October 6, 2018
By Mickey Friedman
I’m not big on conferences, but won’t miss the Annual Gathering of Opinion Columnists from Small Weekly Newspapers and Even Smaller Blogs, purveyors of the prestigious SWAMBY Awards. I co-host “The Worst Columns We’ve Written” panel along with Emilia Spitz-Warren McCloud. Emilia combines cultural commentary for the Fort Wayne Gazette-Sentinel with top-notch international business news.
Emilia knows people, which is why the CEO and COO of one of America’s leading mouthcare conglomerates shared the news they’re positioning themselves to move into the larger healthcare market. “Moving toward full-market integration.” HUMILIATION, they declared with confidence. The driving force. They bought me lunch because they’re thinking Berkshires.
The tip sent us scurrying back to our laptops, to Google. And some serious analysis of the current mental health care sector. I know it sounds petty, but I’m hoping I’m writing this faster than Emilia. I mean she’s already won two SWAMBYS and I haven’t even scored a nomination.
Their first task, COO confided, is to get the customer base – that’s us – to the point where we admit to ourselves, and to those most close to us, that we know humiliation. We accept that in some important way we have failed. Fallen short. That those “in the believing sector” acknowledge they have sinned. And feel really bad about it.
CEO admits market research suggests that while it might initially be hard for males to admit they’re humiliated, with the proper media campaign they’ll come around.
Long term, she – whoops I hope I haven’t blown her cover – maintains that Americans are experiencing a national emergency of embarrassment. Humiliation, the bullish COO declared, transcends age, race, creed, national origin, sexual preference, height, weight, and politics. Even vegans know humiliation. Everyone who’s hiding out at home feeling mortified needs a solution.
COO admitted Hillary Clinton passed on the offer to be national spokesperson for the initial TV blitz. Loser of the unlosable Presidency. They had their tagline: “If anyone knows humiliation, it’s Hillary.” Yes, she earned two hundred thousand a pop talking to corporate execs, and could easily hire private humiliation counselors. But just filming her at a Humiliation House Sharing Session might do the trick. Second choice: Sean Spicer standing before photos of the packed Obama Inauguration and the sparse Trump Inauguration carefully adding stick figures to the empty spaces in the Trump photo. Sean turns to camera: “Humiliation: Been There. Done That.”
CEO leaned in to whisper: “Future opportunity. Robert Mueller.” Explaining that as the Fake Witch Hunt jails real Trumpian Witches like Cohen, Flynn, and Manafort, it becomes harder for the Trumpsters to pretend everything is coming up Republican Red Roses. They’re preparing for a new wave of the humiliated.
She smiled. “When the First Family and He Himself is Muellered, how many millions will be tempted to toss their MAGA caps to the back of the closet. Trying ever so hard to tell themselves they were always Jeb Bush supporters. Repeating over and over: ‘Kellyanne Who?’ Mortified at how many hours they wasted chanting: ‘Lock Her Up!’ and ‘Build The Wall!’ Waiting for a build-the-wall check from Mexico that got lost in the mail.”
COO sent us to the prototype of their website. “Humiliation Houses will provide you, the humiliated, with understanding and empathy. Our social workers are well practiced in helping others access their inner Mother Theresa. At a Humiliation House, there’s no place for “I told you so!” You won’t ever hear “What the hell were you thinking voting for someone who cheated with a porn star months after his wife gave birth to their son!” Because we know that kind of criticism immediately closes off communication. It makes mutual aid and understanding almost impossible. We know it just doesn’t help.
“If you or someone you know is blushing right now, feeling stupid or knowing firsthand the profound pain of mortification, please know Humiliation House offers hope and healing. And your stay may be covered by your existing health insurance or MEDICARE if MEDICARE still exists.”
COO waited for desert to remind us that there are so many who could use a month or two at a Humiliation House. Like the man who’s been blushing for a year because he left his wife and young son to spend six years twisted up in a painful yoga position in a small town in Oregon chanting “BabaGuru, BabaGuru.”
Or the woman who spent eighty thousand dollars and given away her Range Rover to the Church of Practicality? Who actually believed: “The V-Meter reveals what you secretly tell yourself when no one is looking.”
CEO offered me the last bit of her cheesecake then said: “Call me if you need a free weekend.”
I’ll probably be in Memphis next year to talk about my worst columns. Failing to win a SWAMBY. Then spending my free weekend at the new Humiliation House in the Great Barrington old firehouse.
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“Humiliation House” was originally published in the September 27, 2018 issue of The Berkshire Record.