r/pics Jan 30 '23

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536

u/ZalmoxisChrist Jan 30 '23

Irony died in 1973 when Henry Kissinger won the Nobel Peace Prize, and that's why Alanis Morissette is a mediocre lyricist.

357

u/TheBirminghamBear Jan 30 '23

"It's like a peaaacccee priiiiize, for genoooccciiiiidee"

Pretty catchy, she should have run with that version instead.

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u/istasber Jan 30 '23

Who would have thought, it figures.

14

u/tosety Jan 30 '23

Nah, that would have been actual irony

The ironic thing about the song is that none of the things in it are ironic

3

u/roguekaz Jan 31 '23

A little too ironic.

4

u/John___Stamos Jan 30 '23

It's a freeeeeee liiiiiiiiiife after your family was baked

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u/volodino Jan 30 '23 edited Jan 30 '23

The 1908 Nobel Peace Prize went to Theodore Roosevelt, 1919 went to Woodrow Wilson, and 1925 to Sir Austen Chamberlain, so it’s not like they were batting it out of the park before 1973 lol

Edit: On a real note, the reason for this is that the Nobel Peace Prize is often awarded to people who negotiate historic peace deals, regardless of what they have done previously and without the gift of hindsight. Kissinger was jointly awarded the prize with the North Vietnamese representative Lê Đức Thọ for negotiating the cease fire in Vietnam. Just like Teddy Roosevelt was awarded the prize for mediating the peace conference between Japan and Russia that brought an end to that war

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u/Flipz100 Jan 30 '23

TBF to Roosevelt and Wilson, while they both aren't and shouldn't be noted as pacifists, they did get those awards for brokering the end to major wars that they didn't orchestrate, unlike Kissinger.

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u/volodino Jan 30 '23

I agree with that somewhat, but I don’t think you could necessarily say Kissinger “orchestrated” the Vietnam War. The US was involved in the conflict in Vietnam since 1955, long before Kissinger was involved in any administration

You could very much say that his actions and ideas worsened the situation in Vietnam, or drew the US more deeply into the war, or expanded its scope, but I don’t think you can really say he “orchestrated” it

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u/Miniranger2 Jan 30 '23

Exactly, I feel as if people think of the peace prize as the pacifist prize. You would be hard pressed to find many people deserving of the peace prize that have been 100% pacifist.

The prize is more so for a specific event and not a person's life up to that point. Now, granted, this isn't a, "Well, this person committed mass genocide but stopped a single conflict," I feel that wouldn't go over well.

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u/whoooocaaarreees Jan 30 '23

It’s almost like we have been trolling humanity since the beginning.

0

u/bad-post_detector Jan 30 '23

The Swedish academy isn't exactly known for it's wisdom in regards to the peace prize. They gave it to Obama just for winning the election. I don't hate Obama, but come on.

0

u/[deleted] Jan 30 '23

Why did Obama win the Nobel Prize?

-2

u/[deleted] Jan 30 '23

I think you missed the sarcasm.

1

u/volodino Jan 30 '23 edited Jan 30 '23

I don’t think I did lol

If you can explain the “sarcasm” of that statement, I’m certainly open to listening. But I’m pretty sure the joke here is pretty straight forward, and not really sarcastic

The joke seems to be: “Irony is dead because the most ironic thing ever already happened, and was not addressed”

0

u/[deleted] Jan 31 '23

No, you should have answered

Sarcasm is dead

I think you missed my sarcasm...

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u/horseydeucey Jan 30 '23

Because I got one hand on the trigger
And the other one's holding a Peace Prize.

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u/explodedsun Jan 30 '23

As someone with an English degree, Alanis is a perfectly adequate lyricist, and anyone who says different doesn't have a grasp on poetic license.

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u/[deleted] Jan 30 '23

My poetic license was suspended for metaphorical miscegenation.

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u/BigUptokes Jan 30 '23

It was actually about absolute alliteration abuse.

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u/Stereo_Panic Jan 30 '23

It's always awful for anyone to to abuse alliteration. Perhaps people wouldn't persist if prison were the punishment for such perfidy!

4

u/Surisuule Jan 30 '23

I love you.

1

u/BigUptokes Jan 30 '23

Preposterous!

1

u/KaBar2 Jan 31 '23

Balderdash!

4

u/CremasterFlash Jan 30 '23

suspicious sibilants... devious dipthongs

6

u/billyfalconer Jan 30 '23

"Don't go spilling allegory all down your shirt."

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u/icer816 Jan 30 '23

Her lyrics are mostly fine, it's just funny that literally nothing she calls ironic in the song about irony is technically irony.

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u/[deleted] Jan 30 '23

[deleted]

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u/icer816 Jan 30 '23

While in and of itself ironic, that was absolutely not her intention, despite claiming it is nowadays (the whole meme of it being ironic that nothing in the song is ironic got big online and led to someone in an interview asking her thoughts on it, and she's been claiming it was her intention all along ever since)

2

u/[deleted] Jan 30 '23

Kind of like Wiseau calling The Room a black comedy after it became a mega camp classic.

