Darrell Trigg for President: Please let this happen.

We've reached that time when all manner of fringe elements have started declaring for the Presidential race.  Most of the people won't make it the distance because they don't have the resources to get onto the ballot (which is why we need electoral reform), or because they started running two years in advance and ran out of money.  And then, there are those who could have all the money they wanted and won't make it because they are just a fucking lunatic.  That's the category that Darrell Trigg falls into.

Darrell Trigg is an Engineering Consultant from Virginia, and I suspect that the only reason why this information got into his biography is because he had to prove that he wasn't some sort of drifter who killed an old widow for her money.  Aside from those four sentences, the other three pages are about how much he loves God.  Nothing wrong with that.  I just find it startling that a person who wants to be President has almost nothing to say about his employment history.  I mean, if you spend 30 years working at Target and now you want to be President, I'd like to know that, because if nothing else, I expect you to have good customer service skills. 

But Darrell is one of those kinds of people who really wants to be a pastor, but got the words mixed up and said "President" instead.  And being an old man, I see how something like that could happen.  When you see Darrell's platform, it'll all make sense, because this is a man whose only difference from the Taliban is that girls will still be able to go to school.  FOR NOW.

He wants to impose all kinds of holy restrictions upon all of us, and maybe 30 or 40 of you out there will think this is cool, but for the other 300 million, it's going to be a problem.  Well, not really, because it's not like this guy has a shot at winning, but if he did, someone would have him assassinated long before the election.  I'm not kidding.  If this man had a realistic shot at being seen on television outside of public access, he would alienate so many people that the Democrats and Republicans would forget about each other and tear this guy to pieces.  And now that I've said it, I truly hope to see something like that happen.

Thanks to The Everlasting GOP Stoppers and Joe My God for bringing this guy to my attention.  His platform is below and in italics, and I'll be chiming in here and there. 

1. Separation of Church and State will be changed to the Union of Church and State. God will be asked to be an integral part of the government of the U.S.

• The national religion of The United States of America will be the Christian religion . Those belonging to other religions, such as Islam, will be free to live and worship here as now, with their own religion;  however, the Christian religion will be the one chosen to form the basic moral principles of our nation, to give it a strong moral foundation, and a right relationship with God.

See, right away, you'd think that he'd be cool with Republicans, because this is what they claim to want.  But don't you worry; this cozy relationship won't last long. 

2.  Public Schools – all schools supported by the U.S. Federal and State tax systems: 

• The Bible will be a standard required subject in all public schools and universities, for all grades , the same as English and Math.
• Each day of school will begin with prayer and the Pledge of Allegiance. 
• The salary and total compensation package of school teachers will be increased.
• The total budget for our school system will be increased.
• The school day will include one period of physical education that includes 30 minutes of exercise four days per week.

There are actually some good ideas in here that aren't really ideas, but instead empty platitudes.  The people who would support increasing teacher salaries and school budgets have already checked out, though, because there's already too much religion in this.  I'd be surprised if they haven't already burst into flames.  Personally, I wish a motherfucker would tell me that my kid had to learn the Bible.  Hell, I'd make sure I was in college during his presidency just so I could tell him "fuck you" when he tried to make me learn it.  Digging myself further into debt would be totally worth it. 

3.  Homosexuality will not be recognized legally, or in any other manner, by the United States government or any state, city, or county government.
 
4. Public - Traded Corporations :

• The income and other compensation,  received by the managers and officers of public - traded corporations will be limited to $300,000 per year. 

...and now, the Republicans have turned on him.  It was all good just a bullet point ago.  Hating gays, forcing the Bible on folks, that was cool.  But you want to limit our--I mean, corporate pay?  I hope your affairs are in order, Mr. Trigg.  And it just goes downhill from here. 

5.  The income of coaches of sports teams at universities will be limited to $300,000 per year .

Yeah fucking right.  They'd let Jerry Sandusky go back to Penn State before this ever happened.
 
6.  The legal drinking age will be increased to 25 for any alcoholic beverage. 

• Alcohol will not be allowed on university campuses.

Because alcohol is allowed there now.  Please don't think your Bible is going to keep college students from getting fucked up.  Also, you just lost their vote, too.  They weren't even listening until you said this.

7.   Marriage and the family will be protected by the following :

• Marriage will be defined as the union of one woman with one man.
• The legal age for marriage will be 22.
• A couple wishing to get married must first attend Christian marriage counseling classes.
• Divorce will only be allowed in cases of abuse, infidelity, or incarceration. 
• The penalties for abuse and infidelity will include large fines and jail time.
• Married couples who become pregnant must attend Christian parenting classes.

Uh-huh.  You got it, chief.  Especially that divorce part.  That genie isn't going back in the bottle.  Or maybe I should say "toothpaste" so you don't feel the need to tell me that genies are agents of Satan. 

8.  The rating system for movies and T.V. shows will be drastically overhauled :

• No show or movie will be allowed on T.V. systems or computer systems accessible by homes that contain nudity, strong sexual content, excessive foul language, blasphemy, or any form of homosexuality.

This is the statement of a man who doesn't understand how technology works.  I'm tickled that he specified that this stuff wouldn't be "accessible by homes," though, because I read that to mean that this is what he'll be looking at inside the Oval Office. 

9.  Abortion will only be legal in situations where the child has a small probability of living and the pregnancy is placing the life of the mother in extreme risk.

He's actually to the left of much of the Republicans here.  Go figure.  YOU SOCIALIST SCUM.
 
10.  Industries in the United States ( U.S.)  that have suffered from foreign competition with much lower labor pay rates, lower employee compensation costs, and lower environmental compliance costs will be assisted and protected. Assistance will include financial help in building or refurbishing manufacturing plants and training employees and low capital gains taxes. Protection will include tariffs on imported goods in order to establish a market fair for these U.S. industries. These tariffs will be used to help prevent inflation on these manufactured goods.

This is him begging for lobbyist money, because American industries ARE their foreign competition.  Either that or he truly doesn't understand how outsourcing works.  I'm so cynical that I really believe it's the first one.

11.  The Welfare Department will be overhauled. This overhaul will include training welfare recipients for jobs that match their abilities. The financial responsibilities of caring for children of mothers who are not married will be shared by the father .

I wonder if he realizes how socialist he sounds, except that the 30 minute video he posted to announce his candidacy suggests that he isn't self-aware at all.</a>  The first part is actually a good idea that President Obama has been trying to get in place for a while now.  The second part, is pretty random and also what is supposed to be happening already--child support.  Perhaps you've heard of it.  

12. The insurance and medical system of the U.S. will be overhauled. Employers will be required to provide insurance for their employees. The costs of medical services and pharmaceuticals will be reviewed. These will be offered at a fair price without excessive profit for the providers.

If the corporations don't get you for limiting their pay, then Big Pharma certainly will.  Sir, don't say this stuff in public, because your life will be in danger. 

 
13. Illegal immigration laws will be enforced . Laws will be passed to assist this enforcement.
14. Several laws will be reviewed, including several statute -of-limitations.
15. Marijuana will not be legal  except for medicinal purposes.

Yadda, yadda, yadda.  Look, Trigg, I just don't want to see you waste your money here.  Just stop.  I know you said that God wants you to be President, but God has met us, even if you haven't.  He's clearly playing a practical joke on you, which I think he does from time to time.  All of these people out here claiming that God told you to do something, I think he just wants to see if you'll actually do it.  There's no way he really thinks you're going to become President until all 300 million of us die first.  And if that's what actually happens, you'll just be the leader of about 40 people until Mexico claims the empty husk that was America.  

The Donald Sterl-mancipation

So I guess I'm supposed to be happy that Donald Sterling got a lifetime ban from the NBA.  Yeah, that's fantastic, considering that his days on this earth are probably in the single digits, anyway.  It's a lifetime ban for a person without much life left.  And he still owns the team, so all Adam Silver really did was tell him he can't come to the stadium.  When you buy Clippers merch or tix, you're still putting money in his pocket. And speaking of money, on a percentage basis, the amount that he got fined is about the same as you being fined around $20. 

Yeah, we got a huge win today.

But during a few checks on social media when I was supposed to be working, I see y'all out here acting like we just got emancipated.  Like it was the OJ verdict all over again.  And I gotta ask, what are you so happy about?

Now, I'm not one of these people who's gonna try to ruin your good mood by saying that there are more important things to be concerned with.  Those people are assholes, because of course there's always something to be more concerned with. It's just that there hasn't been much change on the Keystone XL Pipeline and Congress still isn't passing any bills.  And since The Walking Dead still hasn't come back, we're pretty starved for excitement.

No, I'm going to ruin your good mood by telling you that this is nothing to be happy about, because Donald Sterling didn't get banned because he's a racist.  Donald Sterling got banned because it became big news that he was a racist. 

Donald Sterling was a racist a long time before now, and there were a whole lot of incidents that he was involved in that were reported on and promptly ignored.  The only difference between this one and all of those was how you found out about it.  The other ones came out through lawsuits and court depositions and OH MY GOD THIS IS SO BORINGZZZZZZZZZZZZ. This one came out because his jump off (I refuse to call her anything else) goaded him into talking about black people so she could record it and leak it to TMZ.  Already, this story is more sexy.  Certainly, sexier than she is.  She looks like she used to be a man. 

All of a sudden, Donald Sterling is an embarrassment and needs to be removed, but wasn't he just as embarrassing, if not more so back in 2009, when he paid out the largest settlement on housing discrimination lawsuit ever?  Or what about those sexual harassment suits?  His callous nature when it came to evicting tenants?  The time that he made his wife pose as a government worker and visit the residents of his buildings to find out what race they were, so he could evict them?  Refusing to rent to Blacks or Latinos at all?  Donald Sterling has been a horrible piece of shit racist for a long time.  So really, it should insult all of you that this is what it took to bring him down. 

You mean to tell me that the NBA didn't know about any of this?  And that his racist views expressed in a private conversation is worse than the stuff listed above that the NBA certainly knows about?  The NBA doesn't care that Donald Sterling is racist.  The NBA cares that you know he's racist.  If this was about his racism, they would have banned him in 1983 when he asked Rollie Massamino, "I wanna know why you think you can coach these niggers."

