Man, you’ve got real problems if you’re feel threatened by Mo Rocca!

There’s a big difference between “threatened” and “seriously annoyed.”

That said, a lot of young people my age seem to favor an attitude of hipster irony that I find tiresome. The problem is less with the entertainment value of these shows and The Soup on E, than that young’uns think they should imitate them in day-to-day life.

Come up with pithy quips of your own that put them on the defensive, instead of standing in as the official spokesperson for America and answering their endless line of questioning, like, “You should be thanking me. Sans anti-Americanism, what would be left standing in your political culture?”

My poor, naive sister did a semester abroad in Glasgow. One night, when she and a group of fellow exchange students from the States walked into one of pubs on campus, a group of Glaswegans started sarcastically chanting “U-S-A! U-S-A!”

She sent me an e-mail the next day, asking what she might have done differently, as the poor thing didn’t want to offend anyone. I told her she should have informed her gracious hosts that it’s only hubris if you’re defeated.

My favorite exchange with an uppity piece of Eurotrash:

Eurotrash: America kills women and children!
Me: Not exclusively.

Of particular interest should be Steyn’s work on how PC Europe is handling the issues they’re running into with Muslim immigrants. Peep this. You can’t say a bunch of Muslims burned a bunch of cars on the set of Travolta’s new flick, even when it’s the truth. They’re “youth” and “immigrants”, which are both true, but doesn’t get at why there are demilitarized zones in Paris that the French police won’t go into after dark. Also, gay bashings are way up in Amesterdam. The European press is petrified of pointing out the obvious (lest they get offed like a Dutch cartoonist). Couple that with the fact that the Muslim immigrants are the only Europeans reproducing right now…

Just point out, whatever our horrid and numerous cultural shortcomings, 50 years from now that putrid and crass culture will be much better than the one found beneath the minarets they’ll be living under.

I can’t speak as to how Colbert and Rocca act behind closed doors and I’m not denying they’ve worked hard, but their public personas are still part of the problem. The endless dry sarcasm and snarkiness that counts for deep thought, analysis and commentary among today’s 18-34 so-called intellectual in destination cities. I guess my bigger problem is their fanbase in particular, especially Colbert’s. It exasperates me to no end to see young, smart people keep praising him for being such a “genius” (now officially the most overused and currently meaningless word in our language) and so “brilliant” just for using SARCASM. I mean really, what is sarcasm except just saying the opposite of what you really mean in a condescending smug way. If that’s now “genius,” what counts as “mildly clever” these days? If sarcasm now counts as genius, my teenage niece’s friends are the equivalent of the Royal Society of London. Regardless of how they are behind closed doors or how hard they work, this new brand of celebrity persona, especially Colbert, have done a lot to promote this obnoxious, passive-aggressive beta mindset in this current generation of young men.

Every time I see Colbert give some commentary on an issue, I think about this article and wish he’d realize that sarcasm is not an argument:
http://volokh.com/posts/1165813933.shtml

While I can appreciate sarcasm and snarkiness in moderation, I have serious issues with people (of both sexes!) for whom they constitute a virtual lifestyle. (Stephen Colbert and Mo Rocca, onscreen persona notwithstanding, worked very hard to get where they are, and they are almost certainly not in this category.)

As you seem to be implying, there is this unspoken idea among much of my demographic (post-college-educated 20- and early-30-something singles in destination cities) that low-ish tolerance for S&S amounts to naivete, oversensitivity, or lack of education. In my case, I just find too much of it to be soul-deadening.

Lately I’m dealing with a classic passive-aggressive guy at my job. He does nothing but hold up progress and stir up trouble, but I’m not in a position to hurt him directly. I’m practicing this strategy: I stroke his ego whenever I run into him, and defer to him in meetings so he has room to hang himself. Then, I leave him out of the loop on the actual work. I never consult him on anything, and if I get an assignment that can’t be accomplished without consulting him, I just don’t do it. This is working well so far; he’s making lots of trouble for others, and I hope he blows himself up soon by going too far.

Keep up the great writing! Post often and write them as long as you want!