Текст книги "Brain Droppings"

Автор книги: Джордж Карлин

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Текущая страница: 8 (всего у книги 12 страниц)

“You people don’t know when you’re well off. Maybe ya’d like to go back to livin’ in the trees, huh? Remember that? Remember the trees? Competin’ with the baboons and gibbons for hazelnuts and loganberries? Degrading! So there’ll be no more drawin’ on the walls! Coupla thousand years from now, people are gonna come here, and they’re gonna study these caves. The last thing they wanna see is a lotta horse pictures on the walls.

“OK, continuin’ on. As some of you mighta noticed, last night the fire went out. Coupla the guys on guard duty were jackin’ around, playin’ grabass, and one of ‘em, Octavio, the short guy with the bushy hair. Well, one of the short guys with the bushy hair. Anyways, Octavio fell on the fire, and the fire went out. Unfortunately for Octavio, he died in the incident. Unfortunately for us, he was the only one who knew how to

GEORGE CARLIN light the fire. So we’re gonna have a contest. The first h get a fire goin’, and keep it goin’, wins a prize. It’s a 1 Nothin’ fancy. Just a regular hat. The kind with the earlap,

“OK, next item. We’re startin’ to get some complai t from the women about dating procedures. This mainly c( ^ cerns the practice of clubbin’ the women on the head u^d draggin’ ‘em back to the cave by the hair. They would like. to i discontinue this practice, especially the hair part. It se&ms some of them go to a lot of trouble and expense to fix UD their hair for a date, and they feel the draggin’ has a nega_ tive effect on their appearance. As far as the clubbin; js concerned, they’d like to elminate that too, because ^^ happens is a lot of ‘em have an enjoyable date, and then tw $ can’t remember it in the mornin’.

“Movin’ right along. As you all know, it’s been our practice when we find a new plant that looks good to eat, we test it on the dogs to see if it’s poison. Does everyone the berries we tested last week on the big brown dog? many ate the berries simply because the dog didn’t die that ^ day? Quite a few. Well, I got bad news. The dog died last rqght. Apparently it was a slow-actin’ poison. Yes, Laszlo? You didn’t eat the berries? But this mornin’ you ate the dog. Vell, Laszlo, ya got about a week. Food chain! How many tim&s do A. I gotta tell you people? Food chain! By the way, anyone %ho’s gettin’ into that new cannibalism crap—I won’t mention any names—I’d strongly suggest not eatin’ Laszlo—or anyone else for that matter.

“All right, now we gotta talk about the Hated Ba%d of Enemy People Who Live in the Dark Valley. As some (of ya

brain droppings might know, they snuck into camp last night and stole a bunch of our stuff. They got those sticks we were savin’. They got the rocks we piled up near the big tree. And they also took sixteen trinkets; the ones we got in a trade with the Friendly Bent-over People from the Tall Mountain Near the Sun. I think it was them. It was either them or the Guys with the Really Big Foreheads Down by the River. Anyways, as I recall, we came off a cool two hundred animal skins for those trinkets, and frankly, the Chief and I think we got screwed. By the way, speakin’ of screwin’, they also stole several of our women last night. Along with a couple of those sensitive men we’ve been usin’ as women.

“OK, a new problem has come up that we’re gonna have to deal with. It concerns the growin’ menace of people chewin’ the leaves of the dream plant. It’s gotten completely outta hand. At first it wasn’t so bad. After a long day of huntin’, or gatherin’—whatever—people would chew a coupla leaves to relax. Recreational chewin’. No harm, no foul. But then some guys couldn’t leave it alone. They would chew way too much and lose control. Some of them became verbally abusive. Of course, they couldn’t help what they were sayin’. It wasn’t them talkin’, it was the leaves. But, hey, nevertheless!

