The Worst Festivus Ever

by Foster Kamer

Today is Festivus. Which, if you didn’t know, is “a holiday for the rest of us.” Beyond this, I have no real idea what a Festivus is, but I do know this: Allen Salkin wrote the book on it. And Allen Salkin was laid off from the New York Times last week.

From what I can gather, Festivus was introduced to pop culture in a Seinfeld episode, via screenwriter Daniel O’Keefe, who wrote it into the show. His Dad came up with it to commemorate the first date he went on with his then-to-be-wife. Daniel O’Keefe wrote it into Seinfeld as the holiday that wacky character George Costanza (played by Duckman star Jason Alexander) celebrates. It’s intended to be a holiday free of the “pressures and commercialism” of the other holidays that people spend money on.

The holiday continued as a storyline throughout Seinfeld, and included such rituals as “The Airing of Grievances,” which is where you sit around a table and tell everyone how much they disappointed you over the last year, and vice-versa. Beyond that, I don’t know much about it, because Seinfeld only served to remind me of the people in my family I can’t stand. They all live in some proximity of Hollywood, Florida, and they all think Seinfeld was so-true-it’s-funny hysterical. I thought Seinfeld was so-true-it’s-traumatizing upsetting, the way some WWII vets couldn’t sit through Saving Private Ryan. (Aunt Roz, if you’re reading this, I’m mostly talking about you. I will marry a Shiksa just to piss you off.)

Two books were written on Festivus. One was by Daniel O’Keefe, in 2005, with an introduction by Jason Alexander. The other was written by Allen Salkin, with an introduction by Jerry Stiller, in 2008.

Festivus strikes me as a well-intended thing: it’s a broad philosophical statement on the bullshit that December holidays are wrapped in whimsical nonsense and served well by the brand recognition of a TV show as popular as Seinfeld. To write one book on it is mountain-of-molehill type stuff. To write a second book on it is to birth a skyscraper from a sandbox. It is, like many things Allen Salkin has done, impressive.

But Allen Salkin has written many things that have been considered-to say the least-unimpressive by the strident group of people who opine about media, be they amateur, professional, or otherwise. In other words: Salkin’s been the target of catty, bitchy bloggers since he started at the Times. (Before that, he was at the Post, and he was dating Lisa Loeb! Funny how those seem like “innocent” times compared to his tenure at the New York Times. )

One of his first pieces for the Styles section was about some kids who were going to have the Lower East Side reality show. It was something that we all wanted to read, right? But also something that made us all cringe. The long view, however: Here was a guy at the New York Times who might try to put some flavor in the Styles.

This interest quickly alchemized into something slightly more hostile, however, when Salkin pissed off everyone at the New York Observer by writing a softball profile of its (at the time) new young owner, Jared Kushner, that largely condescended to and slighted the efforts of the New York Observer’s writers, as well as their now-former editor Peter Kaplan.

In January, 2008, Salkin probably did a good job provoking the wrath of Gawker when he wrote that it had “jumped the snark” in the Times. He was not at the time nor has he been since the only person to write about this! But considering Salkin’s previous efforts, which included writing about how women who eat red meat are easier to fornicate with than vegetarians, curious fascination with Salkin turned to open contempt. Here was this guy at the Times whose job it was to write about trends! And from what some would consider a “lofty” “perch.” (The “argument” against “trend” pieces is always, at heart: why this thing instead of that thing?) But it was his job, and he did it.

Gawker Weekend writer Jon Liu once called Salkin the “Christiane Amanpour of Sunday Styles.” He was later referred to by another former Gawker writer as the “Seymour Hersh of the Sunday Styles.” I also took my share of shots at Salkin. For instance, when Salkin profiled a group of media personalities who have a decidedly anti-oversharey organization, he did so without mentioning his own oversharing tendencies, and also couldn’t acknowledge the irony that they let him profile them. It was not a great piece.

In any event, when Salkin was let go, this was almost inevitable.

And Gawker Media owner Nick Denton wasn’t the only one who expressed schadenfreude at Salkin’s dismissal.

The one time I met Salkin, he seemed surprised that I introduced myself. He was kind. He even signed a book for me. He handed me his business card, we had a quick talk, and I got the impression he was-get this!-a guy who was working hard at a newspaper. Working hard at a goofy newspaper job, yes-but also that his beat put him directly in the path of ongoing public scorn.

Salkin also took on assignments a lot of people would be scared to handle. One example: he suggested that MTV was at least a bit responsible for the death of DJ AM. And also, let’s not forget: he did write that article on Gawker. Whether or not it was good-or even accurate!-is almost besides the point that Salkin, always in the cross-hairs, had basically now thrown his body on the grenade.

So I considered the laying-off of Salkin, and I wasn’t happy. Salkin’s job description at the New York Times, when you get down to it, is, or was, one of the most troublesome. But like so many of the things that “media critics” spend time mocking (The New York Sun! Radar magazine’s Three Different Iterations! Etc!), I get the feeling we will miss Salkin, if for no other reason than that the opportunity for someone to take a risk in a major newspaper and fuck up (or succeed wildly) has now been further shrunk. That’s kind of sad.

So, here: the best media souvenir from the last year I’ve received. Salkin’s business card. Long live him, his reporting, and his ridiculous-ass holiday.