You Cant Explain That!

February 18, 2011 3:28 PM

Geekosystem documents the developing Bill O'Reilly 'Can't explain that!' sort-of-meme. Instigated by O'Reilly in this Youtube.
posted by nj_subgenius (47 comments total)

I grew up in a Bill O'Reilly-loving family. This is the first one of those head-floating-on-a-colorful-square things that I actually laughed at. This is awesome.
posted by phunniemee at 3:32 PM on February 18, 2011

This meme seems a little astroturf'd to me.
posted by 2bucksplus at 3:34 PM on February 18, 2011

My favorite.
posted by localroger at 3:34 PM on February 18, 2011 [2 favorites]

My audience is dying off, but I'm still famous.

YOU CAN'T EXPLAIN THAT!
posted by Kevin Street at 3:36 PM on February 18, 2011

Internet, where is my ICP / Bill O'Reilly mashup? Fucking magnets, you can't explain that.
posted by formless at 3:37 PM on February 18, 2011 [4 favorites]

Even after all of these years, I still want to give a slow, open palmed slap to Bill O'Reilly's left cheek the moment he starts talking.
posted by dobie at 3:37 PM on February 18, 2011 [2 favorites]

Ignorance goes in, outrage comes out.

MetaFilter can probably explain that.
posted by The Winsome Parker Lewis at 3:41 PM on February 18, 2011 [6 favorites]

This meme seems a little astroturf'd to me.
Yeh, a bit, but my posting finger started twitching at 'Bread goes in, toast comes out.'
posted by nj_subgenius at 3:41 PM on February 18, 2011

Bill O'Reilly makes stupid comment, internet reacts. You can't explain that.
posted by catwash at 3:44 PM on February 18, 2011

yes i can
posted by Cool Papa Bell at 3:46 PM on February 18, 2011 [3 favorites]

I do not want a meme that causes me to watch more Bill O'Reilly.
posted by Felex at 3:46 PM on February 18, 2011 [2 favorites]

Starfish regenerate their limbs. But they don't go to church. YCET
posted by nj_subgenius at 3:48 PM on February 18, 2011 [1 favorite]

It's not Endor. It's the Forest Moon of Endor. FFS
posted by Brocktoon at 3:49 PM on February 18, 2011

TATERS.



CAN'T EXPLAIN THAT
posted by beepbeepboopboop at 3:49 PM on February 18, 2011 [15 favorites]

Usually I'm hesitant to click on O'Reilly links, but that guy did better with O'Reilly than I've ever seen before. He knew how to make his points in three words (all that O'Reilly will give him in one sentence), he knew all the points O'Reilly was going to make, except for when the tides came up, and the look of sheer bewilderment on his face was more than sufficient to answer that point.
posted by kiltedtaco at 3:50 PM on February 18, 2011

I does provide an interesting look at how Mr. O'Reilly sees the world, as a terribly complicated place where someone must tell the tides when to go in and out.

So was that 2004 tsunami thing a mistake made by God? Was he distracted by somebody teaching evolution or something, and accidentally told the wrong tide to go in? Can the victims sue God for malpractice?
posted by Kevin Street at 3:56 PM on February 18, 2011 [1 favorite]

I'd seen the references but had not seen the original clip. The idea the Bill O'Reilly goes to church because of TIDES is fucking epic. I love it.
posted by mike_bling at 3:57 PM on February 18, 2011

David Silverman, the guy O'Reilly is interviewing in the clip the OP linked, answered a bunch of reddit's questions shortly after that O'Reilly segment aired. Some of the questions were about that clip. Here: David Silverman answer's reddit's questions. (vimeo).

Also, there's another meme from that O'Reilly clip, the David Silverman WTF face, which David Silverman now uses as his avatar on facebook.
posted by smcameron at 3:57 PM on February 18, 2011

Did you guys miss the fantastic follow-up he issued?

How'd the moon get here? How'd the sun get there? How'd it get there? Can you explain that to me? How come we have that, and Mars doesn't have it? Venus doesn't have it?

