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I read a great comment the other day on one of those right-to-war blogs. The blog is:
KillKillKill
and the original entry was lifted from:
CanadianIsAsCanadianDoes
and the comment is:
"How many Canadian right-wing bloggers have been killed in combat over there? My understanding is that they're badly under-represented because they don't love their country. They're not real Canadians, of course. I guess we can thank the internet for this pathetic generation of unpatriotic ingrates."
Posted by: Crabgrass at August 29, 2007 2:24 PM
Basically (if you don't like clicking on links) the entry questions why all of the Canadian soldiers who have died in Afghanistan are white and male (well, sure they are - if you aren't going to count the female death and the two black deaths) and then goes on pretty much to complain about how immigrants just aren't being very Canadian anymore/these days/now that they aren't all white.
Uh... hunh? No, no, no. As a fourth generation Canadian (with, like - 40 years between each generation, too), let me interject, here. It's not the immigrants who aren't being very Canadian - it's the right-to-war bloggers. Canadian is NOT invading other countries and attemping to impose our Essential Canadianness on the inhabitants. (Essential Canadianness being something we can't even define ourselves without pointing south and saying, "At least we're not THAT" - which, all in all, is better'n being THAT...)
Canadian, rather, is welcoming/inviting/soliciting people from other countries to come here and pick up the economic/birthing slack created by our developedness. And you won't find ANY rich white Canadian males enlisting in the army here. You won't even find right-to-war bloggers enlisting in the army here. What you'll find, mostly, are economically deprived Atlantic Canadians enlisting in the army while right-to-war bloggers (from the West, most particularly), bitch about unfair transfer payments, Eastern Canada unemployment statistics, and now - immigrants not enlisting in the Canadian Army to go fight the Taliban in Afghanistan.
Oh, and by the way, right-to-war bloggers, "immigrants" come in a variety of shapes and colours, these days. Income levels, too. The stereotype of the noble poor European has given way to the reality of the the latte-drinking wealthy developer from one of those countries where you can only get rich being rich already swinging deals on his cellphone over lunch in Yorkville.
Update: Here's another great comment on the same entry. If this comment doesn't make you feel like a proud Canadian, well, maybe you should take out American citizenship or something (The comment is in response to the question from the right-to-war blog owner as to why he is still there, commenting):
"Why am I still here? I told you, this place is hilarious! The inside of a right-wing mind is such a wonderful, magical place. Like Willy Wonka's chocolate factory... but on acid.
And, I am leading by example. I don't support the war, so, I am enjoying some nice martinis, voting for Jack Layton, and feeling guilty for being a white male heterosexual. I might hit a gay bar or two if I have time. I'll send them your love (figuratively, not literally)."
Posted by: The Self-Loathing Multiculturalist at August 30, 2007 11:30 AM
As someone who doesn't support the war, either, I think I'll vote for Jack Layton next go 'round, too. Why don't you join me and we'll make it an Essentially Canadian thing.
Say, wouldn't it be nice if the upcoming provincial election in Ontario featured all three leaders of the main parties, Tory, Liberal, NDP, standing up for something different?
Like, different from each other, I mean.
Imagine John Tory, Leader of the Conservatives saying, "I believe in public funding for private education, public funding for private healthcare, and... a tax cut in the form of a $200 cheque from the government before the next election to be covered in the form of lots of cuts to public services and fees for the ones we contract out to our friends and families."
And Dalton McGuinty, Leader of the Liberals saying, "I believe in the status quo - public funding for one education system and public funding for a Catholic education system, public funding for SOME private healthcare services, and... no tax cuts, but no tax increases, either - unless I change my mind and increase taxes, which, as you all know by now - or should if you've been paying attention - I will do."
And finally, Howard Hampton, Leader of the NDP saying, "I believe in one publicly funded school system, public funding for public healthcare and ONLY public healthcare, and a tax increase to keep up with the costs of both that will be borne by all taxpayers because we plan to get out of the gambling business that we got into last go 'round."
Isn't that how it's supposed to be, anyway? Three parties, three choices? And if you don't like any of them, you can vote for one of the fringe parties? Like Green, or Marijuana, or Marxist Leninist?
And if it's just titillating, isn't that relevant?
I am referring, of course, to this photo of former Mayor Sharon Smith turned unelected, unofficial and completely illegitimate liaison for the people of Skeena-Bulkley Valley to Stephen Harper's New Conservative Government of Canada (Yes. It's true. The good people of Skeena-Bulkley Valley elected a New Democrat to represent them and not a Conservative):
HubbaHubba
By the way, a more detailed rundown of the anti-democracy goings on that actually have nothing to do with the photo of Sharon Smith sprawled naked in a chair wearing only the Mayor's Chain of Office can be found here at:
BloggingADeadHorse
Now, personally, I blame the men in Sharon Smith's life for the fact that...well.. I blame the men in Sharon Smith's life for everything to do with Sharon Smith to tell you the truth. She clearly has a hard time saying "NO" to things she shouldn't do - for the sake of her own credibility, I mean.
And always remember... no wait... never forget - the only thing worse than the political wife, is the political husband. If Sharon Smith's husband didn't talk her into taking off all her clothes and posing for him wearing only the Mayor's Chain of Office - I'll eat my lipstick. In fact, I'll go one step further and suggest that he DELIBERATELY left that photo where either of his two sons could find it - which is to say: ON THE FRIGGIN' COMPUTER! Then, he left town with the Little Woman so that his two sons could have one of those teenaged parties teens are famous for having whenever both their parents leave town - so that the rest, Dear Reader, could be history.
I call it "Svengali's Revenge". I don't know why. I just don't like the cut of Sharon Smith's husband's jib, now that I've seen the photo he took of his wife sprawled naked in a chair wearing only the Mayor's Chain of Office. I can jussssst hear him over the other voices in my head, "C'mon... PLEEEEEEEEEEEEEZ... Just one picture of you sprawled naked in a chair wearing only the Mayor's Chain of Office... C'mon... Do it for MEEEEEEEEEE..."
Gee, Dear Wife Readers - recognize that one? Much? A lot? Okay... is there a husband with you right now, right at this very moment saying, "C'mon... PLEEEEEEEEEEEEEEZ... Sharon Smith did it for HER husband... C'mon... Do it for MEEEEEEEEEEE..."
The fact that there's no towel on the chair is all the proof I need that none of this was her idea. Right, Dear Wife Readers? Am I right? You'd put a towel down on that chair, first, and would NOT sprawl - if it was YOUR idea. Admit it. She's letting it all hang out. You'd sit up, thrust out, tuck in, pull back, cross legs - whatever it took to look like a sexy pin-up and not some skank sprawled naked in a chair.
