Wednesday we learned about satire, the use of irony to ridicule human folly. After discussing satirical headlines of The Onion and reading Mark Twain’s speech, I asked myself: How could satire by useful? Interested, I searched the web for an answer. Several minutes later, I found one. Ladies and gentlemen, I give you Niko Alm.
Austrian Niko Alm became frustrated with a double standard in his country, that Muslims were allowed to wear turbans in drivers license pictures while the rest of the population wasn’t. The Austrian government argued that turbans were allowed to be worn because of their religious importance. To point out how foolish this was, Alm created a perfectly satirical plan to make his point. Alm created ‘The Church of the Flying Spaghetti Monster’ which practices the religion of ‘Pastafarianism.’ These are the beliefs of Pastafarianism:
-Pirates were peacekeeping explorers and the original Pastafarians.
-Every Friday is a religious holiday.
-All global epidemics can be linked to the declining Pirate population
-All Pastafarians must wear pasta strainers on their heads at all times.
Alm showed up for his drivers license picture wearing his pasta strainer. He argued that because of the beliefs of Pastafarianism, he should be allowed to remain wearing it. Three years later and one court battle later, Alm had won his right to wear the pasta strainer, sparking a reform of Austrian government policies. Alm’s satirical actions furthered equal rights in Austria.
This is really interesting. I've known that satire is used to initiate societal changes but I've never thought about satire in real-life action, always ont eh screens or in the pages of a book. Good for this guy!
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