If you need to break the addiction, read a few pages looking for misogyny, bigotry, and casual discrimination against various sorts of people. Your habit'll break by sun-up.
Am I not allowed to state a dissenting opinion online anymore? Shitmydadsays is a brilliant Internet source, and Rules For My Unborn Son strikes me as bigoted and outdated.
I'm sorry. I didn't mean for this to become as serious a thread as it was. I meant my response lightheartedly, as in: "Hey, you could look at it like that and you'll find it." It's got a very 1950s mindset, and I was saying that if you get hooked that's what I realized that made me stop reading it.
Libel? It's an Internet comment, and it's not one taking itself that seriously. It's not like I'm launching a massive anti-Rules campaign. It's my opinion, and I was trying not to be a douche about it. Sorry if I came across as douchey.
But, seriously, "I'll go Communications major on your ass" is a threat? I was implying that if he wanted to be an asshole, I'd devote some major time to explaining what makes Shitmydadsays such a compelling read for me, from the perspective of somebody who's career is going to be focused on the written word.
Shitmydadsays has become one of the best parts of my weekly routine. It's not just how funny they are: There's a poetry to how he speaks that's as good as any one-liners I've ever read.
The meter is beautiful, the phrasing is eloquent, and the concept is hilarious.
You don't know shit, and you're not shit. Don't take that the wrong way, that was meant to cheer you up.
Sometimes life leaves a hundred dollar bill on your dresser, and you don't realize until later that it's because it fucked you.
We didn't have a prom. Dancing wasn't allowed...What's Footloose?...That's the plot of the movie? That sounds like a pile of shit.
It's identifiable, it's beautiful, and it's poetic.
These are the sorts of phrasings that can only come out of an old and wise and hilarious person. The confidence in forming his thoughts that way; the lazy beat of the language. I spend an inordinate amount of time learning to write dialogue, and let me tell you: If Justin's writing that himself, he's got a career as a screenwriter ahead of him. That's some brilliance right there.
Hopefully the examples I've picked do justice without my having to say too much. If you'd like to press your luck, and feel like spreading your smug cockery online without warrant, then I'll go Communications major on your ass and comprehensively make you look stupid in front of people on a web forum that you won't ever know in real life, but I think that would be a waste of both our times.
It's really weird when a bunch of people you thought were intelligent all seem to enjoy the same kind of fart jokes or whatever.
"No, no, listen. It's really eloquent..."
[PHHHHBBBBGGGTTTTHHHH..!!!]
Maybe that's the joke? Like, it's really fucking stupid, everyone knows it, but stands around laughing trying to sucker innocents into laughing as well?
You're allowed to state your opinion. You're not allowed to be a smug turd about it. Making the absurd implication that by reading this guy's 72 tweets we're wasting our life and our brain comes across as massively egodouche. Even if this guy was making fart jokes, you wouldn't be justified in the comment you made.
But, as it happens, his jokes aren't fart jokes. They're smart and superbly funny, and I say this as something of a Humor Asshole. You're not the Smart Person Who Reprimands Stupid People in this archetypal Internet conversation. You are the Person Who Doesn't Get It And So Projects His Dislike. You know how there're people online who insist that Shakespeare was a hack writer and people that like him are only pretending? That's who you are in this scenario.
Shitmydadsays is one of two huge Internet joke site loves in my world, along with MLIA. The reason I think it's brilliant is that it does such a good job of communicating who Justin's dad is. He's apathetic, entirely tactless, calls out bullshit when he sees it, and still feels a fondness for his son. Now, it sounds easy in theory to convey those things, but in practice, creating short pieces of dialogue that manages to both be engaging and sounds like a certain character is really, really difficult. Most people aren't capable of doing it and being amusing. Write down the words most people you know speak in a day, and you couldn't make a site like this. I've seen spinoffs. They serve to remind me just how rare it is to find somebody that speaks in a unique voice, particularly one that's also entertaining.
