Big Smile, No Teeth: Parody's dead, killed by the reality of 2020

Anti-vaxxers are accusing Bill Gates of wanting to pump them full of nanobots in the guise of a vaccine. You know, we couldn’t make this stuff up! Graphic: 123rf.com

I love satirical humour so I used to love reading headlines from the forerunner of parody Internet news The Onion. I’ve been reading The Onion ever since I first found out about it in the late 1990s in university. That’s well over 20 years. But in 2020, The Onion’s headlines just don’t have the same wit that they used to. Is it because the writers are slipping? No. It’s because 2020 is beyond parody.

We’re experiencing a year that most would agree is among the worst of our collective lives. The Covid-19 pandemic. The ensuing economic crisis. The repercussions of 2020 will be felt well past this cruddy year. And, just to twist the screw, 2020 has also laid waste to parody.