I read the news-for-magicians website iTricks pretty often, and was pleasantly surprised to see my face pop up on one of their posts a few days ago.
Clicky clicky:
The Harsh Truth About Life On The Road [NSFW]
http://itricks.com/news/2015/02/the-harsh-truth-about-life-on-the-road-nsfw/
Dear Magicians:
Please stop pulling rabbits out of top hats. In 1814, the French magician Comte (1788-1859) became the first magician on record to pull a white rabbit out of a top hat. John Henry Anderson (1814-1874) is also widely recognized as one of the first magicians to pull rabbits from top hats.
But here’s the thing… these guys were using top hats because they were NORMAL attire for gentlemen at the time and, therefore, NATURAL props. The ENTIRE POINT of that effect was one of SURPRISE: “Yup, just an ordinary hat – HOLY FUCK A RABBIT.”
BUT… Today, top hats are no longer an everyday item.
If an audience sees a magician take out a top hat, they KNOW what’s gonna happen. The whole premise of that trick (everyday item / unexpected surprise) is shot to shit.
There’s a reason why, in 2014, top hats are so heavily associated with magicians (and vice versa); WE’RE THE ONLY DOUCHEBAGS WHO OWN THEM.
So, unless you’re performing a nostalgic old-timey act or period piece, please, stop pulling rabbits out of top hats. If you really feel the need to pull something out of something else… pull your head out of your ass.
Sincerely,
– Nathan Allen
So, earlier this week, someone “reported” a post I had made, and it resulted in Facebook banning me for 24 hours.
What was it? Explicit nudity?! Hateful rhetoric about race, religion, or sexual orientation?! Photos or videos of dogs & cats being abused?! Footage of an execution?!
Nope.
Here is the offending photo I posted:
I captioned it with something to the effect of, “Ohhh. So I should NOT do that while riding on the bus. Okay.”
So here’s a little context.
That page is from a website called ‘Living Well With Autism,’ where they provide free resources for parents and caregivers of children with autism. This particular page was from a section that deals with sensitive topics, such as puberty, personal safety, and appropriate behaviors.
Makes sense now, eh?
BUT… outside of that context… not knowing the original intent of that page (and there is nothing ON the page to suggest its intended audience or use)… I FOUND IT FRIGGIN’ HILARIOUS. And so have a LOT of other people – I found it on an online message-board-forum thingie, where people were just giddy about how ridiculously odd and funny it was.
And I imagine, when you first saw that image, your response was something to the effect of, “lol… wut?!” …the same reaction that I – and thousands of other people have had – when it’s seen out of context.
So, anyway, someone who “likes” my Facebook page “reported” me for that. They reported me for a line-drawn teaching-aid.
Uptight, much? Jeez.
And this is not the first time I’ve been reported.
The first time was a few months ago, when I posted a photo I had taken of a crazy woman standing in a bar at an electronic gambling machine, with her pants half-down. It was funny. I mean, c’mon. Some crazy lady was playing slots with her slot out. FUNNY.
Look… I understand that what *is* and *is not* offensive to people is completely subjective. What one person may be totally fine with, the next person might be so repulsed that they have a nervous meltdown.
HOWEVER… these people ‘liked’ my page. I’m not forcing anyone to “follow” me. THEY found ME. And there is NOTHING about me or my live show or my Facebook page that should suggest that I provide squeaky-clean, Disney-esque, for-all-ages content. My audience for my shows – and for my social media outlets – is adults… adults who know who I am and what I do. I have a pretty sick sense of humor, and it shines through in nearly everything I do.
AAAAAAND… The crap that I post is TAME compared to MANY Facebook pages. There is a LOT of sick shit out there. There are a lot of twisted muthafuckas on Facebook.
Oh, here’s the kicker…
If the content of my post was so offensive that it warranted being reported to the FB police, WHY DIDN’T MY NUMBER OF ‘LIKES’ DECREASE? You’d think that, if I offended someone so much that they reported me, they’d probably click “unlike” so they could stop following me, right? Nope. The number of ‘likes’ is the same. If I’m so offensive, WHY WOULD THAT PERSON CONTINUE TO FOLLOW ME?
