Satire
Written by Edward ChampionPosted on June 2, 2008
Filed Under Satire, Uncategorized
So a bunch of “activists” get together and create a hysterical video. These people claim that in 2012, a foreboding date that conveniently matches up with the Mayan calendar, the Internet as we know it will end. No more net neutrality. ISPs moving in for the big avaricious kill. Without citing a single shred of evidence to support their claim, the video that these “activists” post results in hysteria. It has, at the time of this posting, been Digged 7,170 times, and a strong majority of Diggers have swallowed this castor oil without stopping to question the specifics. Among the group: Tania Derveauax, who promised Belgian voters 40,000 blowjobs when running for political office, who promised to take the virginity of anyone who supported net neutrality, and who pledged online that she would kill herself in 90 days. What’s more, these “activists” created another video in May in which they used the same music cue and much of the same language justifying Ms. Derveaux’s suicide blog.
This latest stunt is fine satire and it’s certainly a masterful prank. And if the point made here involves demonstrating just how gullible people are when accepting such codswallop, then this group has certainly served its purpose. Nevertheless, I find myself a bit troubled by this video. Troubled by the manner in which so many people have easily accepted this. Troubled by the unseen joy that this group has had in witnessing these reactions. Troubled by a group who wishes to abdicate their sincerity and who believes, quite rightly as it turns out, that people are willing to believe nearly everything. One can certainly make the claim that this group is recused from guilt because they were only putting out prevarications that any reasonable person would resist, but these people knew what they were doing. And this video has now been circulated so widely that I’ve even received a few emails from people who seem to believe that it’s real. And while I respect the right of this group to declare nearly everything on a freedom of speech principle, I’ve always felt that if you’re going to execute a gag along these lines, there needs to be a few subtle clues in the details that alert others to the blatant fabrications.
These hangups are mine. I choose to believe, perhaps with solid dollops of naivete, that most people are good. That, in the grand scheme of humanity, the assholes and the solipsists are outweighed by those who are kind, amicable, and wish to help others out. NEE may very well be the living embodiment of the boy crying wolf, and the organization, if we can call it that, certainly has every right to challenge its audience. But I ponder the long-term view. Is life something in which you’re expected to mock every heartfelt gesture or concern? What is the value in being an inveterate cynic? I suspect these are the questions that nearly every satirist asks. But does not effective satire involve getting others to think about a subject? Lenny Bruce’s infamous “nigger” routine is, to my mind, a tremendous achievement. Bruce managed to get his audience to re-examine a loaded issue. The satire bristled against its audience, but it did get them to see another perspective running a bit counter to their own. The perspective practiced in this video doesn’t involve this level of thoughtfulness. It suggests a false expertise and a sense of self-importance (”If you don’t believe us, call your ISP”) on the part of the satirists. George Saunders got into trouble for suggesting a similar line of thought in relation to Borat. And while I disagreed with him, I can see his point. Even if people can ferret out on their own that this video is an outright lie, I find that the best satire is that which respects the audience’s intelligence.
And yet I find myself still justifying the right to shout “Fire” in a crowded theater. And I am willing, on some level, to defend this video and website for the way in which it pushed its audience. Those currently duped will indeed understand this at some point. So perhaps on this basis, NEE is no different from a satirist who chooses a more pellucid distinction. But should there comes a time in Ms. Derveauax’s life when she is suffering some genuine physical calamity, I wonder if others might consider it a gag. I wonder why there can’t be a balance between an elaborate joke and a true sense of being. When one lives exclusively in a satirical bubble, how can that real person or the real voice flourish?
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Books To Jump Up and Down Over
Beyond Heaving Bosoms by Sarah Wendell and Candy Tan. The famed writers behind Smart Bitches, Trashy Books have written a very funny and thoughtful volume about romances, both Old Skool and New Skool. Here is a book that any smug and humorless literary manboy beating his flabby passive chest over Banville or Bolano should probably read pronto, if only for the distant possibility that he might get over himself. While the Choose Your Own Adventure segment at the end caused me to have a very disturbing dream involving Shelley Long (don't ask), Sarah and Candy did have me rethinking many of my own misperceptions when I wasn't busy laughing. They're not afraid to take on the New York Times Bok Review or even the groupthink within certain sectors of the romance community.
