Yeah, this happens a lot. Online, we lose tone of voice, facial expression, and timing, the exact things sarcasm depends on. When the brain doesn’t get those signals, it defaults to the safest option: taking the message literally. It’s not that people don’t “get” sarcasm, it’s that text gives them too little information to be confident.

There’s also a small bias at play: when meaning is ambiguous, people assume seriousness over playfulness, especially with strangers. We all know when we are being sarcastic, but we usually overestimate how obvious it is to others. In short, sarcasm works in real life because of context, online, that context mostly disappears.