April Fools' Day
April Fools' Day or All Fools' Day[1] is an annual custom on 1 April consisting of practical jokes and hoaxes. Jokesters often expose their actions by shouting "April Fools!" at the recipient. Mass media can be involved with these pranks, which may be revealed as such the following day. The custom of setting aside a day for playing harmless pranks upon one's neighbour has been relatively common in the world historically.[2]
"April Fool" and "Fool's Day" redirect here. For other uses, see April Fool (disambiguation), April Fool's Day (disambiguation), and Fool's Day (disambiguation).April Fools' Day
Comparable prank days[edit]
28 December[edit]
28 December, the equivalent day in Spain[32] and Hispanic America,[33][34] is also the Christian day of celebration of the Day of the Holy Innocents. The Christian celebration is a religious holiday in its own right, but the tradition of pranks is not, though the latter is observed yearly. In some regions of Hispanic America after a prank is played, the cry is made, "Inocente palomita que te dejaste engañar" ("You innocent little dove that let yourself be fooled!"; not to be confused with another meaning of palomita, which means "popcorn" in some dialects).[35]
In Argentina, the prankster says, "¡Que la inocencia te valga!" which roughly translates as advice to not be as gullible as the victim of the prank. In Spain, it is common to say just "¡Inocente!" (which in Spanish can mean "innocent" or "gullible").[36]
In Colombia, the term is used as "Pásala por Inocentes", which roughly means: "Let it go; today it's Innocent's Day."[37]
In Belgium, this day is also known as the "Day of the Innocent Children" or "Day of the Stupid Children". It used to be a day where parents, grandparents, and teachers would fool the children in some way. But the celebration of this day has died out in favour of April Fools' Day.[38]
Nevertheless, on the Spanish island of Menorca, Dia d'enganyar ("Fooling day") is celebrated on 1 April because Menorca was a British possession during part of the 18th century. In Brazil, the "Dia da mentira" ("Day of the lie") is also celebrated on 1 April[36] due to the Portuguese influence.
First day of a new month[edit]
In many English-speaking countries, mainly Britain, Ireland, Australia, New Zealand and South Africa, it is a custom to say "pinch and a punch for the first of the month" or an alternative, typically by children. The victim might respond with "a flick and a kick for being so quick", and the attacker might reply with "a punch in the eye for being so sly".[39]
Another custom in Britain and North America is to say "rabbit rabbit" upon waking on the first day of a month, for good luck.[40]
The practice of April Fool pranks and hoaxes is controversial.[28][41] The mixed opinions of critics are epitomized in the reception to the 1957 BBC "spaghetti-tree hoax", in reference to which, newspapers were split over whether it was "a great joke or a terrible hoax on the public".[42]
The positive view is that April Fools' can be good for one's health because it encourages "jokes, hoaxes ... pranks, [and] belly laughs", and brings all the benefits of laughter including stress relief and reducing strain on the heart.[43] There are many "best of" April Fools' Day lists that are compiled in order to showcase the best examples of how the day is celebrated.[44] Various April Fools' campaigns have been praised for their innovation, creativity, writing, and general effort.[45]
The negative view describes April Fools' hoaxes as "creepy and manipulative", "rude" and "a little bit nasty", as well as based on Schadenfreude and deceit.[41] When genuine news or a genuine important order or warning is issued on April Fools' Day, there is risk that it will be misinterpreted as a joke and ignored – for example, when Google, known to play elaborate April Fools' Day hoaxes, announced the launch of Gmail with 1-gigabyte inboxes in 2004, an era when competing webmail services offered 4-megabytes or less, many dismissed it as a joke outright.[46][47][48] On the other hand, sometimes stories intended as jokes are taken seriously. Either way, there can be adverse effects, such as confusion,[49] misinformation, waste of resources (especially when the hoax concerns people in danger) and even legal or commercial consequences.[50][51]
In March 2020, during the COVID-19 pandemic, various organizations and people cancelled their April Fools' Day celebrations, or advocated against observing April Fools' Day, as a mark of respect due to the large amount of tragic deaths that COVID-19 had caused up to that point, the wish to provide truthful information to counter the misinformation about the virus, and to pre-empt any attempts to incorporate the virus into any potential pranks.[52][53] For example, Google decided not to continue "its infamous April Fools’ jokes" tradition for that year.[54] Because the pandemic was still ongoing a year later in 2021, they also decided not to do pranks that year.[55]
In Thailand, the police warned ahead of April Fools' in 2021 that posting or sharing fake news online could lead to maximum of five years imprisonment.[56]
Other examples of genuine news on 1 April mistaken as a hoax include:
