Every morning when I come into work, I walk by an office that has a snowman hanging on the door. It's a cardboard picture of a snowman walking, holding a shovel over one of his shoulders, and waving. I just find that a bit weird, a snowman carrying a snow shovel. Would it really be that different from a smiling cow holidng a meat hook? So now with that thought out of the way...

I've been writing a number of emails lately regarding comedy, due to some personal projects I've been working on. But here's my gripe on the subject:

A lot of "comedy" I see now a days is very mass-directed. Instead of being based on wit and creativity, is mostly seems to be based on mentally programmed associations: Bill Clinton is a pervert, OJ Simpson is a criminal, Barney & Boy Bands are the enemy, blah blah blah. And aside from maybe the first 4 jokes you hear on one of these subjects, the rest of them all made to generate laughter by sole means of those associations. I went to the comedy section of a local record store (yes, I still call them "record stores"; "music stores" can be a term to distinguish places that sell musicial instruments). Anyway, I found no less than 6 different Bill Clinton parody CDs from the same performer. Talk about running a joke into the ground! Who buys this stuff? Hey, I buy comedy albums once in a while. But I get the stuff that I deem to be timeless and creative, and will still give me a laugh years later.

Then you have TV. The vast majority of televised comedy, as with most things on TV, is unwitty, calculated crap for the masses. Sorry to sound like a snobby conspiracy theorist here, but it's true. Jay Leno rewords the same punchline 3 times. David Letterman repeats a punchline randomly on 3 different nights. Sitcoms practically turn into self-parodies within a couple of seasons. Again, the jokes become based on learned mental associations: the act itself of watching Kramer walk into a room is considered funny, some reminder that Homer Simpson is lazy is supposed to be funny, and Kelly Bundy was shown as being more and more unrealistically stupid.

Another thing I've observed are people who act programmed to not laugh at any comedy that's more than 5 years old. Last summer I bought the Mr. Show DVD. I loved this show when it was still on HBO, and I certainly didn't laugh any less when I bought the DVD years later and watched it. It has the complete first two seasons, and a bunch of other stuff. The Newbury Comics clerk said "So, did you like this show?" "Yes, I remember it being absolutely hilarious." "Did you watch the later seasons or something? Because my friends saw this and they didn't laugh at all." Similarly, my brother bought me a copy of another HBO special, a late 80s one called "Rodney's Place". It was hosted by Rodney Dangerfield, and had a bunch of live stand-up and skits from these comedians he basically discovered (including Sam Kineson, some new guys by the names of Tim Allen and Jeff Foxworthy, and several more). Once again, I laughed my ass off whenever I watched this back in the day, and I still laughed my ass off when I watched it this time. Meanwhile, my brother's friend also bought a copy because he shared the same memories. But when he played it for his friends, they didn't laugh once.

What the FUCK is wrong with these people? Now seriously, I'll be the first person on this planet to admit that not everybody is going to like the stuff that I happen to like. But how anybody can sit through these particular pieces and be in complete silent grumpiness just blows my mind. The viewers weren't prudes, I know that. None of the material was really dated (I can't remember there being any jokes on specific trends, politicians, etc. at that time). Do they just see a mullet and immediately tune everything else out? Does anybody care about wit, delivery and originality? Or maybe this has just become like all that packaged stuff: the pop songs centered around one hook from the major scale, rock songs centered around one riff with no coherant singing or solos, internet ISPs made for idiots. Over-priced samples of sugar-rushing frosting, with no cake.

"Only a fool mistakes laughter for humor, and fashion for style." - Anton Szandor LaVey (1930-1997)