If you feel like it, and I do this morning, you can break down the words he says to understand why people are finding it funny.
"Just pay the parking ticket. Don't be so outraged. You're not a freedom fighter in the civil rights movement. You double parked."
It's fascinating that these tweets set up an entire story. That's hard, too. From these four lines, we know that Justin is upset over a parking ticket. That's the establishment of the scenario, conveyed entirely in the response to his feelings, and in a natural way that doesn't come across as a set-up. You didn't read that and think "What a superficial set-up," because it's not.
The joke's funny for three reasons at once. First off, yes, it's funny that the father's not taking Justin's side, because grouchy old men are funny, especially when they're snapping at youngsters. But that's the absolute surface of the joke. The juxtaposition between the parking ticket and his likening to the civil rights movement is hilarious. Partly that's because the father was old enough to see the civil rights movement and Justin wasn't. Another part is that it also serves to show just how absurd it was that Justin's so mad at the parking ticket. It really doesn't compare to civil rights, does it? So it's such a ridiculous perspective that still manages to have the realism of the father's age.
And finally, there's identification. We've been in situations like this, getting mad at small shit. So Justin's dad's words both make us identify with Justin and make us realize how foolish we were being. There's wisdom in his words that requires his sense of humor to fully work.
You get all that in four sentences. I've seen a lot of passages of Shakespeare's that didn't work so well. And this guy will never be as prolific in his brilliance, that's the genius of the short form. You can focus on the best stuff and eliminate the crap. So these lines fit Twitter perfectly as a medium.
"You worry too much. Eat some bacon... What? No, I got no idea if it'll make you feel better, I just made too much bacon."
The comedic twist, where the father's advice turns out not to be advice, comes across as perfectly deadpan. He's sympathizing with Justin, and offers him food—then turns it around, says it's not going to help him, and gives a more mundane reason for his advice that's hilarious in its own right. (Making too much bacon is a mental image that I find pretty chortle-worthy.) So, again, y...
It seems to me you have the core of a doctoral thesis in literary criticism here (said as someone who knows absolutely nothing about literary criticism). In any case, it seems like someone should write a thesis on Shit My Dad Says.
(Maybe literary criticism is the wrong discipline? Is there something more applicable?)
Well, it's early in the morning and I might come to my senses later, but what the hell, the Internet's got a lot of free space: http://shitmydadsaysexplained.tumblr.com/
I promise you within four entries you'll never be able to read SMDS without breaking it down into components, and the humor will be lost, and you'll hate me forever.
I'll admit that some of it is clever, but I still don't find it that funny.
And I may be way off base here, but I think many people don't like this twitter account simply because of its popularity. They can't like what 'everyone' else likes.
That's kind of how I see it. I can sympathize with that, though. It's frustrating to see lots of people like something you can't stand. I have the same reaction to Jason Mraz, American Beauty, and Firefly.
It is very difficult to make 700,000 people laugh with a text message. You have to aim for the common denominator; "cerebral jokes" won't cut it. I'm not saying he's a comic genius, but I am saying that you could not regularly make 30 strangers laugh with a one-liner.
It's a great story -- especially since Shit My Dad Says is hilarious -- but this does more to prove how desperate the networks are for hits in the 18-34 demographic and how poor their judgement has become (see 'Cavemen') than it does to prove anything about Twitter talent shining through, etc.
This doesn't look especially "desperate" to me. They gave the guy "a deal". The article doesn't mention the price. It doesn't mention a pilot, let alone an order of six episodes. It says there's a writer, a co-writer, a producer, and a press release. That's all just paper, and precious little paper so far. The sunk cost of this for the network could literally range all the way down to: The cost of printing out that press release.
(Because, believe me, if you're an aspiring screenwriter and a studio calls and offers to read your spec script, put out a press release, introduce you to a producer whose name you've actually heard, and pay you as little as one nickel, you take that call. Because having a studio on the other end of a phone line may be all you need to get an agent, who will not only help you negotiate your way up to fifty whole bucks above union scale, but will also probably shop your next script or two around. Which is where the value is. Many aspiring screenwriters never get this far.)
