Shrek K

Right now the negative are the all-stars

Smashmouth 99
http://www.azlyrics.com/lyrics/smashmouth/allstar.html
Somebody once told me the world is gonna roll me I ain't the sharpest tool
in the shed She was looking kind of dumb, with her finger and her thumb
In the shape of an 'L' on her forehead Well, the years start coming and they
don't stop coming Fed to the rules and I hit the ground running Didn't make sense,
not to live for fun Your brain gets smart but your head gets dumb So much to do, so
much to see So what's wrong with taking the back streets You'll never know if
you don't go You'll never shine if you don't glow Hey now, you're an All
Star, get your game on, go play Hey now, you're a Rock Star, get the show
on, get paid And all that glitters is gold Only shooting stars break the
mold It's a cool place and they say it gets colder You're bundled up, now wait 'til you get older But the meteor men beg to differ Judging by the hole in the satellite picture The
ice we skate is getting pretty thin The waters getting warm, so you might as well swim My world's on fire how about yours That's the way I like it and I never get bored Hey now, you're
an All Star, get your game on, go play Hey now, you're a Rock Star, get the show on, get paid All that glitters is gold Only shooting stars break the mold Go for the moon Go for the
moon Go for the moon Go for the moon Hey now, you're an All Star, get your game on, go play Hey now, you're a Rock Star, get the show on, get paid And all that glitters is gold Only
shooting stars Somebody once asked, could I spare some change for gas I need to get myself away from this place I said, Yep, what a concept I could use a little fuel myself And we
could all use a little change Well, the years start coming and they don't stop coming Fed to the rules and I hit the ground running Didn't make sense not to live for fun Your brain gets
smart but your head gets dumb So much to do, so much to see So what's wrong with taking the back streets You'll never know if you don't go You'll never shine if you don't glow

Hey now, you're an All Star, get your game on, go play Hey now, you're a
Rock Star, get the show on, get paid And all that glitters is gold Only
shooting stars break the mold And all that glitters is gold Only shooting
stars break the mold

Shrek is love, Shrek is life

Jesus Christ 15 http://www.urbandictionary.com/define.php?
term=shrek+is+love+shrek+is+life
Pray to Shrek every night before bed, thanking him for the life you've
been given
And you will find out
It's never ogre.

Exploring the ocean inevitably infatuates society with

Spongebob Squarepants
Center for American Progress 13
https://www.americanprogress.org/issues/green/news/2013/06/
18/66956/rockets-top-submarines-space-exploration-dollarsdwarf-ocean-spending/
Star Trek would have us believe that space is the final frontier, but with
apologies to the armies of Trekkies, their oracle might be a tad off base. Though we
know little about outer space, we still have plenty of frontiers to explore here on our
home planet. And theyre losing the race of discovery. Hollywood giant
James Cameron, director of mega-blockbusters such as Titanic and
Avatar,
brought this message to Capitol Hill last week, along with the single-seat submersible that he used to become the third human to journey to the deepest point of the worlds oceansthe Marianas

Trench. By contrast, more than 500 people have journeyed into spaceincluding Sen. Bill Nelson (D-FL), who sits on the committee before which Cameron testifiedand 12 people have actually set foot on the surface of the moon.
All it takes is a quick comparison of the budgets for NASA and the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, or NOAA, to understand why space exploration is outpacing its ocean counterpart by such a wide margin. In
fiscal year 2013 NASAs annual exploration budget was roughly $3.8 billion. That same year, total funding for everything NOAA doesfishery management, weather and climate forecasting, ocean research and management, among
many other programswas about $5 billion, and NOAAs Office of Exploration and Research received just $23.7 million. Something is wrong with this picture. Space travel is certainly expensive. But as Cameron proved with his dive
that cost approximately $8 million, deep-sea exploration is pricey as well. And thats not the only similarity between space and ocean travel: Both are dark, cold, and completely inhospitable to human life. Yet space travel excites
Americans imaginations in a way ocean exploration never has. To put this in terms Cameron may be familiar with, just think of how stories are told on screens both big and small: Space dominates, with Star Trek, Star Wars,
Battlestar Galactica, Buck Rogers in the 25th Century, and 2001 A Space Odyssey. Then there are B-movies such as Plan Nine From Outer Space and everything ever mocked on Mystery Science Theater 2000. There are

