A Tale of Two Chucks: Chuck Palahniuk, @chuckpalahniuk, and exactly how NOT to use twitter.

All God does is watch us and kill us when we get boring. We must never, ever be boring.”
— Chuck Palahniuk

I’ve never met Chuck Palahniuk, but knowing what I know of what he writes and how he writes it,  I would hazard a guess that if he ever met @chuckpalahniuk he would either stomp all over his face or flee the room crying tears of boredom. Because the Chuck Palahniuk universe as I know it is a pitched battle between the Tyler Durdens of the world and the forces of ennui, and there simply is no place for being boring.

From all appearances, @chuckpalahniuk is boring, uncommunicative, and somewhat self-centered. He isn’t really interested in what other people have to say (judging from the total of 12 people he is currently  following) and his sporadic communication with the legions of people that are following him all center around promotional offers and tour dates and occasional — in his words — shameless blog plugs.

Gratuitous webmaster plug. Check out my new blog! “How To Make A Film In A Week”: http://tinyurl.com/dle4fo3:17 AM Apr 28th from web

I don’t mean to pick on @chuckpalahniuk, I’m certainly a fan of his alter ego’s writing. I’m singling him out because he represents exactly how not to use this amorphous communication vehicle we call twitter. Namely…

It has to be you.  Turns out @chuckpalahniuk is something of an amalgamation, a mythical creature with the name and likeness of the best-selling author but the voice of his webmaster Dennis. Quite simply, if you’re having your webmaster tweet, you shouldn’t be on twitter at all.  Twitter is a place to be you, to talk like you, and to listen like you. If you’re not being you, people will sniff you out and they will lose interest quickly, as in “who invited the sociopathic self-promoting android to the dinner party?” Particularly if you ARE an inherently interesting person — like I assume Chuck Palahniuk to be — with a distinct and recognizable voice and humor. All the more obvious when it doesn’t sound like you. And it doesn’t sound like Chuck. It sounds like Dennis. Or more accurately, it sounds like Dennis begrudgingly tweeting because someone decided Chuck “should have a twitter presence.”

People do not follow you for a list of promotional updates. If I want promotional updates, I’ll opt into an email list or an SMS promotion. I follow @chuckpalahniuk because I want to know that Chuck Palahniuk had runny eggs for breakfast and he’s tired of hearing about the Swine Flu. I don’t care that Chuck is appearing at the Strand on May 6th at 6:30 PM — or maybe I do, but its not ALL I care about — I want to know details. I want to know if he thinks the Strand is as gross, musty, and utterly unnavigable as I do — in other words, I want to build a conversational relationship. Which is extremely easy to do. Contrary to what Dennis might think.

There is no “us and them.” Recently a follower of @chuckpalahniuk questioned whether Chuck would placate the masses by actually speaking to them himself. @chuckpalahniuks response:

@jamesgardiner I’m working on it, but he’s a busy guy. For now, this is the best you’re gonna get.

Take that, all you faceless fans out there. To use a facebook analogy — and to continue the gratuitous repetition of the letter f — Followers are neither fans nor friends. They land somewhere squarely in the middle. They certainly don’t expect you to share childhood photos, but they do expect a conversation that is more than a one-way communication from ruler to subject. And they certainly don’t want to be talked down to. Especially not by Dennis. Yeah, I’m busy too, Dennis. So is @RealHughJackman and @THE_REAL_SHAQ, both of whom tweet regularly — as themselves.

But Chuck, even if by some miracle you are busier than Shaq, tweeting is easy!  You can tweet from your phone in 10 seconds. You can tweet from the cab on your way over to the Strand… something to the effect of:

in cab, on way to reading at Strand.

There’s simply no way you’re too busy to tweet. Which makes me think you probably aren’t that interested in twitter. Because only people who are actually interested in twitter bother to write updates about being in cabs on the way to readings. And if you’re not that interested in twitter, then you probably shouldn’t be on it…

I’ll end with a simple request to the real Chuck Palahniuk. If the Chuck Palahniuk you want the world to see and hear and engage with is indeed best exemplified in the tweets of @chuckpalahniuk, then by all means keep doing what you’re doing. But upon review, if you realize that @chuckpalahniuk is in fact a boring impostor, a man with your name and likeness but who does things you would never do and says things that you would never say… then maybe you should let us have the real Chuck for a while.

