Terry Pratchett? Vrabia? J. M. Frey? Apocryphal?
Question for Quote Investigator: Satire has been used to attack a wide variety of targets. Cruel or mean-spirited mockery is often controversial. Here is a pertinent quotation:
Satire is meant to ridicule power. If you are laughing at people who are hurting, it’s not satire, it’s bullying.
These words have been attributed to the popular English fantasy author Terry Pratchett, but I have never seen a solid citation; hence, I am skeptical. Would you please explore the provenance of this remark?
Reply from Quote Investigator: QI has not found any substantive evidence that Terry Pratchett made this statement. The earliest match known to QI appeared in a note dated January 27, 2016 on the microblogging platform Tumblr. The Tumblr page with this note began with a message from the handle exeggcute who said:1
satire is “I’m going to take this concept to an extreme or absurd level in order to demonstrate how bizarre/nonsensical/illogical it is” and not “I said something bigoted but just kidding I didn’t really mean it hahaha”
The Tumblr handle bogleech added the following comment:
Dang it I’ve written like 5000 words trying to explain this and I only needed this post to reblog
Finally, the Tumblr handle vrabia added the following note to bogleech’s message. Boldface added to excerpts by QI:
#i always remember that thing terry pratchett said
#about how satire is meant to ridicule power
#if you’re laughing at people who are hurting it’s not satire it’s bullying
#important
It is crucial to observe that vrabia was not presenting a quotation from Pratchett. Instead, vrabia was using their own words to present a conjectural summary of Pratchett’s viewpoint. Later individuals misread vrabia’s message and incorrectly ascribed the words directly to Pratchett.
Below are additional selected citations in chronological order.
During the ensuing days and weeks many people on Tumblr shared the post which included vrabia’s remarks.
On February 2, 2016, writer J. M. Frey shared the post on Tumblr.2 Frey also sent out the following concise tweet under her Twitter handle scifrey:3
RB: “Always remember that thing terry pratchett said about how satire is meant to ridicule power” http://tmblr.co/ZRtywv214O5qo
On March 7, 2016 Prithviraj Singh Pal using the Twitter handle iprsp sent the following tweet which credited Pratchett with the quotation:4
“Satire is meant to ridicule power. If you are laughing at people who are hurting, it is not satire, it is bullying.” -Terry Pratchett
Over time vrabia became aware of the misquotation. On October 20, 2016 vrabia made a Tumblr post responding to a person who asked about the source of the statement attributed to Pratchett:5
terry pratchett did not say this word for word. this was me paraphrasing something i remembered reading either in an interview with or a non-fiction piece by terry pratchett, but unfortunately i don’t remember which. it’s one of those things that hit me like a freight train and then stuck because it changed the way i look at an entire literary genre/entertainment style.
in conclusion: this is not an actual quote out of terry pratchett’s mouth, pen or keyboard. it’s me paraphrasing him in the tags of a tumblr post, which i feel people should know better by now than to use as reliable sources on the internet.
On November 16, 2018 vrabia revisited the topic with a lengthy Tumblr post explaining the origin of the misquotation. The post began with an admission:6
hello friends! let me take you on a journey. a journey about how i unknowingly, and very much unintentionally, released a fake terry pratchett quote into the wilderness of the internet, where it’s been roaming free for nearly 3 years.
Vrabia’s post continued with a brief explication:
the v. short version: in january 2016 i reblogged a post and commented in the tags that it reminded me of something terry pratchett said about the use of satire. terry pratchett said something to that effect somewhere that i can’t source because i didn’t stop to write it down, it’s just something that stayed with me. it could have been an interview, or a non-fiction piece, or even a scene in one of the discworld books. i honestly don’t know. but he never said those exact words. i made a throwaway comment in the tags of a tumblr post, which later got picked up and reblogged, eventually hit twitter and has been thrown around social media as a legit terry pratchett quote since.
In conclusion, the person using the Tumblr handle vrabia deserves credit for the quotation. Vrabia believes that the remark was a paraphrase of a viewpoint that Terry Pratchett expressed somewhere, but vrabia’s memory has been unable to help them to relocate the passage that inspired the quotation. Hence, the expression should not be credited to Pratchett.
Image Notes: Illustration of Earth supported by four elephants on top of a tortoise. This public domain illustration appeared in “The Popular Science Monthly” in March 1877. The structure of Terry Pratchett’s Discworld was inspired by the worldview depicted in this illustration.
Acknowledgement: Great thanks to Kat Day whose inquiry led QI to formulate this question and perform this exploration. Day was skeptical of the ascription to Terry Pratchett.
- Website: Tumblr, Notes on Tumblr from handle vrabia, Description Part 01: This page begins with a message from exeggcute with timestamp February 19, 2014 at 10:03PM; Description Part 02: The page continues with a message from bogleech with timestamp January 24, 2015 at 12:01PM; Description Part 03: The page includes a note by vrabia with a timestamp of January 27, 2016 at 11:43AM; Website description: Tumblr is a microblogging platform. (Accessed tumblr.com August 22, 2024) link ↩︎
- Website: Tumblr, Date: February 2, 2016, J. K. Frey (Tumblr handle: scifrey) posted a discussion thread with participants apfelgranate, bogleech, exeggcute, and vrabia; the thread included the remark by vrabia contained the comment about Pratchett, Website description: Tumblr is a microblogging platform. (Accessed tumblr.com August 22, 2024) link ↩︎
- Tweet, From: J.M. Frey @scifrey, Time: 11:22 PM, Date: Feb 2, 2016, Text Start: RB: “Always remember that thing terry Pratchett …” (Accessed on twitter.com on August 22, 2024) link ↩︎
- Tweet, From: Prithviraj Singh Pal @iprsp, Time: 10:14 AM, Date: Mar 7, 2016, Text Start: “Satire is meant to ridicule power. …” (Accessed on twitter.com on August 22, 2024) link ↩︎
- Website: Tumblr, Message from Tumblr handle vrabia, Timestamp: October 20, 2016 5:07PM, Tumblr handle samesamebutdifferent-deactivate asked about the source of the quotation attributed to Pratchett; Tumblr handle vrabia took responsibility for crafting the statement. Website description: Tumblr is a microblogging platform. (Accessed tumblr.com August 22, 2024) link ↩︎
- Website: Tumblr, Message from Tumblr handle vrabia, Timestamp: November 16, 2018 6:56PM, Tumblr handle vrabia posted a snapshot of a tweet containing the misquotation with an attribution to Terry Pratchett; vrabia explained that they created the quotation and not Pratchett. Website description: Tumblr is a microblogging platform. (Accessed tumblr.com August 22, 2024) link ↩︎