Aliens and Avatar. When it comes

to the ocean, we have 20,000 Leagues Under the Sea, SpongeBob
SquarePants, and Camerons somewhat lesser-known film The Abyss. And
thats about it.
even parodies: Spaceballs, Galaxy Quest, and Mars Attacks! And lets not forget Camerons own contributions:

This imbalance in pop culture is illustrative of what plays out in real life. We rejoiced along with the NASA mission-control room when the Mars rover landed on the red planet late last

year. One particularly exuberant scientist, known as Mohawk Guy for his audacious hairdo, became a minor celebrity and even fielded his share of spontaneous marriage proposals. But when Cameron bottomed out in the
Challenger Deep more than 36,000 feet below the surface of the sea, it was met with resounding indifference from all but the dorkiest of ocean nerds such as myself. Part of this incongruity comes from access. No matter where we
live, we can go outside on a clear night, look up into the sky, and wonder about whats out there. Were presented with a spectacular vista of stars, planets, meteorites, and even the occasional comet or aurora. We have all been
wishing on stars since we were children. Only the lucky few can gaze out at the ocean from their doorstep, and even those who do cannot see all that lies beneath the waves. As a result, the facts about ocean exploration are pretty
bleak. Humans have laid eyes on less than 5 percent of the ocean, and we have better maps of the surface of Mars than we do of Americas exclusive economic zonethe undersea territory reaching out 200 miles from our shores.
Sure, space is sexy. But the oceans are too. To those intrigued by the quest for alien life, consider this: Scientists estimate that we still have not discovered 91 percent of the species that live in our oceans. And some of them look
pretty outlandish. Go ahead and Google the deepsea hatchetfish, frill shark, or Bathynomus giganteus. In a time of shrinking budgets and increased scrutiny on the return for our investments, we should be taking a long, hard
look at how we are prioritizing our exploration dollars. If the goal of government spending is to spur growth in the private sector, entrepreneurs are far more likely to find inspiration down in the depths of the ocean than up in the
heavens. The ocean already provides us with about half the oxygen we breathe, our single largest source of protein, a wealth of mineral resources, key ingredients for pharmaceuticals, and marine biotechnology. Of course space
exportation does have benefits beyond the cool factor of putting people on the moon and astronaut-bards playing David Bowie covers in space. Inventions created to facilitate space travel have become ubiquitous in our livescellphone cameras, scratch-resistant lenses, and water-filtration systems, just to name a fewand research conducted in outer space has led to breakthroughs here on earth in the technological and medical fields. Yet despite far-fetched
plans to mine asteroids for rare metals, the only tangible goods brought back from space to date remain a few piles of moon rocks. The deep seabed is a much more likely source of so-called rare-earth metals than distant
asteroids. Earlier this year the United Nations published its first plan for management of mineral resources beneath the high seas that are outside the jurisdiction of any individual country. The United States has not been able to
participate in negotiations around this policy because we are not among the 185 nations that have ratified the U.N. Convention on the Law of the Sea, which governs such activity. With or without the United States on board, the
potential for economic development in the most remote places on the planet is vast and about to leap to the next level. Earlier this year Japan announced that it has discovered a massive supply of rare earth both within its exclusive
economic zone and in international waters. This follows reports in 2011 that China sent at least one exploratory mission to the seabed beneath international waters in the Pacific Ocean. There is a real opportunity for our nation to
lead in this area, but we must invest and join the rest of the world in creating the governance structure for these activities. Toward the end of last weeks hearing, Sen. Mark Begich (D-AK), who chairs the Subcommittee on Oceans,
Atmosphere, Fisheries, and Coast Guard, hypothetically asked where we would be today if we had spent half as much money exploring the oceans as we have spent exploring space. Given the current financial climate in Congress,
we wont find the answer to his question on Capitol Hill. But there may be another way. Cameron is currently in preproduction on the second and third Avatar films. He says the former will be set on an ocean planet. No one
except he and his fellow producers at 20th Century Fox really know how much the first installment of the movie series cost, but estimates peg it at approximately $250 millionor 10 times the total funding for NOAAs Ocean
Exploration program. Since the original Avatar grossed more than $2 billion at the box office worldwide, if NASA isnt willing to hand over a bit of its riches to help their oceanic co-explorers, maybe Cameron and his studio partners
can chip a percent or two off the gross from Avatar 2 to help fill the gap. Come to think of it, if the key to exploring the oceans hinges either on Hollywood giving up profits or Congress increasing spending, maybe we are more
likely to mine asteroids after all.

