Ha!! Take that!!
How did it feel reading that as you opened up this page? It didn’t shock you. Move you. Or anger you at all, did it?
I didn’t think so. And that my friends, has become a problem for me. The last couple of days my posts have been late because well…I can’t think of anything to write about in a way that would elicit disturbed laughter and/or true outrage in people.
You know why?
I believe we Americans have become mental and emotional zombies, and that is making things difficult for guy like me who dabbles in the art of clever and sophisticated shock prose which we call satire.
Some of my malaise and lack of literary fire can be blamed on the weather. For the past three months here in Ohio, we have had what seems like a mere four days of sunshine. Seasonal Affective Disorder? Oh yeah, there’s something to that. However…
Much of the problem lies with our state of society and culture. For instance…
Perhaps I could write an uproariously hilarious satirical piece about a conservative Governor in a conservative southern state who bolts from his duties, skips town, skips out on his wife, and hikes to Argentina in order to have sex with a hot babe in Buenos Aires. Ha, Ha, and then, and then people dig it…Hee Hee…
A couple of years later this same wacky, adulterous Governor who left office in shame and disgrace runs in a special election to become the U.S. Rep. from South Carolina’s 1st Congressional District and garners more votes than any other Republican. Ha…that would make a great piece of satire. Well, it would have, however…
Last night? Real life beat me to the punch line when Mark Sanford far outdistanced his Republican opponents in the aforementioned special election. Thanks a lot South Carolinians!! Fucking Gamecocks…
Or…or…yeah here we go…I could write a scathing, biting, and jocular piece of satire about the GOP, the party of moral superiority and fiscal frugality hosting a conference and two of the headliners are a half term Governor/reality TV star who gives birth to out of wedlock baby makers and a thrice bankrupted reality TV host. Ha!! That has possibilities maybe I’ll----
Wait…What? That happened at C-Pac last week? What the fuck? See what I mean? I guess one can no longer say, “Art, or in this case satire, imitates life.”, because life IS satire these days. One big, satirical string of events after another.How can I compete with life when life and actual events have become their own laugh factory to the point where the wacky and edgy are no longer wacky nor edgy?
Jay and I often joke about how politicians, pundits, and various people are quick to pop themselves in front of TV camera in order to feign outrage over the latest non-crisis or comment they had recently heard. I think Jay and I have stumbled upon something that has happened in and to this country.
The reason that these folks feign outrage is because they have to fake it, because no one is any longer actually outraged…about anything!! Anything that matters that is.
Oy…The last time I managed to actually outrage anyone through my satire was ayear and a half ago when I wrote about the “true reason” that Anders Behring Breivik went on a rampage and killed a smelt tin full of Norwegians. Oh Baby!!
We had a more than a hand full of pissed off Norwegians (and Dutch people for some reason) more than a little ticked off at IWS.
But man…that was, as I said, a long, long time ago. So I figure I have two options as to how to once again make an impression and elicit emotion through my writing.
I could one, step up my game. Get better at it, be more creative, or number two…
Move to Norway. Hmmmmmmmmm?
I think I’ll opt for option one because as I mentioned earlier…I get bummed out during the drudgery and dreariness of an Ohio winter; I bet I would become downright suicidal trying to live through a winter in Oslo.
Cheers!!
Matt-Man
mattmaniws@ymail.com
@mattman_iws
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I Am Stuck in the Middle of a More Ass Updated at :
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Wednesday, March 20, 2013
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