Does any country other than Britain produce so many of its middling social types who suffer from sarcasm-itis, the affliction that causes them to be compulsively sarcastic, often in highly inappropriate circumstances and usually with excruciatingly little skill (which doesn’t make it funny), making themselves seem like one-trick ponies?
I’ve noticed that when the sarcasm is conveyed by tone only, the impression is frequently one of passive aggression.
Sufferers act as if the other person is some kind of animated turd with whom they happen to be stuck in a lift (US: elevator), and whom they are humouring – for the time being and, please be aware, only because they find themselves caught in that time and place – as if the turd were, as the poor thing believes itself to be, human.
And how does sarcasm-itis connect with the “slurp upwards, spit downwards” personality?