Glitterbombing Rick Santorum

A bunch of bigoted one percenters hired some unemployed 20-somethings to glitterbomb Rick Santorum. And they threw the glitter at him, and no one much cared.

Stupid-ass embedding disabled by request.
http://youtu.be/D4eTuOJhWS8

After landing most of the glitter harmlessly on the ground near Santorum, the protesters revealed their motivation for such enormous symbolic act: they yelled "You hate gays!" at Rick Santorum, one of the less fruitful protest tactics I've seen. The only way it makes sense is if Santorum rushes to defend himself, which is 1)unlikely, since your critique does not come from a position of influence or thoughtfulness and, 2)not even damning were he to decide to. It's like they wanted to provide Santorum the opportunity to reiterate his position on family values.

If that weren't enough to raise suspicion of whether this is actually satire, as they are escorted away the protesters inexplicably begin shouting "occupy!" This fourth-wall breaking is only useful when making a comment on the art, otherwise it's just a disruption. No real occupy protester would be so dumb as to associate their cause with half-assed glitterbombing. Occupy stands for much larger, egalitarian issues and seeks to achieve a real change in democracy. Nice try bigoted one percenters, but no one with half a brain believes that was a real protest.

On the other hand, it is possible some real protesters just punked themselves by valuing zeal more than intelligence, and enthusiasm more than planning. Demonstrating solidarity as you voluntarily leave could be a means to save face at what would embarrass 99% of people. Is it satire?

A call to the shamans, the elders.

Today I wanted to finally pay homage to the primogen of Satire?blog, the straw(man) that broke the camel's back and propelled me to ask "is it satire?" in the shirt-ripping manner that I now do. Please give a warm look of quoi while I bring to you the very definition of the ineffable, TransguyJacePDX.



You might expect me question the utility of spiritual shamans and elder healers in a 21st century policy struggle or to start in on sentences like, "there were the use of sound weaponry," or "...synchronicity...one after another." You know, really shit on him from atop my throne of words. But I'm not. I love this video. It is perfect.

Every thing I've covered on satire?blog so far has obvious extra-textual clues that indicate its intent. For instance, a single shitty hip hop song may be an obvious caricature of art and music, but in the context of a well-established industry which excretes the same waste week after week it is obviously not meant as satire, which makes my tone of ineffability a facade. We could just say these things suck, but pretending they might be intentional makes a greater rhetorical impact and serves as a writing exercise. A healthy exercise, I think, but deliberate and a little unfulfilling.

Jace Transguy doesn't have extra-textual clues. He only has 200+ views on the video and I suspect my post on facebook is at least 100 of those. No one has written about him. No one buys what he makes. He obviously has an agenda, but only in the most recondite sense does his audience have any influence on it. It's almost as if he doesn't exist at all. As his transient delivery calls out to the shamans, this ghostly obsession with spirituality suggests a wish to reach out from the great beyond for a child-vessel in which to be born again; satanically, not satirically.

This lack of corporeality makes it difficult to see Trans Jaceguy as an object of satire as well. At 200+ views, the lack of internet presence makes a strong case that he is not a memelogical agent designed to spread virally and undermine the Occupy Wallstreet movement. On the other hand, what would a satire of a white-collar, ostentatious, liberal look like? If you saw the protesters as entitled, wet-behind-the-ears whippersnappers who've never gotten their hands dirty a day in their lives, isn't this the speech you would write? Obliviousness to consequences, "there were many cities who...for the first time...really encountered force from police, that they had never seen before," grandiose arcs of victimization, "people in wheelchairs were tear gassed," abstract gobbledygook, "reactionary responses...occupied spaces," and problematic grammar throughout, delivered by someone with "trans" in his username who is less than clean-cut. Perhaps you might use someone more self-righteous, or perhaps you were going for dim-witted stammering, but this is 95% of the idea. He may not have sang Kumbaya (the viewer assumes a bum pawned his acoustic guitar for hootch), but his heart was definitely bleeding from those rubber bullets. All told, this is a particularly mean-spirited caricature by whoever made it.

