Dark Humour and Politics, Know what I’m sayin’?

Everyone deals with mourning and the loss of a friend or a family member in their own ways. Some people bask in all the glorious, good memories, while others utter ‘Good riddance’. Some donate vast amounts of money to name a wing in hospitals or community centers in honour of the one they’ve lost. Some go on a bender. Some hide away and cry away their sorrows. Many can’t quite come to terms with everything, standing around muttering words of disbelief. Some move on quickly. Some never do.

And some people fill a glass with a few fingers of bourbon and, with cigarette-stained fingers, hash something out that will let them reflect on the person gone.

So that’s what I’m going to do.

I met Adam some time in 2005 at the University of Toronto, Mississauga Campus. He was a Science major, and I was an English/History brat, and yet the differing foci of our study helped to bond us, as discussing each discipline further broadened our areas of conversation. After all, we didn’t meet in the classroom. We met at the Blind Duck Pub. A place to chat about whatever the hell was on our minds, whereupon he could drink, and I still couldn’t. And though I was an Autumn baby, and would have to wait until my sophomore year to get plastered while I should have been discussing Melville, or Spencer, or Beowulf — damn you, Beowulf. I studied you way too many times — intriguing and varying conversation about an assorted medley of topics — terrorism, racism, a million topical moments from 2005–2010, biochemistry, alleles, ritual practices, the merits of Cannibal Corpse, the inevitable incarceration of Jared Fogel, ironic anything-isms as a way to stimulate a deep discussion about various geopolitical and social issues, JRPGs and which era was the finest, Shenmue, black clothing, the merits of MDMA— substituted for stale, sudsy beer.

Until I could drink, then it complemented it.

Looking at that list, it’s woefully incomplete. Inebriation aside, there were too many topics of conversation over the years. And perhaps, for me, that’ll be what’s most longed for about him.

He had an incredible capacity for acquiring and judging information for its’ biases and merits, understanding rather complex systems of thought or order in multiple disciplines — he holds a B.SC in, if memory serves, Biochemistry, and had pursued research science as a career, though he more recently decided to pursue the realm of political science and had returned to schooling for that purpose — an ability to see through shallow points of view, and a scathingly savant command of dark humour. He also had a penchant for conspiracy theories, some of which I feel he put a little too much stock into, but there was a beauty about how he could rationalize things out, using the concepts of possibility and differing narratives as a way to craft a narrative that was more complete.

If incorrect, at least it was both intellectually stimulating and entertaining.

Part of me always knew he would get involved in the study of political science, though. We’re talking about a man who, for as long as I’ve known him, was someone I could talk to during every single election we’ve given any attention to, since 2005. Someone who cared what was going on outside of election cycles, too. Someone who actually knew about different electoral systems, beyond FPTP. Or who watched the various conventions in the States, and the primaries, with a childish glee, and who’d label politicians with an unmatched vitriol, calling out the very worst for exactly who they are. Hell, leading up to the election last month, we had a number of conversations commenting on the inevitable, and the eventual unmuzzling of our scientists. My, how we rejoiced.

He was a fucking breath of fresh air, wrapped up in about as many articles of black clothing as one could imagine. And that’s the image of him that will persist.

It wasn’t just politics, though. He had an incomparable command of dark humour, something I think takes both an incredible amount of empathy and sympathy to have. Some people laugh in the face of tragedy as a way to cope. I’ve always thought he did this to some degree. But his main drive was a drive to understand, the gears and rotary parts, the nitty-gritty, the bone and sinew. And when looking at the human condition, and societal clashing, and war and poverty and hate-fueled movements, and the worst parts of us, chasing that understanding, there’s a moment where certain things become farcical, where you can taste the bile in the back of your throat, and some statement or phrase would just make itself known, some truth, but a horrible, vile truth. And he’d say it. And it would elicit laughter, but also thought.

Some people couldn’t cope with his ability to do that. They’d become offended. And fine, such is as it is. Make a few jokes at the expense of Israel, and you’re bound to piss someone off. But when you’re cracking jokes about Bosniaks, or Eritreans, or the Sinhalese, or Azerbaijanis, or vaudevillian blackface, comparing the Yom Kippur War and the Tet Offensive, or the merits of Mussolini’s Blackshirts, or what have you, the first thing that I clue into is “Those’re some pretty specific examples from history.”

Black humour’s more than just wordplay. When’s the last time you heard a dark joke about The Killing Fields?

Note: I will freely admit that while that list may not be a wholly accurate reflection of topics he may have hit upon — blame my memory — , there’s not a doubt in my mind that every example could have been remarked upon by him.

Nothing was off limits. Maybe because, at the end of it all, it was human suffering, period. He was the complete opposite of what many university campuses have become: bastions of censorship, this bullshit brand of PCdom, trying to make the world a safe space, stopping the discussion between differing points of view. If anyone knew, he knew that conflicting opinions would always exist, some diametrically opposed to others, and that there wasn’t a way to reconcile that. And he would voice some of those unpopular opinions, or ignorant opinions, or hate-filled opinions, sometimes to rile up others who were blinded by their own biases or emotions. And sometimes, even to take a childish joy out of watching someone squirm or become incensed by his words. Many times, it was to open up the conversation. Important topics that need discussing are often not comfortable. He knew this.

And, I mean, I’ve heard him say some vile, awful shit. Only for him to turn around and act in the most opposite of ways that one would should they truly believe that vile, awful shit. We’ve always gauged people by their actions over their words; Game of Thrones taught us words are wind — perhaps just that way of phrasing it — whereas actions create and cement memories that remain in our minds. And in the minds of many, including my own, Adam will be remembered as a good man.

He was by no means perfect, but without his flaws, he wouldn’t have been Adam.

I could go on, but I am writing this selfishly. This is how I want to remember him, even if it’s incomplete. And it is incomplete, because every single person I know whose lives he’s affected, they’d all have a different narrative about him.

But I can say this without wavering: Every narrative someone gives you about him, dark humour and politics will somehow be included. Because they were an integral part of who he was.

They’ll be what I miss most about him.