Sharp Enough to Cut Yourself: Using Humor to {{or: Soften the Sting|Dull the Burn|Dull the Pain}} of Exposing Biases

The more seriously you take this the less likely it is to work. A casual, playful, and non-confrontational demeanor can go a long way. Making small course corrections to a person's world-view is delicate work and very few people actually appreciate if it's done poorly.

"Oh, and you’d better not drop any hints that you think you’re working a dozen inferential steps away from what the audience knows, or that you think you have special background knowledge not available to them. The audience doesn’t know anything about an evolutionary-psychological argument for a cognitive bias to underestimate inferential distances leading to traffic jams in communication. They’ll just think you’re condescending."

Sharp Enough to Cut Yourself: Using Humor to {{or: Soften the Sting|Dull the Burn|Dull the Pain}} of Exposing Biases

Referenced in

How to communicate with empathy and collaboration