Wednesday, October 27, 2004
Just responding to Laura's points here. The comments are transient: the body eternal.
I've got to say I've never agreed with a word he's said, although I concede that he's funny, if you're a certain type of nihilistic cynic.
I've fallen out of love with Bill Hicks, as well (not that he's got anything to do with PJ apart from their respective loud cynicism).
I realise I'm wrong about both of these people, I just can't bring myself to embrace their world view.
P.J. O'Rourke
It's taken me a while to rid myself of the jerking-knee and allow myself to enjoy his writing. His philosophy can be summarised as a distrust of (all) ideologies* and an intolerance of stupidity. I don't agree with all his points, in fact, I disagree with a lot of what he says, but he usually forces you to define why you don't agree with him. Either way, he is pretty funny; there's a load of his quotes here. Most of them don't work too well on their own, lifted from the text; he tends to use humour as a way of making a point, not for its own sake. I like this one though:
"At best Asian music is off-brand American pop, like Sonny Bono in a
karaoke bar. At worst Asian music sounds as if a truck full of wind
chimes collided with a stack of empty oil drums during a birdcall
contest."
It's just a joke, un-po your face. There are serious ideas here too:
"I guess the argument of contextuality is that anything is okay as
long as it's done by people who are sufficiently unlike you."
I think that cuts through most of the nonsense surrounding the Tatchell-Beenie Man furore very effectively.
* Sure can't be bothered arguing with the point that this is in itself an ideology.
Bill Hicks
Appeals to me much less than he used to. For all his preacher-truth-teller-martyr reputation, sometimes he's just plain wrong. He's right about artists losing all credibility when they endorse products. He's wrong about Rick Astley being rubbish (Never Gonna Give You Up is the best song of the '80s. Copyright: Danny Baker). Also, his obsession with that colossal red herring the Kennedy assassination becomes increasingly wearying.
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I've got to say I've never agreed with a word he's said, although I concede that he's funny, if you're a certain type of nihilistic cynic.
I've fallen out of love with Bill Hicks, as well (not that he's got anything to do with PJ apart from their respective loud cynicism).
I realise I'm wrong about both of these people, I just can't bring myself to embrace their world view.
P.J. O'Rourke
It's taken me a while to rid myself of the jerking-knee and allow myself to enjoy his writing. His philosophy can be summarised as a distrust of (all) ideologies* and an intolerance of stupidity. I don't agree with all his points, in fact, I disagree with a lot of what he says, but he usually forces you to define why you don't agree with him. Either way, he is pretty funny; there's a load of his quotes here. Most of them don't work too well on their own, lifted from the text; he tends to use humour as a way of making a point, not for its own sake. I like this one though:
"At best Asian music is off-brand American pop, like Sonny Bono in a
karaoke bar. At worst Asian music sounds as if a truck full of wind
chimes collided with a stack of empty oil drums during a birdcall
contest."
It's just a joke, un-po your face. There are serious ideas here too:
"I guess the argument of contextuality is that anything is okay as
long as it's done by people who are sufficiently unlike you."
I think that cuts through most of the nonsense surrounding the Tatchell-Beenie Man furore very effectively.
* Sure can't be bothered arguing with the point that this is in itself an ideology.
Bill Hicks
Appeals to me much less than he used to. For all his preacher-truth-teller-martyr reputation, sometimes he's just plain wrong. He's right about artists losing all credibility when they endorse products. He's wrong about Rick Astley being rubbish (Never Gonna Give You Up is the best song of the '80s. Copyright: Danny Baker). Also, his obsession with that colossal red herring the Kennedy assassination becomes increasingly wearying.
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