"The expression of one's meaning by using language that normally signifies the opposite, typically for humorous or emphatic effect"Alright cool, now let's do it again but using the definition of "irony" in the context that most people on the internet use it in:
"The expression of nothing by making your work generally shit."Don't worry, this piece isn't going to go all "Grammar Nazi" on you, I don't proofread this blog enough (at all) to get away with that. What we are going to talk about however, is the somewhat disturbing trend of defending media and/or comments with of "it's supposed to be IRONIC." It's a pretty arbitrary defence at the best of times, but really it just seems to come off as a "Get Out of Jail Free" card for the otherwise undefendable.
Let's start off in videogame town, because that's all I really know. Let's talk about games like Bayonetta and Lollipop Chainsaw, two games that were generally well-received but did get some flak for their portrayal of female characters. But WORRY NOT, because the extreme over-sexualisation of both protagonists in these games was IRONIC (and therefore HILARIOUS).
Regarding Bayonetta, and comparing it's sexualisation with the dictionary definition, what part of it exactly is "ironic"? So Bayonetta herself is intentionally fetishised to a ridiculous degree to make a statement on female characters? What statement is that exactly, that there simply are over-fetishised female characters in videogames, so here's another one to point and laugh at? Bayonetta is goofy but it's certainly not a comedy (or at least I hope it's not supposed to be one), if it's not a comedy why would they intentionally make their character design and art style into a big meta joke?
You could definitely argue that Lollipop Chainsaw is supposed to be a joke, but one I've never laughed at. It's not even the character design of Juliet Starling that's the problem here, it's the whole "generic zombie setting" thing as well. Being a Suda51 game, people like to praise the game for being all wacky and creative, to which I naturally respond "why does the game have such a generic setting then?" "BECAUSE IT'S IRONIC" the imaginary Suda fanboys in killer7 T-Shirts that live in my brain retort, and I simply shout back "WELL THEN I DON'T GET IT." Is the fact that Lollipop Chainsaw has god awful combat part of the big ironic joke too? Or can we not stretch the definition that far yet?
It's possible that some of this cynicism comes from me dabbling in writing and other bits and pieces myself, and I know full well from my own experience that there's times where I can't think of a joke in a place where I want one, so I just settle for the whole "ironic bad joke" thing. So if you read/watch/taste anything else I've made where you see me pull something like that, rest assured it's not some grand meta "ironic" artistic statement, if I had a real joke I would have just used it because it's obviously way better to do that. I feel like we all may as well give up when we get to the point where we don't just actively defend, but actually praise games that are trying to be bad for some reason.
There's two huge issues here can I can dig out. First, people seem to consider "satire" as some kind of synonym for "good", and "irony" as a synonym for "clever". Obviously, there's such a thing as god awful satire, and "irony" can be really lame and stupid, haven't you heard the expression "sarcasm is the lowest form of wit....besides memes"? Secondly, these forms of "irony" and "satire" have the side effect of being hugely appealing to the kind of assholes you're trying to make fun of in the first place.
The kind of "bad satire" and irony I'm talking about reared its head recently with The Colbert Report, which tweeted this:
(this tweet has since been deleted....and one day people will realise that trying to silently delete tweets without people noticing is a really stupid idea that always gets you in more trouble...)
I'm not a huge fan of Colbert or anything, he was pretty funny as the eyepatch guy in Harvey Birdman: Attorney at Law I guess (Ha! Ha!) I do know he's capable of good satire and has done so in the past, and I'm also reasonably sure that he's not a racist. Having said that...what da fudge.
(EDIT: The Colbert Report has since tweeted a reassurance that the account is not controlled by Colbert himself, regardless we can assume that if this wasn't written by him it would have either been approved by him or written by another writer on the show)
For those who don't know, The Colbert Report is a parody of American right wing news outlets, most notably Bill O'Reilly on Fox News. This tweet was made in character by Colbert, so it's a joke, but really what exactly is the joke? It's not that hard to understand before anyone starts dealing out the "irony" card from their deck of bullshit, it's an exaggerated example of what a RACIST MIGHT SAY, but since it's said while simultaneously rolling your eyes at it I guess it's okay.
