"Don't knock, boost!" pleaded President Warren Harding. Well, fuck a bunch of that. We need more people to deconstruct, slash, poke holes through, belittle, and make fun of all that is certain or prevailing.
Thus, Defending the Right Not to Have a Nice Day.
Speaking curmudgeonly if not as a curmudgeon, I'm not so much for jumping to cynical conclusions about individuals as I am groups. To paraphrase Nietzsche, madness is rare in individuals (though the fact that he himself was one of the rarities confuses things a bit) but in groups insanity is the age-old rule. So that's one thing in favour of a curmudgeonly disposition.
There's an exception, however, to the amnesty given individuals: it's the lesson learned from Suetonius, that otherwise decent individuals almost invariably become depraved when given power -- or a pulpit, I'd add.
Knowledge and progress can't come from many yay-saying responses to the powerful or the punditry. A critical or sarcastic climate is the best environment to subject to these factions.
So, give me some shit, readers, just as I give shit to others.
To those who would say, why surely its better to affirm than deny, better to create than destroy, I'd say that it's a service to knock away what is false or fake or inferior in the context of ideas and art. As such, parody, satire and critical demolition (none of that constructive touchy-feely crap) function as necessities -- as well as great fun.
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Edit -- apropos of the above, I especially recommend the latest destruction of Republican stupidity and hypocrisy from the geniuses of Sadly, No.
posted by RETARDO MONTALBAN @ 4:22 AM
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