On Twitter and Cancelling Colbert

If you spend any amount of time on Twitter, you may have noticed that the tag #CancelColbert was trending about a week ago. It was started by the writer and activist Suey Park in response to the following tweet:

That tweet has since been deleted, but #CancelColbert continued to trend and start a Twitter war of its own. On one side was Suey Park and her followers who claimed that the tweet was offensive and that Stephen Colbert was a horrible racist who should not be allowed on television. On the other side were countless Colbert Report fans who viciously attacked Park and her followers for not understanding satire. The whole mess even caught the attention from the mainstream media.

Yes, #CancelColbert was a big deal for about a week, as was Suey Park, but it looks like things have finally died down. Colbert was not cancelled, and the Twittersphere has moved onto other things. 

In the end, the campaign to #CancelColbert didn't seem to amount to a whole lot. It got people talking for awhile, but that's about it. Still, it did make me realize a few things.

1. People on Twitter are Really, Really Racist

Okay, techncially this isn't something I just realized. Saying that people are racist is like saying that fire is hot or that water is wet. I'm not at all surprised that someone would read the above tweet and think "Hah! Stupid Chinese" and utter every racial slur they can throw at Asians. That happens all the time. What took me by surprise is how so-called socially progressive liberals immediately went on the attack when #CancelColbert started trending. Many of us would like to think that the most racist people in America are the conservatives on the far right who live in gated communities and wouldn't dare venture into "the ghetto" (read: predominantly black neighborhoods) for fear of getting mugged. Sadly, it looked like many of the people who took cheap shots at Suey Park's ethnicity considered themselves progressive liberals. They were the type who would proudly proclaim how racist they weren't by talking about their Asian friends. They would never openly make fun of Asians or anyone else who wasn't white, but it became really obvious that they had some pretty racist attitudes just beneath the surface. All it took was a racially-charged Twitter war to bring it out.

The fact that so many white liberals could be so racist probably shouldn't come as a surprise to me, but it does leave me really disappointed. These are the folks who should be above all of this racist crap. Sadly, they aren't. But that's okay. They aren't really racist. After all, some of their best friends are Asian.

*sigh*

2. People Don't Understand Satire

When I say that people don't understand satire, I'm not talking about Suey Park and her followers; I'm talking about everyone who went after Suey Park and her followers. They seem to think that satire is just "edgy" humor intended to be offensive, but they are totally off the mark. Satire is the use of humor or exaggeration to expose and criticize something negative in our society. It might make you laugh, but ultimately it's supposed to make you question and think about whatever is being satirized. Satire is Stephen Colbert's bread and butter, and the offending tweet was a quote from his show that was meant to make fun of Washington Redskins owner Dan Snyder and his attempts to be more culturally sensitive while using his team's offensive name. It was the punchline to a joke, and in context I didn't think it was anymore offensive than anything else on The Colbert Report.

What Stephen Colbert said on his show was satire; what was said on The Colbert Report's Twitter feed was not. It was disgustingly racist, no matter how many people decide to call it satire.

Then again, that's not Stephen Colbert's fault. He's not even the one who posted the tweet. It was someone else associated with his show, someone who doesn't understand satire or Twitter, which brings me to my last point...

3. Sometimes, Twitter Kind of Sucks

Don't get me wrong; I don't hate Twitter. I actually think it's great in theory. It gives people a chance to tell the world what's on their minds in 140 characters or less. It's the closest thing to unfiltered, off-the-cuff commentary on the Internet. Unfortunately, since Twitter comments are unfiltered and off-the-cuff, people don't always think before they tweet. I'm willing to bet that the tweet that inspired #CancelColbert was posted by one person working on The Colbert Report who thought they were being funny and clever. They didn't take the time to consider how offensive it could be, and there wasn't anybody else who could stop the tweet from going live.

This whole incident made me realize that Twitter is a poor platform for comedy. There are no doubt plenty of offensive jokes that get thrown around by the writers of The Colbert Report, but those never make it on the air. Writing a TV show like The Colbert Report is a process that involves a lot of people, and for every offensive joke that is suggested there is someone there to shoot it down or rewrite it into something more acceptable. That same thing can't be said about someone trying to be funny on Twitter. There are times when my Twitter feed is full of offensive "jokes" that are probably only funny to whoever posted them. Nobody is there to stop this crap from going online, so a Twitter comedy account becomes one person throwing out random jokes and hoping some of them are funny.

Does the "throw shit at the wall to see what sticks" approach to comedy work? Sometimes it does, but sometimes it just makes people want to #CancelColbert.

People don't seem to realize that what they do online can have serious consequences. If you're on Twitter (or Facebook, Tumblr or any other social network), please think before you post. There are enough stupid bigots on the Internet without you looking like one of them.

Why Gangsta Culture Isn't Funny

Last Friday, Minnesota Vikings punter and famously outspoken blogger Chris Kluwe (a.k.a ChrisWarcraft on Twitter) wrote a series of tweets about a new massively multiplayer online role playing game (MMORPG) concept he came up with. The following is what he had to say in his feed:

Heard lots of rap lyrics reference "The game", so while running I came up with an MMO rules structure for "The game". #lookoutWoW
— Chris Kluwe (@ChrisWarcraft) November 23, 2012

Name generation in "The game" begins with a normal name, Harold Douglas for example, which is then randomly altered to be contextual.
— Chris Kluwe (@ChrisWarcraft) November 23, 2012

The name database will create a combination of words from "young", "yung", "little", "lil", "big", "old", and random "z"s thrown in.
— Chris Kluwe (@ChrisWarcraft) November 23, 2012

