the joke is on someone

English

Pronunciation

• Audio (General Australian):

  (file)

Phrase

the joke is on someone

1. (idiomatic) Someone is the butt of a joke or is experiencing a negative outcome, especially if that person was trying to make someone else the butt of the joke or subject them to the negative outcome.
   • 1923, The Poultry Item, page 31:

     As only a small per cent of the dealers use the word "Leghorn," and the ones who do try to use it can't tell a Leghorn from a mixed breed or from many other breeds, the most of the joke is on someone else.

   • 2015, Randy Laist, Cinema of Simulation: Hyperreal Hollywood in the Long 1990s, Bloomsbury Publishing USA, →ISBN, page 232:

     Like Cole, we see through the penny-trick instantly, but the joke is on us, and on Malcolm himself, because we fall for the same joke on the level of the film as a whole.

   • 2015, Lia Riley, Last First Kiss: A Brightwater Novel, HarperCollins, →ISBN:

     “Guess what? The joke's on you because I'm going places, getting out of this nowhere town.”

   • 2016, E. C. Eliott, Kemlo and the Purple Dawn, Gateway, →ISBN:

     "Well, the joke's on you because I'm resigning from the gymnast team. And if I resign, so will my friends, particularly when I tell them why."

See also

• have the last laugh
• have the laugh on one's side