A RANT ON HUMOR
Are You A Top Writer In Humor? That’s Mildly Amusing
Wait, did I use the wrong punctuation mark?
Being a Top Writer on Medium is like getting promoted at a shitty job — an empty title without a pay raise.
For most of us, that means goose eggs. Check that, goose eggs cost a lot of money on Amazon.
Having been here since 2015, I can tell you that we used to have a lot more fun before the days of the Wall.
Back then, the algorithm only hurt our pride, not our pocketbook. Today, your literary efforts still go unrewarded, while the same old clickbait crap makes bank.
To paraphrase the great George Carlin, have you noticed that their shit turns to gold, and our gold turns to shit?
A generation on this platform lasts about as long as a fruit fly… with about the same attention span.
Back in the old days, I might read something and think, “well, that may be the greatest article ever written on Medium. Why would I want to write about the same subject?” (Note to self: if I can never write something that great, should I give up writing altogether?)
But a year or two later, new writers would write about the same subject and commit two sins. Not only were they devoid of original thought, but they had no entertainment value.
With Medium’s “new and improved” interface, you can’t find anything older than 30 days. So every month, new writers run around shouting “Eureka!” as they roll out their version of the wheel.
Seriously? You couldn’t research a topic for 30 seconds to see that hundreds of people have already written the same thing?
When it comes to ranting, at least try to make it funny.
The bots who control the flow of information seem to pass on humor. Or was that piss?
My spiritual sister, Roz Warren, posited long ago that Medium may use Corgis to curate stories. That seems as good an explanation as any for the arbitrary way the “alpo-rithm” works.
But there’s no doubt that the choice for Top Writers has gone to the dogs.
I know this after reading a boring sex confessional story by a boring person. The only thing that stood out was how many times they used the word “penis”. You don’t need to tell a joke or write about a funny situation. Just say words that make dogs and six-year-olds giggle and you’re all set.
Here is my application to gain Top Writer in Humor status: Weiner, caca head, fart, Uranus, and poo-dle. (Because that’s the dog you find in a bathroom.)
Don’t rant about how they keep fucking up this incredible writing platform.
I used to be a top writer in humor because I had the sense to tag every story with the subject humor. It didn’t matter if the subject was deadly serious, I can’t help but infect a story with my particular variant of humor. I also can’t help the fact that I fall somewhere between Monty Python and the Dennis Miller ratio.
Then I started digging too deep into the gamification of online writing.
I was dropped like a hot poo-tato and shipped off to Curgatory™.
Now that Medium has removed tags stories, good luck trying to find humor.
If you think lawyers telling jokes is the lowest rung on the humor ladder, you haven’t seen what is posing as humor these days. Even worse, if you do a search for humor it yields stories that only contain the word humor.
Like an article about writing that suggests you should use humor in it to make it memorable by good old what’s his name. Or advice on how to write better humor stories by a guy who claims to be a humorist. But the best one is a response by the guy who complains that he couldn’t find a trace of humor in the article he was reading.
Daaaamn, you can’t even find humor in articles about humor!
If you want a definition for absurdity, look at the list of “Top Writers in Humor”.
I went through the list of Top Writers in Humor and it was about as much fun as reading actuarial tables.
Some of the people are bloggers who write something serious about a humorous topic once in a while. (Does that even count?) Some of the people try to write something humorous but aren’t all that funny. (On the humor ladder, snark ranks down there with crotch shot videos and those lawyers doing standup comedy).
Thankfully, there are some very funny people.
But if your list excludes writers for the Daily Show, New York Times columnists, and pun pros recognized by Harry Shearer, what the fuck does Top Writer even mean?
If humor writing skill doesn’t get you into the club, then that club is a joke. And not the funny kind.
Writing humor is like getting thrown to the lions in the Colosseum.
The only difference is, there is no crowd, no noise, and no lions. You only get your guts ripped out virtually as you spill your heart and soul out on each page.
Given the growing number of talent writers who have disappeared from this site, the carnage is real, even if you can’t see their dismembered dreams and self-esteem splattered across the sands of the arena floor.
And there’s no Katniss Everdeen to rise up and stop our corporate overlords. Our story is simply The Grammar Games.
Are you not entertained?
Here’s to putting a smile on your face.
Here’s a rare shout out and thank you to all the writers who have brought joy to me through their writing and in the three collaborative writing projects we did together.
To the writers of the Grammar Games and the innocence we once shared about this writing site:
Michelle Stone, Morgan Rock Loehr, Gutbloom, Ellie Guzman, THOMAS BARTON JD, Jennifer Smith, Greg Gueldner, A McEnnis, Brad Decker, Graham Anderson, Dave Grigger, Elizabeth Hughes, Notorious DCI, Todd Hannula 🤓 , Lisa Robbie, Elliot Nichols, Victoria Easterday, and JoJo Magno.
To everyone who helped write, edit, or track down other writers for The Tao of Blogging, a beautifully designed (says the graphic designer) book that sold in the handfulls.
Randomly Me, dudemesticated, Victoria Easterday, Mike Essig, Zachariah Wahrer, alto, Michelle Stone, Justin Cox 🌮, Jeffrey Field, Francis Rourke, Gemma Kennedy, Tremaine L. Loadholt, Ernio Hernandez, Lisa Renee, Notorious DCI, Dave Grigger, DayLeeFix, Lizella Prescott, Peter A Slaughter, Alexainie, Sonny Bohanan, JoJo Magno, Pastry Plate, Teraisa, Sarah Williams, Jeannine Harris, KJ Harris, Ginny Callahan, Jennifer Brown, Gutbloom, Ellie Guzman, Ryan Hussey, Vincent Fulco, Insideout, David Graham, Todd Hannula 🤓, Braveen Kumar, Devon Henry, Jing Jing Li, Emilie Remiette Nérieux, Nerissa Naidoo, Letterwriter, Joel Leon., Sherry Caris, Thom Garrett, Luke Trayser, Rachel Thompson, Zac Chapepa 💫, Hassan S. Ali, Thaddeus Howze, and Denise Smith.
To all the writers at Coronapalooza, the publication that hoped to create the world’s longest virtual concert during the shutdown. (We outlasted the infection, but enough about the White House.)
Mike Range, Bonnie Barton, Joe Váradi, Mark Starlin, Susan Brearley, Lizella Prescott, Anna Breslin, Ash Jurberg, Aura Wilming, Helen Cassidy Page, Dawn Bevier, Thaddeus Howze, Jeffrey Field, Gutbloom, Hank Eng, Jack Herlocker, Justine Reed, Kyrie Gray, Lon Casler Bixby, Michelle Monet, Bev Potter, Sherry McGuinn, Steve Morocco, Steve Bouchard, Tonya S. Ware, Stuart James, Stephen M. Tomic, T.S. Johnson, and SF Ali
And to the writers of the funny noir collaborative short stories at Out of Ideas, Out of Time. We should do that again.
Karen Fayeth, John K Adams, P.G. Barnett, Mark Starlin, Terrye Turpin, Dan Leicht, Glenda Thompson, Tommy Paley, J.S. Lender, Jeff Suwak, A Maguire, Indira Reddy, Michael Stang, Kirk Nelson, Elle Fredine, Laura Johnson
Last but not least, nothing brought me more joy than sports trash talking with Brandon Anderson. Too bad you haven’t been around to talk about the Rams’ Super Bowl win. (We won’t talk about that other team in L.A.)