Tsk, tsk. Silly Wife Reader. Men LIKE the skank sprawled naked in a chair look. Listen, I was once walking with my husband, chatting away about world politics, and he's not saying much but he's looking like his brain's about to burst with all the knowledge I'm cramming into it, when all of a sudden he goes, "SHH! I'm concentrating!", like he's REALLY thinking about all what I've been yammering on about - when I notice this woman ahead of us with what I would consider an ample rear-end in need of some toning up (or down), wearing acid-wash jeans TUCKED INTO HER COWBOY BOOTS! and a cheap polyester top WITH HER BRA STRAPS SHOWING! Well, not only was he not listening to me, he was staring at her. To add to this bizarrity, later he asked, "Do you have a pair of cowboy boots?". Naturally, I said, "Of course not. Cowboy boots are NOT in style." And yet, in spite of knowing that - he bought me a pair for... well... it wasn't Christmas... or my birthday... Aaaaanyway, my point is, that photo of Sharon Smith is too... "look at me sprawled naked in a chair wearing only the Mayor's Chain of Office" to have been her idea.
But, having said that, should we all be gawking at a photo, probably not her idea, illegally obtained and sent around the Internet?
Yes. Is the photo relevant to the fact that her appointment is a complete denial of the democratic process? No. Not really. But it IS a photo of her sprawled naked in a chair wearing only the Mayor's Chain of Office. I mean - c'mon. How often do you get to gawk at a photo of an unelected, unofficial and completely illegitimate liaison for the people of Skeena-Bulkley Valley to Stephen Harper's New Conservative Government of Canada sprawled naked in a chair wearing only the Mayor's Chain of Office?
One quibble, though - since it's legal to go topless in Ontario, I really don't see the need to black out her breasts. C'mon, Sharon Smith - Show Us Your Tits!
Shouldn't there at least be a Bill introduced in Congress to ensure that, in order to win a reconstruction contract in Iraq, you must pledge allegiance to the lifelong care of those soldiers who were injured while fighting there?
I mean, what better way could there be for Bush Inc. to show its appreciation to the brave men and women who gave up arms and legs so that Americans (er, and Iraqis, I guess) could live terror-free lives - then to ensure that the financial beneficiaries of their sacrifice, sacrifice some of their financial benefits to those who made it all possible?
We all support the Mission in Afghanistan the exact same amount.
So really, all you troop supporters are just... well... no different than those of us who don't support the Mission in Afghanistan at all.
Practically speaking.
Yes. That's right - Minstrel Rap. It just popped into my head, okay? And it's funny, isn't it. I mean, if you saw a couple of white comedians in blackface doing rap, you'd be offended (on behalf of... well... black people, I guess... and Emminem?), but you'd be laughing. Admit it.
You heard it here first on SooeySays.
Minstrel Rap would, indeed, be funny.
Omigawd... Okay, okay - even funnier. (I'll stop after this.) If you saw Colin Powell and Condi Rice, in blackface, rapping...
I can't help it. From now on, if it pops into my head and I think it's funny, it's going in a "You Heard It Here First" post.
I'm starting to find it a bit... offputting... that you, our Canadian Military (oh, and your boss - Stephen Harper's New Conservative Government of Canada) are trying to sell the War on the Taliban in Afghanistan to us - your boss's boss - instead of to the Afghanis - and using our tax dollars (which already support your efforts "over there", you know) to do it.
C'mon now. Take up a collection at the next strategy meeting and buy a brain, guys. We're not the enemy. We're your fellow citizens fronting the bill, regardless of whether or not we agree with what you're doing. Remember? Use the war propaganda on the Afghanis - over in Afghanistan - where the war is. Leave democracy to us who already have it. Everything we need to know about what is actually going on in Afghanistan - we know. We have all the access to information we can handle and are quite capable of making an informed decision about whether or not we think the sacrifice (human and otherwise) is worth it.
Thank you.
Oh, and feel free to steal my little title makeover from the "Mission in Afghanistan" to "Canada's War on the Taliban in Afghanistan". I know it's cumbersome but you seem to be looking for a way to better explain what the hell it is we're doing over there and I thought maybe if you actually called it what it is, it would save you time over here complaining about how nobody understands you, so you could better spend it over there - explaining yourselves to Afghanis.
But, just to be sure, to put our minds at ease - the Afghanis DO know why we're there, right? I mean, not just the ones we're training to take over the fight when we exit some day from the "theatre", as CNNers say, (and Gawd knows why we think we need to train Afghanis in the art of fighting, but... there you go... I'm not a REAL military affairs expert) - but the ones hither and thither, too?
Hither and thither is what I worry about. I hope you do, too. And, well, again - what do I know - but maybe we should train the Afghanis on OUR side, to plant roadside bombs where the Taliban are, since that seems to be the local preferred way of fighting, that, well... seems to work? For them, I mean. You know, the Afghanis who DON'T want us to win "Canada's War on the Taliban in Afghanistan".
Anyway, my thinking is that (and I don't mean to step on any toes, here) if all the effort that is being expended on selling "Canada's War on the Taliban in Afghanistan" to us, was repackaged somehow to be sold to AFGHANIS, (who may not speak Canadian, but, well - pictures are always good - like say, pictures of cops and protestors mingling as one group at Montebello, the cops dressed like the protestors, going that extra step by carrying rocks, etc., to make it appear like cops and protestors are the same in a democracy like Canada) - it would be one small step for Afghanistan, one giant step for you and Stephen Harper's New Conservative Government of Canada.
Okay. Ready? This is the first in what I hope to be a series of entries called: "You Heard It Here First".
Sit down. It's a biggie.
DivasCan'tDance
Celine Dion, Canada's petite sparrow, is a lesbian.
I know, I know - it explains EVERYTHING, doesn't it.
Here's a funny story with a great idea attached to it. These three amigos (i.e. "Gomers" if you don't speak Spanish) I am acquainted with are traveling together in Ireland. Anyway, apparently Ireland is absolutely lousy with Russians, fighting morosely in the streets, yelling fatefully at tourists in the pubs, fornicating grimly in the cathedrals, answering phones at pizza delivery joints with oppressed rage - you know, acting like Russians except in Ireland.
So yeah, after a night of merrymaking ala Guinness, one amigo decides to order a pizza. But he's having trouble understanding Buddy Comrade on the other end so he says, "Speak slowwwly, I'm Canadian".
Hahahahahaha! Eh? Eh? "Speak slowwwly, I'm Canadian". I lurve it. But you're too late if you lurve it, too, because Amigo #2 already patented it for a tee-shirt company he plans to start up upon his return.
Amigo #3 missed it all because he was distracted by some pixie dust one of the local leprechauns had sprinkled on his shoe after he'd relieved himself in one of those "tinkle pots" we call "a parking lot" here. I dunno. Adding Russians to an island of Irish people seems like a great way to create a race of depressed sprites, if you ask me. I just can't imagine any good coming of it, other than that there's a new race of depressed sprites to look down upon for the rest of us.
