The film critic David Denby's 2009 book "Snark," examines a specific technique people use to put one another down: snarky judgments. These judgments, he explains, label someone in a teasing, knowing, snide, way. For example, snark might involve calling someone, "nasty as a ferret" or a "short-fingered vulgarian" (an expression used by the now-defunct Spy Magazine).
Snarky comments, Denby argues, are especially likely to arise at times when large groups of people are newly empowered to write and speak -- as is the case today with blogging -- and when writing becomes a means to social influence and authority.
Consider the example of Gawker Media, the young media company that controls twelve web sites including "Wonkette" and "Gawker". The company's owner, Nick Denton, once wrote he was:
...not interested in think pieces unless they're rants...The ideal Gawker item is something triggered by a quote at a party, or an incident, or a story somewhere else and serves to expose hypocrisy, or turn conventional wisdom on its head, and it's 100 words long, 200 max.
A recent Gawker article, for example, chronicled how the rich were scaling back their spending following the nation's economic downturn. The headline announced: "Vacuous Spenders Suddenly Find Their Souls," And the author described how:
Six months into the economic meltdown, all big spenders know conspicuous consumption is out...they've truly changed. Inside. Where their souls maybe used to be... "It's kind of like we all went overboard," said [a named individual], a fixture on the charity circuit..."...
In "Snark," Denby says such remarks pull the rug out from someone, and potentially annihilate a person's reputation and effectiveness:
It's the bad kind of invective -- low, teasing, snide, condescending, knowing... Snark attacks individuals, not groups. Snark is a teasing, rug-pulling form of insult that attempts to steal someone's mojo, erase her cool, annihilate her effectiveness, and it appeals to a knowing audience that shares the contempt... It's all jeer and josh, a form of bullying that, except at its highest levels, beggars the soul of humor.
Denby distinguishes snark from satire. Satire, he notes, splits the audience into those who "get it" and those who don't - those who are perceptive enough to realize, for example, that Colbert is intentionally playing a buffoon rather than being forthright, and is doing so for the purpose of making fun of other commentators.
Some critics of Denby's book have worried that the concept of snark remains a bit vague after his descriptions of it. I would add a restatement or extension of Denby's work (though I don't know whether he would accept it).
To me, snark often depends on an "I'm better than you" perspective: The purveyor of snark, and his or her amused audience, temporarily overlook any of their own human faults, while identifying and magnifying others' all-too-human foibles. At least for the moment, the snarker highlights what is unworthy about others, blaming them for their human deficits, and exploiting the entertainment of seeing others as less than ourselves. Perhaps some of today's snarking may even be a reflection of the apparent rise of narcissism in our society.
Denby believes we need to fear Big Brother far less than fear our neighbor with an iphone or dorm-mate with an axe to grind and access to the internet.
Some high school and college students have been afflicted by on-line snarkers who post nasty remarks about them for all to see. A moment's reflection is enough to suggest how painful such public and difficult-to-remove remarks could be to a sensitive young person on the receiving end.
Some sensitive individuals, Denby suggests, may have killed themselves when snark became too painful for them to bear.
Denby begins with the historical example of how two ancient Greek poets, Archilochus (c. 650 BCE) and Hipponax (c. 550 BCE), who pioneered snark, each revenged themselves on a chosen high-born enemy. Denby suggests that their versified snark was so powerful, that their writings drove their victims to suicide.
More recently, Sir Robert Maxwell the Czech-born English entrepreneur and media mogul drowned in a freak fall from his luxury yacht. Denby speculates that Sir Maxwell, who was a victim of merciless drubbing as "Cap'n Bob" in the English satirical magazine Private Eye, might ultimately have lost his balance, quite literally, as a consequence of being worn out from the constant attacks on his character.
The teenager Megan Meier's widely reported suicide was in response to cruel messages she believed she was receiving from a boy she had a crush on. The messages were, in fact, from the mother of one of her friends. Shortly after her suicide, snarky websites appeared, further tormenting both the victim's and her friend's families.
To defend yourself against rising tides of snark, Denby advises, requires character, and especially restraint: "Don't respond to anything unless it interferes with your ability to make a living or lead a happy social life."
Although Denby deplores the use of snark to hurt children and adolesents, his perspective, as I will describe in a later post, is that snark can be used when the target is tough and deserving. As Denby puts it:
Let's not fall into a misunderstanding...Life would be intolerable without any snark at all.
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See also: David Denby on Charlie Rose; on NPR. Also: though I loved the book, the work received some decidedly negative (snarky?) reviews. Entertainment weekly gave it a C+; Walter Krin in the New York Times ends his review hoping the book will be snarked to oblivion. Adam Sternbergh defends snarking and has good fun profiling Denby's Hall of Shameful Snarkers.
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Notes: Denby, D. (2009). Snark: A polemic in seven fits. New York: Simon & Schuster. Portions of the volume relevant to this post: Snark is likely to arise at times when large groups of people are newly empowered, p. 35; "It's the bad kind of invective..." pp. 1, 2, & 4; Snark is anonymous, p. 93; We don't need to fear Big Brother... we need to fear our neighbor with an iphone or dorm-mate with an axe to grind, p. 73. Archilochus (c. 650 BCE) and Hipponax (c. 550 BCE), p. 22; Sir Robert Maxwell the Czech-born English entrepreneur, p. 43. Satire as distinct from Snark, p. 30; "...Don't respond to anything unless," p. 74; "Let's not fall into a misunderstanding," Denby writes (p. 7).
Also in this post, are references to: Tate, R. (March 10, 2009). Vacuous spenders suddenly find their souls. Gawker. [downloaded 3/10/09 from http://gawker.com/5167225/].
The case of Megan Meier's suicide is reported widely; its aftermath is reported in Schwartz, M. (August 3, 2008). The trolls among us. New York Times: The Times Magazine. p. 2 & 3 of 7. My remark on the rise of narcissism is based on: Twenge, J. M., Konrath, S., Foster, J. D., Campbell, W. K., & Bushman, B. J. (2008). Egos inflating over time: A cross-temporal meta-analysis of the Narcissistic Personality Inventory. Journal of Personality, 76, 875-901.
Edit: about 15 hours after posting, I slightly modified the paragraph beginning, "To me, snark often depends...," so as to remove some jargon and to make clearer my meaning.
Copyright (c) 2009 John D. Mayer