Merlin bugs me when he gets cynical about stuff. He spends most of his career looking at how things are deeper and more meaningful than they seem, and then on occasion he dismisses something with a line or two that's got more to it. He does the same thing when he writes about the Beatles, because he always implies that a) the only reason they broke up was Yoko Ono, and b) Yoko was a stupid woman who couldn't write good music, and c) she seduced John.
It's annoying that somebody so smart is occasionally so willing to get snippy without contributing to the conversation.
Merlin is actually correct about the Beatles. Yoko's behavior is identical to someone who wanted the band to break up. She was obsessed with Lennon for years before they hooked up. And, her art is shit.
Following his tumblr, I'd say he celebrates beatles awesomesauce at least as often as criticizing Yoko.
Gonna have to disagree with you there. I'm a fan both of Yoko's art and her music. Lennon wouldn't have reached the peaks he did both as a later Beatle and as a soloist were it not for her avante-garde influence. Plastic Ono Band owes so much to her. And her music is brilliant. Even her latest stuff, in her late 70s, is raw and piercing and occasionally beautiful.
Meanwhile, she gave Lennon peace and happiness for the last ten years of his life. She was the one who mended his more tortured aspects, calmed him down, gave him a reason to live. People call her a she-devil, but she made John happy. Even if she did nothing else of value, that alone made her role a meaningful one.
Twitter gets payments from some telcos because it helps to drive text usage. It's not quite the furnace fed with hundred dollar bills that it's sometimes portrayed as.
I saw a story about it when they reenabled text for canadians and a couple of friends of mine were able to start using twitter from their phones again.
Almost makes me wonder what we're doing busting our ass writing software. </sarcasm>
I'm a little surprised at this - are they turning the blog into the idea for a show? Those 72 one liners would be burned up in as little as half a season (not that I even know how long that is because I don't watch TV).
That said, a sit com that had cankerous old farts in it is nothing new. "There's Something about Raymond", "Seinfield", ... jeez the list goes on.
A great outcome for a truly hilarious collection of tweets. I've always wondered whether the 'dad' was real, but I ultimately decided it didn't matter - the tweets are simply hilarious.
I'm guessing the guy got hired to be a TV writer because those tweets were written by him and the tv producers liked his writing, and not because they randomly chose some guy who tweeted what his dad said.
It's probably more because the guy owns the rights to the tweets, so he added him being hired as part of the deal. He probably won't do much in the way of writing the actual show.
And because Justin is already a successful writer who edits Maxim.com. He founded the comedy site Holy Taco (now owned by Break Media) and for the show he's getting the help of the co-creators of "Will and Grace."
"Shit My Dad Says" was just what turned him into a hot ticket and gave his creativity a specific character to explore.
I had a subscription to a magazine that went out of business. They sold the rest of my subscription to Maxim, and sent me a letter letting me know that I could get a check for the remainder of my money instead of getting Maxim. There were only a couple of issues left in the subscription anyway, so I figured it wasn't worth the trouble to get the check.
I read through the first issue of Maxim that showed up and realized that it was 1.) basically porn for kids too young to get actual porn and 2.) actually insulting to the reader. I'm not saying that the writing quality was so poor that it was an insult to the reader, I'm saying that the writers actually insult the reader by calling the reader a loser, telling the reader that his penis is tiny, and calling into question the reader's sexuality.
I don't know how they make any money by actually insulting the people that bother to buy the magazine. If I had to guess, I'd say that most of the people buying the magazine aren't doing it for the articles.
So there is some use for Twitter after all, isn't this just the "old media" attempting to get cool and "with it" by jumping onto what is a bona-fide internet hit ?
