The more you ignore me, the closer I get
May 29, 2013 2:16 PM   Subscribe

Let me lay it plain: I have been, by a childish and ignorant member of the online community, banned. More: My input regarding Charli and Nico’s wedding is no longer even considered for publication! I have no idea why, and no one will give me the courtesy of a proper response. At first, I thought perhaps it was benign neglect, to re-appropriate a phrase, but I’ve since realized something much more sinister is afoot, so now—since I am no longer even allowed on Charlico.com—I am bringing this matter before you here on this august and humane recipe blog you call, surely in jest, BrendaCookingFun.com. The More You Ignore Me: a novel excerpt by Travis Nichols. From Electric Literature's Recommended Reading.
posted by jokeefe (39 comments total) 21 users marked this as a favorite
 
MFA students are now parodying Metafilter. Great.
posted by GuyZero at 2:24 PM on May 29, 2013 [6 favorites]


This looks pretty amusing, in a Charles Kinbote by way of Ignatius J. Reilly kind of way.
posted by FelliniBlank at 2:28 PM on May 29, 2013 [1 favorite]


The best part about this being on tumblr is that it will, eventually, be reblogged by someone who is unaware of its fictional nature, and that person will Pitch A Fucking Fit.

hooray
posted by elizardbits at 2:30 PM on May 29, 2013 [7 favorites]


Maybe there was hope after all, maybe, I said to myself. I could not only scrub my past clean, but also strike out anew with a joyous community!

I am really enjoying this author's command of language.
posted by the man of twists and turns at 2:32 PM on May 29, 2013 [1 favorite]


Oh god that was creepy. It grew creepier as it went along.

Perhaps I have not read enough of This Kind Of Thing for its effect to wear off. But yes, that was creepy! I kept picturing it written by a monstrous crocodile with opposable thumbs.

Thanks for posting, I think.
posted by Frowner at 2:35 PM on May 29, 2013 [3 favorites]


One of my favourite bits is where the narrator mixes up Margaret Mead and Margaret Mitchell.
posted by jokeefe at 2:38 PM on May 29, 2013 [3 favorites]


This is basically what the Voight-Kampff would be like if it was designed to detect moderators.
posted by cortex at 2:43 PM on May 29, 2013 [18 favorites]


Ooh, I should have added this to the post: Charlico.com actually exists as a promotional site for the book...
posted by jokeefe at 2:44 PM on May 29, 2013


Required soundtrack.
posted by maudlin at 2:46 PM on May 29, 2013


I hope everybody appreciates how hard it is going to be to not address comments that annoy me starting out "EXCELLENT POINT, COOKIEKITTY7" -- because the self-restraint required will be ample.

elizardbits: "The best part about this being on tumblr is that it will, eventually, be reblogged by someone who is unaware of its fictional nature, and that person will Pitch A Fucking Fit.

hooray
"

If you see this happening in the next 30 days, I hope you will bring it to the thread's attention.
posted by MCMikeNamara at 2:47 PM on May 29, 2013 [3 favorites]


The best part about this being on tumblr is that it will, eventually, be reblogged by someone who is unaware of its fictional nature, and that person will Pitch A Fucking Fit.

hooray


How I imagine this sounds out loud.
posted by zombieflanders at 2:48 PM on May 29, 2013


I got halfway through before beginning to feel like a billy goat gruff on a bridge.
posted by infini at 2:51 PM on May 29, 2013


Countdown to someone using:
"Gravioria manent, dear readers.

Gravioria manent."
in a MeTa thread begins now.
posted by zarq at 2:59 PM on May 29, 2013 [1 favorite]


I don't remember that Harry Potter spell....
posted by The Whelk at 3:04 PM on May 29, 2013 [6 favorites]


Welcome to all who have heretofore been shunted from society’s fellowship because of their ability (and willingness!) to express unpopular but prescient opinions clearly, forcefully, and—this is crucial—without apology.


My left eye started to twitch and I had to remind myself I wasn't reading MetaTalk
posted by The Whelk at 3:07 PM on May 29, 2013 [6 favorites]


The whole bloody internet is an injoke. Oh lol.
posted by infini at 3:12 PM on May 29, 2013 [1 favorite]


TRA LA!
posted by It's Raining Florence Henderson at 3:14 PM on May 29, 2013


"The exclamation points, I know, seem out of place or perhaps too much, but you see I’m quite an exuberant fellow, a joyful soul, really, and I can let my emotions get the best of me like a schoolgirl face to face with a succulent lolly, but it is all only for the greater good since, as I hope you’ll see, underneath the emotion there is cold hard reason, such that is missing greatly in this ill-begotten world of incorrigible ineptitude.

"I have had so many—SO MANY!—friends and acquaintances tell me, at long last, that they see my point after all, and yes, it seems I was right all along, and had only exposed my solution with too bright a flash of rhetoric.

