Some 35 years ago, there was an International Dull Men’s Club whose chairman was J.D. Stewart, a statistical analyst for Eastman Kodak Co. here in Rochester, New York.
That was in 1982, a year of peak dullness and boring prosperity for both Rochester and Kodak. Since then Kodak has gone bankrupt, which has made life around here more “interesting” in the sense of the ancient Chinese curse.
The club was formed largely as a joke, but with an underlying idea of honoring people who enjoy mundane things and who do mundane but necessary work.
Stewart would do things like publishing a list of the 10 dullest Americans (including Don Rickles, Gerald Ford, Lawrence Welk, Walter Mondale, Fred Rogers and Garfield the cat) and proposing seminars on topics such as “dressing to break even” and “non-assertiveness sensitivity training”.
The video above shows how the Dull Men’s Club concept has been revived in Great Britain. The club blog is devoted to safe excitement, an outstandingly dull concept.
I do have to say that the British devotion to dullness is incomplete. The new Dull Men’s Club is devoted to unusual hobbies, some of which seem actually interesting.
There is a woman whose hobby is to follow brown road signs, wherever they might take her. That could lead to actual adventures, which is contrary to the spirit of dullness.
What Trump manages to do with all this is to keep public attention focused on himself. He says so many shocking and offensive things that it is hard for the ordinary busy person, who has a job and family responsibilities, to keep them straight. What remains is an impression of Trump as a strong person who doesn’t back down.
