Colloquy
Vol. 9, Fall 2013, pp. 65-74
Forensics as a Space of Fake Activism: Poetry
Performance of Narcissism
Sean Connor
Abstract
Forensics performances allow students an outlet for speaking their minds and
challenging societal norms. However, the positioning of these performances
within a competitive paradigm may re-frame the motive. This paper purports
that a competitive paradigm shifts arguments from an authentic/charitable
framework to a framework that rewards narcissism/greed. The intention of
framing forensics performance within this definition of narcissism is not to imply
that all performances lack empathy and seek only to self-aggrandize, but rather
to suggest that performances become implicated by narcissism when placed
within a competitive paradigm. Therefore, I suggest through this narcissistic and
hypocritical poetic performance that it is first through determining our own
motivations to act that we can allow ourselves the thought of being activists.
Introduction
In 2009, I was actively involved with the Speech & Debate Team at California
State University, Long Beach. One of the events I chose to compete in was the
Interpretation of Poetry, and I used this opportunity to express an argument
that I had wanted to make for quite a while. I began noticing a trend within the
forensics community, a community that prides itself in implicating and indicting
the problems within our society. Teams from across the country sport team
mottos such as “Speak up and Speak out!,” “Don’t Hate! Forensicate!,” and “In
GOD we trust. All others we cross examine.” These mottos suggest that Speech
& Debate or Forensics is an outlet for students to express themselves as well as
construct and critically analyze arguments and solutions for the betterment of
society. Or maybe not.
Maybe you’ll forget this poem when you wake up tomorrow
Maybe we’ll be at war when this airs//
You must stand up in a crowd and shout
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I am the blister on the burn
I am the golden boy turning bronze
I am Van Gogh’s knife
I crack bones like Jesus cracked bread//
Maybe poets will become famous
Maybe they’ll allow sudden stardom to warp their reality//
Skull-fuck whitey
My afro is so militant
it votes green party//
Maybe Viacom will tell the world that this is poetry
Maybe I’ll help this
Maybe I’ll get caught up//
Most poets will lie to you
I’m not that egocentric to make you believe I’m not one of them
Poetry is not about telling you the truth
It’s about tell you the version of the story that gets the most reaction//
Nathan Stucky suggests that these performances within an academic setting do
not need to be immediately life altering, but instead, “in persuasion [we]
measure success in increments” (263). We talk about these “performance of
possibilities in the performance studies curriculum” and, through these
performances, “possibilities are realized” (263).
The performances at competitions can be profound, enlightening, and
justified; however there seems to be a disconnection between motivation and
performance. That disconnection becomes realized when you consider Michael
Bowman’s distinction between oral interpretation and performance studies:
“Oral interpretation’s story [is] how performance will make you a better reader
of literature, of texts…performance studies’ [story] is about what happens to us,
individually and collectively, when culture is constructed or deconstructed,
affirmed or challenged, reinforced or altered by means of performance” (191).
Simply put, oral interpretation is intended for improving the skills of the
interpreter; performance studies is about illustrating and expressing emotion or
identity. This definitional distinction places focus on the intention derived from
each area of study, perhaps drawing a subtle line, but a line nonetheless. And
this line strains the performer to consider both sides, and which side they want
to privilege.
maybe I don’t want to lose my success
maybe I stop writing
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67
maybe I’ll live through previous accomplishments
maybe I forget parts of me
maybe I forget
that I was 17, I lived in Oklahoma,
and I needed to write
to constantly process my teen angst world,
and maybe I’ll never lose that hunger to explore.
experiment. create.//
This distinction highlights a key area on which I will focus this paper: the
motivation of the performance. While it would be ambitious (and perhaps
unproductive) to attempt to locate the motivation in a performance, it may be
helpful to understand the implications of a particular paradigm of performance.
Therefore, I move towards the implication of the forensics paradigm as
inherently competitive, and that it is this competitive frame that skews
motivation in performance, whether intentionally or not.
Truth in Performance
I’m a social worker so I’m broke
My pockets are shattered, sliced open
Spinning my nude amounts of greens and metallic hues
into the barely there of that which begins to haunt me
But these losses make room for lessons
Cuz when your pockets are starving
for something more than the spoils
of a forty hour work week
You have no choice but to fill them with something
Now sometimes my pockets speak to me asking me questions
Why work would have put you further in debt?