At once, Guy Jacetrans's video is both a heartfelt call to shaman/elders, and a clear indictment of university education in the hands of youth. It is completely ambiguous. A strong case can be made for either interpretation, and best of all, there is no key at the end of the text to check our answers. That's what sets this video apart from all the others and makes it truly thrilling. Is it satire? I don't even...!

An Important Film: Megan is Missing

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Mmmhop IPA, a tiggy-top, I doo-wop

Do not adjust your monitor. DK Mode is enabled.

Whatever Fukishima breeze/pharmaceutical trial is responsible for the Hanson boys huge heads/atrophied bodies it is also probably what gave them the bright idea to finally cash in on their Mmmbop fame and create Mmmhop IPA. To conceive of its creation any other way we must imagine the three Hanson brothers sitting down in the conference room of a product development firm and getting pitched. "People will use this product every day. It could be in every restaurant, store, and home. It's called '"Hansoap.'"
"No."
"Okay, how about a sitcom entitled 'Two and a Half Men?'"
"No."
"An IPA called 'MmmHop.'"
"No."
"A line of manboy grooming products called 'Hansom.'"
"Wait, go back one."

It turns out, after reading that article, that Hanson has been cashing in on their faux-fame the entire time. I didn't know that. I guess I sort of tuned them out after I found out the girl I had a crush on was actually a boy. It gets crazier though, apparently they've released eight albums since Mmmbop, which is the same number of children they've released. They're prolific. But look at that photo again. When I imagine the Hansons reproducing I definitely imagine it happening asexually.

I've always regarded Mmmbop as the 90s "Never Gonna Give You Up," and no amount of children can change that. But after his hit, Rick Astley left the public eye whereas Hanson has been jizzing their derivative gimcrack in the public eyes since theirs. This is wrong for two reasons.
1)Asexual reproduction is accomplished without fertilization, therefore ejaculation is unnecessary.
2)Being a joke band stops being funny once you demonstrate you're in on the joke. Rickrolling was popular for a number of reasons, foremost being that it was worthy of mockery but actually pretty fun to listen to, with broad demographic appropriateness; you could rickroll your grandma and children, whereas sending them to YTMND would only be fun for you. Sending someone



My Favorite Christmas Sweater seems funny in the same vein, but only as satire. It can only be satire if they're criticizing old bands cashing in on our misplaced sense of nostalgia. If they aren't, then it's just three boymen trying to cash in on our misplaced sense of nostalgia. Which I resent, assholes. Don't capitalize on the memories of my youth unless you're prepared to drive them into the ground with millions of dollars in marketing tie-ins. Doing this folksy web store with coffee mugs is uncomfortably sincere.

Now, if some internet parasite unaffiliated with Hanson was hocking the same derivative gimcrack it would be okay, because we could live in the fantasy that Hanson doesn't know how badly they suck. That sounds snarky, but the suckiness is the source of the humor. Call it campiness or silliness if you prefer, but the root of the pleasure is in mockery. Sold by someone external to the suckiness, it retains its irony. It's unfair since the parasite is just as conniving, which makes the exercise even more cynical, but that's how it is. You can't profit off a joke about yourself.*

At present, googling for "Mmmhop IPA" returns a full screen of news sites reporting the same brief announcement. No where online can you buy, see, or read about this beer. Just a press release indicating it will appear sometime in 2012. A brand without a product. A news story without a story. An economy without a culture.

"Still, the pop band has its merchandising standards.
'We will never make dolls, lunch boxes or toothbrushes that play our songs for example," he said.'"

But we will sell buttons, scarfs, and Hansonopoly (anagram for: so onan, p.holy) with our branding all over them. Is it satire?

*Not intended to be a factual statement.

Yes, this is 100% real.