“Then we found out some people were chewin’ on the job. Not only endangerin’ the lives of their co-hunters or co-gatherers—whatever—but also lowerin’ the amount of food we acquire, while somehow, at the same time, greatly increasin’ the rate of consumption of their own food. One of the gatherers, a short guy with bushy hair, I think it was Norris, got whacked outta his skull on leaves last week, and

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“Anyway, this new custom is quite different, and it might k come as somethin’ of a surprise to ya, so make sure you’re Or at least leanin’ on somethin’ firm. You peo dift ove C A R L I N A GEORGE he came in from gatherin’, with a grand total

a grand total of six berries and one nut. And this been out in the bushes for eight days! a<*

n v

“But now we’re runnin’ into an even more serious that affects the safety of everyone. It seems that some are chewin’ the leaves and then runnin’ around in Cic high speed. As a result we’re startin’ to get a huge increase ‘ the number of accidents. People are crashin’ into each othe Please! Try to remember. Chewin’ and runnin’ around in circles at high speed don’t mix. If you’re gonna run around in circles don’t chew; and if you’re gonna chew, for God’s sake, don’t be runnin’ around in circles. Designate someone.

“So try to be aware of the signs of leaf abuse. If you’re chewin’ in the mornin’, you got a problem. If you’re chewin’ alone, you got a problem. It’s no disgrace. Get some help. Say no to leaves. ” K

“OK, now, like I said earlier, we got a new thing we’re gonna be doin’, and I wanna announce it today. It’s gonna be a custom. Remember customs? Who can name a custom?

Nat? Goin’ to sleep at night? Well, that’s close, Nat. That’s almost like a custom. Who else can name a custom? Killing the animals before we eat them? OK, actually, Jules, that’s more like a necessity, isn’t it? More like a necessity. Lookin’

for a custom. Another custom. Dwayne? Washin’ the rocks and dryin’ them off before you throw them at the enemy durin’ a rock fight? Is that what you been doin’, Dwayne? Really! Well, I guess that would explain the disproportion ately high number of rock injuries in your squad, wouldn’t it? ,;-:-?> ;«-. >-*.<,??, -.??.. .,

come as somethin’ of a surprise to ya, o^ ^__. sittin’ down. Or at least leanin’ on somethin’ firm. You people standin’ over near the cliff, you might wanna drift over this way a little.

“Now. I want ya to remember that no matter what I say, this is gonna please the Corn God. OK? [Slowly, as if to children] The new custom … is gonna help . . . with the corn. Remember a coupla years ago we had no corn, and we hadda eat the trees? And a lotta people died? How many wanna go back to eatin’ the trees? OK, I rest my case. Yeah? Dwayne? You thought the trees were pretty good? Ya never disappoint me, Dwayne, ya know that? Folks, ya don’t have to look very K far for a tragic example of abusin’ the dream plant, do ya? “All right, here’s the new thing we’re gonna do, it’s called a human sacrifice. Each week, to appease the Corn God, we’re gonna kill one member of the tribe. All right, calm down! C’mon, sit down! Hey! Hold on! Hear me out on this, would . ya? Just relax and hear me out on this. We’re gonna start « havin’ a human sacrifice every week, probably on Saturday night. That’s when everybody seems to loosen up pretty good. So startin’ next Saturday night, about the time we run outta berry juice, we’re gonna pick one person, probably a ^ young virgin, and we’ll throw her in the volcano. All right, girls! Please! Siddown! Please! Stop with the rocks!! Calm down, ladies. We’re not gonna do it today. I promise. Relax. “OK, so we throw the virgin in the volcano. By the way, how many remember the volcano? Remember the fire? Remember the lava? What word comes to mind when we think