I look outward and I squeeze clarity
From the faces of the youth I work with
When a familiar voice says to me
if not me then who?
As observers of performances, we are only ever able to assess its purpose as
secondary recipients. In other words, we can never fully experience what the
performer experiences; we can only watch. The visual nature of this
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consumption requires us to “squeeze clarity” from what we see, and locate
truth within that visual representation.
“Western culture has moved into a more visual paradigm, where the thing
presented is representative of the thing itself (Fraser 109-110). In other words,
we tend to assume that “visibility and truth work together” and that “material
bodies, encoded with the seeable signs of identity, are assumed to carry their
‘truth’, overtly and irrefutably, on the surface of the skin” (110-111). So in this
sense, the performance of literature through bodies signifies a truth in the
performance, even if the performance is not actually words or thoughts
produced by the performer. Forensics is no exception because even if the rules
of competition imply that literature performed must be that of another source
than the performer, the choice of literature and the arguments posed should be
purely constructed by the performer, therefore there is a sense of truth in the
performance. There is a notion that “I choose to perform this, therefore it is a
performance of truth.” The freedom of choice generates the notion that “these
words are my words” and when the body performs, it does so with the weight
of truth behind it.
Performance as Narcissism
Daddy says every time a bell rings an angel gets its wings
And mommy says every time a taco bell employee makes a cheezy gordita
An angel gets fiery diarrhea
And I say every time a score card goes up in poetry
Somewhere out in the tangle of American pubic hair some new poet starts
spewing this bullshit
To rename this country the united states of enough already//
Welcome to the wonderful world of poetry
Where we find more faults in the outside world than
meter maids, sociologists, and the clap combined
We have more teenage angst
Than a bowling alley full of middle aged virgins
Oh but not me//
Oh yes. Even me. For the last three years I have spent three weeks during the
summer helping out at a speech and debate workshop for a high school in
Southern California. The first two weeks are spent helping students put
together Original Oratory speeches which are meant to highlight a social issue
and offer some practical solutions to an audience. While we are all members of
a society, high school students often have a difficult time narrowing in on a
Forensics as a Space of Fake Activism
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topic about which they can feel passionate. As coaches, we understand this and
so we offer some possibilities for topics to these students, hoping that
something will pique their interest. However, if we feel a particular topic or
area of interest does not “work well” for a particular student, we may suggest
that they choose something else. Having been in forensics for a few years, and
currently coaching, one begins to notice trends in topic choice, whether certain
topics are “overdone” (i.e., used by many students from many different
schools), or “not strong enough” (i.e., the impacts on society are not significant).
It is at this point (when a coach is de facto choosing topics for students) that the
divide between performance and motivation becomes tangible, and what
originally began as a way to combat the social inadequacies through
performance morphs into a way to ensure competitive success.
I woke up at 3am
And I’m having trouble remembering how to spell the word wouldn’t
Four years ago I featured at a youth slam in Jersey City
And tried to show children how poetry is supposed to sound cool
Jessica explained to her thirteen year old peers
How rough her father’s beard stubble would feel when he’d been drinking
And how a foster family is a fresh coat of paint over stucco
When you’re running against a wall
She didn’t actually say all of this
Not like I do
Her names not really Jessica
I don’t remember what it is
But for a moment I can make you care about her
Even if she’s not real//
Narcissism has its roots in Greek myth, where Narcissus falls in love with his
own reflection in a pool of water. To call someone narcissistic is to imply that
they “self-love,” and that their personality is characterized by “strong
egocentricity, a sense of self-importance, fantasies of power, and considerable
self-confidence” (Deluga 50). Psychologically, narcissism is defined as a
pervasive personality disorder characterized by symptoms that include
grandiosity, an exaggerated sense of self-importance and a lack of empathy for
others (APA 2000). Ultimately, definitions of narcissism center the discussion on
the motives of an individual as expressed through the performance of self.
