Misanthrosolipsism
Mis∙an∙thro∙sol∙ip∙sism, n.: The belief that I am the only person who is not an idiot.
I thought up the term "misanthrosolipsism" last night. For those who don't recognize the Greek and Latin roots, it's a portmanteau of misanthropy, a hatred or distrust of other people, and solipsism, a theory that other people don't really exist. Of course, in explaining this I've now invoked Middle French. A portmanteau is a word blended from two or more separate words. It's also a large suitcase. Those silly Middle French.
The need to coin this term of special scorn for people around me happened at the movie theater. It wasn't because of the people at the theater, though. It was because of the utterly unbelievable stuff in the pre-movie promos.
For one, there was a trailer of a movie that said absolutely nothing of substance about the movie. It was 60 seconds of climactic orchestra music, with confusing dark images flashing on the screen, while titles exclaimed "FROM THE DIRECTOR OF $(MOVIE).... STARRING $(FAMOUS_ACTOR).... $(TITLE).... COMING THIS $(RELEASE_MONTH)."
That's all. No indication of the plot of the movie.
I've written better Madlibs than that.
When I was six years old.
Then there was the promo for an upcoming TV series. The initial pitch was-- I swear I am not making this up-- an actor whom I absolutely do not recognize saying, "I'm a super successful actor and I'd never work on a crap TV show no matter how much they paid me, so the fact that I'm on this TV show tells you it's not crap. And I am being paid a lot of money." Again, I swear I am not making this up. Including the part where the unheard-of actor states that he is being paid a lot of money to promote his show.
Riiiight. Like I'm going to believe a TV talking head being paid stupid amounts of money. In a world where complete boneheads regularly get cast on reality shows and are richly rewarded for playing up what knuckle-dragging ass-hats they are, No. Shoot everyone responsible for putting Honey Boo Boo on the air, bury them, and burn the ground. Then I'll listen.
The promo that really got my goat was an advertisement for a department store. It showed lots of tween kids going back to school and the pitch was basically, "The most important thing for you/your kids on the first day back to school is having the right fashions. By shopping at JC Penney you can afford TWO sets of fashionable clothes so you/your kids will not only have the confidence of fitting in on the first day back but will actually put all the other kids to shame on the SECOND DAY of school."
At that point I actually talked back to the screen (it was just a pre-movie ad). I raised my voice and said, "The most important thing we should be teaching our 11 and 12-year-old kids is that fashion is NOT the most important thing in life."
I got one "Hell, yeah!" in response. That made me feel vindicated.
It was from my wife, but I still felt vindicated.
Misanthrosolipsism.
View the world through jaundiced glasses with me!