Dogs are good boys, humans are bad and sad
The Onion 20 years ago published a great "Area Man" newspaper. Also, we learn that even if your kid has cancer, you still need to hit your sales targets.
Welcome back to The Onion: 20 Years Later, where we review the print issue from exactly 20 years ago, find out what’s still funny and examine the cultural impact. Today, we revisit Dec. 6, 2000.
This week, The Onion barely pays attention to the real world, instead diving deep into its fake local news universe. Get ready for many “Area Man” stories and one “Area Dogs” story.
As always, please like and share this email — it’s the best way to let people know about The Onion: 20 Years Later! And if you’re new here, sign up directly below.
What issue is this?
This was Vol. 36, Issue 44, the 42nd published Onion issue of the 2000s and the 41st issue of new content.
Here’s what the website (kind of) looked like in 2000, as well as in 2010 and today.
Two headlines are no longer online: “KFC Manager Robbed At Sporkpoint” and “$175 Appliance Makes One Kind Of Food,” which feels like it predicted the startup disaster Juicero.
Also not online, and not even in the 2010 archive, is the story “Attorney Gives Young Woman His Card, The Creeps.” I’m unsure whether this was an oversight or whether something caused The Onion to memory-hole the story.
What was the top story, and other impressions?
The Onion’s Dec. 6, 2000, issue wasn’t really a concept piece, but there are a couple themes. One is that people are bad, sad or unlucky. We’ll get to these stories shortly.
The other theme is that dogs are good, and also that “Nation's Dog Owners Demand To Know Who's A Good Boy” would have killed on social media if it ran even 10 years later.
The Onion in 2000 loved a good fake lobbying group, and National Doggy Appreciation Society fits the bill here. And like similar Onion stories, this group meets in Washington, D.C., to rally around the cause. The Onion tries to drum up conflict, but all they get is slight disagreement on how to express your fealty:
Despite its consensus on overall dog adorableness, the dog-loving community remains sharply divided on the question of who is a good boy. Some say the answer is "Such a good boy, yes." Others contend the good boy "needs his belly rubbed, yes, oh yes." Still other factions maintain that the only good boy is "my special little snuffy-snuffers, the bestest of all the best boys there is."
The National Doggy Appreciation Society’s polling also reveals dog owners who don’t like talking to their pets — “The Pat-Pat League, an extremist group that wants entirely non-verbal resolutions.”
I’ve never had a dog, so I’m not the target audience. But it’s good, playful fun that also lets The Onion return to its pre-election conception of what the “real issues” are.
Area People doing Area Bad Things
So many bad people! Let’s start with the aforementioned “Attorney Gives Young Woman His Card, The Creeps.” The story is as you’d expect: A 53-year-old man coming on to an acquaintance’s 20-year-old daughter and is delusional and arguably stalker-like in his pursuit. Here’s a sample quote:
“He then mentioned his collection of etchings and asked if she had ever danced to Ravel's Bolero.”
We also have “Black Guy Photoshopped In,” which reminds us that institutions have been paying lip service to diversity for decades! One fun note is that “Photoshopping” must not have been universally known, so The Onion felt compelled to mention that Adobe Photoshop was used.
The graphic designer talks at length about the difficulty in finding black people for the photos.
Added Tompkins: "If you think it's hard to find a picture of a black guy, try finding a smiling black guy!"
There’s also an ISU official using the phrase “friendship between the races.”
This is all uncomfortable. Thankfully, The Onion is clear that Iowa State is the one being mocked. And it reminds me of my college, which had a somewhat similar incident about 20 years ago. The black person on the cover of a publication was actually in the photo, but he was, I believe, a seasonal employee and not a student.
This feels like the perfect segue to “There's No 'My Kid Has Cancer' In Team,” as at least the sales manager in this column isn’t a hypocrite like those universities!
This column is one long sales motivation speech, except entirely focused on this poor parent’s malingering (i.e., caring for his child). Here’s just one of the quotes, which reminds us to Always Be Closing:
Did you even try to give the sales pitch to your kid's doctors? The nurses? The Make-A-Wish guys? See, that's what I'm talking about. You're letting opportunities slip through your fingers, and that hurts the team!
