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The Russian Reversal

2018-03-20 · letter vlog · John · 3:55 · watch on YouTube

Topic: History & curiosities · mode: Personal essay

John traces the Russian reversal joke from Yakov Smirnoff back to Cole Porter and Laugh-In, calls it a xenophobic Cold War weapon, finds the construction everywhere (Pollan's corn, Richard II, Piglet, Boss Baby, his own novel), and argues that reversing big forces such as algorithms and markets reveals where power really lies.

What is said

The parts of the video and what is said in each (★ — how much it matters to the video).

00:00:00 — History of the Russian reversal: Smirnoff, Cole Porter, Laugh-In, Cold War xenophobia, American reversals

  • ★★ John says the Russian reversal was a popular joke construction in his childhood; he first heard one in a 1985 Miller Lite commercial with comedian Yakov Smirnoff. — 00:00:01 · Russian reversal
  • ★★ John says the joke is much older: it was used in a 1938 Cole Porter musical and in a 1960s Laugh-In episode ('television watches you'). — 00:00:16 · Russian reversal
  • ★★ John notes the 'television watches you' joke was funny before televisions began gathering data on viewing habits: be careful who you laugh at. (playful) — 00:00:30
  • ★★★ John says Russian reversal jokes were low-level xenophobic Cold War weapons, getting Americans to believe their country was perfect in contrast to life in the Soviet Union. (hedged) — 00:00:40 · Russian reversal, United States
  • ★ John says there were also American reversal jokes; his favorite: in the Soviet Union people sometimes rob banks, in capitalist America the bank robs you. — 00:00:53 · United States
  • ★ John cites a joke refuting both ideologies by Moldovan-American educator Emil Robbie: under capitalism man exploits man, under communism the other way around. — 00:01:01 · United States

00:01:12 — The construction moves agency from you to the thing: Pollan's corn, Richard II, Piglet, Boss Baby, Turtles All the Way Down

  • ★★★ John says the reversal has been memed to near extinction online, but the construction interests him because it moves agency from you to the thing you thought you controlled. — 00:01:12 · Russian reversal
  • ★★ John says Michael Pollan's famous observation about corn is in a way a Russian reversal joke. (hedged) — 00:01:27 · Russian reversal
  • ★★ John relays Pollan's point that humans changed habitats, diets and travel patterns to make corn plentiful, so corn kind of becomes the farmer and we the crop. (hedged) — 00:01:31
  • ★ John says once you look, these jokes are everywhere, starting with Shakespeare: in Richard II the king says he wasted time and now time wastes him. — 00:01:50
  • ★ John cites a Winnie the Pooh story where Piglet says he is so small the kite flies him. — 00:01:59
  • ★ John cites 'the Oscar-nominated feature film Boss Baby', whose title character says either you run the day or the day runs you. (playful) — 00:02:04
  • ★ John says the book the Boss Baby film is adapted from is excellent. — 00:02:11
  • ★★ John says he used the construction a lot in Turtles All the Way Down (the storyteller is the story told; money spends you), because the book is about not captaining the ship of your self. — 00:02:15 · Turtles All the Way Down

00:02:28 — Reversing big forces (algorithms, markets) shows where power lies; false dichotomies; sign-off

  • ★★★ John says what he loves most about Russian reversals is that they reveal how weak we are before the forces of time, wind, money and everything else. (hedged) — 00:02:28 · Russian reversal
  • ★★★ John finds it helpful to take a Russian-reversal look at any big force, such as the social internet's algorithms: are they informing us, or are we informing them? — 00:02:37 · Russian reversal, recommender system
  • ★★ John asks of free markets whether markets exist to make human lives better and more efficient, or human lives exist to make markets better and more efficient. — 00:02:48
  • ★★ John says the reversal can create a false dichotomy: you can waste time and be wasted by time, and watch television while it watches you. — 00:02:55 · Russian reversal
  • ★★ John allows that some reversals may hold no tension: possibly whatever makes markets more efficient is good for human lives, and vice versa. (hedged) — 00:03:05
  • ★★★ John says that in his experience that kind of ideological rigidity rarely holds up to careful scrutiny. (hedged) — 00:03:14
  • ★★★ John likes the Russian reversal because it asks where power is really centered in our discourse; sometimes obviously, as humans who plant corn over the corn. — 00:03:19 · Russian reversal
  • ★★ John asks whether real power lies with the Twitter user choosing tweets and follows or the algorithm choosing what they see, and with people making markets work or markets making people work. — 00:03:31 · Twitter, recommender system
  • ★★★ John says these questions lack easy answers, but looking at them backwards tells us truths we might otherwise miss. (hedged) — 00:03:46

Humor (significant)

  • Laugh-In's joke that in the old country television watches you got a laugh — 00:00:30

    “That's funny, everyone said before our television started gathering reams of information about our viewing habits.”

  • John's favorite American reversal: in the Soviet Union people sometimes rob banks — 00:00:56

    “In capitalist America, bank robs you.”

  • A joke refuting both ideologies: under capitalism, man exploits man — 00:01:06

    “Under communism, it's the other way around.”

  • Listing literary sources of reversals after Shakespeare and Winnie the Pooh — 00:02:04

    “And in the Oscar-nominated feature film Boss Baby”

Threads in this video

Mentioned

Central: Russian reversal

Also: People: Cole Porter · Emil Robbie · Michael Pollan · William Shakespeare · Yakov Smirnoff

Works: Richard II · Rowan & Martin's Laugh-In · The Boss Baby · The Boss Baby (film) · Turtles All the Way Down

Organizations: Twitter

Concepts: false dilemma · free market · ideology · maize · recommender system · television · xenophobia

Places: Soviet Union · United States

Events: Cold War

Characters: Piglet · Winnie-the-Pooh

Products: Miller Lite

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