The intention of framing forensics performance within this definition of
narcissism is not to imply that all performances lack empathy and seek only to
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self-aggrandize, but rather to suggest that performances become implicated by
narcissism when within a competitive paradigm. I intend to view the forensics
performer as the “narcissist” to highlight this disconnect between reality and
competition. In fact, within a competitive and subjective paradigm, the
narcissist is uniquely posed because “given the ambiguity involved in judging
creative work, narcissists may be particularly skillful not only in convincing
themselves of the high quality of their creative ideas but also at conveying their
ideas with enough enthusiasm and confidence to impress their peers” (Goncalo,
Flynn, and Kim 1484). In order to achieve the desired result narcissists try to
convince the audience that their view is the preferable view, even if it may not
be the best view. Furthermore, the appraisal system exacerbates this
narcissistic display by rewarding those whose performance appears “more true”
even if that may not be the case. In other words, “verisimilitude trumps
veracity” in instances of appraisal or judgment (Bowman 569).
The
performance is viewed as truth, and appraised as such.
Forensics as Fake Activism
I’m an activist so I pass out stickers
With catchy slogans such as
“Balls are made for more than slapping up against somebody’s butt”
Here take a flyer
Check my website out
It’s called www.italkfastbecuaseiminahurry.com
Be sure to go to the products page
And get my dope new chat book entitled
Why the fuck am I screaming at you?//
Within a competitive community, one inspired by capitalism, performance
motives become complicated by an opposing duality; charity v. greed. Charity is
a performance of sacrifice, driven by bodies that are not the performers, and
fully devoted to actions that gain the performer nothing. Greed is a
performance of self-preservation, driven only by the body of the performer, and
fully focused on the gain of everything.
My pain is more serious than anyone else’s
My pain
My pain
My pain
My pain makes me the most important person in this room
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I blame my lovers I blame my parents
I blame organized religion
I blame the current, the past administration
My pain//
Forensics is competitive. Its paradigm is one that suggests that some things
are better than other things, and that our performances will be assessed as one
being better than another. This is how competition works. The judgment of
these performances is also subjective; there is a point system that implies that
the higher numbers win, however, who receives what points and how many is
determined fully by the judge and not by some objective methodological means.
Since it is competitive, when one performs it is with the intention of being
better than others. And when one intends to be better than others, their
performance becomes one of greed and not charity.
See I don’t have all the answers
and no matter how hard I try I can’t cure the world,
Real life shit will always remind you
that you can’t
While topics and literature are chosen by the performer, and is often suggestive
of arguments that the performer wants to make, the first goal is for that topic to
be better than other topics. This notion that topics can be “better,” or that a
speech is “not as good as,” suggest that the activism that is implied through the
performance is not one that is active, but rather competitive. While activism in
itself suggests that things are not good and should be better, when topics of
speeches are removed from the argument they make and compared separate
from that argument, there becomes a disconnect between truth and
performance.
I don’t write poems about honesty//
But I hadn’t memorized all the lines yet
Poetry helps you meet people who wanna fuck poets
Who do you talk to
When you’re best friend is biting off her cuticles
While every other girl is sharpening her nails
I need to go to bed now
I never meant to hurt you
I just got tired of feeling ugly
I’ll write the rest of this poem tomorrow
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S. Connor
When I can differentiate what’s none of your business
And write poems with hooks that rhyme
It doesn’t matter what you believe
I’m tired of being the strong one
All the time
I’m sorry I lied
Oral interpretation within the forensics community is not one that seeks
activism, but rather is one that is self-serving. My intent is to seek change
within the community of forensics by implicating the activity as one that is both
narcissistic and hypocritical. It is narcissistic because the performance’s primary
intent is to achieve a higher status that other performances; it is hypocritical
because the change it seeks to enact is only as such because of the narcissistic
desire to win. To seek change becomes simply a byproduct of the performance.
The activity of forensics becomes a “practice ring” for actual expression,
instead of a venue to enact change. The competitive paradigm also suggests
that social discussions/arguments are meant to be “won” and when this is the
case, some arguments, however valid, lose their importance and perhaps are
removed from the discussion altogether.
