White people hate a lot of stuff (white people who vote republican, television, Vin Diesel movies, SUVs, fast food) but every once in a while they turn that hate into sweet irony.
Often times, white people will make a joke about how hard it is to define irony. It’s not that funny, and back in the 1990s people got all upset at Alanis Morrisette for using the term improperly in her song “Isn’t it Ironic?”
But the reason that white people love irony is that it lets them have some fun and feel better about themselves.
The most horrific recent example is Trucker hats, that shockingly went from mainstream in the 80s to Ironic in the early 2000s back to mainstream, at which point they are no longer rare or unique. Once something reaches this stage, irony cannot be restored for 10 years.
Other examples would include white people getting together to have a ‘white trash’ night where they would eat Kentucky Fried Chicken, drink Bud Light and watch Larry the Cable Guy or The Marine. Maybe listen to Kid Rock or P.O.D. These events allow white people to experience things they are supposed to hate, all while feeling better about their own lives, decisions, and cultured tastes.
Occassionally, white people will put an ironic knick knack in their home or apartment such as a “Support our Troops” magnet or a bottle of Mickey’s. 
This can be used to your advantage. If you need to appear cool to white people, you just need to pick something that was popular 10+ years ago and put it in a prominent place at your desk or in your home. A C+C Music Factory Cassette, or a “2 Legit 2 Quit” t-shirt would both be acceptable examples.
Also, you might find yourself in conversation where you mention that you like something and there is an awkward silence indicating that it is not cool. In this situation, uou must say “oh yeah, I also like [insert similar things]” and smile, the white people will laugh and all will be well.
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How ’bout reading this entire blog, like I just have. That’s past irony, it just plain fucked up.
i think the irony is the you wear the shirt (or whatever) and you really don’t like it? or soemthing
*keep it white*
Irony to a Red Neck:
When you get a bad woman and she doesn know how to Irony of your clothes…. Better divorce her now!
Until reading this thread I honestly thought Americans just got irony wrong, now I realise they have changed the definition. For the rest of the English speaking world irony is something like being struck and killed by an ambulance. An unexpected almost contradictory twist in events.
That is one definition.
I don’t know what country you hail from, but in the rest of the language speaking world, a word can often have more than one meaning. Also lots of different definitions.
Is definition different from meaning?…
Pertinent point. Common meaning UK, Australia & NZ. Can’t vouch for other parts of the world. Also general Americanisation of language means that US definition has started to creep in to usage in my country, Australia.
Ozzy, you were right the first time. Your meaning is the original correct one. Americans think irony is sarcasm or facetiousness or paradox or kitschness because they don’t understand the concept of irony. If they did they would use one of those perfectly appropriate, correct terms in its place.
The paradox (or as they would say irony) is that this misunderstanding leads to a new meaning of the word as the ignorance spreads and grows, and then this new meaning becomes accepted, eventually finding its way into the dictionary.
This usually eventually enriches the English language, although it is excruciating to live through and witness, and occasionally it can even lead to a word having two contradictory meanings (for example the verb and noun forms of sanction).
Therefore, what evilyngarnett says is – paradoxically – both correct and incorrect and you are – painfully – both right and wrong.
Ironically, while I too am from Australia and understand the original correct meaning of irony, I use the common American meaning all the time and I don’t have a problem with it.
I’m also a painful white person crapping on about something I don’t really know that much about…
just me commenting here is super white. but i am avoiding writing a paper for a course at my ivy league university, on a mac, wearing used $3 pair of shoes, a $5 dress and $30 bra and $12 underwear. Soooo that’s where i’m at.
But I believe, obviously, that coloquial changes in the meaning of language is all part of the natural developement. Language is only useful if there is an agreed upon meaning–even if that societal definition differs from the current O.E.D. entry.
There are many forms of Irony. One of which is the most commonly sited, which is what you mentioned earlier—A situation where something occurs that is markedly opposite of what one would expect to occur.
yet the definition or understanding under which wear a D.A.R.E t-shirt falls is in the adverbial form. It is not ironic to do that, but it can be done “ironically”. Ironically is more about the intention of the perpetrator (wearer, artist, person, hipster) than about the actual situation. I suppose in this definition “ironically” is the antithesis of “earnestly”.
I hate all of this irony crap.
It’s bullshit!
All of the kids in my school thrive on irony and wear things like the all too popular t-shirt “Frankie Say Relax” and go flaunting it, saying “Dude, Frankie Said Relax!” and laugh heartily.
I don’t even think they know that shirt has to do with Frankie Goes To Hollywood’s biggest hit “Relax” and not with a weird thing some guy said. It disgusts me and I prefer Old-School than Irony when it comes to shirts.
