I can haz dekonstrukshun?

If you're here, on the intertubes reading this blog, I'm not going to explain to you what lolcats are. Instead, I'll point you toward this wickedly smart Salon piece by Jay Dixit, an editor at Psychology Today. Money quote:

"A second major factor in the poignancy of the sad lolcat, I would argue, is the use of animals. The comic form is generally a prophylaxis against sentimentality. By articulating profound feelings through cats and marine mammals speaking garbled English, we're able to shroud genuine emotions in pseudo-irony -- which means those animals can evoke deeper emotions without fear of mockery or cheapness."

If there was going to be anything that could break through the irony force field of today's postmodernly aloof, internet-savvy youth, who'd have thought it would be lolcats?