Anyways … those are the most notable examples of bad people in The Onion 20 years ago, but you might also enjoy:
“Man Can't Decide Whether To Give Sandwich To Homeless Or Ducks”: One guess for how this story ends.
“Personals Ad Omits Goiter”: Just this headline and a tiny, pixelated photo you can see here.
“Youth Sports, Adult Violence”: The Onion examines what was apparently a real-life trend of American parents being stupid about youth sports. As usual, the “systems analyst” (an Onion staple) has the best/worst answer:
"Why are these grown men hitting each other? They should be hitting the kid who blew the game."
Area People being Area Sad
There’s also a lot of bad news for the local people interviewed by The Onion’s fine reporting team this week.
“Hard Day's Work Fails To Yield Sense Of Job Well Done” continues The Onion’s malaise about the rewards of work. This time, it’s a financial services administrative assistant, and not The Onion’s usual default of a blue-collar worker.
“48-Year-Old Still Unsure What He Wants To Do With His Life”: Look, I think is funny even if many millions of us feel the same way sometimes. This guy laments the promotions he keeps getting from the Postal Service, which is a curious complaint to read right now. He’s got lots of ideas, however, and I love this quote for its sheer range:
Other careers Cellini has considered include lawyer, private detective, special-effects artist, used-bookstore owner, pastry chef, sitcom writer, and paramedic.
“Shingles Sufferer Sick Of Explaining What Shingles Is”: This disease could have a more straightforward name, I guess.
“Area Senior Up For Some Boggle”: Boggle’s a fine game, but I doubt The Onion meant this to be complimentary.
Area Religion condemns Area People doing It
Along with bad and sad people, we have the all-encompassing feature “Vatican Warns Against Increasingly Healthy Attitudes Toward Sex,” which is only slightly satirizing the Catholic Church’s stance on non-procreative sex.
The humor is found in the exhausting detail of the various sinful acts and utterances — “intercourse positions designed to heighten sensations of ecstasy” is banned, for example.
Also notable is the quoting of Archbishop (and future Cardinal) Edward Egan, who later refused to apologize for failing to root out priest pedophilia. This quote reads several ways now:
"There is nothing holy about people feeling good about their bodies and themselves."
(I was an altar boy growing up in Connecticut and served at a couple Masses that Egan officiated, hence my extra interest in this.)
Were the infographics good?
“Least-Safe Airlines” feels kind of random, but that’s OK. I really enjoyed “Amtrak Air,” and I say that even though I regularly take Amtrak in normal times and think we need more regional inter-city rail routes.
I did not laugh at the Bubba joke, which is lazy hillbilly humor The Onion occasionally succumbed to in 2000.
“Airline ‘77” is a nod to the disaster movie “Airport '77.” If you read this regularly, you know I love to give context for these references. Talking about "Airport '77” in 2000 is like referencing “Dante’s Peak” or “Volcano” in 2020.
I completely missed the Razor scooter fad in 2000, so “The Scooter Craze” was new to me. Today, we have electric scooters all over city streets, so I guess this fad eventually found the right formula (i.e. venture capital funding).
“Enables children to establish class distinctions just like adults” is a vicious line.
What columnists ran?
Finally, some good news for Onion publisher emeritus T. Herman Zweibel in his latest column, “All's Right With The World.”
Now, his idea of happiness does not mean he is gaining new wealth, enjoying robust health or even getting an extra dose of laudanum. In fact, these periods of happiness seem to portend doom, including the 1918 influenza pandemic (he got it, but recovered):
“Come to think of it, I only experience times of buoyant mood when disaster is about to bring the shit-hammer down upon my head.”
What will happen next to our country? To Zweibel?
Speaking of Onion columnists with delusional qualities, we return the accountant/white-guy-trying-too-hard Herbert Kornfeld, with a column titled, simply, “H-Dog Jr.”
Turns out Kornfeld might be a father, as documented in the extremely-2000-titled “Cash-Room Bitch Be Havin' My Shortie,” which I discussed in March as the pandemic shut everything down. Kornfeld is excited about the birth even as he suspects other men could be the father.
