I'm reading a Fox News article about Facebook's decision to censor a Babylon Bee piece titled "Senator Hirono Demands ACB Be Weighed Against A Duck To See If She Is A Witch." The fictional quote from Hirono is: "Oh, she's a witch alright, just look at her! Just look at the way she's dressed and how she's so much prettier and smarter than us! She's in league with Beelzebub himself, I just know it! We must burn her!"
And: "In addition to being a Senator, I am also quite wise in the ways of science. Everyone knows witches burn because they are made of wood. I think I read that somewhere. Wood floats, and so do ducks-- so logically, if Amy Coney Barrett weighs as much as this duck I found in the reflection pool outside, she is a witch and must be burned.'"
The threat of burning and the verbal image of burning a human being — a specific, famous person — is violent. It's certainly not a true threat, because witch burning is a familiar trope in American discourse and because, if somehow we're confused about whether literal witch burning is a possibility, we can be confident that Barrett weighs significantly more than a duck.
Babylon Bee CEO Seth Dillon tweets: "So after a manual review, Facebook says they stand by their decision to pull down this article and demonetize our page... They say this article 'incites violence.' It's literally a regurgitated joke from a Monty Python movie! In what universe does a fictional quote as part of an obvious joke constitute a genuine incitement to violence? How does context not come into play here? They're asking us to edit the article and not speak publicly about internal content reviews. Oops, did I just tweet this?"
I'm not impressed by the "regurgitated Monty Python" argument. Not everyone knows the movie. I saw it long ago but didn't remember this part, which actually isn't a good reference point if the aim is to make Hirono look stupid and wrong. Watch:
There, you see that the character who proposes the duck-weight test is attempting to devise a method of convincing the mob that the woman is not a witch. So the Bee lacks originality — cutting and pasting text from a movie script — and it isn't even very good at selecting what text to use.
But Facebook doesn't have a policy against unoriginality, inapt quoting, and lame humor. Facebook teems with that stuff. The question is whether equivalent violent language — with reference to a real person — is censored the same way when it is posted by non-conservatives. I don't know the answer, but if Dillon wants to make an argument that works on me, he needs to point to similar things from the other side that Facebook has not targeted.
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165 comments:
No, Sir Bedivere is not there to try to convince the mob she's not a witch. The character is making fun of the pseudo-reasoning of the "science" of Medieval Europe... Terry Jones, the actor playing Bedivere, is (was?) a medievalist. He's done multiple history shows on Medieval Europe since his Monty Python days.
"Regular readers know I'm not a fan of the Babylon Bee website. I don't think it's original or sophisticated enough ......"
SNL apparently is though, for which we given a weekly dose every Sunday morning by our gracious host. To each their own.
Love the word sophistication, rhymes with deplorable.
Anne, it seems to me you had to walk a long way to not see the point that the Babylon bee was making.
How big is the duck? The policy is obviously not applied impartially.
It is okay not to get a joke, and I understand some platforms don't want certain kinds of jokes. But one would hope expectations of what's allowed are known.
It is amusing to me when my leftie friends just discover all of a sudden can't write "poor white trash" or even "white trash" in a facebook post, because they're not expecting the block, but conservatives do expect that specific phrases be blocked and go straight for workarounds once they see the block. I've had some friends bitch they can't complain about their trashy relatives...you can't write "girls are weird" as a jokey statement...so much just gets an autoblock from the all holy algorithm.
One friend was using a scfeenshot from the Simpsons (Lisa opening Nelson's door, which has a bunch of stickers on it, like Nuke the Whales) for a joke post, and it got dinged for inciting violence.
One gets annoyed by the humorlessness of it all, even when the joke is making fun of the intolerant. Facebook really is becoming a place for folks to be boring, or to use for app sign-in credentials.
"No, Sir Bedivere is not there to try to convince the mob she's not a witch. The character is making fun of the pseudo-reasoning of the "science" of Medieval Europe.."
You're missing my point. He's trying to save her by using a clever line of bad reasoning that he figures will work on them.
Frankly, Facebook must think Democrats are either STUPID or uncontrollably violent if it has to filter something like this to keep someone from taking it as a cue to commit harm to ACB.
Given how the scene ends and that Bedivere doesn't much care that they're off to burn her, he's not really trying to save her at all. The whole movie is absurd -- trying to use "normal people" motivations to analyze a scene is really missing the point.
("Tis but a scratch!")
The only "normal" reaction I can think of in the movie is when King Arthur tells the Black Knight that he's a bloody looney. Or when he dismisses going to Camelot, as it's a silly place. The whole movie is silly.
By the way, the argument that I don't understand the Monty Python thing isn't helpful to the Babylon Bee's argument, which relies on some sort of notion that everyone is supposed to know and get Monty Python stuff.
I love the Babylon Bee. My wife too, and we both have advanced degrees. (She has a masters in biomedical engineering and I have a law degree.)
Original? Sophisticated? Who honestly cares? Most of their stuff is extremely funny. To each his or her, I guess. Humor is subjective. I don't find SNL stuff to be very funny (with rare exceptions.)
Do not need to watch MP, even though I have many moons ago, to get the satire. As to originality and sophistication your brien nosing of NYT is perplexing.
This is probably a minor point, but Sir Bedivere is not trying to save the "witch". "We shall use my largest scales" gives it away. It's all rigged but with the cover of "science!". We've seen a lot of that lately.
Kathy Griffin holds up a bloody Trump head...Okay?? There are a lot of violent images from the left, that NEVER get taken down or banned. It's okay for THEM to be violent. Look at the streets in Democrat run cities.
It should be enough that the Bee’s audience will get the reference—I find it hard to believe that someone who has seen The Holy Grail wouldn’t recognize this reference to one of it’s most famous scenes. Regardless, the story is absurd on its face. No one could believe that Barrett weighs as much as a duck or that Hirono really thinks she’s a witch and wants to burn her. And it’s not incitement to say somebody else wants to do something. So their claim that it is incitement to violence is irrational and fails the reasonable person test.
Does the Bee really have to cite examples to convince you? Plenty of their defenders have. But you shouldn’t need it because if you’ve ever been to Facebook, then you’ve personally seen examples. Facebook teems with them.
Ann Althouse said...You're missing my point. He's trying to save her by using a clever line of bad reasoning that he figures will work on them.
No, he’s not. He’s showing them how to reason. In the end, the woman does weigh as much as a duck, is a witch, and is taken off stage to be burned.
You are the audience for the Bee like my Aunt Gladys was an audience for the NYRB, Althouse. Which is to say, not.
