Boring Lefties

[Dennis Perrin]

> All that said, there's a lot to what Matt says about
> the tone of the left in America, its dull style,
> heavy-handed unfunny humor, narcissistic political
> correctness, and inability to connect with ordinary
> folk, is absolutely true. I gave up on Z Mag for
> precisely these reasons. It has generated a stable of
> writers who can make the most interesting truth seem
> tedious, self-righteous, and of no concern to anyone
> who doesn't already agree, as well as many who do
> (like me). It's sort of Chomsky's style degraded,
> without his awesome encyclopaediac knowledge and
> effortless command of everything. Solomon is also
> guilty of that -- though I don't think EXTRA! is,
> curiously -- he once wrote a book attacking Dilbert as
> a corporate tool. I mean, rilly, as Kelly would say.
> The Nation isn't dreary in precisely that way, but
> it's getting dreary in another way, too much Corn and
> Alterperson and Cooper, ruminating about how to save
> the Demicans from themselves.
>
> We need more Henwoods and indeed more Kellys doing
> this sort of thing, more spikes and odd unpredictable
> angles and a bettah sensahuma. That's partly why
> Hitchens is such a loss, he brought a sort of class
> and elegance to left wing polemics that few others
> here can; Cockburn used to be able to do this too, but
> not lately.
>
> So what is to be done?
>
> jks

I think people need to be more themselves, and not what they think any
"movement" may or may not approve of. This of course does happen on the
left -- our fractious tribe is not monochromatic -- but, as you say, there
is a general tendency toward correctness, cultural sterility (in the "pop"
sense), and guilt, and this can lead to some truly dreadful manifestations,
like insisting that a work of art be "topical," or that humor be
"uplifting," and so on. I remember some lefty comics from the 80s who were
incredibly unfunny, who placed political "relevance" over a good joke or
observation. But they were applauded because their audience wanted to hear
their prejudices amplified.

When I was at WBAI, I tried to bring some of my comedy writing and improv
background to the pwog audience. Some of it went over, some of it sucked,
but none of it would be uttered by the Transgender Red Lesbian Humor
Collective. In other words, I tried to go against what was expected while
maintaining my political viewpoint. I recall a red-faced Dennis Bernstein
lecturing me after a show -- "Why are you being funny? People are dying!" --
and though I attempted to explain that I was attacking the killers (in this
case, Salvadoran death squads) and not their victims, Bernstein would have
none of it. He simply didn't get it, and didn't want to.

I did do a wicked Cockburn impression, however, and apparently fooled a
listener who phoned in to talk to "Alex."

DP