I need a word for it.

I need a word for it.
I’ve been thinking about an issue that’s been bugging me for a few days, or years, whatever. It’s a big issue, and lots of people fall prey to it, but I don’t have a single term for the effect.

That thing, where someone acts like they love something, but obviously have never actually consumed any of it. The guy who claims to love Spaghetti Westerns, and then says “You know, John Wayne made the best Spaghetti Westerns!” Just to lay a spoiler on you, he never made any. Not one. He didn’t need to, he was a big star and never had to go to Italy just to find someone willing to put him in a movie. Fortunately, that is a made up example. It will be the last one.

It goes deeper than that though, much deeper. Like the people who claim to love The Beatles, but would never actually sit down to listen to any of their music. They know they’re supposed to say they love The Beatles, but that’s all they know about it. They couldn’t even tell you if “Can’t Buy Me Love” is an original Beatles song or not. They might even mistake a Beach Boys song for a Beatles song and vice versa. Actually, I should take might out of that sentence, I know someone who thought Sloop John B was a Beatles song. When shown the Beach Boys album it came from, he demanded that McCartney and Lennon wrote it.

You get this a lot with semi-popular niche things. People who want to appear knowledgeable, but either have only looked things up on wikipedia or are just bluffing the whole way. They’ll get very unspecific when asked for specific examples. I’ve found people will do this with… what do you call it… Regency fiction? You know, that period with Jane Austen and the Brontë sisters. You know, what I mean? They’ll claim that it’s their favorite set of novels, and then you ask them which is their favorite book and they’ll say something like “Oh, you know, that romance where the girl likes that rich guy.” and you’re forced to look at them, wave your hand and say “Yeah…?” To which they’ll add, “Oh, you know! The one with the plucky heroin! She’s got to do lots of plucky things to get her man!” And again you’re just looking at them and rolling your hand in a “Go On” gesture. And they just burst out “That one by Jane Austen! You know! About the plucky girl who hooks people up while trying to getting Mister Darcy into bed! Jane Eyre!” And then you’re forced to explain that Charlotte Brontë wrote Jane Eyre, that the girl who hooks people up is Emma and that Mr. Darcy is from Pride and Penetration. I know that much and I haven’t even read the bastards.

This gets really annoying though when talking about books and movies that I have watched. Hearing someone describe their favorite Film Noir as “You know, that black and white one. The one with lots of shadows, and the girl who gets people into trouble. The one with the detective!” At which point I’m forced to look at them and demand “Have you ever watched a single film noir movie?” And they look and say stupid things like “I’ve seen Chinatown and Who Framed Roger Rabbit, so yeah.” and then, after a brief period of shouting they go all quite and never talk again and that judge goes on about how it’s a stain on the community to kill someone just because they pretend to be versed in movies but aren’t or some bullshit. I don’t know. I never listen to them when they go on like that. I’m already planning the escape and new identity by that phase of the proceedings to be honest. I get on the same kick with people who claim to know all about Saturday Morning Serials because they watched the Indiana Jones movies or Avant Garde Comic Books because they once looked at the cover for Watchmen.

We won’t even go into all the Christians who have clearly never once cracked open the bible they carry around with them everywhere. Those fuckers… I just… just read the damn thing! It’s really interesting and you’ll find Jesus actually was a pinko, liberal, socialist motherfucker. Maybe that’s why they avoid reading, they don’t want to know that their hero would have run (not walked) the fuck away from them.

It’s okay to be enthusiastic about something that you’re just learning about. I don’t mean to suggest that you can’t be. It’s even okay to be wrong about things, just admit where your education level is. Tell me ahead of time that you haven’t watched as many movies or read as many books as you could have. Don’t go talking about shit like you know when clearly you do not. That’s all I ask.

Well, also, I ask for a term for this phenomenon.

And a pony.

I would also like a bowl of ice cream… yeah.