Fill in the blank: someone who interprets emphatic statements of honesty as obvious signs of deception are __________.



I don't understand why this website Texts from Bennett is popping up on my Facebook feed from multiple angles today. The people posting it are claiming it's "the best tumblr ever" or "so funny" or longing "I wish there were more." Bafflingly one wrote, "This is COMEDY!!!" as if front kicking his doubt into a well. Or perhaps he's just a Satire?blog reader and knows how hilarious it is to pretend things that suck might be intentional.

It's not a funny website, nor is it real. We know this for two reasons.

First, the author says it's 100% real. There is no surer sign of mendacity than figures in the 99-100th percentile. Similarly, any sentence that begins with "to be honest" is about to transform into some hilarious bullshit. I don't think these are physical laws that govern the universe or anything, I just know that in a meta world, that is any world where the majority of the population is 4+ years old and sentient, assertions of truth can't help but raise alarm. Why are you insisting something is true? Aha, because you have motives! Where there are motives there is bullshit; so, everywhere basically.

Second, the following exchange mentions a specific Lil' Wayne lyric.



This lyric was recently featured in a Bloomberg Businessweek article on RapGenius.com, which, I know, is basically the intersection of everything everything misunderstood in this world.

When the rapper Lil Wayne, aka Dwayne Mic Carter, was released from prison last year after doing time for attempted gun possession, he disappeared into the studio to work on his comeback album, Tha Carter IV. The rap star sent his fans into a frenzy with the release of the first single, 6 Foot 7 Foot, packed with densely woven boasts, threats, and drug references. There was one line, however, that confounded everybody: “Real Gs run in silence like lasagna.”

While some rap aficionados assumed Lil Wayne had blazed one joint too many, the founders of Rap Genius, a two-year-old website that uses the Internet’s hive mind to explore the deeper meanings of hip-hop wordplay, were determined to unravel the mystery. They posted the lyrics to 6 Foot 7 Foot and soon they had an answer. “When you pronounce ‘lasagna’ this G is silent,” Rap Genius contributor “vmoney” wrote on the site. “We certainly had that up before Yahoo! Answers (YHOO) or Cha Cha,” boasts Mahbod Moghadam, one of the site’s founders.

Do you believe Bennett would read Businessweek? Of course not, he's functionally illiterate and if he knew checking his texts was reading he'd stop doing it. So this website is clearly fictional.

At the moment it's not selling anything obvious other than Iphones, but it's relatively new. Viral marketing has to establish an audience first, and in this case they need to establish the two characters. Eventually things will change. They won't let Bennett, the buffoon character, endorse anything, so the nameless protagonist will start mentioning products he uses or political opinions he has. I think as the straight man he's suppose to do the pitching (which by the way is an insightful metaphor, a pun, and double entendre). In the event this site is maintained by a hobbyist and not a corporate firm, the site will be quietly monetized with ads on the sides and the obligatory Texts-from-Bennett Tshirts. In either event I am sure to see it again and again on my facebook feed.

Perhaps bath salts?

Save a Life: Stop Shopping

The day after Thanksgiving, the leading cause of accidental death in the United States between 4am and 6am is Black Friday. The leading cause of preventable death in those hours is still probably heart attack, which makes it sound more preventable than adults trampling other human beings underneath their feet. But it is not.





John Barryman explains how companies have adapted to life-threatening shopping.

As a precaution to avoid the 2008 incident where someone died, a Wal-mart store in Upland, CA decided to remain open all night to avoid lines and door-rushing. Unfortunately for them, customers began tearing into the shrink-wrapped products that were meant to be open and distributed for sale at 5 AM.

When turned away by employees, they started fighting inside, forcing the Wal-Mart to call police to kick all the customers out and close to clean-up in time for the sale at 5 AM.