Oh - and I can say the above because I'm neither Russian, nor Irish - so don't be coming around here with your iggorant comments, "Sooey! That is SO bigoted!" Because it'snot. Geddit? It'snot? Well? Do ya? Hunh?
Last night I had one of those dreams that was of a real time I had back when I was a kid. When I woke up, I realized how rarely I do things that I really liked doing when I was young. That applies to lots of things, of course, but this dream was about the time a friend of our family built us a raft.
Every Saturday, my Mom would drive me and my brother and sisters out to the country to visits friends of hers. Well, by friends of hers I mean, friends of my dead Dad - with whom she maintained an ongoing relationship. Er, with his friends, I mean. Not my dead Dad. He was kept alive for us by the odd reference, "What are you talking about now? Are you talking about death again? Ohfergawd'ssake! Your father was cut down in the prime of his life and here you are a young girl obsessed with dying! Go outside and pick those dandelions out of the lawn - and don't just pull them out - dig down and get the root!"
This couple, I'll just call them "Bob and Ethel" lived on a river that we got to by meandering through the woods and trespassing on several properties until finally we came out on to a rocky sand shore. It was just a narrow river but it had pockets where we could swim and it was clay-based so we had fun even where it was shallow, attacking each other and taking running slides until it dipped again and we could dive down. One year, "Bob" built us a raft out of real dead branches he'd cleared out of the woods on their property. He even fashioned a steering pole for us so we could navigate the river. It was the best summer because even though we were city kids, we figured out (it was knowing the raft was there that got our synapses firing) that we could bike there on our own during the week - even though "Bob and Ethel" would be at work and we were strictly forbidden to do it by my Mother.
Eventually, every Tom, Dick and Harry knew about the raft - not to mention, the river - and we'd bike out in teams of kids. Then, one day, just as we rounded the bend on the road that took us to their long, barely visible driveway, there was "Bob" - standing at the end of the driveway, arms folded across his chest. "Sorry, kids. This is private property. You'd best be heading back home now."
I felt sick. All the way home all I could think of was how we'd blown it by telling everybody about the raft and now we probably wouldn't get to use it, either. I also felt kind of bad about "Bob and Ethel" knowing that all those kids knew where they lived now, too. They were a childless couple and pretty reclusive, so I knew it wouldn't sit well with them that their privacy had been betrayed.
Anyway, as usual, my Mother was the worst of it, "What were you thinking? Why would you do something so stupid? Is it possible for me to turn my back for a second without one of you kids trying to get killed on the highway or drowned in a river? I don't know why I bother! It seems you were born braindead! And why is it you can bike out into the middle of nowhere but you can't walk up to the store for a quart of milk without being told to do it a hundred times!" - but once she'd gotten over it the rest was a breeze. "Bob" just made us haul the raft in and bring it all the way through the woods, across several other private properties, and into his work shed. NOT to punish us, either - "It's just for safety reasons, kids. I can't do my job worrying about kids showing up all summer and maybe drowning in the river. My insurance rates would skyrocket." And he'd wink.
"Bob" always brought things around to business. As he told us later, it turned out, too, that building the raft was the best thing for his summer, as well, because it meant we were always busy playing and the adults could hang out drinking and smoking and talking about stuff we weren't supposed to hear.
Anyway, I dreamed about the raft last night and how much fun it was, steering it down the river, and I realized I almost never do things like that anymore and how disappointed I would have been in myself back then if I'd known I was going to be such a nofunnick when I became an adult. Still, having realized that I am, in fact, a nofunnick is probably half the battle.
I know, I know - what battle? Good grief, eh? Being an adult is so stupid, sometimes. Right now, today, I have no idea what my point is in being one.
This link was posted on my forum yesterday:
MaybeI'mAGramma,MaybeI'mNot
I'm glad somebody, lots of people, are paying attention to this whole Montebello thing (and if you recognize the name, it's because it's the same resort that had a nasty bout of food poisoning hit its "paying" customers a few years back) but I kind of wish they'd just stick to the civics of the matter and not get sucked into the swirling "polipartisan" vortex that is known as 9/11. Because:
1. Although Bush Inc. is an evil, corrupt administration of proven liars and psychopaths, the Arab guys who'd been living and working in the United States and flying suspiciously in and out of the country acting like potential terrorists for years while the FBI and CIA raided their own closets or whatever they were doing while Al Queda set up its network did it.
2. Although Bush's approval rating went up in the aftermath of 9/11 and he can be said to have benefitted personally and mightily from 9/11, we must blame the American media for that, including Vanity Fair and the NYTimes. Remember that Vanity Fair centerfold of Bush Inc. in the Oval Office posing for all the world like its saviour? I do. And yes - I'm in year... what... how long have we been paying in civil liberties for 9/11 now... let's see... 5?... 6 years? Year six. I'm in year six of my boycott - with a couple of exceptions, one being the time I bought it to refute Christopher Hitchens on "Why Women Aren't Funny":
AmIRightAboutTheWarYet?
3. I'm just paranoid enough to wonder every time a blog mixes the issue of civil rights in with 9/11mutterings if it isn't being written by "Muddy Waters" - CSIS spy No.X Classified, Special Assignment "Deflector Shield" Code: "CyberAlert". And that's pretty much when the blogger loses me. If I can't tell if it's being written by someone wanting to cover the protest in the interests of civil libertarianism or if it's being written by someone wanting to discredit someone wanting to cover the protest in the interest of civil libertarianism by cramming in conspiratorial stuff about 9/11 "The Inside Job" - then I don't read it. Sure, I look at the pictures - BUT - then I wonder why someone supposedly on the side of the protestors is putting up pictures of THEM on the Internet instead of the SECURITY DETAIL - the same one that would dearly love to know just who these peaceful protestors are, since they already know who the violent protestors are (if you catch my drift...)
Anyway, back to Civics 101. Here's my take on Government and Corporations versus Media versus Us:
1. Corporations should not have rights because they are not citizens - they are money-making entities whose only concern is to make more money.
2. Governments should not meet "in secret" to discuss corporate interests because that is not the job governments are elected to do. We pay politicians to represent our interests, its citizens, and to protect our civil rights - over the longterm. That's why we pay them well and give them good pensions. That I even know the name "Thomas d'Aquino" annoys me. He's nothing more than a corporate shill and no government - EVER - should give him the time of day except as an individual citizen. There's plenty of civilian work to do to keep politicians busy - there is no need for them to work gratis for corporations.
3. Unless the Media is critical of government and reports on all its comings and goings, it isn't media. It's just another government spokesthingie bought and paid for with our tax dollars. Good government means an adversarial media - no less - and I refer you to paragraph No.2 in the 9/11 rant above. It's no good to say, "Sorry", once the invasion is underway and the President has been re-elected for a second term. So, if you're Canadian, cancel your CanWest subscriptions now and stop watching Global because you're just being bribed with your own money and then sold a bill of goods.