The Bee hits the tropes and memes that come unforced from those raised in a traditional Christian background, and though your logical analysis of the issues raised by the Python movie reference is accurate, it is as irrelevant to the Bee's audience as an exegesis of the collapse of the Hays commission from a 1960's theologian would be to Roman Polanski. The point (yes it's a simple point, to be sure) is that the "science" of the progressive mindset is at these times as medieval as a witch trial in the current political frenzy, and the Bee piece accurately reflects what most of its audience is thinking. It's the National Lampoon for us Bible Belters, but you knew that.
How many evangelicals did you meet in art school? We get it that you don't get it. That's OK. We can still be friends. I am thinking of my Aunt Gladys's reaction to going to see Woodstock back in the day. It was on the bill as a dollar movie, and Gladys was a big fan of a cheap movie. Listening afterward to her reaction to events before she walked out brings a smile to my face lo these many years later.
I'd like to see a Venn diagram of readers of the Bee and the NYRB.
Amazon did the same thing to me and rationalized it by claiming I was “inciting violence.” Thirty years of book reviews were deleted.
In my SATIRICAL book review I suggested that the US bomb to bits all of the Chinese coal-fired power plants. The Left insists that the future of Earth is at stake. If true, we should protect the planet now.
I was illustrating the absurd by being absurd.
Everyone? In order for the Bee's humor to work it must work for everyone? Certainly most Americans won't get the MP reference, but then again most Americans don't know the Civil War occurred in the 19th century. It seems to me that the real question should be whether a reasonable person might think that the piece is true reportage rather than parody, and on that score the answer is pretty obviously no. Unless the American standard of reasonableness is now beyond repair.
serious question
If you type "she's a witch" into a search engine (ANY search engine), what comes up as the first thing it shows you? (don't take MY word for it). If people live in the 21st century; they Know about witches and ducks.
All you old people out there? How many of YOU didn't know about witches and ducks?
...some sort of notion that everyone is supposed to know and get Monty Python stuff.
I'd suspect that in the Bee's usual audience, pretty much everyone does. This particular post has developed greater reach thanks to the Streisand effect, and some uninitiated readers are puzzling over the joke, apparently.
I don't think the person who wrote Hirono's dialogue did the greatest job, but using this particular very well-known trope to illustrate both the intolerance and the thin soup that passes for "science" on the Left today seems decidedly apt to me.
Monty Python and the Holy Grail came out five years before I was born. I could still quote that scene from detailed memory, and see or make references to it on what has to be at least a weekly basis. I know culture is vast, and I don’t always get the references made here and many other places, but Althouse, you’re really out of the loop on this one.
Also, the character was ultimately found to be a witch (using the logic applied), which she even admitted was “a fair cop.”
Her honor Hirono is trying to play judge (and jury). That is the point of the satire. One need not remember Monty Python — just good old fashioned American history. I can still recall the graphic depiction of dunking witches from a 3rd grade text. BTW, I passed 3rd grade. Others didn’t.
Once this all plays out
Perhaps as a last ditch effort to save the company
They’ll experiment with the radical idea
Of trying free speech.
So it's not "sophisticated" enough for you. Fair enough; please base a future blog post of what's sophisticated and what isn't so we minions can know what to appreciate and what not to.
I had no idea that when I laughed at a BB tweet that I wasn't sophisticated enough by virtue of that. Guess I better re-address my opinions of Dylan, et al.
The question would be whether she floats, not her weight. Most women float.
"Now, here is a little peninsula, and, eh, here is a viaduct leading over to the mainland.
Chico: Why a duck?
Hammer: I'm alright, how are you? I say, here is a little peninsula, and here is a viaduct leading over to the mainland.
Chico: Alright, why a duck?
Hammer: (pause) I'm not playing "Ask Me Another," I say that's a viaduct.
Chico: Alright! Why a duck? Why that...why a duck? Why a no chicken?
Hammer: Well, I don't know why a no chicken; I'm a stranger here myself. All I know is that it's a viaduct. You try to cross over there a chicken and you'll find out why a duck.
Chico: When I go someplace I just...
Hammer: (interrupts) It's...It's deep water, that's why a duck. It's deep water.
Chico: That's why a duck...
Hammer: Look...look, suppose you were out horseback riding and you came to that stream and you wanted to ford over...You couldn't make it, it's too deep!
Chico: Well, why do you want with a Ford if you gotta horse?
Hammer: Well, I'm sorry the matter ever came up. All I know is that it's a viaduct.
Chico: Now look, alright, I catch ona why a horse, why a chicken, why a this, why a that...I no catch ona why a duck.
Hammer: I was only fooling...I was only fooling. They're gonna build a tunnel there in the morning. Now is that clear to you?
Chico: Yes, everything excepta why a duck."
"Coconuts" Marx Brothers
So, this is how history dies? What was once common, is now obscure and must not be used as a reference?
It seems like we are compressing social disconcerted from centuries to decades to weeks. Anything prior is ancient history akin to the crusades and must not be named.
Some humor, I guess, is subjective. I’m also guessing that those who don’t like the Babylon Bee don’t ‘like” Monty Python. But does that mean a reference should not be used because someone doesn’t understand it? Please celebrate your twenty grams of chocolate rations.
People have pointed to thing demonstrating Facebook's hypocrisy.
Bedevere is not trying to save her. He's trying to teach the rabble not to go off half-cocked and instead apply his version of the scientific method. The girl's fate is of no interest to him. One of Monty Python's major themes is the ridiculousness of authority as it lectures on matters it doesn't comprehend.
They ought to test any censorship of the right by asking whether the equivalent material were presented by the left, they'd do the same thing.
Very lawyerly. Of course this leads to everything being censored.
Jeffrey Toobin’s name is bring turned into a slur as we speak. Pretty soon talking about anyone named Toobin will be flagged and rejected.
Eventually it will happen to an Althouse.
By the way, I largely agree with Althouse about the Babylon Bee. The headlines are occasionally chuckle-worthy, but not consistently enough, and the writing (as seen here), is really clunky. But this is a really, really common reference and it’s absolutely reasonable to expect most people to get it. I’d say it’s a much more we’ll known reference then basically anything Bob Dylan has written, for example.
I'm shocked that anybody in America doesn't know the Monty Python line. That's one fairly well known scene. As soon as it said does she weigh more than the duck I knew it was what they were talking about.
I haven't used Facebook in years personally.
You should have watched some (or more?) Monty Python during your school years. Or not.
Either way, if one cannot see this as a farce, then one has zero sense of humor. Even if you don't think it's funny, clearly it's meant as a outlandish parody of witch dunking, a fairly popular solution in medieval times. Perhaps those black glasses-wearing, under 30 year old censors at Facebook were not taught any of that because it's part of Western Civilization and that's not allowed.