So here is a plea:
If you are such a Puritan uptight prude that you can’t handle skewed senses of humor and opinions that differ from yours, PLEASE UNLIKE MY PAGE. I don’t want you there. I don’t want to interact with you, I don’t want to offend you, AND I don’t want you to come to my live shows. I don’t even want to run into you in public. Just do this: Lock yourself in your house and – for fuck’s sake – STAY OFF THE GODDAMNED INTERNET.
Or maybe I’ll just start posting photos of cute kittens.
Had to share this hilarious rant about magicians by stand-up comic Doug Stanhope.
Even as a magician myself, I can’t say I disagree with anything he writes here… And THAT, my friends, makes me think that perhaps… just perhaps… I’m on the right track.
Enjoy “Nothing Up Their Sleeves” by Doug Stanhope:
Nothing Up Their Sleeves
http://www.dougstanhope.com/journal/2011/5/3/nothing-up-their-sleeves.htmlIt’s a good Sunday when you spend the afternoon trying to stop yourself from directly calling or emailing children to piss wildly on their dreams simply because you can.
I watch an assload of documentaries when I’m home and generally it’s because I hope to enjoy them – unlike regular television which I often times watch just to hate. Hate is entertainment too.
In order to understand how a simple documentary on teenage magicians taking part in a contest can bring me to the brink of calling or emailing those same teens to tell them how much they suck, you have to understand a few things.
First and most obvious is that you have to understand how (shitty) magic is and how wildly delusional magicians are about what they do.
Another key is to understand how easy it is to find the people from documentaries on the internet, either the documentarian or his subjects. These people aren’t celebrities. If a Kevin Bacon movie makes you angry, you can’t just pull up his name and number on Google in a fraction of a second. But a teenage magician…?
Yes – if I hate magic so much why would I watch a documentary about it? Frankly – on the off-chance that the documentary was mocking it. I watched “Jesus Camp” as an atheist and was thrilled with the results.
But no such luck with this one. This one was magic at it’s most magician-y. In the first three minutes you are shown a montage of professional magicians hurling lofty quotes about their own craft such as…
“Magic reminds us that the universe is a huge, capital ‘M’ mystery.”
No it doesn’t. It reminds us that some people will do anything to get people to look at them. The universe never springs to mind at all, ever.
“It’s a specific state of mind when your world view is shattered for a second.”
This goes into footage of someone doing a pedestrian coin-disappearing hand trick. Which of course shatters your world view.
“Magic… on a significant level and a more deeper impact, it is changing people’s lives. When you are able to do the impossible, there are no obstacles left in your life anymore.”
Yes but you don’t do the impossible. You have the dexterity to hide a coin between your fingers while wearing spangles. It’s extremely possible, as are the obstacles in life. Idiot.
Now a montage of the teenagers in the contest.
“I found something that came naturally to me, came easy to me and blew people away, made a lasting impression, made people wanna talk to me, made people like me.”
Magic doesn’t make people like you. It makes people watch your hands to figure out where the coin went. If they don’t like you without doing magic, you have a long road, son.
“Maybe that’s what we’re trying to do with magic – is trying to find out who we are as a person.”
Um… yeah. You’ll figure that out by hiding a silver dollar. Jesus fuck.
Now comes the Japanese kid.
“When I can’t communicate with language, I can use magic. Because magic is borderless.”
Remember this next time you are overseas and can’t find the bus station – just pull a string of chinchillas out of your top hat. It’s an international language.
You can see now why I’m already in a state of vomit-shock in the first three minutes. Or maybe you can’t. Regardless, I now had to watch the whole thing. And while I watched, I Googled the most annoying of them and all had email contacts and most had phone numbers for bookings.
I didn’t call or email any of them – maybe because I’m a better person than that or maybe because Bingo kept yelling at me for even thinking of doing it.
But just being on the verge of shitting on their happiness, I understand every piece of hate mail I ever received. I’ll settle for simply imploring these young magicians-in-the-making to lean more towards the Penn Jillette and less towards the every-other faggots who seem to believe they are mystically doing more than spinning plates in a uni-tard.
Again, this was written by Doug Stanhope, and the original article can be found at http://www.dougstanhope.com/journal/2011/5/3/nothing-up-their-sleeves.html