And watch words, people! (Swirling polipartisan vortex derailment straight ahead, by the way, should you wish to detour down 4 paragraphs.) I just noticed the other day that our hopelessly out-of-date media continues to refer to the "conflict" in the Middle East. What conflict? The Israelis have the Palestinians trapped behind a wall. That's not a conflict. That's "Look, you lost, Palestinians - and now it's time for the UN to relocate you to Davis Inlet".
As far as the rest of the Middle East goes, well, from what I can figure, the Arab States (who aren't exactly ponying up re the Palestinians, either, I've noticed) periodically engage in rhetorical war by threatening to wipe Israel off the map and Israel responds by bombing the crap out of Lebanon, or threatening to nuke Iran, or whatever.
That isn't a conflict, either. That's just one side saying the same stupid shit over and over and the other side responding like the U.S vis a vis Iraq.
(Oh - and comments are on for all you Middle East nutters - go crazy(er). I did the aside on porpoise like, because I'm crazy that way, too.)
Closer to home, it's the same deal, just different, if you follow my drift... again. There is no conflict between protestors (who should be all of us, includng the media, which is no longer "our" media once it's decided to take the government's word for it that it's acting in our interests by meeting "in secret" with corporate interests) and the government at Montebello. The fact that there is a meeting at Montebello at all means that our government has failed us. If Canadians have any sense at all, they will turf it at the first opportunity - before we lose the opportunity altogether.
Governments and corporations do NOT go together. Governments and media do NOT go together. Only governments and citizens go together. We elect them, they work for us. That's their only job and we pay them well to do it.
Work for us or go do something else, G-man.
Here's a funny story for you.
One summer, my Gram fell down our basement stairs and broke her leg. She'd been carrying a watermelon down to the cellar - a watermelon we'd insisted on her ordering from the grocery store and which we had neglected to take down to the cellar before we went outside to play.
It wouldn't have been so bad (for us) except that she slipped on a baseball, which my brother had left on the shelf going down to the basement (where Gram also kept soot for Christmas pudding - which is why I never eat Christmas pudding) - even though my Mom had yelled at him about 50,000,000 times about putting his baseball on the shelf where it could roll off and land on the stairs, causing someone to fall and break their leg going down to the basement.
Still, the watermelon was unexpected. Although, as my Mother pointed out - we SHOULD have expected it. Pointing out that it was a total wildcard cut no ice with her.
Anyway, Gram spent the summer up in her room in traction with a little bell at her bedside to ring whenever she needed anything. We took turns responding to the little ding - which is to say that me and my brother took turns attending to her while our older sister went off to summer camp and my younger sister continued to sit two inches away from the TV, sucking her thumb and watching Mr. Dressup. (I was a bit of a Juniour Mom and tried to convince her to sit further away from the TV for fear she'd get radiation sickness, but no sooner would I leave the room then she'd be back with her nose practically touching the screen. The thumbsucking bothered me for the germ factor, but if I pulled it out of her mouth she'd want to wipe it off on something, so, I decided it was the lesser of two evils to leave it in. Mr. Dressup I had no quibble with, although I always wondered if he wasn't just a bit sexist and I'm sure I caught him being crabby to Casey and Finnegan a couple of times. Years later I saw him being interviewed about being Mr. Dressup while having kids of his own - teenagers at the time - and it confirmed my suspicions as he confessed that there was no cache in his job for his kids, and that he'd even seen "Mr. Dressup Is A Transvestite" spray painted on a wall in his neighbourhood.)
Anyway, my brother and I were deemed responsible for my Gram's accident on account of it was his baseball and my Mother decided I was the one who'd been told to take the watermelon down to the cellar, so that was the way the cookie crumbled for us that summer. The thing is, when I'd been told to take the watermelon down to the cellar, my older sister was still at home and she said, "Haha! Bloody Bones is going to get you for sure with that big watermelon in your arms. He's just waiting down there for you and as soon as you get halfway down the stairs, I'm going to turn off the light and you'll be totally at his mercy."
And she wasn't fooling. I mean, there's no way I'd be able to get down to the cellar with a big old watermelon in my arms before Bloody Bones got me. He lived just around the corner in the creepiest part of our super creepy basement - where my Gram had stored stuff from "people who'd been dead for so long there was no use for their things". So I'd done the only thing I could and disappeared outside long enough for my Gram to give up and finally carry the watermelon down herself. (For some reason, my older sister was never asked to do anything like that - she was exempt from menial chores by virtue of... well... I have no idea, really - except maybe that she was better looking than the rest of us, which woud have conferred a higher status on her with my mother - who was a bit disappointed in our potato faces, I think.)
Anyway, that's how my brother and I spent that summer - I forget which one it was - and for years after that my Gram would complain of an ache in her leg whenever it would threaten to rain and remind my Mother of the time my brother left his baseball on the basement stairs and she slipped and fell while carrying that watermelon down to the cellar on account of I'd skipped out of my responsibility to do it because of some crazy story about Bloody Bones. Finally, one summer, I said, "Hey yeah - whatever happened to that watermelon?" and my Mother laughed until tears ran down her face and my Gram finally started chuckling and that was the last time we heard "The Watermelon Story".
Someone posted on my forum recently about a test some of us had back in high school that determined what we should be, professionally, when we went on to bigger and better things. Assuming by bigger and better things, of course, that high school wasn't the peak of your existence.
O!Mi!Gawd! Can you imagine what life is like NOW for those for whom high school WAS the peak of their existence? I mean, I actually dated a guy for whom University was the peak of his existence - but we were in University at the time, so... for me it was a bit of a vicarious peak of MY existence, "Wow. He's actually enjoying this...". But it's always left me unsettled that life ever after was, for him, a slide down from BMOC to... well... one of thousands of ambulance chasers in Toronto.
Meanwhile, I'd KILL to be an ambulance chaser in Toronto. Or even IN Toronto. Gawd. Ottawa. The city that boring forgot.
But for me, life just gets better with age - it really does. It is ALWAYS looking up. I can't think of any period of my life that I look back on and don't think, "Thank Gawd I'm here - now - and not stuck back there - then". Although, there are certain quips I would like to be able to go back in time to make - with the benefit of my much superiour quiptitude now. But such is life - most of it stuck on, "I know you are, but what am I?" and "No, YOU shut up!" - instead of, "Haha! You've got toilet paper stuck to your shoe" and "It's "its" not "it's" - Einstein".