Or maybe it's just as simple as this: You cannot say anything bad about a Lefty, a Democrat, a black woman or man, a trans person, gay person, or Muslim. Everyone else is to be censored.
And definitely no humor. Humor is verboten. Hang all of them.
Everyone who was of that generation, or the next, and the next, AND was a computer/tech geek knew all the Monty Python stuff by heart. It was part of that subcultures version of E.D.Hirsch's "cultural literacy". Other things in that culture were Science Fiction obsessions, like knowing several dozen Heinlein quotes. The Babylon Bee is part of that culture, and references it often. It is not the Ann Althouse culture.
These are worlds that dont often intersect. And if these worlds collide, trouble happens. This is one reason I married my wife - she was of my world. She used to run SF conventions and her wedding registry was at Fry's Electronics.
if Dillon wants to make an argument that works on me, he needs to point to similar things from the other side that Facebook has not targeted...otherwise I'm going to come down on the side of the censor.
"You're missing my point. He's trying to save her by using a clever line of bad reasoning that he figures will work on them."
No. He's simply helping them determine whether she's a witch or not. I don't see or hear him being biased one way or another.
You're missing my point. He's trying to save her by using a clever line of bad reasoning that he figures will work on them.
No he's not. As meep pointed out, the Python witch detection method is similar to the actual witch detection methods; see the Malleus Maleficarum for examples.
some sort of notion that everyone is supposed to know and get Monty Python stuff.
Sophisticated people are familiar with Monty Python.
I don't do Many Python. I got the joke because I am vaguely aware of medieval history vis a vis witches and ducks. There's "float" and "burn" and "see if" in all kinds of discussions of various levels of historical seriousness. I'd probably have gotten this joke after my last high school Am Hist class ij 1961.
Being sophisticated can be achieved without knowing M. P.
I'm not impressed by the regurgitated Monty Python argument. Not everyone knows the movie.
Of course, the article was not necessarily written for "everyone." I suspect that regular Bee readers are more likely to know the reference than non-readers (and that the typical Bee writer does not feel compelled to dumb down every reference enough to be readily understood by all readers in any event).
You're missing my point. He's trying to save her by using a clever line of bad reasoning that he figures will work on them.
Taken in the full context of the piece, perhaps the Bee was making the more subtle joke that Hirono uses bad logic that actually works against her points in a satire on Hirono's actual argument. Asking whether ACB had ever sexually assaulted anyone, for example, simply draws to mind (or at least to minds on the Right) that conservative nominees get subject to vastly different and offensive treatment than do liberal nominees, much like the way conservatives get treated differently than liberals on platforms such as Facebook and Twitter. Hey, full circle! Maybe this satire was more sophisticated than you originally thought?
All three of my sub 25 year old kids and all four of my over 80 parents/in-laws would get it.
Maybe you are a minority here?
-XC
Once again, this is an example of how incredibly stupid the people who run social media sites like Twitter and Facebook can be. Rather than admit they made a stupid mistake, they're digging in.
Nice just so story, meep.
You cannot write girls are weird on Facebook?
BULLSHIT
People should definitely have to come with their hat in their hand to some anonymous panel and argue for the right to make a joke. And if they don't make a good enough argument, well, the default is NO.
And if the joke isn't the kind that everyone will get, well that's a NO too.
I don't know if adds to the confusion or not, but in the end she DID weigh less than a duck, and she admitted to being a witch ("it's a fair cop").
Bedivere is quite sincere in his scholastic-style disputation, Arthur takes him quite seriously and Bedivere sincerely accepts Arthur's praise...
But whether or not the joke or the Bee is funny, the po-faced "this post incites violence" is a double-standard. Progressives literally incite violence all the time ("no justice no peace") and it's waved through on social media.
The joke was aimed at middle-aged men. Most of whom will at least chuckle at it.
One of the funniest parts of the scene is when they weigh her. Everyone watching the movie assumes she'll weigh much more, but what are you going to believe: the staged scene, or your lying intellect? See, e.g., "Muh Russia!"
It's also a dig at the "science believing" Democrats. You try to apply reason to a question, thinking what you're doing is scientific. If you weigh a woman and a duck, and find they have the same mass, a properly trained scientist would immediately begin looking for reasons why the experiment failed rather than just accepting the results. Data always trump theory, but there absolutely are caveats to that.
Wow. Humor is not your strong suit, AA.
I loved the Monty Python TV show, but the movie, the first one, wasn't good enough for me. It was drawn out. I know it has its fans, but the idea that you have to know all the references today, half a century later, is ridiculous and certainly not something that Facebook needs to accept.
I saw "Holy Grail" when it came out and have never rewatched it. I don't feel required to know all the potential memes in it. That's ridiculous.
I recall reading somewhere about Google demonetizing a prominent blogger over reposting and commenting on text from mainstream newspapers. Can't remember where I read it.
I don't feel required to know all the potential memes in it. That's ridiculous.
Maybe regular readers of the Bee are fluent in Python.
For every single person who knows Monty Python, however, Facebook's decision here is hilariously inept, and they just look humor-starved.
I'm not a fan of the Babylon Bee website. I don't think it's original or sophisticated enough
As compared to what? The NYT and WaPo, of which you are so very fond?
People should definitely have to come with their hat in their hand to some anonymous panel and argue for the right to make a joke. And if they don't make a good enough argument, well, the default is NO. And if the joke isn't the kind that everyone will get, well that's a NO too.
Don't be ridiculous. The only standard is if it makes Democrats look bad (that's a NO, obviously).
You all are missing the point that the woman in the Minty Python sketch is a witch! “It’s a fair cop.” The Babylon Bee is calling Amy Coney Barrett a witch!
“Small rocks.”
Still funny, although perhaps could be perceived as a slam on the legendary Hank Johnson, so right out!
Professor Althouse said..
but the idea that you DO know all the references today, half a century later, is true for the MAJORITY of people in this country, if not the entire world
fify!
protip: Bragging about your ignorance of common knowledge doesn't make you seem smart
You have got to be kidding. Censoring this is idiotic. It is impossible for a human being of average or almost-average intelligence not to realize that this is a joke, even if they don't get it.
Not knowing Monty Python is shameful.
Facebook, Twitter, and Google provides comfortable sinecures to Obama Administration lackeys FOR THE PURPOSE of discriminating against Republicans and conservatives.
Your wishing won't move the needle.
“I don't feel required to know all the potential memes in it. That's ridiculous.“
Lighten up Professor.
Ann, you go out of your way to avoid the fact that Facebook is using a very cheap bullshit excuse to demonetise and censor the Bee in service to partisan politics. There are actual threats of violence from BLM etc on Facebook that are allowed to stand.
