The 8th Type of Bizarro Fiction Hater

bizarrofictionhater

I don’t hate bizarro fiction, regardless of what others might say. I love bizarro fiction. I’ve put more time, effort and creativity into writing bizarro books than I did making films, which is saying something.

I never had to quit filmmaking. I chose to. I never had to write bizarro fiction. I chose to. I’m not bitter. I haven’t been rejected. I don’t think I’m better than other bizarro writers. I don’t misunderstand what bizarro is.

I’ve sat on and hosted writing panels at Bizarrocon and am the ONLY bizarro fiction writer to be nominated twice in the same Wonderland Award category in the same year. I founded a publishing house listed on Bizarrocentral.com as a bizarro press. Helped kick start the careers of many beginning bizarro authors and cover artists.

I’ve been published on Bizarro Central numerous times. I’ve been featured in numerous bizarro anthologies. Appeared multiple times as a featured guest on the most popular bizarro podcasts. I’m probably among the most successful indie bizarro authors never published by Eraserhead Press or one of her imprints.

I’m a new type of bizarro fiction hater. I’m the 8th type.

Back in 2012, my friend Carlton Mellick wrote an essay on Bizarrocentral.com outlined the 7 types of bizarro fiction haters. Back then, bizarro was still riding a transgressive wave. It had built its reputation off of books like Ass Goblins of Auschwitz, Cripple Wolf and Adolph in Wonderland.

Books like The Baby Jesus Buttplug and Rampaging Fuckers of Everything on the Entire Shitting Planet of the Vomit Atmosphere. Bizarro was punk rock. Bizarro was rebellion. Bizarro took heat from all the other literary communities. In other words, bizarro was cool as fuck.

Then a funny thing happened. Bizarro authors who’d found success writing subversive, fuck-the-mainstream badass books suddenly went soft. Maybe it was the criticism of the literary community at large. Maybe their egos couldn’t handle being seen as juvenile one trick ponies. Shock jocks with a pen. A one note joke.

Whatever it was, it happened. The same guys writing joke Nazi books became fly fishermen and literary authors. They turned into Carlton’s first type of bizarro fiction hater, the “2 literary 4 U” hater, without ever coming out publicly in condemnation of the genre. They just slowly backed away.

Most people didn’t notice. Most people STILL haven’t noticed how dull and boring bizarro fiction has become. How neutered. How toothless. But I’ve noticed. And I’ve been on the front lines fighting for our ability to be punk rock. To say fuck the establishment and be OFFENSIVE again. That’s what brought me here in the first place. That’s what brought a LOT of us here in the first place.

And for that, I’ve been labeled a hater. See, you can’t actually have a relevant criticism in the social justice age. Now, in today’s social and political climate, you’re either with the regressive left, or you’re literally a Nazi. Ironic, since some of the best bizarro fiction is Nazi satire.

Hell, bizarro fiction has a literary tribute to GG Allin. If he was alive today, GG Allin wouldn’t get one FOOT in the door at a Bizarrocon. The so-called genre police would excommunicate him before he had a chance to get a single book published. I’ve seen them do it to people like him many times.

Art NEEDS to be controversial. Needs to find the limits of cultural acceptability and smash past them. The regressive left bizarro leaders pretend we still live in the 1990s. They’ve grown complacent as the status quo, firing arrows at religion and republicans long out of power and out of control of society. Worse, they’re actively trying to hold others back from creating truly provocative art.

Bizarro writers come to me in private and tell me they’re afraid to write about certain topics or discus their political points of view publicly for fear of being ostracized by the political zealots with power in our community. This is REAL. This is HAPPENING.

I don’t know what the future holds, but I do know that we’re living in scary, scary times and that my favorite genre of fiction is suffering because the loudest voices in its ranks are hysterical alt-left liberals who push their social and political ideology down the entire community’s throat.

It’s time to be louder than them. Fuck what you heard. I love bizarro fiction.

8 thoughts on “The 8th Type of Bizarro Fiction Hater

  1. Pingback: 5 Reasons Kevin Strange Spoke Out | KevinTheStrange.com

  2. I do have one thought and suspect you’ve had it too. Satire, rebellion, laughing at sacred cows, et al are needed and are displayed in other art forms. However, many people in the literary world find the printed word to be a “sacred cow.” Sure, as you said, the poke fun at liberals, religion,and right wing Republicans; safe targets which get the obligatory bored smiles.

    Zap Comix and R. Crumb were truly underground comics when I was much younger. I liked them and find that they are considered racist and sexist among other things. What I find amusing is that those characterizations were not said in their time; but are said by people of today.

    Fuck ’em if they can’t take a joke.

    Maybe like the Bizarro literature of today Zap was primarily for the young of the time. Maybe too; it takes a young mind to be on the cutting edge. Maybe too, some of the imitators were pretty stupid. So, the brilliant deduction that I made was not to buy all of them.

    There is a parallel with Bizarro. Some of it is as dumb as a dung beetle, and some of its fans are as happy as a dung beetle on a wet pile.

    Things were different then. The baby boomers were the center of the universe and everybody catered to them; and tried to sell them crap.

    This generation is largely ignored and they think that the long existing rights of the LGB&T sector is their enlightened height of social justice.

    Hehehe. Tough shit. Deal with it.

  3. Well, Strange… Since they appear to now be withholding my posts over on that site run by people who never censor anyone, I guess I’m the 9th. The kind that humbled himself to no end for years promoting their books, kickstarters (I don’t even fucking like crowdfunding), films, alienating my own friends and family and suspending my own Christian values, all to win their respect, then suddenly decided he was where he belonged and could let his guard down, but because he was raised in a different environment with different values that are far more benevolent than they could ever understand, burned out.

  4. And if any of them read this so they can take it back to their herd to make light of, fuck you. You fucking hypocrites and cowards. Rest assured, you don’t ever have to worry about me darkening any of your doorsteps again. Clearly, our paths should never have intersected.

    Rose and Donihe are saints. I exclude them from this missive entirely, and would even offer my regret that things didn’t work out.

  5. The fact is, I met Strange the year I went to Bizarrocon, and he was one of the few that didn’t come off condescending. That’s why I liked him. All you phonies who hugged and shook his fucking hand, then started practically gangstalking him as soon as he got back to Missouri. Digging up or even making up shit about his personal life. Who the fuck do you people think you are?! And one among you asks me to ‘keep an eye’ on Strange. Fuck you. What is this, a small press cold war? It was the same guy who threw up on Strange’s shoes in his lovesick stupor while Strange was trying to clean him up! That’s the person Strange is. You northwest-centric phonies.

  6. Perhaps someone not tripping over their own feet to be noticed by Carlton might have posed the question: “Why do you have seven different kinds of haters?”

    Maybe you should do a show on the 7 Kinds of Kevin Strange Haters.

  7. Pingback: A forradalom felfalja saját gyermekeit – a társadalomkritikus él, valamint annak kicsorbulása a bizarr irodalomban - The Black Aether

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