The people, naturally, were pissed off, and it seems at that moment, most of them turned into zombies, banging on the glass doors and even eating some brains (not really on that last one). Some got crafty and tried to sneak into the back entrance and the lawn and garden section. Through-out the entire night, there was chanting of "let me in, let me in" and cops had to remain until 6:15 AM.

This coming from one of the store managers trying to calm the crowd, "It was scary." Meaning that crowd could have teared him limb from limb.

The arms race continue to escalate. One woman, evidentially applying lessons learned from the war in Iraq, deployed her offensive capability preemptively. "Moments after a Walmart in Los Angeles opened its doors at 10 p.m., one woman reportedly used pepper spray on at least 20 customers – some of whom were children – to keep them away from the discounted electronics she planned to buy."1

I say to the rest-of-the-world, alien observers, and ancestor spirits, that this is just what happens. It is the unavoidable outcome of incomes so high people can't remember what it's like to think about their own survival, while still too low for every wish automatically manifest via Sphere magic. We are the victims here, victims of our own success. Our government is agile and effective, our roads lead everywhere, and our economy provides for our every need. We have good reason to camp outside of stores for hours; it's the only means we have to improve our lives! John adds, “Here in the U.S., no matter how many civil liberties are denied certain groups, no matter how unhappy people are with their government, what it really takes to get people riled up is 40% off of a DVD set.” I don't know what he's saying on the first two points, but yeah, DVDs!

Our corporate string pullers are to thank. They're so effective at making and marketing widgets they can co-opt entire holiday traditions like Christmas, Valentine's Day, and now Thanksgiving to create this consumer carnival. It is a marvel the way gratitude, love, and Christ have been grossly fashioned into shiny gadgets and greeting cards to create the awesome Frankensteinian cultural creation of Black Friday. Only in America.

I don't recall hearing about Black Friday much until the mid 2000s. It was then that watching obese people squeeze through small entrances, like their own blood cells through plaque-laden arteries, became a guilty pleasure. In those days I still watched evening newscasts, and Black Friday reporting was a seductive mixture of corporate shilling during the lead up and stoic restraint in the aftermath. At first it didn't make sense why news producers feel coverage of the nearby sales serves the public good, nor the on-air talent showed so much restraint while reporting. Watch the corners of the anchor's mouth as he tries not to yell “fuck” during the following report.



You may also have noted the empty look in his eyes as hatred for mankind disintegrates the emotional centers in his brain. It now makes sense now 5 years later, as I too have discovered the way widgets fulfill me. Black Friday is education.

These door stampedes reacquaint adults with lessons learned in school about not running and how to queue. We see the pregnant lady mixing up those childhood drills as priority one is getting her wig back on, later considering getting off her belly. That's stop drop and roll lay there, lady. That's a fire safety technique! Perhaps she was trying to remain under the door frame until the shaking stopped. I'd like to think she was just dumbfounded by the savings.

It doesn't always turn into a gunfight or stampede. Here's what it looks like when things don't go horribly wrong:




Oh who am I kidding. Still horribly wrong. I can only take this as a critique of an educational system which provides no instruction in asking philosophical questions. If I had my buddy record me while I cackled and grabbed box after box of vibrators, that's what it would mean; it seems like a pretty obvious testament to the vibrator-shaped hole in our souls/intellect. So is this satire, or am I going to be posting videos of the first dirty bomb going off in the parking lot of a Walmart next Black Friday?

Redress = get dressed again what?!

One ongoing theme at Satire?blog is the difficulty distinguishing between stupidity and mockery. If someone fails sufficiently enough it can be impossible to tell if that person did so deliberately to make you laugh or make a point. Depending on the (1)source and your own (2)personal level of skepticism, you will make an informed guess as to the person's (3)intentions, and thusly decide (4)is it satire?

