McKean's Inversion

[metaphortunate]

Also, I noticed the other day that Scalzi had done a post about what he calls McKean's Inversion: i.e., the law that anyone who describes themselves as "classy" immediately, accurately and irrevocably conveys the message that they are not classy.

I thought of this on Friday because of my one coworker who is the type of person who would never describe herself as "quirky". We all went out to lunch and politely spent much of the time looking at the pictures of squirrels on her iPad that she really wanted to show us. People who say they are "quirky", I somehow magically hear "desperate to be interesting".

I actually don't think "funny" is one of those words, though. Though maybe this is because I know a lot of professional juggler/comedians. I mean, plenty of unfunny people say they're funny - most salient example right now, my two-year-old, who likes to say his most annoying bullshit is "funny" - but plenty of funny people, even people funny enough to be professionally funny, also say that they're funny, with good reason. In my experience there's neither a negative nor a positive correlation.

Comments

[jae]

There are people who describe themselves as 'classy'? Unironically?

-J

[xiphias]

I agree that one of the reasons that "funny" doesn't do that is EXACTLY that you can be professionally funny. There's a guy that I RPG with at cons if I run into him whose business card just says "William [oh how embarrassing -- I can't remember his last name] is a very funny man that you can hire to be funny by contacting him at [contact information]."

Bill Cosby's first album was titled "Bill Cosby is a Very Funny Fellow -- Right." If your job is to be funny, you have to tell people that your job is to be funny, and you are good at it, because you are funny.

On the other hand, while plenty of people's jobs REQUIRE them to be classy, that's not the actual DESCRIPTION of the job. In addition, you can state that your job can ADD a touch of class to an event, but that's not the same as saying that you are PERSONALLY classy -- rather, that you can professionally help OTHER people be classy.

But "quirky"? I'm not sure I want to live in a world where "professionally quirky" would be a thing.

[luna]

I think they're more often found yelling about how *not classy* other people are. Frequently on Bravo reality shows.

[jae]

I can definitely imagine that much more easily!

-J

[metaphortunate]

Maybe if Manic Pixie Dream Girl was an actual career. :)