Why does Mars have Phobos and Deimos and not Luna? Why? Did Mars steal a moon from Venus and that's why it has two? How'd Venus get burned? How'd it get burned? How'd it get burned?
posted by 0xFCAF at 4:04 PM on February 18, 2011 [12 favorites]

0xFCAF, thatks. I was a bit hasty in the OP.
posted by nj_subgenius at 4:09 PM on February 18, 2011

"Starfish regenerate their limbs. But they don't go to church..."

Ungrateful son of a guns.
posted by Kevin Street at 4:21 PM on February 18, 2011

"...Made of paper, not okay
Ooo iv'e been down this bumpy node

Invisible man in the sky keeps on scamin'
He knows you get paid tomorrow
Belief on the sly keeps a burnin..."
posted by clavdivs at 4:23 PM on February 18, 2011

Starfish go to starfish church.

You should see them make the sign of the cross--it's really something.
posted by Sidhedevil at 4:50 PM on February 18, 2011 [2 favorites]

No hybrid ICP/O'Reilly/magnets action yet? Really?
posted by everichon at 4:50 PM on February 18, 2011

This is a meme?

I'm going to say no.
posted by cjorgensen at 4:54 PM on February 18, 2011

No hybrid ICP/O'Reilly/magnets action yet? Really?

FUCKIN' EVERICHON HOW DOES IT WORK?
posted by Cool Papa Bell at 5:05 PM on February 18, 2011 [1 favorite]

cjorgensen, the use of "meme" as "internet macro thingie" is pretty common. It is not a Richard Dawkins-type "meme" exactly.
posted by Sidhedevil at 5:05 PM on February 18, 2011

we all know that the tides are caused by the paragons
posted by pyramid termite at 5:31 PM on February 18, 2011 [1 favorite]

Javascript - You can't explain that!
posted by Mister_A at 5:40 PM on February 18, 2011 [1 favorite]

WHAT MISTER-A SAID. Javascript, you feed it 3+3, sometimes you get 6 and sometimes you get 33. I still can't fucking explain that.
posted by localroger at 5:47 PM on February 18, 2011 [2 favorites]

Bill O'Reilly / My Little Pony: Friendship Is Magic Meme fanart mashup
posted by ShawnStruck at 6:01 PM on February 18, 2011

This is the first one of those head-floating-on-a-colorful-square things that I actually laughed at.

The reason this works is that they are completely unfair to O'Reilly in exactly the same way he's completely unfair to all of his opponents.
posted by straight at 6:56 PM on February 18, 2011

Got a feeling inside (Can't explain that)
It's a certain kind (Can't explain that)
I feel hot and cold (Can't explain that)
Yeah, down in my soul, yeah (Can't explain that)

I said ... (Can't explain that)
I'm feeling good now, yeah, but (Can't explain that)

(Please please please somebody mash that up)
posted by Joey Michaels at 7:12 PM on February 18, 2011 [1 favorite]

Hey, thanks, giant-fucking-autoplay-video-ad that appeared over the article. Why do I do this to myself?
posted by snapped at 7:35 PM on February 18, 2011

I can't explain that, snapped.
posted by ODiV at 7:42 PM on February 18, 2011 [1 favorite]

"[Thermos] How does it know?"
posted by five fresh fish at 7:44 PM on February 18, 2011

The reason this works is that they are completely unfair to O'Reilly in exactly the same way he's completely unfair to all of his opponents.

It's really really really not. There was no further nuance to his thoughts that we're missing out on here.
posted by mrnutty at 9:13 PM on February 18, 2011 [1 favorite]

Wait wait wait all this time I thought it was the forest moon of Endor. As in Endor, the forest moon. But it's actually Forest-Moon of Endor, as in a forest covered moon orbiting Endor.