If I were to look at the democratic body of the US, I would see an astounding demonstration of confidence in lieu of actual expertise. Occupy Wall Street protesters provide a particularly wounding example: "It's unfair how investment banks can print money and use it for what they want." But a failure to understand how the government manages the national economy is not unique to park dwellers. These groups, literally demonstrating they can articulate neither the problem nor the solution, provide fertile grounds for asking are you fucking kidding me?

If I were responsible for solving the nation's problems and this was the feedback I got I might be inclined to react negatively. So it is understandable that on September 22nd the White House rolled out this petition mechanism on whitehouse.gov, no doubt as a means to more effectively discard with the risible sentiments of the hoi polloi. It allows you to petition the government for redress of grievances, which sounds a little-old fashioned.

It's also weird to think about. How is the government, the perpetual faceless bureaucracy, supposed to respond to millions of citizens? It's not God. Smaller, more local components of government lack the authority needed to address many grievances, and the institutions at the top certainly don't have time to address any which are not backed by a PAC. The idea of individuals talking to government is sweet, but indistinguishable from prayer.

Of course, that vague, dreamlike feeling you get from reading "petition the government for redress" is the fading memory of the first amendment. Oh high school civics! The way you made the structure and purpose of government so sensible. Much is lost by the time people become actual voters and start agitating for the 1% to pay their school loans or for the 47% to sink into the income gap with their bootstraps pulled up to their grimace.

Petitioning the government via the internet seems like a real solution which does not involve shitting in a park or posting photos of handwriting on the internet. Finally. But it's so plainly not a solution due to the much larger influence of campaign contributions, lobbying efforts, and grassroots movements funded by billionaires (the influence of physical protests belongs here in this parenthetical afterthought), that we have wonder if it is satire. Make a petition. Email your friends. Then go play in the kiddie pool.

A satire test I like to use for political issues is to ask if it could be featured as a joke on the Onion News Network. A system where 5,000 25,000 people need to electronically sign a petition to get a government essay in response? What good is a response? Is the response essay, written by the intern who "consulted relevant experts" going to a vote in the Congress? And if it did, would it get to go ahead of political bullshit that our legislators are currently involved with?

Many people are frustrated by what they view as a lack of responsive government and paradoxically, its intrinsic devotion to public relations. To those people this petition mechanism is a joke. So they use the joke to make a joke: We demand a vapid, condescending, meaningless, politically safe response to this petition. Hey yo dawg I heard you like satire so we put some satire in your satire so you can shake a fist and laugh while you humorously criticize a system of fist shaking.

The public's relationship to governance is as fascinating as it is depressing. The public mistrusts the government because the public does not believe it governs in their interests, but the public at all times will criticize the government for being influenced by the public. Through these simple rules we get a rich myriad of interactions which fill our TV boxes and news sheets daily; OWS & Tea etc. It's like a goddamn Mandelbrot sequence:

Travis Porter Make it Rain

Art rule #23: Make your art black and white to add meaning.
Rap rule #17: Lines that don't end with bitch should end with yeah.

Please pause and note your reaction around 30 seconds. 1)ask yourself whether you expect the rest of the video to be an enjoyable experience or not and 2)predict whether you will think the music is good music, regardless of your enjoyment.

A video in-part named "Viral Music Video."


At 30 seconds did you get an ominous feeling of "unggh...?" Were you dreading the rest of the video the way you might dread having AIDS? As for your prediction about the song's merit, were you certain it would have none although still curious if it will contain the familiar rap tropes you have previously enjoyed on BET?

I am embarrassed I gave that a Youtube view. Anyone who holistically enjoys that video is suffering from intellectual dysfunction. Visually it is interesting, and as a white person I liked that it had imagery from a Brita water commercial. But...as a whole it is the worst thing I can imagine. It makes Watermelon look good.

Putting "Viral Music Video" in the title of your song--which isn't about viral music videos--is the kind of meta-consideration (or lack thereof) on which this blog thrives. Is it wishful thinking? Is it a joke? Is it a joke on the obviousness of the joke? Do we believe the creators are in on the joke? Is this supposed to be actual music/film/policy? Should we see it as critique or humor? Is it satire? Or just depression-inducing reality? More to the point, if it isn't satire, what would actual satire look like?