Here's the thing that ties this back to the problems with "irony", because it's a "joke" and therefore "clever" people will instantly dismiss any offence it might cause (which evidently, based on the Twitter feedback, was a lot). Even worse though, is that for every person who laughs at this because of "HA! He's making fun of racists! Those silly racists!" there's a person actually laughing at it because they are just racists and find this kind of thing funny. It's not pictured but originally the first tweet responding to this one was a guy asking him to "do Mexican Americans next!" so in other words: "Say what a racist would say about Mexicans because I would find that soooooo funny!"
Ultimately, although this whole thing is a joke, it's a ridiculously lazy joke by a performer who is better than this, and it panders to bigots whether it intends to or not.
Jokes, (good) satire and comedy are really important in fighting oppression and changing hearts and minds in my opinion. Comedy takes reality and exposes it for how ridiculous it truly is, and there's nothing more ridiculous that discriminating against someone because of their race, gender, sexuality and so on and so forth. But what -good- comedy should be doing is blowing up stereotypes and exposing them for the stupidity that they are. In order to get someone to consider new ideas you have to challenge their old ones and comedy is a great outlet to do that. People set in their ways WILL reject new ideas almost instantaneously, you have to challenge their way of thinking intellectually first, and it takes smarter "satire" than this.
What this particular brand of "joke" boils down to is simply copying and pasting something a racist might say and then putting "LOL" after it in the script...which even if it wasn't offensive wouldn't be funny or clever. It doesn't challenge anyone's ideas, it doesn't stand up for anyone, it just takes real hatred that exists and gives it more exposure. That might in itself be the point, let more people see it to realise the insanity of it, but that's normally where the REAL ACTUAL SATIRE SHOULD FILL IN THE GAPS...maybe. In the end it's just a gutless, dickless little joke that panders to two different brands of idiots and achieves nothing other than upsetting a lot of people.
Having said that, there is one part I'm not on board with in this whole thing and that's the whole #CancelColbert movement on Twitter. Now admittedly, "Cancel Colbert" might just have been the words of choice due to the funky almost-alliteration for "this sucks we don't like this", but with these things there's always an aura of "this is bad so it needs to be removed/censored etc." to them that bothers me. As important as racism is as a social issue (and it's SUPER important) I don't class it as more important than free speech as a whole. The largest reason for this is because free speech is not only the biggest weapon in the arsenal of people fighting against racial issues, it's important for ALL oppressed people. I would hate to see a precedent put in place where something can be forced off the air for a couple of bad jokes.
As I said above, I think comedy is a really powerful tool when it comes to these issues when it's good. When it sucks...well things like this Colbert thing happen and that's unfortunate. Speaking for ALL comedy here, it's important not to put comedians in an environment where they can get 999 jokes right and 1 wrong and be freaking pulverised for the one that they got wrong (Note: this sentence doesn't apply to comedians that are ALWAYS tasteless and shit). All that attitude will do is cut the nuts off all comedy and put everyone working in it in places where they can't take risks, and sure that would wipe out most of the bad tasteless sort of stuff but it would also take away a lot of the really good and important stuff. Censorship is something that will encase all of us in our grasp if we give it leverage.
This is a situation where it must suck to be a minority, and I accept that as a white straight dude there are things I can't fully understand (unfortunately being fat, poor and British don't count as minorities). On the one hand, you could ignore this sort of stuff and roll your eyes at it, letting it go to the "free speech" argument, and continue to let it slide in our culture. On the other hand you can stand up and speak out against it, which is the most tiring option and also has the side effect of potentially giving the content even more exposure. Or you can hope this sort of thing gets banned, which again can have horrible consequences. So basically, you're damned if you do, you're damned if you don't, and you're also damned if someone else does. Eugh.
I was also going to have a bit in this rambling where I ragged on Mrs. Brown's Boys for being tasteless, offensive and generally awful. But this is has already gone on longer than expected and it doesn't really tie into the whole "irony" thing, so I'd like to use this space to briefly say Mrs. Brown's Boys can go straight to hell.
So in summary, don't use "satire" or "irony" as a defence for something horrible or stupid. "Satire" can be awful and offensive, "irony" can be stupid and pointless, they aren't "heal all wounds" buzzwords that make everything immediately okay. Perverts get off to Bayonetta, and racists like racist jokes and stereotypes. "Irony" does not change what these things truly are at their core.
Also, just as a shorter and louder summary: LEARN WHAT THE FUCK IRONY MEANS.