Your arguments are rather weak, quite frankly. Especially weak is the assumption that Silicon Valley IT nerds don't know about Monty Python and the Holy Grail. That movie is Canon for that particular sub-culture.
I would think that Monty Python scene would resonate deeply with our retired law professor hostess.
A person who is seen as learned and wise starts with a premise, constructs a logical argument from that premise, ignores countervailing facts that call into question the premise and the good faith of those pushing the issue and the need for a definitive resolution (mob-enforced "carrot nose" and woman's witch hat), and accepts or doesn't dismiss arguments that don't come close to passing the red face test and aren't made in good faith (she turned man into a newt but he got better). All leads to an absurd conclusion that happens to reach conclusion sought by the mob but since my logical chain of thinking has solid links, well, the conclusion must be right and can't be seriously questioned.
Basically, that's a lot of what goes on in law schools (not to mention courts across the US).
I fondly recall a lesson learned by HS chemistry teacher - when you reasoned your way to a conclusion, even when the answer was the result of math, ask yourself, "Does your our answer seem reasonable? Does it make sense in light of what you know, the context of the question you sought to answer?"
The Babylon Bee gag on censorship is way funnier.
Twitter Censors R2D2 for Sharing Hacked Death Star Plans
I don't feel required to know all the potential memes in it. That's ridiculous.
And yet a lot of people do. Apparently they don't find it quite as ridiculous. I myself, as another commenter up-thread also implied, don't find anything about Bob Dylan compelling.
The contention is that this was a bad use of humor by the Babylon Bee, and that (again, by implication) Facebook was therefore justified in censoring it because a reasonable person could in fact read it as a call to violence. Now that's ridiculous.
I question the sanity of anyone that thinks this is violence or promotes violence.
More than that I question the good intent of anyone that argues this is violence or promotes violence. Without being able to prove it, I suspect that Facebook's actions are motivated by a malignant spirit and the desire to do violence to others.
And by the way Monty Python has nothing to do with the appropriateness of this joke. The joke stands on its own. One need not know the prior reference. It would of course have been better if Babylon Bee had been original enough to have invented it. But there is nothing wrong about the joke that it needs the excuse that it has already been said before.
It is also my opinion, and I'm sure the opinion of a vast number of others, an accurate depiction of the spirit of Senator Hirono.
There are several Python scenes that have been repeated and shared in internet chats from the old BBs on. These tropes have taken on a life of their own outside the movies and TV shows. There are people who are very familiar with them but may not have ever seen the source. It doesn't matter any more. The way the trope or meme is understood by the internet culture is what counts.
My hoovercraft is full of eels.
There are several Python scenes that have been repeated and shared in internet chats from the old BBs on. These tropes have taken on a life of their own outside the movies and TV shows. There are people who are very familiar with them but may not have ever seen the source. It doesn't matter any more. The way the trope or meme is understood by the internet culture is what counts.
My hoovercraft is full of eels.
"I don't feel required to know all the potential memes in it. That's ridiculous."
Of course you are not required to know all that.
There are many subcultures, we can't exist in all of them, life's too short.
I may have watched "Holy Grail" a dozen times. The "Bee" lot strikes me as the sort of chaps that may have done likewise.
Althouse - your bitter schtick against the Bee is strange. But that bit from Holy Grail - and nearly the WHOLE FILM - is pretty much burned into the collective comedy conscious whether you agree or not.
However - my biggest gripe on the Bee (and similarly The Onion) is that the totality of the joke is in the headline. The comedy usually trails off in the body copy. Like trying to explain a joke.
The reason why Facebook demonetized Diamond and Silk was that they "violated community standards" by supporting Trump while being Black.
Later, Mark Zuckerberg told Congress that demonetizing Diamond and Silk was "a mistake".
In his testimony to Congress, Zuckerberg did not elaborate, though, that Facebook's mistake was to get caught demonetizing Diamond and Silk. Facebook mistakenly informed Diamond and Silk that they were being demonetized.
Many humorist and others understand the word "regurgitated" as also meaning not the same as when it was first consumed.
Duck Lives Matter
Ridiculous or not, it'w one of the most-quoted movie scenes of the 1970s. I see it referenced online at least every few days. It is a super-meme. I'm 65, and I don't have a single friend who doesn't know it by heart, and most people younger than me do as well. The whole point of the Hirono gag is how shamelessly exact the quotes are. That's the joke.
ButI also know people my age who have somehow never seen GONE WITH THE WIND or THE WIZARD OF OZ. Cultural literacy is hit or miss, especially with movies. But HOLY GRAIL is undoubtedly the most-quoted Monty Python production, much more so than anything on the TV series. Glenn Reynolds seems to make a "Brave Sir Robin ran away" reference almost weekly.
I decided to search "Antifa" on Facebook, and chose a random Antifa page. It isn't incredibly active. There they had posts about the guillotine set up on Bezo's property, and pictures of burning, as well as call to actions for "proud boy" rallies.
https://www.facebook.com/antifascistmichigan
So yes, I would say Facebook does not have a blanket policy on calls to violence.
Additional question to Althouse - is the Onion posted a tweet that Donald Trump shot an elephant in his pajamas, how would you feel if it was taken down because of "violence against animals"? I bet even fewer people get that joke. Certainly fewer know where it's from.
Just chiming in on the "continued relevance and awareness of MP and the Holy Grail" controversy...
1) Geeks of my generation (I'm 60) - just a little before widespread VCR - used to do readings of MP and the Holy Grail AT PARTIES. Like...the party would get to a certain point and a bunch of guys would pull out their mimeographed transcripts and start playing it out. It's not relevant to the point, but I like to relate the story.
2) Jumping ahead (gulp) 40 years...my two youngest are 19 and 15 year old males - and they have this scene memorized. When MP and Holy Grail is on Netflix or Prime (and it is usually on one or the other), some scene from it - usually this one - gets watched once a day in my house. I don't think they're unusual in that respect. Along with Nacho Libre and Napoleon Dynamite, it's at the center of their movie comedy universe.
"The question is whether equivalent violent language — with reference to a real person — is censored the same way when it is posted by non-conservatives."
One gets the impression you that never actually go on the internet. Twitter and Facebook abound with left-wing idiots showing their coolness by threatening death or immolation to anyone they dislike. They are doing it in all seriousness, where the Bee is doing it for fun.
I find the Bee's humor mostly worth at best a light chuckle, but the duck posting was for me one of their best. Note: as with the Onion (do you ever read that?) one really needn't and perhaps shouldn't go past the headline.
