[HN Gopher] Jingle Bells (Batman Smells): An incomplete festive ...
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Jingle Bells (Batman Smells): An incomplete festive folk-rhyme
taxonomy
Author : helsinkiandrew
Score : 116 points
Date : 2025-12-21 11:38 UTC (4 days ago)
(HTM) web link (loreandordure.com)
(TXT) w3m dump (loreandordure.com)
| ItsBob wrote:
| My wife and I had a good chuckle at these. The one we both
| remember is the one about Penguin losing his lollipop and buying
| a Milky Way.
|
| However, we both agreed that when comparing the UK(ish) and
| US(ish) variants, the UK ones are much more fun and colourful:
| The US ones seem a little, erm, boring!
| baobun wrote:
| Someone should tell the author that Robin laying an egg is the
| source of Batman's smell.
| Sophira wrote:
| Tom Scott did a video in 2020 on the exact same subject and
| premise[0], and it's _super_ interesting. I 'd recommend it to
| anybody who enjoyed this article, honestly.
|
| [0] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=V5u9JSnAAU4 - Tom Scott, 'I
| Asked 64,182 People About "Jingle Bells, Batman Smells". Here's
| What I Found Out.'
| robrain wrote:
| Thank you for remembering and sharing this - I knew I'd seen it
| before, I just couldn't recall where. Mr Scott is and was (and
| maybe will be?) the obligatory xkcd of nerd experiments.
| modeless wrote:
| Yeah the Tom Scott video is based on significantly more data.
| Seems weird that this person wouldn't have found it when
| researching this topic.
| adzm wrote:
| I saw something similar on Reddit r/FoundPaper where a parody of
| twinkle twinkle little star had a hilarious divergence at the
| end. Not all mutations have reproductive fitness but it is
| fascinating to see in the wild.
|
| https://www.reddit.com/r/FoundPaper/comments/1p7bvtz/found_n...
| nephihaha wrote:
| Does "While Shepherds Washed their Socks by Night" count?
| jimnotgym wrote:
| While Shepherds watched their kidney beans
|
| All boiling in a pot
|
| A load of soot came tumbling down
|
| and spoiled the blinking lot
|
| Alternative. The Angel of the Lord came down and eat the
| blinking lot.
|
| Definitely British. Evidenced by the term 'kidney bean'
| phantasmish wrote:
| I'm in the US and was able to look straight up from where I'm
| sitting at a shelf of canned food and spot a store brand can
| labeled "kidney beans". We call them that, too.
| nephihaha wrote:
| I know this as "when Shepherds washed their socks by night."
| randycupertino wrote:
| How about the add-ons/call-backs to Rudolph the Red nosed
| reindeer:
|
| Rudolph the red-nosed reindeer *(reindeer)*
|
| Had a very shiny nose *(like a light bulb)*
|
| And if you ever saw it *(saw it)*
|
| You would even say it glows *(like a light bulb)*
|
| All of the other reindeer *(reindeer)*
|
| Used to laugh and call him names *(like Pinochio)*
|
| They never let poor Rudolph *(Rudolph)*
|
| Play in any reindeer games *(like Monopoly)*
|
| Then one foggy Christmas Eve Santa came to say *(Ho Ho Ho)*
|
| Rudolph with your nose so bright Won't you guide my sleigh
| tonight? Then all the reindeer loved him *(loved him)*
|
| And they shouted out with glee *(yippee)*
|
| "Rudolph the red-nosed reindeer *(reindeer)*
|
| You'll go down in history!" *(Like George Washington!")*
| someothherguyy wrote:
| https://acedino.medium.com/regional-variation-in-rudolph-
| the...
|
| a (original?) version is from 1975 on john denver's
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rocky_Mountain_Christmas
|
| https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OlvxvSDOrAA
| mxmilkiib wrote:
| fwiw, from North East Fife (Scotland), it has been ('89/'90) "the
| Batmobile lost a wheel, and landed in the Tay", the Tay being the
| big volume river between Fife (the Scottie dog shaped bit on the
| East) n Dundee/Tayside (with the Tay having come via Perth etc)
| schoen wrote:
| I only know the Tay from the poem:
|
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Tay_Bridge_Disaster
|
| Hopefully I'll get to see it sometime.
| nephihaha wrote:
| Never heard that round there. I wouldn't count Dundee as "north
| east Scotland" either. Angus maybe. That's where they begin to
| sound like north easterners.
| philiplu wrote:
| Huh, my childhood version was almost the standard US one, but the
| ending was "and Alfred saved the day", not shown in the article's
| diagram. This would have been learned in the Midwest US (St.
| Louis vicinity), late 1960s.
| LorenDB wrote:
| The redneck version goes something like "Jingle Bells, shotgun
| shells, Santa Claus is dead. Grandma got her .44 and shot him in
| the head."
|
| Don't ask, it's not original with me.
| cgriswald wrote:
| Must have been other Grandma, since Santa Claus killed Grandma
| in a hit-and-run. Revenge maybe?