SpongeBob popularity weakens Shreks political capital

The Onion 04 http://www.theonion.com/articles/7yearoldloses-respect-for-shrek-after-seeing-him,4702/
Cale Parnell, 7, said Monday that he no longer holds Shrek in high regard,
ever since the green ogre started appearing in TV ads for Burger King Kids
Meals. "Shrek just wants to sell things and make money," Parnell said. "He
doesn't care if kids like me are having fun." Parnell added that Shrek is
"just like that stupid money-grubber SpongeBob SquarePants."

If we dont praise Shrek we defy God

Roberts 10 http://www.thehighcalling.org/reflection/whyshould-we-obey-god#.VPeXX_nF-So
Why should we obey God?

There are many answers to this questionmany that are right, many that are wrong. Among the

. We should obey
God because otherwise he'll make our lives miserable. We should obey
God because that guarantees a painless life. Right reasons for obeying God are many, including:
most commonly held, but incorrect, answers would be the following: We should obey God in order to earn salvation

We should obey God because it's the right thing to do. We should obey God because obedience leads to a fulfilling life. We should
obey God because Jesus taught us to do so. One could easily come up with dozens more answers by a careful study of Scripture.
Leviticus 22 provides a reason for obeying God that we might easily overlook. The whole chapter spells out a variety of laws
pertaining to the offering and eating of sacrifices. Verse 31 summarizes: "You must faithfully keep all my commands by putting them
into practice, for I am the LORD." Obedience is a response to God's very nature as embodied in his holy name. Verse 33 adds, "It
was I who rescued you from the land of Egypt, that I might be your God. I am the LORD." At first this might seem like an odd way to
sum up a chapter on obedience. But, in fact, the last verse of Leviticus 22 provides a powerful rationale for obedience. The Israelites
are to obey the Lord in response to his gracious salvation. Their obedience isn't meant to earn God's favor, but rather to respond to
this favor already given. God's own name, the LORD, embodies his grace and mercy (see Exod. 34:6-7). Thus, to honor God's name
is to live in response to his grace by obeying his commands. As Christians, our call to obedience is in many ways similar to that of
Leviticus 22. Romans 12:1-2 reveals that though we do not offer literal sacrifices, we are to offer our whole lives as living sacrifices
to God. We do so because of God's mercy given in Jesus Christ. Thus, we should obey God out of love for God and gratitude for all
that he has done for us. QUESTIONS FOR FURTHER REFLECTION: If you were to be asked the question "Why obey God?" what
answer(s) would you give? In what ways does obedience benefit God? In what ways does it benefit us? PRAYER: Merciful God, today
I begin by thanking you for your amazing grace, for coming in Christ to save the world, including me. Thank you, Lord, for the way
your grace has filled, shaped, and guided my life. Thank you for the privilege of living in your grace each day. May I seek to obey
you in all that I do, Lord, not in order to earn your favor, but so that I might respond appropriately to your favor already given to me.
As I receive your mercies, which are new every morning, may they motivate me to offer myself to you, all that I am, all that I do.
May my obedience to you be an act of thanksgiving, a demonstration of my love for you. All praise be to you, O God, because you

have rescued me from sin and death and because your grace fills my life each day. Amen.

ogre now.

