Great Moments in Conservative Humor, or Why I Should Write for The American Prospect
Me, 2/11/07
Staunchly ideological, partisan kind of thinkers are rarely as funny as those who can see both sides of an issue. I don't always agree with moderates, but they're more funny. Great satire can be designed to convince an audience, but the best jokes are usually focused solely on being jokes as opposed to expressing a political viewpoint.
...
You'll never come up with something funny if you go in with that attitude. "I've got to find something some liberal has done to make fun of!" It's lame and predictable. First, find something FUNNY. If you need to do political comedy, then find something political that's FUNNY. Then talk about that, and your ideology should come through naturally. If you have any talent as a comic.
The American Prospect, 8/8/07
What the Konservetkult has failed to grasp through all this is that art is most successful when it is not put slavishly in the service of political ideology. To be sure, art and politics have commingled in the past, from Beethoven's symphonic tribute to Napoleon to Goya's graphic depictions of war, to South Park's barbed libertarian social satire. But lasting political art uses politics as its inspiration; in the Konservetkult's calculus, politics must always use art. Normal people look at a piece of art and ponder how it changes their view of the world, or how it deepens their appreciation for life. The right's culture critics look at art and ask, "How can this help us win?"
I really liked the article, but damn...how come I can barely eke out 200 readers a day if I'm this far ahead of the curve? Also, I was hating on Zach Braff for, like, 2 years before it was cool, and I first saw TV on the Radio right after the "Young Liars" EP first came out. Face.
2 comments:
"from Beethoven's symphonic tribute to Napoleon"
Boy, I hope that doesn't represent the accuracy of the information your team is putting on Mahalo. Beethoven dedicated his Eroica symphony to Napoleon when he began writing it, but angrily scratched out the dedication after Napoleon had himself declared emperor of France.
That quote's from yesterday's The American Prospect. Doesn't appear on Mahalo anywhere. And just for the record, our team has been repeatedly trained diligently fact-check every assertion before adding it to Mahalo.
Actually, I'm glad you pointed this out, because it means that in addition to finally getting around to covering a story I was on to in FEBRUARY, the Prospect can't even get their basic facts straight!
Post a Comment