4 ms·

I think people don't like Onion stories because they're not funny, they're just pretentious and political. For instance, their famous 'No Way to Prevent This,'

by bko 6mo ago

I think people don't like Onion stories because they're not funny, they're just pretentious and political. For instance, their famous 'No Way to Prevent This,' Says Only Nation Where This Regularly Happens article they post all over their page whenever there is some high profile gun related crime. It's all over their page and no doubt they get a bump in traffic from smug people who feel it's clever. It's just so exhausting. It was a great headline, but by the time the joke gets its own Wikipedia, it might be time to retire it. You can have a message and point of view, but don't put activism over comedy. Look at their trending article: Critics Outraged By Flippant School Shooting Plotline In ‘The Super Mario Galaxy Movie’. Where's the joke? There is obviously no school shooting plotline. It's not clever or creative. I guess the joke is school shootings are a thing, and Mario is a popular movie? It's basically South Parks criticism of Family Guy where they write jokes by having a seal put together random words from popular culture. School shootings + Mario = funny. And this stuff gets clicks because people think they're clever or subversive when it's just lazy and unoriginal. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/'No_Way_to_Prevent_This%2C'_Says_Only_Nation_Where_This_Regularly_Happens https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/'No_Way_to_Prevent_This%2C'_Sa... https://theonion.com/critics-outraged-by-flippant-school-shooting-plotline-in-the-super-mario-galaxy-movie/ https://theonion.com/critics-outraged-by-flippant-school-sho...