God Hates America

I was saving the title of this post for an entry on the Westboro Baptist Church, but then I realized it wouldn't be ironic enough for that purpose.

Today it serves as the scientific conclusion to an experiment recently conducted by Western "secular" governments with rain prayers.

In response to Texan rivers drying up from over-demand, Governor Rick Perry ordained a weekend of prayer in April. Understanding that God controls the rain and if we ask Him nicely enough He will strike the clouds with the Holy Rainbringer, we can only conclude that the 5 billion dollars lost due to the worst year-long drought in Texas history means He didn't get the message.

This month, the desert-dwelling nation of Israel, frustrated by the perpetual lack of rain in deserts they settle in, took matters into their own two hands. As per their annual schedule they pressed their hands together and said "God, how about some rain?" And immediately God said unto them, "Okay." Immediately here indicates cause-and-effect and satisfaction due to low standards. Usually Israelis pray for rain for weeks.


Did they do a better job of praying to God? Or does just God work in mysterious ways of satire?

In a show of appreciation for God's sense of humor, the US Congress recently voted to remind everyone that in the 1950's they voted a national motto into law; "In God We Trust." Since no laws actually changed, the vote can't be construed as anything other than a sort of passive aggressive note for God, and...satire?

Note: Only the government is allowed to pray rather than act. If individuals use the same approach they will go to prison.

Megan is Missing is a horror/movie

Megan is Missing is so amateur it hurts. Horror should hurt, but for different reasons.

I doubt I could write dialogue that felt more contrived. Scene-after-scene of forced merrymaking and “friendship” assaulted my sense of humanity. It was as if some Google algorithm gathered up blog and youtube comments and wrote a script to try and convey teenage life. Now, if Google did that it would be interesting. Good job Google! You're a pre-sentient algorithm and a keyword like “friendship” is indistinguishable from other data. A for effort. But IMDB confirms this film was created by an actual human being so it is not interesting, just bad. To get a taste of writer/director Michael Goi's writing ability, check out the summary on the back of the box:


The whole script is like this. They're friends because you're told they are!

Have you ever seen a movie where a 14 year old incredulously explains being face-raped by a camp counselor? I hadn't either, until about 20 minutes into this one. The point where she begins to describe, with a smile, turning blue, is when I began examining this movie from arms-length like a piece of art. Why is the scriptwriter putting these words in her mouth? Why is the scriptwriter explaining how much cum the molester deposited in her mouth? Most of all, what does this scene do for the movie? Ostensibly the graphic recollection is some sort of characterization; typically horror films attach you to characters in the first half and kill them off in the second. But after seeing the whole film I'm convinced the playful 10-year-old throat fucking scene is just there to be controversial.

Then I began to wonder what it meant about me that I was still watching, and how people might view me if they knew I was watching a film where a teenage character verbally reenacted forced sex with glee. Not because I thought the scene was realistic and I fear for the souls of the teenagers but because the role of sexual taboo in our society is so active I'm forecasting the potential impact this post will make on my future careers. “Says here on your resume you watched Megan is Missing, a terrible film.” A moral person would have turned the film off rather than consider it's effectiveness as a film, right? Writing this review was the scariest part of the film for me.



Then there was the equally sensationalized party scene. Parents be warned, if you give your 14-year-old ten dollars, she's going to spend it on the entrance fee to a “party” in a furniture-less abandoned house where they love Heineken and videotape everything. Boy do they love Heineken. But there is also cocaine, pills, and sex, so for ten dollars it's a bargain. Some of the savings is due to the lights being off, but the kids are well-practiced in relying on flashlights to take their hits, so relax. If you want a movie that deals honestly with sexualization and drug use in teens I recommend Thirteen. Because Thirteen is sincere it is potentially much more horrifying than this painful excuse for a film.