brain droppings GEORGE CARLIN about the volcano? Hot! Right. The volcano is hot. What’s that h Dwayne? No. No way. If this idea’s gonna work at all, it’s gotta be done while the volcano is actually erupting. I don’t think the Corn God is gonna be impressed if we throw some chick in a dormant volcano. It’s meaningless. I think he’s lookin’ for ^ somethin’ with a little more screamin’ involved. “OK, so we throw the virgin in the volcano. What’s that? i How does this help with the corn? Good question. Look, Morley, I just make the announcements, OK? I’m not involved with policy. It came down from the high priests, that’s all you gotta know. This is one of those things you just gotta accept on faith. It’s like that custom we started last year of cuttin’ off a guy’s head to keep him from stealin’. At first it seemed ^ severe, am I right? But ya gotta admit, it seems to work. “OK, one last point: You say, Why does it have to be a young virgin; why can’t we throw a wrinkled old man in the volcano? Lemme put it this way. Did y’ever get a real good, close look at the high priests? OK. Once again, I rest my case. “Now, the only problem we anticipate with this new cus-® torn is the distinct possibility of runnin’ out of virgins. Ya gotta figure best case scenario we’re not gonna see any corn till late next year, so it looks like we’re gonna be waxin’ virgins at quite a clip. And hey! . . . girls, don’t take this the k wrong way … but we don’t have that many virgins to begin with, do we? Ha-ha-ha-ha!! No offense, girls! Really! No, hey, you’re very lovely.

“Well, that’s it, folks. Thanks for listenin’. Good night. Walk home slowly. And walk safely. In case you didnt notice, the sun went down, and it’s completely fuckin’ dark-

Brain Droppings

y observEdl (oil euphemisms actual

= holistic massage therapy liEQP llOttl = limited service lodging

= interim financing = custodial interference mottfESJ ond box spring = sleep system SnQCKJOD = live-in companion W StOP = travel plaza USED UIQEOCOSSEttE = previously viewed cassette Ullrf DEQtfflj] = intermittent explosive disorder

= performing arts center

= nail technician nUQC DEQCl) = clothing optional beach pEEpnOlE = observation port DQIQI)ESS = acquired uncombable hair = remains pouches

= deficit water situation rECESSIOI) = a meaningful downturn in aggregate output 111 IOUE = emotionally involved lOOm ClEfK = guest service agent

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GEORGE CARLIN

brain droppings

I1QRE FAVORITE EUTHEtlSHS

= career apparel SEQt D€lt!/Qir DQQ = impact management system

= commercial sex worker = marital aid nOllbeliEUErS= the unchurched

= resume enhancement = pregnancy loss = batons

= commodity relocation = adult entertainer fOOID SEFUiff = private dining = party space

= pipe-frame exercise unit X = makeshift home finpprinting= digital imaging ffltlOdl|= big woman JlinKlES = the user population apflrtmEI)t= dwelling unit committee = task force

= room attendant = product specialist

bO(l lOOItt = nonperforming assets SEQSJCknCSS = motion discomfort QQRQS = nontraditional organized crime CiUiliOIldEOtllS= collateral damage pl)ling]Oint= gaming resort IDOlE = beauty mark giirbQgf COllECtiOl) = environmental services bfEOSt = white meat = dark meat = bio-solids

= ethnic cleansing = sports utility vehicle

= learning resources center jllllk mail = direct marketing SOdajerk = fountain attendant soldiers and weapons = military assets thirdflOOr= level three illegal immigrant = guest worker JEtSKI = personal watercraft loafers

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GEORGE CARLIN

I know I’m a little late with his, but I’d like to get a f licks in on this bogus topic before it completely disappea from everyone’s consciousness.

First, I want to be really clear about one thing: as far as other people’s feelings are concerned—especially these “victim groups”—when I deal with them as individuals, I will call them whatever they want. When it’s one on one, if some guy wants me to call him a morbidly obese, African-ancestored male with a same-gendered sexual orientation I’ll be glad to do that. On the other hand, if he wants me to call him a fat nigger cocksucker, then that’s what it will be. I’m here to please.

If I meet a woman who wishes to be referred to as a motion-impaired, same-gender-oriented Italian-American who is difficult to deal with, fine. On the other hand, I am perfectly willing to call her a crippled, Guinea dyke cunt if she prefers. I’m not trying to change anyone’s self-image. But! But! When I am speaking generally, and impersonally, about a large group of people, especially these victim groups, I will call them what I think is honest and fair. And I will try not to bullshit myself.