ndsipa_pomu 6mo ago
I'm not in the USA, but I think the issue is not so much the joke getting tiresome, but the repeat school shootings. Maybe if there was work done to stop the shootings, then the joke wouldn't keep getting repeated.
- bko 6mo ago
  First and foremost you should attempt to be funny or original. This is neither. It's political. I would love headlines like: > Illegal Immigrant Finally Caught After 20 Years of Successfully Contributing to Society but instead you get non joke headlines like: > ICE Agents Hurl Pregnant Immigrant Over Mexican Border To Prevent Birth On U.S. Soil It's just cringe.
  - youarecringe 6mo ago
    First and foremost you should endeavor to be a human, and The Onion does not owe you a thing. It's not a joke anymore, its a class ware and genocide that they are reporting on with headlines that make you cringe.
    - akramachamarei 6mo ago
      This is a repulsive, fallacious, and unproductive comment. Hackernews is not the place for emotional venting.
  - malfist 6mo ago
    > First and foremost you should attempt to be funny or original. Who are you to declare what satire and and cannot criticize?
- ern_ave 6mo ago
  > Maybe if there was work done to stop the shootings It's odd that you seem to believe no work has been done. Lots of work has been done. Lots more work is blocked by people who steadfastly refuse to punish criminals - claiming instead that it's not their fault that they're violent. I'd love to hear any additional ideas you have other than violating the rights of citizens.
  - bko 6mo ago
    I agree, most of the arguments have been basically "do anything" hysterics that are divorced from reality. For instance, much focus is given on rifles, specifically big black scary looking rifles. In reality if you look at murder rates by weapon type Handguns: ~45–50% Firearm (type unknown): ~20–25% Rifles: ~2–3% Shotguns: ~1–2% Knives / cutting instruments: ~10–12% Blunt objects (clubs, hammers, etc.): ~3–5% Hands, fists, feet (“personal weapons”): ~3–5% Other (poison, fire, etc.): low single digits https://www.criminalattorneycolumbus.com/which-weapons-are-most-commonly-used-for-homicides/ https://www.criminalattorneycolumbus.com/which-weapons-are-m...
    - JKCalhoun 6mo ago
      "…much focus is given on rifles, specifically big black scary looking rifles" Military-style rifles designed primarily for killing humans? That's called a low hanging fruit. If the U.S. can't even restrict those I expect everything else to be a wasted effort.
      - zetanor 6mo ago
        Military-style ARPANET designed primarily for nuclear warfare?
    - throw0101d 6mo ago
      > In reality if you look at murder rates by weapon type What is the school shooting by weapon type? The 'general' mass shooting by weapon type?
      - 6mo ago
- deleted 6mo ago
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Goronmon 6mo ago
You can have a message and point of view, but don't put activism over comedy. The "joke" in this case is people's reactions to school shootings. And people's reactions haven't changed, so I don't see why the article should change. It's just so exhausting. This has some real "The worst thing about school shootings is knowing that The Onion is going to repost that article I personally am tired of seeing" energy to it.
- bko 6mo ago
  It's not a joke if you repeat it 100 times. That article has some real "The best thing about school shootings is we get to have literally every article on our website be this clever headline we wrote 10 years" energy to it.
  - JKCalhoun 6mo ago
    Yeah, pretty sure it's not expected to be funny. If at all, it has entered absurdist territory.
  - throw0101d 6mo ago
    > It's not a joke if you repeat it 100 times. The fact that it's been repeated so often kind of makes it a tragedy at this point.
  - latexr 6mo ago
    > It's not a joke if you repeat it 100 times. A joke does not stop being a joke because of how often it’s repeated. You may no longer find it funny, but it’s still a joke. More importantly, it’s still satire, and The Onion is a satirical news website. > That article has some real "The best thing about school shootings is we get to have literally every article on our website be this clever headline we wrote 10 years" energy to it. If that’s what you take from it, you have completely missed the point. The headline works because it’s social commentary, being funny is secondary. The fact they keep reposting it over and over is itself part of the criticism, it shows disapproval for an easy resolvable situation and removes teeth from the arguments of those opposed to it.
  - deleted 6mo ago
speedster217 6mo ago
Americans are so used to school shootings they complain about the Onion's reaction to it rather than the failure of politics that led them here.
- josefresco 6mo ago
  Indeed, the comment could be spun into an Onion headline itself! "American Man Exhausted by Frequent Mass Shooting Reporting"
- justin66 6mo ago
  Which is part of why the reuse of the headline still works as grim comedy.
catapart 6mo ago
> "[...]but don't put activism over comedy." lol. yeah, carlin and bruce can go fuck themselves, I guess. hilariously unserious take, bruh.
- bko 6mo ago
  They were funny. Do you see the difference?
  - catapart 6mo ago
    not quite; spell it out for me. are you suggesting that the onion has never, under any circumstances, been funny and therefore are guilty of having pretentious opinions that are "not funny", which makes them bad? Or is it that you're suggesting that you are the sole arbiter of what is and isn't funny, so you're the only person who gets to determine the worth of specific types of humor? Sorry, I have a hard time distinguishing which type of childish, smug bullshit I'm dealing with, so any help you can provide would be appreciated. In any case, I've never laughed as hard at anything Lenny fucking Bruce said as I did at The Onions "Sony Releases Stupid Piece Of Shit That Doesn't Fucking Work" bit. So if you've got some favorite bruce bits, I'd love to get educated on what is hilarious about 60 year old observational standup.
    - bko 6mo ago
      [flagged]
      - catapart 6mo ago
        it's amazing how much asking someone to actually explain what they are trying to imply will completely shut them up. Thanks for playing! I hope your next one is so pithy that I'll rue the day I spoke against you. fingers crossed
      - Fnoord 6mo ago