I enjoyed the Dateline-esque news show portion. Its flashy graphics and cloying host highlighted the way victims are exploited by shows like America's Most Wanted, Unsolved Mysteries, and even Doctor Phil, and more broadly the way the media sensationalizes. After its dramatic reenactment I was finally convinced that this film was a satire about well-meaning parental obsession with violent “predators,” akin to the 1st world fascination with 3rd world cannibalism in Cannibal Holocaust. But I have had to adjust my conviction after seen the film in its entirety, as satire seems outside the ability of the writer/director given the failure of the film in so many other areas.

Clearly the final scenes are Goi's attempts at horror, but it was unclear what he achieved. I concede I got a good jolt that made my hair stand up, but the rest was a pain to watch; more boring than anything, and I'm not referring just to the rape scene. The human imagination is the most powerful tool a filmmaker can harness to create fear, so darkness and keeping horrible things out of the frame are generally effective. But Goi managed to turn this sort of space-for-thinking into naptime with the extended cuts that dull rather than enhance emotional turmoil. If you want to see an excruciating rape scene that fully conveys the brutality of the act check out Irreversible. If you want someone to exploit rape for shock value--and fail--watch Megan is Missing.


At times unbearable to watch, Irreversible is a finely made film that explores dark qualities of human nature. The moments that turn your stomach do so because they treat their subjects seriously and honestly. When a rape is the cause of the plot and a means to explore vengeance and sexuality in otherwise normal people, it would be senseless to turn it into montage. The Irreversible rape scene is almost 10 brutal minutes long. After a few seconds viewers don't want be there anymore, but the filmmaker doesn't let them off the hook. Just as the rape victim can't close her eyes and make it go away, neither can the viewer. By unflinchingly refusing to cut away, Irreversible affirms the reality of rape within the scene, and in the context of the entire movie creates a parallel urge in the viewer to exhibit justice on the perpetrator.

Goi doesn't cut away either, but there's no hook to be on. Megan is Missing fails to humanize its characters in the first place, reducing the seriousness of rape to an off screen gag. If you haven't seen the movie you can get the same sense by imagining a single pane comic. In it, a husband and wife stand in the kitchen looking down at a broken vase. His speech bubble says “that makes me sad, honey.” “Honey” is the author's means of conveying life-long love and commitment (see: DVD back cover). Now Goi, having chosen an object for his tragedy, decides to shock the viewer by making the comic into a full-page spread, showing the vase tumbling senselessly to the floor and painstakingly shattering. Would this comic shock you? No, it's a vase. Thankfully vase-breaking isn't as important an act as rape, because if the comic was about rape you'd be staring frightfully into the unmasked id of a sociopath for whom rape is a really scary thing that scares parents, and therefore belongs in the Sunday paper. The only shocking part of the comic is when you wonder why a full-page comic doesn't find the time to examine why they are so concerned about a broken vase. Seems important, no?*

I wager this film will be effective only for dumb parents, so shocked at the lives their teenagers might be living they get tunnel vision and see past the glaring failures as a horror film. Everything has been done better. The parts where we're supposed to care for the characters is tortuous, and the parts where we're supposed to watch them suffer is not torturous. As a satire about the way the media conjures fear of predators in parents, I felt the film was much more successful. But is it satire?

Michael Goi:

The next Tommy Wiseau?


*For more on the connection between Goi, Wiseau, and the unexamined concern for a vase, check out An Important Film.

God I Love Awkward

This is a perfect example of kids who are probably too studious to belong to the meta-narrative of "I Love College."



This video is clearly a project for school and unless that project was to record a 4 minute music video during a 10 minute break, someone's GPA is taking a hit. Protip: reshoot until at least one person is lip syncing.

