So this morning on WNYC's Brian Lehrer Show they had a little five-minute debate concerning the possibility that Conservatives have a better sense of humor than Liberals. And, in a way, this goes straight to the heart of my anti-hipster argument. Or maybe more like the liver or spleen. So, Brian Lehrer, in his unnervingly calm and probing voice had the editor of the L.A. Weekly on the phone. The editor had been comparing recent issues of The Nation and its Conservative counterpart, the Weekly Standard, and finally ('against his good judgement' as Brian put it) he came to the conclusion that reading the Nation was like forcing a box of dry musilix down your throat, whereas reading the Standard was, well, better. They didn't offer any analogy here but I'm guessing it's something like eating an Egg McMuffin or taking a bong hit or something. And to my surprise, most people who called the show actually agreed with the guy. The quick explanation they came to was that the Left has lost its sense of humor because they're too worried about offending people. They're too 'PC.' That's true. Also, I would add, because the Old Guard's all got heartburn from too much Southern Comfort back in the day and they look back at their politically 'significant' youth with rose colored granny specs and they would not dare to make a joke out of the great work they did. This is not hard to understand, fuck, look at Oliver Stone, look at the Village Voice. I don't want people making a joke out of shit that I hold dear either. Anyway, my point is this: All of these crusty, curly old hippies had children and moved to the suburbs, got hemorrhoids and mortgages, and all of their children grew up, got drunk, nabbed the checkbook and moved to Williamsburg. I'm trying to make a point, but it's unraveling slowly here. Bear with me.

Let us agree on one thing: Young Liberals walk around like they have a load of shit in their pants, and if you've ever had a load of shit in your pants you know what I'm saying: Your mind strays no farther than your own ass.

Let us agree on another timeless premise: Parents are good at setting examples of behavior but they are generally very bad at explaining these examples.

Now then, all the Old Liberals have lost their sense of humor, and this humorless sacred cow attitude translated onto their children, who adopted and emulated it. (I know it's counterintuitive to think that kids would like to imitate their folks, I generally think of each generation as growing up to rebel against its forebears, but in this case I believe it simply because the sixties was probably pretty cool, what with all the music and fashion and attitude, and of course, who doesn't like drugs?) And whereas their parents may realize they they've lost their sense of humor, and perhaps could even extract some wisdom from it, tucked away in their burned brains somewhere, their children are not equipped with the tools to do this, because they never experienced the things their parents did, the things that inspired their parents to burn their bras and fuck like rabbits, the forces too that eventually crushed their parent's ideals into a model home in lazy acres. The children are awash in a sea of protest posters and tofu and irony and do not have a lifeboat. All they have is the face of compassion, their posturing, which they took from their folks. They cannot escape the sacred cow attitude even though they don't know exactly why they have it or where it came from. They are humorless beyond the point of return. So they scramble to find something of authenticity, something with meaning. This is where we find vintage clothing piled to the sky, this is why hipsters wear gas station attendant uniforms and trucker hats, this is why hipsters dress like construction workers and soldiers and why they wear archaic horn-rimmed glasses and nerdy librarian shawls, this is bobby socks and cigarettes, this is poodle skirts, this is the beat-up cowboy hat, this is (recycling, it's true, and I do like the glasses, I think they're quite sexy sometimes) But this is also the young hipster, spawn of the old hippy, cut off from experience that it so wants to find, nowhere in time, trying to 'strike a vein' : driving to the levee, when the levee, alas, is dry.

It's true, there is no Truth, there are no great causes anymore, no great battles ahead, no rallying wars, no expatriated soldiers, no romance, no wounds, there is 'no fucking fun,' as Sid Vicious once said it. (Unfortunately, but very apparently too, there is no imagination either. For Fuck's sake, we've been post modern and meaningless since the end of WWII and at least the fucking hippies could come up with something relatively new looking to rally behind, all the hipsters do is fucking imitate.) So the hipsters try to find authenticity the easy way, the way they've gotten everything in their stinking little lives, by walking the walk. Sucking the teat of authenticity like the beginning with their parents. Dress in an old shirt, you become old and informed, dress like a writer, you become that writer, dress like a Rastaman (and this one is really difficult to swallow) you, your white-Ohio-oatmeal-eating-cracker-ass, becomes that Rastaman. And I think we begin to approach the absurd now. And let me remind you that the absurd is not necessarily funny. It could be, in fact I think it damn well should be, and that's what this whole loss-of-humor discussion is about, but try telling that to the dude in the Ralph Lauren dress shirt and polished creepers and horn-rimmed glasses and the manicured sideburns (gag) slumming it for change with his $10,000 Tuba down in the Bedford stop on the L train. If you don't believe me, go up to him and say this: "Hey asshole! Why are you here?" You know what he'll say? "Physics!" Meanwhile we see another man digging through the garbage looking for empty bottles.

See, the hipsters have lost all context of reality. And this is dicey territory, I agree, because I like listening to 'music' in the Subway too, hell, I like looking at a fucking tuba, I like Carhart pants, I'm not an outspoken advocate for the poor and the homeless, I like 'bohemia,' but at some point, I think we must all come to grips and realize that this stuff is no more REAL than the name 'Bob' embroidered on the 1967 pep-boys button-up shirt purchased by an Oberlin fine arts graduate named Dave who's never changed a car's oil in his life. But here I am again, preaching to the choir.

Wrapping up here (I know you all have a place to be), I think we can trace the loss of humor of the Old Left to the repulsive absurdity of the New York City "Hipster," fashionably speaking, of course. But then, what else is there? Da-ha-ha-ha-ha!

ON A LIGHTER NOTE: I got my first piece of fan mail today! Hooray! A girl named Bess who lives in Greenpoint ("mecca of all things Urbn Hpstr") By the way, I like the vowel omission, very cute. She relates, or at least says she relates, with my anti-hipster mission. Thanks Bess, you're the Bess-t! It's good to know there's somebody above ground who relates with me. And I must toot my own horn very blatantly here by quoting from Bess' letter: "Your writing is highly, highly entertaining."
QUESTIONS, COMMENTS? EMAIL ME, BITCHES! (we're cultiviating the sense of humor here, you see?)