Humor and Society

[Ierrellus]

I have the good fortune of being a babyboomer. My generation had Kurt Vonnegut, our own Mark Twain. My children weren't so lucky. They got Seinfeld.
What they got was a comedian who discovered how ordinary, mundane life-experiences were silly. We could laugh about them. It is clear from the sitcom that Seinfeld cannot think deeply enough to consider humor as an antidote for fear. For the fear that recognizes that we are not only hell-bent toward extinction, but we are proud of it. Clemens and Vonnegut saw that. Seinfeld doesn't.
The characters in Seinfeld's show all appear well-to-do. They seem to spend most of their time not working, but in gabfests at spiffy apartments and avant-guarde diners. As a slice of life, the show is like a skunk sprayed with our perfumes.
You would think that a comedian who begins with his back against a brick wall would be out for vengeance, not out for redifining "cool". Remember when cool meant finding no comfort in the warm fuzzy atmosphere of public inanity and hypocrisy? Remember Lenny?
Those were the days.
Yadda, yadda, yadda.

[jonquil]

Thank you masked man.

I once tried listening to the Lenny Bruce concert at Carnegie Hall in 1961. It felt very weird listening to his spiel on so many timely topics that seemed rather bold and avant garde for that time... e.g.,his take on genocide; abortion; interracial marriage; Miami and Guantanamo; etc. I have to say he sounded just like an ordinary mensch, but with a mind towards social justice through excoriating humor.

[tentative]

Ier,

Is it possible that Seinfeld, in emphasizing the inanities of today's "culture", is another way of forcing people to look in the mirror? Is there any chance that his comedy is seducing people to ask questions about themselves? Obviously, this sort of comedy is missed by the large majority, but maybe he is trying to talk to the few that are able to comprehend the irony?

Yeah, Lenny... Loved him. Carlin was another one. In-your-face confrontation. But maybe they are just two styles of comedy attempting to reach the same goal?

There just might be a subtle difference between seduction and rape...

[-Billy-]

I thought Hineline put it well in Stranger in a Strange Land when him main character suddenly realized why humans laugh and could not stop himself for quite some time... He realized that we laugh to nullify or comfort all the agony in our world... Tragedy = Comedy. I'm not a literary buff, but I'm pretty sure that theme has been around for quite some time in literature... And I life, I assume.

[Billy]

Is it possible that Seinfeld, in emphasizing the inanities of today's "culture", is another way of forcing people to look in the mirror? Is there any chance that his comedy is seducing people to ask questions about themselves? Obviously, this sort of comedy is missed by the large majority, but maybe he is trying to talk to the few that are able to comprehend the irony?

Seinfeld is capitalist propaganda. But good on you that you have such imagination to see more in than that.

Yeah, Lenny... Loved him. Carlin was another one. In-your-face confrontation. But maybe they are just two styles of comedy attempting to reach the same goal?

Mr. Carlin is really nice. But also a capitalist propaganda machine. His stand-up really helped me to see that progress out of the BC period values is always simultaniously a movemnet into capitalist alienation.

My all time fave comedien is Bill Hicks, in particular his "Is there a point" was revelatory.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iMUiwTubYu0

[Ierrellus]

Ier,

Is it possible that Seinfeld, in emphasizing the inanities of today's "culture", is another way of forcing people to look in the mirror? Is there any chance that his comedy is seducing people to ask questions about themselves? Obviously, this sort of comedy is missed by the large majority, but maybe he is trying to talk to the few that are able to comprehend the irony?

Yeah, Lenny... Loved him. Carlin was another one. In-your-face confrontation. But maybe they are just two styles of comedy attempting to reach the same goal?

There just might be a subtle difference between seduction and rape...

If you've heard Seinfeld's latest judgement of Lady Gaga, you might realize that he is too uptight to think deeply about our looking at ourselves in the mirror and escaping to humor from the horrors of what we see. Subtle, he is not.

[Ierrellus]

Is it possible that Seinfeld, in emphasizing the inanities of today's "culture", is another way of forcing people to look in the mirror? Is there any chance that his comedy is seducing people to ask questions about themselves? Obviously, this sort of comedy is missed by the large majority, but maybe he is trying to talk to the few that are able to comprehend the irony?

Seinfeld is capitalist propaganda. But good on you that you have such imagination to see more in than that.

Yeah, Lenny... Loved him. Carlin was another one. In-your-face confrontation. But maybe they are just two styles of comedy attempting to reach the same goal?

Mr. Carlin is really nice. But also a capitalist propaganda machine. His stand-up really helped me to see that progress out of the BC period values is always simultaniously a movemnet into capitalist alienation.

