A Legitimately Frequently-Asked Question
Every so often, someone in the comments here on Slumbering asks if I'm bothered by the shall we say less-kind postings that can follow my humor articles on Wired News. I figured I'd answer here so that I have someplace to point people.
The answer is no. It helps that most people ranting don't actually seem to realize that I'm writing a humor column, no matter how outrageously clear I make it. It's hard to take someone seriously when they accuse me of poor journalism in a column that's obviously not intended to be journalistic.
Even the people who seem to be more or less aware that I'm joking generally just make me roll my eyes, though. I've heard it said that if you run a restaurant, it's not the people who complain that you have to worry about, it's the people who don't complain, but who leave and never come back. I think it's similar with the comments on my columns. People who simply don't find me funny are going to just move on, the same way I generally do when I don't find someone else's work funny. The complainers aren't leaving comments because I've failed to live up to their high standards of humor, they're leaving comments because they're pissed off. They're either pissed off because I'm making fun of something they like, or because they came in expecting a news article and they can't make the mental leap to realize it's actually comedy.
To illustrate: I think my article about space tourism and my article about Warcraft expansions are somewhere in the range of equally good, but only the Warcraft article is followed by angry complaints. If I were to take the complaints seriously, I'd have to conclude that somehow my writing skills deteriorated so much that I went from being an excellent humorist to being a talentless hack in a mere week. (And that at some point in the future I'll once again metamorphose into a good writer.) I think it's a lot more likely that the difference is that people are more emotionally invested in Warcraft (or Wikipedia, or any of the other subjects that get people riled up) than they are in space tourism.
I've heard it said that if you're a humorist, complaints are how you know you're doing something right. I don't think I agree. They're just the unavoidable side-effect of making jokes about things people care about, whether the jokes are good or bad, caustic or friendly.
Comments
As so many Sunday comic strip writers have shown, it can take decades to accomplish the transition from excellent humorist to talentless hack.
Posted by: Rubrick | September 28, 2006 03:34 PM
Sadly, I seem to move between excellent writer to talentless hack from word to word.
Posted by: Maverick | September 28, 2006 04:07 PM
I particularly enjoy it when they point out your factual errors; it's like watching Monty Python and the Holy Grail and yelling "THEY ARE DRESSED FROM THE WRONG CENTURY!": It misses the point entirely.
...I always hear the Comic Book Guy from The Simpsons reading the posts.
Posted by: Magic Flyin' Lemur | September 28, 2006 04:23 PM
I think writers should be judged by the company they keep, i.e. those writers I make sure I catch every week. They include:
Lore
Mark Moford (SF Chronicle)
Molly Ivins
Dave Weinberger
And whoever write this blog: http://underodysseus.blogspot.com/
Who do you all read besides this Lore guy?
Posted by: Bob Filipczak | September 29, 2006 05:57 AM
That's all wrong and so pathetic. Man,you make me want to drive nails through my cheeks! Who gives you the right, mister?
Posted by: unclewilly | September 29, 2006 06:54 AM
I cannot BELIEVE the misstatements and poor research reflected in this post. As a so-called "journalist," you owe it to your readers to put forth facts, not opinions. You talentless hack.
You need to do what the boys over at Something Awful do: write a column or piece ("Your Band Sucks") whose main goal is to piss off as many people as possible so they write invective, poorly spelled e-mails in defense of the subject being attacked. This allows you to crank out a future piece making fun of said e-mails -- and it's nearly pre-written for you!
Posted by: Craig | September 29, 2006 08:30 AM
"Who do you all read besides this Lore guy?"
In addition to Lore, I also read:
Adam Felber.
Robert Rapier.
Mike Doughty.
Chuck Klosterman.
Julie Klausner.
As well as the usual smattering of news feeds, comics, and personal friend's stuff.
Posted by: YLlama | September 29, 2006 12:35 PM
Kinda reminds me of this comic I saw once - http://www.badgods.com/keyboard.html
Posted by: Sean Gallagher | September 29, 2006 01:08 PM
Wow, way to go, man. It takes a strong (or thick-skinned) person to not get constant negative comments get to you.
I find that, since the beginning of my decade on the Interweb, the YOU SUCK comments have lost some of their impact after a while.
Posted by: K.T. Slager | September 29, 2006 02:06 PM
If the WoW people get violent and threaten your person, I'll back you up. I live in Berkeley, so light up the Lore signal if you need help, or at least a wimpy guy with a lead pipe. And a blog.
brad
Posted by: Brad | September 29, 2006 02:43 PM
The comments about people not understanding that you're joking remind me of a Dave Barry column on that very subject, called something like "Mr. Humor Person". He said, more or less, that the real bane of his existence was not those readers who did not find his jokes funny, but rather those who simply could not comprehend that the words were intended to be funny. As I recall, the column was subtitled for the humour-challenged, along the lines of "In my Mr. Grammer Person columns, for example, I run each piece of advice past trained grammarians, who signal their acceptance by barking excitedly [THOSE ARE NOT GRAMMARIANS, THOSE ARE THIS DOGS]"
I think many of the commenters in the Wired forum could use those subtitles, is all I'm sayin'.
Posted by: dave_mcmillen![[TypeKey Profile Page]](http://slumbering.lungfish.com/nav-commenters.gif)
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September 30, 2006 01:15 AM
"... HIS DOGS", I mean. If I'm going to quote inaccurately, I'd rather not have typos in there.
Posted by: dave_mcmillen![[TypeKey Profile Page]](http://slumbering.lungfish.com/nav-commenters.gif)
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September 30, 2006 01:17 AM
Lore, what about the other sort of comment that you frequently get, the one that says, "Man, your post on 'Genetically Modified Foods to Die For' is better than anything I've ever written, and I used to consider myself a pretty good writer. I mean, it's better than everything I've ever written. Even that term paper on Dali that got me two A's and an A+ from three successive art teachers three years running. That was a great paper. In fact, funny story - the third art teacher gave me an F on it at first, and accused me of having obviously copied the whole thing from books! Needless to say, she changed her tune. That's how great that paper was - and what you wrote in that article was better than that paper AND better than the story that goes with it. Thanks a lot."
How do you feel about those sorts of comments?
Because I tell you, even distancing it by putting it in quotes and framing it as a hypothetical, that hurts a fella to admit.
d
Posted by: dogimo | September 30, 2006 10:42 AM
I find your comments on the subject of humour in very poor taste and expect a correction and apology in short order! Rabble rabble, rhubarb, etc.
What I really want is for my name to go on the same lists that people put in comment threads on the Internet. That way I'll know I've made it at last.
Posted by: Simon Roberts | September 30, 2006 11:36 PM