In our native terms, the ironic style is often compounded....

“ In our native terms, the ironic style is often compounded with the sardonic and the hard-boiled; even the effortlessly superior. But irony originates in the glance and the shrug of the loser, the outsider, the despised minority. It is a nuance that comes most effortlessly to the oppressed. ”

Christopher Hitchens

From : Unacknowledged Legislation: Writers in the Public Sphere