PARTISAN ALERT: I have never been a regular reader of Penny Arcade. I have been a regular listener of The Sound of Young America and Jordan Jesse Go for several years, and have met both Jordan and Jesse. They strike me as nice guys, not “ironic hipsters”, though perhaps this makes me an “ironic hipster” and therefore inherently biased. I don’t pretend otherwise.
There’s really no way to take the high road when you throw the first punch. A number of people linked me to today’s Penny Arcade strip, featuring Jesse Thorn as some sort of cannibalistic serial killer. I didn’t really get the hubbub — Jesse is a guy who works out of the home while wearing bowties and sweater vests, who dotes after his dog, who owns taxidermied squirrels, is obsessed with a demonic pig toy — Penny Arcade wouldn’t be the first people to connect these dots into a portrait of a killer. But when I read the corresponding news update, it was clear this was no affectionate jab: it was a sincere indictment of Jesse and his radio program.
The organism who answered the door had worn a bow tie – and I am not making this up – on purpose. The next forty-five minutes were spent engaged in absolutely the most stultifying kind of nonsense while we awaited the co-host. Recording the show wasn’t much different than the previous hour, except that now there were two people to ignore us. We were steeped in a high PSI stream of cultural detritus, which culminated in an attempt by the hosts to engage seriously the subject of “Waterworld.”
There’s even an allusion to some sort of dark hostility on the part of Jordan and Jesse, as
They managed to bring out a side of Gabriel that I’ve only seen three or four times in twelve years, and only once directed at me: the implacable judge who becomes (without warning) the unadorned aggressor. You must work diligently to bring out this monster; a feat they managed in record time.
The news update paints a grim picture of Jesse as an unpleasant, unprofessional and irritating figure that one must endure, and of a duo of creators tossed into this nightmare with no forewarning. I have no idea of the day-to-day obligations of Penny Arcade creators Jerry “Tycho” Holkins and Mike “Gabe” Krahulik, but I imagine they’re quite busy with their mini-empire of comics, video games, conventions and merchandise, and I respect that being forced to wait around to get interviewed would be frustrating for people with only a fraction of the balls in the air that the two of them have. Even so, I can’t believe that they couldn’t do some cursory research about the “ironic hipster” lion’s den in which they were about to fling themselves. Instead they chose to wait until after the interview to find out that Jesse wrote a manifesto about “New Sincerity” in college and snidely dismiss it.
In the wake of this screed, I was pleasantly surprised to find almost everyone else involved behaving with civility: Jesse acknowledged the logistical problems involved with the recording and accepted partial blame for the awkwardness. Penny Arcade and Maximum Fun seem to have a large overlap in fanbases, so the discussion on both forums has been largely civil, if frequently partisan. Everyone seems to be handling this like adults, except for Mike/Gabe, who after again calling Jesse “a serial killer waiting to happen” on Twitter, responded to a fan pointing out that Jesse has all his guests record at his home with:
Putting aside the continued personal indictment, it’s odd that Mike looks down on Jesse’s home-based, Internet-borne operation as “unprofessional” when I assume their strip was produced out of the home for years prior to them reaching their current lofty heights. Dozens of older and more “Old Media” professionals have appeared on Jesse’s shows and not been so intensely disturbed that they make public proclamations about what a horrible experience it was, and how they now fear for their lives. Even more frustrating was Mike’s response in his own forum’s thread:
I don’t think anyone is really at fault. We are just not a good fit. Hanging out at this stranger’s house for an hour while we waited for his friend was frustrating. Then when he got there the two of them just started talking about old movies and random stuff. I honestly had no idea what was going on. We had never heard of them before, maybe if we had we’d have known what to expect. Towards the end we realized it was just a random show about nonsense and so I started talking about trees and Tycho started reading through the guy’s CD collection. I felt like the very end was actually kind of funny. I think the problem was that right away we just did not hit it off and the being late thing just made it worse. The vibe I got from him was “ironic hipster” and I’m not a fan of that character. Maybe I read him wrong but it doesn’t matter now. Oh well. I’d say we can comfortably go back to having nothing to do with each other now
“It doesn’t matter now”, outside of the post and cartoon that is being viewed by thousands of readers, and will likely be viewed for years to come, perhaps even in a printed collection for which they will one day do a press junket. Even this clarification repeats the indictment of Jesse’s work and of him as a person. Mike then makes a “humorous” follow-up, “Also I’m pretty sure [Jesse] is a rapist.” No doubt this was meant to signify that it’s cool, Mike is just joking and there isn’t “anyone really at fault” and there are no hard feelings. I’m sure Jesse is too classy to press the point, but the person making personal attacks is not the one who can pull back and decide is all is forgiven.
I don’t expect any of the principals in this issue could even begin to care about my opinion on this, but somehow I’ve had enough contentious conversations about this today that I wanted to put this out there. I have no insight into the circumstances that led to the awkward recording session: there may have been negligence on the part of any number of parties, and it’s a shame that things were so unpleasant for Mike, Jerry, Jordan, Jesse, Cocoa, the fine people at Random House, etc. That’s a black box. What isn’t a black box is how people handled themselves after the fact, and I don’t see how anyone besides the Penny Arcade guys can be considered “unprofessional” at present. But in Mike’s own words, “hey, I’ve made a good living coming off like a sociopathic asshole!” so perhaps this was the plan all along. If I have pick a team in “Ironic Hipsters” vs. “Sociopathic Assholes”, I’m okay with how I’ve cast my lot.
