A Festivus for the Rest of Us, 2021
Starting with performative dunking and ending with The Mountain
“I got a lotta problems with you people, and you’re gonna hear about it!” – Jerry Stiller as Frank Costanza in the December 18, 1997 episode of Seinfeld titled “The Strike”
Most people know Festivus from the popular ‘90s sitcom about nothing, but few people know that it was actually an invention of one of the writers of the show, at least according to Wikipedia, it is. Either way, due to Seinfeld, or namely, the hammy and memorable performances by Jason Alexander, Michael Richards, and the late Jerry Stiller, the “holiday” has taken a life of its own. Given the current state of independent opinion writing, and well, to be frank, opinion writing in mainstream newspapers, it is a celebration tailored to the writer with an opinion. So as many people probably will do today, I am partaking in the holiday known as Festivus. First, I will let one of my big pet peeves out into the air.
THE AIRING OF GRIEVANCES
This year, my biggest pet peeve is social media interactions, not all of them, mind you. Social media is a great invention that allows people to connect over interests banal and esoteric. You’ve never stood in wonder of the Internet until you’ve posted about an obscure album or a mid-level famous at best video game and had more people than you’d ever have expected in your wildest dreams reply to you with the same deference with which you originally posted. Social media has done more to bring people together much more easily than the old-fashioned, Boomer-approved way has. However, as much as it’s brought people together, it’s also gotten explosively opposing parties in close proximity to each other. Like gasoline in contact with a flame in an oxygenated environment, stunted, maladjusted, or repressed folks finding an opinion they find disagreeable with the insulation of ample physical space combusts with the fury of a thousand cluster bombs.
I’m not annoyed at the fighting. Asking people to be nice online is like asking the ocean to stop moving in sync with the moon. It’s just a natural occurrence. However, there’s a strictly annoying phenomenon that drives me up a wall. It’s one thing to want to dunk on someone like Dan Dakich or “Movie” Bob Chipman. I would rather not see them on my social media timelines, but I get it. They’re everywhere, and the best way to ward them off isn’t necessarily by ignoring them, but by dunking on them so mercilessly that perhaps their supporters might be wary at sharing them. You can’t put the toothpaste back in the tube on morons at that level.
The problem I have is when you have someone, anyone, it could be one of you even, who posts up and slams down on someone who has anywhere between zero and a couple-hundred followers. If you look hard enough on social media, especially Twitter, you can find the most random of random accounts spewing unbelievably hateful garbage in the replies of any high-follower account. It’s like the world’s easiest game of “find the truffle,” and you can be the pig with the strongest snout. It’s not that hard! The hard part is leaving them to wallow in their bigotry, but oh man, dunking on bigots is the ultimate truffle find.
Except truffles are tasty; bad opinions don’t really enhance anyone’s mood outside of the person getting that slight dopamine hit from dunking on them in the moment. Some things that are easy to do are worthwhile, sure. Things like making a grilled cheese sandwich, cracking open a cold one or four, or firing up that Microsoft Solitaire game when your boss is on vacation are not difficult things and provide a great boost to one’s mood at no one else’s expense as long as they’re done responsibly. Quote tweeting someone named @xXxFourteenWordsxXx saying “Captain Marvel is for soy beta cucks” with a reaction pic? The thing is, I didn’t know that person existed before you hit that QT, and I was happier for not knowing who they were.
You know who else didn’t know that @xXxFourteenWordsxXx existed before that QT that dunked on him went semi-viral? Other chuds with few followers who like to hang out in the replies of famous people spewing whatever it is they like to spew. Even worse, awful Team Follow Back accounts who have 100,000+ followers on the strength of following roughly just as many people will find them too. Basically, you are helping the people who have the worst opinions network and grow stronger. You’re feeding into their ability to spread the opinions you found awful enough to post that reaction gif in response to and churn it all into one gigantic feedback loop. For those who make it their duty to log on and dunk on the biggest idiots in the world, at least in their view, it’s a win. For everyone else who doesn’t need to see any number of awful opinions from relatively innocuous to the kinds of things that helped get Donald Trump elected, it’s a fucking nightmare.
What’s even worse is you have people who seem dedicated to seeking out the opinions that make them maddest just to quote tweet them. What kind of existence is that, anyway? Imagine getting up in a world where the only thing you need to do to get angry is to turn on the television or log onto your favorite news site and then blatantly seeking out even worse opinions from people you could more easily ignore? It’s so puzzling to figure out what feeds into the pleasure receptors of the human brain. My guess is that getting to feel superior to someone, no matter how insignificant that dunk victim is, just keeps those chemicals pumping, whether they be endorphins, serotonin, dopamine, whatever.
No matter how good that hormonal rush feels in the moment, it’s shallow, hollow. You know why? That dunk you just made doesn’t serve anyone but the people who are to blame for everything you find fucked up in the world, the people in charge. Oh, you want to shame someone for not getting vaccinated? They’re stupid, sure, but have you considered the government, Democrat or Republican, doesn’t care if you get sick or not as long as you keep the economy going? Of course not. Pointing that out doesn’t get you style points for being better than that person who didn’t get vaccinated. The same thing is true on a smaller, less-important scale. Oh, people are chanting “what?” at a wrestling show? It’s their fault, not the fault of WWE, which has been stagnant and lazy for five years at least with what they present to those fans who show up out of habit or inertia or out of the faint hope that maybe this year is the year WWE finally starts catering to them and not to the whims of their demented septuagenarian owner. But none of that really matters to you if you’re comfortable. The question is, why should you need to feel superiority over someone if you’re comfortable?
I could say you’re insecure, but what end would that serve? I’d probably be no different than you would be if I just dunked on you for dunking on some nerd with a Chris Benoit avatar thinking that WWE should go back to the Attitude Era or that All Elite Wrestling is better because they’re real wrestling1. The best thing for you to do is probably ignore those idiots, or if you are dunking on them because you’re trying to justify watching a bad product, maybe try not watching that bad product and seeing how your life is improved by doing literally anything else during that time frame where you would be annoyed watching said bad product. Either thing is better and probably more peaceful than getting performatively mad at someone for not having the exact same opinions as you.
Improving the state of the world takes work. It’s not posting. It involves something, be it as passive as not giving your money or attention to a bad thing like Disney or WWE or whatever or active like organizing and actually putting pressure on politicians to do something other than say “we can’t do this because some dickhead from West Virginia would rather smoke cigars on his yacht.” In the meantime, we can all use a place where we can congregate and not have to get mad because @CowboysLakersYankees, with account created in November of 2021 and with all of 24 followers, said that the NBA is boring and sucks because the Lakers are struggling right now or something along those lines. No matter how benign or malicious the bad statement is, I don’t need to see it. No one does. Let it stay hidden in Adrian Wojnarowski’s replies where it belongs.
And now, it is time for…
THE FEATS OF STRENGTH
Everyone gather around the aluminum Festivus pole and watch Hafþór Júlíus Björnsson, whom you may know best as The Mountain in Game of Thrones, show off his massive strength from the World’s Strongest Man competition:
Oh hell yeah, now those are some Festivus-level feats of strength, baby.
All Elite Wrestling IS better, mind you. But explaining why is more enriching if I did so in more than a footnote, so just take my word for it.