He's Just Being Ironic

From Ask Figaro:

Hey Fig,
What do you make of the fact that the younger generation (college age students) are so steeped in rhetorical messages, from MTV to Myspace, and yet so often fail to advocate for much of anything? Is this a shortcoming on the part of the academy to teach classical rhetoric (public sphere advocacy), or is their rhetoric subtler, more personal, and perhaps the academy needs to adapt (maybe term papers should be “Which is Better: The Simpsons or Family Guy”)?
DB

Dear DB,

The Simpsons.

Oh, wait. That wasn’t your question. Young Americans seem to belong to a particularly ironic generation. As I say in my book, a kid who uses “like” every other word is practicing a form of irony, distancing himself from his own statement. (“Are you, like, freaking or something?”)

Of course, college campuses regularly exceed their quota of idealistic whelps who are perfectly willing to point out the essential evilness of everything you do. But here’s the interesting part: most of what they deem political, previous generations would consider purely personal.

This country has merged the two lives in a way that would have astonished, say, Thomas Jefferson, who earnestly opposed slavery while practicing it. The issue, Jefferson thought, wasn’t Jefferson. It was America. That’s no longer true. A senator who plays footsie in an airport bathroom stall, for example, is no longer qualified to represent the anti-gay movement, even though self-deluded homosexuals often make the very best homophobes.

So what should the academy do about it?  For one thing, it should stress the difference between deliberative argument and demonstrative (I call it “tribal”) rhetoric. Deliberative argument deals with choices and speaks to your mutual advantage. Demonstrative rhetoric is all about good and bad, who’s good and who’s bad. When we use tribal rhetoric in politics, the personal becomes political. Americans are skilled at tribal rhetoric, and clueless about deliberative argument.  (See chapter 3, “Orphan Annie’s Law,” of Jay’s book.)

As for those term papers on the Simpsons and Family Guy, I’d suggest an oral debate instead. Let a student playing Peter Griffin argue family values with one playing Homer Simpson. The ancient rhetoricians loved this exercise, which they called ETHOPOEIA. May the best cartoon win.

Yrs,
Fig.

Welcome to the Su-damn-premes

Quote:  “Whoop-dee-damn-doo.” Clarence Thomas, upon learning the Senate had confirmed his nomination to the Supreme court, in his new memoir.

Figure of Speech:  tmesis (tih-ME-sis), the insertion.  From the Greek, meaning “cut.” 

Clarence Thomas remains bitter over his 1991 confirmation hearings — one of the more sordid moments in modern American politics, which is saying a lot.  The Democrats used Thomas’s accuser, Anita Hill,  with lugubrious cynicism, and they set a nice precedent for the Republicans to follow during Clinton’s impeachment.  But does Justice Thomas have to keep calling his hearings a “lynch mob”? 

We do like  his tmesis, though.  The figure, which inserts a word into the middle of another word, is great for amplifying a thought or sounding funny.   “Whoop-de-damn-doo” must have sounded terrific in Thomas’s southern accent as he twirled a soapy, apathetic finger in the air.  (He was taking a bath when his wife brought him the news, a picture Figaro does not choose to imagine.)

Snappy Answer:   “Abso-damn-lutely right.”

Under the Influence of Being a Jerk

From Ask Figaro:

Dear Figaro,

Some people explicitly try to deny their intention before carrying it out, like “Not to hurt your feeling, but you suck!” What’s the best way to respond to this “Not to…but” phraseology?

Forky

Dear Pronged One,

“Uh, how do I say this without being offensive?” mused Moe, the bartender in the Simpsons. “Marge, there ain’t enough booze in this place to make you look good.” The figure is an apophasis, the deny-it-then-say-it figure. One response Figaro favors whenever there’s an audience of onlookers is quiet irony: “I see that your sensitivity matches your intelligence.”

Fig.

All Dilberts Are Alike

From Ask Figaro:

Dear Figaro,
Scott Adams claimed some people have ripperitis (I think it is is a meme or snowclone…?) when they don’t understand logic and argument…this seems related to what you talk about. What do you think about ripperitis?
Avi

Dear Avi,
It’s an eponymic snowclone—a person’s name with a cliched ending (-itis). Not one of Adams’s better efforts, I’m afraid.

