Do you remember the first time you heard this little Gem? If you’re like me, you might even remember going on a little mental roller-coaster ride from “Okay, good” to “I guess that’s reasonable” to “no it’s not” to “not even close actually” and then on to “fuck you asshole for saying that shit!” all in the space of less than a second.

Okay, so I take that particular roller coaster ride all the time, but let’s not dwell on that! The point is that this particular line of reasoning has a certain seductive quality to it. If you are lucky, you escape its wiles within a moment; if you are a Fox News Fan, you probably still think it’s gospel.

…which reminds me of a certain meme with temptations of its own. er, cough! cough! It is tempting, …oh so tempting.

And yet, I hear the voice of Nietzsche calling back to me, reminding me of the dangers of staring into a void, and suddenly I feel naked, and I want to say; “you stop staring back at me you damned void. You just stop that right now!”

And I somehow manage to squirm free.

It was John Stuart Mill, and he did say ‘most’ rather than ‘all’ in that last part, and he definitely meant something different by ‘Conservative’ than I was thinking when I started down this route. …and I’m really not sure if all those caveats help or hurt my case, so we are just moving on now.

Hell, I’m not even sure if the quotation is all that accurate.

Does this help?

No?

Okay, this post is getting to be a guilty pleasure, I know. But the point is that we can turn this logic around and apply it in all sorts of different directions. If it hasn’t escaped you that I have failed to apply it to my own political camp, well then let’s just treat that as an object lesson in how this particular gambit works. You apply it to your enemies, silly, not your friends.

It does get sillier!

Is this a good question? Um, …no.

Seriously, do I have to provide links to the American Nazi party? Cause I’m not gonna.

No.

Nuh-uh!

You’re just going to have to get the point. And you know, it’s entirely possible that is even the point of this meme (or even the last one), because that damned Nathan Poe dogs my every judgement.

Besides everything else, this one is completely out of date, but what else can you expect from a thinking dinosaur. Not all anachronisms are philosophical lizards, but all… nevermind!

Maybe we could take this quotation in a positive direction? This sounds wonderful and warm and smart, and …well I should probably verify the quotation and discern it’s context and what not, but that would take time away from basking in the glow if literositude that this one kindles in my heart. I just want to sit here and think about how leading and reading go together like carrots and cake.

Or Christmas and BB Guns. Or lingerie and a live wallaby.

…I’ve said too much.

But hey, let’s get even more positive. Boy you just read this one and you can’t help but feel the love. Doesn’t it just make you want to reach down inside your soul and let the good stuff out for a walk in a park called Success.

Seriously folks, you just gotta let your awesome blossom!

That’s all I’m sayin’.

And who the Hell is Mark Gorman?

Okay kids, that was a rhetorical question. I just googled him and the only thing I learned is that I really don’t want to know anything more about him at all. We are moving on again.

Did I mention that it gets sillier?

No really, it does.

Honestly, I’m not sure what to do with this one. It’s actually rather clever. I might even like it. But I don’t know much about Hentai, or porn, …or one of those anyway.

Not me! Huh uh!

er, not all men watch porn, but… nevermind!

It also gets ickier. Much ickier!

Okay, that one doesn’t even begin to make sense, and I probably should have left  it out. But you know, you turn over a rock and see something gross underneath…

…so, you post it on the internets for all your friends to see,

…and to feel just a little creeped out by the whole thing.

Which is fine with me, actually, I believe in sharing the misery.

…in case you hadn’t noticed.

Alright, this one might be real. At least I can’t think of a counter-example. Seriously, I’ve been trying.

But part of what makes this so fun is that it breaks the mold a little; gender politics aside, this is a nice little exercise in creating an expectation and then violating it. …which is very cool in a joke-I-just-killed-by-explaining-it kinda way, but the point is that the whole meme rests on a manipulation of expectations. You start by repudiating a generalization, thus leading people to expect a smarter wiser replacement and hope they won’t notice that you left them with a whole new pile of dumbitude sitting there in place of the one you repudiated. This one just takes that approach and drives it to Hawaii.

…Yes, I said drives.

I’m not sure what to make of this one, but I think I might love it.

So anyway, I guess you can file all of this under the category of, “Shit we oughtta know better”