Thinking about the many, many conservatives who thought Starship Troopers was a good, fun romp about killing evil aliens, think we're supposed to agree with the racist rants in the Sopranos, consider Gordon Gekko a role model, etc.

    • ElGosso [he/him]
      ·
      4 years ago

      How do you fuck that up? Bernie is practically a cartoon character

    • MarxMadness [comrade/them]
      ·
      4 years ago

      doesn’t have any truthful elements to it, which is essential to satire

      This is an underrated point. Seems like you can do satire in three ways:

      1. Taking something firmly grounded in reality and emphasizing its contradictions for humorous effect. "The Sopranos" does this.
      2. Creating something further from reality, but close enough to maintain a clear connection, then getting your humor from further exaggerating the outlandish parts of your real subject. Sacha Baron Cohen's "The Dictator" does this.
      3. Creating something far from reality, but making the characters and story points clearly analogous to a real subject, then doing Option 2. "Starship Troopers" does this.

      Conservative satire usually shoots for 2 or 3, and often falls flat because they wind up too far from what the subject of their satire actually does. It's the whole "making up someone to get mad at" bit.