"I am working on this admitted character flaw, but I hope you’ll agree that it is a relatively minor one, especially when it is often the reader’s own flaws that prevent him (or her!) from seeing my point."



it would be rude to say whom this reminds me of

but it reminds me of that person so hard
posted by Rustic Etruscan at 3:29 PM on May 29, 2013 [11 favorites]


I'm hardly like that at all - AT ALL!!!
posted by It's Raining Florence Henderson at 3:34 PM on May 29, 2013 [1 favorite]


Metafilter: Squirp is the horrendous noise I imagine this act making.
posted by Rustic Etruscan at 3:44 PM on May 29, 2013


This is pretty good satire. And yes, there's more than a little truth in it, leaping like the proverbial narwhal from the city sewer system, except in this case that sewer system is a computer screen.
posted by Kevin Street at 3:48 PM on May 29, 2013


Dagger!

Also:

Yes, of course!
That is why lovely Charli had a wedding blog!
For me!


There it is, that entitlement that runs roughshod through the internet, the crux of it all. Beautiful.
posted by davejay at 3:59 PM on May 29, 2013 [1 favorite]


I thought it was wonderfully written.
posted by It's Raining Florence Henderson at 3:59 PM on May 29, 2013 [1 favorite]


Good god, is there a whole book of it? Or is the book a collection of short stories? I'm not sure I could follow this fellow's adventures much further.
posted by BlackLeotardFront at 4:09 PM on May 29, 2013


Anybody remember this morning when somebody posted a piece of prose fiction in the form of an Internet posting and I was all, "nice idea, but not that good?"

Well, this one is good.

And I'm not just saying that because it's from Coffee House Press, the people who published my novel long, long ago, but I can't deny I'm glad it's them!
posted by escabeche at 4:13 PM on May 29, 2013 [1 favorite]


I am just a citizen who wishes his voice not be silenced.
posted by bukvich at 4:27 PM on May 29, 2013


You know sometimes you read something that's just such an accurate portrayal that you can't appreciate the artistry because of the visceral horror that the work conveys? Yeah, that.
posted by dubold at 4:30 PM on May 29, 2013 [5 favorites]


This is why I hardly ever post. To avoid sounding like this. (450 words deleted).
posted by kandinski at 4:55 PM on May 29, 2013


I am just a citizen who wishes his voice not be silenced.

ALL HIS LIFE.
posted by FelliniBlank at 5:07 PM on May 29, 2013


I am going to shout ASSASSIN at people who have wronged me for the next week or so to see if it is as amusing as shouting J'ACCUSE.

i will report back

for science
posted by elizardbits at 5:41 PM on May 29, 2013 [1 favorite]


Awesome I can just copy and paste that letter into the contact form.
posted by fleacircus at 6:02 PM on May 29, 2013 [2 favorites]


I am going to shout ASSASSIN at people who have wronged me for the next week or so to see if it is as amusing as shouting J'ACCUSE.

Don't pretend like you haven't already been doing this for years.
posted by His thoughts were red thoughts at 6:05 PM on May 29, 2013 [1 favorite]


When I first read this I thought it was one of those random generated texts like they do in spam and I wasn’t getting it. I went back and got into it and it got really freakin’ funny, more as it went along. I think I’m going to have to get the book.
posted by bongo_x at 7:20 PM on May 29, 2013 [1 favorite]


elizardbits: "I am going to shout ASSASSIN at people who have wronged me for the next week or so to see if it is as amusing as shouting J'ACCUSE.

i will report back

for science
"

for SCIENCE!

FTFY.
posted by Samizdata at 12:11 AM on May 30, 2013


I cannot express my level of deep disappointment to see comments disabled on this page!
posted by MysteriousMan at 6:28 AM on May 30, 2013


If Woody Allen’s only outlet were an anonymous comment stream on the The Huffington Post it might look a lot like this novel.

Someday I may understand how people find the output of the neurotic and whiney set entertaining and compelling reading, even "funny".

That day has not arrived.

Even as satire that piece set my teeth on edge before I hit page-down once.
posted by Pirate-Bartender-Zombie-Monkey at 7:20 AM on May 30, 2013


cause if anyone's funny, it's the confident and satisfied
posted by Rustic Etruscan at 8:14 AM on May 30, 2013


cause if anyone's funny, it's the confident and satisfied

Not necessarily funny. But they do lack the teeth-grating, hackle-raising whine of a Woody Allen.

Lots of funny people express lack of confidence without coming across as a neurotic whiner. Seem of us want nothing to do with that energy and go out of our way to avoid people like that.

Life is too short to sound like George Costanza, or spend time around people who do.
posted by Pirate-Bartender-Zombie-Monkey at 8:42 AM on May 30, 2013 [1 favorite]


strokes, folks, etc
posted by Rustic Etruscan at 9:17 AM on May 30, 2013


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