Character classes depend on gender selection. Males can choose from "gangsta", "pimp", "hustla", and "playa". Prestige class is "real".
— Chris Kluwe (@ChrisWarcraft) November 23, 2012

Female classes include "ho", "skank", "bitch", and "meat receptacle". Prestige class for women is "fly honey".
— Chris Kluwe (@ChrisWarcraft) November 23, 2012

"The game" will have permadeath, because YOLO. Unless, of course, you unlock the extremely rare [Tupac] perk. All dungeons are autotuned.
— Chris Kluwe (@ChrisWarcraft) November 23, 2012

Any out of game communication on strategies or hints will result in loss of level, because snitches get stitches. Now to find a publisher...
— Chris Kluwe (@ChrisWarcraft) November 23, 2012

I would ask if all of this is racist, but I’ve always been of the opinion that if you have to ask if something is racist, then it almost certainly is. This is unfortunate, because I don’t think Kluwe was intending to be racially insensitive. This is an attempt at satire, and taken from a certain point of view it’s actually kind of funny. Kluwe is making fun of “gangsta” culture, something that I’ve always found stupid, offensive and deserving of all the scorn and ridicule we can throw at it. Unfortunately, many people see “gangsta” culture and African American culture as one and the same. There are just far too many people who will read something like this and just assume he’s making fun of African Americans in general. To make matters worse, many of these people will “agree” with him that all black people are like this and find it hilarious.

In other words, Chris Kluwe wasn’t trying to be racist, but he ended up feeding into the racism inherent in our society.

This whole thing got me thinking about “gangsta” culture and what it really represents. I’ve already said that I think it’s stupid and offensive, but I didn’t talk about why I feel this way. The way I see it, “gangsta” culture, or the version of it that has been glorified by rappers since the 1990s, is just one example of institutionalized racism. It delivers the message that African Americans are violent criminals, and it tells poor young black people everywhere that this is the best kind of life they can hope for.  Meanwhile, predominantly white businessmen make millions of dollars by perpetuating negative stereotypes and giving an entire race a bad name.

Like I said before, I’d love to see someone use satire to tear down “gangsta” culture and reveal the racism behind it, but Chris Kluwe isn’t the one to do it. Kluwe is a smart guy who can be very insightful and funny, but the fact of the matter is that as a white male he’s not in the position to make these kinds of jokes. Too many people will see him as just another racist making fun of black people, which is really sad.

In a perfect world, it wouldn't matter that someone is making these kinds of jokes. People would understand that Kluwe is making fun of a certain subculture that happens to be related to African American culture but isn't representative of African American culture as a whole. Unfortunately, we don't live in a perfect world. We live in a world where racism exists, and where people like to believe that the worst stereotypes of an entire culture are true. Since we live in that world, I can't read something like Chris Kluwe's tweets about "the game" and find them funny.

How Not to Talk to Women Online

Today my lovely wife was talking to a couple of young men on Twitter.  She had just met these guys, and she apparently was having a pleasant enough conversation with them until one of them asked for a picture of her “big titties.”  Not surprisingly, my wife was offended by his request and let him have it with both barrels.  He responded by calling her a slut (because “slut” apparently means someone who doesn’t take her clothes off at the merest suggestion now).  She wasn’t happy about it, but she just shrugged it off and went about her day just as she should have.  After all, the Internet is full of asshats who like to take shots at people just because they can.

Still, the whole incident had me thinking about how guys talk to women, especially online.  Specifically, it got me thinking about how guys really don’t know how to talk to women.  Practically every woman I know has at least one story of some moron sending her messages on Facebook, Myspace, Twitter, MMORPGs like World of Warcraft or any other format that allows people to communicate with each other over the Web with such thoughtful romantic messages like “ur hawt,” “show ur titties” or “lets fuckk.”  It’s not always trolling, either.  Some of these guys really do seem to think that sending out these messages will get them laid.  After all, they’re paying these women compliments, right?  They should be flattered that someone is taking an interest in them.

I know part of it is just the anonymity of the Internet; it is and always has been a breeding ground for the most obnoxious trolls imaginable.  I think there’s more to it than that, though.   I think part of it has to do with this sense of entitlement that a lot of men in our society have when it comes to women.  We’re basically taught that not only can a man have a beautiful woman if he wants one, but that he deserves to have one.  All he has to do is show interest in a woman, and she’s expected to just go along with whatever he wants.  Any woman who says otherwise is wrong and deserves the label of “bitch,” “slut” or whatever nasty name a guy can come up with.

Of course, this doesn’t just happen online, either.  I’ve seen plenty of instances of guys saying whatever they want to women and acting genuinely surprised when they get shot down.  It just seems to get worse on the Internet where people have enough anonymity to be able to say things that they wouldn’t dare say to someone’s face.  Still, I can’t help thinking that we’ll soon have an entire generation of men who think the proper way to talk to a woman is to basically proposition her and assume she must be a frigid bitch if she isn’t into it.

It should go without saying that this is not the right way to talk to a woman, and yet it looks like someone has to say it.  I’ve seen other unfortunate aspects of what I call Internet culture seep into other aspects of our lives.  I’ve heard people actually say things like “LOL” or “OMG” out loud (they sound like idiots, by the way), so I have to wonder if going up to a girl and saying “ur hawt show me ur titties” is going to be an actual pickup line for a certain brand of socially awkward male who grew up on message boards and MMORPGs.  I can see them getting shocked that it doesn’t work, and I’m not sure whether to laugh or weep for the future.

Hey guys, here’s a radical thought: if you like a girl, try talking to her like a human being instead of something that’s only there to please you.  Trust me.  That’s how most healthy relationships start, not with some lame attempt to get a girl to show her “big titties” over the Internet.