| cvwright wrote:
| The redneck version that I heard as a kid was _way_ worse than
| that. Things I won't repeat...
| culi wrote:
| You mean the racist one where grandma is replaced by a
| sheriff? Yeah... the US is incredibly shitty about race. My
| mother grew up in the Soviet Bloc and they learned about
| Segregation in school. She told me that none of them believed
| it was real and that it was just Soviet anti-US propaganda.
| Turns out the Soviets didn't need to make up stories about
| how racist the US is
| montag wrote:
| Generalizing a bit, aren't we? I never heard this version
| of the rhyme
| garbagewoman wrote:
| Your experience isn't universal either
| jdminhbg wrote:
| > My mother grew up in the Soviet Bloc
|
| Ah yes, famous racial utopias, all of them.
| gostsamo wrote:
| Surprisingly, communism was antiracist which explains why
| it was popular outside the US. There is the fact that
| many communists were racist on a personal level, but the
| state policies were inclusive due to the very nature of
| the ideology. As someone who also comes from the former
| block, I think that communism was a bad idea with
| terrible implementation but it also had its moments no
| matter what the US propaganda is trying to present it as.
| rini17 wrote:
| Have you heard about Roma? The communist states tried to
| help them but in a hamfisted ways like separating kids
| from parents. They did nothing to actually resolve
| racism. Many Roma ended up in squalor in segregated
| settlements. That goes on to this day and improves very
| slowly. It definitely was not "its moment".
| gostsamo wrote:
| So nice of you to teach me about the roma. I was sure to
| have never heard about them. /s
|
| The history of gypsies and their segregation is much
| older though and the regimes inherited much of their
| attitude based on prior prejudices. The treatment
| differed in different times and locations. I've heard
| accounts of casual police brutality and of good
| integration in the local community and of a "leave
| everything as it is without engaging with hard problems".
| None of those was sanctioned on the bases of race theory
| and in fact the official stance was for equality. Compare
| it to the US where it was part of local and state
| legislation. On the other hand, the higher ups in the
| regimes were often repainted nationalists and common
| criminals of old so adherence to the ideals was often
| perfunctory and positive actions and outcomes were
| falling short of what was possible.
| canjobear wrote:
| Are there particular successes that you have in mind?
| Because what comes to my mind is stuff like https://en.wi
| kipedia.org/wiki/Deportation_of_the_Crimean_Tat...
| gostsamo wrote:
| Yep, worker's rights, universal health care, women's
| rights (voting, divorce, abortion, generous maternity
| leave). Compared to Switzerland which allowed women
| voting rights in the seventies, communism was putting
| uncomfortable comparisons at some moments. If you wonder
| why communism was attractive, it wasn't just because of
| propaganda or because people were stupid, but because
| communism was addressing actual problems of the time that
| the christian conservative establishment of the west was
| preferring not to handle.
|
| The fact that you put the tatars as the only thing to
| know about communism shows that you've learned one thing
| and found it sufficient. At the same time, the link you
| share shows how later communist leaders acknowledged
| Stalin's actions as a crime... I'm not here to defend
| communism though (mainly because it is not defendable),
| just to provide a perspective beyond the standard tropes.
| dijit wrote:
| People can't think anything good of communism because
| they're conditioned to feel that way.
|
| Whats interesting is how equal it was for everyone, one
| comment I got when asking people who lived through the
| soviet era was that.
|
| "there's no advantage given to any religion" (hence, new
| years being the traditional family get together time).
| and "we were all comrades, men and women". A lot of what
| they hear from the US about gender equality falls on deaf
| ears because thats what they _had_ and they were told was
| bad.
|
| A weird perspective, but certainly an interesting one.
|
| It's always difficult to hear things that doesn't fit our
| narrative.
| andrepd wrote:
| There's also corrupted versions in other languages than
| English! I'm from Portugal and there's also semi-bawdy lyrics
| that somehow spread across the country organically across
| hundreds of miles.
| hecanjog wrote:
| "Jingle bells, Batman smells, Robin laid an egg. The Batmobile
| lost its wheel and the Joker ran away." is the version I heard as
| a kid in the American midwest. It's fascinating to me that this
| rhyme was international at a time in my life before I'd ever
| heard about the internet.
|
| Edit: Oh, it's simple. This is the version broadcast on The
| Simpsons TV show in 1989 and I must have heard it second-hand
| from my fellow students who were allowed to watch the Simpsons.
| cgriswald wrote:
| We were singing this before the The Simpsons, so I wonder if it
| was the show that made it international or it already was that
| way.
| jephson wrote:
| I recall being 6 years old and singing the "Wonder Woman lost
| her bosoms" variant at primary school in New Zealand. This
| was 1982 so definitely sung internationally prior to The
| Simpsons.
| paulmooreparks wrote:
| Same. I was singing this in the very early 80's, if not late
| 70's.
| ChrisMarshallNY wrote:
| A classic: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_XU6zrGyUUo
| randycupertino wrote:
| Does anyone else remember the 12 pains of Christmas?
|
| RIGGING UP THE LIGHTS!!
