Parody Newsletter Loves NPR Commentator; Rates His TV Show TOLERABLE
In the Onion, volume 43, number 16, April 19-25, 2007, in their "The Tolerability Index" section, the Onion gives This American Life its top rating: TOLERABLE. The caption reads: Ira Glass' traveling desk on This American Life. Where will it be out of context next? TOLERABLE means you have gotten lots of media exposure, but no one is sick to death of you yet, basically.
They ran an entire cover story on the show! Below the fold, it says, "This American Life Completes Documentation Of Liberal, Upper-Middle-Class Existence," with the first paragraph, "Producers of the long-running Chicago Public Radio program This American Life announced Monday that they have completed their comprehensive 12-year survey of life as a modern upper-middle-class American."
It rolls from there in a similar satirical vein. Unfortunately, they really let us in on the magician's trick (I was decrying on k1cup's LJ a big reveal of Glass' methodology by Glass himself) for the program. The Onion has let the cat outta the bag. Sigh. On page 9, "There is not a single existential crisis or self-congratulatory epiphany that has been or could be experienced by a left-leaning agnostic that we have not exhaustively documented and grouped by theme." Added Snyder, "We here at public radio couldn't be more pleased with ourselves."
Hee hee. Oh well. But now I can rest easy, knowing that my unique cultural and experiential existence has been covered and analyzed. This SES and birth cohort is documented, Jack!
For you TMBG fans, the dynamic duo get a shout out:
"Glass and his team of producers, writers, and interns set about the exhausting task of gathering all available information on a range of subjects from minor skirmishes with the law to the rewards of occasionally talking to poor people. The raw data was then analyzed, deconstructed, reconstructed, redeconstructed, organized under a broad philosophical title, and interspliced with musical interludes by rock duo They Might Be Giants.
"
They ran an entire cover story on the show! Below the fold, it says, "This American Life Completes Documentation Of Liberal, Upper-Middle-Class Existence," with the first paragraph, "Producers of the long-running Chicago Public Radio program This American Life announced Monday that they have completed their comprehensive 12-year survey of life as a modern upper-middle-class American."
It rolls from there in a similar satirical vein. Unfortunately, they really let us in on the magician's trick (I was decrying on k1cup's LJ a big reveal of Glass' methodology by Glass himself) for the program. The Onion has let the cat outta the bag. Sigh. On page 9, "There is not a single existential crisis or self-congratulatory epiphany that has been or could be experienced by a left-leaning agnostic that we have not exhaustively documented and grouped by theme." Added Snyder, "We here at public radio couldn't be more pleased with ourselves."
Hee hee. Oh well. But now I can rest easy, knowing that my unique cultural and experiential existence has been covered and analyzed. This SES and birth cohort is documented, Jack!
For you TMBG fans, the dynamic duo get a shout out:
"Glass and his team of producers, writers, and interns set about the exhausting task of gathering all available information on a range of subjects from minor skirmishes with the law to the rewards of occasionally talking to poor people. The raw data was then analyzed, deconstructed, reconstructed, redeconstructed, organized under a broad philosophical title, and interspliced with musical interludes by rock duo They Might Be Giants.
"