Pre-Islamic naqa’id (flytings) were used to attack and dishonor competing poets’ tribes and clans, but these attacks became increasingly out of place in the first Islamic century, not only because they were contrary to new urban sensibilities against injuring another’s reputation, but also because ties to tribe had waned in favor of other ties. People began to identify with their city, their region or their profession more than with their tribe. Whereas lineage had been the primary marker of identity in the pagan era, the new civilization encouraged migration to new Islamic cities and an ethos that valued ideas over blood ties, which brought about changes in how many people approached old customs, rituals and aesthetic systems, including poetry. Given this new social context, what were the new functions of naqa’id poetry? Why did audiences enjoy it? This paper will investigate a sampling of naqa’id poetry from the corpus of Umayyad-era poets Jarir (d. 728) and al-Farazdaq (d. 730). It will showcase facetious elements in this poetry by drawing analogies to the modern practice of the “Dozens.” I will argue that Jarir and al-Farazdaq’s performance of the naqa’id was geared more toward entertainment of an audience than to defense of a tribe. Using comparative methods I will demonstrate how Jarir and al-Farazdaq deployed the genre of naqa’id as an entertainment tool in a way similar to that found in the “Dozens,” a poetic exhibition between two performers in which each tries to “win” by making insulting—and untrue—remarks about his or her rival. This interpretation of Jarir and al-Farazdaq’s naqa’id will shed light on the societal changes that had occurred from pre-Islamic times through the Umayyad era. By employing contemporary scholarship on the “Dozens” I will note similarities between it and the naqa’id of Jarir and al-Farazdaq, both of which use insults to elicit a reaction from the audience by besting one’s opponent. I will conclude that Jarir and al-Farazdaq performed insult poetry as an entertaining spectacle to the increasingly urbanizing audience of early eighth-century Basra.