|
| Yo-ho, sending Christmas cards.
|
| The damn lightS!!!
|
| Facing my in laws!
|
| One light goes out, they all go out!!!!!!!
|
| FiiiiiIIIIIIiiiive months of bills!!
|
| She's a witch, I hate her.
|
| You're so smart, YOU rig up the lights!
|
| https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aMxgttJpbZE
| icehawk wrote:
| It was several years after first time I heard this that, that
| i realized that #3 was an impression of Archie Bunker with:
| "Edith, get me a beer, huh.", "oh jeez look at this" and "oh
| who's got the terlit paper."
| ChrisMarshallNY wrote:
| There's probably not too many folks here, that even
| remember that show.
|
| R.I.P. Meathead
| ChrisMarshallNY wrote:
| I wonder how those subtitles were made.
|
| Reminds me of the "Misheard Joe Cocker Lyrics" video:
| https://vimeo.com/448217206
| QuadmasterXLII wrote:
| Growing up, the lyrics always included the verse as well as the
| chorus: "... and the joker got away! // Batman in the kitchen //
| Robin in the hall // Joker in the bathroom // peeing on the wall.
| // ..." but I can't remember how it ended. does anyone else
| remember this?
| cgriswald wrote:
| We usually ended it there, but I vaguely recall a version where
| Batman slips on it (the pee) and breaks his balls; I don't
| recall the actual verse though.
| jimnotgym wrote:
| I heard it in the UK before the Simpsons.
|
| Robin flew away
|
| Mr silly bit his willy on the M1 motorway.
|
| I seem to remember hearing the standard US one in the bit at the
| end of The Cosby Show, which was on free to air TV soon after
| getting home from school.
| jimnotgym wrote:
| Edit:
|
| Robin laid an egg. Batmobile lost its wheel and the
| commissioner broke his leg...I think.
| shagie wrote:
| Tangent - Monktoberfest 2016: Bryan Cantrill - Oral Tradition in
| Software Engineering
| https://youtu.be/4PaWFYm0kEw?si=avSAlBsCVUzjW2xo&t=163 (only 2:43
| in ... so after the relevant clip, start over and you'll catch
| back up quickly)
|
| > so let's just do a little experiment here ... um ... so if I
| say Jingle Bells Batman Smells you say ...
|
| > okay where did you learn that? If that's not a movie reference;
| it's not not from a TV show; you learn that the way I learned
| that you learned that - on the playground. You learned that from
| another eight-year-old another seven-year-old ...
| caseyross wrote:
| Advanced version from early 2000s (US), incorporating several
| additional lyrical-flow improvements on phrases seen in the Tom
| Scott video and TFA: "Dashing through the snow -
| - on a pair of broken skis - - -" "Down the hills we go - -
| - Crashing into trees!" "The snow is turning red - - I
| think I'm almost dead - -" "And now I'm in the hospital
| with stitches in my head! Oh, -" "Jingle bells, Batman
| smells, Robin laid an egg! - - -" "Batmobile lost a wheel
| and the Joker played ballet! HEY!" "Jingle bells, Batman
| smells, Granny got a gun, - - -" "? ? ?, and shot a man in
| 1931! HEY!!!"
| raldi wrote:
| I'm guessing the missing part probably ended with an internal
| rhyme for "man". Maybe "missed the can" (she was aiming at)?
| caseyross wrote:
| Could be, although not that particular completion. The second
| chorus was rare and I'm kind of unsure about "shot a man".
| Can't edit previous comment but should have just put it as:
| ? ? ?, ? ? ? ?, in nineteen thirty one. Hey!
| prokopton wrote:
| The egg is canon. Joker sings this version in the BtAS Christmas
| episode.
|
| https://youtu.be/DpV9f4Tv8kA?feature=shared
| gota wrote:
| All I can think of reading this is how many versions - and how
| enriched with genius local detail - of the Illiad, Gilgamesh, etc
| there must have been when they were strictly oral traditions
| bryanrasmussen wrote:
| from The Carols of Halloween -
| https://medium.com/luminasticity/the-carols-of-halloween-47c...
|
| Jingle Bells, Jingle Bells why won't they shut up
|
| Being chased by werewolves, ain't this just my luck
|
| Dashing through the gloom
|
| In a one-horse open cart
|
| Trying to escape the doom
|
| Where Werewolves eat my heart
|
| You had to read the tome
|
| And utter the mad curse
|
| Now if we get home
|
| I'm sure it's in a hearse
|
| Ohhhh...
|
| Jingle Bells, Jingle Bells why won't they shut up
|
| Being chased by werewolves, ain't this just my luck
| bethekidyouwant wrote:
| It's almost striking to read something not written by AI
| crtified wrote:
| Growing up in northern Queensland (Australia) in the 1980's, our
| primary school boy's version was :
|
| "Jingle Bells, Batman smells, Robin flew away, Wonder Woman lost
| her boobs - flying TAA."
|
| Context note : TAA or Trans Australia Airlines was a major
| Australian domestic airline of the time, later merged into
| Qantas.
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