The truth is, if Donald Sterling's jump off was a woman of a higher character, you wouldn't know anything that he said and they wouldn't have done anything.  Period.  Despite the fact that he's continued to make himself rich by denying living space to minorities.  Despite the fact that he's sexually harassed women in his employ.  Adam Silver can get in front of reporters and make his dramatic statements, but the truth is, it wasn't a problem for them before.  It only became a problem when it became public.

And the same goes for all of these sponsors who cut ties with the Clippers.  If y'all don't stop acting like you have morals.  Every one of you is a conglomerate of corrupt pieces of shit.  Every one of you knew who Sterling was and chose to sign deals with him anyway, because OOH LOOGIT BLAKE GRIFFIN JUMPS HIGH.  And now that everyone knows that he's a bigot, you don't want your brand associated with him.  Good thing those lawsuits got swept under the rug, otherwise, you would have been forced to leave all that money on the table.  So CarMax, State Farm, Kia, Corona, AQUAhydrate. Red Bull, Sprint, Lumber Liquidators,  LoanMart, Yokohama Tires, Samsung, Mercedes-Benz, and Virgin America, you ain't shit.  Not a single one of you.

So don't get too excited about all of this.  All that happened is that they reminded you what their real priorities are.  No progress has been made.  Unless you're Donald Sterling's jump off.  She's about to come up when she gets that spot on Basketball Wives.

I totally get your Kardashian anger, Vogue readers.

Some people wonder why you wasted all that time being upset about Kim Kardashian on the Vogue cover.  "She's just getting her money and not hurting anyone." Someone probably told you to stop hating, because they have no idea how to form a legitimate argument.  But I understand, Vogue readers.  That's right, Thad Ochocinco, sporadic blogger who knows nothing about anything outside of sports or comic books, feels your pain. 

To sum it all up, It's worlds colliding, except no one asked or wanted them to. 

See, on some level, people read shit like Vogue so they don't have to deal with lowbrow shit like the Kardashians.  It's supposed to be a safe space away from all of that.  People who like the Kardashians have the E! Network, where they can have all of the Kardashians and Chelsea Handler and Joan Rivers that they can handle.  The rest of us program our cable boxes to skip over the E! Network, because ignorance of what is on that channel is bliss.  "You keep that over there, and I'll stay over here."  "I don't bother you and you don't bother me."  It was like a storefront church in the middle of a red light district, except that in this metaphor, the Kardashians are actually the church and the red light district is the rest of the free world.  You know, come to think of it, maybe this metaphor doesn't work.

But to stick with it, say the church starts venturing out to convert the people.  Now, my ambisexual S&M Massage parlor isn't hurting anyone, but here comes this nun, trying to save souls, which kills my business.  She's making people think that there's something wrong with the sexual gratification of a massage while being whipped by a person of an unidentifiable sex.  But we had an understanding:  You keep inside the church, and I won't have your building firebombed by the mob underboss who controls this neighborhood.  Basically, this metaphor can also double as the pitch for Quentin Tarantino's Sister Act.

That's what's happening here.  Kim Kardashian is invading what was supposed to be a Kardashian-free zone, and we all deserve one of those, because without it, we're likely to devolve into whatever we call people from Tennessee.  She's breaking the terms of the agreement, and a lot of people are upset.  True, it wasn't her decision (the editor of Vogue said this would never happen, then magazine sales got low), but Vogue readers didn't want this.  Vogue readers (I guess, because I don't know any) believe that they're too high class to watch a show about two sisters smelling each other's vagina sweat (this actually happened on "Keeping Up With the Kardashians").  When the bar is that low, I'm not gonna say that they're wrong for feeling that way.

Usually, when worlds collide, something good comes out of it, like when the Justice League fought the Avengers, when Larry Bird played against Magic Johnson, when Spider-Man started selling Twinkies in the 1970s.  That was both adventurous and delicious.  This is more like what happened to Ashlee Simpson at the Orange Bowl.  Or when RoboCop showed up on WCW Capital Combat.   Yeah, worlds were colliding, but in the same way that the world of sports cars sometimes collide with the world of the underside of a truck.  There was symbolic blood everywhere that night, and it was in the form of Sting's expression when he realized that he was actually standing in front of people pretending to be saved by RoboCop.

So I understand the anger of Vogue readers, and you should, too.  For all everyone's talk of "She's just doing her thing, let her make her money," or whatever stupid shit people say to make it appear like they're above it all, you know you'd be pissed if someone tried to feature her useless ass in three episodes of The Walking Dead. 

No One Cares If You Approve Of Their Life Choices

It's pretty common these days to say, "I just don't agree with his lifestyle," as if people are sitting around waiting for your fucking approval.  You usually hear this in conversations about gay people or gay marriage, but I don't see why people even waste time thinking about it.  Gay people haven't gotten the approval of lots of people in human history, and it hasn't curbed the inherent lust for same-sex flesh even a little bit.  So clearly, they're not waiting for you to give the thumbs up. 

In fact, the more people that come out against gay activities has led to a response in the other direction:  More gay people are being openly gay.  The idea that you think your approval is needed has actually drawn more gay people out of hiding.

Back when people didn't talk about gay sex so much, because everyone was sexually repressed, gay people just kept quiet and snuck off to their bathhouses or the Blue Oyster, or wherever gay people got together.  But now that gay sex is on everyone's lips, gay people decided to fight back.  And yes, that particular phrasing was done on purpose.  

See, you don't have to approve of anything, because it's still going to happen.   For instance, I don't approve of bigotry, but it hasn't stopped you from saying stupid shit about gay people, has it?  In fact, to drive the point home, try that strategy in other scenarios to demonstrate how effective it is.  Next time a bear attacks you or a guy tries to rob your house, you should tell them, "I don't approve of this lifestyle choice," and report back here to let me know if it prevented you from getting shot or eaten.  My thinking is that I won't ever hear from you again.


That's why, despite this overt lack of approval, we still have gay people.  The arrogance needed to believe that approval matters is why we still have thickheaded people walking around worrying about cock-ravenous gay men attacking them in showers and alleyways.  I wish bigots understood how funny it is to listen to them fear the lustful urges of gay men without ever considering that:

A: Gay men might also have self control.

B: The bigot in question probably isn't even their type.  

Instead of saying that you "approve" or "agree" with something, you should really ask yourself if you do or don't care.  If you don't care, then you generally don't give a shit, and never think up stupid phrases like, "I don't agree with his lifestyle," or "What if he looks at me in the shower?" If you do care, then you probably give more thought to the activities of gay men than actual gay men do.  At this point, you have to ask yourself why you care so much what gay men are doing.  The answer is either one of those things:  You're fucking ignorant, or you're...you know, curious. 

You probably also assume that your own life is worthy of approval.  It probably isn't.  You probably cheat on your wife, or steal pens from your job, or vote Republican, or contribute to Love & Hip-Hop's ratings.  Maybe you drink too much, or let your kids sag their jeans, or cheer for John Cena.  Any number of things that deserve to be frowned upon.  By my standards, I think that saying kind words about Justin Bieber should come with a mandatory jail sentence.  And if you're thinking right now that it isn't about your standards, but the standards of your religion: I don't approve of your religion.  Odds are, it's a manmade invention designed to placate the masses so they don't attack their wealthy overlords.  It probably has a well-entrenched history of murder, genocide, racism, and misogyny, and in the modern age, does nothing but drive wedges in between people and/or hides pedophiles from justice. 

So instead of wasting all that time and energy being judgmental (because this is a game that we can all play), why not just go live your life and let everyone else live theirs?  All of that focus on manlove is time you could be spending inventing a Fruity Pebbles drink, or an iPad that does more than waste time.  We don't need another person trying to stand in the way of other people's happiness, but we can always use another person who really couldn't give two fucks what's happening in someone else's bedroom.

On Marcus Smart, Jeff Orr, and Acting An Ass At Basketball Games

If you taunt, berate, out belittle athletes in games, it says a lot about how you view them. To you, they're not people. They're chattel. Hired entertainment. Dancing monkeys. They don't become real until they come onto the stands. Like Mos Def said, "The hardheaded always gotta feel it to believe it." 

A thorough, well-earned, ass-whooping will end a lot of this. The average fan really doesn't wanna risk the possibility that security will get there before they eat that two-piece.  It's all fun and games until that ass is getting tenderized. I think we all understand that most fans are pussy, even in this shit-talking, rude, and insulting environment we call "America in 2014."  Everybody talks, but almost nobody really wants to back it up, which is part of the reason why gun sales are up.  The threat of backing up shit-talk without a gun would eliminate all but the most "bout that life" fans from getting disrespectful. The people who want to fight would just have to become the hazard of doing business, I guess.

Still, we can't have that. Letting players to go after pieces of shit in the stands is a horrible business plan, because unlicensed dentistry in a public place isn't really a selling point.  No matter how right the player may be (I still think that Dikembe should have been allowed to punch that dude for calling him a monkey), that kind of stuff has to be deterred. Otherwise, players will think that it's normal to run in the stands and people will stop coming to games.  This isn't wrestling, where the fight coming into the stands is a good thing.  Patting the participants on the back will just make you part of the fight.  And the first time a totally innocent fan gets hit by a player, that fan will suddenly own a piece of the team and start making all the stupid trades that you and your friends talk about during flag football.  So what's the solution, then?

There isn't one. I think we all understand that human beings are terrible creatures, most of which don't deserve the basic decency that they think they're entitled to. I work in a field where all I do is deal with entitled, shitty, people who think they're better than me because I have on work boots.  I see it all the time.  You're condescending, arrogant, and rude.  Just look at how you act when you go to a restaurant, or heaven forbid, Wal-Mart.  You don't deserve any kindness, especially after you answered your phone in the movie theater.  Dear People of America: Generally speaking, you're pieces of shit.  Okay, you might not set car bombs, kick puppies, or use the n-word, but those aren't the only things you can do to be considered a terrible person. 

