Polish socialist store, no butter, no toilet paper
joke · Slovenian/Yugoslav ·
retold in 9 talks
A customer in socialist Poland asks if a store doesn't have butter; the clerk replies: 'We are not the store that doesn't have butter, we are the store that doesn't have toilet paper; the one without batteries is across the street.'
≤2000talks it is told in, per year2026
As told 7
“we are not the store which doesn't have butter. we are the store which doesn't have toilet paper”
“We are the store which doesn't have toilet paper. The one across the street is the one which doesn't have butter.”
“We are the store which doesn't have toilet paper, not butter. The other store there is the one which doesn't have butter.”
What it carries
one story, many jobs: the ideas this anecdote is deployed to argue, one tally mark per use (an idea page shows the same relation from the other end, as its shelf of stories)
contents · one story, 3 jobsuses
determinate negation
×6
differentiality
×1
ideology as implicit meaning
×1
Its cast and sources
populated by
Walter Benn Michaels1Zygmunt Bauman1Joe Slovo1Jela Krečič1Aaron Bastani1François Fillon1Karl Popper3Dan Brown3
alongside works
Every retelling 7
A customer in socialist Poland asks if a store doesn't have butter; the clerk replies: 'We are not the store that doesn't have butter, we are the store that doesn't have toilet paper; the one without batteries is across the street.', illustrating differentiality,socialist shortage economy as ideological symptom
A customer in socialist Poland asks a store if they don't have butter; the clerk corrects him, this store doesn't have toilet paper, the one across the street doesn't have butter. The joke maps ideological absences onto shortage economies., illustrating ideology as the unsaid,differential approach,coffee without cream
A man enters a store and asks if they have no butter. The clerk corrects him: this is the store that doesn't have toilet paper, the store that doesn't have butter is down the street. The joke illustrates how determinate absence (which thing is missing) matters ideologically., illustrating determinate absence,shortage economy,ideology
In early socialist Poland you ask a store 'Do you have butter?' and are told 'No, you are in the wrong store; we are the store that doesn't have butter, the one that doesn't have oil is across the street.' Illustrates how ideology lies not at the level of facts but at the level of implication., illustrating bestimmte Negation,ideology and implication,Soviet/Eastern bloc humor
A customer asks the wrong shop whether they have butter; the clerk says they are the store that doesn't have toilet paper, the store that doesn't have butter is across the street. Absence is specific and classified., illustrating bestimmte Negation (determinate negation),socialist shortage economy
A Soviet-era joke: a man enters a store and asks if they still don't have toilet paper; the clerk says 'No, you're in the wrong store, we're the one that doesn't have oil; the other one doesn't have toilet paper.' Each store specializes in its particular absence., illustrating determinate negation,capitalism with Asian values,Soviet ideology