Betty Bowers is, of course, the comedic alter (altar?) ego of actor Deven Green, who has portrayed the white, upper middle class, self-satisfied, smug, self-righteous Betty for many years now. Her parody videos have often been spot on, while others have pointed out the hypocrisies of the ultra-religious, as well as their ignorance of what’s really in their holy book. No wonder I’m such a fan.
The graphic above is typical of what “Betty” posts to Facebook and Twitter, and many are taken from the Betty Bowers videos. Personally, I think the graphic related to her video “The DOs and DON’Ts of PRAYER” is one of best ever of these sorts of Betty Bowers graphics.
Betty’s previous Halloween graphic said “Halloween: The day that Satan introduces your child to the gateway drug to homosexuality: CONSTUMES!” And this is why, I think, the graphic above doesn’t include gay people: She already made the point. Betty frequently mocks homophobic religious nutters, so I think that including us in that graphic up top might actually have crossed the line into mocking gay people rather than those nutters, particularly since many of the things on the list of scary things really are scary to people, while gay people should never be. In other words, I think leaving gay people out of that one was definitely the right call.
I’m a huge fan of Betty Bowers partly because the parody and mocking is obvious, unlike those who engage in what I’ve called “Deep Cover Parody” in several posts. I think Betty Bowers doesn’t risk raising Poe’s Law, unlike all the deceptive deep cover parodies out there, and so, I think Betty Bowers makes points far, far more effectively.
And, of course, “Every Day is Halloween” made me think of this Ministry song.
Roger Green provides lots of interesting Halloween linkage.
Happy Halloween to those who care about it.
2 comments:
I think you're right about Betty. She is not easily mistaken for a legit person.
No, she isn't, and I think that's one of the main strengths of that character.
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