"I don't feel required to know all the potential memes in it."
And you call yourself a boomer? Shame. In any case, to evaluate humor you are required to have a sense of humor, which apparently you are missing. Your "cruel neutrality" pose has morphed over time into "unrelenting partisanship and lack of humor."
"You're missing my point. He's trying to save her by using a clever line of bad reasoning that he figures will work on them."
Is he? I don't think Bedevere cares one way or the other. He just wants the mob to "follow the science." You know, due process and all that. And as it turns out, she really is a witch.
If a law professor (!) is too dumb to realize that the witch test in Monty Python was a parody of trial by ordeal, which should come up in the secular discourse of the Salem witch trials as persecution of proto-feminists, how the hell does she have the presumption to declare that the Babylon Bee isn't sophisticated enough for their perfect palate?
Besides, there are few shows as moronically crude and out of touch as Saturday Night Live, but Althouse routinely posts about it the day after, so "ok Boomer" remains the only dismissal. Except that's not fair to the Woodstock hippies, who were never so stoned that they believed Monty Python was offering a witch a fair trial!
Actually, that has implications for Althouse's "neutrality" on the horrifically corrupt persecution levied against Michael Flynn, among others...
Althouse may be familiar with Monty Python but she can't possibly be familiar with the dumbest Senator Horono. If she was, she'd know it is impossible to resist mocking Horono and that is what this joke was about. Holy Grail line was just the prop used to mock her.
"...if the aim is to make Hirono look stupid and wrong."
Hirono is both stupid and wrong. Long live the Bee!
Professora discussing Monty Python says …
There, you see that the character who proposes the duck-weight test is attempting to devise a method of convincing the mob that the woman is not a witch. So the Bee lacks originality — cutting and pasting text from a movie script — and it isn't even very good at selecting what text to use.
---------===========
Looks to me Professora is taking the Bee seriously and also literally in her goal being to denigrate Bee "Humorosity"
I would ask : could it be that Bee knows the intent of Python character but wants to present Hirono as too stupid to know that intent behind the test?
And a better ACB-related Bee bit is this one: The Power of the Constitution Compels You. But, of course, if one is unfamiliar with The Exorcist it would be meaningless.
"AND was a computer/tech geek knew all the Monty Python stuff by heart."
They had a very early, extensive screen saver program that I probably still have somewhere.
If anything, I would say it's Hirono who is a witch, magically causing Mirriam Webster to change the meaning of a word.
The issue is that the piece by the Bee is a JOKE. Really.....just a joke. Does Facebook think that their users are that stupid that they need to be protected from jokes, sarcasm, humor? (wait!....they ARE using Facebook...sooooo..probably yes....they are stupid).
Just because someone doesn't get a joke (Althouse) or think it to be sufficiently funny.....doesn't mean that it is still not humorous.
Lighten up people.
The Economist reported 20 years ago of children in the Congo who were being driven from their homes because their parents couldn't afford to keep them, and they were accused of witchcraft to justify their parents' shame:
https://www.economist.com/middle-east-and-africa/2002/12/05/sad-little-sorcerers
Unfortunately behind a paywall, but the article included a quote from a government official that one downside of the practice was that it made it difficult to distinguish between these innocent children and the country's real witches.
Regular readers know I'm not a fan of the Babylon Bee website.
Obviously, the reason why you avoid the Bee but religiously watch SNL is the question of whose side is being mocked. Lots of people on the left can’t laugh at themselves; you don’t seem to be alone.
Nobody expects the Spanish Inquisition.
Pythonian memes, like those from The Godfather, are ubiquitous and always appropriate. They are on equal footing with Greek mythology for literary allusions and probably more widely understood.
Not everyone gets "Titania McGrath". Let's throw "her" off of Twitter!
BTW I was in the UK (as a guest of Uncle Sam) in 1969 when Monty Python's Flying Circus first appeared on the BBC. Several years later, on my return Stateside, I would try in vain to describe it to my friends. It wasn't until 1974 that PBS started showing it in the US, and everybody started quoting it.
Maybe today we could do a dead parrot scene parody of Joe Biden's campaign. It's not dead yet, it's only sleeping. His campaign is pining for the fjords.
"Basically, that's a lot of what goes on in law schools (not to mention courts across the US)."
Exactly right, and exactly the BS that prime Python skewered.
On the "It's a fair cop" subject, the legal reasoning of Sir Bedivere passes the Amy Coney Barrett standard - writing the opinion from the perspective of the losing party so that even though they would not like the result, they would understand that the decision was fairly reasoned and grounded in law.
I don't think it's original or sophisticated enough
My god Althouse is insufferable.
This is one of the dumbest things I have ever read on this blog. Shame on Althouse. She may be a witch. Find me a duck!
Ann, are you seriously arguing that if someone isn't familiar with the Monty Python sketch, they would conclude that the article is genuinely calling for the Senator to be weighed against a duck? You can't possibly think that, can you? And if not, how can any reasonable person conclude that the article is anything but a joke?
An internet decided by those who don't get a particular meme.
I can haz censorship?
I am Laslo.
I'm sorry, but I have to say anyone who doesn't know and understand the witch scene in Holy Grail really isn't qualified to comment on humor, politics, history or science.
I'm not sure that such a person is even qualified to vote.
Now you must go and cut down the mightiest tree in the forest with . . . a herring!
I guess you don't like Babylon Bee, but you like SNL. Talk about lame. SNL hasn't been funny since Bush 41.
Personally, I think Frank J. Fleming, who writes for the Bee, is a hoot.
You're missing my point. He's trying to save her by using a clever line of bad reasoning that he figures will work on them.
He's not the only one.
Barrett turned me into a newt! (I got better.)
It's only a model : )
“I love the Babylon Bee. My wife too, and we both have advanced degrees. (She has a masters in biomedical engineering and I have a law degree.)”
“Original? Sophisticated? Who honestly cares? Most of their stuff is extremely funny. To each his or her, I guess. Humor is subjective. I don't find SNL stuff to be very funny (with rare exceptions.)”
Very much agree.
Ann reminds me a bit of my mother and her friends. Very earnest. Very bright. Well educated. But their husbands and sons all thought the group of them were seriously humor impaired. I remember one hike we had maybe 40 years ago, with two couples, with one son per couple. The other son would stand at the corners, sometimes with his hands raised, as the two women would come down hill. He was protecting his mother from distractedly running off the corners. All four guys thought it hilarious. The two women never had a clue that we were laughing at them. Interestingly, all four of us guys were ultimately attorneys (The other father/son ended up being our estate attorneys). And then, about 70, my mother discovered humor. She would tell a joke, which we assumed wasn’t one, since she was, in our minds, incapable of telling one, and she would get us, because of that. Still don’t know how someone can go for 70 years, and all of a sudden develop a sense of humor.