        I know a comedian who is very good on absurdity. He's been doing that for ages (he kind of popularized it in my country), and he generally attracts right-wingers. I don't appreciate all his humor, as in I don't find it all funny because the goal seems to be to shock (kind of like Goatse, which was also a joke/meme riddled with a political message). I do find it political and humor though, as I can clearly see the intent is (at least also) to humor, and also can recognize political virtue signaling within. I've also found him, at times, funny. Whether something is humor can be objectively established by disassembly of the structure of the content, whereas 'if you find it funny' is personal, yet 'if it is funny' is a summary of whether a certain group (such as 'the general public', whatever that may be) find it as such. As such, I believe the expression of not finding someone or something funny a red herring. Different emotions obviously flourish, and the person who expresses that they don't find it funny finds these (more) important. The red herring here isn't whether The Onion is funny or not (personal), it isn't whether it is humor or not (it is, specifically satire). It is that you fundamentally disagree with the political message it entails. Which you are allowed to do so, but in a discussion it is useful to recognize a significant amount of people do find it funny, and either have no problem with the political messages (tolerance) or agree with these (acceptance).
oe 6mo ago
Part of the joke is that the new Super Mario movie has been criticized for being overly violent. So it’s partly commenting on that discussion. I think it’s useful to know, that all Onion jokes start with the headline, and the rest of the article is sometimes bit of filler.
Zigurd 6mo ago
II know, right? If you let "activism" into comedy, you might stop thinking Joe Rogan is funny. Tragic.
FrustratedMonky 6mo ago
"The lady doth protest too much, methinks" a famous line from Shakespeare's Hamlet (Act III, Scene II). It means that someone's overly emphatic or frequent denial of a situation suggests they are hiding the truth, are insincere, or actually guilty of what they deny. It implies their defense is covering up a secret desire or truth.
latexr 6mo ago
> You can have a message and point of view, but don't put activism over comedy. As Jon Stewart put it in the Crossfire interview where they asked him “which candidate do you supposed would provide you better material if he won?” because he has “a stake in it that way, not just as citizen but as a professional comic”, the citizen part is much more important. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aFQFB5YpDZE&t=599s https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aFQFB5YpDZE&t=599s The point of satire is social criticism first, funny second. I have little doubt everyone at the Onion responsible for reposting that headline would a million times prefer that they didn’t have to do it ever because the situation were resolved. > It's just so exhausting. It really says something about the state of society when an atrocity is perpetrated over and over and the complaint is that someone keeps talking about it rather than the atrocity continuing to happen.
JKCalhoun 6mo ago
The joke is of course that they are hoisting the 'No Way to Prevent This' all the time. The (new) punchline is that nothing has changed. To be sure it became gallow's humor sometime after the 2nd or 3rd run. And, no, I don't think it is intended to be funny at all anymore.
malfist 6mo ago
Its okay to find things not funny that other people do find funny. Not everyone agrees or has the same sense of humor. Bko is not the final arbiter in deciding if something is funny or not.
deleted 6mo ago
[deleted]
justin66 6mo ago
> I think people don't like Onion stories because they're not funny, they're just pretentious and political. After reading this comment thread I think this would best be rephrased as "Some people don't like Onion stories because they feel like they're the butt of the joke." Which is fair enough, but let's not over-intellectualize it.
- akramachamarei 6mo ago
  That may be true in some cases, but not in all. In particular, the Onion school shooting joke strikes me as a satire of a strawman. Whatever humor can be derived from ridiculing a stupid version of a position (like "school shootings are unavoidable") is, at least for me, made flaccid by the counterproductive nature of the satire. In other words, when the satire ridicules a dumb argument that not many serious people make, it's not so funny.
  - justin66 6mo ago
    I don't pretend to be an expert on political satire but I never noticed that steelmanning, to use the modern vernacular, was ever a technique featured in high quality work like Tom Lehrer or George Carlin. I mean, literally never. It sounds like you're describing something very boring, but if there's a political satirist (or Satanist, or Salafist, or whatever) you think is funny and an exemplar of what you're describing, drop it here.
deleted 6mo ago
[deleted]
dogleash 6mo ago
Reader's Digest: What pleases you more, applause or laughter? Tina Fey: Laughter. You can prompt applause with a sign. My friend, SNL writer Seth Meyers, coined the term clapter, which is when you do a political joke and people go, "Woo-hoo." It means they sort of approve but didn't really like it that much. You hear a lot of that on [whispers] The Daily Show. Obviously we can't see that people aren't genuinely falling out of their seats laughing when that headline get rolled out again. There's no way argue that someone doesn't earnestly think bad (or tired) jokes make effective satire. I don't think a whinge is a joke just because it has the shape of a joke and a point I like. Overall, I agree with you. But you'll never convince anybody.
Henchman21 6mo ago
> You can have a message and point of view, but don't put activism over comedy. Ok, who made you arbiter of what people can do? Have you missed entirely the point of repeating this little bit of dark humor is to perhaps SPUR THE PEOPLE TO ACTION THAT NEED TO TAKE ACTION? You're right, it isn't a joke. Its very serious. Children are being killed at school. Kids are anxious about going to school because they don't want to be shot. How is that OK? And how is the thing you're taking issue with the repeated headline in a rag that is pure satire? Its like taking issue with the people who point out the Catholic church has a problem with pedophilia. Maybe direct your ire at the people taking no actions on gun control, eh?