March 1st, 2010 - 7:15 pm
It sounds to me like they just weren’t a good fit and that maybe the interviewer didn’t really have alot to talk about with the Penny arcade duo. This happens sometimes especially with things like book tours. It seems like a good idea to have these people on your show but then you realize you don’t really have anything in common or to talk about.
And from what I understand Jerry and Mike don’t travel too well. In the end sometimes people just don’t get along.
March 2nd, 2010 - 1:48 am
I respect that sometimes people just don’t get along, and that the Penny Arcade guys had plenty of legitimate reasons to be grumpy or frustrated and not have a fun time on the podcast. These things happen and are often out of anyone’s control.
Mike’s public comments after the fact are completely within Mike’s control, and that’s what I take issue with.
March 2nd, 2010 - 1:56 am
Lurklen: It’s one thing to not be a good fit, that’s fine. The adult thing would be to suck it up and ignore it (and perhaps make a note to not show up again). Instead, they decided to be a big fat baby and whine on the internets, “WAAAH I DIDN’T HAVE A GOOD TIME ON HIS PODCAST (AND HE’S A RAPIST)”
It would be perfectly acceptable to call out Jesse if he was an outright inconsiderate dick, but from both sides, nothing gives the impression that he did anything wrong other than be late. That’s something that adults give each other crap about directly, not in a public forum (it would also be acceptable to joke about it, but they were quite serious in their blog/news post).
Do remember that it was their publicist that asked to be on JJGO, Gabe and Tycho come off as complete dicks when their representative/publicist asks Jesse to go on a show and then they proceed to shit on it.
March 2nd, 2010 - 2:21 am
It should be noted that Penny Arcade created a charity that benefits Children’s Hospitals all over the world based entirely out of the want to disprove attorney and anti-video game activist Jack Thompson when–due to his own spite and ignorance–he attacked gamers as being uncaring and violent.
Now, Penny Arcade is attacking Jesse Thorn due to their own spite and ignorance. They’re openly calling out the character and professionalism of a truly upstanding man, whom they fully admit to knowing nothing about. They’ve refused to take responsibility for their own mistake in booking the appearance, and instead have decided to take the frustration of their personal failures out upon a good man’s dignity and livelihood by slandering him on the proverbial throne overlooking their fans (one of whom I will no longer be).
They’ve gone so far as to joke about him being a murderer and a rapist. It’s infantile, despicable, and itself completely unprofessional. They’ve shown themselves to be irresponsible hypocrites, and frankly, they should be ashamed of themselves.
March 2nd, 2010 - 6:47 am
boo fucking hoo
its the internet, who gives a shit
March 2nd, 2010 - 9:57 am
If he was really a truly upstanding man, he wouldn’t commit all those murders and rapes.
March 3rd, 2010 - 2:48 pm
Slab64: the “it’s the internet so it doesn’t matter” argument hasn’t been valid for at least 10 years
March 6th, 2010 - 1:10 am
Yeah, a public apology/retraction from the Penny Arcade guys would go a long way towards me ever respecting them again.
March 7th, 2010 - 3:35 am
Holy shit, webcomic makers claiming to know about professionalism come across as huge assholes?
Unfortunately the thread on maxfun is locked, but the truth is that PA is a shitty unfunny webcomic and their creators are equally horrendous towards most anything that doesn’t involve them. Anyway, I feel sorry for Jesse because PA has a huge fan base and the creators made some lame comments about Jesse that they more likely than not won’t apologize for and will end up hurting his image. Hopefully it won’t matter, but the internet can be a horrible place sometimes.
More PA bullshit from the past: http://www.somethingawful.com/d/daily-dirt/heres-mud-your.php
April 5th, 2010 - 8:33 am
Everything the Penny Arcade guys said was completely reasonable. Depicting Jesse as a murderer? Absurd and offensive overstatement is their stock in trade. This is a comic book which routinely suggests that its writer FUCKS GIRAFFES, and you’re offended they depicted someone you like as a movie serial killer?
I looked up what an ‘ironic hipster’ is online, and – I’m sorry – but Jesse is one. He presents a show where they talk about how a hideous stuffed pig on wheels getting valued on the antiques roadshow is the most awesome thing ever. His ‘new sincerity’ quote is ridiculous, and Tycho really hit the nail on the head when he said that the new sincerity seems to be ‘exactly the same as the old irony.’
Now I’m sure Jesse is a good guy. I don’t think anyone suggested that he’d done anything malicious in any sense, and Gabe was quite clear when he said “I don’t think anyone is really at fault. We are just not a good fit.” This is an issue of taste. Gabe & Tycho found Jesse & Jordan’s exaggerated enthusiasm for random nonsense and pop-cultural jetsam annoying, crass and ’stultifying’, and that’s pretty much all they said.
You can pick through it and try to find things that are ‘genuinely’ offensive and hold them up as evidence of malice – “ooh, they said he was unprofessional, that’s so uh… uh… unprofessional of them!” – but the fact is they expressed a reasonable opinion in a typically hyperbolic manner. If you’re going to stop reading their comic over that, you probably should, because that’s pretty much what their comic is about.
I think the real issue here is that a bunch of people who listen to a podcast about indiscriminately declaring things awesome suddenly had to deal with being told that things – specifically the podcast in question – was not awesome, and was in fact pretty stupid and inane. A certain sense of betrayal is inevitable.
May 19th, 2010 - 11:52 am
boo fucking hoo
its the internet, who gives a shit
June 27th, 2010 - 2:02 pm
@Rapewaffle
Fantastically said.
And… I must point this out: that is _by far_ the most eloquent and well-reasoned comment I have ever seen by a person with the word “rape” in their name. You might want to consider a less offensive moniker if you’re going to be so reasonable.