If I see another person with a forgotten 80′s band shirt and they tell me they don’t know the band, I’m going to rip that shirt of their chest.
It is ironic how many white people are in this forum honestly dissecting irony and sarcasm, to the length of quoting dictionary entries, to try and establish how cool and superior they are.
But maybe I’m just being sarcastic.
Irony: Most white Americans would fit this profile, except one thing is missing: Old MONEY inherited down from generation to the next. Yuppies are the ones who must work in the office for money, although many of them are like card-carrying members (drones) of the WASP elite. +
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/White_Anglo-Saxon_Protestant
You know, everything in this Stuff White People Like blog can be boiled down to this:
White people have a desperate need to feel superior to other white people.
They need to be cooler.
They need to be greener.
They need to be more culturally aware.
They need to be more tolerant.
They need to think more globally and act more locally.
This desperate need comes from an inner insecurity, an insecurity that will never go away until the white person repudiates forever his need to be superior, and embraces his inner nerd/geek/spaz/dork/redneck/yooper and wallows in his uncool cravings and propensities with unironic enthusiasm.
From living the “Greek life” of sunny southern California by the beach…to living in the “sticks” of the northern Cal. mountains. I thought the previous 20 year trend of whites with money moved from the rightist conservative corporate capitalist majority…to the leftist liberal radical socialist elite, was one of those weird psychological-pathological phases white people of all classes goes through. Admit it whitey, you admire the GOP and the KKK…the irony of protecting white privilege and supremacy. +
Irony often gets mistaken for sarcasm.
or mistake for like nostalgia/retro stuff?
*keep it white*
Sarcasm is irony with less formal education. The hipster-inflicted irony SWPl describes involves people with a specific kind education mocking people with less of that education.
Whether it’s funny or cruel depends on whose got the power.
Who does?
Who has the power?
“I’ve got the power!” and “It’s gettin’, it’s gettin’, it’s gettin’ kinda hectic”
Sarcasm is a form of irony.
Sarcasm is a sense of humor for the (um should I say this kindly) sophisicated without a college degree? Or one who’s IQ is higher than a door knob? Or a 5 year old gets it. SWPL is not for people with no lifes, all races and classes welcome to read and reply (or in O’reilly’s words: to opine). +
I need to be even more dull and blunt:
Irony described here, is about class– People from the upper middle (professional) class imitating people from the working class. Not todays working class– “whatever was going on 10/20 years ago”.
I think it’s that simple, but we are confused because America is a classless society.
Isn’t it?
My father was a psychoanylist, my mother the head of the cultural anthropology department at a private college in the North East.
If I started to become a dedicated fan of the WWF what would I be, besides a snot?
Burlesque was the WWF of it’s day. It seems innocent and lovely now. If I do that, and Betty Page my look, is that better? Is nostalgia nicer?
I know to ask the question because of my education in cultural anthropology,btw. Should I hide that fact?
Should I take David Byrne–of the Talking Heads and graduate of the expensive and prestigious Rhode Island School of Design–that his favorite form of art is ice sculpture.
Did Andy Warhol mean it when he said things like that?
Would anyone reply and tell their class backgound?
What does it say about you, besides everything, I mean.
evilingar,
you’re dull all right. Obvious too. Don’t you know a joke isn’t supposed to be explained. Academic bred bimbo.
irony 1 |ˈīrənē; ˈiərnē|
noun ( pl. -nies)
the expression of one’s meaning by using language that normally signifies the opposite, typically for humorous or emphatic effect
sarcasm |ˈsärˌkazəm|
noun
the use of IRONY to mock or convey contempt
contempt |kənˈtem(p)t|
noun
the feeling that a person or a thing is beneath consideration, worthless, or deserving scorn
Which of course is ironic. Howzatt for a cultural drift from an English swine-hood.
Which is of course ironic. Etc
I agree with that. I think that describes what is an ironic fad. I believe that an ‘ironic fad’ is something so out, it’s now in. Years ago, it was those trucker caps you talked about. A few years before that, it was those black plastic 60′s style glasses. Now it’s skinny jeans, even on guys. I think it takes a certain look or thing to be so despised or so frequently dissed as ‘forever out’ that some crazy guy decides to bring it back in style and it’s not all that long until white people buy up that irony and it becomes all the rage again.
Don’t forget that not everybody, including a few white people, buy the ‘so uncool it’s cool’ irony. There are still those that stubbornly believe that in is in and out is out, period!
What’s ironic is I see just as many as black people (or more) wearing skinny jeans…
really? i don’t believe i’ve ever seen a black male in skinny jeans…
I have!
[...] nothing at all interesting is going on today in the Association and because I’m white and therefore like irony, here’s a link to a wedding-related [...]
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