by bko 6mo ago

ndsipa_pomu 6mo ago

I'm not in the USA, but I think the issue is not so much the joke getting tiresome, but the repeat school shootings. Maybe if there was work done to stop the shootings, then the joke wouldn't keep getting repeated.

bko 6mo ago
First and foremost you should attempt to be funny or original. This is neither. It's political. I would love headlines like: > Illegal Immigrant Finally Caught After 20 Years of Successfully Contributing to Society but instead you get non joke headlines like: > ICE Agents Hurl Pregnant Immigrant Over Mexican Border To Prevent Birth On U.S. Soil It's just cringe.
- youarecringe 6mo ago
  First and foremost you should endeavor to be a human, and The Onion does not owe you a thing. It's not a joke anymore, its a class ware and genocide that they are reporting on with headlines that make you cringe.
  - akramachamarei 6mo ago
    This is a repulsive, fallacious, and unproductive comment. Hackernews is not the place for emotional venting.
- malfist 6mo ago
  > First and foremost you should attempt to be funny or original. Who are you to declare what satire and and cannot criticize?
ern_ave 6mo ago
> Maybe if there was work done to stop the shootings It's odd that you seem to believe no work has been done. Lots of work has been done. Lots more work is blocked by people who steadfastly refuse to punish criminals - claiming instead that it's not their fault that they're violent. I'd love to hear any additional ideas you have other than violating the rights of citizens.
- bko 6mo ago
  I agree, most of the arguments have been basically "do anything" hysterics that are divorced from reality. For instance, much focus is given on rifles, specifically big black scary looking rifles. In reality if you look at murder rates by weapon type Handguns: ~45–50% Firearm (type unknown): ~20–25% Rifles: ~2–3% Shotguns: ~1–2% Knives / cutting instruments: ~10–12% Blunt objects (clubs, hammers, etc.): ~3–5% Hands, fists, feet (“personal weapons”): ~3–5% Other (poison, fire, etc.): low single digits https://www.criminalattorneycolumbus.com/which-weapons-are-most-commonly-used-for-homicides/ https://www.criminalattorneycolumbus.com/which-weapons-are-m...
  - JKCalhoun 6mo ago
    "…much focus is given on rifles, specifically big black scary looking rifles" Military-style rifles designed primarily for killing humans? That's called a low hanging fruit. If the U.S. can't even restrict those I expect everything else to be a wasted effort.
    - zetanor 6mo ago
      Military-style ARPANET designed primarily for nuclear warfare?
  - throw0101d 6mo ago
    > In reality if you look at murder rates by weapon type What is the school shooting by weapon type? The 'general' mass shooting by weapon type?
    - 6mo ago
deleted 6mo ago
[deleted]

Goronmon 6mo ago

You can have a message and point of view, but don't put activism over comedy. The "joke" in this case is people's reactions to school shootings. And people's reactions haven't changed, so I don't see why the article should change. It's just so exhausting. This has some real "The worst thing about school shootings is knowing that The Onion is going to repost that article I personally am tired of seeing" energy to it.

