Dear Aunt Snarky:What is Real?

Dear Aunt Snarky,

My roommate and I have a disagreement. He thinks the National Enquirer is fake, I think the Bloggernacle is fake. We have made a bet, and have agreed to accept your answer.

I think some of the things in the National Enquirer are at least possible. Like for instance, somebody says Elvis was seen in a laundromat in Pocatello. Well, Elvis COULD be in Pocatello, right? And if he was, wouldn't he have to do laundry? Right again. Then there is that other article by the guy who claims to be the illegitimate love child of Ellen DeGeneres and the Pope. Hey, who knows? I mean, she is young and attractive, he has a good job and a stable income. They were both born Catholic, and they both like Italian food. Who's to say it couldn't happen?

On the other hand, the bloggernacle is just plain nuts. My roommate was telling me, and he swears it's true, that there is this thing like the Oxygen channel, where women talk for days about how they have to go into therapy because twenty years ago when they were beehives the mean old bishop wouldn't let them get the boy scout woodchopping merit badge. And then they change the subject and talk about cramps and control top pantyhose and stuff. Is there anybody, ANYBODY, who would want to participate in something like that? No, the thought makes reason stare. It's obviously fake.

Another thing that proves the bloggernacle is phony is that the people in it are supposed to be smart. My roommate says lots of them claim to be college professors and lawyers, but I think he was just trying to make another lawyer joke. As if anybody who was really smart would want to be associated with something like that. For example, he showed me this thing that says the Super Bowl is satanic, and he says the guy who wrote it is a lawyer. Oh, sure. Like somebody who spent three years getting trained in jurisPRUDENCE wouldn't know better than to put his name on something that stooopid. That's just crazy talk. Plus, lawyers have important jobs. I'm sure there is no way they would waste billable, company time in something foolish like this.

But here is the main reason I think the bloggernacle is fake. My roommate says that people have discussions about stuff when they don't even know what they are talking about. If you take a topic where Gordon B. Hinckley says "I don't know" and then raise that topic in the bloggernacle, people there DO know, and they know it FOR SURE. So there are lots of arguments and stuff, where people who don't even know each other get all huffy. Think about that. You can malign complete strangers and call them to repentance, and you don't even have to use your real name! Don't you think something like that would soon become a magnet for self-righteous, self-important showoffs? Of course it would, and it would soon fall over from the weight of its own smugness.

So that is our question, Aunt Snarky. Settle our bet for us by telling us which one is more likely to be fake. Please see it my way, there is a steak dinner riding on your decision!

Thanks,

Norm Al Morm

p.s. If this bloggernacle thingy really is real, that means you have a pretty easy job, right?

p.p.s. Do you really get your information from a chihuahua?


Dear Norm,

We are a chihuahua, so, yes, all of our information comes from a chihuahua, and, yes, our job usually is pretty easy.

Now that that is cleared up, yes the Bloggernacle is real, just take the Banner of Heaven for example, there you had a group of young kids all earnestly pouring their hearts out over mental health issues...oh...um...wait...OK, bad example. Lets try this again. Take a look at Feminist Mormon Housewives, staffed with...um...a bunch of women all named Lisa...and some Greek godesses...OK, well, alright, how about Zelophedad's Daughters then? You have Kiskilili, Elbereth, Melyngoch and...uh...Amalthea...who are all sisters...of the same father...who likes wierd names...errrrrmmmm.... Um...

Alright, no, come on, how about GeoffJ who is a part-time ninja and ska band member, and AnneGB who is a cantankerous old gal who wants to kill her husband and marry off her older tatooed daughter when she isn't working at Wal-Mart telling people she is a lesbian, and Susan M the mormon mom who is into cookie monster voiced Death Metal, and Clark Goble the physicist who reads Philosophy Today and Journal of Discourses in the bathroom, and Ronan the only British member of the Bleeding Heart American Liberals Foundation who heads up the NibletCast while teaching his young son about Monkey Steals the Peach, and DMI Dave the lawyer who reads a couple of hundred books a week while running his own blog site and managing another while married with kids apparently without smoking methamphetamine, and Steve EM the complete pervert who actively evangelizes Mormonism while bashing General Authorities the Word of Wisdom and civility in general while publicly opining the recent surprise of a 20 year old son whom his wife insists he befriend while he refuses, and Rusty the uber-gay-sensitive graphics arts designer in NYC...who is a faithful Mormon who co-blogs with his Dad...and Ned Flanders the less-active underemployed cartoon character...who...um...lives in...Rhode Island...and has moral dilemas about former converts he taught and baptised...and Roasted Tomatoes and Serenity Valley...who...um...champion liberation theology to Mormons while retranslating the Book of Mormon into modern English...and have...various...people...

OK, I give up. Its all just a fake. I cannot do this anymore. Its all a giant Turing machine. I admit it. Its a Beowulf cluster composed of old PCs strung together in my basement, front ending a database of inane conversations excerpted from MySpace chats randomly mixed with the electronic text from Encyclopedia of Mormonism and Journal of Discourses. It is designed to place standard topics into rotation (e.g., Women & The Priesthood, Blacks & The Priesthood, Institutional Racism in the Church, Old General Authority Speculation, Polygamy, LDS Church's Theological Etiology, Politics & Religion, Abortion, Murder, Death Penalty, and exegesis of obscure Biblical texts) and mix up inflamitory language and spelling mistakes. It make liberal use of a thesaurus as well, so as to throw the nit-pickers off. I did it in my spare time as a social experiment.

I'm sorry, Norm, to have deceived everyone like that. Its a shame. But, it just kind of got out of control once it started, good intentions gone bad.

But, remember, after its all over, you can stand around trumpeting yourself as "the most reviled member of the Bloggernacle" and expect people to attempt to exonerate you for it. Except the Bloggernacle doesn't really exist.

Aunt Snarky

P.S. Throw a dog a bone off that steak, will you?

P.P.S, The National Enquirer is more real, since it at least is in print and the paper and ink that composes it is substantive, even if the information it conveys isn't accurate.