Footnotes are for morons and
scumbags. Footnotes are for the intellectually and morally bankrupt.
Footnotes are for literary failures. If you’re particularly
dull-witted and slimy, and have nothing to say, use footnotes! A good rule of thumb is: The more the footnotes, the more the article or book isn’t worth
reading. No writing of quality or value has a lot of footnotes.
Whenever
a thinker or intellectual is incompetent and a loser, he quietly
indicates this by using a lot of footnotes – by inventing a slew of
phony references. He tries to hide his intellectual fatuity and
depravity by directing us to a plethora of falsely erudite and
recondite sources.
But
smart and good people aren’t fooled. People of intelligence and
virtue refuse to read such heavily footnoted vapidity and
intellectual nonsense. Their time and life are too valuable to waste
on such pleasure-destroying, soul-sapping drivel.
Footnotes
suck the life out of every essay. They vitiate and ruin every piece
they infect. They kill the thrill of intellectual discourse, and the
fun of life.
These
academic cancers drain the joy out of every fascinating and important
intellectual debate. They render it lifeless, void, tedious, and
moot. Nothing on earth is more boring than reading a footnote. Even
vital issues of tremendous controversy are rendered lifeless and
empty by footnotes.
As
for people using quotations in their writing, yes, such things often
help to illustrate a point. Yes, they frequently strengthen an
argument by placing a powerful authority behind it. But these quotes
don’t necessitate a footnote. Any truly important reference can be
placed in the body of the text or, at worst, inside a brief
parenthesis.
People
of quality and brains who have something to say don’t use
footnotes. Articles and books worth reading don’t have footnotes.
So my message to everyone is: Stop boring us to death with your joyless and
awful writing, you footnote-bloated morons and scumbags!