Welcome to the web home of The American Bystander, America’s print humor magazine. Since 2015, we’ve published most of the world’s greatest comedy writers, cartoonists and illustrators. My name is Michael Gerber, and I’m the Editor & Publisher. Pour yourself a lemonade and pull up a seat in the shade—lemme tell you what this is all about.
The Internet: A Bad Idea
I’ll say this right up front—we’re print people, and if you want the Full Bystander Experience, you should read the print magazine. I hate and fear the internet. If human civilization survives the next decade (odds: low), future generations will look upon us with the same pity and horror we feel towards Londoners during the Gin Craze. “They let their children eat gravel while they doomscrolled? Didn’t they realize Elon Musk was insane?”
So why have a website at all? For ten years we really haven’t. We’ve nibbled at the digital realms—put up a piece or two, run a website for short stuff (251.com), written a Substack (Viral Load)—but our focus has been on the print mag, because that’s what the world needed. It absolutely did not need more quick-hitting topical jokes drip-feeding dopamine.
So What Changed?
When we were kids, there were great print humor magazines like MAD, National Lampoon, and SPY. Earlier this year, Bystander General Manager Laura Fox convinced me that putting our archives online would be a great way—maybe the only way—for young people to learn the wonderful literary form of print humor magazines. I’m a stubborn man, but I do have a soft spot for the youth.
Unfortunately, I am also very lazy. This is what caused my forbears to make the journey from Sicily around 1900, changing from fisherman (hard) to guy who hangs around Pimlico racetrack (easy). So the question became, “How do we put together a really great online presence…without Mike having to do anything?”
Laura and two volunteers, Zachary Baiel and Andrew Rodwin began gathering all Bystander’s vast output under one digital roof. It’s already been a hell of a task; as of this moment we have nearly 900 posts. Just scrolling the splash makes me tired.
But it won’t make you feel tired. We hope it will delight you, and give you hours of laffs. We also hope it will encourage you to give us money in one or several ways: subscribe to the print edition, buy back issues, and donate to our supporting non-profit. Indolence is expensive, the way I do it.
The Bystander Story
In 1981, the legendary comedy writer Brian McConnachie created the prototype of a new literary humor magazine called The American Bystander. Piloted by a bright young staff—Jennifer Finney Boylan, Bruce Handy, and Trey Ellis among others—the oversized tabloid was filled with writing and cartoons from Brian’s friends from National Lampoon, SNL, and SCTV, The Bystander nearly made it to the newsstand before the Reagan Recession did it in.
Fast-forward approximately thirty years. Brian and producer Alan Goldberg—Brian’s boon friend and companion in many happy schemes—reached out and asked if I could create an updated version of The Bystander. I had retired from magazines after writing a mega-bestselling parody (Barry Trotter), but still loved the form and hated seeing it disappear from our culture. As a student, I had resurrected Yale’s ancient humor magazine, The Yale Record, and as a young magazine guy was the first call whenever a big company wanted to take a run a humor (they would call me, I would give them a sheaf of recommendations, then they would do the exact opposite and faceplant). I was also getting over a life-threatening illness, and didn’t think I could take the daily pounding of running a magazine. But Brian and Alan were lovely guys, and it had always been my dream, so…“Here’s my offer: I’ll make you a dummy, and then you two can run it.” We shook hands and I got to work.
I spent the next several years designing and redesigning, and building a bullpen of contributors. By 2014, we had the greatest collection of writers and artists—people from The New Yorker, SPY and National Lampoon, of course, but also lots of writers from The Simpsons, Letterman, even a Python. By Fall 2015, I had a completed first issue; Brian and Alan were knocked out but—and this will surprise no one who knew dear Mr. McConnachie—they said, “Looks great, Michael…but all this is ‘way too complicated for us. You run it.”
Deep breath—was I strong enough? Didn’t matter; it had to be done. So in October 2015, we launched The American Bystander #1 on Kickstarter. We blew past our $25,000 goal in four days. And the moment we printed and shipped that issue, our readers asked, “When’s #2 coming out?” Uh…”Soon?” Suddenly I was riding a tiger, a ride that wouldn’t end for nine years. My health held, thank God, and The Bystander became beloved, at The New York Times and everywhere else.
In January 2024, Brian died. All through his long illness, I had pledged to him and Alan that I would continue to produce issues for as long as he lived. Now released from that pledge, I wasn’t sure whether we should continue, and consulted some of our 350 contributors. To a person, they all told me the magazine needed to continue—not just to preserve the classic print humor magazine form, but also to provide levity during our increasingly dark age. “Remember how bright things looked in 2015?” I said. “Basically from the moment we launched, the world has been galloping towards Fascism. Maybe we’re the problem?”
“Don’t overestimate yourself,” they said.
Bystander 2.0
Taking their word for it, I and Bystander GM Laura Fox—on board since 2023—began figuring out a path forward. We investigated a million things: t-shirts, consulting, an occult goods store we hoped would throw off enough dough to support our humor magazine habit. But nothing worked; frustrated, Laura said one day, “We should just run this like the ballet.”
“What do you mean?”
“A not-for-profit,” she explained. “Donations, educational programs, all that.”
The lightbulb went on. Within six months, we had a founding donation, and here we are. With not just our good ol’ print humor magazine, but a new website designed to spread the gospel of literary humor and cartoons.
The Future
If you dip into my writings on American comedy, you’ll see that The Bystander comes from a very particular lineage, a type of humor that began in America in the early 1950s, and took over the entire world. The current political situation in the U.S. threatens this tradition, and the big media companies that have made so much money from satire will not risk their profits to defend it. American comedy—free speech—free thought—is imperiled in a way that was unthinkable just a few years ago. All of the sudden, The American Bystander has got to keep publishing—and we will. This website is an effort to spread what we’ve done, what we do, this kind of thing as widely as possible, as quickly as possible, so that if I (or some equally foolhardy successors) have to run Bystander-in-exile from Toronto or Gin Lane in London or in a crumbling parapet of an old Knights Templar castle in Malta, they’ll have a running start. If all goes well, I’ll make sure they have a bank account, too, overseen by a Swiss banker as honest as he is humorless.
We’re not in this for the money, but we need money to stay in it—so if you poke around and like what we’re doing, please consider
1) Buying a subscription;
2) Buying back issues or merch; and
3) Making a tax-deductible donation.
If money is tight, or you want to do even more, consider volunteering. The Mighty Bystander Voluntary Army has plenty for you to do, and we pride ourselves on having the nicest people around. And talented ones, too—this site wouldn’t exist without our volunteers Andrew and Zachary, led by the indefatigable Laura. All I do is sit in the sunshine drinking lemonade, smoking Cuban cigars, and looking just a half-second too long as every pretty woman that walks by. What can I say, it beats fishing.
Over the next few months, we’ll be adding new material to the website, as well as every single piece we’ve published since Issue #1. That’s probably 2500 more posts, so better block out some time for reading. You can sit next to me if you want, we’ll be Sicilian together.
We—me, Laura, our 350+ contributors, and the ever-growing MBVA—hope you enjoy the website. We made it for you.