In other words, don’t be boring.

– @brooklynjosh

Author’s note: As I write this, @chuckpalahniuk has 228,584 followers on Twitter, and I have 92. So that fact alone might trump any feeble points I have made here.

Street Art Revelation #13: Magic Straight Perm

In Queens they call it the “Magic Straight Perm.” I believe its more commonly referred to as a “shower.”

Street Art Revelation #12: My response to the swine flu.

Street Art Revelation #11: CHFO

I happened upon this gravestone in an unmarked graveyard by the side of Cerrillos Road in Santa Fe New Mexico. Some men lead lives of quiet desperation. Others have the words “Cowboy, Father, Husband, and Outlaw” as their eternal epitaph. Hopefully those aren’t the only two options, but man, what a badass. All of a sudden my balls feel really small.

“One of the Greatest and Most Exciting Events in Human History.”

The Chinese government — and apologist journalism — achieved new lows today, with a Beijing spokesperson quoted in this monstrosity of an article by AP’s Anita Chang as saying that the occupation of Tibet was: “one of the greatest and most exciting events in human history” and lauding it as “an important milestone in the world’s anti-slavery movement.”

My response to this insult is below:

To the Editor:

The laws of good journalism dictate that reporters should present a balanced view of any story, drawing on accepted fact as well as on opinions and arguments from both sides of an issue.

The question I have after reading Anita Chang’s article on the Chinese Government’s newly created “Serf Emancipation Day” is what a responsible journalist should do when one side’s arguments aren’t even worth reporting.

The Chinese government’s utter disregard for the truth does not warrant the screenspace Ms. Chang affords it. No, repeat no, historian or international affairs analyst of any worth or measure would even entertain the equation of the occupation of Tibet with “an important milestone in the world’s anti-slavery movement,” or refer to it as one of the “greatest and most exciting events in human history.”

Reporters who cover the outrageous statements of Holocaust denial that emanate from Iran’s Ahmedinijad often do so with eyebrow raised and tongue planted firmly in cheek, as if to say: “He may be saying this, but we all know the Holocaust actually happened.”

What is troubling about Ms. Chang’s article is that she spends the majority of it presenting the Chinese government’s argument, without ever once dipping into the accepted historical record, which clearly states that Tibet was invaded and occupied and that during the years that followed many, many Tibetans were victims of forced labor and many more were tortured, imprisoned, and died.

The more that journalists cover the Tibet issue from the viewpoint of the Chinese government — whom Human Rights Watch has called the biggest propaganda machine in the world — without bothering to present accepted history, the further they are drifting from the laws of good journalism and the closer they get to being mouthpieces for a great and growing ugliness.

Josh Schrei
Former Chair, Students for A Free Tibet
Producer, Tibetan Freedom Concerts

Street Art Revelation #10: The Eternal Question

Why you treat me so bad??????

Street Art Revelation #9: When did mannequins get so hot?

When I was growing up, mannequins were awful, pale, shapeless things. Now apparently J-Lo and Sir Mix a Lot’s gift to American culture has extended even to the once humble mannequin. Though of course these mannequins have no upper bodies. Which isn’t that hot. Unless you’re into that kind of thing.

Street Art Revelation #8: Imaginary Friends Exist

Its true.

Street Art Revelations Special Edition: Texas Signs

To me, nothing says Texas like guns, fire ants, rabbit meat, God, wholesale TNT, defensive drivers, and Bovine Reproductive Services.

Don’t get me wrong. I love Texas. Here are some dreamy pictures of Texas farm country from my recent trip to Austin…

Street Art Revelation #7: Scientology is creepy.

So I snuck into the Scientology compound in L.A. recently just for the hell of it, and what did I find but an absolute wealth of airbrushed motivational poster art. Its comforting to know that if sales of Dianetics ever tank or the Hollywood cash flow dries up, the Church can always auction this stuff off to Dentist offices around the globe. And yes, I am writing all this tangential crap because I really don’t want to think about what the “purification rundown” actually involves.