F*** ‘Em if They Can’t Take a Joke

/ ruswornom
The backlash has begun.
It’s a book for grownups — a parody of a child’s picture book, with a sentiment that parents are sure to sympathize with.
If you have kids, come on, admit it: you’ve thought this very thing.  Now Adam Mansbach and Ricardo Cortés have put your thoughts to paper.

Go the F*** to Sleep is hilarious.  The New Yorker loved it.  Samuel L. Jackson narrated a portion of the book on Letterman.  Even websites for kids and families, such as Kidlantis, love the book.  And what parent with a sense of humor wouldn’t appreciate a verse such as

The cats nestle close to their kittens now.
The lambs have laid down with the sheep.
You’re cozy and warm in your bed, my dear
Please go the f**k to sleep.

But, oh nooooooo, the mundanes — the muggles — are up in arms, trying to protect their precious little snowflakes from such unholy filth.

Karen Spears Zacharias is a good, Godfearing nonfiction writer, or, as she describes herself on her site:

Author/Journalist/Speaker on a life-long quest in search of God’s poetry and presence.

How the hell did this suburban Khrist Krispie ever find a pulpit on cnn.com for her brand of over-protective, ultra-religious bullshit?  This piece of WE-HAVE-TO-PUT-THE-CHILDREN-FIRST tripe is the first article I’ve seen — and certainly won’t be the last — by self-righteous, humorless know-nothings whose mission in life is to stand up for little Suzy and Timmy and the other little snowflakes who could be harmed — Hurt!  Injured!  Maimed!  Irreparably damaged by the power of words and ideas! — by imaginary violence that “could” be induced by this slim book of humorous verse.  With Go the F*** to Sleep, she somehow puts two and two together to come up with pi.  Pi, in this case, is commensurate with infinite insanity.  

“Go the F*** to Sleep” mocks the parental frustrations of trying to lay a child down to bed. Crass in concept and execution, this is an expletive-filled bedtime story intended solely for the amusement of parents.

Joan Demarest is an attorney in Corvallis, Oregon, and the mother of three young boys. Demarest told me that initially she thought the book was funny. That was before she read it. “Now I find it unsettling. I don’t like violent language in association with children.”

When the censors come out, it’s always for the sake of the children.  Sorry, but that just doesn’t cut it.  Especially when it’s a book for adults, not kids.

Zacharias nutballs it from the very beginning of her essay.  This book doesn’t mock parental frustrations.  It admits they exist.  This is a book reflecting, in a very funny and extremely clever way, how a lot of parents feel  — if not every single one of them, at some point — about their kids who just won’t fall asleep when, well, you know: when they need to go the fuck to sleep, and right now, damn it.  Then she brings in the hovering spectres of child neglect and abuse — even though this book doesn’t imply abuse, wish for it, urge it, nor indicate it at all.  Then she tries to backpedal:

Nobody is suggesting that there’s a connection between Adam Mansbach’s book and child abuse or child neglect. Still, there’s no denying the reason “Go the F*** to Sleep” should be kept out of reach of children is because of its violent language and because of the way it demeans children.

Yeah, Karen, that’s exactly what you’re doing: suggesting books like this promote neglect and abuse, although you deny the specific connection (in case there’s a lawsuit, perhaps?).

For a supposed Christian, the author is, basically, lying — creating connections where they don’t exist in order to convince us that her holier-than-thou point of view is correct, and that Go the F*** to Sleep is EEEEEEEVIL.  (She and Michele Bachmann need to huddle together in a faith-based lesbian frenzy.  I hear the crazoid needs a running mate…)


Yes, the language is crass . . . and that was the author’s intent.  This whole book is one big joke that most parents are in on.  They get the joke.  Zacharias obviously doesn’t.  And the execution of  the illustrations, the satire — the whole book — are far from crass.  The workmanship is professional, and the art is a parody of classic children’s picture book illustration.

It works — and it’s funny.  And that’s why the zealots will always hate it. 


Because, at it’s core, it’s true.  It’s 100% honest.


Go the F*** to Sleep is a joke that mundanes and God-thumpers will never get.

And you know what we say about the uptight asses who don’t know what’s funny…

You can buy the book from Amazon here.  Get a lot of copies and really piss off the right-wing soccer moms who still haven’t graduated from their evangelical community colleges.
 




One thought on “F*** ‘Em if They Can’t Take a Joke”

Leave a Reply

Fill in your details below or click an icon to log in:

Gravatar
WordPress.com Logo

You are commenting using your WordPress.com account. ( Log Out /  Change )

Facebook photo

You are commenting using your Facebook account. ( Log Out /  Change )

Cancel

Connecting to %s

This site uses Akismet to reduce spam. Learn how your comment data is processed.