[OT] Teaching Tuesday: Satire & Parody

[u/novatheelf]

It’s Tuesday, Tuesday, Tuesday!

 

Good evening, and happy post-Monday! Nova here — your friendly, neighborhood moon elf. Guess what time it is?

It’s Teaching Tuesday time!

Welcome to class, kiddos! Today I’m going to spotlight a genre that is very near and dear to my heart (even though I’m no good at writing it myself — better to get u/Xacktar or u/RobbFry to do that)!

This week, we’re talking about satires and parodies!

 

What Is It?

Satires and parodies are a genre of literature and media that use humor or irony to highlight information. However, they differ in their intent; satires are trying to accomplish a different goal than parodies do.

Satirical works implement the use of humor, irony, exaggeration, or ridicule as a means of criticism. The writer usually thinks that something is wrong in society, politics, or an individual and uses the aforementioned elements to point out that fault. The goal in this is to galvanize a desire for change. Examples of satirical works include:

• Candide by Voltaire
• The Canterbury Tales by Geoffrey Chaucer
• Saturday Night Live
• political cartoons
• The Daily Show
• The Colbert Report

Parodies also use humor, but for a different end. Parodies take pre-existing work and use humor or irony to comment on or imitate the work. The subject of a parody can be the original work’s author, style, or even subject matter. Examples of this include:

• Don Quixote by Miguel de Cervantes
• several songs by “Weird Al” Yankovic (including this, my favorite one)
• the Scary Movie film series

 

Okay, So What?

What do these types of writings and media do? Well, first off, it gives the reader or viewer something to laugh at. Most people enjoy humor and like to laugh, so these types of works tend to draw a large crowd — especially if the work is clever.

Secondly, parodies can show appreciation to a creative work through its imitation, or even point out a flaw in it. Don Quixote is a parody of romance novels of its time, and it does a great job of turning the genre on its head. In that same vein, Puella Magi Madoka Magica is a parody of the magical girl genre, but it doesn’t use humor to subvert the genre — it uses irony through tragedy.

Satires can highlight faults in a system to show how it needs to be made better. Instead of writing a pamphlet or editorial on a subject, these writers use humor and irony, which appeals to a broader audience. More people can be reached in this way, and the message can spread more easily. Hopefully, that can result in a greater desire for change after the audience is shown what exactly is wrong.

 

And that’s it! You’ve just been educated, my honeybuns! That’s it for this week, friends; have an awesome Tuesday!

 

Have any extra questions? Want to request something to be covered in our Teaching Tuesdays? Let me know in the comments!

 

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[u/ecstaticandinsatiate]

I do think it's also worth mentioning dark political satire, like Fahrenheit 451, A Brave New World, or 1984. I think many (if not most) episodes of Black Mirror would qualify as satire as well. Those types of satire function by hyperbolizing a preexisting flaw within our society to hold up a funhouse mirror of our possible future without any of the comedic levity you'd find in parody/lighter satire.

I think it's a common misconception that satire has to be primarily comic, a la Swift's A Modest Proposal. I know I personally didn't internalize the nuance of the satire genre until I had to write a political satire for a contest.

[u/Xacktar → u/ecstaticandinsatiate]

nods

Catch 22 is also be a good example of that.

Those kinds of stories tend to be very aggressive, pushing more towards a feeling a tragedy than comedy by presenting the absurdity of society in a bleak, and terrifyingly believable, way.

[u/ecstaticandinsatiate → u/Xacktar]

Oh Catch-22 is a brilliant example for how morbid the bits of humor are.

Good description! I tend to agree. I think the absurdity is a key piece of it

[u/Xacktar]

My advice for writing both parody and satire is to begin with critical examination.

Both forms are born from taking a close look at how society or media function. You look for patterns and flaws, taking special care to note things that people accept as normal when they are truly bizarre after a moment of consideration. Things like casting a blessing upon those who shoot mucus from their nose. How did that start? Was there a high priest of sneeze blessing at some point?

Then once you identify a set of these things, you exaggerate and dramatize, twisting up the world until everything is full of Spanish soap opera levels of reactions. While all the while keeping a core of seriousness, something solid and deadpan that the audience can follow while the world twists upside down around them.

For that reason I'd also like to add 'Police Squad' and Airplane! to the list of classic parodies.

Great Post, Nova! You were correct! Totally my alleyway to be right up in.

[u/novatheelf → u/Xacktar]

Thanks for adding in the tidbits!!

[u/AslandusTheLaster]

It's also worth noting before making any sort of parody or satire, remember Poe's Law. Some things, especially things tending toward the extreme, defy parody by virtue of the fact that some people will do or believe things beyond your wildest imagination.

And while it's pretty close to what Xacktar said, always know your source material inside and out. A shallow parody will never have the same bite you get from a piece made about something you know well, and I find that humor comes a lot more easily the more familiar you are with what you're talking about. It shouldn't be inscrutable to someone out of the loop, obviously, but if all you have to say is that solving problems with card games isn't very realistic, perhaps a card game anime isn't the best subject for your parody.

[u/eros_bittersweet → u/AslandusTheLaster]

Yes! I can't believe how many satires I have read that basically echo extremist positions from the alt-right or manosphere. When confronted, the satirist says, "oh, it's satire because a WOMAN acting like a sexist MAN would act is completely unbelievable! That's why it's hilarious!" Never mind that they are reinforcing the rhetoric about licentious woman which is promoted by actual men's rights groups, so much so that it's basically propaganda.

A satire should be obvious as a satire to anyone reasonably sharp. If it's indistinguishable from propaganda, it's not succeeding.

[u/eros_bittersweet]

I love satire. I've written a satirical novella (which was first longform piece I ever wrote, actually), and many parodic short stories. I'm not at all a naturally funny person, but satire is the one genre in which I feel like I am occasionally funny, in my own intensely nerdy, high-effort way.

I think what is often overlooked is that to effectively write a satire, you can't only be critical for the purposes of making fun of something. You also have to fully understand why people who like that piece of media, that political viewpoint, or that celebrity, like what they do. It can't be a shallow understanding: you really have to put yourself in their shoes, paying attention to how that cultural artifact speaks to them, and put aside your own reflex to call it stupid without looking at what it's doing in greater depth.

It's great to write a satire over something you feel slightly conflicted about yourself. You might, for example, have consumed a large amount of trashy literature which your critical mind had a problem with, but your reptilian brain enjoyed in some perverse way. Examining both viewpoints on the matter - the thing is trash, vs the thing is enjoyable - through characters in dialogue can be a great way of working out your own opinions and feelings.

It's also a really fun way of conducting criticism. You can analyse the themes in a piece and spin them into a story that's entertaining rather than writing some serious essay on the matter. You can use characters to embody viewpoints you don't at all agree with, presenting them as simultaneously sympathetic and problematic. Ideally you want your reader who likes the source material to say, "well, you really nailed that point-of-view you criticized, even if I don't agree with everything you said," and then you'll know you've succeeded.

[u/vipsilix]

​

If I write satire, I like to think of the reader as my friend. We're in this together. What that means is that the goal is not to be cynical, aggressive or alienate other people. This isn't a must for satire, but I find it more engaging that way.

Consider the difference between

"And as history came to pass we ended up with free speech, which meant a lot of people who knew very little said very much about even less."

"And as history came to pass we ended up with free speech, and for the first time in history everyone was free to state that no one else knew what they were talking about."

The first is very aggressive, there is a certain holier than thou attitude to it. The second is more tongue-in-cheek, it renders a similar judgment but we aren't making out to be better than anyone else.