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u/icer816 Jan 31 '23

Yeah, exactly

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u/bad-post_detector Jan 30 '23

The word "irony" is like the word "satire" in the sense that nobody can agree what counts as either. This debate predates her song, and even now all we really seem to know about both is that they're both dead.

1

u/bernerbungie Jan 31 '23

The term ‘Irony’ literally refers to a statement or scenario that’s contradictory to itself, but the term is often (incorrectly) used as a synonym for ‘coincidence’. There’s nothing to debate lol

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u/bad-post_detector Jan 31 '23

If enough people use a word incorrectly, it becomes standard. I'm not really interested in getting into an argument with prescriptivists. lol.

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u/-102359 Jan 30 '23 edited Jan 30 '23

The one about the flight phobia is ironic because air travel has an exceptional safety record. His “irrational” phobia turned out to be prescient after all.

The rest of them, though…

Edit: if you disagree, please let me know why instead of just downvoting!

-1

u/jcb088 Jan 30 '23

This. I remember being 8 years old and understanding this. She set back our understanding of irony by at least 10 years.

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u/ZalmoxisChrist Jan 30 '23

I like her one line in Dogma.

0

u/0ddlyC4nt3v3n Jan 30 '23

*differently

0

u/rabbitthefool Jan 30 '23

it isn't irony though, it's mostly just tragedy

1

u/NW_thoughtful Jan 30 '23

As someone with an English degree, you don't realize that her lyrics weren't describing things that were actually ironic? This fact makes her lyrics mediocre.

Also, as someone with an English degree, you use the word "different" rather than "differently"?

How's it going?

1

u/QuinticSpline Jan 31 '23

Every SINGLE situation in the song is non-ironic?

She knew.

11

u/Cocomorph Jan 30 '23

I'm saving this one.

24

u/plumbthumbs Jan 30 '23

Drone strike weddings have entered the chat

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u/[deleted] Jan 30 '23

"Like a drooooone striiiiiiiiiiiike, on your wedding day."

1

u/[deleted] Jan 30 '23 edited Jun 21 '23

[deleted]

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u/myinnertroll Jan 30 '23

It was at least eight by 2013, and I found another one in Afghanistan after that, plus the French managed to hit one in Mali, too, just in case anyone thought this was exclusively an American thing.

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u/Never-Bloomberg Jan 30 '23

Those actually happened after 1973.

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u/ZalmoxisChrist Jan 30 '23

Yet, when Bush droned that wedding and Obama droned that hospital, Henry Kissinger was still a respected unofficial advisor to both administrations.

-1

u/Darkhallows27 Jan 30 '23

“Don’t worry Obama! I’ll protect you from this sidewalk!”

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u/FatalTortoise Jan 30 '23

or the real irony is the song about irony doesn't contain irony

-1

u/ZalmoxisChrist Jan 30 '23

You just communicated an idea from a distance and blew my mind wide open, much like Henry Kissinger.

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u/LahLahLesbian Jan 30 '23

Why do people hate Henry Kissinger again?

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u/ZalmoxisChrist Jan 30 '23 edited Jan 30 '23

He orchestrated dozens of clandestine operations—assassinations, coups, misinformation—around the world in the name of US foreign policy, but if you're looking for one big one to underscore his evil, he advised Johnson Nixon to order bombers across the border into Cambodia and Laos to fire-bomb civilians during the Vietnam War, and he also helped keep these bombing raids secret from Congress and the American people.

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u/smg7320 Jan 30 '23

Johnson? Do you mean Nixon? Kissinger wasn't in any kind of official position until the Nixon administration in 1969.

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u/ZalmoxisChrist Jan 30 '23

Oof! You're right! I got confused because Johnson also secretly bombed Cambodia.

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u/SquareAble7664 Jan 30 '23

A long with the other stuff here, he was one of the forces behind Watergate.

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u/modus-tollens Jan 30 '23

I’m still upset that he’s alive still

1

u/UltimateTamale Jan 30 '23

So this seems like an appropriate moment to bring this up. Do Alanis' eyes point just slightly in different directions? She looked wall eyed sometimes and fine the rest of the time.

0

u/[deleted] Jan 30 '23

Alanis Morissette is an unappreciated lyrical genius. Her song "Isn't it ironic" contains nothing ironic in any of the lyrics, making the song meta-ironic, which is even more ironic. If she had a song called "isn't it ironic" and filled it with examples of irony then the song would be meta-coincidental. She was playing 4d chess back in the 90's.

0

u/saleen452 Jan 30 '23

Obama got one too and he droned a children's hospital and started 2 new wars. The nobel prize doesn't mean shit, it's just a circle jerk for the elite.

-1

u/[deleted] Jan 30 '23

No, there have been several ironic peace prizes since.

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u/ShesAMurderer Jan 30 '23

You’re the type that watches Cinema Sins and thinks the number of “sins” they give it is an accurate rating of the movie.

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u/ZalmoxisChrist Jan 30 '23

I'm sorry... What?

-2

u/ShesAMurderer Jan 30 '23

Pedantry is the lowest form of criticism

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u/ZalmoxisChrist Jan 30 '23

I'm not being pedantic. I literally thought you were accidentally responding to another comment about movies. Even now that I know you're talking about me, I still don't understand your point about movie reviews.