…have mercy [DOT 9/6/24] (v. 1.1)

now...at at the hour of our death...

9/6/24 SplinterRIP 25

…I know I always go on about the shortcuts to navigate past the walls of text at warp-speed…& I did end up with this header image for sundays on account of a gag about getting monday replaced with a second sunday…as a pillar of faith kinda proposition…with tax benefits…but…honestly…it wasn’t a long con intentionally designed to give me a pulpit from which to declaim a sermon that would take two days to get to the end of

…so…anyone who makes it to the end of what was meant to just be a regular averagely-overlong DOT…full marks for effort…in fact…it’s sunday…double marks…at least

…but…if the only part you weren’t absolutely sure you weren’t here for on a day of rest was the tunes at the end…look no further?

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25 Comments

  2. I wonder how old this guy is:

    https://www.msnbc.com/opinion/msnbc-opinion/jon-stewart-reaction-trump-verdict-hush-money-trial-rcna155383

    Because “news” started becoming “entertainment” as far back as the ’80’s.  I even remember watching a comedy sketch way back then which was skewering this decidedly unsubtle shift in how the news was being presented.

    Sure, Stewart’s approach was very different, but it didn’t start with him.  His predecessor, Craig Kilborn, did the same thing–he just wasn’t as good at it. There were also a lot of one-off parodies of news programs which used real news and twisted it.  So, to blame Stewart for this stuff, just because he happened to be the most successful at it, is myopic at best.

    Yes, yes, MSNBC is definitely different from the other major media channels.  But holy shit did they do the exact same thing as the others when it came to the overall coverage.  My MIL watches the channel all day long, so when we go to visit, I would see the trial coverage.  There was a mix of about 10% real, useful, content, and 90% filler rubbish.  So, no, it’s not Jon Stewart’s fault.  It’s the fault of the executives who decided that making news entertaining was the way to go.  The people who bitch about Stewart’s “bothsidesing” are simply too wrapped up in their own cocoons to be willing to accept the criticism.

    • …private eye has only been at it since the 60s…but the folks at le canard enchainé have been at it since 1915 or so…& I don’t think it was new then

      …how we do it has added a few dimensions since then

      …still…if I had to guess…dude might not be younger than me but would need to be to be close to having an excuse…either way…seems to mistake cart for horse…which is a neat trick of perspective presumably produced when a horse’s ass looks at the cart in front of it?

    • Weekend Update is the first example I can think of “politainment” (which is a stupid fucking word). SNL has been on since 1975. I don’t think there’s a legitimate case to blame that form of comedy on Jon Stewart. I would say, yes, he’s the best at it, largely because he’s smart and does research (SNL was just reading jokes off a teleprompter). Though John Oliver is pretty damn good too, for the same reason.

    • Michigan is under siege? Presumably she means Muslim- (or Arab-) majority Dearborn. I’ve been. More than once. It’s fine. No one declared jihad on me, and they have amazing “party stores” (they’re called bodegas in New York.)

      O/T, I was just looking at my driver’s license. Do not question my ways, because they are indeed mysterious.

      In New York when you renew your license you can ask them to use the photo on file. And keep using it. I vividly remember when my photo was taken, and it was at least 20 years ago. Probably more like 30. I was feeling under the weather and it was sleeting that day. Then, for the photo they made me take my glasses off. I look like a serial killer. Except my hair is a dark chestnut brown, so I’ll treasure this photo.

      What I was really looking for was the little symbol denoting that I am an organ donor. Just to confirm. I think I put it in my will, actually. Shortly after I put myself on the list we had our annual family reunion/free-for-all and I mentioned this. My siblings thought this was hysterical. “What organs? You’re blind as a bat. Your liver and kidneys are probably shot. All that smoking probably didn’t do much good for your lungs. Maybe your pancreas works? You’re very smart though but very weird so maybe someone would want your brain. Do they transplant brains?”

      I stood up and said, “I made an ice cream-based trifle for dessert which is taking up our hostess’s entire freezer. You, Dr. Welby, doubter of the fitness of my organs, can go munch on your dog’s kibble for all I care.”

      I love my family so much. 🙂

    • In this case, she’s one of the R-words as defined by Lewis Black.*

      *I attended a show in Toronto and he called extremists a bunch of r-words. Someone took offense (I get why) but Lewis pointed out that these people who are otherwise functioning adults who are so damaged or warped that they can’t deal with the world as it is.

  4. A follow up on the Columbia University’s hard lean into supporting genocide.
    https://apple.news/AtWU9EAJhS4usq9lsHX1T-w

    Seems the blowback became too much for them and they reinstated the website and the article. The interview with the attorney who wrote the article is great. He notes that now people are talking more about whether the article should be published rather than what the article is about. So the Guardian did a good job of giving us the Reader’s Digest version of what he wrote.

    • It’s always the same. These invariably white men don’t have a career anymore due to lack of any discernable talent, so they get angry and join the MAGA ranks because their career decline can’t POSSIBLY be their own fault. It has to be the fact that everybody’s “woke” or “liberal” or … fuck, I don’t know.

      See also: Joe Rogan, Jerry Seinfeld, Kid Rock, Tim Allen, Pat Sajak, Mel Gibson, Kirk Cameron, Dennis Miller, Vince Vaughn …

      Feel free to add your own names to the list.

      • Mel was always a nutter thanks to his Fundie Catholic dad.

        Dave Chappelle is another. For a lot of them it is just society has passed their idea of comedy by or has become so cliche that it has lost all meaning (Jerry). Chevy Chase is another example where a lot of his material about homosexuals and penises went over like a turd at a banquet on the Sitcom Community.

        Like talkies were an anathema to silent movie stars.

        Not many comedians are truly timeless.

        • I think it’s mainly a thing of what languages white audiences find offensive has changed.

          Like if you watch some of the older comedians, there’s jokes that are funny but there’s other stuff where now I’m like what the actual fuck people actually thought that was okay?

          Like my parents loved Don Rickles, and one time they found one of his old shows on youtube and wanted me to watch it. I was like… wow the joke might be a good set up but he used like 4 racial slurs to the audience person in the process of setting it up.

           

          • I read something a long time ago by a former standup talking about the Michael Richards fiasco, and his point was it’s the comedian’s job to read the audience and provide them with entertainment they want. In other words, it takes empathy to see what the audience responds to and then you lean into that. That’s what you get paid for.

            Most of the comedians I listed are just reciting their standard joke set, without any regard to how it might need to be modified for the audience they face.

            Or, to look at it another way, they’re bad comedians because they lack empathy. They’re right-wing because they lack empathy. The basic problem is that they’re focused on themselves, not others.

            • Ok I can see that rationale holding for unknown comedians but these guys are very much known quantities. So at some point the audience needs to know what they are expecting. The Richards thing was from way out of left field, but people go to see comedians who are well known because they expect a certain set of jokes. It’s like when people go to a restaurant and order the same thing off the menu every time.

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