Althouse: "Every year at the holidays, millions of Americans partake in a whole parallel tradition: avoiding the 'crazy uncle'..."

November 26, 2015

"Every year at the holidays, millions of Americans partake in a whole parallel tradition: avoiding the 'crazy uncle'..."

"... that one exhausting relative who treats every event as a chance to assault you with their fringe political ideas, hector you about your life, infuriatingly question your values. Whole articles now offer strategies on how to handle this character when the family sits down around the table.... But wait: What’s so bad about crazy uncles? Who said the holidays need to be as boring as a George Pataki rally?... Yes, it’s time to be the crazy uncle for a change...."

That's Politico, "How to BE the Crazy Uncle This Thanksgiving." That's the only title in the hate-your-family subgenre of Thanksgiving stuff(ing) I've clicked on. Basically, politicos at all websites have figured out a way to keep writing about politics while purporting to provide Thanksgiving sustenance. The fiends.

45 comments:

jr565 said...: I think a lot of liberals are actually the crazy uncle and don't know it.; 11/26/15, 12:30 PM
Michael K said...: The lefties are usually eating at somebody else's house because they don't make enough to buy a turkey and don't know how to cook.; 11/26/15, 12:40 PM
Che Dolf said...: 1996: Soccer Moms
2004: Security Moms
2016: Crazy Uncles
- The Duck

"Give me ten thousand crazy uncles and i will conquer the world." - general douglas macarthur
- The Duck; 11/26/15, 12:47 PM
MisterBuddwing said...: As an uncle, I don't consider myself the least bit crazy, and I for one wish Thanksgiving would remain an apolitical event filled with the giving of thanks, which I think is the basic idea.; 11/26/15, 12:52 PM
Chris N said...: Aunt Sally positions herself near the turkey, waiting to be uncorked like a cask of bad wine, flowing on for two hours about early childhood education policy.

Cousin Joe stares down the long, childless street. It's near dusk. He mumbles something about ISIS and the GDP to debt ratio.; 11/26/15, 1:04 PM
The Bergall said...: Well, as a Uncle I am offended. I am sick and tired of hearing of this Uncle privilege, Uncle "ism's", Uncle "ist's, and all that rot.; 11/26/15, 1:05 PM
320Busdriver said...: Is this about Obama?; 11/26/15, 1:06 PM
Wince said...: Whatever happened to "pull my finger"?; 11/26/15, 1:15 PM
SteveR said...: The "crazy uncle" is basically some one who is on the right. Which means they are really just stupid. Because we know who the smart people are.; 11/26/15, 1:21 PM
averagejoe said...: I've been the crazy uncle for decades now... And it's got nothing to do with politics...; 11/26/15, 1:25 PM
Chuck said...: Aren't there a lot more crazy aunts? I didn't have any crazy uncles with fringe political ideas. And certainly none who bugged me about my life.

But there are countless aunts with half-baked political ideas based on something one of their BFF's told them, and they ALL want to bug you about what's going on in your life...; 11/26/15, 1:30 PM
Real American said...: Crazy uncle >>> snot-nosed spoiled safe-space requiring PC Democrat Party talking point spewing wannabe know-it-all college student.; 11/26/15, 1:34 PM
pious agnostic said...: As an uncle, and one with mental issues, I feel targeted by all these posts. Who can I sue?; 11/26/15, 2:20 PM
Unknown said...: Damn my siblings for not having children, yet another unrealized dream.; 11/26/15, 2:54 PM
cubanbob said...: We have a crazy uncle right now-Uncle Sam as channeled by Barack Obama. And if the electorate goes crazy next November we will have a trans-gendered crazy Uncle Sam as channeled by Hillary Clinton ( or if she gets indicted or "ill" on the way to the forum we might just get the old-school Crazy Uncle Joe).; 11/26/15, 3:03 PM
Lewis Wetzel said...: It used to be that people discussed how to handle the uncle who drank too much at family gatherings. Now it's the uncle with politically crazy ideas ("The world is heating up!", "We're at Peak Oil!", "Overpopulation will cause billions to die of starvation!", GMO crops are going to kill those who can get their hands on what little food remains!").; 11/26/15, 3:29 PM
n.n said...: The first rule at Thanksgiving dinner is to give thanks.