I regularly taunt my kids with how great it is being older and wiser, too. And it's true. But I can remember what it was like being a kid (unlike many adults I know who seem to remember childhood as fun and carefree instead of the heartless gulag it was) and it was the worst, really. It was for me, anyway, and I had a relatively stable and secure childhood - just no rights or freedom. Of course, kids today DO have rights, so that's one thing that's a bit different. Still, they're under enormous pressure to do well, "If you fail urban geography, students, you may as well kiss your futures in the Urban Planning Department at City Hall goodbye, so listen up because I'll be telling you in class tomorrow exactly what you need to know to get a passing grade on the exam."
I'm serious. Imagine the pressure of being led to the water AND made to drink it, sip by sip, until you're quenched. I couldn't have coped with that in high school. Give me the old, "None of you will amount to anything anyway so you may as well fail now as later" any day and let me overachieve to prove everybody wrong. And then completely lose my confidence just in time for University so that a job as a temporary file clerk seems like a step up the ladder and a job as permanent file clerk, well, it doesn't get much better'n that - does it. How could it?
Anyway, the benefit of whatever age I'm at, doing whatever it is I'm doing now, is that for me - it only gets better, which is something I enjoy imparting to my kids. For me, the joy of adulthood, earning my own money, making my own decisions, and not having to answer to anyone is a constant high. I just don't know if they really understand that because kids today already don't have to answer to adults the way we had to, back in the olden days. It seemed to me that we were always having to answer to somebody - even if we weren't doing anything, "Don't think you can just lay around doing nothing with your nose in a book all summer! Those baseboards need dusting!" Adults were constantly on our cases about this or that - and I was a good student who never got in trouble, too - but in no way was I ever let off the hook for not being an adult with all those onerous responsibilities they were always complaining about. "Just you wait. Enjoy being young now, kid - because it's downhill after that. Nothing but work, work, work. Now go buy me a pack of smokes, and when you're done doing that, I know a lawn that needs mowing."
Tsk, tsk. I dunno but I wonder if kids today will appreciate the freedom afforded by adulthood as much as I do or if they're spoiled by being treated like human beings with rights - now. As Gilda Radner said, "It's always something", I guess.
We watched "Factory Girl" last night. It's supposed to be the story of Edie Sedgewick, an It Girl back in the 60s, but it's really just a fart in the direction of Andy Warhol.
NOT that there's anything wrong with that, it's just that after renting "Fur", the story of Diane Arbus, I've come to realize that movies about specific people are really just movies about A person, SOMEbody, ANYbody, EVERYbody. I mean, once you've fictionalized the life of Diane Arbus, it's pretty much a done deal that the next biopic is gonna be a biopic like McDonald's milkshakes are milkshakes.
But it's ironic that we rented "Factory Girl" just at a time when I realized all art isn't - because the film is really an expose (computer, insert accent ague over the "e", please) of how art becomes valuable which in turn makes it art.
Yup. Rich people buy it, thereby giving it value, then they sell it - thereby giving it more value. And so on and so forth and more of the same, etc etc until it's so valuable, the best thing is to donate it to an art gallery as a tax write-off.
It was quite the revelation. Also, it occurred to me during the movie that Money + Time = Art. And, Rich Layabouts + Doing Nothing = Hollywood Cultural Touchstone. I mean, there was Andy Warhol selling his prints to Edie Sedgewick's Mother and her friends, thereby giving his art price tags that could only go up. It's all about resale, baby, and rich people decide what the mark-up's going to be when they put their investments back on the market to sell to the next rich person.
What a racket, eh? Art - ya gotta love it. I am rich, therefore, what I buy has value added.
Meanwhile, poor Edie just got addicted to drugs and died. You feel sorry for her, too, because she seems like a fun sort of useless parasite, although at one point I said to my viewing companion, "Gawd, these people are pretentious assholes. I mean, who else but a bunch of rich kids could afford to hang out at The Factory with Andy Warhol being no talent pretentious assholes? No wonder they all died young. They had lots of money and nothing to do but take drugs and hang out partying. It's not so much sad that they died young as it was inevitable. What else were they going to do?"
Sadly, Edie's end loomed in sight not long after she got cut off from her Daddy's money. Tough love is what pretty much killed her, although the movie blames her death on Andy Warhol - who apparently never paid her for her work in his movies, such as it was and they were. I think the idea was to portray him as her Daddy, except without the sex.
So yeah, I'm not saying she didn't have a hard go of it, I'm just saying Paris Hilton she weren't.
Which brings me to Paris Hilton because, as we watched the movie, I realized, "Hey, Paris Hilton is a rich heiress, too, except she no longer needs her family's money. For a rich heiress, that's pretty independent of her, I think. She could get addicted to heroin, etc and probably be able to support her habit. If she wanted to, I mean."
And it's true. Contrast Edie with Paris and you'll see what I'm driving at. Edie was pretty much just a model, as was/is Paris - but Paris makes sure she gets paid. Edie continued to rely on her Daddy's money and when she got cut off, that was it - she died. She was the It Girl with a heroin habit and no way to support herself.
Harsh, eh? What kills me, though, is how The Factory and Andy Warhol and Edie Sedgewick and the whole lot of that crowd became a cultural touchstone. All they did, afterall, was be dependently rich and hang out being assholes. The art blows. I don't even think it's art (although, my new theory is that all art isn't, so, you'll have to go from there to arrive at my tangential theory that pop art by any other name is garbage). It's pretty obvious that the prints were just prints and that if it weren't for Edie Sedgewick's Mother and her friends, Andy Warhol would have died an obscure and unlamented asshole.
Instead of just an unlamented asshole.
Still, "Factory Girl" is worth renting just to see the unbelievably unbelievable portrayal of Bob Dylan as something less than a pretentious asshole, himself. That the actor seems to be channelling a million Elvis impersonators to play Bob Dylan simply adds to the overall "acting tour de farce" quality of the movie. But maybe I'm getting old because the scene where he pushes his motorbike into the lake to prove to Edie that he's not like her, that material wealth doesn't mean anything to him, that channelling his talent into achieving social justice is what life's all about for him, well, I turned to my viewing companion to opine, "Yabbut, he can just go buy a new one, so all it proves is that he's a spendthrift."
I dunno. Either they aren't making movies like they used to, or people's lives are getting more banal with every Hollywood treatment. Which is to say, specifically, that the only reason there's a movie about Edie Sedgewick, apparently, is because Andy Warhol was so jealous of her fleeting relationship with Bob Dylan (who totally shows him up to be a desperate wannabe loser freak) that he cast her out, thereby killing her quickly, rather than slowly.
NOT that Bob Dylan doesn't have a hand in her death by dumping her right after they have sex. "How does it feel?" indeed.
Murderous pricks.
Okay. I was tagged by this maniac: RaymakerMakesHay and responded thusly: TrueLies and am now passing the tagged torch to: YankeeGrrl and PicturesGuy and Harpy and HotTalk
So, I got to thinking during "The Last King of Scotland", what is it about us in the West that we assume the role of saviour when the evidence of our effects on the planet is so much to the contrary?
