‘A coworker once said to me, “Of course you know the Moon isn’t real!”

‘Not the Moon Landing, the Moon.

‘I pretended to not hear him because I was getting off in an hour, and that was going to be a four hour conversation that would end in him continuing to disagree.’
-saltytrey

3.

‘A woman once told me that guys could die from blowjobs. Because you’d blow air into the dick and if that air gets into your bloodstream and reaches your heart, you could die.’
-AggressiveCaptain420

4.

‘Not to me— but my friend who worked as a therapist in a mental institution in Brooklyn. On the morning of 9/11, she got off the subway and arrived at work and was greeted by her patients screaming that a plane flew into the World Trade Center. She calmly took them aside and said, “let’s talk about this….” Having no idea they were telling her the truth.’
-Lauren_sue

5.

‘In a wheelchair at the airport, and an older woman comes over and asks “ Are you handicapped? You’re too pretty to be in that wheelchair “. I gave her a death stare, until she walked away.’
-Successfulwoman62

6.

‘I was making small talk with the fellow who was making my food. I mentioned something about the dreary weather we’d been having. He said something about people’s mood being bad. I nodded and said that our mood is certainly affected by the weather. He looked me right in the eye and emphatically stated that it was the other way around… that our mood and emotions MAKE the weather bad.’
-granddadsfarm

7.

‘I have a friend who genuinely believes dehydration is a myth made up by Nestle to sell bottled water. It’s her only truly bizarre belief and she’s a very smart, well-educated woman with a master’s degree. We’ve been friends for about a decade, I know her well, and it’s the only weird thing and she refuses to drop it. Her bf apparently chugs water while making eye contact with her during arguments.’
-ingracioth

8.

‘I was with a friend at their community pool and talking with some neighbors of theirs that they are friendly with.
My phone accidentally fell in the pool but it was no big deal because it is waterproof.

‘The neighbor said “oh that’s nice, I can’t get a new phone because I don’t want the 5Gs changing my DNAs” pluralizing both “5G” and “DNA”.

‘I laughed because I thought it was a joke. She was VERY serious.

‘She also may have called in “D&As” instead of DNA but I can’t be sure’
-Regalrefuse

9.

‘My sister in law and another cousin got really into genealogy. At a family gathering they announced they had been doing months of research and traced the family tree back to Adam and Eve.

‘I started laughing and said, well everyone is related to them, I could have saved you some time. (No I don’t really believe that but they’re Catholic) I seriously thought they were joking.

‘They were not joking AT ALL and it was a very awkward thanksgiving dinner for me.’
-EdgeMiserable4381