The second rule at Thanksgiving dinner is to give thanks.

There are no "crazy uncles" or aunts, left, right, or center, at our Thanksgiving dinner.; 11/26/15, 3:29 PM
CWJ said...: My crazy uncles are my left wing facebook friends who can't give sharing their prepackaged single panel political quotes a single day's rest on Thanksgiving. The idea that this behavior is owned by the right is quite precious. I love to read their canned snark about welcoming refugees when my wife and I are the only ones who have welcomed year long arab exchange students into our home not once but twice.; 11/26/15, 3:32 PM
Unknown said...: Terry, you forgot the uncle that seemed to enjoy the niece to sitting on his knee a little too much.; 11/26/15, 4:21 PM
MathMom said...: I have been to Thanksgiving dinners since I was a kid. The German side had dinners, the Okie side had dinners, and when in Saudi Arabia, our friends had dinners and we invited soldiers who were there fighting the Gulf War.

At none of these dinners do I remember anything but nice relatives and friends, good food, and darts or chess or Monopoly or football after dinner.

Libs are from a different universe.; 11/26/15, 4:31 PM
Big Mike said...: @jr565, I read your comment and thought you won the thread right out of the starting gate. But @MichaelK, I dunno, you have have topped jr. Great insights from both of you.; 11/26/15, 4:36 PM
alan markus said...: CWJ, my Facebook feed was getting pigged up with all those "OccupyDemocrat" memes being shared by my young relatives & aged boomer ladies. Things got better when I pulled down the arrow that gives the option to not see those posts. One of my nieces is working on her PHD (STEM related) - sad to see how she and her colleagues are "idiot savants" when it comes to reposting all those "bumper sticker" political statements.; 11/26/15, 5:13 PM
Steve M. Galbraith said...: Remember: you can't blame all of the world's uncles just because of the behavior of the really crazy ones.; 11/26/15, 5:14 PM
Guildofcannonballs said...: "A state that's untouchable like Elliot Ness
The track hits ya eardrum like a slug to ya chest
Pack a vest for your Jimmy in the city of sex
We in that sunshine state where that bomb ass hemp be
The state where ya never find a dance floor empty
And pimps be on a mission for them greens
Lean mean money-makin-machines servin fiends"

"California Knows How To Party" by Dre and Pac; 11/26/15, 5:16 PM
iowan2 said...: I did an informal survey of about 20 people, none my family. Not a single one has ever, in there lifetime experienced this.; 11/26/15, 5:24 PM
ken in tx said...: We just finished our big meal. We had no crazy uncle. However, one guest said that her daughter did not celebrate Thanksgiving because it was insulting to Native Americans. If we can get all of the crazies to take this position, we won't have to put up with them at the table.; 11/26/15, 5:49 PM
Unknown said...: Most of all, what all of these smug assholes fail to accept, steeped as they are in their philosophy of self and blinded by the myth of their superior intellects, is that there are billions of people out there who do not subscribe to their selfish worldview: people who believe in something larger then themselves and who act upon those beliefs. They can’t understand it when they run across it in their own culture for God’s sake (That Christians might have an honest belief that homosexuality is a sin does not compute. Christians MUST be bigots, or homophobes or haters), they have no chance at recognizing it in a foreign one. Last week in Paris, one of the terrorists calmly went down a row of handicapped people in wheelchairs and calmly executed each and every one of them in turn. I guarantee you that as this evil man calmly committed this bloody and evil act, he felt in his heart the same satisfaction that you do when you give money to a homeless man Mr. Elite. These people have their own beliefs and the free will to act upon them. They will tell you all about them if you ask, and even if you don’t. They are PROUD of what they are doing. They BRAG about their bloody ways. THEY MEAN WHAT THEY SAY. AOSHQ; 11/26/15, 5:54 PM
Michelle Dulak Thomson said...: iowan2,

