The Thirst Games

Mad Men: The Drinking Game; or Why Punk Sucks

 

                Punk rock  is terrible.  Now, I’m not talking about the music alone, because though the vast majority of it is unlistenable garbage, there are some bands in that genre that are undeniably great. I grew up on a healthy diet of Green Day, The Clash, The Ramones, The Germs, and The Velvet Underground (which gets included in this genre, for some crazy reason.) I’m talking about the pathos of this subculture which consists of a group of people who purposefully put themselves on the margins of society.  Punks have extreme tendencies, from the way they dress to the way they brawl, their politics and choices in hairstyle. It’s about rebellion. My problem is in the bones of this message; I’m railing against the package they sold you.

The punk scene appealed to those who felt outside of mainstream culture.  It was a phenomenon that swept up those who thought of themselves as disenfranchised youths who were disgusted with the life that American consumerism offered (don’t bring up the fact that Punk rock shared a lot of popularity in Great Britain, I am not talking about those wenuses. The rebellion of British punkers against their governments were for their own political reasons).  And believe me, philosophically, I can totally understand that reaction. But here’s the thing that was so disingenuous about punk rawk: It became a subculture that had a specific attitude, lifestyle, and very specific clothing of things that were designed to be purposefully shocking. Not to mention all the bastardized incantations that came after (I’m looking at you, Avril Lavgine). It all seems so disingenuous because, look, weirdos have no idea they are weird. They aren’t trying to be anything, they just are who they are and don’t care what mainstream society thinks of them, like Salvador Dali or Weird Al Yankovic.

 

To purposefully put yourself in the fringes of society still takes a working knowledge of the stuff a society considers normal (wearing a tie, brushing one’s hair) and intentionally subverting that. If you don’t like what society thinks is normal, and project an image that represents the exact opposite of that, then all you are doing is reinforcing that what society thinks is normal is in fact normal. You are letting the culture that you are rebelling against (for telling you who to be) by letting it tell you who to be.  You are actively buying the clothes, the music, and the hair dye that you think best represent who you are as a person; it’s still consumerism. Rebellion against normality is never more than an illusion, because it is defined by what it’s rebelling against and still has to play by the rules that the larger society sets.  And with a few exceptions, the music  just sounds like a bunch of  guys screeching into microphones and banging their instruments against the amps who found a way to market themselves well.

Mad Men is the antithesis of everything those punkers stood for. It takes place in a sleek, polished, Madison Avenue advertising agency. Over the last six seasons, Mad Men has detailed the lives of the people who work at the firm Sterling Cooper Draper Price. And I do mean detailed — it’s been a slow burn. Creator Matthew Weiner has laid out the story at a deliberately slow pace. The show maintains several different story lines by only giving you tiny and infrequent glimpses into the inner world of the characters. The breakout star of the show is the popular and multitalented Jon Hamm, who plays Donald Draper. Draper is a cool, complicated, and nuts-deep, fucked-up ad man. Some of my favorite parts of the show deal with the way Draper’s firm constructs these advertisements. They get right down to the basic human experience, and how we construct our identity through the things we buy. Draper isn’t just trying to sell you garbage you don’t need  to swindle you out of your food stamps and spare income. That’s part of it, but he seems to have a preternatural instinct for what makes people fit together. He is able to take this knowledge and spearhead these campaigns that both get to the heart of what people desire and mock the culture ironically. Take a look at this ad from the show:

It’s an ad for lipstick, but in its message is a clear connection between feminine beauty and power. Her lipstick not only enhances her lips, but symbolizes her prowess over her man. Look at the woman — She isn’t smiling like a goon staring off in the distance, she is looking deadpan into your eyes, which is a powerful, aggressive image. Image is important. It’s important to an advertising agency, and it’s important to a teenage punk rocker buying her first pair of Doc Martins. It helps us to define who we are to the outside world. Mad Men is about the understanding of that image, its hypocrisy, and the way that image is constructed.

Phew, that was meaty. Let’s have a drink.

 

The Mad Men Drinking Game Rules:

1. Pick a hero

A. Roger Cooper (John Slatterly)

You’ll need a bottle of Smirnoff Vodka.  Drink it neat or in a dry Martini.

 

B. Donald Draper (Jon Hamm)

 

You’ll need bourbon, either neat or in an Old Fashioned.

 

C. Peggy Olson (Elizabeth Moss)

 

You need whiskey, neat or with Ginger Ale on the rocks.

Rules:

• Drink when anyone drinks.

Goodnight!

-SR