So expecting the paying customer to improve his own behavior is a fool's errand.  The leagues still need to get something in place to deal with this, because it's gotten ridiculous. Basically, the leagues (Really, just the NBA and college basketball, because it's no coincidence that the leagues where the players have weapons also have barriers between players and fans) need to empower players to get fans ejected.

Tell the players that if someone is getting out of line, they can pull a ref to the side, point the person out, the ref will eject the fan, and security will throw him out on his ass.  It should be that simple. I doubt the players would lie on fans, because they've got out things going on, like the game happening around them.  They don't have time to pick out fans to eject so you can confirm your victimization bias.  Truth is, do you know how big of an asshole you have to be to get the attention of someone on the court, let alone make them try to come after you?  And while the players run the risk of identifying the wrong person, after throwing down $1,000 on courtside tickets, the fans standing around the right person will make sure that they stand out.  Watching everybody turn into snitches will be part of the fun of a program like this.

And to get an athlete in the middle of a game so upset that they want to put their hands on you is hard to do.  I know, because I've tried, and I assure you, it takes more than effort and a big mouth.  When I was in college, my friend Mike and I used to sit courtside at our team's basketball games and go in on people.  To us, it was all in fun, but we were assholes, plain and simple.  It got to the point where it was secondary to the game.  We just wanted to insult people.  We felt like we were creating the homecourt advantage that Jackson State desperately needed (because we weren't getting better players any time soon).  And to show how stupid our asses were, we yelled at the referees more than anyone else.  The same referees that could have put us out at any time, and here we are, making fun of their shoes and pants. To their credit, they never reacted, and I know they heard us. 

They should have put us out. I would have. If it had been me, i would have tried to get is banned from the building. What we did was uncalled for.  Fun at the time, because we were stupid 20 year olds, but uncalled for.

So I get why people do it when they're young.  I wouldn't do that now, because I'm mentally well-adjusted.  You're supposed to grow out of this kind of shit, but the people who seem to wind up in these incidents now are all 40 and 50 year old men.  I guess it's empowering to feel like you can yell at these people and they can't do shit, but how emasculated do you have to be in your personal life to think that insulting rich athletes is a healthy outlet?  Who told you your dick was small, Jeff Orr?

Because it isn't about the money that they paid for tickets that makes people feel empowered to act like that.  Hell, we got in free to our games and we were practically standing on the court.  I think that making it about the money paid just gives them an excuse.  No, they're just shitty people.  I bet they treat wait staff at restaurants the same way.  It has nothing to do with the tickets.  There are hundreds of other people in that same section who paid just as much who didn't incite a player to jeopardize his paycheck, scholarship, or legal freedom just for the chance to crack them across the jaw. 

Knowing that, I won't blame Marcus Smart for shoving that asshole, because I've been that asshole. Jeff Orr had that coming, and probably more, just like i did. We can't keep going through life thinking that, just because someone is doing something for us, be it entertaining us or working on our behalf, rich or poor, that we can just treat them with disrespect.  You might think you're above them in that instance, but a fist to the face will put you on the same level real quick.  

A Calm, Sensible Reaction to Jesse Eisenberg as Lex Luthor

Jesse Eisenberg is Lex Luthor, because Michael Cera is already booked.

I'm sure that's the kind of reaction that DC was expecting and I'm all too happy to give it to them.  And it's not even because I'm angry about the casting. I actually kinda like it.  I, unlike so many others, have perspective.  The perspective that comes from an reading too many comic books.  I understand that there are many different versions of Lex Luthor, and that Jesse Eisenberg fits into a few of them.  Dare I say, this casting is brave...and bold.  Please, hold your applause, because that joke was awful.

Still, you're gonna have to go through the initial shock of people saying, "The fucking dude that played Mark Zuckerberg is gonna be Lex Luthor?"

I saw a guy on Facebook that said, "Is he going to invent Facebook to defeat Superman?"  Really, that's the level of discourse DC has to face, and it's not like Jesse Eisenberg has given the fans a ton of ammo to throw back at him.  This won't go much past unfunny Facebook jokes and DC will be fine with that, because they already weathered the worst of this storm with Ben Affleck.  That was an epic tantrum, and once we got past that, it's like people couldn't really get that mad anymore.  It was like the world said, "Okay, we all know this flick is gonna suck. They really can't do any worse than this." 

And after that, Gal Gadot just got questions about her physique, mostly because no one knows who she is.  Jesse Eisenberg is just getting bad jokes, like the ones I've written just now.  It's all just been diminishing nerdrage, so we'll probably be done with this story by Monday.  No one even noticed that Jeremy Irons is playing Alfred.

I saw more outrage yesterday that Fox wants Channing Tatum to play Gambit in a future X-Men movie.  It wouldn't be a surprise that Fox was thinking about doing some more bad X-Men casting, but people were legit mad at that, I guess because Channing Tatum is too sexy or can't act or something.  As if Gambit is a character filled with such pathos that only a Shakespearean actor could capture it all.  Anyway, the X-Men flicks are filled with terrible decisions. I still believe that Halle Berry was cast because she was the only black person the producers could name.

Warner Bros. is supposed to be better than that.  Or at least Christopher Nolan is and Zach Snyder are.  And I'm willing to give it a chance, because as I've said trying to talk people off the ledge today, it all depends on what kind of Lex Luthor will be in the movie.  You got your "evil businessman" Lex Luthor (who could stomp ass), and you got your "sociopath scientist" Lex Luthor (who could not).  I think the second one is something Eisenberg can work with.  As long as he's not on there talking about being the "greatest criminal mind of our time," I think we'll be fine.

Dr. King: The Hero I Never Knew

I think most young black men go through a phase where they turn against Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. I know I did.  It happened to me around the time I read The Autobiography of Malcolm X.

When I started learning about Brother Malcolm, I got excited.  Here was a guy who wasn't taking no shit off white folks.  He dared them to do something in a time when they could have done it and gotten away with it.  He wasn't concerned with racial harmony or any of that bullshit.  He wanted what was right, and he wanted it now.  He was openly dismissive of anyone who stood in the way of that message.  When you're a young black man in a country that doesn't seem to like or respect you, it's empowering to read his thoughts.  And who didn't want to be the dude telling off these white folks, and they couldn't do shit about it?  I wasn't racist or anything, but I liked to believe that, if I was alive then, I would have stood with Malcolm X. 

Compared to that, Martin Luther King was boring as hell.  Oh, he gave some speeches?  He marched on Washington?  "Man, please.  Let me know when he starts fighting back," I'd think, like there was gonna be a later chapter of his life. "Ol' weak ass Dr. King.  Malcolm X is a real nigga."  That's how young I was.  I used ignorant words like that. 

Speaking of ignorant, that's exactly where that attitude came from:  Ignorance. 

Except for four years, I went to school in the South.  I started out in Sumter, SC, and finished in Biloxi, MS.  And in all those years of school, I learned like, five things about black history.  It wasn't because I was in the South, because the American schools overseas weren't exactly opening the floodgates of black history for me, either.  I can't imagine it was different anywhere else in America.  By the time I graduated from high school, all I had learned in school about black people was "The March on Washington," "I Have A Dream," "Harriet Tubman and the Underground Railroad," "George Washington Carver," and "Crispus Attucks was the first person to die in the Revolutionary War."  Didn't even learn what Crispus Attucks was doing there.  And what made it sadder was that my history teachers at Biloxi High were all black. 

Point is, if you grow up thinking that's all he did, then you're gonna think he's weak.  Every year, they celebrate this man and all they say is that he created racial harmony through nonviolent resistance.  They paint him as weak willed, like he just took abuse from white people until they felt bad and signed the Civil Rights Act.  Based on what is said about him in the mainstream, Dr. King didn't win because he was determined.  The white folks just got tired of hitting him, and that's how we got our rights.

I kept that attitude about Dr. King for a long time.  After I read The Autobiography of Malcolm X, I decided to read up on other black names that I had heard about, but didn't know anything about.  I wanted to know about the revolutionaries who empowered us and fought back.  The ones that scared Whitey back in the 60s and 70s so bad that they never talk about them now.  So i bought books about Marcus Garvey, the Black Panthers, Eldridge Cleaver.  I read books of speeches from revolutionary figures of the time.  I wasn't becoming militant, but I felt like I was learning about who we were during those times that schools don't talk about.  Fighting the power, in a way.

But it never occurred to me that I didn't know enough about Dr. King.  I figured they had to be telling us all we needed to know about him, because white folks love the man.  If he had been militant or anything, they wouldn't celebrate him like they do.  The Panthers.  Brother Malcolm.  This is that real, right here.  So I never bought books about Dr. King.  Still haven't, in fact.

But I did make an effort to learn more about the man, out of respect, really.  I mean, he got shot with firehoses and had dogs sicced on him.  And he suffered the indignity of having Paul Winfield play him in a movie.  So here and there, I'd pick up little factoids or read articles about him online.  And I came to understand where he was coming from.  I also saw that he wasn't the weak-willed simp I always believed him to be.

I also understood why they only teach us two things about him, because this man was trying to bring this whole system down.  Yeah, white folks like him now, but they didn't like his ass back then.  They weren't embracing his message, J. Edgar Hoover was tapping his phones.  They thought he was a terrorist and Communist, bent on destroying America.  Yeah, nice ol' Martin Luther King.  Sure, the FBI was on Malcolm X and the Panthers, but they were just criminals to the FBI.  No one considered that they were toppling anything.  Not even with Malcolm X's plan to speak before the United Nations.  White America truly feared Dr. King. 

Some of them still do, because there are tons of websites bent on discrediting everything Dr. King stood for.  The man's been dead for almost 50 years and they're still throwing dirt on his name, as if he's gonna come back and lead the revolution again. 

And that's because he was a true revolutionary, planning to bring the poor right to rich folks' doorsteps.  He was against the war in Vietnam, because he could see that it was just another way to exploit poor people.  He wasn't just trying to help black people, he was trying to change this whole system.  His "second bill of rights" was so ambitious that this country would be unrecognizable today had it fully been implemented (it probably wouldn't have, but still).  The only reason why rich people celebrate him now is because he's dead and couldn't do all of the things he had planned.  If you hate socialism, then you should just go ahead and start hating Dr. King retroactively.  Dr. King thought so much bigger, and even though we celebrate him today, we're actually doing him a disservice by reducing the expanse of his vision.

