So despite the fact that the “oh my God, Justin Bieber‘s last name sounds like beaver!” jokes have been around for years (and not one of them has been funny, by the way) someone saw fit to create an iPhone app called … ugh … Joustin’ Beaver. Yes, that pun just happened. That barely counts as humor. Hell, I’m not even sure that counts as a language. I’m pretty sure that’s what the English language would write as its suicide note before swallowed a bottle of pills, but I digress. Anyway, Justin’s suing them because hey, why not right? TMZ reports:
Let us explain. A company called RC3 has created a mobile app called Joustin’ Beaver. The app is a cartoon game, in which the user floats down a river, defending Joustin’ from the phot-hogs. Of course, the Beev looks like Biebs, and that has rankled him so, his lawyers have fired off a cease and desist letter to RC3, demanding they cease production and sales, stat. Lawyers for Justin (the person) want the app removed from iTunes and they want an accounting of all revenues collected by RC3. But RC3 says hogwash and will continue selling the 99 cent app, claiming it’s a parody and therefore protected by the First Amendment to the Constitution.
All right, new rule: parody is only protected by the first amendment if it’s actually funny or clever. Look, I think we can all agree that South Park deserves to exist, but Joustin’ Beaver? I feel like whoever came up with that one deserves a swift kick in the balls. So new rule: if you’re going to parody something, at least be clever about it, because noticing that certain words sound like other words isn’t so much parody as it is being able to recognize homonyms.