OK, so, who exactly are these victims? Well, first of all, I don’t think everyone who says he’s a victim automatically qualifies. I don’t think a homely, disfigured, bald minority person with a room-temperature IQ who limps and stutters is necessarily always a victim. Although I will say she prob ably shouldn’t be out trying to get work as a receptionist. But maybe that’s just the way it oughta be. ; 160

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brain d r o p p i n g s

I’m more interested in real victims. People who have been chronically and systematically fucked over by the system. Because the United States is a Christian racist nation with a rigged economic system run for three hundred years by the least morally qualified of the two sexes, there were bound to be some real victims. People who’ve been elaborately fucked over.

The way I see it, this country has only four real victim-groups: Indians, blacks, women, and gays. I purposely left out the Spanish and Asians, because when you look at what happened to the Indians and blacks, the Spanish and Asian people have had a walk in the park. It’s not even close. Not to downplay the shit they’ve had to eat, but in about one hundred years the Spanish and Asians are going to be running this country, so they’ll have plenty of chances to get even with the gray people.

Let’s get to some of these other non-victims. You probably noticed, elsewhere I used the word fat. I used that word because that’s what fat people are. They’re fat. They’re not large; they’re not stout, chunky, hefty, or plump. And they’re not big-boned. Dinosaurs are big-boned. These people are not necessarily obese, either. Obese is a medical term. And they’re not overweight. Overweight implies there is some correct weight. There is no correct weight. Heavy is also a misleading term. An aircraft carrier is heavy; it’s not fat. Only people are fat, and that’s what fat people are. They’re fat. I offer no apology for this. It is not intended as criticism or insult. It is simply descriptive language. I don’t like euphemisms. Euphemisms are a form of lying. Fat people are not gravitationally disad-vantaged. They’re fat. I prefer seeing things the way they are, not the way some people wish they were.

GEORGE CARLIN

brain d r o p p i n

; I don’t believe certain groups deserve extra-special ?m names. w

For instance, midgets and dwarfs are midgets and dwarfs They’re not little people. Infants are little people; leprechauns are little people. Midgets and dwarfs are midgets and dwarfs 0 They don’t get any taller by calling them little people. I wish their lives were different. I wish they didn’t have to walk around staring at other people’s crotches, but I can’t fix that. And I’m not going to lie about what they are. The politically sensitive language commandos would probably like me to call them “vertically challenged.” They’re not vertically challenged. A skydiver is vertically challenged. The person who designed the Empire State Building was vertically challenged. 6 Midgets and dwarfs are midgets and dwarfs.

Also, crippled people are crippled, they’re not differently-abled. If you insist on using tortured language like differently-abled, then you must include all of us. We’re all differently-abled. You can do things I can’t do; I can do . things you can’t do. I can pick my nose with my thumb, and I can switch hands while masturbating and gain a stroke. We’re all differently-abled. Crippled people are simply crippled. It’s a perfectly honorable word. There is no shame in it. It’s in the Bible: “Jesus healed the cripples.” He ^ didn’t engage in rehabilitative strategies for the physically disadvantaged.

So, leaving aside women and gays for the moment, I’ve narrowed it down to blacks and Indians. Let’s talk about what we ought to call them, and let’s talk about what the language commandos would like us to call them. And remember, this

> 6

has nothing to do with the people themselves. It has to do with the words.

And, by the way, when it comes to these liberal language vandals, I must say I agree with their underlying premise: White Europeans and their descendants are morally unattractive people who are responsible for most of the world’s suffering. That part is easy. You would have to be, uh, visually impaired not to see it. The impulse behind political correctness is a good one. But like every good impulse in America it has been grotesquely distorted beyond usefulness.

Clearly, there are victims, but I don’t agree that these failed campus revolutionaries know what to do about them. When they’re not busy curtailing freedom of speech, they’re running around inventing absurd hyphenated names designed to make people feel better. Remember, these are the white elitists in their customary paternalistic role: protecting helpless, inept minority victims. Big Daddy White Boss always knows best.

