Ye Olde Staging Point

So, Bob Hope died recently. I'm vaguely familiar with Bob Hope, although I have never, to my knowledge, actually seen him in any of his movies or comedy acts except perhaps in brief excerpts; the general consensus seems to be that he was a pretty funny and influential guy. Good for him.

Which brings me around to the point of this rant. In my Internet travels over the weekend, I came across this article at Slate (found by following a link from AndrewSullivan.com) about Bob Hope. Specifically, about completely shredding Bob Hope's life and career on the grounds that he wasn't really all that funny.

Now, I'm a pretty average sort of person, intellect-wise, but "humor" seems to me to be one of the more subjective, eye-of-the-beholder type concepts out there, which makes me wonder why a journalist is taking time out of his busy schedule to rip apart a (recently deceased, remember) comedian that he doesn't happen to find funny. Along the way we are treated to a nice quotable quote about the sort of people who apparently enjoyed Bob Hope's jokes:

This is comedy for people who have no sense of humor and who come determined to be entertained and laugh to show that they "get it."

So it turns out that everyone who found Bob Hope funny is a dull-witted moron whose intelligence pales before the vast and witty intellect of Christopher Hitchens.

But this gag-inducing pretentiousness aside, after reading this article, I was left with one question: What is the point of this exercise in bitterness? And how does it come to grace the (virutal) pages of a major online journal? What would inspire someone, especially a trained journalist, to take up their pen and spew such vitriol all over the life of a harmless person whose jokes, funny or not, so many people appreciated? I'd like to think that when you set out to write something--be it a humorous piece, informative story, thoughtful critique, or thought-provoking opinion--that writers are bound by some sort of moral injunction that they be doing so for purposes loftier than simply reveling in the puerile glee of having savaged something that others cherished. Did Mr. Hitchens put down his pen after writing this article and feel anything like pride at what he had written? Of all the evils he could be addressing from behind his Internet pulpit, the target of his viciousness is... Bob Hope. The sheer pettiness is just astounding.

Ahem. Apologies for the rant. Nothing to see here--move along, move along.