As a hint here, Hirono is considered by much of the BB audience as being the stupidest Senator currently serving, and her question to ACB was probably the stupidest one asked. The point is that, based on her questioning, she is stupid enough to actually believe the witch thing. She knows that Republicans in general, and Republican nominees for the Supreme Court, in particular, are rapists. She apparently knows this on general principles, since it is leftist cannon. (And she is too stupid to realize that the other Dems calling Republicans rapists are engaging in projection - all of their people engage in sexual harassment, and even a bit of rape-rape, from the Biden family on down). So, knowing that Republican nominees to the Supreme Court are rapists, Hirono asks ACB if she is one too, not taking into account that ACB is a devout Roman Catholic WOMAN. But then Kavenaugh was a devout RC man, who claimed to have been a virgin on his wedding night, and the attacks worked in him, despite their patent absurdity.
Another part of the joke though is that the left doesn’t realize that they usually are the joke at the BB (or do realize it, and don’t like to be laughed at). Sometimes BB jokes involve differences between sects, and esp Protestant sects. Differences that you might not appreciate, if you were brought up in a different culture. But mostly, anymore, they are fairly political, with the left bearing the brunt of the humor. And every time that the left bans them like this, is just more evidence that they are as humor impaired as my mother and her friends were, and we can laugh at them for not getting the jokes. Or just don’t like being laughed at.
And, yes, I have their home page open in my primary browser on each of my Internet attached devices, as I do Instapundit, Althouse, VC, etc. and check it out every day or two for new headlines. (I agree that the headlines are usually more humorous than the actual articles).
Hirono is both stupid and wrong. Long live the Bee!
@mockturtle, +1
"I'd like to see a Venn diagram of readers of the Bee and the NYRB"
Raises hand.... I'm frequently underwhelmed by both, but when they're good they're good. I find The Bee's Christian jokes more consistently funny than their political jokes.
I think that whether Python references can be assumed to be "gettable" should be subjected to Judge Woolsey's dictum "It is only with the normal person that the law is concerned" and Althouse is distinctly not "normal" for this particular bit of culture. For the Normal American (well American Male, anyway) under 60, Holy Grail is as familiar as the Bible was to a 19th century American. When I was an assistant scout master, I went to a weekend long training campout with a bunch of other assistant scout masters and every conversation, all weekend long, was littered with Holy Grail references. Seriously, it was remarkable.
And Sir Bedivere is most certainly not trying to save the witch. He's a scientist, doing science; there's some fairly pointed satire going on there:
Sir Bedevere:...and that, my liege, is how we know the Earth to be banana shaped.
Arthur: This new learning amazes me Sir Bedevere. Explain to me again how sheep’s bladders may be employed to prevent earthquakes.
"Blogger Ann Althouse said...
By the way, the argument that I don't understand the Monty Python thing isn't helpful to the Babylon Bee's argument, which relies on some sort of notion that everyone is supposed to know and get Monty Python stuff."
Whether they know the Monty Python stuff or not, the absurdity is manifest to anybody but a drooling idiot. That's the real point. You're either being willfully disingenuous or laughably naive, Althouse.
If Biden wins, how far away are we from strange women lying in ponds distributing swords as a basis for a system of government. Well you can expect to wield supreme executive power just 'cause some watery tart threw a sword at you!
“An internet decided by those who don't get a particular meme.
“I can haz censorship?”
What I don’t always know is whether the left actually doesn’t get the jokes, and that they are jokes or they do, and don’t like being laughed at.
And Jonathan Swift was canceled for his baby cooking tips. We are progressing all the way back to colonial times.
Hirono needs no assistance showing shes a blathering idiot. Only the people who voted for that trash are more idiotic.
> I saw it long ago but didn't remember this part,
"100 Movies You Must Watch to Be Culturally Literate." Yikes, what an embarrassing admission. Monty Python references are ubiquitous; missing one on par with missing an obvious Shakespeare reference or a Bible reference.
"Supreme executive power derives from a mandate from the masses, not from some farcical aquatic ceremony."
If the left could meme, this would have been their answer to all the Trump boat parades. But they can't, so their only answer was a parade of golf carts. Toot, toot.
This post strikes me as a complete mis-fire. It's not that you dismiss the Bee as lame and unoriginal. That's just a matter of taste, so to each her own. But no one reading the Bee's article -- even if the reader wasn't familiar with the Bee and its shtick -- would see it as a "threat" by Sen. Hirono to burn ACB as a witch if she weighs more than a duck, let alone as suggesting the "burning [of] a human being — a specific, famous person." Nor was there any "depiction" of violence -- it was just a picture of a duck on the Senator's desk, accompanied by a silly text.
Even in the world of cruel neutrality, it's much more reasonable to start from the premise that a reader of the Bee's article is not a complete idiot, and ask whether any such reader would deem the article a "threat" of "violence" by burning ACB as a witch. And if you are looking for more realistic threats of actual violence that Twitter/Facebook deem OK, just search for antifa/BLM stuff that doesn't get taken down. I suspect you will find what you're looking for.
Reference comedy is quite common. There is always the risk that someone in the audience will not get it. It behooves the author to make sure to tailor the comedy to the audience. I'm pretty sure the Babylon Bee knows their audience well enough that they will get the reference on the whole, and for those that do not get the joke there are usually 4-5 more new articles there for the audience to consume. It took me a while to get up to speed on what "essential oils" were and why that had anything to do with Christianity.
Needless to say, the Facebook algorithm is not part of the Babylon Bee's audience. Censorship because "I don't get it" is not a valid reason and makes you look stupid at best, tyrannical at worst.
So Monty Python references out, handmade tale references..............NO problem. I never saw it, have no plans. In fact I didnt even understand the red dress thing for a while.
I prefer Python. Reruns and all its still better than SNL on its best day.
Humor like beauty is in the eye of the beholder.
Ann, are you seriously arguing that if someone isn't familiar with the Monty Python sketch, they would conclude that the article is genuinely calling for the Senator to be weighed against a duck? You can't possibly think that, can you? And if not, how can any reasonable person conclude that the article is anything but a joke?
Ann used to be stimulating, but lately - and maybe it is because I am not as sharp as I was twenty years ago - I can't tell if she's being ironic and I don't get it, or perhaps she's being sarcastic but I cannot understand her subtlety. Maybe it's my blood pressure meds.
Althouse: "I don't know the answer, but if Dillon wants to make an argument that works on me, ....."
.....then he needs to start attacking conservatives like SNL does.
