Ask not on whom the Joke is… the Joke is on Us

Everyone writes with an audience in mind. To some extent, what we write says something about what we think of that audience: Are we condescending? Demagogic? Demanding? Generous? Some of the above?

Bloggers, especially the political bloggers who form the core of the new Pajamas Open Source Media, got their start by writing to an imagined audience that wanted to hear what they had to say even if, initially, they had no idea how large an audience that might be (and any expert in the MSM would have told them to forget about it). Above all they broke the matrix of MSM mimetic desire, the now suffocating arrogance of the gatekeepers of public discourse, those who get repeat parts in the public discussion, those who adhere to the powerful, if invisible, consensus as to what the “public” wants (entertainment, lifestyle issues, national news, all packaged professionally) and what they need (images that encourage respect for other cultures, that do not give fodder for right-wing warmongering).

I once read about a fish that is programmed to follow the fish in front of it, so that they all follow each other and the whole school moves in a kind of Brownian motion. But when experimenters took one fish and pithed the part of the brain that made it follow other fish, it swam off in any direction and drew in its wake the rest of the school. Although far from pithed, or random motion, the bloggers who form the core of PJMedia’s initial launch group, and those who follow them, are not random swimmers followed by mimetic idiot(arians). They are mavericks followed by independent thinkers, and they do break out of the Brownian motion of the MSM. No phenomenon illustrates better the workings of the invisible hand in the market place of ideas, than the sudden, stunning, and salutary rise to the top of the blogosphere of such independent minds as Richard Fernandez, Glenn Reynolds, Charles Johnson, Roger Simon… ah, the list could go on forever.

So going to the launch of PJMedia promised to be a delightful experience. It was like going to a convention of people, all of whom, were they at the procession where the emperor paraded naked, would have said – indeed they have said – “Daddy, why is the emperor naked?”

But every time a grass-roots movement institutionalizes, or as Max Weber says, goes from charisma to rationalization, certain dangers emerge. This week we’re studying heresies in my medieval French history course. Repeatedly movements that started out charismatic, independent, passionate, gained immense popularity thereby, and got drawn in the direction of institutionalization that all too often distorted the very source of their initial strength. Francis of Assissi, pressured to form an order by the Pope Innocent III in the early 13th century, ended up resigning from his order, so unhappy was he with the results; and before the century was out, institutional Franciscans were executing spiritual Franciscans for heresy. Now modern grass-roots movements like the blogosphere need not be as extreme in their demands, nor as violent in their transformation, but... you get the idea. And since Pajamas Media was such a nice term – like the Lollards or the Quakers, a name given to the group by disdainful outsiders and accepted by the group as a way of turning the insult around – the idea that it would be discarded in favor of something more neutral made me uneasy.

Would the process of institutionalizing contribute to shifting from a primarily free-wheeling discourse that rewards plain talk and common sense to one that worries about who speaks rather than what they say. As OSM becomes a portal to the blogosphere, it runs the risk of shifting attention in this direction, and ending up more as a gatekeeper than a portal. How much effort will now go into catching the eyes of the institutionally powerful decision makers, rather than into addressing the very audience of plain-thinkers who raised them to prominence? This can be the beginning of the slippery slope of mimetic desire that leads to a group of people who, taking their cues from above, end up praising “the emperor’s new clothes.”

Pushing that thought to the back of my mind, with the prospect of hanging with all the lively independent minds, I made my way over to the W hotel on Wednesday night with Pedro Zuquete (my partner in crime), just glad to be there.

Getting Warmed Up: The Root Causes of Terrorism

The first evening, after spending a delightful time with, among others, Sol (Solomonia), Pieter Dorsman (Peak Talk) and Stephen Green (Vodka Pundit) on the lobby of the W, Pedro pointed out David Corn of The Nation to me.

“We used one of his writings to illustrate the PCP (Politically Correct Paradigm) slogan, poverty breeds terrorism.”

“Really, so what’s he doing here?” I asked, thinking that that was a pretty idiotarian position to hold.

“He’s the token leftist on the steering committee.” (On the panel, Corn referred to himself at the “token liberal”).

“Great, let’s ask him if he really thinks that.”

We finally reached him by “joining” a conversation between him and Pamela, of (don’t mess with) Atlas Shrugs.

“Is it true” I said, with the kind of incredulous tone that tends to make people defensive, “that you think poverty breeds terrorism?”

“I didn’t say that,” Corn responded quickly, “I said that addressing poverty is a way among others to reduce terrorism. I didn’t say that poverty breeds terrorism [ah, cyberspace is so merciless]. I’m just arguing that if you have programs and help the economic situation, then you’ve going to reduce terrorism and… the influence of jihadis,” he said, gesturing to us as if to say, “you know, the people you’re so worried about’).

“That’s not helping, that’s extortion money,” Pamela shot back without missing a beat. Pure PCP vs JP. This was going to be a lot of fun.

First Panel: Whimper of Joke?

I didn’t check the program, trusting that it would be stellar. We finally sit down, at our tables with outlets and wireless, and then have Roger and Charles tell us about OSM. Good stuff… I’m following on my computer – what a great way to take notes at a conference, look up anything I want while the speaker speaks. And then the first panel. Lifestyles.

Lifestyles? I look up from my computer and watch in astonishment and growing horror as a bevy of smart beauties take their seats, introduced by a witty moderator, each one a specialist in that great lifestyle arena – fashion. And behind, occasionally adding a comment in a disembodied voice, the great Manolo, whose Dadaesque blog on shoes and other fashion accessories I quickly visited.

“Wait a minute,” I thought, “the last time I looked in my computer, France was still burning (smoldering the MSM would insist), and we’re listening to what?”

I look at Pedro with astonishment. He smiles at me and raises his eyebrows. Then the panel begins with Elizabeth Hayt, fashion columnist for the NYT and author of I'm No Saint : A Nasty Little Memoir of Love and Leaving (2005) and when asked the very deep question “what do you think the blogosphere means for fashion?” replied with refreshing candor: “I’m not sure why you’ve asked me here, I don’t blog, I don’t even think blogging is useful, it’s for rich people with too much time on their hands.” I blinked. Excuse me? Wait a minute, what’s going on here. Isn’t this woman making a fine career in fashion, that field for people with too little money and too little time on their hands? Did I go to the wrong place. Is this the People Magazine blog launch?

Pedro leaned over and said in a conspiratorial whisper, “It must be a joke.”

I looked around to see who got it. The faces were wonderful. Some staring in disbelief, some smiling, some annoyed, the people with computers started to work… Sol had a poker face with the traces of a bemused smile on the edges of his lips, no way to tell what he’s thinking; Tom Bowler pulled his glasses down and a blank stare descended over his face. One of our tablemates leaned forward and whispered in Pedro’s ear: “I think they’re waiting for Larry Kudlow.”

The situation became particularly surreal when the nice looking blonde girl on the panel, began talking about the make-up styles of celebrities: “I trash them every Saturday.” Stunned silence. Some people started moving uncomfortably in their seats, others looked bemused and, others like Pedro, were slowly becoming aware that the joke was on us. I felt like the Roman soldiers in Life of Brian trying desperately not to laugh as Pontius Pilate talks about his fwend Biggus Dickus and his wife Incontinentia Buttox. I wondered how many people out in cyberspace were dropping out in astonished dismay.

As Austin Bay put it later, in an interesting conversation with me, neo-neocon and Pedro, Elizabeth Hayt “was quite admirable in her lack of curiosity.” What? New York Times? Uninterested in the world around it? How can you say that?

[This entry is part one of five.]

Update: Part 2 is up here.