Molly wasn’t funny.

Molly from Cupertino.

Molly expected to be funny.

Her expectations for herself made her less funny.

At Phillippe’s clown school, being funny was the status game at play.

Pleasure is the king of my school. Philippe Gaulier

Funny no matter what she did, Molly, she wasn’t funny.

Molly was used to status.

In the classroom, Molly had none. In the court of the Cafe, she had outrage. She had a virtue game to play.

Molly attempted a status game with Phillippe. She complained about problematic jokes when mocking the students. Phillippe mocked her stupid virtue game. We all laughed.

And the people that Phillippe was mocking?

They were all laughing too. We were in clown school. There, we had one singular sacred status granting rule: Be funny. Experience pleasure. Share it.1

Molly would frequently say things like

This kind of stuff would not be ok in Cupertino

She said this while holding a baguette under her arm, had a bottle of red wine in her hand and punctuated the statement with a long deep pull on a Gauloises and an exasperated exhale.

I’ve never been to Cupertino, but I’m guessing it looks a little different. Does everyone smoke? How about their dogs, do they let their little shitty dogs shit all over the sidewalk?

No. It’s not Cupertino. You have no status here. Let us be funny.

Molly didn’t like me.

When I first arrived, I was totally unfunny. I wanted to be funny so badly it hurt. It hurt people to watch me because all they could see was my will to be funny.

Eventually, I gave into the fact that I wanted to be funny, wasn’t and enjoyed how funny that was.

It was magic.

All of a sudden buy enjoying being unfunny and making fun of myself, I became funny.

Molly, wanted to do things correctly too much. She couldn’t abandon herself. She couldn’t abandon her ‘I do things the right way status game. So Molly, She wasn’t funny.

No status there.

Going back to the book I mentioned yesterday - The Status Game, by Will Storr.

There, Storr argues that people who can play multiple status rolls on multiple fronts typically fare better in the world of status. If you get all of your status within one singular community the urgency to play along with the dominant voices within that community is huge.

What’s more, people within communities, he argues, gain both status and register endorphins / pleasure centers in MRI’s when transgressors are punished. So. Rats get both a pleasure boost AND a status gain. It’s no wonder call out culture has grown as it has.

So, if you want to be psychologically healthy around status, don’t put all of your status eggs in one basket.

Molly put a lot of pressure on herself to be good. Success status games were a really big story in her head. When she couldn’t do that and enjoy being bad, find delight in low status2 she switched to a virtue based game.

In retrospect, Phillippe had / has a very problematic reputation these days. The talent he produces is still outstanding. Molly may have been there to attempt to conquer Phillippe with a virtue game. Luckily, pleasure was the king in his school and she had none. Adios immediately.

I did not realize this until I started writing and reading about status games, but I’ve been acutely aware of status and status games. They’ve been painful because I’ve spent much of my time losing them. I’m not good at them and I don’t like them.

The fools and the clowns have a special status. We care less about status. Well. Not true. We crave the status of being the funny one. The person who says and does the funny thing. The wild thing. The unimaginable thing. The outrageous thing.

When I’m performing and being funny, I want to be so funny that you piss your pants. For a while I only performed in daycares and retirement residences. I was doing great.

Wait a minute…

Clowns and fools have a flexible relationship with conventional status. That makes it easy to play with the cook and the servants one moment and the king and the court the next.

Our status comes from our ability to see the games and engage with them with awareness.

How do you give status?

When do you take status?

Know any places where you’ve tested people to figure out what status game they’re playing?

1

The experience pleasure and share it parts were how the funny would be concocted.

2

In order to get the high status of being funny? That’s two doctors. Or, a paradox.

Thank you thank you thank you.

I’ll be here all week.

And next week too.

And for the foreseeable future.

Tell yer friends eh?

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Molly the capable, was a clown school failure