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Funny Because It's True

How The Onion Created Modern American News Satire

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Funny Because It's True

By: Christine Wenc
Narrated by: Christine Wenc
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About this listen

Discover the real truth behind the original fake news with this in-depth history of beloved humor publication, The Onion.

In 1988, a band of University of Wisconsin–Madison undergrads and dropouts began publishing a free weekly newspaper with no editorial stance other than “You Are Dumb.” Just wanting to make a few bucks, they wound up becoming the bedrock of modern satire over the course of twenty years, changing the way we consume both our comedy and our news. The Onion served as a hilarious and brutally perceptive satire of the absurdity and horrors of late twentieth-century American life and grew into a global phenomenon. Now, for the first time, the full history of the publication is told by one of its original staffers, author and historian Christine Wenc. Through dozens of interviews, Wenc charts The Onion’s rise, its position as one of the first online humor sites, and the way it influenced television programs like The Daily Show and The Colbert Report. Funny Because It’s True peels back the layers to reveal how a group of young misfits from flyover country unintentionally created a cultural phenomenon.

©2025 Christine Wenc (P)2025 Running Press Adult Art & Literature Entertainment & Celebrities Journalists, Editors & Publishers Comedy Funny Witty

Critic reviews

“The inside story of how a comedy institution was born in Wisconsin, cracked up the country, and changed the way we think about news and satire. I devoured it!”—Patton Oswalt
“Despite dozens of copycats, thousands of comedians, and an exhausting amount of late-night political commentary, The Onion stands alone as the strongest example of incendiary satire in America. Christine Wenc has provided us with a necessary and long overdue history of an enduring, influential gem.”—Kliph Nesteroff, author of The Comedians: Drunks, Thieves, Scoundrels and the History of American Comedy

“You may ask whether a ‘fake news’/news parody outlet deserves such a serious work of history. After you see how The Onion and its writers sparked some of the great comedy that has helped us survive this dreadful century, your answer may well be ‘Yes!’”—Jeff Cohen, founder of FAIR (Fairness & Accuracy In Reporting)
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