My all time fave comedien is Bill Hicks, in particular his "Is there a point" was revelatory.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iMUiwTubYu0

Geeze, Billy, where have you been? The video--much appreciated. The insights, IMHO, yours and those expressed by Hicks are accurate and needed! I watched as Bill Cosby got the Mark Twain Award for humor and thought to myself well, this is another fortunate son being congratulated by other fortunate sons, while his views on immigration, on the plight of young blackmen., etc are about as prejudicial as are those of the whites who honored him--a tragic irony. And Seinfeld, for me at least, is too into the designer jean and urban cool generation to speak to any social issue that involves inequality.

[tentative]

Ier,

Is it possible that Seinfeld, in emphasizing the inanities of today's "culture", is another way of forcing people to look in the mirror? Is there any chance that his comedy is seducing people to ask questions about themselves? Obviously, this sort of comedy is missed by the large majority, but maybe he is trying to talk to the few that are able to comprehend the irony?

Yeah, Lenny... Loved him. Carlin was another one. In-your-face confrontation. But maybe they are just two styles of comedy attempting to reach the same goal?

There just might be a subtle difference between seduction and rape...

If you've heard Seinfeld's latest judgement of Lady Gaga, you might realize that he is too uptight to think deeply about our looking at ourselves in the mirror and escaping to humor from the horrors of what we see. Subtle, he is not.

It's possible that your agenda for what is humor might be just a bit narrow in scope. There is little in human activity that isn't laughable - even if it is gallows humor. C'mon Ier, don't be a disappointed old hippie looking for deep messages. There might not be any. You mention Gaga. Now there is a sick joke if there ever was one.

[Tab]

Ga-ga's the point of the spear, let her thrust.

She's interesting to me, in that she's representative of all the things a person has to be to achieve aclaim with the rapidity she has in our current society. She is either simply probabalistic, or extremely well-informed, and flexible enough to take advantage. Either way, respect.

[Ierrellus]

Seinfeld describes Lady Gaga as an artist whose only claim to fame is exhibitionism. I disagree. She's, IMHO, a gutsy, juicy, in your face rocker! And that's how rock began: shock the parents! ("It is the duty of the young to shock us and keep us up to date".--G. B. Shaw.)
Back to the OP, we seem to have established that there is more than one type of humor that serves as an antidote for fear and dread. One type is the silliness of everyday situations; another is the multiple meanings of words; another is social satire. If we could group these like beers, there are some that are the dregs, some that come from the middle of the vat; and some that are mostly froth. All of them do the job of getting you intoxicated.

[Billy]

Lady Gaga as an artist whose only claim to fame is exhibitionism. I disagree. She's, IMHO, a gutsy, juicy, in your face rocker! And that's how rock began: shock the parents! ("It is the duty of the young to shock us and keep us up to date".--G. B. Shaw.)

The first time I heard Lady Gaga was her "Paparazzi" on MTV; I was immediately impressed to say the least: the wheelchair, the crutches... And I was not the only one seeing something really brilliant. It is too obvious to mention that MTV and pop-music are the system's over-writer/programmer; but when Paul Watson of Prison Planet, and no less than Dorian Lynskey of The Guardian report on blogger Vigilant Citizen's analysis of Lady Gaga it's worth having a deeper look.

Vigilant unpacks the Illuminati symbolism in "Alejandro"; but let's not attribute more mendaciousness to the elites than is due; we are all human and if someone sees only militaristic conditioning where there is atleast as accurately great satire and commentary, then it is the analyst who is caught in sheep-think.

Watson's analysis which opens, "Dumbed-down, amoral, nihilistic drivel from the likes of Gaga ... serves to keep the masses in a state of spiritual decay" is reactionary and simplistic. By comparison, he would also see D-9 as propaganda, which it of course is at the lowest level, but, much more important is the satire and criticism: (no one can criticize capitalism without making themselves its advanced guard); Germanotta (Lady Gaga) is no puppet, she's a shrewd Italian-American with a good fine arts education.