Oh, I have. Not, to be sure, over Thanksgiving, at least not in a long time. But visiting my parents, over the summer or over Christmas? Hell yes. It doesn't help that every meal is served with MSNBC in the background. I just keep my mouth shut tight, whatever goading I get from Dad. (Mom is a different phenom, nice most of the time but prone to blow up on me when I do something wrong, like step into the street or try to put tomatoes in the fridge.)

I swear to God, nothing on the planet is as stressful as a stay with The Parentals. And yet I keep going back. Possibly because there mightn't be all that much time left. They're 70 and 75 respectively.; 11/26/15, 6:06 PM
donald said...: In my 55 years, I've never had anybody at any of our family get togethers pull any of this kind of bullshit.

Of course we're civilized and polite being from the south and all.; 11/26/15, 6:22 PM
Unknown said...: "Most of all, what all of these smug assholes fail to accept, steeped as they are in their philosophy of self and blinded by the myth of their superior intellects, is that there are billions of people out there who do not subscribe to their selfish worldview: people who believe in something larger then themselves and who act upon those beliefs. They can’t understand it when they run across it in their own culture for God’s sake (That Christians might have an honest belief that homosexuality is a sin does not compute. Christians MUST be bigots, or homophobes or haters), they have no chance at recognizing it in a foreign one. Last week in Paris, one of the terrorists calmly went down a row of handicapped people in wheelchairs and calmly executed each and every one of them in turn. I guarantee you that as this evil man calmly committed this bloody and evil act, he felt in his heart the same satisfaction that you do when you give money to a homeless man Mr. Elite. These people have their own beliefs and the free will to act upon them. They will tell you all about them if you ask, and even if you don’t. They are PROUD of what they are doing. They BRAG about their bloody ways. THEY MEAN WHAT THEY SAY." -- AOSHQ, weirddave; 11/26/15, 7:12 PM
Jake said...: I'm so sick of this trope.; 11/26/15, 7:15 PM
MathMom said...: Michelle Dulak Thompson -

There is still time for your parents to learn manners. My mom finally learned "thank you" at about age 80. Believe me, all of us kids discussed what we were going to do with her if she needed help as she got older, and a nursing home wasn't going to make any of us feel guilty. Then, she finally became nice. She was nice for the last 10 years of her life, and passed away in September. She needed a lot of hands-on help, especially in the last two years, and we gladly gave it, because she was nice. When she finally needed full-time care, we found a small assisted living home with 9 beds, where she was safe and well cared-for. We did all we could to keep her out of a regular, impersonal nursing home, because she had become nice.

Keep going, keep trying. They are dead a long time.; 11/26/15, 9:00 PM
Guildofcannonballs said...: Because I don't misremember White Artist's['] Names of Songs, and I do that to Tupac, along with lyrics of his, I can't help but think I am racist as they all say.

The name of the song is "California Love" not what I wrote above, like an asshole.

I am just as sorry as Jim Carrey in the Farrelly movie "Me, Myself, and Irene" when he said he was "truly sorry" and whatnot.

This is a link you might not understand as you attribute willful ignorance to others and never heard Will Rogers say "everybody is ignorant, just about different things is all" whatnotly my good Person, I bid you Good Day.; 11/26/15, 9:14 PM
Carl Pham said...: Well, take heart, burdened Thanksgiving listeners and the scribblers concerned with their sorrows. All your crazy uncles will eventually die, or you will, and then their voices will be forever silent. Won't that be nice?

