Truth About Computer Security Hysteria

Comedy vs. hysteria

I WENT BACK to an eerily dated issue of U.S. News & World Report just for this column. Their "real heroes" cover story came out two weeks before the World Trade Center imploded.

Gibson ex­ploits hys­teria be­cause it works. He launched a pre­emp­tive tem­per tan­trum in 2001 be­cause he knew Micro­soft wouldn't give him what he wanted.

Micro­soft couldn't spank Gibson in public — so Vmyths did it for them. (You're wel­come, Bill.)

The list of "real heroes" included a female Army colonel, shot down behind enemy lines in the Gulf War, captured, and sexually assaulted while suffering from a bullet wound. Mother Theresa and Rosa Parks made the list, too. So did a WWII Medal of Honor recipient. USN&WR focused on a paraplegic who fights Baltimore's urban decay and a journalist who nearly lost her life when terrorists targeted her for daring to investigate them.

No computer security expert showed up in this list of "real heroes" published shortly before the twin towers fell. Tsk, tsk. How sad.

But while no computer security expert made the list, one comedian did. USN&WR hailed Mel Brooks, who "had the guts, and gall, to realize the simplest way to demolish [Nazi leader Adolph] Hitler was to mock him. 'If you stand on a soapbox and trade rhetoric with a dictator you never win,' says Brooks, 75. 'That's why they do so well; they seduce people. But if you ridicule them, bring them down with laughter — they can't win. You show how crazy they are."

You can't expect people to laugh simply because you call a dictator names. Rather, you need to use comedy as a weapon. Brooks makes people laugh not just at the dictator, but at the absurdities he represents.

So let's paraphrase Brooks' observation, shall we? If you stand on a soapbox and trade rhetoric with a computer security fearmonger you never win. That's why they do so well; they seduce people. But if you ridicule them, bring them down with laughter — they can't win. You show how crazy they are. You make people laugh not just at the computer security fearmongers, but at the absurdities they represent.

Vmyths operates on this very principle. We use comedy as a weapon against hysteria. Mary Landesman (About.com) published "a serious interview about antivirus comedy" with Yours Truly, and I encourage you to read it.

Sadly, not everyone views a comedian as a hero. Indeed, the dictator and the computer security fearmonger see comedy as a threat to their power base. I want to point out one very important passage from Landesman's interview:

Won't some people take you less seriously because you use comedy?
Certainly. I quote John Ralston Saul: "In contemporary society, respectability is tied to expertise. Subjects are controlled by those who know how to talk about them properly. These dialects of expertise are both obscure and serious. They require the gravity of the insider. The effect on public debate is to transform any levity into irresponsibility... In this atmosphere comedy is excluded and reduced to base entertainment."

Some of the experts I've mocked will dismiss me as a comedian before they acknowledge me as a social commentator. They'll say my criticism would reach a much wider audience if I'd just tone down the humor. Bah! I make a far greater impact because I use comedy.

The answer to these questions could lead me to talk about any number of fearmongers by name. For this column, I choose to single out ... Steve "raw sockets" Gibson.

OUR REGULAR READERS will recall I pointed my comedy cannons at Gibson two years ago this month when he erupted over an obscure dead horse known as "raw sockets." (If you don't know about raw sockets, then don't fret about it. Gibson wasn't an expert on the subject when he predicted the literal end of the Internet.)

Gibson's followers embrace his prophesies of cyber-doom; dozens of them wrote in to protest my humor. No joke — many of them consider the topic of raw sockets "too serious for comedy."

Ah. Of course.

Mel Brooks can make you laugh about the Third Reich. Richard Pryor can make you laugh about racism. Dennis Miller can make you laugh about capital punishment. George Carlin can make you laugh about the Ten Commandments. Gallagher can make you laugh about gun control. Bill Hicks can make you laugh about Jesus Christ. How can an obscure Internet specification be too serious for comedy?

Ask yourself: who dismisses levity as irresponsibility? Who excludes comedy from the debate?

I've said it many times before and I'll say it again. People take computer security waaay too seriously. You can see it everywhere you look. Racist senators from New York claim foreign college students come to America to learn how to commit cyber-terrorism. Media-ordained experts equate computer viruses with germ warfare. Salesmen warn you'll get laid off and your children will starve if you don't buy their software. Corporate computer security managers act like funeral directors with a "casual Friday" policy.

War? Disease? Famine? Death? Hey, I just named the Four Horsemen. What a coincidence.

Gibson exploits hysteria for a simple reason. It works. It draws the unwashed masses to him. For example, he picked up gobs of free publicity in 2001 when he threw a preemptive temper tantrum over "raw sockets." Then the childish little dictator threw a second tantrum when Microsoft didn't do what he demanded. When that screamfest didn't work, the holier-than-Microsoft messiah threw a third tantrum.

Oh, which reminds me. Hi, Simone! You're my favorite niece and you deserve a trip to Dairy Queen. Go scream at your mommy like I taught you.

Mel Brooks can make you laugh about the Third Reich. Richard Pryor can make you laugh about racism. How can an ob­scure Inter­net speci­fi­ca­tion be too serious for comedy?

Gibson's hysteria works wonders as a self-marketing tool. But Microsoft couldn't publicly spank Gibson for his "raw sockets" fearmongering — and they certainly couldn't spank him with comedy — so Vmyths did it for them. (Thwack! thwack! thwack! thwack! thwack! thwack! thwack! You're welcome, Bill.)

VMYTHS USES COMEDY for a simple reason. It works. It draws the elite minority to us; it exposes the fearmongers' absurdities.

Yet, as Saul implies, dictators & fearmongers don't want comedians to expose their absurdities. Given the opportunity, those who wield power (in whatever form) may try to squelch a comedian by shame or even by force.

And this leads me to a public address Gibson made last year from the royal balcony of his self-run fan club (the place where he regularly publishes his Securitie Apocrypha)...

[Continued in part 2]