That's what should be taught in schools.  Racial harmony is cool and kids need to learn that, because kids are assholes, but they also need to see the totality of his message.  I wish I had seen it when I was younger, and I'm ashamed to say that it took me until my late 20s and early 30s to learn what I do know.  I'm not done learning about him, though.  I've found that I identify with him more than I ever did Malcolm X.  In today's world, Dr. King resonates more than ever.  Which says a lot about where we are as a nation.

You should be ridiculed for caring about Dwyane Wade's outside kid

You people express shock at the dumbest shit. 

Dwyane Wade and Ludacris were revealed to have knocked up their side pieces in the same week.  Both are in relationships (but were on breaks at the time).  Dwyane Wade is an NBA player.  Ludacris is a rapper.  The only thing shocking here is that they didn't knock up the same woman.  I mean, we don't know that rapper and ballplayer sperm can't do that.  

If anything, it's your own fault for believing that a pro basketball player or a rapper would stay faithful to his wife.  And I don't say that because I think they're bad people.  I say it because they're constantly having random model/stripper ass thrown at them as they travel in luxury around the world.  The man who can resist that forever either has supreme will or is already gay.  The rest of us would have to have his wife standing next to him at all time, like Doug Christie did.  As freakish in the face as Doug Christie looked, the only reason why he got through his day without tripping into a pair of strange, spreadeagled thighs is because Jackie Christie was never more than 10 feet away at all times. 

True story.  Sat in on his interviews and everything. 

So, I don't see why what Wade and Cris did was anything outside of what you should expect from them.  If you want to call them out for anything, call them out for raw dogging their jump offs.  I mean, I assume they've both had enough jump offs to know better.  I also don't see why you're coming to Gabrielle Union's defense all of a sudden, because y'all know y'all hate Gabrielle Union. Gabrielle Union was this generation's Robin Givens until people stopped casting her in movies.  And the hate came solely from the fact that she was too good at her job of playing smart-mouthed shrews in every flick she'd been in.  It wasn't even based on real life.  So let's not act like you're doing this for her benefit.

And I'm sure, somewhere out there, someone's thinking about the kids, because Dwyane Wade and Ludacris (I guess) are supposed to be role models.  And if you're letting Ludacris's example raise your kids, then you're a worse parent than Siovaughn Wade.  Allegedly.  There might be an explanation for that day she sat on the corner wearing a sandwich board. 

But anyone who would look at Ludacris as a role model shouldn't be allowed to raise the kids that they're claiming to protect.  I mean, this is the same person who led off with "What's Your Fantasy," "Phat Rabbit," and "Ho," and followed up with "Area Codes," "Move Bitch," "Splash Waterfalls," and "P-Poppin."  These are probably the parents who post videos of their twerking children on YouTube.  The video would probably be set to a Ludacris song if he had any hits out right now.  As for Wade, true, he has a fatherly image that would be a good example for young boys. But so did Bill Cosby, when we were kids.  And look at how our generation turned out.  Our generation didn't follow his example.  Our generation didn't even eat the damn pudding pops. 

Also, I'm not throwing shade on Luda for those songs, because I own every last one of them.  Believe me, I ain't judging.  I'll be able to recite the words from "Ho" when I'm on my deathbed.  I'm just saying, if your kids ever knew the words to those songs, you're a horrible parent, that's all.

So what are we really talking about here?  Two men who ruined the concept of a "break" for black men everywhere, for starters (a ridiculous concept, anyway).  And a bunch of women who care more about two strangers' relationships than their own, evidently.  Also, I'm seeing that I have a far different concept of what is "shocking" than everyone else.  Magic Johnson was shocking (and scary).  Tiger Woods was shocking (and hilarious).  No one's been burnt or driven into a tree in either of these stories, which makes them quite boring.  I need to be scared or entertained, so I refuse to pay attention until we hear that one of the women is actually a man or something like that. 

Everybody can't be Eddie Guerrero. So stop holding that against Chavo.

There's no shame in not being as talented as Eddie Guerrero. 

There have been thousands of wrestlers to walk the earth in the last hundred years.  It's safe to say that many of them were not on Eddie Guerrero's level.  You're talking about a guy who was strong, athletic, super-charismatic, and able to match up with any wrestler in the world.  When he was alive, he was easily one of the five best wrestlers in the world.  Since guys like that don't grow on trees, people get that, since he was so great, there was no shame in not being able to live up to his standard.

Unless you're Chavo Guerrero, Jr.  Then, you just plain suck.

Chavo had the misfortune of being raised with Eddie Guerrero.  Had he grown up anywhere else in the world and become a wrestler, he'd be looked at respectably, and judged on what he can and can't do.  But because his last name is Guerrero, this guy has to live the rest of his life being told that he isn't Eddie.  If only his last name was Cruz.  Chavo Cruz might have been a world champion by now, or at the very least, a TNA World Champion. 

All that's ever said about Chavo on the internet is that he isn't as good as Eddie and that he's getting by based on his name.  To be fair, everything said about everyone on the internet just as negative, but when it comes to Chavo, I'm like, "You're taking it too far, internet.  You're talking about him like you're talking about President Obama."  The guy just can't do anything right. 

So he isn't charismatic as Eddie.  So he doesn't move like Eddie.  So he isn't the wrestler that Eddie was.  Who the fuck is?  You know who else wasn't Eddie Guerrero?  AJ Styles.  Or Rey Misterio, Jr.  Or Big Show.  Or Christian.  But no one's rubbing their noses in the fact that they aren't some other guy.  Except maybe Christian.  I mean, Edge was so much bigger than him. 

But folks do it to Chavo because they share the same name.  All the while overlooking the fact that he's pretty damn good himself.  No, he's not Eddie, but he's a guy that also has good, fast-paced, exciting matches.  And he's stuck next to fucking Hernandez.  The internet is so fixated on hating Chavo for not being Eddie that they're overlooking the fact that he's teaming with Hernandez and still manages to pull good matches out of his ass.  Now that is talent.  When was the last time Eddie had to carry a shit partner like that?

The internet:  "When he teamed with Chavo." 

Me:  "Well, I guess I kind of walked right into that one, didn't I?"

Except that Eddie didn't have to carry Chavo through those matches.  No one did.  It ain't like he was Erik Watts, a clear case of nepotism.  Chavo carried his weight, held his own, whatever cliche you want to use to describe someone who does their part.  Chavo was one of the "Smackdown Six," and for once, he wasn't just "Eddie's nephew" something like that, where he could be dismissed.  He was on equal ground with everyone else.  And was just as big a part of those matches as Edge or Rey Misterio, Jr. or [REDACTED] or Kurt Angle.  Or, yes, even Eddie Guerrero.  Go back and watch those matches.  World titles be damned; Chavo Guerrero, Jr. can wrestle.

It's safe to admit it to yourself, Internet.

How to Fail at Comforting Others: A True Story

One of my old co-workers died recently and I was really at a loss for words. Not because we were particularly close or anything, because we weren't. In fact, we didn't get along at all. But I was real cool with her son, whom I also worked with, and so i wanted to say something supportive to him and a couple of other people who worked there. And that's when i realized i had nothing prepared for such an occasion. 

When you're a socially awkward person like I am, you have to prepare for the moment when the world forces you to interact with others, sometimes on an emotional level.  For those who are personable and likeable, you probably won't understand, since you're able to use words to express what is in your heart.  But for those of us who spend a dangerous amount of time inside their own heads, preparation is necessary.  Usually, I have some stock phrases that i keep on call for certain situations. One of the worst feelings is to be caught out there, fumbling over your words when someone speaks to you in the hallway.  By the time you come up with something, the person who spoke to you is already around the corner, thinking what a rude asshole you are. 

So you have to prepare for that mundane interaction by coming up with a variety of responses in the event that someone does speak to you.  If you're particularly anal, you might write them down or rehearse them in the mirror, so you can get used to saying them without spitting in anyone's face.  Me, I like to imagine each scenario, where I'm able to effortlessly rattle off the response to each greeting.  My timing is always perfect, and sometimes, I even give the double point to the person walking by.  Yes, even in my imagination, I'm lame.

Anyway, you might have some go-to jokes or sarcastic comment that usually works in a variety of situations.  You might have a self-effacing comment for that person who asks how your day is going.  "I can't call it," works when you're around black people.  I don't even know what that means. 

But I got nothing for when someone dies. Nothing.  I wish I could be that person who always has the right thing to say in moments like that; the person who can console an entire room of people with just the sound of his voice.  That's the kind of person who talks people out of killing themselves, or influences people to turn their lives around.  They're like the opposite of a high school football coach. 

Me, I'm the one in the back of the room with his head down, precisely because I don't want to make eye contact and be forced to speak.  I know I don't have anything to add, so why make this gathering awkward for all of us?  Just leave me back here to draw my pictures of Spider-Man fighting the Ultimate Warrior. 

I genuinely struggle with all kinds of sad or sentimental moments. You'd think someone who wrote all the time would be better at that sort of thing, but it seems I'm only good with being critical, sports, movies, and mockery.  The worst part is, I can't even do those in spoken word form. Sadly, technology hasn't evolved to the point where I can use a keyboard to speak all of my words for me.

I know most people don't even have to think about this sort of thing in sad situations like death, because they have religion to lean on.  They can regurgitate any number of Bible quotes at a moment's notice, and all of them are the right thing to say, because they're almost identical.  "Trust God, it's His will, I'm praying for you (almost always a lie), He's right on time," and much, much, more.  It's like Time-Life's "Most Pious Greatest Hits Collection."

Not to say that they don't mean it or it isn't heartfelt, but no real thought is going into that.  They're just saying something they heard someone else say.  People have been saying those exact things to each other for literally the last 1500 years.  But that's the goal, I think.  You want something that will resonate with people, but no one has the time to think up something that good every single time something tragic happens.  So, plagiarism works, too.  The Bible is a large book with tiny words, and the majority of people who claim that they've read it haven't actually read it.  So you're in the clear, even if you decide to make up something that sounds Bible-ish.  Really, just say that the Lord has been there for you like he was for Methuselah, and people will just nod and say "Amen," never realizing that God killed Methuselah before the Great Flood so he wouldn't have to die with everyone else.  So uplifting. 