Lady Gaga's video's are brilliant art, please enjoy,

Lady Gaga, "Paparazzi",
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=d2smz_1L2_0

Lady Gaga, "Telephone",
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EVBsypHzF3U

Lady Gaga, "Alejandro",
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=niqrrmev4mA


Analysis:

Paul Watson, Popular Music Is The Babylon System
http://www.prisonplanet.com/popular-mus ... ystem.html

Dorian Lynskey, Lady Gaga and the New World Order,
http://www.guardian.co.uk/music/2010/ju ... illuminati

Vigilant Citizen, Lady Gaga’s “Alejandro”: The Occult Meaning,
http://vigilantcitizen.com/?p=3979

[Ierrellus]

Billy,
I was more concerned with Seinfeld's decsription of Lady Gaga than of her merits as an entertainer, even though I used Shaw's quote to emphasize that her place in popular culture, whatever it is, is open to interpretation, not to elitist dismissal. Who knows--she may be as much of a money and limelight ho as Seinfeld appears to be.

[matthatter]

I have the good fortune of being a babyboomer. My generation had Kurt Vonnegut, our own Mark Twain. My children weren't so lucky. They got Seinfeld.

Simple as that, huh? One humorist per generation?

What they got was a comedian who discovered how ordinary, mundane life-experiences were silly. We could laugh about them.

More specifically, the show demonstrated how a biased and goal-oriented mind's (interpretations and responses to) "ordinary", "mundane" life-experiences were (when viewed in light of a different eye) silly (and, by emphasizing the uniqueness of an individual's subjective "constructions", not ordinary, nor mundane).

It is clear from the sitcom that Seinfeld cannot think deeply enough to consider humor as an antidote for fear.

Maybe he cannot think "deeply enough" to consider that, maybe he can. Are you suggesting he isn't because his humor isn't an act of criticizing war and other possible causes of extinction?

For the fear that recognizes that we are not only hell-bent toward extinction, but we are proud of it. Clemens and Vonnegut saw that. Seinfeld doesn't.

Okay...

The characters in Seinfeld's show all appear well-to-do.

What is "Well to do"? How do they appear that way?

They seem to spend most of their time not working, but in gabfests at spiffy apartments and avant-guarde diners.

avant-garde diners?

As a slice of life, the show is like a skunk sprayed with our perfumes.

Hm

You would think that a comedian who begins with his back against a brick wall would be out for vengeance, not out for redifining "cool".

Was redefining "cool" the purpose of Seinfeld?

Remember when cool meant finding no comfort in the warm fuzzy atmosphere of public inanity and hypocrisy?

Maybe you boomers were too intoxicated to figure out that those things are inescapable, and that living in society means putting up with it. I'm not claiming any intentional significance to Seinfeld, but it registered with a lot of generations Xers because the focus on rational contradictions and practicality
--all in the context of one trying to make and meet personal goals without any clear, fundamental socioculturally-backed moral system providing support and guidance--
rang true with their own concerns (the ongoing attempt of trying to find, do and maintain "right" in a hurricane of conflicting opinions).

Generation X didn't grow up programmed to think they were the most fortunate children--thanks to their being American and getting to live the american way;
they didn't grow up with an assurance of high hopes for their futures, given they respect and follow their social systems, and their authorities.

Instead they grew up raised by a generation that did, and were then affected by the illusion of absolute good being torn apart by an explosion of conflicting views. The baby boomers trusted the authority figures as they grew up; they gave their hearts and souls for the promise of safety and happiness. Then their binkies were torn from their mouths, and all they had left was crying over the injustice of this and that. They didn't all agree with the rational of each other's criticisms, but they all shared the emotional determination of finding things that were wrong.

And that's what Generation X was fed. Lesson after conflicting lesson of what is wrong. With few beliefs and values remaining untethered, Generation X doesn't live with its heart as much as it does its rigorous "flaw checker".

Why no passionate quest for vengeance, and limited public outcries against the hypocrisy of this and that? Because those who followed the baby boomers never lived without it, and have grown trained to expect it.

[Ierrellus]

One humorist per generation? No way. The selection was based on quality, not quantity; and the quality was based on creative insights about the human condition. My children were Xers. Their favorite program was the Michael J. Fox sitcom about a capitalistic kid who seems to outsmart his "hippie" parents. They loved Seinfeld. This was the Reagan generation when idealism was seen as a drag on good old self-centered materialism. IMHO, the Xers were balless followers. But all this generational conflict is really beside the point. if you think getting the goods is more desireable than charity, you are really going against the best of Jesus' teachings and the moral considerations of our founding fathers. Not all hippies can be described as the "me" generation escapists. Some were actually Jesus freaks. Hopefully, now, there is a third generation that may be able to bounce back to empathy and compassion, even when it is politically unpopular.

[matthatter]

One humorist per generation? No way. The selection was based on quality, not quantity;

...

My point was you chose one humorist for each. You chose an extremely influential novelist (also a president of the American Humanist Association) for one, and a sitcom writer for the other.

and the quality was based on creative insights about the human condition.

