The Abernathy, Robert 1924-1990 creator Emshwiller, Ed 1925-1990 text utu 2026 monographic en 1 online resource : multiple file formats The laugh by Robert Abernathy is a science fiction short story written in the mid-20th century. It explores a technocratic society’s effort to suppress spontaneous emotion, focusing on the pathologizing of laughter and the shaping of children into obedient, efficiency-driven adults. A small boy named Dicky watches ants in his backyard and, delighted by their antics and a memory of a frog, bursts into uncontrollable laughter. His shocked mother rushes him to a towering clinic, where a calm psychologist tests him and explains to the parents that laughter is a wasteful “emotional outlet” to be corrected so the child’s energy can be channeled into productive action. After treatment and guidance, Dicky returns months later to the same slope; the weeds are mown, the secret thrill is gone, and his wonder has thinned into indifference. Remembering a tongue-twister from the clinic, he methodically crushes the anthill under his new heel and walks back to the house without a flicker of feeling, a quiet sign that the system has done its work. (This is an automatically generated summary.) Release date is 2026-02-15 Tom Trussel (This file was produced from images generously made available by The Internet Archive) Originally published: New York: King-Size Publications, Inc., 1956 Science fiction Short stories Psychological fiction Boys -- Fiction PS New York: King-Size Publications, Inc., 1956 https://archive.org/details/Fantastic_Universe_v05n05_1956-06_Gorgon776/page/n3/mode/2up https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/77941 https://archive.org/details/Fantastic_Universe_v05n05_1956-06_Gorgon776/page/n3/mode/2up https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/77941 UtSlPG 260607 20260610134815.0 77941