Sadly, I'm not religious, so I have to think up my own material.  And there's my problem.  What do you say to someone who's lost their mother?  I mean, I care, and I hurt for him, even if we haven't spoken in years.  I don't want to lie and tell him I'm praying for him (because I'm not), but he and his family are in my thoughts.  How do I get that across in one or two sentences that will hopefully help him through a trying time?

Because I don't think Kardashian jokes are going to go over well in that circumstance.

Some guy named Kevin Jackson is a partisan hack

Thanks to Twitter, this blog entry came to my attention, and I just couldn't resist.  It was attributed to Joe the Plumber, because most people who saw it came across it on his blog.  But there's no way a boob like that could be this articulate.  This wrong, yes, but not this articulate.  So I responded to the blog, FJM-style.  The unedited article can be found here.  The original post is in bold.  My comments are in regular text. 

Admit it. You want a white Republican president again. 

This is gonna go well.

Now before you start feeling like you’re a racist, understand you are not. Wanting a white Republican president doesn’t make you racist, it just makes you American. 

Naturally.  Everyone knows that this is the natural order of things.  Only wanting a black President makes you racist, which is why all of us black people voted for him.  We're all so racist.

In the pre-black president era, criticizing the president was simply the American thing to do. An exercise of one’s First Amendment right. Criticism had nothing to do with color, because there had never been a black president, or at least one whom people recognized as black. So to criticize the president meant that you didn’t like his policies. 

Yeah, all of those signs of President Obama as a witchdoctor or a monkey that Teabaggers held up were just the extra gravy to drive home the point of their valid criticism.  Definitely not racist.
 

The election of a recognized black president was not supposed to change anything. In fact, it was supposed to (1) ease any perceived racial tensions, and (2) allow the government to focus on legislating without race. So America would be more free than ever to discuss the issues. 

And yet, that damn Obama let his blackness get in the way.  Making all of these good white folks mad that he's black and President by being black AND President.  So racist.  How dare he?


Not the case. And that is why having a white Republican president is best for the country. Consider that nobody is ever accused of being racist for disagreeing with white presidents.

Unless you're Rev. Al Sharpton, Rev. Jesse Jackson, Cynthia McKinney, Dr. Cornel West, Tavis Smiley, Roland Martin, Tupac, all of the Black Panthers, Malcolm X, Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., or any black commentator who isn't a Republican.  But go on. 

Mexicans disagreed with most white Republican presidents over America’s immigration policy. Many deranged Mexicans believe we should open the country up to them, some saying that much of America belongs to Mexico anyway. They are not called racists. 

Probably because they didn't say anything racist.  


Liberal blacks have disagreed with most Republican presidents since Eisenhower, yet these blacks are not considered racists. 

Clearly, you're not familiar with #WhiteTwitter. 
 
In fact, when blacks had sanity and disagreed with the policies of racist white Democrat presidents, nobody accused black people of being racists. 

Probably because, back then, people still knew what the word "racist" meant.
 
Fighting for one’s civil rights was not racist then, nor is it racist now. Blacks (and Republicans) were on the side of righteousness, when they disagreed with the racist policies of Andrew Johnson, and adopted by every Democrat president since. 

This is that part where Republicans forget what happened to their party in the 1960s.  Just willingly oblivious to the reasons why black people vote Democrat these days.  Always bringing up history until this decade. Then, they're all MARTIN LUTHER KING AND THE ABOLITIONISTS WERE REPUBLICANS WHAT IS WRONG WITH YOU PEOPLE????

Never has a black person been called racist, because they didn’t like one of the white presidents’ policies. Blacks were just exercising their First Amendment rights to speak freely. Blacks have disagreed with policy positions of about every Republican president in the modern era, including those who have helped them. 

See?  They just can't figure out why black people have been against Republicans since the 60s.  COINTELPRO was in your best interests, black people!
 
Take Reagan for example.

SAINT Reagan.  #fixed

Reagan ushered in a veritable Renaissance for blacks, as Fox News showcased. And the Reagan record? African-American columnist Joseph Perkins has studied the effects of Reaganomics on black America. He found that, after the Reagan tax cuts gained traction, African-American unemployment fell from 19.5 percent in 1983 to 11.4 percent in 1989. Black-owned businesses saw income rise from $12.4 billion in 1982 to $18.1 billion in 1987—an annual average growth rate of 7.9 percent. The black middle class expanded by one-third during the Reagan years, from 3.6 million to 4.8 million. 

Feel free to discount any impartiality in that block of text just because Fox News was cited as the source.

But, I would ask, what were the unemployment and income numbers for white people during the same time?  Because unless theirs were stagnant during the same period, I would just call that "general economic improvement," and not something he did specifically for black folks.  Just something we happened to benefit from.  Like welfare.  But please, continue giving Reagan this verbal handjob.      
 
Real Politics reports Obama’s statistics as follows: Median family income for black Americans has declined a whopping 10.9 percent during the Obama administration…This decline does not include losses suffered during the financial crisis and the recession that followed, but it instead measures declines since June 2009, when the recession officially ended. That’s not the only bad news for African-Americans. The poverty rate for blacks is now 25.8 percent. The black labor force participation rate, which rose throughout the 1980s and 1990s, has declined for the past decade and quite sharply under Obama to 61.4 percent. The black unemployment rate, according to Pew Research, stands at 13.4 percent. Among black, male, high school dropouts, PBS’ Paul Salmon reports, the unemployment rate is a staggering 95 percent. That report was from 2011, and it’s gotten worse since then. Facts don’t lie. 

Yes, like the fact that you're suggesting President Obama did this on purpose.


Yet blacks want to put Obama on Mt. Rushmore and hang Reagan in effigy. The only way you can argue with those stats is if you are a racist. 

He's the first black President.  That is pretty historic.  All he had to do was not fling his own poop at foreign dignitaries to lock down a Rushmore spot. 

And I argued with those stats, but I already knew I was a racist, because #WhiteTwitter told me so.  You know, that bastion of racial harmony. 


Truth be told, most Liberal blacks are racists. Nobody wants to discuss it, because racism by black Liberals has been sanctioned by the Left, even encouraged. 

I don't even know where this bullshit comes from.  So much wrong here, and yet, all of it remains a Republican talking point.

For instance, just because damn near all black people vote Democrat doesn't mean they're "liberals."  And almost all the black people I know vote Democrat, but they don't hate white people.  They might get angry with them, and truthfully, sometimes it's hard not to, but they don't hate white people.  
 
Black racists get a pass, as black race-baiters are unchallenged on the most idiotic ideas and statements. MSNBC’s Touré said that using the word “angry” to describe Obama is racist. Juan Williams of Fox News said that mentioning the Constitution is racist, and the list goes on. But it gets worse. These Lefty racists do a far bigger disservice to blacks and America in general, as they rationalize Obama’s (and the Left’s) inability to create opportunity. 

And there it is.  "Voting for Democrats only hurts black people."  If only we were smart enough to look past all of the racist comments and behavior that come from Republicans to see that they're what's best for us. And I'm not even a Democrat.  I'm just anti-Republican. 

When their policies wreak havoc, they pose insane arguments. They say that Republicans are trying to starve people by reducing the welfare rolls that Liberals have happily increased by 16M Americans. Race-baiting, poverty-pimp Al Sharpton argued recently to keep 3M known deadbeats on welfare. 

Not like there's any particular reason why 16 million people needed to hop on food stamps.  No, the "liberals" just wanted them there.  You know, to bribe them into voting for Democrats.  Of course. 



Black racists don’t complain when black people are marginalized and insulted with policies that dumb down black America, like the lessening of academic standards. They are fine telling black youths that those youths are less smart than all other ethnic groups. 

I've never heard of a black kid saying that they were told that they weren't as smart as other ethnic groups.  Not unless that black kid was reading a report from the Heritage Foundation, a right-wing think tank that swears that black people are dumber than white people.  I know you know who they are, because Fox News cites their research all the time. 

Certainly no future ramifications from that policy, said nobody ever. These same racists allow for black children to be cheated in education and ultimately, opportunity, as their enablers—guilty white Liberal racists—turn a blind eye. 

Yeah, Republicans haven't played a part in the reduction of education standards at all, what with their desire to get everyone into private schools, fire public school teachers, bust unions, cut funding, add religion to science classes, rewrite history books to remove references to slavery and Civil Rights, as well as the horrific disaster called "No Child Left Behind," that has continued to ruin education for the last decade.  But keep telling us how "liberals" are so bad for education.

I long for the days of a white president, because under white presidents, at least black people had pride. Liberals have stolen pride from blacks, and they have no intention of giving it back. At least if we had a white president, black people might have a shot of regaining a modicum of respect. 

Yeah, we had so much pride under those first 40 Presidents.  Slavery and Jim Crow just helped us build character, right?


© 2013 Kevin Jackson – The Black Sphere, LLC – All Rights Reserved

Giving him all the credit for his bullshit, because I couldn't be this blind if I tried.

Ben Affleck as Batman isn't worth an anger stroke

Watching the internet unravel after Ben Affleck was announced to play Batman was something to behold. Seeing millions of allegedly grown ass people lose their shit over a guy dressing up in a rubber suit was a memorable moment in the history of nerddom, right behind "The Dark Knight Returns," "everyone in America pretending to be nerds," and "guys being able to pull girls with superhero shirts on."  Except this was truly entertaining, and I thank you.

I guess I just never really understood that level of anger over something that I don't own or can't control. Sure, I've had differences with movie creators over things, because who the fuck reads that Catwoman script and thinks that their work is done?  Also, my hate for Joel Schumacher's Batman movies was so great, I actually made an ex-girlfriend cry because she wanted me go see "Batman and Robin."  But even that was after we left the theater.  I at least had the decency to watch the movie before I shit on it so hard that I hurt a person's feelings. 