I can think of about four or five of my family, whose crazy opinions I'd listen to without a peep for several hours at Thanksgiving, and indeed with a broad smile on my face, if I could only see them alive again. But I guess my priorities are out of fashion.; 11/26/15, 9:58 PM
rcocean said...: The trope is that its your crazy WHITE right-wing uncle who's terrorizing everyone with his "Hillary is a communist" extremist rhetoric.

In my experience, its ALWAYS the leftists who are pushing their politics 24/7. They're like some hyper-active Evangelical Christian, only their not trying to save your soul, just show everyone how superior they are.; 11/26/15, 10:07 PM
Joe said...: Except it's bullshit. Are their crazy uncles? Yes. Are their millions? No. Not even close. I suppose it sounds good when you're paid by the word.; 11/26/15, 11:03 PM
Skeptical Voter said...: In my case it's a crazy nephew,
.
Poor little so and so, he grew up in San Francisco with an indulgent mother who believed all the liberal shibboleths of the day. I guess it s my fault he grew up to be an A hole

if I'd just sent him a "nuke a gay whale" poster he might have turned out alright.; 11/26/15, 11:17 PM
Qwinn said...: For years lefties have been demonizing Thanksgiving as a celebration of genocide.

Now they argue for accepting Syrian refugees because "the Pilgrims were refugees too".

I'd be astonished that they could miss the obvious incoherence of these two positions, if it weren't obvious that they are incapable of raising their debate over the level of trolling anymore.; 11/27/15, 12:29 AM
tim maguire said...: I have a brother who's quite conservative who, when drunk, can get over-enthusiastic about some political thing that bothers him, but never at the table, he'll corner you after dinner. And that table--he'll do as much as anyone to fill it with good food. Now there are plenty of liberals at the table too, but they generally have the good sense to keep their politics to themselves when the topic isn't politics. But that does not blind me to the never-ending assault of liberal stupidity on my Facebook feed.

(It may help to mention that they are among the dying breed of unashamedly patriotic blue-dog strong defense brand of liberal.); 11/27/15, 4:43 AM
alan markus said...: I was wondering where this "crazy unckle talking politics at Thanksgiving" meme was coming from. I suspect the minions experienced some unanticipated blow-back in 2013 & 2014:

Obama Wants A Seat At Your Thanksgiving Table; 11/27/15, 8:41 AM
retail lawyer said...: I drove for 2 hours to get to my Thanksgiving, sometimes listening to NPR (San Francisco). This topic was the only one being discussed. The smug twits were insufferable. I began to worry about the aggressively stupid liberals I may meet. Would there be a Pajama Boy? No need to worry, the entire affair was wonderful.; 11/27/15, 10:22 AM
Freeman Hunt said...: The kids like the crazy aunts and uncles.; 11/27/15, 11:09 AM
JSD said...: My 90 year old crazy uncle came to Thanksgiving and talked about the coming Armageddon. He then gave each of us a “monster box” of silver eagles. His Ford Crown Vic was sagging from all the weight. I would have been happy with a box of pears from Harry & David, but WTF.

Of course, my liberal relatives only brought a bottle of crappy wine. I don’t think there gonna be ready for Armageddon.; 11/27/15, 11:09 AM
Tyrone Slothrop said...: Sadly, my brother the crazy uncle was not invited to family Thanksgiving this year. I mean, I'm a right winger, but my brother is a crazy right winger. The way this manifests itself is that he will not abide by the no-politics-or-religion rule, and invariably jumps in with both feet, trashing gays, Hillary, and any Republican who fails his orthodoxy tests. Then comes the literal interpretation of the Bible-- the King James Bible. He is driven to proselytize, but the rest of us, being grownups, have pretty much already made our minds up about these things, and being preached to is merely offensive. It's too bad. He is a very good person, and I love him, but people can't stand to be around him.; 11/27/15, 11:21 AM
walter said...: This is no way to talk about Uncle Bernie.; 11/27/15, 1:58 PM