Cuz that will work.
Every single time.
1. NO. 2. Also, NO.
If you are tuned into the history of Western culture, you are aware of all the stupid things—like whether a witch would sink or float— that were used sort out out the devil’s workings. You don’t need to watch Python and the grail to get it.
Mazie Hirono has impressed so many of us as remarkably stupid (Ed Markey knows he is not the the stupidest member of the senate as long as she is there) that we are amused by the idea that she might buy into “witches float” theory. It really isn’t out of line with other stupid stuff she has said, it’s just a step further. The idea that the Bee’s joke is inciting violence is stupid coming from a platform (Twitter) that says they aren’t a publisher.
But why did Althouse step into this appearing as a humorless scold? We all know she has a sense of humor.
The Bee has a long way to go to top the old Onion. Who can ever forget their headline: “Clinton feels Nation’s Pain, Breasts”.
As for the scene itself, the key to me is that all the major players involved are idiots. You have uneducated peasants who have no idea what they are talking about eliciting the opinion of Bedevere who, despite being educated and trying to be the voice of reason, also has no idea what he is talking about, except he is more nuanced and complex about his nonsense. The whole scene is framed as the "witch" being the only sane woman who is obviously innocent and getting railroaded. The punchline is the idiots are 100% correct.
It is true that if you need to explain the joke it was not funny, at least not to whomever failed to get the joke. However, I found it funny originally and breaking it down provides me with even more admiration of what a masterpiece of humor this is.
Alas, even the best humor is not for all markets, as the Bard would say.
"I very much want the big social media platforms to apply their various content-related policies with neutrality as to viewpoint."
And no doubt you think Zuckerbucks cares what you very much want.
From now on, I want you all to call me Loretta...
Splitters
"You're missing my point. He's trying to save her by using a clever line of bad reasoning that he figures will work on them."
Didn't you have a job where you taught people how to do that?
By going into the weeds this debate is missing the point; FB is de-monetizing BB because mockery devastates Dem ideas and PC culture. Arguing over the point legitimizes FBs censorship. Would you want Ma Bell to cancel your phone because you made a political joke on a party line while your neighbor eavesdropped? Same thing!
I don't feel required to know all the potential memes in it. That's ridiculous.
I routinely skip over your SNL posts and your Dylan posts. SNL quit being funny 20 years ago. I also think you are somewhat lacking in humor but that is not why I come here. The Facebook thing is just what I would expect from them.
Yep, sure. I think you don't like the Bee, because its Christian and you're a social liberal. Its as simple as that. So, you adopt a pose of "cruel neutrality", and support facebook's obvious left-wing censorship.
Your political comments are becoming less and less intelligent.
"By the way, the argument that I don't understand the Monty Python thing isn't helpful to the Babylon Bee's argument."
The BB isn't making an argument- they're making a joke.
Amadeus 48: Personally, I think Frank J. Fleming, who writes for the Bee, is a hoot.
I didn't realize Fleming wrote for the Bee. I've been a fan of his since way back in the IMAO days.
When you come right down to it, the people who run Facebook and Twitter censorship efforts are essentially the Knights who say "Ni!" Just as foolish, just as arbitrary, just as herd-following, just as puffed up with their own importance, just as tyrannical.
Holy Grail (and Life of Brian) are crucial texts in understanding the worst of human nature.
Now put down that sandal and follow the gourd!
Being willfully obtuse is a bad look whether you’re Facebook or Althouse.
FACEBOOK: ALL YOUR JOKE ARE BELONG TO US.
Also Facebook: No Money For You!
If you have a policy against "incitement to violence" you should be able to explain with ease why the post in question actually does that. Where's the actual incitement? There's none. It's satire.
You're missing my point. He's trying to save her
Psst...She doesn't need saving.
Ok, forget the specific reference to "ducks" in the Babylon Bee post.
Would Althouse complain about the BB's post if, instead of using the duck-test, they'd used the commonly-known historical fact that women were subjected to the witch-test of being dunked in water to see if they would float?
"Senator demands ACB be thrown in the Potomac to see if she floats; says she will only vote to confirm if ACB sinks."
Would Facebook still have censored? Sure!
Would Althouse condemn the ridiculous basis for this censoring?
Wow, Althouse, you don't get the point of the skit at all. Sir Bedivere is cruelly neutral in the entire skit- the woman turns out to have the same mass as the duck.
"I don't think it's original or sophisticated enough..."
Sure it's not a kneejerk reaction because of the openly Christian nature of the publication?
I’m thinking that if Republicans get control of Congress and keep the White House, the DCMA will be seriously modified to ensure that web hosts who pick and choose material they allow to be posted will, in fact, be publishers. We cannot continue with large platforms having this power. They should lose their immunity having so rawly abused it.
I wonder how that would affect blog moderation policies? It shouldn’t, but Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram have monopolistic power that must be addressed. If they want to be media, they must be treated as media.
- Krumhorn
I'm Not Sure said...
"By the way, the argument that I don't understand the Monty Python thing isn't helpful to the Babylon Bee's argument."
The BB isn't making an argument- they're making a joke.
Bingo. They're making a joke. And you're standing with Facebook, saying "That's not funny!"
So what? Are people not allowed to tell jokes that don't appeal to your sense of humor?
Are you really so uptight and humor lacking that you're going to defend Facebook for trying to destroy a company, because you don't find them funny?
Do you think that Facebook will refrain from going after anyone you do find funny?
Phil 314 said...
“I don't feel required to know all the potential memes in it. That's ridiculous.“
Lighten up Professor.
10/21/20, 7:20 AM
You mean "Lighten up, Francis!"
The BB's joke is perfectly appropriate, from a text selection perspective. They are comparing the senator to Terrys Jones' Sir Bedevere, not John Cleese's or Michael Palin's peasant. The joke is about nonsense pretensions to expertise, based on Sir Bedevere's being "wise in the ways of science", after all.
Get the joke?"
If it looks like a baby, if it evolves from a fertilized egg, then it cannot be aborted for light and casual causes following a witch trial, warlock judgment, social distancing (e.g. "fetus" label), in darkness, behind a wall, under a veil of privacy. The same for diversity dogma, not limited to racism, that denies individual dignity, individual conscience, and intrinsic value.
Sometimes the Bee is good, sometimes it's bad, but this is bullshit, so I sent them fifty bucks.
BB parodies 16 trimesters of witch hunts, warlock trials (e.g. by press, by mob), and protests. This is on top of social progress, where people are cancelled, and human life deemed unworthy of life, is, so to speak, burned at the stake in what has been remarkable monotonically divergent normalization. Boy Scouts is another organization that is being burned at the stake for what is either early adoption of political congruence ("=") or infiltration by transgender activists. The Progressive Church needs to be closed, and liberals need to lose their Pro-Choice quasi-religion ("ethics").