Its all

2NC Shrek
2NC Overview:
Our Shrek K is satirical, painting a picture of the harmful nature of the
current debate space. We defend the fact that the actual debate space is
harmful, thus you must vote for the alt:

Alt: Vote neg as a criticism of the affs role playing: we arent

actually policymakers- they arent real world and destroy
education by creating role confusiontheres no benefit to
policy if we cant put it into effect
Kappeler, 95

(Susanne, The Will to Violence, p. 10-11)

`We are the war' does not mean that the responsibility for a war is shared collectively and diffusely by an entire
society - which would be equivalent to exonerating warlords and politicians and profiteers or, as Ulrich Beck says,
upholding the notion of `collective irresponsibility', where people are no longer held responsible for their actions,
and where the conception of universal responsibility becomes the equivalent of a universal acquittal.' On the
contrary, the object is precisely to analyse the specific and differential responsibility of everyone in their diverse
situations. Decisions to unleash a war are indeed taken at particular levels of power by those in a position to make
them and to command such collective action. We need to hold them clearly responsible for their decisions and

our habit of focusing on

the stage where the major dramas of power take place tends to obscure our sight in
relation to our own sphere of competence, our own power and our own
responsibility - leading to the well-known illusion of our apparent `powerlessness
and its accompanying phenomenon, our so-called political disillusionment. Single citizens even more so those of other nations - have come to feel secure in their obvious nonresponsibility for such large-scale political events as, say, the wars in Croatia and Bosnia-Hercegovina or
actions without lessening theirs by any collective `assumption' of responsibility. Yet

Somalia - since the decisions for such events are always made elsewhere. Yet our insight that indeed we are not
responsible for the decisions of a Serbian general or a Croatian president tends to mislead us into thinking that
therefore we have no responsibility at all, not even for forming our own judgement, and thus into underrating the

it seems to absolve us from

having to try to see any relation between our own actions and those events, or to
responsibility we do have within our own sphere of action. In particular,

recognize the connections between those political decisions and our own personal decisions. It not only shows that
we participate in what Beck calls `organized irresponsibility', upholding the apparent lack of connection between
bureaucratically, institutionally, nationally and also individually organized separate competences. It also proves the
phenomenal and unquestioned alliance of our personal thinking with the thinking of the major powermongers: For
we tend to think that we cannot `do' anything, say, about a war, because we deem ourselves to be in the wrong

Which is why many of those not

yet entirely disillusioned with politics tend to engage in a form of mental deputy
politics, in the style of `What would I do if I were the general, the prime minister, the
president, the foreign minister or the minister of defence?' Since we seem to regard their mega
spheres of action as the only worthwhile and truly effective ones, and since our political analyses
tend to dwell there first of all, any question of what I would do if I were indeed myself tends
to peter out in the comparative insignificance of having what is perceived as
`virtually no possibilities': what I could do seems petty and futile. For my own action I
situation; because we are not where the major decisions are made.

obviously desire the range of action of a general, a prime minister, or a General Secretary of the UN - finding
expression in ever more prevalent formulations like `I want to stop this war', `I want military intervention', `I want
to stop this backlash', or `I want a moral revolution." 'We are this war', however, even if we do not command the

troops or participate in so-called peace talks, namely as Drakulic says, in our `non-comprehension: our willed
refusal to feel responsible for our own thinking and for working out our own understanding, preferring innocently to
drift along the ideological current of prefabricated arguments or less than innocently taking advantage of the
advantages these offer. And we `are' the war in our `unconscious cruelty towards you', our tolerance of the `fact
that you have a yellow form for refugees and I don't' - our readiness, in other words, to build identities, one for

We share in the responsibility

for this war and its violence in the way we let them grow inside us, that is, in the way we shape `our
feelings, our relationships, our values' according to the structures and the values of
war and violence.
ourselves and one for refugees, one of our own and one for the `others'.