So, let me tell you how I handle some of these speech issues. First of all, I say “black.” I say “black” because most black people prefer “black.” I don’t say “people of color.” People of color sounds like something you see when you’re on mushrooms. Besides, the use of people of color is dishonest. It means precisely the same as colored people. If you’re not willing to say “colored people,” you shouldn’t be saying “people of color.”

Besides, the whole idea of color is bullshit anyway. What should we call white people? “People of no color”? Isn’t pink a color? In fact, white people are not really white at all, they’re

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GEORGE CARL I N different shades of pink, olive, and beige. In other word 5 they’re colored. And black people are rarely black. I see most’ ly different shades of brown and tan. In fact, some light-skinned black people are lighter than the darkest white people Look how dark the people in India are. They’re dark brown, but 4 they’re considered white people. What’s going on here? May I see the color chart? “People of color” is an awkward, bullshit, *, liberal-guilt phrase that obscures meaning rather than enhancing it. Shall we call fat people, “people of size”?

By the way, I think the whole reason we’re encouraged in this country to think of ourselves as “black and white” (instead of “pink and brown,” which is what we are) is that black and white are complete opposites that cannot be rec-

I also don’t say “African-American.” I find it completely illogical, and furthermore it’s confusing. Which part of Africa are we talking about? What about Egypt? Egypt is in Africa. Egyptians aren’t black. They’re like the people in India, they’re dark brown white people. But they’re Africans. So why wouldn’t an Egyptian who becomes a U.S. citizen be ^ an African-American? The same thing goes for the Republic of South Africa. Suppose a white racist from South Africa becomes an American citizen? Well, first of all he’d find plenty of com pany, but couldn’t he also be called an African-American? It , seems to me that a racist white South-African guy could

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brain droppings come here and call himself African-American just to piss off black people. And, by the way, what about a black person born in South Africa who moves here and becomes a citizen? What is he? An African-South-African-American? Or a South-African-African-American?

All right, back to this hemisphere. How about a black woman who is a citizen of Jamaica? According to P.C. doctrine, she’s an African-Jamaican, right? But if she becomes a U.S. citizen, she’s a Jamaican-American. And yet if one of these language crusaders saw her on the street, he’d think she was an African-American. Unless he knew her personally in which case he would have to decide between African-Jamaican-American and Jamaican-African-American. Ya know? It’s just so much liberal bullshit. Labels divide people. We need fewer labels, not more.

Now, the Indians. I call them Indians because that’s what they are. They’re Indians. There’s nothing wrong with the word Indian. First of all, it’s important to know that the word Indian does not derive from Columbus mistakenly believing he had reached “India.” India was not even called by that name in 1492; it was known as Hindustan. More likely, the word Indian comes from Columbus’s description of the people he found here. He was an Italian, and did not speak or write very good Spanish, so in his written accounts he called the Indians, “Una gente in Dios.” A people in God. In God. In Dios. Indians. It’s a perfectly noble and respectable word.

So let’s look at this pussified, trendy bullshit phrase, Native Americans. First of all, they’re not natives. They came over the

EORCE CARLIN

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Bering land bridge from Asia, so they’re not natives. There ar no natives anywhere in the world. Everyone is from somewhere else. All people are refugees, immigrants, or aliens If there were natives anywhere, they would be people who still live in the Great Rift valley in Africa where the human species arose. Everyone else is just visiting. So much for the “native” part of Native American.

As far as calling them “Americans” is concerned, do I even have to point out what an insult this is? Jesus Holy Shit Christ! We steal their hemisphere, kill twenty or so million* of them, destroy five hundred separate cultures, herd the survivors onto the worst land we can find, and now we want to name them after ourselves? It’s appalling. Haven’t we done enough damage? Do we have to further degrade them by tagging them with the repulsive name of their conquerers?

