Chicken Little Was a Fucking Lunatic
Perhaps it's time to admit that maybe these are all acorns and the lunatic Chicken Little Syndrome is now ours to acknowledge. The Right owned it for eight years and now it's ours.
If Men Are From Mars and Women Are From Venus, Where the Fuck Have I Been All This Time?
It has come to pass as I read the countless examples of sexual harassment proliferated by so many other men that I don't understand most men, either.
Dick pics?
Coming on to women by pulling the schlong out for view?
Masturbating in front of women as a seduction technique?
Catcalling random strangers?
Drugging women to have sex?
Raping drunk, sleeping women?
I Believe... [Joking About "David Cop-a-Feel" is NOT Rapey]
The Transactional Life (and How to Get Around It)
If one does X, then one receives Y.
Couldn't be simpler. If one mows the neighbor's lawn, the neighbor will reward you with some money. If you clean your room, you receive an extra Twinkie. Punch the bigger kid, get clobbered. Do the crime, do the time. Quid Pro Quo. If X, then Y. Call it The Transactional Life.
The difficulty in growing older or up or however you choose to look at the passage of time is that you start to see that this contract with the world, this Transactional Life, is not fair. Most of the time, the value you place on X is not in equal proportion to the perceived value of Y.
The Scariest Movies of All Time (According to My 12-Year-Old Self)
I’m not much of a Halloween kind of guy. In fact, I don’t care for it at all. The costumes—meh. The parties are just another excuse for adults to get hammered and dress up in racially and sexually insensitive garb, writing it off as a spoof. The candy—well, I like the candy but I like candy anytime of the year.
But scary movies? I love 'em.
I Believe... [The Monsters Are Us]
...that if aliens came to Earth with any mission but total annihilation of the human race, 2017 would convince them otherwise.
The Ease of Accusation and Biased Belief
This is likewise not to indicate innocence of predatory behaviors or to suggest that we should not give accusations of sexual misconduct and criminal behavior a full hearing. For most of recorded history, women and those in the minority have been systematically been disbelieved for no other reason than to protect a false hierarchy and thus demonize those accusers. Disbelief for reasons outside of the facts is just as erroneous and damaging as belief for the same reasons. Making the mistake of over-correction is still making the same mistake.
I Believe... [George W. is Enjoying the Trumpster Fire]
...that, if nothing else, at least the ineffectual pile of runny dogshit that is the Donald Trump presidency has managed to rehabilitate the image of poor, dimwitted George W.
Make NOT Doing the Wrong Thing a Habit
"Me, too."
Following the explosive revelation of something everyone already knew about—the serial abuse upon countless women in Hollywood by Harvey Weinstein—the simple request online was for any woman who had experienced sexual harassment or assault to respond with “Me, too.”
The numbers of women who typed those two words was harrowing and maddening.
Most men online were either silent (that was my response) or typed in response “I believe you.”
Neither the declaration of contextless assault nor the insincere blanket belief is particularly helpful. It is the activism of the internet—looks good but generally doesn’t amount to much.
I was 13 years old in 1979. My mother had been married a couple of times by then and I had witnessed my first step-father, Dennis Coley, routinely beat my mother with his fists, with a belt, with a cast iron skillet. In terms of toxic masculine behavior, I had a front row seat to the freak show.
One would think that being audience to that would have an effect.
I Believe... [Shifting Demographics]
...that when piranha smell blood in the water, even paper cuts will doom you.
You Aren’t Harvey Weinstein So Calm Down
Seriously.
On the heels of the not so surprising news that a mega-wealthy, older, white, Hollywood power broker turned out to be a serial sexual harasser there are now articles and statuses and tweets going around that other men are now afraid to meet with women because they might then be accused of the same.
Calm down, already.
I Believe... [AIM Wasn't Dead and Buried?]
...that it is almost embarrassing when it is announced that someone or something died and you thought they or it was dead long ago. That said, if you were still using AOL Instant Messenger, you're the one idiot using an abacus in the middle of an Apple store.
Gun Control and Abortion — Two Sides of the Same Coin
In an effort to gain understanding on some level for the inexplicable, in lieu of simply writing off the Gun Nuts and 2nd Amendment Monsters and their lust for all things that shoot and kill, it occurred to me that the way I feel must be at least in the same wheelhouse as someone adamantly anti-abortion must feel every time a regulation on abortion rights is struck down.
Trump is a Mirror We Hate Looking In To
To misquote the oft-quoted meme, Donald Trump is not the president we need but he is the president we deserve.
I Believe... [I Heard a Rumor...]
...that if your allegiance is to a symbol rather than people, to a song rather than citizens, you *might* be a racist or you *might* not be a racist but you are definitely a jackass.
Manufacturing Wounded Status to Beat the System
Do white males in America really feel marginalized by the strident Left? I don’t think so. I think these MRAs and Alt-Right dipshits see those who are banking on victimhood, elevating their marginalized survival as somehow heroic and cashing in on it as just another opportunity to seize some much needed financing.
Sharing the Last Slice of Privilege
"Would I give up my whiteness to be Black?"she asks. Her answer is yes. Mine is a definitive NO.
This is not to say that I see being Black as a bad thing in any way. It is, however, in this society, a genuine disadvantage, and why would anyone simply give up any advantages he or she has to serve some sort of guilt-ridden non-purpose?
Would I give up my legs to be a paraplegic? No.
Would I give up my mental health to be schizophrenic? No.
Would I give up my American citizenship to be European? Maybe...
The question is broader than the skin color or the rich cultural heritage. The question asked is more complicated.
I Believe... [Nazis are the White People of Germans?]
...that when the shit hits the fan, focusing on all the shit flying everywhere is the wrong choice. Deal with the fan.
Skewering a Genre Perfectly: Not About Dicks but About the Justice System
Galaxy Quest is the perfect spoof of Star Trek. Blazing Saddles is perhaps the best takeoff on westerns. This is Spinal Tap seems over the top until you see Anvil! The Story of Anvil and see clearly how close the rockumentary is to real life.
Which brings me to Netflix's American Vandal.
When Intersectionality Runs Amok: The Underlying Misunderstanding that is Fracturing Society
"Once these angry Rage Profiteers have kids, their kids will look at them and tell them what a mob of bullies they were. They'll be so disillusioned because they thought, by jumping in on the separatist dogma, by leaping into the public shaming online, they were making a difference."
I've had more than a few conversations lately that sound a bit like this. Thinking people who see the current level of Leftist backlash to Trump and the onslaught of Republican rule in this country as wholly negative. Like me, they see the term whypipo as just an attempt to come up with a white people version of a term that strikes offense in the same way that other racially derogatory terms heretofore banned in polite society accomplished for marginalized groups. Like me, they see the term to simply indicate that the users of it are merely assholes (just like those who continue to use gay as a pejorative).
The question becomes simply, why is the idea that one's political discourse is centered on their personal identity has become so divisive?
The trend began with an academic trying to define a broader experience.
...that, at a certain age, a birthday is no longer a celebration of your existence but another notch in the ‘Fuck off, Death’ belt.