Our Violent representations matter, and are the root cause of

war and violence.
Kappeler 95
(Susanne, 1995, lecturer in English at the University of East Anglia and an Associate Professor at the
School of Humanities and Social Sciences, Al Akhawayn University,[2] and now works as a freelance writer
and teacher in England and Germany. Kappeler also taught 'The literary representation of women' in the
Faculty of English at Cambridge while a research fellow at Jesus College, Cambridge[3] and was a parttime tutor for the Open University Course, A History of Violence, pg 8-9)
Violence what we usually recognize as such It is no misbehaviour of a minority
amid good behaviour by the majority, nor the deeds of inhuman monsters amid humane
humans, in a society in which there is no equality, in which people divide others
according to race, class, sex and many other factors in order to rule, exploit,
use, objectify, enslave, sell, torture and kill them, in which millions of animals
are tortured, genetically manipulated, enslaved and slaughtered daily for
'harmless' consumption by humans. It is no error of judgement, no moral lapse and
no transgression against the customs of a culture which is thoroughly steeped in the
values of profit and desire, of self-realization, expansion and progress. Violence as we
usually perceive it is 'simply' a specific and to us still visible form of violence, the
consistent and logical application of the principles of our culture and everyday life. War
does not suddenly break out in a peaceful society; sexual violence is not the
disturbance of otherwise equal gender relations. Racist attacks do not shoot
like lightning out of a non-racist sky, and the sexual exploitation of children is
no solitary problem in a world otherwise just to children. The violence of our
most commonsense everyday thinking, and especially our personal will to
violence, constitute the conceptual preparation, the ideological armament and
the intellectual mobilization which make the 'outbreak' of war, of sexual
violence, of racist attacks, of murder and destruction possible at all.`We are the
war', writes Slavenka Drakulic at the end of her existential analysis of the question, 'what
is war?': I do not know what war is, I want to tell [my friend], but I see it everywhere. It is
in the blood-soaked street in Sarajevo, after 20 people have been killed while they
queued for bread. But it is also in your non-comprehension, in my unconscious cruelty
towards you, in the fact that you have a yellow form [for refugees] and I don't, in the way
in which it grows inside ourselves and changes our feelings, relationships, values in
short: us. We are the war ... And I am afraid that we cannot hold anyone else responsible.
We make this war possible, we permit it to happens 'We are the war' and we also
'are' the sexual violence, the racist violence, the exploitation and the will to
violence in all its manifestations in a society in so-called 'peacetime', for we
make them possible and we permit them to happen.

Their world of debate is bad- it causes disinterested

argumentation and reinforces oppression.
Spanos 04

(William Spanos, 2004, Distinguished Professor of English and comparative literature at

Binghamton University and kind of an asshole, Spanos on debate, http://the3nr.com/2010/01/17/spanos-ondebate/)//RTF
Dear Joe MIller, Yes, the statement about the American debate circuit you refer to was made by me, though some
years ago. I strongly believed then and still do, even though a certain uneasiness about objectivity has crept into

debate in both the high schools and colleges in this

country is assumed to take place nowhere, even though the issues that are debated
are profoundly historical, which means that positions are always represented from
the perspective of power, and a matter of life and death . I find it grotesque that in the
debate world, it doesnt matter which position you take on an issue say, the
United States unilateral wars of preemption as long as you score points. The
world we live in is a world entirely dominated by an exceptionalist America which has perennially
claimed that it has been chosen by God or History to fulfill his/its errand in the wilderness. That
claim is powerful because American economic and military power lies behind it. And
any alternative position in such a world is virtually powerless. Given this inexorable
historical reality, to assume, as the protocols of debate do, that all positions are
equal is to efface the imbalances of power that are the fundamental condition of
history and to annul the Moral authority inhering in the position of the oppressed .
the philosophy of debate that

This is why I have said that the appropriation of my interested work on education and empire to this transcendental
debate world constitute a travesty of my intentions. My scholarship is not disinterested. It is militant and intended
to ameliorate as much as possible the pain and suffering of those who have been oppressed by the democratic
institutions that have power precisely by way of showing that their language if truth, far from being
disinterested or objective as it is always claimed, is informed by the will to power over all manner of others.

I told my interlocutor that he and those in the debate world who felt like
him should call into question the traditional objective debate protocols and the
instrumentalist language they privilege in favor of a concept of debate and of
language in which life and death mattered . I am very much aware that the arrogant neocons who
now saturate the government of the Bush administration judges, pentagon planners, state department
officials, etc. learned their disinterested argumentative skills in the high school and
college debate societies and that, accordingly, they have become masters at
disarming the just causes of the oppressed . This kind leadership will reproduce itself (along with the
This is also why

invisible oppression it perpetrates) as long as the training ground and the debate protocols from which it emerges
remains in tact.

A revolution in the debate world must occur. It must force that

unworldly world down into the historical arena where positions make a difference. To
invoke the late Edward Said, only such a revolution will be capable of deterring democracy (in Noam Chomskys
ironic phrase), of instigating the secular critical consciousness that is, in my mind, the sine qua non for avoiding the
immanent global disaster towards which the blind arrogance of Bush Administration and his neocon policy makers is
leading.