I'm not sure how to take this. On one hand it looks like a response to "I Love College," highlighting how far-fetched or unrealistic that lifestyle is for them. Unrealistic because for various ethno-economic reasons, they go to a school that wears uniforms. They probably have parents who require good grades. They may even live at home. They also scatter when girls appear, whereas Asher Roth makes out with them. "I Love College" excludes them because they know that at one dollar(s) a slice they will exhaust their allowance, and that imprudent spending begets debt.

In a sentence, their video says "look at how stupid 'I Love College' looks from prep school." "I wished we taped it because then I would have documentary evidence of being at said party." One of them even brandishes a condom at 2:00. Hah hah son, put the condom away, you'll need that for masturbating. Given that at least 100% more people in this video will graduate college than in Asher Roth's video, it reveals "I Love Collage" to be a juvenile, short-sighted creedo. And they are correct.

On the other hand, this analysis assumes their awkwardness and failure to deliver on even the most pizza-based lyrics is intentional, which is hard to accept. To think any of these kids danced their asses off last night and had this one girl completely naked you would have to be blind. One conspicuous student is wearing a helmet in their school's hallway and that is likely the craziest thing he's ever done; hopefully his parents won't find out.

They seem to be having fun, so maybe they like "I Love College." Bros stick around for their bros to come down the slide, ya know? Given that there's not a single head-bob in sync during the 4 minute video they need the "I Love College" ethic more than anyone. If they do indeed wish they could get the equally awkward girls at their school drunk, then this is not satire, it is an homage. It's a dress-up. It says "hey, look, we could be cool guys, just get drunk and smoke some weed first, please." It says, "I love college, not for it's rigorous engineering program but it's opportunities to play a dexterity based drinking game called beer pong," or "I love drinking debauchery because it has reliable rules like don't pass out with your shoes on and don't have sex if she's too gone. And ladies, I follow such rules."

Who knows, maybe when they go to college they'll uninstall Minecraft and wear sunglasses to house parties. Or perhaps their parents instilled work ethics instead of entitlement. I prefer to imagine they're celebrating not fitting the meta-narrative mold, because that means passing out at 3 will be in the library, and doing it again at 10 will help change the world. We can't be sure. The semiological meaning of various scenes leave me baffled.

Their idea of hazing a freshman (denoted by glasses, which is what nerds look like to kids wearing uniforms) is running up to him and repeatedly patting him down. What are they searching for, weed? Pogs?

There's a scene where they coolly open a locker, and proceed to stomp the living shit out of the notebooks that fall out. What is the object of your hate? Is it the nearness of the locker to the floor and the propensity of books to fall out of it? Or is it the books themselves? If that isn't a strong epistemological vote for "I Love College" then I don't know what is.

I also noticed the hilarious scene on the playground where Asher Roth says "you know what's going down," and visually before us is a slide. Is it satire?

I Love Party by Asher Roth

Pretty sure this is what Plato envisioned when he started the academy:



Asher Roth has never been out of the G8. "I Love College" is a catchy tune we can all relate to, having been induced to debauch our college experience by songs like, "I Love College." Is it just a party anthem, or also a satire of that inescapable cultural narrative therein?

Why D. Willz be actin' silly

If I were to try and attack contemporary popular hip hop it would be for the the gayness with which it celebrates materialism, the brash presentation of male sexuality, the audacious facade of self-esteem with the paradoxical lack of self-reflection, and the complete absence of effort linguistically or poetically.

So if I wrote a parody it might:
1)Show poor conditions from which no one is thinking about yachts, like a farm of (possibly) migrant workers.
2)Make it contain absurd references to sex, although making them any more absurd than they already are would be challenging. Comparisons to food and animals maybe?
3)Show no attempt to use real words or rhyme scheme. Like every line should end in "ey" or "ly."
4)And I'd probably make it about watermelon, because I'm a racist.

Behold:

I did not make this video. But undoubtedly it's everything that's wrong with hip hop rolled into a 3 minute video package. It's catchy, but is it also satire?