Why I love satire (and why you should too)

If I was to tell you why I love satire in one sentence I would say: "I love satire because it is one of the few things in this world that the weak can use to get back at the strong.” John Snyder touches upon this in his book Prospects of Power: Tragedy, Satire, the Essay and the Theory of Genre where he states that “Satire consists of literary strategies for gaining moral, social, religious or political ascendancy by reasoned demonstration that its high targets really are what they have been from the start – low” (p. 97). This, according to me, is a unique quality of satire in a society where most power is exercised by people in high positions (government officials, corporate leaders, leaders of big organisations and coalitions etc.) towards the “common man”. In a way, satire is almost exclusively reserved for the common man; it uses jokes and similes that the common man understands and appreciates. What’s more important is that satire almost exclusively aims at targets richer or more powerful than the common person; it aims at celebrities, companies, politicians, rich people and powerful religious leaders. To me, satirists are like Robin Hood-characters with slightly more conventional methods.

Let’s take a look at this example of satire from The Simpsons. Does it agree with John Snyder’s idea of satire as something demonstrating that its “high targets really are what they have been from the start – low”?