bko 6mo ago
It's not a joke if you repeat it 100 times. That article has some real "The best thing about school shootings is we get to have literally every article on our website be this clever headline we wrote 10 years" energy to it.
- JKCalhoun 6mo ago
  Yeah, pretty sure it's not expected to be funny. If at all, it has entered absurdist territory.
- throw0101d 6mo ago
  > It's not a joke if you repeat it 100 times. The fact that it's been repeated so often kind of makes it a tragedy at this point.
- latexr 6mo ago
  > It's not a joke if you repeat it 100 times. A joke does not stop being a joke because of how often it’s repeated. You may no longer find it funny, but it’s still a joke. More importantly, it’s still satire, and The Onion is a satirical news website. > That article has some real "The best thing about school shootings is we get to have literally every article on our website be this clever headline we wrote 10 years" energy to it. If that’s what you take from it, you have completely missed the point. The headline works because it’s social commentary, being funny is secondary. The fact they keep reposting it over and over is itself part of the criticism, it shows disapproval for an easy resolvable situation and removes teeth from the arguments of those opposed to it.
- deleted 6mo ago

speedster217 6mo ago

Americans are so used to school shootings they complain about the Onion's reaction to it rather than the failure of politics that led them here.

josefresco 6mo ago
Indeed, the comment could be spun into an Onion headline itself! "American Man Exhausted by Frequent Mass Shooting Reporting"
justin66 6mo ago
Which is part of why the reuse of the headline still works as grim comedy.

catapart 6mo ago

> "[...]but don't put activism over comedy." lol. yeah, carlin and bruce can go fuck themselves, I guess. hilariously unserious take, bruh.

bko 6mo ago
They were funny. Do you see the difference?
- catapart 6mo ago
  not quite; spell it out for me. are you suggesting that the onion has never, under any circumstances, been funny and therefore are guilty of having pretentious opinions that are "not funny", which makes them bad? Or is it that you're suggesting that you are the sole arbiter of what is and isn't funny, so you're the only person who gets to determine the worth of specific types of humor? Sorry, I have a hard time distinguishing which type of childish, smug bullshit I'm dealing with, so any help you can provide would be appreciated. In any case, I've never laughed as hard at anything Lenny fucking Bruce said as I did at The Onions "Sony Releases Stupid Piece Of Shit That Doesn't Fucking Work" bit. So if you've got some favorite bruce bits, I'd love to get educated on what is hilarious about 60 year old observational standup.
  - bko 6mo ago
    [flagged]
    - catapart 6mo ago
      it's amazing how much asking someone to actually explain what they are trying to imply will completely shut them up. Thanks for playing! I hope your next one is so pithy that I'll rue the day I spoke against you. fingers crossed
    - Fnoord 6mo ago
      I know a comedian who is very good on absurdity. He's been doing that for ages (he kind of popularized it in my country), and he generally attracts right-wingers. I don't appreciate all his humor, as in I don't find it all funny because the goal seems to be to shock (kind of like Goatse, which was also a joke/meme riddled with a political message). I do find it political and humor though, as I can clearly see the intent is (at least also) to humor, and also can recognize political virtue signaling within. I've also found him, at times, funny. Whether something is humor can be objectively established by disassembly of the structure of the content, whereas 'if you find it funny' is personal, yet 'if it is funny' is a summary of whether a certain group (such as 'the general public', whatever that may be) find it as such. As such, I believe the expression of not finding someone or something funny a red herring. Different emotions obviously flourish, and the person who expresses that they don't find it funny finds these (more) important. The red herring here isn't whether The Onion is funny or not (personal), it isn't whether it is humor or not (it is, specifically satire). It is that you fundamentally disagree with the political message it entails. Which you are allowed to do so, but in a discussion it is useful to recognize a significant amount of people do find it funny, and either have no problem with the political messages (tolerance) or agree with these (acceptance).

oe 6mo ago

Part of the joke is that the new Super Mario movie has been criticized for being overly violent. So it’s partly commenting on that discussion. I think it’s useful to know, that all Onion jokes start with the headline, and the rest of the article is sometimes bit of filler.

Zigurd 6mo ago

II know, right? If you let "activism" into comedy, you might stop thinking Joe Rogan is funny. Tragic.

