“But who are the participants in this social act called ‘irony’? The party line says that there is an intending ‘ironist’ and her/his intended audiences — the one that ‘gets’ and the one that doesn’t ‘get’ the irony. What do you do, then, with the obvious fact that ironies exist that are not intended, but are most certainly interpreted as such? Similarly, there are ironies you might intend, as ironist,

“The world of human aspiration is largely fictitious, and if we do not understand this we understand nothing about man. It is a largely symbolic creation by an ego-controlled animal that permits action in a psychological world, a symbolic-behavioral world removed from the boundness of the present moment, from the immediate stimuli which enslave all lower organisms. Man’s freedom is a fabricated freedom, and he pays a price for it.

Q: What do you get when you cross Steven Den Beste and an outraged French journalist? A:  57,000 words and a surrender. **** h/t’s: Amish and Mike.

Robin Williams. Still so over.