Snarky, Snark Snark, Snuck

Friends

OK. I love sarcasm, wit, and cleverness. I hate snarkiness. Yes, I am an admitted hater — of nasty, cruel, and self-promoting quips hurled at unsuspecting persons. I see snarkiness as a form of bullying. Snark is the sound of the snot of a 12-yr old boy who forgets or refuses to blow his nose, as it moves back up into the nasal cavity; then down again. Yuck. The sound makes me cringe every time I hear it. Truly. Feh!!!

A couple of weeks ago I witnessed a flame-up in one of the blogging sites I frequent. I was incensed and very angry – so angry I could not write for over a week. Not because I cared what these people thought of my writing but because I was so lathered by the sheer stupidity I was witnessing by a self-touted “community” of writers, I was rendered near speechless; not very common for me I might add… I always have an opinion.

I actually happened into the center of this flame-up by reading a parody of the original blog, which took a few readings to get that it WAS parody; it was so stunningly stingingly scorpionic and mean-spirited I could not calm down for hours. The writer’s tone — meaning to be funny — was simply spiteful and malicious. It took more hours to get to the original blog that inspired this, which, granted, was rather pretentious and a badly thought-out blog that poorly estimated her audience and their response. It required commentary; it did not require the degree of nastiness I saw unless of course, your own writing is so insecurely self-regarded. A week after a bad reaction to chemo and a true annoyance at ongoing snarky language and a bunch of malcontents calling this blog site a community (which I found antithetical to their behavior) I calmed down. This is now four or five weeks later so I guess it took a long time to be able to express myself about this issue. I am often slow on the uptake when it comes to anger – I smoulder.

Bullying is bullying no matter what you call it; snarky writing is bullying when you can so easily decipher a singularly nasty tone versus great language. Mind you, I also hate Pollyanna-like thinking; I don’t see myself as that unsophisticated or that dumb – I see myself of as a realist, and equally hate the idea of condescending to an audience in any way. I am neither brighter than nor smarter than my audience – I simply might have experience and knowledge they do not, or a way to get somewhere that they might benefit from, and that includes my using sarcasm, and hopefully wit, to get there. Do I dare say I am witty, a bon vivant, a clever sophisticate? Hell no, I am your average smart-ass…

Great parody is worth every word as is great writing. BUT I always thought parody was meant to be burlesque, humor, spoof, a lampoon of an original not the distortion or willful insult that what I read was at least in my estimation. This is a completed non-event and I don’t need to rehash it – anyone reading from that source this will recognize the who/what/where – that it occurred is what I find so distasteful. Obnoxious might proclaim my feelings better…much in the way I feel about that happened to that sweet young man in Upper Darby, PA and the response to his bullying by the adults in his community. His parents were told to move (they did), and take him out of his school (he’ll be home schooled now) because they could do nothing about it. Nadin Khoury, a small-framed intelligent boy went on TV almost immediately to tell his story, and was showered with kindness by his heroes. This young man cried openly on TV at their willingness to go out of their way to make him feel good, reward him for being brave enough to move his life forward.

A few of my favorite writers on this blog site posed some even-keeled and fair questions regarding this non-event; they even managed to aid the original writer in redeeming herself. What I discovered in not participating much (tho I did respond to the people questioning the event not the snarkers – I probably would have been equally or more evil to them – GRRR!) was that there is this dance you do in a “community” of writers – whom you do not know other than through their writing — which is to tango/cha cha around the people you like, and comment on their sites to try to get them to be nice and comment to you. You want to be rated and selected for the home page to broaden your audience and therefore become validated. I had not realized before this event that your audience on this and other blog sites is other bloggers, unless you have a list of readers that you connect with on other sites; other social networks.

My knee jerk response was to comment on more blogs than normal somehow needing to be part of the community that I was truly concurrently finding repulsive, non-responsive and unkind. Then a writer I really like a lot, someone quite genuine and never condescending as well as quite talented, bared her heart about a truly personal event she was experiencing; a lot of people redeemed themselves and rallied round her need to keep her distracted from her sadness, fear and pain.

Maybe I AM a little thin-skinned. I don’t think so, and I’ve certainly done my share of dishing –being a recipient and an advocate of same. I am a naïf, maybe even simpler in my thinking than I’d like to believe. Perhaps it boils down to being too black and white in my thinking, but certainly with age, I have learned about some grays…

Dishing ultimately is a form of gossip that I try not to engage in anymore partly because my favorite dish partners are no more, they are gone from the face of the earth and so made dishing an art form I cannot ever reach the pinnacle of great dish ever again. That said, dish is what happens after every party I have ever made or attended. I am often the last person to leave a party – maybe that’s the reason – to avoid being the recipient of being dished. Hmm, never thought of that. But it’s the marrow-sucking, “who/what the fuck was THAT?!” that has always been the most fun – watching people’s behavior, their clothes, their attitudes, and behaviors as well as that of their partners. My family has always been famous for that. I now realize that dishing can be evil, too, so I refrain from the nasty bits…

What were they thinking????

When I was a kid, I sat around listening to my stepmother and my aunts laugh and dish their way thru the after-party-dish. They talked about someone’s incapacity to cook, the bad food they brought, the stupid things they said. Et al. It was hard not to learn to do that…in a big family there is always some unresolved issue that gets addressed by acting out anger and superiority. There is also truth, but more often that crap never gets addressed directly.

The great family dish of all times was at a family reunion several years ago. With nine brothers and sisters, their 26 children and constantly expanding generations of endless cousins, by that time a minimum of 45-55 cousins of all ages, a lot of unresolved crap exists. Some viable/some ridiculous and who the hell cares at this point…right? Wrong. My second eldest aunt is a well-known artist globally. She has her opinions and expectations as do we all – we are a rather verbal and expressive family, coming from sheer size. One aunt continually reminds me that the best dressed was the first-up in the morning…we’re not screamers, but there is an elevation of decibel levels at family events….

During a video presentation on the family one of my uncles mentioned this aunt’s age. Yikes. Her response was “Fuck you!” She was neither happy nor amused, and did not care that there were children present. Most of us were both amused and ready to dish big-time after leaving the building. As you can well imagine, there are always sides in a family of that many people, with as many opinions.

Part of her response was to her reputation and celebrity; certainly much was sensitivity to her age – now her age is a badge of honor to her – she is nearing 100 and is the eldest, the family matriarch, and one of two siblings still alive. Part was that she was video-bullied by someone in her family that she always had a lot of issues with and could not control. Her anger was immediate and I salute her for it.

I am just weighing in that bullying is a ridiculous form of communication. Frankly, I perceive it as non-communication. This is not because I am weakened by my cancer; I am weakened physically but mentally I am probably stronger, sharper and more attuned to the crap I see out in the universe. I also have more time to think about this stuff, recognizing that in addition to the general bullying going on, the medical professional bullies their patients into things they may or may not need; patients bully themselves into acquiescence rather than question the need or efficacy of their treatment; and that fear itself bullies us all in every aspect of our lives.

Remember FDR?