You can't explain that
posted by Xoebe at 10:34 PM on February 18, 2011

I was merely mildly amused by this until I saw "Penis In, Baby Out - Never a Miscommunication". That sealed the hilarity.
posted by wierdo at 12:11 AM on February 19, 2011

Silverman's WTF face has become a pretty standard closer for many "Mad shit religious people say" rage comics.
posted by Decani at 2:04 AM on February 19, 2011

Christ they're both assholes.
posted by Sailormom at 6:02 AM on February 19, 2011

Tide goes in, stains come out. Never a miscommunication.
posted by dirigibleman at 7:51 AM on February 19, 2011

This reminds me of a story that was linked here on MeFi, several years ago, about a woman who lost her faith and went through the gradual process of re-understanding her world. One of the things that really struck me was how frightened she was when she realized that God wasn't making the Earth sail around the sun, and wasn't watching over us to be sure we're safe (as long as we play by very draconian rules), but rather, that it was a purely mechanistic process, with no intent behind it.

I was really struck by her sense of grief, fear, and uncertainty. She'd always just assumed, on a very deep level, that things moved because God was pushing them, all the time. I was very impressed by her courage in following her thoughts to what were, for her, very uncomfortable conclusions. I felt so bad for her, and wanted so much to give her a warm blanket and commiserate. Truly grasping that the Universe is just a giant machine, coldly indifferent to our welfare, is terrifying for many.

As humans, we have a very large part of our brains that's devoted to understanding the motives of others, and magical thinking in general is using that part of the brain to explain mechanical and random processes as being the result of intentions. I think it's this conflict, more than any other, that drives the many problems we're facing as a species... the two parts of our brain come up with very different explanations for why things happen. The motive detector always assigns a motive to anything that happens... "lightning hit him because God was angry at him." "The city was hit by a hurricane because it was sinful, and God was punishing us." "I'm wealthy, so I must be a good person; God is rewarding me."

Everyone starts with the motive detector, it's one of the strongest parts of the brain, but rationalism has to be carefully trained. It's very hard.

I'd like to see studies on metacognition like this brought down into public school, not lost off in some ozone-level college course. Teaching kids to think is very important, but I think perhaps teaching them HOW they think might be even more critical.

This conflict is why you see O'Reilly saying such apparently nonsensical things.... for people using motive detectors, the "no miscommunication" part is critical. The moon rises and sets because God wants it to be so, and he's telling us [insert religious message here] by doing so. For people who think this way, his statement is perfectly clear, although it's also terribly clever. There's "no miscommunication", but he doesn't actually say what's being communicated. Every listener can believe the communication is what he/she wants it to be. Meanwhile, those of us who understand the mechanistic processes involved are taken aback by the non-sequitur.

O'Reilly is not stupid. Don't ever make that mistake. He's probably five times cleverer than any of us. What he's saying appears idiotic, but he'll have done more to sway public opinion with those statements than every blogger and website commenter combined.
posted by Malor at 10:27 AM on February 19, 2011 [9 favorites]

Bill O'Reilly may not be stupid, but I think he's cavalier, which is dangerous. From the wayback machine: the Long Island Railroad, back in the day, alternated smoking and non-smoking cars on the Hempstead line, and had one boozer car that allowed smoking. Even now as a smoker, I recall it as a fetid hive of second-class brokers. Bill O'Reilly strikes me as one of the well-dressed beer-swillers who would hold court to the drunker, angrier end of the car. Everything made sense to them after three Miller tall boys and a half a pack of Chesterfields.
Fuck Bill O'Reilly.
posted by nj_subgenius at 12:31 PM on February 19, 2011 [3 favorites]

I was really struck by her sense of grief, fear, and uncertainty. She'd always just assumed, on a very deep level, that things moved because God was pushing them, all the time. I was very impressed by her courage in following her thoughts to what were, for her, very uncomfortable conclusions. I felt so bad for her, and wanted so much to give her a warm blanket and commiserate. Truly grasping that the Universe is just a giant machine, coldly indifferent to our welfare, is terrifying for many.

Sounds to me like she was better off with religion.
posted by r_nebblesworthII at 3:48 PM on February 19, 2011

Please don't turn the thread into an argument about the value of religion. Malor wasn't talking about that.
posted by LogicalDash at 4:38 PM on February 19, 2011

He's probably five times cleverer than any of us.

Bill O'Reilly is not even a little bit smarter than me. I am quite certain of this.
posted by stavrosthewonderchicken at 12:41 AM on February 20, 2011 [1 favorite]