Respect The Weird
Getting Funky With It
There are few things I like better in a work of art than a well-done “WTF” moment.[1] I’m not talking about random for random’s sake. Early 2000s Disney channel sitcoms are not something that I enjoy, but a well-done instance of bonkers-ness. Like basically ever single minute of Holy Mountain, the squid invasion in Watchmen, the big twist in Death Becomes Her, the song “Dopesmoker” by Sleep, and Saturn Devouring His Son by Goya. I could keep listing examples, but there are already enough lists on this newsletter’s homepage so I’ll stop there. I don’t hate “non-weird” things, but I certainly enjoy “weird” ones more.
If you had the inclination, the free time, and a lot of money, you could read the millions of words that have been written about “the point of art.” If I had that type of money and free time, I wouldn’t do that, but maybe you would. I’d probably go on a lot of really fancy trips, build a truly cheugy house, and go to a lot of nice restaurants[2] or something.[3] But who am I to judge what people do with their riches and free time? No one but a simple newsletter writer.
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Sorry. Got away from myself there, spending too much time imagining the mega-rich version of myself.[4] I was talking about the meaning of art. I don’t really have an opinion on that, other than that I think art, truly good, transcendent, beautiful art, should make you think differently. Whether it slightly alters your worldview or changes it drastically, art should help you consider something, anything, in a new light.
Let me give you an example of what I’m talking about: something that is weird, made me think differently, and thus became art. I’ve recently been reading Jeff Vandermeer’s new book Absolution. I haven’t finished it yet, but I’ve been enjoying it so far. There’s a scene – very early on, so don’t worry about spoilers – where a biologist spots a marsh hare eating a crab. It’s an arresting scene, bloody and chaotic in its depiction. Certainly, a WTF moment, even if you don’t know anything about the eating habits of marsh hares. This bit also made me think about climate change in a new way. The whole scene, and the book in many ways, is an extended metaphor about the dangers of humans trying to “conquer” nature. It made me think not only about my stances on modern science but also about humanity's relationship with nature. Not for very long – some even crazier stuff happens in the book soon after this – but it did make me think about that. Hence, art.[5]
Now, to be fair, everything I’ve talked about so far in this newsletter, “WTF moments,” “art,” “think differently,” is very vague. Something that I think is a WTF moment someone else might have seen coming a mile away. Maybe someone does think it’s not that weird for a rabbit to crunch down on a crab. Something that I think is art, someone else will think is garbage. I won’t do the third one. I’m tired of typing “Something that I think is.”
But, always a but, it’s still important to write about. Even if all those things are so highly influenced by a menagerie of intersecting experiences such as culture, race, gender, and class - to name a few – as to become inherently personal, that does not mean that there is not any commonality between all of us. We’re all human after all. That’s got to count for something.
“Weird” is one of those things that bind humanity together. We live in a vast, underexplained universe. We all, each and every one of us, are dragged kicking and screaming into this world without as much as a by your leave. It’s not a very stable world that we live in, either. Downright weird shit happens every day in every country of the world. Some of that stuff can be explained by science; some of it can’t. Hell, physicists had to invent “dark matter” and “dark energy” just for their models of our galaxy to make even a bit of sense. It’s a weird world that we inhabit. Giant dinosaurs, literally giant, used to walk around where we now like eat cheeseburgers. Not sure what’s weirder than that. Why shouldn’t our art, the media that we consume, also be a bit weird?
At the risk of sounding like Andy Roney on 60 Minutes, I think mass media is pushing away from weird even more than it usually does. An example. One should always ground their complaints in explicit reality after all. Something that I don’t love is the explosion of online “explainers.” Articles with headlines like “The Ending of The Sopranos,” or “6 Questions about The Matrix, Answered.” Most of these are SEO junk, designed to capture clicks from Google searches, clickbait for the unaware. But they also latch on to a human impulse to know everything. I don’t think that’s always necessary. I’m not promoting ignorance or anything like that. Searching for the truth, especially in this day and age is an important journey. I just think it’s good if, at times, artistic decisions are just that, artistic decisions. Not everything in every piece of art has to have an immediately available explanation. I don’t need a sixty-minute podcast episode “explaining” why there’s that scene with the bear man in The Shining. It’s just there. It’s weird. Sometimes, things are unexplainable, and that’s good. If we knew why everything happened ever, it would be a very boring world.
Another example. I hate that places like Netflix executives are explicitly pushing for TV and movie creators to put in scenes where main characters outright explain what just happened and why it matters. They want to create content that is completely devoid of mystery. Stuff that can be watched while you’re scrolling through TikTok and still fully understood. That sort of shit just makes me mad. I’ve tried to cover my emotions, but hey, what are conclusions for if not putting all your cards on the table?
[1] NSFW translation: “what the fuck.” Though if you’re worried about someone at your workplace seeing the word “fuck” in something you’re reading, you need to get a new job STAT.
[2] Like the Chili’s at O’Hare.
[3] I’d also donate some of it.
[4] It’s me, but really, really douchy looking
[5] Yes, I’m making the argument that even just a few paragraphs of a single book can be art. Sue me.
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