Alice Fantastic by Maggie Estep. This wild and highly enjoyable narrative involves two sisters (presumably, the third one was still being rented out by Chekhov), a hippie ex-junkie mother who lives with seventeen dogs, a murder, gambling, and libidinous Hollywood actresses who live in Woodstock. But this is the wonderful Maggie Estep we're talking here. And what seems at first like a quirky yarn becomes something unexpectedly moving about connectivity. What I love about Estep's work is the way that she'll juxtapose an extremely astute observation (now that you mention it, why do cab drivers always have somebody to talk with on the phone past midnight?) with an often outrageous story development.
Generosity by Richard Powers. It doesn't come out until September 29th, but Richard Powers's latest will have anyone committed to books reconsidering their literary fervor. I foresee some animosity from the vanilla critics hostile to idea-driven novels, but book bloggers, YouTube chroniclers, and MFAs would do well to plunge into this chance-taking narrative, which introduces vital questions about what the reader's relationship is with media, scientific dissection, and "creative nonfiction." Are we rats fleeing to happy cities? Or can we find the humanism within the purported plague?
Pieces for the Left Hand by J. Robert Lennon. Lennon is one of the most underrated fiction writers working today. Much as On the Night Plain proved that Lennon had a lot more in the toolbox than heartfelt (and often very funny) suburban satire, this slim but fascinating volume juxtaposes 100 small-town anecdotes -- arranged by category -- in a manner that reads, at times, like Nicholson Baker's passions for minutiae and, at other times, Stewart O'Nan's concern for psychological detail. The result is fiction that makes us wonder about whether one person's subjective view of particulars can entirely be trusted. This book never found a publisher in 2005. But thankfully, Graywolf has released it in the United States, along with Lennon's latest novel, The Castle.
Wonderful World by Javier Calvo. This wonderfully raucous volume has been completely ignored by the Washington Post, the New York Times, and the Los Angeles Times. But it's probably one of the most delightful reading experiences I've had this year. Calvo cavalierly mashes up multiple genres and manages to mix up familial subtext with larger-than-life, almost cartoonish characters. (Indeed, one might argue that one mobster's penis is a character of its own in this sprawling novel.). This is not an easy thing to pull off, but Calvo makes it work. And it's helped immeasurably by Mara Faye Lethem's idiom-specific translation. (See longer post.)
The Means of Reproduction, Michelle Goldberg This thoughtful book tackles the complicated (and little discussed) subject of reproductive rights from numerous angles, which includes a number of unpleasant but necessary ones. The upshot is that there isn't a quick fix solution for declining birth rates and fundamentalist abuses. Just about every political faction has contributed to the friction. But you'll want to read this book anyway to refamiliarize yourself with the topic, but also to understand just what's occurred during the past several decades to get us where we are today. (See also podcast interview with Goldberg.)
Ed, I sometimes brood over this terrible dilemma: the power of speech, writing and language over people’s minds, over their sanity even — a dangerous power for anyone to wield.
My brooding goes like this:
“Oh dear. I could state anything… anything at all… using the full arsenal of language, imagination and sheer gall — and somewhere, some fanatic or gullible person will take the statement as Truth — no matter how fake it sounds. In fact, the more outlandish the statement, the more feverishly the believer will accept it. He might even act on it.”
Language can be a more terrible weapon than the Bomb.
What a burden of responsibility this insight brings you! You are no longer able to throw around careless words, because you’re painfully aware that mere words can hurt; mere words can breed fanatical followings, lynch mobs, suicidal terrorists, crazed gunmen, endless strife.
What to do? We must teach. Teach the world to tell the difference between a word and what it’s supposed to represent; that just because you name something the “named” doesn’t exist.
Digg really isn’t a crowded theater. It’s more of a zoo. Or a preschool.