The Ghost Of Tom Joad
October 16, 2011 7 Comments
You will probably have seen this video making the rounds:
One thing that’s clear is that this guy (and the girl holding the camera) is really mad. Not just mad, but upset. Now, I listened to (most of) his rant, and as far as I can tell, the main thing he could articulate being mad about is that there exist some people who own yachts.
If there’s a more grounded or concrete thing he was able to put forth for being so mad about, I couldn’t detect it.
If there is some gigantic hardship in his (or her) life, something harming the lives of these two people who were hanging out in safety in a square in New York making a video, something that was caused by someone else, some justifiable grievance, some grievance caused by someone who merited such anger from him, it is not apparent. He certainly did not articulate it.
A comment on the Youtube link suggests that he is a Columbia graduate student (UPDATE: with a “trust fund”…an honest-to-goodness, actual trust fund. Not making this up, just telling you what I read.)
Is this getting repetitive? Will it be redundant if I say I told you so?
I really thought this guy was kidding. In fact, I kind of thought he was a bit like you know who.
Do you think he was serious?
It’s probably not a parody, but I couldn’t be sure, either. The guy seemed awfully smirky in between gusts of decidedly theatrical anger. At 1:34, I was convinced the girl’s sobs were laughter, but she looked tearful immediately afterwards. If the video is not all goof (or all serious), it is probably part seduction technique. What guys won’t do…
Forgive my ignorance of American youth fashion trends, but what are the chances a well fed, decent-looking guy like him would be wearing that cap non-ironically?
I also think this was tongue in cheek. . .
either a joke or else his putting on a big performance. . . dunno about the girl though lol
I don’t know if my sarcastometer is on the fritz or something – or if I just have a lower opinion of humanity than others here – but I absolutely believe this video is 100% genuine.
you mean you think he cries and whines like this to his friends when there’s no camera?
He wanted to put on a great performance, something to chuckle about. Not that I’m saying he doesn’t ‘support’ the movement. . . so you could argue it doesn’t much matter that he’s deliberately cranking it up to a ridiculous level.
Oh no no…I definitely agree that the emoting contained more than a little bit of performance-art for the camera. Actually, that was the whole point (it was a completely contrived situation – who was he talking to?)
But what I thought Pastorius was implying was that he was faking having the opposite of his own political opinions for comedy effect and to discredit the other side. You know, that old cheap trick. I don’t think he was, sounds like you don’t either.
>to discredit the other side. You know, that old cheap trick
It rings a bell … but I think it’s an urban myth. Who’d go to the trouble of doing that?? I did hear that Yglesias (who finds it no trouble to write blog posts ad infinitum) is subtly sending up the ‘progressive’ thought-system, parodying their arguments and that his real blog (itself a spoof) was about the iraq war and also (this part it tricky) about his own straight-faced blog. . .