I mean, in "Blood Diamonds" we're responsible for the murders of thousands of people due to our lust for diamonds and in "Last King" we're responsible for the health and well being of Idi Amin, while HE kills thousands of people.
But why did we ever think Africa needed us to send over our doctors, anyway? Surely Africa has always had its own healthcare practitioners (including doctors with a lot more experience in the field than anybody from this part of the world would have) who are better able to treat their fellow Africans - whether it's by our standards or not. I mean, it's not like we don't have such enormous fallout from our own drug-centric way of practicing medicine in the West that we shouldn't be concentrating all our efforts on mitigating them, instead of proselytising throughout the world about our fabulous "new" way of practicing medicine.
Anyway, it struck me that I've just accepted as a good thing that we spread our medical ways throughout the world and now I realize that assumption was just based on the usual propaganda about how much better'n everybody else we are at doing things.
Of course, I could just stop watching Hollywood movies about how heroic we are even when we're cads and rogues and how we're so good now at getting the word out about what's REALLY going on that it redeems us for continuing to inflict our way of life on other countries not our own.
None of which would be quite so gross if Hollywood didn't have an over the top awards ceremony every year to celebrate its movies that's so sickeningly self-congratulatory it defies all logic, especially since it's chock-a-block with Harry Winston diamonds being worn by starving actresses who show up wearing less and less every year while their male counterparts pack it on and move into the man's world of directing and producing.
Gee, I just thought of something else - no wonder Black Americans are so pissed off. They don't even get to star in Hollywood movies about Africa. Even if they're playing Idi Amin, they're second fiddle to the role of the white doctor - even when they get the Oscar for Best Actor.
Is it just me or does everybody kind of feel like a running dog capitalist pig every time there's a recall of Chinese products because they are coated in lead paint that we know isn't good for our kids' health, but which we also know can't be good for Chinese kids' health, either?
I mean, shouldn't we be just a tad concerned, too, about the millions and millions and millions of Chinese kids who are stuck with no alternative but to play with toys coated in lead paint, and who seemingly have no one looking out for their health interests (assuming they aren't working in factories making the toys and being exposed to lead paint fumes all day, anyway)?
Or is there a special NO LEAD PAINT factory where the Chinese toys for Chinese kids are made by well paid Chinese adult workers with good benefits and working conditions?
I couldn't help but notice this story today on Bourque:
I Am Man, Hear Me Snore - I mean, Roar
Now, good for him for having his way via Advertising Standards Canada with RONA (although from the Bourque headline, I thought Rona Ambrose was back in the news: Okay, She Sucks - But There's No Need For Violence) but like, does that mean women don't start gyrating "Bowchickawowwow" around guys wearing Axe?
And sexy young girls don't really hang around in cheerleader uniforms serving middle-aged men beer??
And that Patrick's mom can hear him herself and doesn't need his Dad to tell her, "It's Patrick. And he's calling about life insurance."???
Well, thank Gawd Peter Regan started the ball rolling and got that RONA ad what's offensive to men off the air.
Okay. I'm going to try and top Raymaker's list below:
RaymakerLiesHere
1) My father was a good and decent lawyer. To prove it - he died young.
2) I trained for "Cycle Canada 76" but my Mom wouldn't let me go because there were going to be men on the trip so I went on a French Immersion where I almost lost my virginity - twice! By accident, too! Those French guys have a different word for everything!
3) I suffer from an absurd fear of penury.
4) I once wrote a letter for a politician, let's call him... "NormaBob Rae", that he scribbled corrections all over so I reprinted my original version and used the signing machine. Okay, "once" is an estimate. But "a million times" would be an exaggeration.
5) My first concert was Gordon Lightfoot at Memorial Gardens in Sault Ste. Marie and he farted into the microphone so the audience could hear what a folk singer farting into a microphone sounded like.
6) Al Purdy kissed me on the cheek and wished me a safe journey home.
7) My photograph won a fellow student a photography award at U of T. The same photograph graced the walls of Malcolm's in Yorkville (hair salon) for several months because he was dating a hairdresser there - even though I'd got the cut at Sassoon's.
8) I coined the expression "roodiscroorama". It's what I do best. Coin expressions.
We watched "Iraq in Fragments" last night. Geez. Louise. I sure hope the American invasion of Iraq IS all about oil, because, man - it's pretty clear from this documentary, anyway, that the Iraqi people aren't exactly digging their Yankee Emancipators.
In fact, the word most often used in connection with Americans is "Oppressors".
After a while, I actually got kind of tired of the back and forth from the old guys in the cafes calling Americans "Oppressors" and the young guys in the mosques calling them "Blasphemers".
Yikes! I mean, there's the kind of fear that allows for Patriot Acts and Homeland Security Departments and Yellow Alerts, and then there's the kind that checks all reason at the entrance to the mosque and gives itself over to religious fascism.
Meanwhile, the sane guys are caught being sane, pointing out that Iraqis are choosing to go from the fascism of Saddam Hussein (as the old guys in the cafes repeatedly lament "propped up by the Americans for 35 years") to the fascism of the Imams - and being punished for their honesty in wanting something different, something new, something... well... sane.
Like maybe - Democracy.
But while watching the documentary, I realized that what's eerie to me about talk of "stability" in the region by politicians over here in LaLaLand (which is what our real estate agent referred to Ottawa as when we first moved here a dozen years ago, "Welcome to LaLaLand" - I'm referring here, however, to the West) is that "stability" to us usually results in fascism "for them".
And the guys caught by the religious fanatics selling alcohol in the marketplace are left to shout in the wind about Democracy. Certainly "Iraq in Fragments" doesn't hold out much hope for a revolution in democracy any time soon. The locals just seem to want the trains to run on time, at this point - even if they have to spend all their free time praising Allah and cursing their American oppressors.
I dunno. Don't watch "Iraq in Fragments" if you want to believe the world is any safer now'n it was before, is all I'm sayin'.
Women, by the way, are pretty nowhere in "Iraq in Fragments" - just like they are in Hollywood movies. Not that it's either here or there, anyway, I suppose.
So I was going on to a long suffering friend the other day (when I refer to a friend it's always the same friend, by the way - when I refer to another friend, it's my other friend) about all my Internet enemies and I said, "It's a gas. I've never had enemies before."
Then, just as I'd closed my mouth and stopped talking for that nano second that I did, I opened it again and said, "Oh... wait a minute - I've ALWAYS had enemies!" And proceeded to tell him about this guy who physically attacked me at a party when I was at University. I had no idea what was going on but apparently he'd developed a real hate on for me from another time at another party when I was going on about something he had disagreed with (if I told you it was The Bay City Rollers - would you believe me? - I mean, bear in mind, it WAS university in the early 80s) and had been nursing a grudge ever since.
