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I wrote a book called “Crap Towns”. It seemed funny at the time

samj.substack.com

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Re: I wrote a book called “Crap Towns”. It seemed funny at the time

#21

Post by s1artibartfast »

JumpCrisscross wrote: post #2

Yes, it’s a problem that something like that is insulting to publish.

Not necessarily. I think the interesting idea the article dances around is changing attitudes and sensibilities. In many ways, I think media of the 90s and even 2000s had a different balance of optimism and cynicism. Critical commentary was an edgy (or in this case humorous) counterpoint. 1999 saw dark edgy and dystopian films like the matrix, fight club that felt like a warning, criticism of a future to be avoided.

Similar subjects today are noticably darker without the buttress of social optimism. Films like The Joker seem less like a cautionary tale and more like a documentary. Is the joker now the protagonist?

Re: I wrote a book called “Crap Towns”. It seemed funny at the time

#22

Post by casey2 »

protocolture wrote: post #3

Be harder to identify the non crap towns tbh.

It's exactly this kind of structuralism induced fatalism that makes more towns than ought shit.

If you know a town is shit, it's your moral obligation to tell them so that their kids and smart residents move out. Post 2000s progressive seem to think that Towns, religions and culture can form opinions. They are trying to be "empathetic" and so get tricked by scammers who personally benefit from these horrible situations.

Re: I wrote a book called “Crap Towns”. It seemed funny at the time

#24

Post by relaxing »

svat wrote: post #16
addicted wrote: post #9

So it’s not that it won’t be published today. It just won’t be as popular today. And would, ironically, be crapped on by other people, which is what the author is unhappy about. Thats what the author means, and represents the entirety of the “Oh I am so oppressed because I can’t say shitty unfunny jokes because other people will make shitty unfunny jokes about me in response” genre of argument. The difference between…

That's not the author's main point — the author's point is the surprising observation that “That joke isn't funny any more”, even to the author himself. This is something deeper than the usual “genre of argument” you're referring to.

Eh, he goes out of his way to say

> The good news is that I don’t think that the illiberalism of identity politics will endure much longer. Especially when it comes to the literal policing of humour - and cancellation of comedians for telling the wrong kinds of jokes.

I think it’s still his point.

Re: I wrote a book called “Crap Towns”. It seemed funny at the time

#25

Post by dandellion »

MathMonkeyMan wrote: post #19
thomassmith65 wrote: post #6

The author writes well. Within a few paragraphs the reader entirely forgets that "I couldn't publish Crap Towns today" is a hypothetical.

Yeah I kept reading for the part where the author addresses the thesis, but that's not what it's about.

Is it about keeping you reading for long enough to show you a pop-up for his newsletter?

Re: I wrote a book called “Crap Towns”. It seemed funny at the time

#26

Post by relaxing »

JumpCrisscross wrote: post #2

Yes, it’s a problem that something like that is insulting to publish.

I’d be pretty upset if the value of my home was harmed because someone decided to make it common knowledge that the town I lived in was crap.

Re: I wrote a book called “Crap Towns”. It seemed funny at the time

#28

Post by jhbadger »

Yossarrian22 wrote: post #12

The problem is those towns weren’t crap within living memory when the books were written. Now anyone who remembers otherwise is close to dead

Some of them maybe have gentrified (not to ignore that this in itself isn't 100% a good thing). Others are if anything worse than when he wrote the book.

Re: I wrote a book called “Crap Towns”. It seemed funny at the time

#29

Post by petesergeant »

> but mainly because when I read the comments on there about incels and chavs and carbuncles and brutalism it all just seems grubby. Maybe even cruel.

There we go. People shift from being the out-group to being more sympathetic and unfortunate, and humour that targeted them moves into being punching down. I was shocked at how less funny Bill Hicks feels 20 years on, because now it just sounds like he's being an asshole about people who are struggling.

Re: I wrote a book called “Crap Towns”. It seemed funny at the time

#30

Post by jimnotgym »

relaxing wrote: post #26
JumpCrisscross wrote: post #2

Yes, it’s a problem that something like that is insulting to publish.

I’d be pretty upset if the value of my home was harmed because someone decided to make it common knowledge that the town I lived in was crap.

That is a very British take. Constant worry about the value of something you don't want to sell. Thinking about your home as a financial investment, rather than a...home.
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