And really, at the time, announcing George Clooney at Batman actually provided some hope, until they said that Joel Schumacher was coming back, and thus began a two-year long campaign to never see that movie.  All of which was ruined opening weekend, when she begged me to go with her and her brother and sister.  We went to see that fucking movie, and now, we're no longer together.  I'm not saying the two events are related, but that was a really shitty movie. 

Anyway, freaking out on that level based on announcements has never made sense to me. Especially considering how wrong fandom tends to be.

By now, everyone's been reminded of how wrong they were about Michael Keaton as Batman in 1989, and Heath Ledger as the Joker in 2008.  Even those didn't bother me at all, because in 1988, when they revealed Michael Keaton, I thought it was pretty cool that Mr. Mom would be Batman.  Keep in mind, I was 10, and still considered Garfield comics to be a prime reason to read the newspaper.  And when Heath Ledger was announced as the Joker, I really didn't mind, because every announcement came with the disclaimer that they were going for something different.  Which they did.  And everybody was happy.

No, I'm not comparing Batfleck to Heath Ledger's Joker, but it's not like it's a fuck up that you can see coming a mile away.  It's not like it's Jessica Alba as the Invisible Woman or Keanu Reeves as John Constantine or every painful second of "X3: The Last Stand."  Some people are horribly miscast at times or are generally bad actors, and this isn't one of those times.  Now, that's the kinda stuff that fans should get upset about, but there you are, helping "Fantastic Four" make enough money for a sequel.  And instead, y'all wanna get mad about Idris Elba playing Heimdall in the Thor movie.  Look, Heimdall could have been played by Macho Man Randy Savage, and he still would have just stood there and been irrelevant.  That's why they were fine with turning him black.

Everyone has been bringing up all that old shit, like "Gigli" and "Daredevil, but Ben Affleck wasn't what was wrong with those movies.  You can see it if you watch them without actively hating Ben Affleck.  They were bad because of the people in charge of making them, and in the case of Mark Steven Johnson, writer/director of "Daredevil," he's proven that he was the problem when he made "Ghost Rider."  That guy is desperately trying to tell you to keep him away from the set of your movie.  That guy's directed five movies with an average Metacritic score of 5.6.  On Rotten Tomatoes, he has a 32.75% fresh rating.

I don't know what went wrong with "Gigli," though, because the guy who wrote and directed that also directed "Beverly Hills Cop" and "Midnight Run."  No one could have seen that coming.  But sure, it's Ben Affleck's fault that the fourth friend in the Hangover flicks was allowed to copy Dustin Hoffman in "Rain Man" and call it acting.

That's right, the guy who spent the first Hangover stuck on the roof.  That guy.  Oh, and it was also Ben Affleck's fault that Jennifer Lopez's pussy monologue got through multiple edits.  Fuck, that was a painful movie to watch.  #butitwasntBenAfflecksfault

Right now, it's the cool thing to say that stuff, or talk about how you aren't going to see Superman/Batman or Batman/Superman or Batman vs. Superman, or Superman: The Quest for Peace, whatever they're going to call it.  But the more I think about it, the more I get excited about the idea of Ben Affleck as Batman.  And I'm the guy that everyone expects to be hyper-critical of everything (Man of Steel sucked, fuck you).  Because, like Matt Damon said, "He's not playing King Lear."  Except I've never seen that, so I'll go with the guy who played Gollum in "Lord of the Rings."  But he's been playing Bruce Wayne for the better part of his career, and since he already has the chin, all he has to bring for Batman is a better Batman voice than Christian Bale.  Preferably one that he can use when speaking meaningful dialogue.

But think about that:  All he has to work on for the next year is choosing a good Batman voice.  As long as he doesn't try to get creative or make him British, he's already won.  Honestly, I'm more worried about the writer and director.  Those people made made Superman an emo hobo and a killer. At the same damn time.  For all we know, these jokers might have Batman dancing or enjoying life.  I really don't know what to expect.

Even if you don't agree with this casting decision, why get mad?  If it fails, they will know, probably before opening weekend is over, that they made a mistake.  Not only that, you just spent two years hoping it failed so you could be right.  But if it succeeds, then you've just spent the previous two years being upset and wrong about something.  It's a no-win for you.  And most importantly, you had no effect on it either way.  You were angry, wrong, and irrelevant.  But if you sit back and just wait for it, you'll only be one of those things.

Keep On Being Cunty: The Guide to Being Alone Forever

If you're one of these women who likes to repost those pictures and statuses about how proud you are to be a difficult woman, you go fuck yourself right now. 

So, lemme get this straight:  You're a pain in the ass.  You're moody.  You're difficult.  You're selfish.  You know all of these things about yourself, aren't trying to change any of them, and you still think you're worth the effort?  Get the fuck outta here, because nowhere in that list did you say you were gonna cook or give massages or give the bomb head or anything.  You didn't say that you were smart or interesting, either.  I hope you didn't think that your personality was going to make time spent with you "worth it," because you've already established you're a piece of shit.

If this is your description of yourself and you're single, I hope you're able to figure out that you're the reason why.  It's not because no man is worthy of your charms or whatever princess-fantasy-bullshit lie you tell yourself.  Oh, so only a worthy or deserving man will put up with you long enough for you to reveal your true nature?  What, are you supposed to be Excalibur, waiting for the king to pull you out of the stone?  You must be as stupid as that fantasy sounds. 

As a rule of thumb, you should try to be a good person before you meet the person you want to be with.  But you haven't done that, because you'd rather keep on being all cunty.  The reason for that is simple:  It's because you're a horrible human being.  And people who are horrible human beings are generally called words like "bitch" or "cunt."  They don't call you that because they're sensitive, either.  They do it mostly because you're a bitch.  Or a cunt.  Trust me, you've earned that vile description.  Now, maybe I'm stupid, but I'm trying to figure out how those qualities mean that you deserve a man at all, even a shitty one.

No one likes those types of people, especially not a man who faces the prospect of spending his life being infected with your presence.  See, to land a man, you should be someone he can stand to be around without a social lubricant of some sort in his system.  In short, if he can't pass the drug test at his job before he comes to see you, you probably need to work on your personality.  Or he's got a drug problem.  But there's a 45-55% chance that it's you.

No man wants to deal with that all the time.  Yes, women like to argue, because right or wrong, you'll continue to do it, like a robot that was programmed to do one thing.  You seem to thrive on arguing and drama, even if it doesn't involve you, which is why reality TV is still a thing.  We're not built like that.  We expect the argument to stop at some point, which is why we forget that you're still upset during that lull in the action.  We think it's over, not realizing that you're on the other side of the bed, still thinking about it.  You're over there plotting and we're trying to decide which ESPN we're going to watch for the rest of the night.  We're just not built for that. 

It makes no sense to us why you would want to be a hard ass about everything, because the more time you're trying to test or manipulate us, that's time wasted that we could have been doing something productive.  For instance: 

You could have been playing each other in Ms. Pac-Man.  You could have been coloring.  You could have been playing "What A Fool Believes" on repeat.  Or you could have been making sweet, sweet love.  That's right, you could have been balls deep in the throes of passion right now, but you had to try to see how much abuse he was willing to take from you.  And for what?  Are you planning on being like that forever?  Answer carefully, because it leads right into my next question:  "What man would want to marry a woman who still throws temper tantrums?"  There's only two ways that relationship could end, one of them is probably a murder-suicide.  The other is an anger stroke.  Happiness is nowhere in the equation. 

And to find out that you were doing it on purpose the whole time?  I hope you drown in your own vomit.

I really shouldn't have to tell you this, but you're going to have to grow up.  Learn to play well with others.  Share.  Smile.  Be a pleasant person.  Everyone likes pleasant people.  Especially men who might want to marry you.  And if you're not able to do that, you better be able to fuck really well.  That's your only hope.  Don't even expect that your good looks (if you have them, because ugly chicks are bold these days, too) will get you over.  You will get older at some point, and wrinkle creams can't do anything about sagging breasts. 

Feel free to keep on being cunty, though.  It's just that more often than not, you'll be doing it alone.  Although there are always suckers out there. 

Where did women get that idea that this was acceptable behavior in the first place? I know one of those pictures filled with this sage advice has been attributed to Marilyn Monroe.  I don't know if she actually said that stupid shit, but then, who wouldn't want to be just like Marilyn Monroe?  Who wouldn't want to be a homewrecker carrying on secret relationships with the most famous man on the planet and his brother.  That's it, ladies; just keep reaching for the stars.  

Yes, Jay-Z is a role model, too.

You can't dictate who another race's role models should be.  I know it's hard for some white conservatives to understand, but you can't tell black people that their role models need to meet your approval.  Well, you can, but we're going to ignore you.  No matter how much you think Condoleezza Rice would be better for black youth than Jay-Z, you don't get to make that decision.  If it were up to you, do you really think Superfly would have taken hold in the 70s like it did? 

Pretty random topic, right?  Well, I had a conversation with a lady on Twitter today about this exact thing.  I should have been focused on my work, but this was way more interesting.  Because what kind of person tells me (as an example, just to make this sentence work) that my role model isn't good enough for them?  You've got to have some big balls, lady. 

Why shouldn't a kid look up to Jay-Z?  The man is rich and famous, and since kids are stupid and shallow these days, that's really all they need to know.  But he was a drug dealer, that lady said, and drug dealing rappers who glorify drug dealing are not worthy of role modelhood.  I'm paraphrasing, because she was way more long-winded.  Also, in my mind, she was wagging her finger at me.  "Tut, tut," I think she said.

On the surface, she might be right.  After all, these are the things that they say about Jay-Z on Fox News, and we all know they're never wrong.  At least they picked someone who has rapped about the drug game, unlike the time they went after Common.   But yes, Jay-Z did sell drugs - almost 20 years ago.  And if the crux of your argument against rappers being role models is something one used to do 20 years ago, you've lost the argument before it even started.  I mean, if you picked Nicki Minaj for this debate, I would have agreed with you, unless the goal was for your kids to become clowns.  It would have nothing to do with her drug history, because I don't know if she did or didn't.  I just wouldn't want my kids to act like that.