And as far as these classroom liberals who insist on saying “Native American” are concerned, here’s something they should be told: It’s not up to you to name people and tell them what they ought to be called. If you’d leave the classroom once in a while, you’d find that most Indians are insulted by the term Native American. The American Indian Movement will tell you that if you ask them.

The phrase “Native American” was invented by the U.S. government Department of the Interior in 1970. It is an inventory term used to keep track of people. It includes Hawaiians, Eskimos, Samoans, Micronesians, Polynesians, and Aleuts. Anyone who uses the phrase Native American ‘ Before 1492 there were 25 million people in Central America. By 1579 there were 2 million.

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is assisting the U.S. government in its effort to obliterate people’s true identities.

Do you want to know what the Indians would like to be called? Their real names: Adirondack, Delaware, Massachuset, Narraganset, Potomac, Illinois, Miami, Alabama, Ottawa, Waco, Wichita, Mohave, Shasta, Yuma, Erie, Huron, Susquehanna, Natchez, Mobile, Yakima, Wallawalla, Muskogee, Spokan, Iowa, Missouri, Omaha, Kansa, Biloxi, Dakota, Hatteras, Klamath, Caddo, Tillamook, Washoe, Cayuga, Oneida, Onondaga, Seneca, Laguna, Santa Ana, Winnebago, Pecos, Cheyenne, Menominee, Yankton, Apalachee, Chinook, Catawba, Santa Clara, Taos, Arapaho, Blackfoot, Blackfeet, Chippewa, Cree, Cheyenne, Mohawk, Tuscarora, Cherokee, Seminole, Choctaw, Chickasaw, Comanche, Shoshone, Two Kettle, Sans Arc, Chiricahua, Kiowa, Mescalero, Navajo, Nez Perce, Potawatomi, Shawnee, Pawnee, Chickahominy, Flathead, Santee, Assiniboin, Oglala, Miniconjou, Osage, Crow, Brule, Hunkpapa, Pima, Zuni, Hopi, Paiute, Creek, Kickapoo, Ojibwa, Shinnicock.

You know, you’d think it would be a fairly simple thing to come over to this continent, commit genocide, eliminate the forests, dam up the rivers, build our malls and massage parlors, sell our blenders and whoopee cushions, poison ourselves with chemicals, and let it go at that. But no. We have to compound the insult. Native Americans! I’m glad the Indians have gambling casinos now. It makes me happy that dimwitted white people are losing their rent money to the Indians. Maybe the Indians will get lucky and win their country back. Probably they wouldn’t want it. Look what we did to it.

C A R L I N GEORGE

People like to say that no matter how bad off your life is, there is always someone worse off than you. I guess it’s a source of comfort. It’s nice to know that while they’re removing a bone from your throat, the man in the next room has a four hundred-pound tumor in his groin.

But the idea that there is always someone worse off leads to the logical conclusion that somewhere in the world there is a person who is in worse shape than everybody else. Some guy who has almost six billion people doing better than he is.

But, in reality, as you get down to the bottom of the bad-shape pile, it becomes harder and harder to know who’s doing worse. Is a blind, paralyzed, maniac really better off than a three-foot, paraplegic imbecile? Tough call.

Then there’s always my “Plus-a-Headache” formula. No matter how horrible and painful a person’s condition may be, it can always be made worse by simply adding a headache: “He was poor, ignorant, diseased, lonely, depressed, and abandoned—plus he had a headache.” Look on the bright side: The headache will very likely go away.

Everyone complains about this being a “victim society.” Well, I don’t know about the victim society, but I would like to talk about the “Grief, Tragedy, and Sympathy Industry.”

The news media are playing a game with you. You’re being fed a large ration of other people’s troubles designed to keep your mind off the things that should really be bothering you. I guess the media figure if you’re sitting around feeling ?68

brain droppings sorry for every sick, injured, or dead person they can scrounge up, you’ll have less time to dwell on how fucked up your own life is, and what bad shape this culture is really in.

