When Kevin Smith announced he wasn't going to do a press tour for his new movie Red State on Twitter yesterday, he started the kind of controversy that can only bubble up on a slow news day:

Smith has already announced that he plans to wrap up the film's first Sundance screening by auctioning it off to a distributor while the audience is still in the theater, but now the jorts-clad auteur — who recently decided to dispense with press screenings altogether after Cop Out's critical lambasting — has declared that he'll be refusing print interviews to promote the movie.

(You can find a copy of Smith's rant here.) Movie blogs everywhere went up in arms. Then Smith announced that he would hold one press screening at his house in LA, and he would give 48 Red State tickets to media outlets that approached him. The same blogs that jumped all over him for not doing a tour tried to cozy up to Smith for their tickets. Between the faux-outrage and the whiplash-tastic turn to ass-kissing, it's a breathtaking public show of movie-promotion hackery. (For more about the awful, depressing world of press promotion, please see my story about the most boring Michael Cera interview in the world in this week's film section.)

And then? Smith Twittered weight-loss tips to a depressed fan:

So no more of this suicide bullshit: how the fuck do you know you’re not the one who’s supposed to cure cancer. Or change shit. Or inspire the one who WILL change shit. The flick has three acts, sir; stay above ground — or you’ll never know what was possible; just what wasn’t… So today, eat only HALF that Ho-Ho. All this week, eat only half the Ho-Ho. Next week, it’s Anti-Claus time: meaning NO Ho-Ho. Ho-Ho’s won’t vanish in our absence: there will ALWAYS be Ho-Ho’s. Months from next week, maybe years even? You can have another Ho-Ho — after which, you may mutter to yourself “Wasn’t worth it…” because that Ho-Ho becomes an hour walk to even make a dent in the caloric burning department.

The internet is a weird place.

(Thanks, Slog tipper Brad.)