Their complaint is with the form rather than the content of the
1ACtranslating this complaint into a rule plays into sovereign
hands which turns decisionmaking and guts education
Steele 10Associate Professor of Political Science at the University of Kansas (Brent, Defacing Power: The
Aesthetics of Insecurity in Global Politics pg 109-111)
The rules of language and speaking can themselves serve to conceal truth in world
politics. I begin here with the work of Nicholas Onuf (1989), which has inspired constructivists to engage how
language is a rule-governed activity (Wilmer 2003: 221).

Rules help construct patterns and

structures of language exchanges, and without these rules, language becomes

meaningless (Gould 2003: 61). From the work of Onuf, we recognize that rules do more than set
appropriate boundaries for language, as the paradigm of political society is aptly named because it
links irrevocably the sine qua non of society the availability, no, the unavoidability of rules and of politics the
Rules lead to
rule what Onuf (1989) titles the rule-rules coupling. Thus, linguistic rules demarcate relations
of power and serve to perpetuate the asymmetry of social relations. The structure of
language games is valued because it provides order and continuity . But because
those rules are obeyed so frequently and effortlessly, they are hard to recognize as
forms of authority. Where does the need for such continuity arise ? As mentioned in
previous chapters, Giddensian sociology suggests that the drive for ontological security, for the
securing of self-identity through time, can only be satisfied by the screening out of
chaotic everyday events through routines, which are a central element of the autonomy of the

persistence of asymmetric social relations, known otherwise as the condition of rule. (1989: 22)

developing individual (Giddens 1991: 40). Without routines, individuals face chaos, and what Giddens calls the
protective cocoon of basic trust evaporates (ibid.). Yet, as I have discussed in my other work (2005, 2008a) and as

rigid routines can constrain agents in their ability to

learn new information. This is what the rhythmic strata of aesthetic power satisfies. In the context
it creates for parrhesia, these routines, connected to an agents sense of Self, shield that agent
from the truth.4 The shallowness of our routinized daily existence , Weber once stated,
consists indeed in the fact that the persons who are caught up in it do not become
aware, and above all do not wish to become aware, of this partly psychologically,
part pragmatically conditioned motley of irreconcilably antagonistic values (1974: 18).
The need for such rhythmic continuity spans all social organizations, including
scholarly communities (thus we refer to such communities as disciplines). The function of these
rules creates a similar problematic faced by the parrhesiastes who is attempting to
shock these structured rules and habits of the targeted agent. Because the parrhesiastes may find
Jennifer Mitzen notes (2006: 364),

the linguistic rules or at least styles or language used by the targeted power to be part of the problem (the notion

must perform a balancing act between two

goals. First, the parrhesiastes must challenge the conventions that serve to simplify and
even conceal the truth the parrhesiastes is speaking. Second, the parrhesiastes
must observe some of these speaking rules, part of which may themselves be
responsible for or derivate toward the style of the Self that needs to be challenged
by the parrhesiastes. Favoring the first, the parrhesiastes is prone to being ignored
as irrational, as someone on the fringe or even unintelligible or, in the words of Harry Gould
already noted, meaningless. Favoring the second moves the parrhesiastes away from the
truth attempting to be told or at least obscures the truth with the language of
nicety. As developed by Epicurean philosopher Philodemus, parrhesia existed within this spectrum:
at times, it bordered on harsh frankness that was not mixed with praise; at
other times, the frankness was more subdued (Glad 1996: 41). 5 As the examples of Cynic and
that one must be tactful, for instance), she or he

academic-intellectual parrhesia provided later in this chapter illustrate, different manifestations of truth-telling as a
form of counterpower occupy different spaces along this spectrum balancing between abiding by these
conventions of decorum and style; the need to provide forceful, decloaked truth; or, in the case of Cynic parrhesia,

The parrhesiastes will most likely face

charges of the first order (ignoring convention) regardless of the manner in which
parrhesia is delivered. If, indeed, the truth hurts and if the target of such truth cannot deny the
facts being delivered, the most convenient option for the victim is to blame the way in
which the parrhesiastes said something, knowing full well that it was the substance of what that
flauntingly contradicting the conventions altogether.