Anyway, I'm about 110 pounds, 5'5" - just as I was then - and he was a former champion amateur boxer and about, oh... let's say... way bigger. He had me on the floor and was about to knock me unconscious when a guy who is now a famous actor (he plays villains and rogues) and who weighed about as much as me but was several inches taller, hauled him off. This other guy (who came out of the closet a year later - one of the bravest things I'd ever witnessed in all my years of University - 4) actually managed to push him against a wall so I could run before he got punched in the face.
The rest of the macho crew at the party stood back and did nothing - I still have all their names committed to memory - "Sooey's List", I call it. (Just kidding - I'm not even sure now if I just dreamed all this or read it in an Alice Munro book of short stories. Did I? Let me know if you've heard it or read before - 'kay? I don't want to look like a nut on the Internet.)
Whatever, it was all very dramatic and if I told you the University covered it up just like it covered up the rape of a 15 year old girl the year before by a similar angry psycho - would you believe me?
Anyway, I survived (the University had him come to my room - alone, late one night - to apologize, so I forgave him quickly and then yelled for help, whereafter the other girls on my floor chased him out of our residence) even scoring a job a couple of months later so I could stay in Toronto for the summer.
The bad news was that it was at The Danish Food Centre.
Now, not only was I totally unqualified to serve people lunch, but I had to wear a majorly dorky uniform to do it in - complete with red and white checkered cap and apron over a white nurse Bertha type uniform and white nurse Bertha like shoes.
So, one day, this friend of mine comes in (uh... not the friend I usually refer to - a long lost friend who could play classical music by ear and who could eat anything and keep an hourglass 36-24-36 figure which she hated because she wanted to be thin - not perfect) and says, "Holy Shit! You look like a complete dork in that uniform! You've gotta quit!' And I was like, "I can't quit, I can't even do THIS job. How the hell am I gonna get another one?" But she insisted, "What if one of your enemies came in and saw you in that outfit? What if, you know, "Psycho Pete" came in right now and ordered a pickled herring pastry?"
"Omigawd", I said. "You're absolutely right. I can't be seen in this outfit by Psycho Pete." And I quit the next day. Luckily, even though it was the early 80s, I got a totally cool job as a courier working for one of the big stock brokers downtown and was still able to stay in Toronto for the summer. (At that age, I would do almost anything not to have to go home to the Sault for the summer. I even tried checking out a couple of strip joints - although I couldn't get in without a male escort and the only males I knew were my enemies, so... yeah... I considered myself pretty super lucky to get the courier job).
And I've had plenty more enemies since then - all men. So I asked my friend (the usual one) why I had these enemies. I said, "Why did that guy hate me so much? Why did I have those male enemies?" (I'd told him about a couple of others that I won't bore YOU with, Dear Reader).
Well, would you believe me if I told you he said, and he chuckled (sort of heheh-like), "Because you wouldn't fuck 'em."
I dunno. Want the answer to a question about men? Ask a man.
(By the way, that boxer guy who was a big deal at University went on to become a lawyer. A while after that there was some funny business in the Crown Attorney's office in Hamilton. A while later, a woman sued over a Law Society Bachelor Auction because it turned out the bachelor she'd won was up on attempted murder charges - of his girlfriend. Later still, there was a conviction and time served. Finally. Some people, eh?)
Why do men crank the air conditioning to freezing on a really hot day? Is it a power over nature thing? Or are they just stupid? I mean, what's comfortable about freezing your balls off INSIDE, just because it's rubber meltingly hot OUTSIDE?
Why don't men, on a really hot day, turn DOWN the air conditioning to just a bit cool? Or even, slightly warm? Instead of tongue rippingly popsicle cold?
That online "Beaver" poll got me thinking the other day. Dr. Henry Morgentaler was #3 on the list (of Worst Canadians) because (surprise, surprise) a bunch of numbnutters spent their day voting in the poll instead of blogging about how great the War on Terror is.
Let'sThrowStonesAtTrudeau'sGrave - Again
Anyway, in contrast to the numbnutters mentioned above, I consider Morgentaler a Canadian hero and a truly brave person.
St.Henry of Abortions
I'm such a fan, I would have had him #1 on that CBC online poll what put Tommy Douglas in top spot for Best Canadian, but there you go - abortionists are a hard sell. (You'd think not as hard a sell as some pencil-necked four-eyes from the Prairies, but that's Cyber Canadians for you, I guess.) Even these days, which seem more like the middle ages the further one ventures out into cyber space, to tell you another scary truth (for normal people - a field day of blogging anti-ideas for the rest of us, or is that anti-blogging ideas), abortionists are a hard sell.
So, as I say, I got to thinking about abortion and Dr. Morgentaler and it dawned on me - people who say they care about the unborn are lying. They don't care about the unborn. It simply isn't believable. What they care about is restricting the rights of women and harassing atheists (which is another thing I admire about Dr. Morgentaler - his unrepentent atheism - probably because I'm more the impressionable suggestive type and if someone says, "I saw Jesus' face in my Fruit Loops this morning", I buy Cheerios just to make sure I'm not scared shitless by Jesus' face staring up at me from my cereal bowl, taking great comfort as I do from a religious friend's advice that, "Gawd only gives you what you can handle", but not wanting to tempt fate, either).
Just kidding. I'm so humanist nowadays that when another friend started talking about the point at which math meets physics, my brain almost exploded with joy over the divine beauty of reality, what we know, the here and now, the present (as in, presence) of life.
And I'm not just all woman, I'm left-handed, too! AND my Mom never switched me to my other side when I was in my crib - so that whole one side of my brain got squashed while the other side, the communicating side, started telepathizing with strangers just to have someone to transmit all my artsy ideas to before they were crowded out by more artsy ideas. So for me to find joy in science is proof positive that Gawd is a figment of some pretty fired up imaginations.
I mean, look - I care about a lot of people, actual living people, but I can't honestly say I care about, say... large numbers of people I don't know. (Which is what Charles Templeton once said about Christian love - he said, "It's not possible to love everybody. It's an untruth. The best we can do is care about one another".)
It's like that for me with the unborn. I've only got so much caring to go around and the unborn just don't make the cut-off. Heck, Africa doesn't even make the cut-off anymore. I suppose to some that makes me an evil monster (i.e. lefty feminist), but so be it. I'm really only being honest. My caring only goes as far as the woman I know or know of or maybe even read about in the newspaper. It just doesn't reach out as far as the unborn. And I don't believe anti-choicers are any different than me (except that they're batshit crazy liars, of course). They don't really care about the unborn at all. They can't possibly. They just care passionately about restricting women's rights and making it look like they care about the unborn in case their Gawd is watching and keeping score of their willingness to sacrifice any appearance of sanity for the sake of religion.
