For those few who haven’t yet seen it, read
about it in the Los Angeles Times, or
heard
about it on NPR, the blog was created by a 29-year-old aspiring comedy writer
in L.A. and it is, by its own description, “devoted to stuff white people
like,” presented as numbered, encyclopedia-style entries, e.g. #1
Coffee; #5
Farmer’s Markets; #69
Mos Def; or #79
Modern Furniture.
A few
observers
have already pointed out, rightly, that Stuff
White People Like isn’t about white people in general, but rather about a
very specific demographic sliver of left-leaning, city-dwelling white folk--in
other words, people like me. These people have previously been trapped and
tagged alternately as yuppies, or Bobos, or (by yours
truly in New York magazine) grups.
Basically, they embody the uneasy marriage of urban affluence and liberal
(and/or progressive, and/or alternative, and/or “indie”) ideals. For example,
there are plenty of white people in America who fairly obviously don’t like (#15)
yoga or (#46)
The Sunday New York Times or (#28)
not having a TV. But it’s much funnier and, at least on its face, more original
to say “White People” rather than “Yuppies.” I mean, if someone sent you a link
to a blog called “Stuff Bobos Like,” would you even open it, let alone forward
it to all your Bobo friends?
But if this blog is such a piquant satire of white liberal cultural
mores and hypocrisies, then why do so many white people like Stuff White People Like? I imagine the
most common reaction among its readers is summed up by one rhapsodic commenter:
“Oh, lord, it only hurts because it’s true!” And that’s the problem. The reason
the phrase “it’s funny because it’s true” has become a shorthand for things
that are neither (a) funny nor (b) particularly true is because humor is rarely
truly satirical when its targets also make up the bulk of its audience. Or, if
it is, the audience doesn’t tend to find it funny. Think Colbert skewering Bush
at the White House press corps dinner. I don’t remember Dick Cheney slapping
his knee and shouting “Oh lord it only hurts because it’s true!” Instead, with
this brand of comedy, the goal is to comfort, rather than challenge or disturb,
the audience. (Other things widely known to be funny-because-they’re-true: Britney Spears is a bad mom;
cats are standoffish, while dogs are blindly loyal; women love shopping, while
men can’t get enough sex. Are you with me? The ladies know what I’m talking
about!)