Wikipedia:Reference desk/Archives/Humanities/2022 May 8
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May 8[edit]
Alanis Morissette and irony[edit]
Something I remember reading a few years ago. Can you tell me if I was dreaming this?
Apparently a kid approached Alanis Morissette somewhere and said to her that he understood what she was trying to say with the song "Ironic". That the true irony of the song was that it was a song called "Ironic" that made millions and confused people as to the meaning of irony while containing little to no actual irony in the lyrics. And that the line "isn't it ironic - don't you think?" was an invitation to the listener to say "no, actually".
And Alanis was like "finally, someone gets it - well done".
I swear I read that in an article somewhere years ago. --Iloveparrots (talk) 05:08, 8 May 2022 (UTC)
- I wouldnt like to comment on how many people may have been confused, or by Ms Moristte's intentions, but the examples of irony in that song are all situational irony.— Preceding unsigned comment added by 2A01:E34:EF5E:4640:3D12:92D5:8912:E9AA (talk) 10:54, 8 May 2022 (UTC)
- Are they? Certainly a couple of them are, notably the main stories in the first two verses (the old man that turns 98, wins the lottery and dies the next day, and the man that was afraid to fly, ahd the first plane he flew in crashed). But none of the other events in the song are so out of the ordinary to qualify as "contrary to what would be expected to happen in the situation", situational irony. They are borderline Murphy's Law, but not quite, because they're all just one off events. Just lousy luck SirTramtryst (talk) 14:31, 8 May 2022 (UTC)
- Are death row pardons 2 minutes too late really that common in the US? Note especially pardon implies the death sentence is removed rather than simply stayed so the governor or president somehow found a reason to do that but was 2 minutes too late. I know there can be a lot of last minute attempts to stop an execution but from what I've seen most of these either succeed or they don't. They don't come 2 minutes too late. From a cynic political standpoint, doing something like that also seems a good way to piss off everyone involved those who support putting the person to death and those who don't. TV shows like to do the ooops too late thing although not necessarily a pardon often new evidence etc, but that's TV for you. Note I'm not saying it's a good example of situational irony simple that to me or does seem like something very very uncommon in the real world. Nil Einne (talk) 08:47, 9 May 2022 (UTC)
- Executions in America are relatively rare anyway. --←Baseball Bugs What's up, Doc? carrots→ 11:47, 9 May 2022 (UTC)
- Well, official ones anyway; those involving a tenager who wasn't getting any except from an AR-15 seem pretty frequent. :D SN54129 14:42, 9 May 2022 (UTC)
- Compared to what? --←Baseball Bugs What's up, Doc? carrots→ 15:23, 9 May 2022 (UTC)
- Compared to literally any other well-developed democracy in the world. Gun violence in the United States is higher by several orders of magnitude over just about any country that the U.S. tries to compare itself to economically and socially. "Compared to 22 other high-income nations, the U.S. gun-related homicide rate is 25 times higher." The U.S. claims to be the best in the world at many things, but the only thing it is actually best at is murder. --Jayron32 13:06, 10 May 2022 (UTC)
- Most of that gun-related homicide is by citizens killing citizens. It amounts to gross abuse of the Second Amendment. But I don't understand what 54129 means by a teenager "who wasn't getting any". Any what? Lovin'? Gunfire? --←Baseball Bugs What's up, Doc? carrots→ 15:00, 10 May 2022 (UTC)
- Maybe both... Happiness is a Warm Gun after all... --Jayron32 15:46, 10 May 2022 (UTC)
- Most of that gun-related homicide is by citizens killing citizens. It amounts to gross abuse of the Second Amendment. But I don't understand what 54129 means by a teenager "who wasn't getting any". Any what? Lovin'? Gunfire? --←Baseball Bugs What's up, Doc? carrots→ 15:00, 10 May 2022 (UTC)
- Compared to literally any other well-developed democracy in the world. Gun violence in the United States is higher by several orders of magnitude over just about any country that the U.S. tries to compare itself to economically and socially. "Compared to 22 other high-income nations, the U.S. gun-related homicide rate is 25 times higher." The U.S. claims to be the best in the world at many things, but the only thing it is actually best at is murder. --Jayron32 13:06, 10 May 2022 (UTC)
- Compared to what? --←Baseball Bugs What's up, Doc? carrots→ 15:23, 9 May 2022 (UTC)
- Well, official ones anyway; those involving a tenager who wasn't getting any except from an AR-15 seem pretty frequent. :D SN54129 14:42, 9 May 2022 (UTC)
- Executions in America are relatively rare anyway. --←Baseball Bugs What's up, Doc? carrots→ 11:47, 9 May 2022 (UTC)
- Are death row pardons 2 minutes too late really that common in the US? Note especially pardon implies the death sentence is removed rather than simply stayed so the governor or president somehow found a reason to do that but was 2 minutes too late. I know there can be a lot of last minute attempts to stop an execution but from what I've seen most of these either succeed or they don't. They don't come 2 minutes too late. From a cynic political standpoint, doing something like that also seems a good way to piss off everyone involved those who support putting the person to death and those who don't. TV shows like to do the ooops too late thing although not necessarily a pardon often new evidence etc, but that's TV for you. Note I'm not saying it's a good example of situational irony simple that to me or does seem like something very very uncommon in the real world. Nil Einne (talk) 08:47, 9 May 2022 (UTC)
- Are they? Certainly a couple of them are, notably the main stories in the first two verses (the old man that turns 98, wins the lottery and dies the next day, and the man that was afraid to fly, ahd the first plane he flew in crashed). But none of the other events in the song are so out of the ordinary to qualify as "contrary to what would be expected to happen in the situation", situational irony. They are borderline Murphy's Law, but not quite, because they're all just one off events. Just lousy luck SirTramtryst (talk) 14:31, 8 May 2022 (UTC)
- Here’s a line from The Words and Music of Alanis Morissette, by Karen Fournier: ...a 2002 interview with [Morrissette], during which she defended the song with a claim that “the irony about ‘Ironic’ is that [the situations it describes] are not ironic!” The quote is footnoted but I can’t see the footnote in my preview – perhaps another volunteer here can. It will be between pages 155 and 164. 70.67.193.176 (talk) 14:34, 9 May 2022 (UTC)