person said that was, for the victim, inappropriate or, more to the point, inconvenien

Satire is a key form of public pedagogy its a prerequisite to

meaningful debate
McClennen, 12 Ph.D., Duke University M.A., Duke University A.B., Harvard
University, cum laude Dr. McClennen directs Penn State's Center for Global Studies
as well as its Latin American Studies program and has ties to the departments of
Comparative Literature, Spanish, and Women's Studies. She has published seven
books and has three in process. Her latest single-authored volume is Colbert's
America: Satire and Democracy (2012), which studies the role of Stephen Colbert in
shaping political discourse after 9/11. (Sophia. A, America According to Colbert:
Satire as Public Pedagogy post 9/11, July 3rd,
http://societyforcriticalexchange.org/conferences/MLA%202011/Public
%20Intellectuals/America%20According%20to%20Colbert.htm)//IS
By inquiring into the ways that Colbert has functioned as a public intellectual, this
paper suggests that satire is a comedic and pedagogic form uniquely suited to
provoke critical reflection. Its ability to underscore the absurdity, ignorance, and
prejudice of commonly accepted behaviors by means of comedic critical reflection
offers an especially potent form of public critique, one that was much needed in the
post 9/11 environment. This paper argues that, in contrast to the antiintellectualism, the sensationalism, and the punditry that tend to govern most mass
media today, Colberts program offers his audience the opportunity to understand
the context through which most news is reported and to be critical of it. In so doing
Colberts show further offers viewers an opportunity to reflect on the limited and
narrow ways that political issues tend to be framed in public debate. Colberts
satire, then, is a form of what Henry Giroux defines as public pedagogy since it
demonstrates the use of media as a political and educational force. Recognizing
that the political opinions of most US citizens are shaped by an uncritical
acceptance of the issues as provided by the mainstream media, Colbert uses the
same venue to critique that process. By impersonating a right-wing pundit, Colbert
differs in significant ways from other critical comedians since his form of humor
embodies that which it critiques. This paper suggests that this form of parody has
both the potential to be more incisive in its critique and also more dangerous, since
its dependence on a cult of personality could merely mirror the same passive
viewing practices common to programs like The OReilly Factor. This paper also
contributes to the ongoing conversation about how satire and humor post 9/11 have
been able to effectively encourage critical perspectives on major social issues,
thereby providing an important source of public pedagogy. Focusing on one of the
leading figures of satire TV, my paper claims that Colberts program incorporates
a series of features that foster critical thinking and that encourage audiences to
resist the status quo. By analyzing the context within which the program emerged
and the specific features of the program, this book offers readers insight into the
powerful ways that Colberts comedy challenges the cult of ignorance that has
threatened meaningful public debate and social dialogue since 9/11.

Satire Works
If people dont understand the irony at first, itll make an even
bigger impression on them once they get it we can always
explain the joke later
Day, 8 Ph.D. and Assistant Professor of English and Cultural Studies at Bryant University; (Amber,
Are They For Real? Activism and Ironic Identities, 2008,
http://www.cios.org/www/ejc/EJCPUBLIC/018/2/01846.html)//IS

Hutcheon warns of the potential danger inherent in the use of irony in that it can
easily backfire. She explains, those whom you oppose might attribute no irony and
simply take you at your word; or they might make irony happen and thus accuse
you of being self-negating, if not self-contradicting. Those with whom you agree
(and who know your position) might also attribute no irony and mistake you for
advocating what you are in fact criticizing (16). The Yes Men, it seems, found
themselves precisely falling prey to these traps, but have hit upon a method of
using the pitfalls to their advantage, allowing audiences to read them seriously and
then exposing them for being complicit with the offensive ideas put forward. In
hindsight, the irony is much more obvious, meaning either that those present at the
live event appear morally unscrupulous or that the media is spurred to engage in
reflection about why they were taken in. Perhaps more importantly, the revealed
hoaxes speak to a growing number of fans who take delight in witnessing
organizations and corporations they are already critical of be publicly pranked,
again providing affirmation for existing discursive communities.

