Smirror: The Augie Doggie must die
JUSTIN KAUTZ
jkautz14@ole.augie.edu
In a world riddled with war, famine, corporate greed, theocracy, school shootings, opioids, Facebook data breaches, tariffs on Chinese electronics, underpaid teachers in Oklahoma, child labor in Eastern Europe, Tide Pod lunches, teenage rappers with “Lil” in their name and people who honestly enjoy the Dave Matthews Band, one thing has become abundantly clear: Satire must go.
And, on a campus like ours, where important news and information (bicycle theft, sports scores, ASA elections) is made available to students by the administration, I think it’s obvious that, specifically, The Augie Doggie and its creators must go, too. I think this for a handful of reasons.
1) Let’s start taking things way more seriously than we already do. Being straight-up worried and sad is the best and only way to deal with the anxiety you feel from existing on this big rock.
2) As I alluded to above, there’s plenty to talk about already. Although it hides a good deal of information from its students (because they’re silly until they graduate and become our statistics), the university makes available a lot of inconsequential information to highlight that 1) this is a school, and 2) it’s the best one that you could ever dream of attending, you big idiot.
3) The Augie Doggie’s satire is not even funny. Most of the jokes are bad, but not because I don’t get them! Actual funny things include: blooper reels, junk punches, cats that try and fail to jump from one platform to another, America’s Funniest Home Videos, Daniel Tosh, farting, Jackass, ventriloquists and people who are really overweight or really short.
4) Let’s stop getting political about everything. There’s more to life than the foundational beliefs that affect the way you act and think about everything in front of you. Good satire deals with funny workplace interactions, couples choosing which restaurant to eat at, uncomfortable first dates, awkward holiday situations with family and faux pas in general!
5) The Augie Doggie’s creator is a liberal atheist. Not only are his politics clear through his writing and his social media, but also, have you seen how he dresses? Skinny jeans to make me think that gender is a spectrum. Ill-fitting shirts to make me believe that physical appearance, health and weight don’t matter. A beard simply to check a box on the hipster checklist. Various hats as if to say, “Why do we, as thinking beings, worry so much about how our hair looks?” But I bet he’s just balding. He must be balding.
So, yeah: The Augie Doggie’s gotta go. And The Smirror, while we’re at it. We need less satire and more state-sanctioned, Sinclair-ish news. Enough with the “jokes.” Tell it to me straight.
