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You Live By The Sword, You Die By The Sword
Well, this piece certainly is interesting. We recognize it as satire because we know the cultural context that is Dan Savage. We only wish that Mr. Savage would have done the same about a month or four ago when he royally skewered Garrison Keillor, who wrote his own bit of satire in this Salon piece.
At first, we couldn't help but giggle at his error in judgment. Perhaps he didn't understand Mr. Keillor's cultural context? Keillor's old-timey, radio sketch comedy, for example, simultaneously employs and skewers all manner of stereotype every second it is on the air. Unlike the current mode of the day which involves lots of screaming, self-righteousness, cussing, and blogviating, though, Mr. Keillor diffuses them with subtle, and often self-effacing, humor.
After thinking about it, though, we got a little angry that Mr. Savage let his energies loose on one of the least deserving targets of his vitriol, especially when there are plenty of real targets. After all, when Dan Savage attacks Garrison Keillor for alleged homophobia, Ann Rove has already won. This is the problem with blogs in general: their knee-jerk nature really emphasizes the jerk sometimes.
The problem with doing satire is that context is hard to transmit to someone unfamiliar with your work. This is especially true if you're a relative unknown like us--we've personally had our writing misinterpreted. It's also true when you are crossing genres and (pop-) cultural borders. Since nobody under 62 (except this Seattlest) gets Mr. Keillor's humor, we understand Mr. Savage's ignorance. Understanding such context takes time, far longer than blog time; although in the amount of time Mr. Savage took to edit his post(s), he could have done some cursory research.
Of course, this whole problem is exacerbated by the level of subtlety one employs in one's writing. The more subtle the satire, the more likely one is to be misinterpreted and attacked. Unfortunately, subtlety is completely lost on the American audience. It's not our fault, though, so don't feel bad about it. As soon as we told the Brits that we were packing our things and taking our business to Walgreen's, we started losing the Brits' acute mastery of literary devices. Unless we are tediously bludgeoned by the obvious these days, we just don't get it.
Having said that, we understand Mr. Savage being a bit sensitive, especially on a deeply personal issue like parenting. What with the civilly-destructive ideologies of the Failed Bush Administration, and the caustic venom of people like Don Imus, it's not difficult to take umbrage. But c'mon... step out of Planet Broadway every now and then.
What we are saying is: people, shut up and quit flying off the buttplug! Do some research into pop culture and make certain that the person you are smearing with journalistic santorum is truly deserving. For example, we could have gotten all huffy and serious about Mr. Savage's "war on teenage sex" post, blathering on about how so misunderstood teenagers are and how adults need to remember what it was like as teens and perhaps even making a crappy analogy about forced, hormonal sterilization of The Gays. But that would have betrayed how far we had missed the boat. By the same token, then, Savage's attack betrayed just how clueless he was about Keillor's tone.
Given his latest post, though, we're glad to see that he's starting to understand satire.
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Gosh Tom, you make it difficult to like you. My knee-jerk reaction to:
"Since nobody under 62 (except this Seattlest) gets Mr. Keillor's humor"
"Unfortunately, subtlety is completely lost on the American audience."
"we started losing the Brits' acute mastery of literary devices."
"we're glad to see that he's starting to understand satire."
is that you're a pretentious jerk. I doubt you are, but come on... You may want to re-read your post to see what I'm seeing. Never thought I'd be one to defend Dan.
dan savage is a moron.
totally true. I enjoy Dan Savage's writing most of the time, but he's got a lot of hypocrisy. Can't wait to see the Slog post where he points out how very very different these two circumstances are.
he won't point out (defend) the differences, he'll make some arrogant "yeah yeah yeah i'm SUCH a hypocrite" post, and then start off other posts with "i'm SUCH a hypocrite, blah blah blah" just like he did with the war. he never really took responsibility for being wrong. instead he turned it into a snide riff about how everyone is so hung up on some column he wrote "YEARS ago" and how it's ALL HIS FAULT. he can play the martyr when it suits him.
hence, he's a moron.
I like and enjoy Dan Savage's writing well over 90% percent of the time --even if I don't agree with it here and there. Also, I'm fine with him flying off the handle at times; anybody who writes publicly does it.
But his attack on Garrison Keillor, especially given his tremendous influence with individuals/demographics which may not intersect with GK's demographics, seemed misplaced and misinformed and, I thought, counter-productive to the greater good. GK's comments may have deserved rebuke, but certainly not the vitriol they got. That was better reserved for Coulter, Rove, et. al.
I dredged it up because it's continued to leave a bad taste in my mouth precisely because who knows whom his next undeserving target du jour may be. Dan Savage has a great amount of influence and, thus, a great responsibility to use it carefully.
Point taken, guest #1. Again, it underscores the risks of making flippant, satirical comments, especially if one is worked up about something.
Wait Tom, at the risk of being someone under 62 who doesn't get satire may I say that I don't think your post is satire. I mean it's satire like Alanis Morrissette is ironic.
"burlesque, caricature, parody, travesty. Satire, lampoon refer to literary forms in which vices or follies are ridiculed. Satire, the general term, often emphasizes the weakness more than the weak person, and usually implies moral judgment and corrective purpose."
One of the reasons the post bothered me was because I don't think any of what you said about Dan was incorrect. Pretentious yes, but I didn't get the lampoon.
The quintessential example of satire in my mind is bugs bunny singing italian opera with Wagner gear on. Eating babies if you're starving? Yeah that too. But saying Dan is jerk? Well......
Or maybe he doesn't. Today there's a Rupert Everett slam.
"Wait Tom, at the risk of being someone under 62 who doesn't get satire may I say that I don't think your post is satire. I mean it's satire like Alanis Morrissette is ironic."
You're right - this post isn't satire. And, unless I'm also misreading, Tom didn't intend it to be. He discusses Keillor's & Savage's satiric pieces.