The first website took us to Youtube, to watch a video blog
posted by a man named Jim Ruel, a Native American who proudly proclaims himself
to be “Nerdtastic”. He starts talking about obscure space junk falling in a
small town in Siberia, and then quickly moves to Ashton Kutcher and how he
wants to pay $200,000 to get some weightless time in space. He is horrified
that other poor nerds are not getting the opportunity to get to go up in space.
I was personally not thrilled when he started in about the release of The Hunger
Games, but I suppose that is to be expected. It is just annoying when people
critique books and movies when they have never read or seen them. The irony of
course is that Ruel likes the movie Borat, a horrifying excuse for a comedy.
The irony of course here is that I have never watched Borat, yet I just judged
it. See, two can play that game! Then he speaks about the idea of free will. An
illusion or a real decision made by our thoughts and feelings? Then he makes a
bad joke about his soul being constipated by the thought. He also speaks about
the new season of Game of Thrones coming out, which is very interesting because
I just had a friend in my class do a presentation about the books that the TV
show is based on. Overall, I really didn’t like this man’s blog. It reminded me
of just another blog about people going off about their opinions (or is that
the point of a blog?). I found his humor unsatisfactory and I would not
voluntarily watch this blog again.
I really liked the second cartoon; I think it said a lot in
the fact that it was titled “The Last Real Indians”. The caption above the man
in the cartoon says “have you had your identity stolen?” and on the desk is
written “identity theft protection here”. These of course are interesting thoughts
because Natives seem to struggle with their identity so much more often than
other Americans and that with everyone doing their banking online, there are
much more cases of literally identity theft. It really is no wonder with the
terrible treatment Natives had faced and still face today that they feel that
their identity has been stolen. I love the bottles presented on the desk that
say “hipster repellent” it is a standing joke that people don’t like hipsters,
so this made me laugh. I also liked that the flyer said will barter, because of
course Natives are known for their trading, and you are accused of being an “Indian
giver” if you give something to someone and take it back. The Native man looks
like he is the “typical” Indian with a headdress and feathers, and even a
buckskin coat. I like the nature of this joke because it is not from the 1800’s
it is clearly talking about present day issues.
The next video is from the Chiefs of Comedy, the skit is called "Dropped Feather". It is
possibly the weirdest video I have ever witnessed. It shows three Native men,
all wearing “Native” clothes. Then one of them looses a feather from their
hair, and they all stare at it and start dancing to this electronic beat. Then,
they grab the feather and run away, only to drop another feather. The same
thing occurs, with robotic dancing and yelping, to add to the overall
strangeness. I get the point of the fact that Natives can listen to electronic
sounding music, generate this music, dance to it, and feathers are a thing of
the past, but other than that I was stumped. Maybe I just don’t get the point
of this video but I did not laugh once.
The frybread
movie trailer was next on the list. Again it was an odd video, all about the
art of making frybread, and the Arizona state competition about who makes the
best frybread. It shows several contestants in the competition. They also show
that the winner receives a trophy, and $10,000. There are rules about the frybread
and how large it is, color and smell. There are 22 Native tribes competing,
with one representative from each tribe. Apparently this is to become a real
movie, which would be interesting to see. I for one had no clue there was such
an art to creating frybread. The people participating in the show are very
overdramatic, but what do you expect from a reality-tv-esque show?
Charlie Ballard: Being Gay and Native American
was next. I had the same problem with Charlie Ballard because I just found the
humor sad. I realize that self-deprecation is part of Native humor; however his
jokes went beyond that. Things you should not joke about, such as the Trail of
Tears were made into farce. Personally, not a fan in the slightest, maybe I am
just too touchy, or too non-Native. I would not ever watch Charlie Ballard
again. He is just too offensive for my taste.
Overall, I have now realized that on the whole I
probably do not have a Native sense of humor. I do not understand about 85% of
it, and the rest of it I feel is too offensive. I understand self-deprecation
for a laugh, but sometimes things just go too far. I would be the equivalent of
making fun of the Holocaust or poking fun at people suffering in Darfur, or
even the Irish Potato Famine. Call me touchy, naïve, or accuse me of having no
sense of humor, I really am not offended. I have a sense of humor, but it does
not include these examples.
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