Adams claims that most people form their political opinions along these lines:  “If you think Jack the Ripper was a doctor in his day job, and you think doctors are positive role models, you must support Jack Ripper and celebrate the killing of women. Die, you woman-hater!”  The fallacy already has a name: generalization.  Not all doctors are positive role models.  Look how many play golf.

But the problem we face in politics isn’t generalization—that was going on in the Garden of Eden, when Eve rolled her eyes heavenward and sighed, “Men!”

What’s ruining politics today is an epidemic of values talk, or what Aristotle calls demonstrative rhetoric.   Values talk defines what’s good and bad, and WHO’s good and bad.  It strengthens your base, as they say in politics, while labeling those who disagree as evil.  (“Woman hater!”)

Aristotle tells us she should be using deliberative argument instead.  It focuses on the future, deals with choices, and has as its main topic the “advantageous”—what’s to the advantage of your audience.  (“How is calling me a woman hater going to get me to support women’s rights?”)

Deliberative argument is what a civilized society uses to solve problems together.  Values talk is what less civilized people use to form tribes.

So let’s not call the phenomenon “ripperitis.”  Call it the Tribal Syndrome. That sounds even scarier.

Fig.

They Say She Wears a Transparent Proxy

Quote:  “Host refused to talk to me.”  The Postfix program at host mail2.wildblue.net, whatever that is.

 Figure of Speech:  anthropomorphism (an-thro-po-MOR-phism), the humanizing figure.  From the Greek, meaning “change into human.” 

 If you subscribe to this site’s emails using Yahoo Mail, you may wonder why Figaro hasn’t visited lately. It’s because we seem to be blocked by Yahoo’s spam filters.  Make sure you put figaro@wildblue.net on your good-guys list, or switch to a friendlier service, for crying out loud.  Look what it’s done to poor host  mail2.wildblue.net. “Host refused to talk to me,” she — it — sobs . 

Wait.  How can both of them be host?  Doesn’t mail2.wildblue deserve treatment as a guest? And what would they talk about if the Yahoo host weren’t being so rude? 

“See the mountable rack on that new DNS server?”

“Yeah, steer clear of that one. I hear she’s into serial console redirection.”

Computer inventors have been anthropomorphizing their machines from the getgo, of course, fantasizing that their circuits and algorithms have human characteristics.   Anthropomorphism qualifies as both a metaphor and a metonymy.  Both tropes can be a force for good.  Building human qualities into machinery, for example, makes great ergonomic sense.  But if you take your metaphorical metonymy literally — believe that your machine actually is human — you’re in for a big date repellant among humans.

As your server would “tell” you:  403, baby.  Access denied.

Snappy Answer:  “Have you tried flowers?”

Mandela Might Not Appreciate This Figure

From Ask Figaro:

Fig,
I’m sure you won’t let Bush’s Mandela comment of today pass for long: “I heard somebody say, where’s Mandela? Well, Mandela is dead, because Saddam Hussein killed all the Mandelas.”

In this context, writes James Taranto in the WSJ, it is clear that the literal meaning of “Where’s Mandela?” is “Where is the Iraqi who will play the role in his country that Mandela played in postapartheid South Africa?” This was a pithy metaphor, not an “embarrassing gaffe.” I have to admit, I see it that way too, Fig. Can everybody else on the web be wrong?
m stone

Dear M. Stone,
The president is using an ANTONOMASIA (an-toe-noe-MAY-sia), the nicknaming figure. It uses a proper noun in place of a description, or vice versa. “You’re such a Polyanna!” “I’m no Rambo.” “Miss Cleavage” (said to describe the late Anna Nicole Smith). The antonomasia is most effective in recalling memorable characters and applying them to new situations. It links the present to the past. And, in Mr. Bush’s case, it’s a refreshing bit of figuring. Figaro loves it when journalists tie themselves in knots trying to describe a device that can be named in one (unpronounceable) word.
Fig.