July 24, 2014
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Either way, it doesn”t matter. The writing had been on the wall for some time. The Onion‘s style of satire had its time, but it’s become as dated as National Lampoon. MAD might be timeless, but few other things are. The Onion had a good run; sadly, it’s been overtaken by the actual media.
The American grievance industry is now mired in the deep end, finding offense absolutely everywhere. We”ve hit critical mass for outrage fatigue. No one takes these shenanigans seriously anymore, save perhaps first-year sociology students enjoying their first hours off the reservation of a gated community”or the structurally unemployed, wiling the hours away on Tumblr, posting gifs of Lady Gaga flipping her hair in lieu of a counterargument, as they “literally cannot even.”
There’s also Slate, there’s the New Media Company That Shall Never Be Named … even the once-venerable Daily Mail has gotten in on the act. The mainstream media, old and new, are enough of a joke. Why do we even need satire anymore? Is anyone surprised that there are people who couldn”t tell the difference between Real Salon and Bizarro Salon?
Still, even when”no, especially when”the “real” news media are indistinguishable from satire, we need actual satire. It’s what keeps us sane. It is what lets us know that we”re not alone. It’s a winking inside joke for anyone who’s ever read grievance “journalism,” shook his fists at the heavens, and demanded that the gods get him out of this stinking madhouse.
