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Musicmystery -> RE: Satire at it's Finest (7/17/2008 11:26:31 AM)
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quote:
ORIGINAL: Alumbrado
quote:
Then we have our pseudo-sage Alumbrado, who feels that the American Heritage Dictionary, the Houghton Mifflin Co. Dictionary, the Oxford University Press, the Encyclopedia Brittanica, and the Columbia University Press, from whom I quoted those pieces on satire, are all in error.
Oh, lets drag that flight of fancy kicking and screaming back to reality for a moment.
I cited the authoritative reference for the word, you provided a made up and erroneous one... let's make that perfectly clear. And we are still waiting for you to back up your claim that the people who published that etymology dictionary are full of it.... I won't be holding my breath.
When you finally got around to cutting and pasting something you Googled, every single reference proved you wrong, and showed me right... the definition of satire rests in the intentions of the creator, not with armchair would be critics, who as Swift pointed out, cannot see that they are the ones being ridiculed.
Now feel free to return to whatever blows your shirt up.
This is getting beyond ridiculous. Let's recap.
Alumbrado, you certainly did not check those references. However, you or anyone else can do so easily and quickly by going to http://www.answers.com and entering "satire." There, unlike searching for keywords in Google, you will find the labelled entries I mentioned and more. It's called research.
If you like, I'll paste the entry from the Oxford English Dictionary, considered the ultimate authority, but I doubt it would make any difference here.
First, folks, you accuse me of inventing definitions. Then, when I present authoritative ones--ones some of you are too lazy to read--you call into question of validity of definitions generally, as evolving. In other words, YOU folks feel you can define a word anyway you wish. Apparently, for you, "it depends on what the meaning of 'is' is."
OK, we've by now passed Heretic's attention span, but for anyone who seriously wants to address the issue the OP presented, here's a summary.
The cover was presented as "satire at its finest." A bunch of cheerleaders jumped on the bandwagon. Once the definition of "satire" was clarified, they questioned the definition itself. Once that was supported, they questioned the validity of definition itself. And unable to make (let alone support) any counterargument, naysayers fell back on ridiculing their challenger on completely unrelated issues (whether I'm pendantic or humorless--claims silly to anyone who's read the rest of my posts--just isn't the point (it's a red herring).
The problem is that you made a sweeping, unsupported claim, and when called on it, didn't like it. Welcome to reality.
Now, the OP could have simply stated, "I find the cover amusing." Fine. No problem. That's a matter of personal opinion. It's also no more important an observation than whether he likes Coke or Pepsi, but fair enough.
Or, as is implied, the OP meant, "I love anything that attacks Obama," well, narrow-minded, but still a matter of personal opinion, and again, fair enough--with the understanding that others are free to post their dissenting views on the matter.
Convenient though it is, "I'm just right and everyone else is just wrong" isn't argument. It may be popular on some talk shows dependent on the ignorance of their audience or the willingness of that audience to simply serve as cheerleaders, but it's not argument, and is easily challenged.
As it was here. You don't have to like it--but that won't change a thing.
Here endeth the lesson.
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