The whole thing was based on a bias, that's it. It all started with your dislike of Seinfeld.

My children were Xers. Their favorite program was the Michael J. Fox sitcom about a capitalistic kid who seems to outsmart his "hippie" parents. They loved Seinfeld.

Even if this applied to them in adulthood it wouldn't mean anything. An entertainment interests doesn't define one's absolute being, and demonstrate their intellectual/emotional/etc. limitations.

This was the Reagan generation when idealism was seen as a drag on good old self-centered materialism. IMHO, the Xers were balless followers.

Ballessness implies one one wants one thing, and thinks it is the right thing to go for, and doesn't do so due to fear. What do you think they should have been, and should be, doing?

But all this generational conflict is really beside the point. if you think getting the goods is more desireable than charity, you are really going against the best of Jesus' teachings and the moral considerations of our founding fathers.

What the...

Not all hippies can be described as the "me" generation escapists. Some were actually Jesus freaks. Hopefully, now, there is a third generation that may be able to bounce back to empathy and compassion, even when it is politically unpopular.

You're just all over the place now...

Well okay take pride in the times with which you define yourself. I won't bother you.

[Churro the Viscous]

i love seinfeld
i think the show (not the standup) can be quite existential
not on the surface, of course, but between the lines i find a lot of depth

[Ierrellus]

Matt,
I stated my bias at the outset. If you don't like it, don't muddle the thread with irrelevant and prejudicial criticisms. All over the place? Why, yes. Sometimes you have to go around the barn to find which way is in.

[tentative]

I think that trying to define humor is much like trying to poke a wet noodle up a bobcat's ass...

[Ierrellus]

Thanks,Tent!
With apologies to the Matthatter, I'll admit that the line I attempted to draw between Clemens and Seinfeld is a weak one. Clemens and Vonnegut were prolific writers. Seinfeld is not. It can be said that, in a sense, all three were standup comedians. In the days of Clemens and Vonnegut standup was done on lecture tours.
My references to generational tastes in comedy are, of course, incomplete. I am only lamenting here my belief that comedy as social satire may have died with Vonnegut or with the best of Woody Allen.
I was too old and too conservative to be a hippie. I was too liberal to be a Reganite. I see nothing of the generation of Xers that defines them as a group. I also realize that my descriptions of the generations are limited to the most vocal part of the population and does not take into account societal tastes en masse. Cool in the 50s meant beatnic.
That being said, whatever became of comedy as social satire? Maybe I'm just ignorant of its present existence. I admit I watch Seinfeld and enjoy his show. I'd like to hear more of those who believe what he does in his shows is social satire and do not buy my opinion of the shows as shallow and superficial.

[uglypeoplefucking]

Seinfeld is definitely amusing, but totally apolitical - if you want Gen X social satire, you won't really find it there - you need instead to look to a show like The Simpsons, or maybe South Park (tho the latter kind of spills over into Gen Y, both in spirit and chronology)

also Chappelle's Show or the stand up of someone like Chris Rock if you want the really challenging racially-charged satire like you used to get from a Lenny Bruce or, say, a Richard Pryor . . .

[tentative]

Ier,

I think that part of the problem in defining social satire today is finding something that ISN'T social satire. What is comedic today is cutesy commentary on all social intereaction. Is it because comedy has become superficial or is it because, socially, the audience has become superficial? Whatever happened to slap stick comedy? No one slips on a banana peel any more. We rarely find humor in the individual, but in their social circumstances. Life ain't quite as funny as it used to be.

[Ierrellus]

Seinfeld is definitely amusing, but totally apolitical - if you want Gen X social satire, you won't really find it there - you need instead to look to a show like The Simpsons, or maybe South Park (tho the latter kind of spills over into Gen Y, both in spirit and chronology)

also Chappelle's Show or the stand up of someone like Chris Rock if you want the really challenging racially-charged satire like you used to get from a Lenny Bruce or, say, a Richard Pryor . . .

Yep. Chappelle does it well. My favorite of his is the black, blind guy who is KKK! Simpsons and South Park do carry on the good, in your face, satire. So, there is really much of it out there. I liked Richard Pryor, but found Eddie Murphy's satire weak and dependent on verbal shock. Whoopie Goldberg did a better job of speaking about the inequalities her race is subjected to. Example: "Just say no!" said Nancy Reagen about drugs. To which Whoopie responded (paraphrased). Imagine this family with 8 or 10 kids, abandonned by the father, living in abject poverty in a one room apartment. One kid earns a thousand dollars a week selling drugs to folks who want them. Just say no?