FrustratedMonky 6mo ago

"The lady doth protest too much, methinks" a famous line from Shakespeare's Hamlet (Act III, Scene II). It means that someone's overly emphatic or frequent denial of a situation suggests they are hiding the truth, are insincere, or actually guilty of what they deny. It implies their defense is covering up a secret desire or truth.

latexr 6mo ago

> You can have a message and point of view, but don't put activism over comedy. As Jon Stewart put it in the Crossfire interview where they asked him “which candidate do you supposed would provide you better material if he won?” because he has “a stake in it that way, not just as citizen but as a professional comic”, the citizen part is much more important. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aFQFB5YpDZE&t=599s https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aFQFB5YpDZE&t=599s The point of satire is social criticism first, funny second. I have little doubt everyone at the Onion responsible for reposting that headline would a million times prefer that they didn’t have to do it ever because the situation were resolved. > It's just so exhausting. It really says something about the state of society when an atrocity is perpetrated over and over and the complaint is that someone keeps talking about it rather than the atrocity continuing to happen.

JKCalhoun 6mo ago

The joke is of course that they are hoisting the 'No Way to Prevent This' all the time. The (new) punchline is that nothing has changed. To be sure it became gallow's humor sometime after the 2nd or 3rd run. And, no, I don't think it is intended to be funny at all anymore.

malfist 6mo ago

Its okay to find things not funny that other people do find funny. Not everyone agrees or has the same sense of humor. Bko is not the final arbiter in deciding if something is funny or not.

deleted 6mo ago

[deleted]

justin66 6mo ago

> I think people don't like Onion stories because they're not funny, they're just pretentious and political. After reading this comment thread I think this would best be rephrased as "Some people don't like Onion stories because they feel like they're the butt of the joke." Which is fair enough, but let's not over-intellectualize it.

akramachamarei 6mo ago
That may be true in some cases, but not in all. In particular, the Onion school shooting joke strikes me as a satire of a strawman. Whatever humor can be derived from ridiculing a stupid version of a position (like "school shootings are unavoidable") is, at least for me, made flaccid by the counterproductive nature of the satire. In other words, when the satire ridicules a dumb argument that not many serious people make, it's not so funny.
- justin66 6mo ago
  I don't pretend to be an expert on political satire but I never noticed that steelmanning, to use the modern vernacular, was ever a technique featured in high quality work like Tom Lehrer or George Carlin. I mean, literally never. It sounds like you're describing something very boring, but if there's a political satirist (or Satanist, or Salafist, or whatever) you think is funny and an exemplar of what you're describing, drop it here.

deleted 6mo ago

[deleted]

dogleash 6mo ago

Reader's Digest: What pleases you more, applause or laughter? Tina Fey: Laughter. You can prompt applause with a sign. My friend, SNL writer Seth Meyers, coined the term clapter, which is when you do a political joke and people go, "Woo-hoo." It means they sort of approve but didn't really like it that much. You hear a lot of that on [whispers] The Daily Show. Obviously we can't see that people aren't genuinely falling out of their seats laughing when that headline get rolled out again. There's no way argue that someone doesn't earnestly think bad (or tired) jokes make effective satire. I don't think a whinge is a joke just because it has the shape of a joke and a point I like. Overall, I agree with you. But you'll never convince anybody.

Henchman21 6mo ago

> You can have a message and point of view, but don't put activism over comedy. Ok, who made you arbiter of what people can do? Have you missed entirely the point of repeating this little bit of dark humor is to perhaps SPUR THE PEOPLE TO ACTION THAT NEED TO TAKE ACTION? You're right, it isn't a joke. Its very serious. Children are being killed at school. Kids are anxious about going to school because they don't want to be shot. How is that OK? And how is the thing you're taking issue with the repeated headline in a rag that is pure satire? Its like taking issue with the people who point out the Catholic church has a problem with pedophilia. Maybe direct your ire at the people taking no actions on gun control, eh?