And that's all I have to say "these days" about abortion, Dear Reader. Nope. Don't bother arguing with me. There's no point. I just don't care about the unborn.
The other night I picked up a movie called "Breach" because I'm a fan of the leading man - Chris Cooper. Normally, of course, he does what people know as "character roles" (a term I believe I coined when I was a child) because he's got one of those faces that just looks beaten/resigned/irked and slightly menacing. Always with the menacing looks that Chris Cooper is. Like he'd just as soon kill everybody in the room and then himself as pass around the hors d'oeuves.
Anyway, "Breach" turned out to be about Robert Hanssen, the FBI agent who was caught after spying for the Russians for years - even though his last name has that "double s" common to all double agents.
Hello? FBI? Anybody home?
That'sTwoSSes
As far as movies go, it pretty much blows. The young agent isn't Matt Damon, who is supposed to play the young agent in these movies, but instead is that actor named Ryan Witherspoon who recently left Reese because her career is so much hotter'n his and he JUST COULDN'T TAKE IT! In the movie, he is so flummoxed and confounded by his bitter and paranoid boss that it's hard not to keep shouting at the screen, "He's spying for the Russians! He's spying for the Russians!"
Meanwhile, young numbnuts has the ubiquitous movie girlfriend back at the apartment who is always there waiting for him to come in from the cold and act all whiny and squishy-faced so she can stare tearfully back at him and ask, "What's happening to you?" At one point they entertain the boss and his wife - both devout whackos - and later she's like, shocked, that such a wingnutty weirdo would be a big wig at the FBI.
Uh. Yeah. Because normal FBI-ers parade around in women's clothing after hours - riiiiiight, young agent's girlfriend?
The movie ends with Chris Cooper getting caught (the make-up department deserves a Raspberry for its work in "Breached", by the way) and asking the young guy to, "Pray for me". Which he clearly didn't because he got 30 years in the slammer, 23 hours a day to be spent in solitary confinement.
Yeah. That's right. Welcome to America, Comrade. I mean, Geez Louise, I read that final bit (it's just before the movie credits) and almost threw up with the anxiety of thinking about this guy spending 23 hours/day for the next 30 years in solitary confinement. Why the hell would a so-called civilized country isolate ANYBODY for 23 hours/day? Why? What kind of demented, twisted reason could there possibly be for condemning someone to 30 years in prison and solitary confinement for 23 hours/day?
Gawd. Fuckin' whackjobs.
By the way, the wife of Chris Cooper in the movie doesn't know it but he's been making pornos of the two of them having sex together. So she's in the movie, not just as the devouted religious wife, but also as the internet rough sex lady. The girlfriend I've already described. But there's another woman in the movie (which is otherwise pretty much homo central). The boss of the young agent, the woman who has sent him to spy on the rogue spy, is played by Laura Linney. She doesn't have much of a part but her sign off number is a doozy. When the young agent comes into her office at the end to say he's leaving, he's out, he's gone - she just smiles that bitter sad smile of the barren, yet golden handcuffed, her dried up womb a testament to the tough, but losing, choice she made to claw her way up the FBI ladder only to find that the men at the top all have wives and families or are spying for the Russians.
So yeah. I don't know where people get the idea that Hollywood is wild and crazy with liberalism. Because it isn't. The more I thought about it, the more I realized how women are so nowhere in the movies, always playing the supportive girlfriend, wife, mother - that I really wanted to rip up my movie rentals card. I mean, really. It's such a turnoff, all these blinking girlfriends and sterile bosses. Do you suppose all the scripts are by women haters?
I do.
The other movie we saw was "Shortbus". I liked it:
FornicatingAlert!FornicatingAlert!FornicatingAlert!
And I thought Sook-Yin Lee was pretty cool. I mean, THAT'S brave - masturbating on camera for... thousands? of viewers. Nevermind beautiful actresses who wear ugly make-up to play serial killers - Sook-Yin Lee takes the Bravery in Acting Award for 2006.
Next up was Debbie Melnyk's and Rick Caine's movie about Michael Moore "Manufacturing Dissent":
I Would Have Called It "Michael and Me"
I thought it was really good. I'm a fan of the duo (they did "Citizen Black" and "The Frank Truth") and they didn't disappoint with this "manipumentary" of Michael Moore - as I had worried they might in an earlier SooeySays:
CouldYouBlogMoreAboutRick&Debbie,Sooey?
And I say "manipumentary" in the most complimentary of ways because, although Ms. Melnyk claims to have set out to make a documentary and get an interview with Michael Moore, it's pretty obvious to me - even from her own movie which she must have edited - that she wasn't REALLY trying to get an interview with Michael Moore at all. She was, in fact, doing to Michael Moore, exactly what Michael Moore did to Roger Smith. Except instead of leaving the interview on the cutting room floor, she made sure she didn't get one at all. I mean, see for yourself. I'm not a REAL journalist, but even I would be pushier'n Ms. Melnyk is in the movie when she lamely asks/says, "I'd like to do a real sit down interview?" and pretty much leaves it up to Michael Moore to say, "Uh... no?" in various ways on several occasions.
Still, the movie reveals him to be just the person most of us figured he was - that super obnoxious smart alecky student shitdisturber all grown up and playing in the big leagues, not really to his surprise, but very much to the surprise of anybody who knew him back when. But it also shows up all his opponents as... well... kind of jealous. There's really only one guy in the movie who sums him up in that generous, open-minded way that I would, "Yeah, he's an asshole. So?"
But that's the thing about Michael Moore. Whatever shifty bullshit he gets up to, he also takes on the U.S. establishment and really makes a mockery of it - like nobody else does, because most anybody else who can - won't. It takes a big set of balls, if you ask me to go up against Bush Inc. - and even bigger set to do it at a time when Patriot Acts and Yellow Alerts are the order of the day. And the real kicker is that he explains his passionate crusade so simply, "I'm an American".
And he is. He's also the American success story. And we all know how Americans REALLY feel about American success stories.
So rent, "Manufacturing Dissent". It's fun and whether you're left or right (and the makers of the manipumentary lean to the left, I'd say) you'll be entertained. The incidental footage of the political scenes that surround the attempts by Ms. Melnyk to interview Michael Moore is very compelling stuff - it really adds up. Some lefties might be mad (the video store guy was, "I don't give a shit how he does it - just that he does it!") but I wasn't. I like it when fancy pantzes are exposed by other fancy pantzes - especially when they can take it. (And some might argue here that Michael Moore CAN'T take it, but I'd argue otherwise. I think he knows he's a huckster - you can hear it in his voice when he says, "It's a mooooovie!")
Yes indeed. Always be there to cheer on somebody else taking down the guy who makes it to the top, I say. No matter your politics, the bigger they come, the harder they fall, and it's important to take time out to laugh at them as they pick themselves up, brush themselves off, and go make another manipumentary.
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