I can't find too much yet on this Twitter parody account other than certainty at its cleverness, like The Little Train Robbery. Parody is about sequencing surprising references, creating an audience that shares the conspiracy of code and the humanity of laughter. Parody is the politics of the uncanny, tribute, and A number of the posts have bylines that I am sure have some astute subtexts unbeknownst to me, including Wendy Caufield, Dr. Lloyd Hurst, and Alex Critchlow, among others. Broadsheets of the front page of a print newspaper, with a globally familiar font, and perhaps obviously inspired by The Onion, "The New York End Times," offers condensed, crafty, and cutting headlines that highlight some of the less camouflaged contradictions in the political and social world of 2023.
The first two posts, from March 22, 2023, "New Studies Show SARS-CoV-2 Disables At An Alarming Rate. Follow these five easy steps to pretend it's not happening," and "Biden Announces New Plan To Squander The Remainder Of His Presidency An exclusive look inside the White House with corporate lobbyists," establish a pattern of focusing on politicians and public health issues. Yet, all is fair game.
With an image of a group of seniors innocently hoping that politicians will spend some money on their lives, the headline reads, "Senate Unveils New Plan To Fix Looming Social Security Crisis, Masks To Be Criminalized Nationwide Hospitals, assisted living facilities targeted first according to newly released bi-partisan agreement."
Other layers of aphoristic sarcasm in the secondary headlines accompany the main story: "Life was good while it lasted," "Making preparations & Staying Upbeat," and "Our 2023 Guide to Bucket Listing."
To be fair, and this is perhaps an imitation's aspiration, I am not sure this is a parody headline, "Area Militia Members Woefully Uninformed About What The Constitution Actually Says, Reports indicate the men learned everything they know from bumper stickers and 4chan."
With a time-traveling headline, and no mention of guns, I am anxiously waiting for the Senate hearings on this one, "Republican Lawmakers Blame Heavy Metal Music For Recent Uptick In School Shootings GOP Senators plan to convene several hearings to discuss how Satan is to blame." To be fair, on the broadsheet image, next to secondary headlines, "An exclusive interview with Tipper Gore," "How to play MP3s backward," and "Judas Priest maintains their innocence," is a snippet of an unfinished headline, "Guns are…? Question for the New York End of Times, what is the rest of the headline?
This opinion editorial by Wendy Caufield is my favorite, "Anyone Suggesting Climate Change Is Unprecedented Hasn't Read The Bible." Check out this New York Time video story focusing on the "Ark Encounter" in Kentucky and how Noah included dinosaurs in his floating zoo created out of necessity because the Christian God was going to destroy the earth.
The NYET reminds me of Aldous Huxley, "Parodies and caricatures are the most penetrating of criticisms," rather than the pre-urinal-tagging lampoons of Ernest Hemingway's imagination.
Okay, one last headline, "What Was Twitter, Anyway? Whether the platform is dying or not, it's time to reckon with how exactly it broke our brains." Admittedly, this is not a lampoon headline, but a recent story from The New York Times, the inspiration for the NYET – which is, incidentally, the English phonetic spelling of the Russian Нет, or no.
