I have taken shelter in the ridiculous

September 16, 2006 8:11 PM

Satire[M]y father, temperamentally a gentle person, is often filled with rage. The news does this to him . . . . I have found a way not to be angry at all. I have taken shelter in the ridiculous.
posted by caddis (31 comments total)

I imagine this to be the case more & more with the rise of Stewart & Colbert. Unfortunately, at least among 20 & early 30 somethings, ironic detatchment & amusement at the ridiculousness of something doesn't really bother the people committing high treason nearly as much as outrage, protests, & voter registration drives.
posted by jonson at 8:18 PM on September 16, 2006 [1 favorite]

But it does no good to have got rid of the causes of individual sorrow; for one is sometimes seized by hatred of the whole human race. When you reflect how rare is simplicity, how unknown is innocence, and how good faith scarcely exists, except when it is profitable, and when you think of all the throng of successful crimes and of the gains and losses of lust, both equally hateful, and of ambition that, so far from restraining itself within its own bounds, now gets glory from baseness - when we remember these things, the mind is plunged into night, and as though the virtues, which it is now neither possible to expect nor profitable to possess, had been overthrown, there comes overwhelming gloom. We ought, therefore, to bring ourselves to believe that all the vices of the crowd are, not hateful, but ridiculous, and to imitate Democritus rather than Heraclitus. For the latter, whenever he went forth into public, used to weep, the former to laugh; to the one all human doings seemed to be miseries, to the other follies. And so we ought to adopt a lighter view of things, and put up with them in an indulgent spirit; it is more human to laugh at life than to lament over it. Add, too, that he deserves better of the human race also who laughs at it than he who bemoans it; for the one allows it some measure of good hope, while the other foolishly weeps over things that he despairs of seeing corrected.

-- Seneca
posted by jason's_planet at 8:32 PM on September 16, 2006 [4 favorites]

It makes me wonder what happens when the language of argument and the language of ridicule become the same, when the address of a potentate is voiced no more soberly than the goofings of some rube.

No need to wonder, Wyatt. You've been able to read it, hear it, watch it and live it, for years and years.
posted by wobh at 8:57 PM on September 16, 2006

This article made me angry, but I'm not sure I can resolve this emotion without the Colbert Report.
posted by pokermonk at 9:05 PM on September 16, 2006

I agree, I think (I couldn't stomach more than three pages), but Jesus Christ, kid, get a fucking editor.
posted by IshmaelGraves at 9:30 PM on September 16, 2006

But it does no good to have got rid of the causes of individual sorrow; for one is sometimes seized by hatred of the whole human race.

2 tru, Seneca! It happens usually right before my period, when formerly attractive men and women suddenly appear to me as skillfully shaven apes, and I am seized with the urge to make great dripping caves of their simpering expressions by taking jagged rocks in hand, a feeling which I am often able to chase away by imagining them in ludicrous large diapers and natty top hats, sometimes smoking cigars, sometimes devouring bananas, sometimes readying their hideously denuded lips for the open-mouthed kiss of some shit-painted infant, and I think to myself what a wonderful world.
posted by Powerful Religious Baby at 9:43 PM on September 16, 2006 [4 favorites]

Without reading any of the snarking that's likely preceded me, I will say this: what a perfect little gem of cultural commentary. This Wyatt Mason, he writes? I must investigate whether the medical technologies exist yet for me to bear his children.
posted by intermod at 10:07 PM on September 16, 2006

We all take shelter in the ridiculous from time to time. I'm not sure this article makes a very compelling argument that this is a phenomenon unique to the times. (That is, if that was his point. It was hard to tell. Echoing IG, get an editor, d00d.)
posted by Arthur "Two Sheds" Jackson at 10:17 PM on September 16, 2006

the urge to make great dripping caves of their simpering expressions by taking jagged rocks in hand

Well done.
posted by five fresh fish at 10:47 PM on September 16, 2006

Ah, Internet: limitless column-inches.

Satire can channel rage into empowerment. When we laugh, we forget to fear. That which we do not fear, we feel we can overcome.
posted by zennie at 10:59 PM on September 16, 2006

He needs to be fitted with a device that drills his teeth whenever he uses a comma.
posted by fleetmouse at 12:01 AM on September 17, 2006

Satire can also channel rage into a sense that you are doing something when your actions actually have no consequence. It kills me that the most effective opposition to the Republicans we have in the US is a late night fake news show. As opposed to, you know, people who actually make things happen.
posted by Nelson at 12:12 AM on September 17, 2006

I suspect I'd rather hang out with Wyatt's father than I would with Wyatt.
posted by PeterMcDermott at 12:34 AM on September 17, 2006

Well, shit. I thought writing satire was an effective substitute for action.

Now a satirist scoffs at that notion.