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[ 4.8 ms ] story [ 127 ms ] thread"misogyny, bigotry, and casual discrimination"
"I'll go Communications major on your ass"
Libel? It's an Internet comment, and it's not one taking itself that seriously. It's not like I'm launching a massive anti-Rules campaign. It's my opinion, and I was trying not to be a douche about it. Sorry if I came across as douchey.
But, seriously, "I'll go Communications major on your ass" is a threat? I was implying that if he wanted to be an asshole, I'd devote some major time to explaining what makes Shitmydadsays such a compelling read for me, from the perspective of somebody who's career is going to be focused on the written word.
388. If you don't know what a knob does, don't fool with it.
I couldn't bring myself ever to give such bad advice to anyone :(
;)
ED: Quit downmodding me and read the god damned things, people:
"When I used to live in Los Angeles, I used to step in human feces a lot."
It's absolute garbage. Raise your standards a bit. You only get one life and one brain.
You don't know shit, and you're not shit. Don't take that the wrong way, that was meant to cheer you up.
Sometimes life leaves a hundred dollar bill on your dresser, and you don't realize until later that it's because it fucked you.
We didn't have a prom. Dancing wasn't allowed...What's Footloose?...That's the plot of the movie? That sounds like a pile of shit.
It's identifiable, it's beautiful, and it's poetic.
These are the sorts of phrasings that can only come out of an old and wise and hilarious person. The confidence in forming his thoughts that way; the lazy beat of the language. I spend an inordinate amount of time learning to write dialogue, and let me tell you: If Justin's writing that himself, he's got a career as a screenwriter ahead of him. That's some brilliance right there.
Hopefully the examples I've picked do justice without my having to say too much. If you'd like to press your luck, and feel like spreading your smug cockery online without warrant, then I'll go Communications major on your ass and comprehensively make you look stupid in front of people on a web forum that you won't ever know in real life, but I think that would be a waste of both our times.
"Son, people will always try and fuck you. Don't waste your life planning for a fucking, just be alert when your pants are down."
It's really weird when a bunch of people you thought were intelligent all seem to enjoy the same kind of fart jokes or whatever.
"No, no, listen. It's really eloquent..."
[PHHHHBBBBGGGTTTTHHHH..!!!]
Maybe that's the joke? Like, it's really fucking stupid, everyone knows it, but stands around laughing trying to sucker innocents into laughing as well?
But, as it happens, his jokes aren't fart jokes. They're smart and superbly funny, and I say this as something of a Humor Asshole. You're not the Smart Person Who Reprimands Stupid People in this archetypal Internet conversation. You are the Person Who Doesn't Get It And So Projects His Dislike. You know how there're people online who insist that Shakespeare was a hack writer and people that like him are only pretending? That's who you are in this scenario.
Shitmydadsays is one of two huge Internet joke site loves in my world, along with MLIA. The reason I think it's brilliant is that it does such a good job of communicating who Justin's dad is. He's apathetic, entirely tactless, calls out bullshit when he sees it, and still feels a fondness for his son. Now, it sounds easy in theory to convey those things, but in practice, creating short pieces of dialogue that manages to both be engaging and sounds like a certain character is really, really difficult. Most people aren't capable of doing it and being amusing. Write down the words most people you know speak in a day, and you couldn't make a site like this. I've seen spinoffs. They serve to remind me just how rare it is to find somebody that speaks in a unique voice, particularly one that's also entertaining.
If you feel like it, and I do this morning, you can break down the words he says to understand why people are finding it funny.
"Just pay the parking ticket. Don't be so outraged. You're not a freedom fighter in the civil rights movement. You double parked."
It's fascinating that these tweets set up an entire story. That's hard, too. From these four lines, we know that Justin is upset over a parking ticket. That's the establishment of the scenario, conveyed entirely in the response to his feelings, and in a natural way that doesn't come across as a set-up. You didn't read that and think "What a superficial set-up," because it's not.