Framework

AT: Cede Political

Cede the Political
Satire doesnt cede the political its actually key to motivate
action
Thai, 14 editor for The Crimson (Anthony, Political Satire: Beyond the Humor,
The Crimson, http://www.thecrimson.com/article/2014/2/6/harvard-politicalsatire/)//IS
Despite these advantages, some have argued that political satire encourages
cynicism, trivializes politics, and promotes a narrow point of view (stemming from
the predominantly liberal leanings of most political satirists and comedians). It is
true that, when taken in isolation, political satire poses many drawbacks, and that
the constant critique of political figures and media outlets can lead to skepticism.
However, viewers of satire are more likely to watch and read traditional news
sources as well, according to an article in the Columbia Journalism Review. In fact,
satirists often refer to other news sources to provide background for their critiques,
as Stewart has done numerous times with CNN and Fox News, serving the dual
purpose of communicating news and criticizing the current methods of political
media. The same article also references research that suggests increased
viewership of political humor does not distance the audience from politics but
instead increases knowledge of current events, leads to further informationseeking on related topics, and increases viewer interest in and attention paid to
politics and news. This more informed and interested audience naturally has more
opportunities to share educated opinions with others and provoke discussion.
Arguments that satire actually increases narrow-mindedness because it panders to
liberals also have their flaws. While there are few Republican and conservative
viewers, data show that less than half of the viewers of The Daily Show and The
Colbert Report are liberals; in fact, 38 percent of viewers of The Colbert Report,
as well as 41 percent of those watching The Daily Show, consider themselves
independents. These shows have roughly the same percentage of Democrat viewers
as the New York Times and USA Today and a lower percentage than CNN, all of
which claim to be non-partisan news sources. Moreover, humorists connect with
their audience more effectively than news anchors do. While politics in news is often
portrayed as a field separate from daily life, Stewart and Colbert easily relate their
coverage to the average viewer. In contrast to Sunday talk shows such as NBCs
Meet the Press and ABCs This Week, which host roundtables of pundits
discussing the political issues of the day in non-personal terms, satirists need to be
personal for their comedy to be understood and entertaining. Finally, instead of
allowing experts to express their opinions as fact as some journalists do, humorists
often challenge the views of experts to the audiences benefit. For example, in
October 2013, Stewart hosted Kathleen Sebelius, the US Secretary of Health and
Human Services, and criticized Obamacare for delaying compliance with the bill for
big businesses but not individuals. He critiqued the fact that these businesses can
lobby for their interests while individuals cannot. Although some coverage of this
issue made news sources, Stewart presented it at length with an authentic source

and in a comedic and memorable fashion. He caught viewers attention and

demonstrated that experts are not always correct. Taken together with traditional
news sources, political humor at least molds a more informed public and at best
increases political involvement and excitement. The humor provides the tools;
viewers must decide whether to use them.

Satire is key to political action empirics

Freedman, 10 UCLA Professor of Political Science, specializing in American and
British politics, and as Dean of UCLA Extension. Since his retirement he has taught a
seminar on political satire in UCLAs undergraduate Honors Collegium. His political
satire presentations for university and community audiences extend an avocation
begun in a common setting for political satire in Britain the university musical
review. Lens publications include: The Offensive Art: Political Satire and its
Censorship Around the World From Beerbohm to Borat (2009); Power and Policy in
America, 7th edition (2000)(Why Political Satire Matters,
http://www.strictlysatire.com/mysites/WhySatireMatters.aspx)//IS
And yet, if satire alone is unlikely to change the course of history, it often
accompanies and reinforces political action. And though its impact can never be
measured precisely, it seems likely that, together with other forces of dissent,
political satire can make a difference. The cartoons and lascivious jokes leveled
at the royal family helped to create the atmosphere of derision and fury that
culminated in the French Revolution. The satirists rage against the Vietnam war
played its part in the shift of public sentiment that at last forced its end. Colbert and
Stewart make politics amusing and interesting to youthful audiences who otherwise
tend to be politically uninvolved. Moreover, if some authoritarian regimes have
contemptuously tolerated a limited amount of satire, most have not. And here we
come to the most important argument for why political satire matters its role as a
bulwark against political oppression. Political satire, after all, is by definition
aggressive, hostile, offensive. Political leaders generally dont like being offended,
and especially they dont enjoy being made to look ridiculous.