In These Trying Times, the Happy Place's Commitment to Stupid, Irrelevant Bullshit Remains Fierce
For the three years that this site has been in existence, the phrase “Escape the inexorable horror of contemporary life” has been the first thing readers see when logging on, just above the words “Welcome to the curious online realm of longtime pop culture writer Nathan Rabin. I very much want this to be your Happy Place too.”
When I wrote those words in early 2017,, I was exaggerating for comic effect. But I was also, on a fundamental level, not kidding or exaggerating at all. Even in the comparatively idyllic, long-ago days of 2017 a crazed narcissist was president, my industry was in a seemingly permanent free fall and it was becoming harder and harder to feed my family and pay the bills doing what I love with each passing day.
If the line about escaping the inexorable horror of contemporary life was at least somewhat tongue in cheek the part about me my website being my Happy Place and my desire for this to be a Happy Place for readers and patrons as well was one hundred percent, achingly sincere.
I started the Happy Place because I needed a permanent professional home where I could be my best, truest, purest, weirdest self and I desperately needed a new source of income but also because I saw, and see, the world, and particularly the internet, as a cesspool of greed and exploitation, fear and hate-mongering, cynical calculation and shameless clickbait.
I created the Happy Place to be a safe haven for oddballs and aficionados of everything cult and weird and obscure where I could write whatever the hell I wanted to write, regardless of whether or not it would bring in clicks or page-views or advertising revenue.
I created the Happy Place so that I could write about things that matter: mental illness and politics and the presidency and parenthood and trying to steal a little bit of happiness in an often cruel and insane world. But I also created the Happy Place to write about things that don’t matter, about terrible movies and self-published show-business memoirs and Ben Garrison cartoons and tabloid television and Kiss and cheesy old variety shows.
In other words, I created the Happy Place so that I could write about stupid bullshit that doesn’t matter, on my terms, for my audience. I did so because I realize that, in a very real way, stupid bullshit DOES matter.
To put things in Sullivan’s Travels terms, I realized that I could best serve the public good not by churning out the pop culture website equivalent of a dour message movie like Oh Brother Where Art Thou? but rather by distracting the masses with the escapist likes of Hay Hay in the Hayloft and Ants in Your Pants of 1939.
Before 2015, I made the mistake of wondering what it would be like to live in a Fascist country under a fascist dictator. I’ve also wondered what it would be like to live through the Great Depression. Now I feel like I have an answer for both questions, and, to be honest, it doesn’t feel great! In fact, it feels absolutely abysmal but I take some comfort in knowing that I have a role to play in this unending nightmare and that is to help distract you from the impending end of the world.
During the Great Depression we NEEDED the escapism and distraction of Hollywood at its fizziest and dizziest and most ridiculous. We similarly need to be distracted from the horrors of the pandemic with goofy, giddy reminders of how absurd and dumb and gloriously idiotic the world can be.
When I was reading and writing Doug Hutchison’s flaming garbage fire of a memoir, Flushing Hollywood I was filled with a curious but exhilarating sense of purpose. I felt like I was doing EXACTLY what I was put on earth to do.
So I can assure you that in the weeks and months and years ahead, the Happy Place’s commitment to writing about stupid bullshit will remain as fierce as ever. We will be carrying on as usual with the next 11 theme months of 2020/2021, and Travolta/Cage, and Control Nathan Rabin 4.0 and then in 2021 I will begin a project called a Trejo-A-Day-O, where I will write about a different Danny Trejo movie every day for an entire year.
You better believe I will be writing about the grubby likes of Who’s Harry Crumb And Loose Cannons with a renewed sense of purpose!
Writing has helped keep me sane and relatively hopeful in the early days of the quarantine. I hope reading the Happy Place will do the same for you.
We are currently at the start of an intense war on boredom that will be fought on many fronts. To paraphrase the inspiring words of a man who triumphed in a time of trial and adversity, I’m Nathan Rabin and I am reporting for duty!
Help ensure a future for the Happy Place in a scary and uncertain time by pledging at https://www.patreon.com/nathanrabinshappyplace
AND of course we would dig it if you would buy the Weird Accordion to Al book at https://www.amazon.com/Weird-Accordion-Al-Obsessively-Co-Author/dp/1658788478/ref=sr_1_1?keywords=weird+accordion&qid=1580693427&sr=8-1#customerReviews
Finally, if you’d like to contribute to the Happy Place without Patreon please do consider making a one-time donation through PayPal at nathanrabin@sbcglobal.net