by Chris McGinty
I wrote a blog post a long while back about how boring the Stupor Bole was one year. Let me clarify, that I wrote it, but I can’t seem to find it to link to it. Let me further clarify, that may mean that I wrote it, but never posted it. Allow me to take these clarifications further, in that, perhaps, I thought of the idea for the blog post, but never actually wrote. Let’s go even deeper, and maybe it was never my idea to begin with; perhaps only existing in the hive mind of human society. But no, I think we’ve not gone far enough. It’s possible the idea never even existed, and even now is elusive to the very fabric of the universe.
Speaking of conspiracy theories…
The actual idea behind my alleged blog post is that one year people were complaining online about how boring the Sous Vide Bowl was that year. There was no drama. There was no tension. Why did I watch four hours of TV? It wasn’t for the commercials… ok, it was for the commercials. My take on this outrage was that if you don’t want the games to be predetermined and scripted then don’t protest too much. We don’t need Ralph Fiennes playing Jerry Jones in “Quarterback Show” about the time that they threw the Sudafed Pill for ratings. I figured this didn’t have to be completely nefarious. They could play the official game without a crowd or cameras and then script the actual game around the results. It would be like that Star Trek episode, except that we wouldn’t have to genocide our own people based on the equivalent of a “Call of Duty” game.
It would have been the Cowboys in the Quiznos Bowl. I knew the correct answer was, “I want Taylor Swift to date the quarterback of the Scowboys.” But they told me that for ratings, I should say Paula Cole instead.
You can imagine how elated I was when I realized that Taylor Swift’s team made it into the Swiffer Bout. I was going to get to write my follow up to that blog post (that may not exist) where I exposed that this was the result of people complaining. You couldn’t handle the truth that sometimes in real competition things are just going to be dull and the outcome is going to be obvious, because one team is playing considerably better than the other. If you want twists and turns watch a suspense thriller. I was going to suggest that this season was finally that scripted mess and the teams didn’t lose their games, but were voted off the island, because it was now reality television. We know this because Taylor Swift gave the final Rose Bowl to Travis Bickle and now the NiFfLe is finally getting that much sought after teenage girl and women 18 to 35 demographics interested in their billion dollar empire. Watch the sports ball merchandise fly off the shelf.
Then I realized what the true conspiracy is…
It’s QAnon. It’s fucking QAnon. That whole mess of Whose Tin Foil Is It, Anyway? style improv on the internet has ruined satirical conspiracy theories. Democrats are pedophiles. Yes, and… they eat babies. Yes, and… they do it in the basement of a Chuck E. Cheese. Wait, why do the parents never complain that they went to Chuck E. Cheese and their baby disappeared? Can I get an admin to bounce this guy? He’s not playing by “yes, and” rules.
By the time I even had a chance to get the idea about Taylor Swift being a plant to boost female viewership (an idea that possibly isn’t actually real, because I may not be real, dead internet…) I found out that the right wing “news” bowls were already saying that it was a conspiracy. It wasn’t the same conspiracy that this handsome, yet nonexistent, blogger had come up with though. It was a political conspiracy.
There’s this brainstorming technique where you take two seemingly unrelated ideas and try to find a way to blend them. Star Wars and Taco Bueno. Go. Well, maybe you have a boss take his subordinates to a taco restaurant and on the way into the restaurant one of the subordinates hits their head on the door. Then they sit down to eat, but the subordinates can’t seem to hit the taco target that is their mouths and they keep smashing food against their face.
This seems to be a daily activity at news networks. Pick a thing that happened in the news and find a way to either talk about how your political team is great or the other political team is horrible. I was having a discussion one time with my brother about how the Affordable Care Act was originally intended to make private healthcare insurance work a little more like Social Security where the young and healthy pay into a system that pays out to people who need in when they become retired or disabled. The problem is even though somehow it’s mandated that we pay Social Security tax from our paycheck with only a few exceptions, somehow it can’t be mandated for private healthcare (probably because they didn’t go with universal healthcare to begin with). My brother said, “I don’t want to talk politics,” and I responded, “That’s good, because we’re talking economics.” Because everything is politicized now.
Let’s play a little game called “yes, and” this is for Greg, Sean, Maria, and Tucker. We kicked Tucker off the network. Ok, fine. Bret. Taylor Swift’s boyfriend is in the Sordid Bowl game. Why does this make Joe Biden a senile fool? We know Joe Biden loves young girls. Um, ok. I mean yes, and he’s probably the one dating Taylor Swift. Yes, and he convinced her to date Travis so they could install his team in the Sugar Cane. Yes, and when his team wins the game they’ll walk to the center of the field like the homecoming king and queen and announce their support for Joe Biden. Wait, why would they need Taylor Swift to support Biden when they rig the election anyway? Can I get an admin! There are no admins in the newsroom, Sean. I thought the Natural Sportsball League has gone woke anyway. Can we please remove him?
Taylor Swift after those other 49 Guys win the Super Prom
I feel like this is all a little weird, anyway. Maybe they have some legitimate intel that Taylor Swift is going to support Biden; but at this point, haven’t they basically thrown Taylor Swift’s support behind Biden just by presuming that she will? Why does she even need to announce it officially? There was a story a little while back that she simply suggested that her fans register to vote and it probably helped a particular side. She doesn’t have to support a side. All she has to do is rally for her primarily women 18 to 35 audience to register to vote. They’ll mostly vote for the side she wants anyway.
Please, please. If you’re going to go conspiracy theory say something that rings somewhat true to the ear. Taylor Swift moved away from country music so that when she influenced her audience to register to vote, it wasn’t largely a right wing audience. It’s simple. It uses a mind reading technique, as its built in fallacy, because without asking her directly you can’t say for certain that it wasn’t her motivation. Sure, right now you have a roughly 50/50 chance that the Travis team wins and you can claim it was rigged, but what if they don’t win? You can no longer say that my Super Balls were molested… I’m not sure I typed that right. All I’m saying is your conspiracy theory needs to be resilient to most lines of critical thinking.
Chris McGinty and his thoughts do not exist.
This is nothing
“I just had sex with the most beautiful woman in the world, but she only wanted it missionary, so it sucked.” I’m not sure that metaphor worked… If you want a real competition, on the field, sometimes it’s just not going to be exciting.
“Who’s playing today?” “It’s Taylor Swift’s Commander in Chief vs. the 49 Republican Senators.”
The real Conspiracy is that Microsoft Word still doesn’t recognize the name McGinty.