As I’ve mentioned, Kornfeld’s slang isn’t easy to follow, and his views are archaic in 2020. But at least his prose is action-packed — he’s trying to resolve an account variance of $194.07, calls in a favor to get transportation to the hospital (he hates the bus), and goes toe-to-toe with Agnes’ mother, who wants her grandchild to have no part of the “officin’” life.
Kornfeld has also apparently never seen a baby, but he eventually accepts this strange creature:
But he don't look like no shortie I ever seen. He all red an' shit, an' his face be all pinched up. He don't even look like no boy.
…
Suddenly, he didn't look like some Yoda-lookin' freak, but a true son an' worthy heir of tha H-Dog.
Here’s what I think: Zweibel and Kornfeld don’t make any sense in today’s world, but they are a wall-sized window into how The Onion staff thought about the alternate universe they were creating in Madison, Wis. (soon to be New York City).
These columnists, along with Jean Teasdale, don’t always hold up well, but they are part of the personality that made The Onion great. And so they are worth talking about, and I’m happy to do the reading for you.
Most “Hey, it’s 2000!” reference
Every single thing in “Freddie Prinze Jr. Fan's Favorite Color Also Green,” including the reference to Tiger Beat magazine. But especially the phrase “teen heartthrob Freddie Prinze Jr.”
Was Bill Clinton mentioned? Was an animal quoted?
No Clinton, and dogs were discussed but not quoted.
What was the best horoscope?
The Onion predicted the future of dozens of C-list celebrities and journalists in this week’s horoscopes:
Gemini | May 21 to June 20
Your view of yourself as the victim in every situation will earn you your own cable talk show.
What holds up best?
“Nation's Dog Owners Demand To Know Who's A Good Boy” probably holds up better than any story The Onion published in 2000, as dog mania has only grown since then. The phrase “dog parent” probably existed back then, but it was not yet something that people proudly described themselves as, like saying “ambassador” or, you know, “parent.”
“Black Guy Photoshopped In” and “The Scooter Craze” also feel relevant today, whether for good or bad.
What holds up worst?
Sadly, the Herbert Kornfeld column “H-Dog Jr.” is probably for diehards only.
What would be done differently today?
No Herbert Kornfeld, that’s for sure! There are a few word choices throughout that would be changed today, also.
And, of course, there would be much more election coverage.
What real-life events/people were mentioned?
Al Gore. George W. Bush. Freddie Prinze Jr. Elvis Presley. Pope John Paul II. Edward Egan. Joaquin Navarro-Valls.
Gore and Bush are mentioned in “Gore Calls For Recount Of Supreme Court Vote.” The best defense of this article’s humor is that it seems to be referencing the Court’s internal disagreement despite the public 9-0 vote. But who would remember that now?
An Elvis impersonator is mentioned in the horoscopes.
The pope and Navarro-Valls are mentioned in “Vatican Warns Against Increasingly Healthy Attitudes Toward Sex,” although Navarro-Valls is mistakenly called a cardinal. He was a layperson who was a key spokesman for John Paul II.
What was happening in the real world?
Here are real-world news events from Nov. 27-Dec. 3, 2000, stopping a few days early to account for the lead time The Onion needed to print and ship a newspaper.
News is from InfoPlease and the front pages of The New York Times (subscription required). Movie and music charts are linked:
Mad Cow alarms Europe. GSA hasn’t released transition funds for Bush or Gore. Microsoft wants antitrust verdict tossed out. Jeff Immelt to become General Electric CEO, replacing Jack Welch. NYT profiles prison boom, parole. Report: N.J. State Police routinely profiled; N.J. blames the feds. Supreme Court bars police roadblocks for drug searches. Canada re-elects Jean Chrétien. Mexico presidency changes parties for first time in 71 years. “Entrepreneurs' 'Golden Age' Is Fading in Economic Boom.” Chilean judge orders house arrest for Gen. Augusto Pinochet. Auto insurers target larger vehicles for rate changes.
Top movie (weekend of Dec. 1-3): “How the Grinch Stole Christmas”
Top TV show (Nov. 27-Dec. 3): “Who Wants To Be A Millionaire”
Billboard top single (Dec. 2): “Independent Women Part 1,” Destiny’s Child
Billboard top album (Dec. 2): “1,” The Beatles