Also, let's not start digging into the past of some of these conservative heroes, because I won't even need to leave the decade before I get a hit.  But we're talking about Jay-Z.

Anyway, he's changed his life since those days.  Yeah, he got a little stabby there at one point, but all in all, he's turned things around.  You don't see him getting into fights or arrested for marijuana or gun possession.  He built companies, bought others, run other companies, sold those companies, and built more.  He's produced movies.  He was a minority owner of a sports team, and now, he's a sports agent.  A guy that was a drug dealer from Brooklyn.  Now, he's got an art film out on HBO and had Samsung buy his album to give away for free.  He's married to the biggest singer on the planet.  He can call the President.  What about his life doesn't make him a role model? 

What, the music?  You can disagree with the music all you like, but the life story shows people that no matter where you are, no matter what your circumstances, you can change them, and you can get out.  However, since you brought up the music, well, for one, I know you haven't listened to any of it.  Jay-Z had exactly two albums about drug dealing, and one of those was actually about a movie.  The other one was about why you shouldn't become a drug dealer.  All of his other albums were about being rich, famous, and sex with women.  Money, cash, hoes, in essence.  And the time he shot his brother.  And that one song about his mom.

So ever since that first album, Jay-Z has rapped about his life after he stopped being a drug dealer.  If you're going to accuse him of something, at least know what you're talking about.  Now, if you want to get on him for misogyny?  Fine, he probably wasn't the best on gender relations.  Cussing too much?  You got me there.  Defending the use of the n-word?  We'd be on the same side.  I think he's got a lot to be proud of, though.  He has a creative mind, a hard-working individual, and knows his business.  So if anyone is going to get through to some of these kids, it would be him.  They can't say he hasn't been where they've been.  

That's not to knock Condoleezza Rice, because she's a role model as well.  She's a positive woman who came up during segregation, played all kinds of musical instruments, taught at Stanford, advised two Presidents, and was appointed to the Cabinet; fields that are almost always dominated by men.  No shade on Condi at all, even if she does have Bush's stink on her.  But to cast Jay-Z aside because of the decisions he made in his past is really discounting his value.  Not only that, I guess black people just accept flawed individuals more easily than white conservatives do.  One of the benefits of so many of us going to jail, I guess.

The fact that he sold drugs, grew up in a fatherless home, shot his brother, and still managed to become what he is today is what makes him a role model.  His life is the life that a lot of kids of all colors see every day.  He's not pushing the drug life on kids, he's shining the light of redemption.  And if you can't see that, then I don't have anything else for you.

Don Lemon was right. Yeah, you already knew.

Don Lemon said some real stuff on CNN the other day and folks got pissed.  They were suddenly butthurt for a number of reasons, but I wouldn't know what most of them are, because I try to keep ignorant bullshit out of my timeline.  I just know what I didn't like about it, but we'll get to that later.  First things first, though:  Don Lemon was right.  And if you disagree, you're probably part of the problem.  Because who can argue with shit like pulling your pants up or finishing high school? 

He didn't even say "go to college."  Just get a diploma.  Be more respectful.  Don't throw trash on the ground.  Simple, basic things.  He's not telling you to cure sickle cell, and be grateful he didn't, because if you're fighting him this hard on proper pants height, imagine how rough the discussion on nucleopeptides is going to be.

He basically said on TV what many of us have said to each other:  "You look like an asshole wearing your pants like that."  "Hey, stupid.  Read a book."  "I ain't nobody's 'nigga.'"  What, because he's on CNN, he's not supposed to say it?  Well, would it make you feel better if I said it?  I don't have a show on CNN, but if you reread this paragraph, you can still get the message. 

Seriously, y'all.  You wanna go to war over "pull your pants up," "finish high school," and "stop littering?"  Get the fuck outta here.  If you're worried about Don Lemon looking down on you for that, if it helps you feel better, I'm broke and I still look down on you for at least two of those.  You're fighting the wrong battle here.  Instead of being mad at Don Lemon, how about you get mad at some math problems?  How about you go to war against that dropout rate? 

I guess some people are feeling like he was judging them, but if you couldn't finish high school and don't have a good excuse, you probably should be judged.  Still, he wasn't judging you, he was telling you that you can do better.  I'm not saying that we don't all make mistakes (I swear, a bunch of y'all don't need to be parents.  Can't you just give your kids to someone else?  Because under your care, you're just creating the next generation of criminals.), but it doesn't mean you can't make a better life for yourself.

If you have kids, would you want them walking around like that?  If the answer is "yes," you probably weren't going to read this anyway, and probably would have given up after I said, "nucleopeptides."  But for the rest of you, I'm sure that you have higher goals for your kids than an appearance on WorldStar. 

It's not even about trying to look good for white people, because there are plenty of black folks who have been screaming this shit for years.  Lots of us are just embarrassed by what we see now.  I know I am.  Hell, I was embarrassed 15 years ago, when Bill Cosby said it.  And the same folks that complained about him are probably the same ones complaining now.  Lemme guess, you don't want anyone messing with your food stamps, either.  But this has got nothing to do with white people.  Maybe I'm crazy, but I'm tired of seeing young black men on the news for home invasion. 

But maybe that's what people don't like, that he said it in front of the white people.  Well, we've proven that saying it in private doesn't help, because look at where we are now.  I'm sure Bill Cosby and Don Lemon weren't the first people to try to give you some advice.  If you weren't listening either of those two times, then what else are people supposed to do?  No one's asking you to save the world, but can you stop going to jail?  Is that too high a bar for you to reach?  Are repeat visits really necessary, or did you not take in the entire experience the first time? 

The only problem I have with Don Lemon is that he said, "Bill O'Reilly is right."  It almost de-legitimized everything that followed, because Bill O'Reilly is never right.  It's like siding with the cast of "It's Always Sunny in Philadelphia."  You're agreeing with terrible people who are only looking out for their own self interests 100% of the time.  Bill O'Reilly doesn't give a shit about anything that black people do unless they're on his set, and only after security has patted them down.  This is the same asshole who told Marc Lamont Hill that he looked like a drug dealer.  This is the same asshole who said that he was "shocked" that the black staff at Sylvia's, a restaurant in Harlem, could speak without cursing. 

I'm probably not the best example of that right now, but who gives a fuck with Bill O'Reilly thinks about black people?  He didn't have shit to say about black-on-black crime until (like every other right-winger in America) it became a talking point, because they were sick of people talking about Trayvon Martin.  Fuck Bill O'Reilly and anyone who looks like him. 

That's the only mistake Don Lemon made.  He did Bill O'Reilly a favor, one that will never be returned.  I get that he was trying to make a point, and he wanted to show that he was actually fair and balanced, but there are plenty of other non-hate filled people to use as an example.  It doesn't even matter if Bill O'Reilly was right (and I will never say that he was).  Don Lemon sided with one of the worst human beings in America.  Otherwise, I would have taken up for Don Lemon from the start. 

The best I can do for him now is say that calling him an "Uncle Tom" is extreme.  He's not an "Uncle Tom," because it's not like he's Crystal Wright (she's like "Aunt Ruckus," if you're unfamiliar).  Again, he wasn't wrong, and it didn't hurt me.  If anything, I deal more with the fallout of that stuff, because when someone sees me, they expect me to be like the stereotype they've heard about, and I'm in my mid-30s.  Like it or not, we're viewed as a group, and that's hurting us way more than he is.  He has a job, a platform, and isn't an embarrassment.  What do you bring to the table? 

So Don Lemon shouldn't lose his "black card," or "hood pass," or whatever the fuck we're calling it now because you're sensitive about your life choices.  Are his suggestions going to fix all of Black America's problems?  Of course not; no one's stupid enough to think that.  But if we can't even respect each other enough to stop calling ourselves "nigga," how are we going to fix the bigger stuff? 

A White Conservative Educates Me About BET

After a discussion with a white conservative today, some things have come to my attention about BET, and it's purpose that I was not aware of.  I'd like to thank you, Ryan Cracka (@RyanCracka on Twitter), for opening my eyes.

It was always my belief that, for all of its faults (and there are many), BET was created to fill a void in the black community.  At the time of its creation, there was no programming that was controlled by black people.  With the exception of "Soul Train," the shows that did star black people back then were created, controlled, and owned by white people.  In addition, we are only 12% of the population.  Even if we managed to get a show on the air, every black person in America would have to watch it to keep it from getting canceled, which is impossible, unless the show is called "Good Times."  So that means for a show featuring black people to stay on network TV, white people had to like it, too.  It's the reason why almost everything from "Living Single" to "My Wife and Kids" got canceled. 

This is all stuff I believed. 

I also believed that BET wasn't created out of hate for white people, like so many white conservatives think, because that would be a breathtaking level of stupidity.  Watching TV to make white folks mad?  I'm pretty sure they would have taken us up on that.  I guess we'd just give that James Evans glare to the TV, and they'd keep running the world, guilt-free.

My thinking was that it's a numbers game.  It's harder for black people to get and sustain a show on TV that doesn't have white support, because our 12% is smaller than their 55%.  So, instead of fighting to get shows on channels that won't support them, why not start a channel just for us?  I figured white conservatives would like that, considering how much they talk about us not being self-sufficient.  Some might wonder, though, "What's wrong with having shows that cater to everyone?"  The answer is, "nothing."  But I believed that a black channel would be good, because we don't always like the same stuff, which is why there wasn't a large influx of black people watching "Friends." 

(Yes, I know, there were black people watching "Friends."  But usually, they were the only ones in their entire family and circle of friends who were.  Seriously, anyone know two black people that watched "Friends?"  The first time, not reruns.)

So, that's why there was a need for BET, or so I thought.  Black people wanted to watch stuff with black people in it, and white people didn't always want to deliver.  And it isn't because of racism that we don't always have shows.  It's economics.  I didn't understand all of this backlash, because no one give Latinos this kind of grief about their channels, and that's probably because no one understand what the fuck they're saying on Telemundo.  Hell, they have their own cable packages that include Spanish Disney Channel, Spanish ESPN, and Spanish CNN.  If we had our own Disney Channel, they'd probably riot. 

