a comedian's take on the whole 'weird' thing
This dialectic is muddy from the get-go, of course. It’s a version of the more familiar hipster trap: over time, the marginal labor of the bohemian experimentalist and taste-maker is swallowed up by the smug cartoon of the in-the-know consumer clone. But the near inevitability of this process also suggests that the first hipster was already part of... See more
Erik Davis • The Weird and the Banal
that last line
But this strategy of defense brings to mind the slogan Keep Austin Weird , which has since been repurposed for Portland, San Francisco, Seattle, and other formerly groovy towns. These calls are sad because they fail the second they are uttered. When you are forced to demand the preservation of the weird, the shark hath jumped.
Erik Davis • The Weird and the Banal
Some colleagues I know even speak of an “ethics of weirdness”, something I hope to work on more and that would presumably involve risk, improvisation, nonsense, even magic, not to mention a refusal to retreat before the bizarre, the disturbing, the nonhuman, the unthinkable. To turn and face the strange; to stay with the trouble.
Erik Davis • The Weird and the Banal
“ethics of weirdness”

democrats accept the weird aka they laugh at themselves - that’s what makes good improv comedy - “yes, I am weird, let’s laugh together”
in comedy, weird is the whole thing. ‘what’s the weird thing’ is how you figure out what the funny thing is in a scene.

The Democratic Party of George McGovern was, in this narrative, the party of “acid, amnesty and abortion,” the party of chaos, disruption and overreach. Out of touch with the vast American middle, it had cast its lot with cultural elites and antiwar militants. This Democratic Party, said the Nixon campaign, could not relate to the tens of millions ... See more
Jamelle Bouie • Opinion | The Real Reason Trump and Vance Hate Being Called ‘Weird’
what is counterculture has changed. but is alt-right really counter culture???
Through all of this, Republicans still insist that they’re the party of normalcy. This is why they can’t quite deal with the charge that they’re weird. There’s a reason for this. For years, in the American political imagination, Republicans were the normal party and Democrats were the party of weirdness.
Jamelle Bouie • Opinion | The Real Reason Trump and Vance Hate Being Called ‘Weird’
yep there it is!!