Back to the drawing (aint gonna waste time writing) board.
posted by sourwookie at 12:46 AM on September 17, 2006

I found this to be a very well written piece. It is certainly not excessively long, at less than 5000 words. Get an attention span, d00d.
posted by alltomorrowsparties at 1:56 AM on September 17, 2006

Nelson writes Satire can also channel rage into a sense that you are doing something when your actions actually have no consequence. It kills me that the most effective opposition to the Republicans we have in the US is a late night fake news show. As opposed to, you know, people who actually make things happen.

But broadcasting and publishing satire really can be an action of consequence because not everyone it reaches is already in the choir. Getting anyone to think is a victory in itself.

Currently the US House, Senate, Presidency, and nearly all key government positions are occupied by one party whose most powerful members operate on assumption of divine right, implacably and indiscriminately enforced with an arsenal of shiny well-oiled political, personal, legal, and illegal weapons. Going up against that is like a fistfight with The Blob. I don't wonder that the "people who actually make things happen" aren't as visible as the satirists. There aren't as many weapons against satire.
posted by zennie at 3:08 AM on September 17, 2006

I got a couple of pages into the article and it just wasn't grabbing me, but that illustration that accompanies the piece is rather unexpected and refreshing. At first glance it appears to be a collection of generic clip-art images, which I imagine is the artist's intent (as well as inspiration), but upon closer inspection it reveals itself to be just a little stranger and a wee bit more, eh, unsettling than random clip images. Anyway, seemed like an unlikely choice for the NYT magazine: I'm surprised they went for it.
posted by flapjax at midnite at 4:56 AM on September 17, 2006

You know, I found this writing to be really unwieldy, drawn-out and boring. With every sentence, I screamed "get to the POINT" in my head. It reads like a parody of writing in Harper's or the New Yorker -- which, sure could be the point, but how PAINFUL.
posted by chinese_fashion at 5:12 AM on September 17, 2006

I have not yet read the whole thing, so I won't comment on it in its entirety, but I do like reading sentences like:

What’s more, my father and I are of one mind about the inveterate folly, craven hypocrisy, unchecked greed, rampant abuse of office, ugly abuse of trust, vile abuse of language and galloping display of ignorance that has become a daily standard.

If ironic detachment allows us to say that sort of thing more often, then I am all for it.
posted by mmahaffie at 5:56 AM on September 17, 2006

I have now read skimmed the whole thing and, yes, it could have used a more rigorous edit. I still enjoyed it.
posted by mmahaffie at 6:07 AM on September 17, 2006

It's my belief, personally, that the comma, though frequently overused, can, if used carefully, allow arguments which, if expressed without pauses for thought, would be difficult to follow, to appear lucid and, indeed, compelling; on the other hand, run-on sentences are, generally speaking, a sign of an unfocussed mind.

Satire should be pungent.
posted by flabdablet at 6:40 AM on September 17, 2006

Actually, it's about time we stopped laughing and got angry, there's plenty to be angry about and anger is motivating.
posted by Vindaloo at 7:31 AM on September 17, 2006

Ah, Internet: limitless column-inches.

Huh? The piece appears in today's NYT Sunday Magazine.
posted by mediareport at 7:36 AM on September 17, 2006

The piece appears in today's NYT Sunday Magazine.

The piece appears in today's NYT Sunday Magazine.

Yeah, realized that after I posted.
posted by zennie at 7:54 AM on September 17, 2006

flabdablet, you made my point much better than I could have. I (think I) have a reasonable attention span, yet struggled to finish that article, even though I (think I) agree with the author, love The Daily Show, and hate the current administration. Doesn't that mean Wyatt Mason and I should be friends?

And yet I wanted his piece to end. NOW. Five pages? Or was it six? I think not. I (almost) got through the first two, then gave up in despair. It just didn't seem worth slogging through the antiquated (or is it just *bad*) sentence structure? Of course, I felt the same way about David Foster Wallace after reading his 3rd footnote in ASFTINDA.

Current administration bad. Satire bad. Phil Hartman, where are you when we need you?
posted by jenii at 12:04 PM on September 17, 2006

That should (of course) have read "Current administration bad. Satire good."

ARGH.

Preview good. Posting without previewing (especially after editing) bad.
posted by jenii at 12:05 PM on September 17, 2006

Preach it, chinese_fashion. Long-winded, heavy-handed, and rounding the corner from turgid to downright pompous.

He may appreciate wit, but he is clearly not on speaking terms with the concept of brevity.
posted by GrammarMoses at 3:54 PM on September 17, 2006

I found it likewise. My perceptions were tainted by your opinions, but I was pretty quick nonetheless to skip to the end of it in search of a worthwhile conclusion for which to justify reading the entire explanation.
posted by five fresh fish at 6:16 PM on September 17, 2006

Methinks Thackeray would be displeas'd that his quaint style has been thus extravagantly ripp'd off.
posted by nasreddin at 6:37 PM on September 17, 2006

Metafilter: Everything sucks in at least one way, and that way is all that matters.
posted by JHarris at 11:18 PM on September 17, 2006 [2 favorites]

Needs more pig.
posted by Smedleyman at 11:19 AM on September 18, 2006