That what I was thinking.  But thanks to Ryan Cracka, I see the truth now. 

. @ThadOchocinco No, Thad. It comes from a fallacy - instilled by The Left - that we want to exclude you in the first place. #Colorblind
— Ryan (@RyanCracka) July 21, 2013

Brainwashing.  The only logical explanation.  And if I know anything, it's that a guy named "Ryan Cracka" is gonna have his finger on the pulse of Black America.  He continues: 

. @ThadOchocinco You are likely smart enough. But conditioning and brainwashing are poweful tools even against smart people.
— Ryan (@RyanCracka) July 21, 2013

He couldn't finish educating me, because he said I was putting words in his mouth.  I was only trying to interpret his words into a form that I could use, because we're not smart enough to figure out shit on our own.  Here I was thinking that black people wanted to see themselves represented in television, media, and politics, but that's crazy talk.  The simple answer is obviously 30 to 40 years of training freethinking human beings to succumb to the will of your political enemies in an attempt to gain voter loyalty.  Obviously. 

The best part is, it's not even our fault.  It's Nancy Pelosi's fault, evidently.  Or, uh...George Soros, I guess.  Whoever keeps getting that thoughtful Sean Hannity so worked up.  I would be more familiar with Fox News, but I've been brainwashed to segregate myself by watching BET.  In fact, I gotta wrap this up, because there might be some reruns of "The Game" on.

And only conservatives care enough about us to fight this injustice.  After all, you don't see them taking on Asians or Indians for segregating themselves, and they've been doing it for longer than America's been in existence.  So, the next time you see a Republican on TV using coded language like "thugs" or "welfare queens," trying to roll back voting rights, editing all of the slavery out of history books, or cutting spending for funding at HBCUs, just remember that they're doing it for you, to make things fair for everybody.  Because once we all hit rock bottom, we're going to look up and see the white conservatives standing over us again.  Just like they think it should be.

You bleeding assholes.

Paula Deen is full of lard-laced shit: One Man's Opinion

If it was just about the fact that Paula Deen said the n-word, I probably wouldn't care at all.  I mean, she's just some old Southern woman who bleeds butter.  Aesthetically, there's no difference between her and Honey Boo Boo's mom.  So not only do I not care that she said that word, I would call her a liar if she tried to say she didn't say it.  White people, for whatever reason covet that word.  It isn't about freedom or fairness.  I just think they want to be allowed to call us "niggers" again.  Seriously.

Everything Paula Deen said lines up with that.  For one, I don't believe that she said the word once, 30 years ago, after the highest of high pressure situations.  If you're thinking about racial hatred during a time like that, then you're thinking about that shit all the time.  The rest of us are thinking shit like, "I hope I get to see my family again," or "Am I wearing clean underwear?" 

Also, her brother is an unrepentant racist, if the lawsuit against Paula Deen is to be believed.  Not only did she allow him to be said unrepentant racist around a business that she was funding, she allegedly turned a blind eye to it.  Allegedly.

So yeah, let's not act like she has a problem with the word being said.  All those histrionics about the word making her physically ill is just bullshit.  You can always tell when someone is lying about this kind of stuff when they claim that it hurts them physically.  "Hearing these young boys call each other that word is just like a sledgehammer to my uterus."  Look, I'm actually black and hearing the word doesn't cause me any physical pain.  In fact, it probably should, seeing how it pertains to me and my race.

Then, in interviews, she tried to put a positive spin on slavery, which is kind of like TRYING TO PUT A POSITIVE SPIN ON SLAVERY. What the fuck is wrong with you, you gravy-filled wench?  Who in their right mind would try to convince people that slavery in America was a family environment?  Slavery in America was probably the worst type of slavery ever, because it was a business.  Slaves were no longer people, they were commodities.  There was no light at the end of the tunnel; no time where slaves could expect to be freed.  Slaves were worked until they died.  And they weren't even treated as human beings.  At best, they were considered to be really smart pets.  Maybe I shouldn't expect her to know that, since none of it was written on a slab of bacon.

Now, I know that people like to think of their dogs as family members in 2013, but that concept is a recent, American creation that's maybe 20 years old.  Before that, it was a common training practice to shove your dog's nose in his own piss to housebreak him.  And during slavery times, slaves weren't considered much better than dogs.  And this greasy diabetes machine expects me to believe that her family treated their slaves as family?  Yeah, until one of them learned to read.  Then, they'll be hung or beaten to death for their insolence.  That's exactly how we treat our family when they try to educate themselves.

And as a final insult, she wanted to have a plantation style wedding with black men dressed up as slave waiters.  Because, why the fuck not?  All of the family should be invited to the wedding, but some of them have to work and not make eye contact with anyone else, because the other family members will take it as a personal insult.  I guess we were supposed to be honored by that or something.  I'm almost certain that there wouldn't have been any black guests invited.  It would only confuse Paula's brother when he decided to assault the help and saw black people sitting down or smiling. 

But what am I supposed to think when someone not only tries to blunt the blow of slavery, but then thinking that making it a wedding theme is a good idea?  When people deny the Holocaust, they're considered batshit crazy.  For example, two well-known Holocaust deniers are Mel Gibson's dad and Former Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad.  Neither is known for his credibility on any topic, including "gravity" or "if the earth is round."  But this deep-fried asshole can say "slaves = family" and then try to recreate the experience.  And you wonder why Wal-Mart got rid of her.  Wal-Mart.  And that's a company that would still be selling you lead lined Chinese breakfast cereal if they hadn't gotten caught doing it. 

So, no, I don't believe that she only said it once 30 years ago.  I believe she's said it lots of times in the years since.  I'm not a person who believes that every white person who says the word is racist, because that's stupid, considering how many "down white boys" there are out there who are ignorant as hell.  I do think that they are disrespectful, and just don't care about the effect that word can have. All they care about is their own wants.

Of all of the words in the history of speech, that's the one they want to use.  The really fucked up one.  They could have chosen "titmouse," or "resplendent," but no, "nigger" is the one they want, since I know these assholes don't read.  So, since this means so much to you, ignorant white folks (I know all white people don't want to say it, and for that, I thank you), let's make a deal:  You can say the word as much as your ignorant heart sees fit, and in exchange, I get to bust out your fronts with a lead pipe.  Deal?  

Watching Hoarders hits a little too close to home

I need a psychiatrist to explain to me why I always start throwing out crap whenever I watch Hoarders.

I don't even watch that show regularly, but whenever I turn it on and see someone find a dead cat buried until a mountain of trash in the hallway, or a bathroom that looks like someone opened their ass cheeks and sprayed all over the walls, I have to stop whatever I'm doing and clean something.  It never fails. 

Last time I did this, I threw out a bunch of stuff in my closet that I had forgotten was even there.  None of that stuff was hurting anyone in the back of my closet, and since it's already packed tight, there was no need to even worry about it.  It wasn't going anywhere.  Well, not after I saw someone tear up their carpet to reveal the inner mold carpet underneath.  I found a computer in my closet.  A computer.  And threw that shit in the trash. 

I found that computer, an old laptop, hundreds of video tapes, a box of old computer wires, a DVD player that didn't work, a VCR that didn't work; okay, I didn't find it.  I knew it was there, but like those people, I kept it for whatever reason.  I had plans for it, I was going to fix it and use it, I was saving it for a rainy day, shit like that.  And none of that is true, because I'm lazy.  I'm not fixing a damn thing, or paying anyone else to do it, because the means I gotta get up and take it to the person who is industrious enough to fix it. 

This isn't even the first time I've done it.  Last time I watched Hoarders, I threw out a bunch of books, paper, two more unused computers that I planned to fix, and cleaned out my junk drawer.  That's right, I had four unused computers in here at one time.  Who the hell keeps that many unused computers around?  I have a one-bedroom apartment, not a workshop in my garage.  And say I did fix them.  What was I going to do with them?  They were all old as shit.  The reason why they were unused is because they were all too old to upgrade. 

Maybe I do this because I fear becoming one of these people.  It's not like I don't have the packrat gene.  I've always liked keeping everything.  And every so often, when my room got to the point where it looked like one of those houses on TV, my mom would give me about three hours to get my shit organized.  I would fail, because I was easily distracted and overly sentimental about scrap paper with superheroes scribbled on it.  My mom would come in about an hour early with a garbage bag, because she could see that I was just wallowing in my own filth, and throw out everything.  If I wasn't using it, it was gone. 

Eventually, I would move out and I was free to keep all the useless junk I wanted.  And I did.  I mean, it was organized, to some degree, because I could bring over females and they would actually take their shoes off.  I didn't keep a nasty house, just a cluttered one. 

Then, they put that show on the air.  And not only that, I actually started visiting houses like those as part of my job.  Those people have a million excuses for why their houses look like that.  "Oh, you just caught me in the middle of cleaning up."  "Oh, we're just getting back from vacation."  "It's the kids, they won't clean up." "I can't stop the cats from pissing everywhere."  No matter how damaged their homes were, there was an excuse for why it was like that.  Like I'm stupid or something.  If there's a well worn path through the chaos, then that means you always live like this. 

One lady couldn't even give an excuse.  She just sat on a chair in the hallway and stared at the mountain of stuff that filled up her living room.  Another lady was basically just like, "fuck it, just step on my mattress, because I have nowhere else for you to stand."  The excuses all sounded just like the ones I gave my mom, and worse yet, the ones I told myself.  Except those last two ladies.  They had just given the fuck up.

So watching Hoarders or being in those houses made me itch.  Seriously.  I felt like I needed to clean up something, so I didn't wind up being buried in garbage.  While it's funny to watch some sad sack on TV talk about how they had to buy a hot plate for the living room because they couldn't get into their kitchen anymore, it is a fear of mine to wind up like that, dying alone in my house because no one could get to me.  So if I was still at work, I'd clean out my truck.  I had to do something to prove to myself that even though I'm a packrat, I'm not like them.  I can't be like them.  I refuse to be like them. 

Okay, so maybe I don't need the psychiatrist to explain it.  The truth is, I'm a giant pussy.