Mike S said..
The reason why Facebook demonetized Diamond and Silk was that they "violated community standards" by supporting Trump while being Black.
Later, Mark Zuckerberg told Congress that demonetizing Diamond and Silk was "a mistake".
In his testimony to Congress, Zuckerberg did not elaborate, though, that Facebook's mistake was to get caught demonetizing Diamond and Silk. Facebook mistakenly informed Diamond and Silk that they were being demonetized.
Are Diamond and Silk demonetized?
The only reason to cut off the Bee is because the Bee commits the sin of mocking the left.
The woke don't know how to joke. They also are incapable of making a judgement because judging someone would be an inexcusably judgemental. That's why the schools have inflexible rules. A poptart nibbled into the shape of a "gun" is a hanging offence. The child must be branded forever as a dangerous murderer and forever banned from school.
Lyssa said...
I’d say it’s a much more we’ll known reference then basically anything Bob Dylan has written, for example.
A. I love you.
B. Ann will hate you.
Are Diamond and Silk STILL demonetized?
Is what I meant to ask....
he needs to point to similar things from the other side that Facebook has not targeted.
It would be easier to point out similar things from the other side that FB has targeted ... if such things existed. Which they don't.
That's the whole point. It only goes one way.
Like all humor sites, the Bee is hit-or-miss, but I thought the "she's a witch" story was particularly amusing. It mocked perfectly Sen. Hirono's vapid stupidity and the left's general inability to ask serious questions of Judge Barnett. I do not believe there is any living person anywhere in the United States who took it as a serious call to violence, so I call b.s. on Facebook's censorship.
No, Althouse, you are wrong. There is no need to find an equivalent on "the other side", FB's action is absurd on its face. They are making fun of Hirono and even if you are unaware of the Python's scene, there is no threat of violence involved--not against Hirono, and by putting those absurd words in Hirono's mouth, not against Barrett, either.
FB is testing what levels of censorship they can get away with, and with your approach they can get away with almost anything. because even if there is a parallel on "the other side" that they let pass, that parallel will never be perfect.
Free speech and related freedoms are either worth fighting for, or they are not.
He specifically mentioned Hawk Newsome calling to Burn it All Down on a Black Lives Matter page in the twitter thread.
I think it's ridiculous to think the satire only works if you know the reference to MP. I didn't know it, but I completely understood the point BB was making. Hirono is a nut and half the stuff she says is blatant BS. I'm astonished anyone takes her seriously, much less votes for her. Can you imagine giving her power over you? I don't doubt that she would use ducks to make policy decisions! And the fact that BB brought up MP as a defense also doesn't require you to know about MP. It's just defending on the basis that the skit has been around a long time and has never before publicly been censored as being an incitement to violence.
Grail, Brian, and Animal House were the standout generation-shaping comedies of the era. Some Anglophile friends and I were early Python fans, but it took a few years for the slower kids to catch up--but they all did eventually . . . those with functioning senses of humor anyway.
But more importantly as others have mentioned, Python is a huge part of Anglosphere comedy even unto the grandchildren of their original fans.
(Use a script? Only wankers didn't have it all memorized.)
Narr
Beware the Rabbit of Caerbannog!
I saw a doctor once, but he didn't see me!
You're missing my point. He's trying to save her by using a clever line of bad reasoning that he figures will work on them.
The only thing that will work on them is a hot shot of Thorazine, and only for 20 minutes, at that.
Senator Hirono is a perfect caricature of a long line of horrific politicians, on both sides of the aisle, elected by voters. I think Winston Churchill had it correct: "...The best argument against democracy is a five-minute conversation with the average voter..."
if you are recieving flak, you are over the target. Or is it flack?
https://www.etymonline.com/word/flak
DarkHelmet said...
When you come right down to it, the people who run Facebook and Twitter censorship efforts are essentially the Knights who say "Ni!" Just as foolish, just as arbitrary, just as herd-following, just as puffed up with their own importance, just as tyrannical.
What strikes me about Facebook and Google is the number of Indians who occupy senior positions. Is the humor in Hindi very different? Maybe they have political views much more aligned with India.
A witch trial occurs with a prejudice and denies due process. The modern equivalent is selective-child, also allegations of diversity (e.g. color supremacist). A warlock judgment occurs to normalize a narrative. The modern equivalent is a protest founded on false premise (e.g. 1619 Project) to suppress or defeat competing interests. This was a popular strategy used against natives (e.g. South Africans) in order to ethically justify mass murder and secure natural resources. Both are examples of conventional social justice and cancel culture.
It's 'flak,' or should I say FLAK since it's acronymized German.
FliegerAbwehrKanone (Airplane Defense Cannon).
Narr
Krauts have such a way with words
Of course not everyone knows the movie, there no movies that everyone knows. That said, one of the original cast members spun off a Broadway show from it that debuted in 2005 and went on to tour for another 12 years. The movie already had a cultish following among the generation that saw it when it was in theaters. It's a near certainty that if the people who kept buying tickets for Spamalot weren't familiar with the source material before they saw it on stage, they likely looked into it afterwards. You're going to have a hard time finding a movie with more universal recognition in the US.
And I suppose all of those audience members, plus all the members of American Theatre Wing, The Broadway League, the Dramatists Guild, Actors' Equity Association, United Scenic Artists and the Society of Stage Directors and Choreographers who awarded it the Best Musical Tony in 2005 just don't have your sophisticated taste in humor.
No one at Faceborg needs to get the joke. They only need to know that the Bee is a humor business.
This is like banning MAD magazine because the SPY vs SPY feature might inspire violence.
Ann, you and the commenters are missing the bigger point here about why the joke may have fallen flat and had been flagged by Facebook's algorithmic censors. It's not that the joke employs dated absurd or culturally obtuse Monty Python references, or that witch burning conjures up images of burning a human being, or that the Babylon Bee lacks proper amount of sophistication and originality, or that there is some kind of one-sided political ideology at play.
No. The joke fails because Sen. Mazie Hirono is just crazy enough say and do something so mind-bogglingly stupid and outrageous as to suggest the Senate should test if Judge Coney Barrett weighs as much as a duck and, if so, is a witch and should be burned at the stake. Some may have missed the subtlety of the joke (even though "satire" is emblazened on the website and any one with an IQ above room temperature understood it to be satire) simply because Sen. Hirono is possibly the dumbest person in the Senate, who has embarrassed the Senate so many times with crazy things over the years, that some may wonder if actually said it.
jvb
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