The joke's funny for three reasons at once. First off, yes, it's funny that the father's not taking Justin's side, because grouchy old men are funny, especially when they're snapping at youngsters. But that's the absolute surface of the joke. The juxtaposition between the parking ticket and his likening to the civil rights movement is hilarious. Partly that's because the father was old enough to see the civil rights movement and Justin wasn't. Another part is that it also serves to show just how absurd it was that Justin's so mad at the parking ticket. It really doesn't compare to civil rights, does it? So it's such a ridiculous perspective that still manages to have the realism of the father's age.
And finally, there's identification. We've been in situations like this, getting mad at small shit. So Justin's dad's words both make us identify with Justin and make us realize how foolish we were being. There's wisdom in his words that requires his sense of humor to fully work.
You get all that in four sentences. I've seen a lot of passages of Shakespeare's that didn't work so well. And this guy will never be as prolific in his brilliance, that's the genius of the short form. You can focus on the best stuff and eliminate the crap. So these lines fit Twitter perfectly as a medium.
"You worry too much. Eat some bacon... What? No, I got no idea if it'll make you feel better, I just made too much bacon."
The comedic twist, where the father's advice turns out not to be advice, comes across as perfectly deadpan. He's sympathizing with Justin, and offers him food—then turns it around, says it's not going to help him, and gives a more mundane reason for his advice that's hilarious in its own right. (Making too much bacon is a mental image that I find pretty chortle-worthy.) So, again, y...
(Maybe literary criticism is the wrong discipline? Is there something more applicable?)
I promise you within four entries you'll never be able to read SMDS without breaking it down into components, and the humor will be lost, and you'll hate me forever.
And I may be way off base here, but I think many people don't like this twitter account simply because of its popularity. They can't like what 'everyone' else likes.
(Because, believe me, if you're an aspiring screenwriter and a studio calls and offers to read your spec script, put out a press release, introduce you to a producer whose name you've actually heard, and pay you as little as one nickel, you take that call. Because having a studio on the other end of a phone line may be all you need to get an agent, who will not only help you negotiate your way up to fifty whole bucks above union scale, but will also probably shop your next script or two around. Which is where the value is. Many aspiring screenwriters never get this far.)
It's annoying that somebody so smart is occasionally so willing to get snippy without contributing to the conversation.
I think he is correct that the tweets are somewhat fabricated, but also right that this is cool to see a twitterer get a tv deal.
Following his tumblr, I'd say he celebrates beatles awesomesauce at least as often as criticizing Yoko.
Meanwhile, she gave Lennon peace and happiness for the last ten years of his life. She was the one who mended his more tortured aspects, calmed him down, gave him a reason to live. People call her a she-devil, but she made John happy. Even if she did nothing else of value, that alone made her role a meaningful one.
I find this story http://www.thestar.com/article/592619 but it doesn't mention any deal w/ twitter.
I'm a little surprised at this - are they turning the blog into the idea for a show? Those 72 one liners would be burned up in as little as half a season (not that I even know how long that is because I don't watch TV).
That said, a sit com that had cankerous old farts in it is nothing new. "There's Something about Raymond", "Seinfield", ... jeez the list goes on.
Ok, I used to watch a lot of TV.
Lawyer Says: "I have read hundreds if not thousands of Tweets and have yet to read one I believe would be protectable, but the possibility exists."
"Shit My Dad Says" was just what turned him into a hot ticket and gave his creativity a specific character to explore.
I read through the first issue of Maxim that showed up and realized that it was 1.) basically porn for kids too young to get actual porn and 2.) actually insulting to the reader. I'm not saying that the writing quality was so poor that it was an insult to the reader, I'm saying that the writers actually insult the reader by calling the reader a loser, telling the reader that his penis is tiny, and calling into question the reader's sexuality.
I don't know how they make any money by actually insulting the people that bother to buy the magazine. If I had to guess, I'd say that most of the people buying the magazine aren't doing it for the articles.
Well good on you Justin.