As both a competitor of six years, and a judge for two years, this analysis is
garnered as an auto-ethnography. My performance frames itself within the
forensics venue, and highlights these areas of narcissism and hypocrisy. When
someone “signs in” to their room they use their name, which places emphasis
on the performer and not the performance. Also, if the competitor has more
than one event they will write DE (double entered) or TE (triple entered) next to
their name to let the judge know that this is not their only, and perhaps not
even their primary performance/argument. Judges assess each performance in
relation to other performances, and will rank from first to fifth, where first is the
best in the round and fifth, as a former coach would tell me, the “least best.”
While this euphemism eases the blow of the ranking of fifth, there is still an
understanding of a hierarchy in the round, and competitors do not want to be at
the bottom of that hierarchy.
Next, my performance is a meta-narrative of poetry, as the argument I
attempt to make is one that implicates forensics as narcissistic and hypocritical
while working within the competitive paradigm to make the argument.
Therefore, my performance is both narcissistic and hypocritical, and even if I
choose to make this argument, the performance is still implicated. This caused
a divide within the community, as some judges would rank me first on the
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justification that such an argument needs to made, other judges would rank me
fifth on the notion that this performance indicts itself and therefore does not
deserve to “win.”
The oldest of the three girls is eleven years old
belly swollen with child
As I say there and listened to their testimonies
my pockets remained silent
all I could think about was
The fact that I can’t sell a CD a month in my own city
at any given open mic poetry slam or feature
makes me want to throw all of this save the planet shit
down the toilet and start talking about safe shit.
Like cars, clothes, hoes, sex, drugs, money, and rock & roll
Cuz I’m honestly starting to believe
that we as human beings are the descendants of
domesticated cattle.
Because we support and follow trends
like sheep support and follow shepherds
And I know it might sound like I’m ranting
but my pockets are empty and I’m trying
hard to make a difference
Even in my choosing of this topic, I have implicated myself within this
criticism and therefore cannot be fully supportive of this argument. It is only
when I remove myself from the competitive paradigm that I can fully justify this
performance. Our competitive natures implicates all of our performances, and
even if we claim to argue that what we say or do is out of charity, motivation
and intention are the only things that determine the reality of that charity.
Therefore, I suggest through this narcissistic and hypocritical performance that
it is first through determining our own motivations to act that we can allow
ourselves the thought of being activists.
And sometimes I wonder
if the passion to fight the good fight
will ever become as empty as my pockets
But I found the answer to the question posed by them
Why work when it puts you further in debt?
My reply is, I have no choice.
If not me, then who?//
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S. Connor
Works Cited
American Psychiatric Association. Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental
Disorders. 4th ed. Arlington, VA: American Psychiatric Association, 2000.
Print.
Bowman, James S. “Performance Appraisal: Verisimilitude Trumps Veracity.”
Public Personnel Management 28.4 (1999): 557-74. Print.
Bowman, Michael. S. “Toward a Curriculum in Performance Studies.” The
Future of Performance Studies: Visions and Revisions. Ed. S.J. Daily.
Annandale, VA: National Communication Association. 1998. 189-94. Print.
Deluga, Ronald J. “Relationship Among American Presidential Charismatic
Leadership, Narcissism, and Rated Performance.” Leadership Quarterly 8.1
(1997): 49-65. Print.
Fraser, Mariam. “Classing Queer: Politics in Competition.” Theory, Culture &
Society 16.2 (1999): 107-31. Print.
Goncalo, Jack A., Francis J. Flynn, and Sharon H. Kim. “Are Two Narcissists
Better Than One? The Link Between Narcissism, Perceived Creativity, and
Creative Performance.” Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin 36.11
(2010): 1483-95. Print.
Stucky, Nathan. “Fieldwork in the Performance Studies Classroom.” The SAGE
Handbook of Performance Studies. Ed. D. Soyini Madison and Judith
Hamera. Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage, 2006. 261-77. Print.
Poetry
Anderson, Chad. “Liars All of Us.”
Brown, Jonathan. “Skull Fuck Whitey”
Buck, Andy. “Fiercest Diarrhea.”
Herrera, Edward Thomas. “My Pain Keeps Me Regular.”
Moonbeam, Da’Shade. ”Empty Pockets.”
Roskos, David. “Certain Prostitute.”