I’m not so much opposed to grief per se, as I am to public media grief. My attitude is fuck sick people and fuck a dead person. Unless I knew them. And, if so, I’ll handle it on my own, thank you. I don’t need media guidance to experience sorrow.

Above all, I object to the abuse of the word tragedy. Every time some asshole stops breathing these days it’s called a tragedy. The word has been devalued. You can’t call every death a tragedy and expect the word to mean anything. For instance, multiple deaths do not automatically qualify as tragedies. Just because a man kills his wife and three kids, her lover, his lover, the baby-sitter, the mailman, the Amway lady, and the guy from Publishers’ Clearing House and then blows his own brains out doesn’t mean a tragedy has occurred. It’s interesting. It’s entertaining to read about. But it’s not a tragedy.

The death of a child is also not automatically a tragedy. Some guy backing over his kid in the driveway is not a tragedy, it’s a bad, bad mistake. A tragedy is a literary work in which the main character comes to ruin as a consequence of a moral weakness or a fatal flaw. Shakespeare wrote tragedies. A family of nine being wiped out when a train hits their camper is not a tragedy. It’s called a traffic accident.

You wanna know what a tragedy is? A tragedy is when you see some fat bastard in the airport with pockmarks on his face and his belly hanging out, and he’s with a woman

6 GEORGE C A R L I N who has bad teeth and multiple bruises, and that night he’ i| gonna make her suck his dick. That’s a tragedy. They don’t mention that a lot on TV.

The media often refer to the killing of a white policeman as a tragedy. Why is that more tragic than the same white 0 policeman killing an unarmed black kid? Why is it never a tragedy on TV when a white cop kills a black kid? It’s never presented in that way. The whites save tragedy for themselves. Why is that?

The media have elevated the marketing of bathos and sympathy to a fine art. But I gotta tell ya, I really don’t care about a paraplegic who climbs a mountain and then skis cross-country for 50 miles; I’m not interested in a one-legged Q veteran who ice skates across Canada to raise money for children’s prosthetics. I have no room for some guy without a nervous system who becomes the state wrestling champion; or a man who loses his torso in Vietnam and later holds his breath for six months to promote spina bifida research; or . someone born with no heart who lives to be ninety-five and helps everyone in his neighborhood neaten up their lawns.

Is this all we can find in America that passes for personal drama? People overcoming long odds? God, it’s so boring and predictable. ^ And does this mean we are supposed to admire people sim– ply because of the order of their luck? Because their bad luck j came first? What about the reverse? What about people who start well and then fail spectacularly in life? People who were born with every privilege and given every possible gift and tal– ;??-??? ent, who had all the money they needed, were surrounded by

brain droppings good people, and then went out and fucked their lives up anyway? Isn’t that drama too? Isn’t that equally ineresting? In fact, I find it more interesting. More like true tragedy. 6 I’d prefer to hear something like that once in a while, rather than this pseudo-inspirational bullshit that the media feel they have to feed us in order to keep our minds off America’s decline. If they’re going to insist that we really need to know about sick babies and cripples who tap dance and quadraplegic softball players, why don’t they simply have a special television program called “Inspirational Stories”? That way I can turn the fuckin’ thing off. I’m tired of people battling the odds. Fuck the odds. And fuck the people who battle them. After a while don’t you just get weary of being told that some kid in Minnesota needs a new liver? Kids didn’t need new livers when I was growing up. We had good livers. What are they feeding these kids that suddenly they all need new livers? I think it’s the gene pool. Nature used to eliminate the weak, imperfect kids before they were old enough to repro-. duce their flaws. Now we have a medical industry dedicated T§ to keeping people alive just long enough to pass along their bad genes to another generation. It’s medical arrogance, and it works against nature’s plan. I’m sick of hearing about a baby being kept alive on a resuscitator while doctors wait for (j a kidney to be flown in on a private jet contributed by some corporation seeking good publicity because they just killed six thousand people in Pakistan with a chemical spill. I’m tired of this shit being presented in the context of real news. Prurient gossip about sick people is not real news. It’s emotional pandering.