Freedom of speech is one of the cornerstones of a just and open society. Everyone is entitled to his or her opinion, but that does not mean that all opinions are equally valid, nor does it place any obligation on me to listen. Decades of bitter experience have caused my subconscious mind to install a cognitive kill switch. It is triggered by certain words, phrases, or sentences that when encountered cause my attention to disengage.
When dealing with written material, it's a simple enough matter to stop reading and move onto something else. In conversational environments, notions of tact and decorum make things a wee bit trickier. In situations where I can't just tell the other party to fuck off and be done with it, my body slips into a automatic routine of glassy-eyed stares and occasional nods while my consciousness scrolls a mental slide-show of Mamie Van Doren, Tuesday Weld, and Ann-Margret pinup shots set to the following tune:
Laurie Johnson - Shopping Spree (from Music for TV Dinners, 1997)
The mind is a wonderful and mysterious thing.
Here is a representative sample of some of the trigger phrases guaranteed to land someone on my "please disregard" list:
- "America needs a flat tax."
- "Um, actually..." (It doesn't matter if the pedantic infodump that follows those words reveals the location of a cache of unmarked twenty-dollar bills, the cure for cancer, or a meticulous chronology of Phantom Girl's appearances; once that introductory phrase is uttered, my mental firewall kicks in at full force.)
- "I'm a big fan of Dane Cook."
- "I'm a big fan of Chuck Klosterman."
- "I'm a big fan of Ayn Rand."
- "I'm a big fan of Orson Scott Card."
- "It contradicts my fan-fiction." (Or any statement evoking fan-fiction as something other than a curious hobby.)
- "My psychic told me..."
- "Fight Club is my favorite novel."
- "I pay his/her/their/your salary." (When spoken by an end user, not by the actual employer)
- "...then we'd all be speaking German/Russian/Japanese."
- "Steampunk" (Used seriously in any context outside genre fiction.)
- "...according to Rush Limbaugh/Bill O'Reilly/Michelle Malkin/Ann Coulter/Michael Savage." (As a serious citation, not a negative example.)
- emoticons, IM-speak, or l33t used unironically in ratios greater than one to one thousand words of coherent English
- "Future generations will appreciate Kenny Loggins's immense contributions to rock music."
Hüsker Dü - Never Talking to You Again (from Zen Arcade, 1984) - The sound that spawned a host of inferior imitations.
Bananarama and Fun Boy Three - He Was Really Sayin' Somethin' (from Deep Sea Skiving, 1983) - I wouldn't go so far as to call this the whitest cover of Motown song ever, but it's definitely up there in the top ten percent of its class.
Saturday, May 24, 2008
tired of wasting all my time
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7 comments:
Chaykin followed up by a Husker Du song? Good times indeed.
I know this was the last post but what has always struck me as odd about Chaykin is how much folks love his work but then claim to have not read American Flagg! I think I might need to dig out my long boxes and go over the series again.
I can see why you'd dislike Rand and Card, but I'd be curious to know why you dislike Mr. Klosterman.
"it's up there in the top ten percent of its class". Damn that's horribly clever.
David: I don't so much have a problem with the man, though I think he's started to believe his own hype and overestimate his importance. It's the fans who treat him as a prophet that bug me.
YES!!!!
Let the Chuck Klosterman/Dane Cook/Fight Club backlash begin!!!!!
You know, you say that BA, and we all laugh. But it isn't until you're a planetarium director that you realize Laser Kenny Loggins really IS a good idea...
hi andrew,
in the late '60s, early 70's, i was involved in comics fandom in south florida which led me to g. b. love and the RB-CC (Rocket's Blast-ComiCollector), his fandom adzine. g. b. was a huge huge captain marvel fan and someone whom gave don newton great and well deserved exposure. if it hadn't been for g. b. i wouldn't have been exposed to captain marvel and c. c. beck's wonderful work.
i just wanted to comment about c. c.'s brushwork. it's hard to tell from his printed work and especially from scans of those that he had a marvelous stroke. really beautiful. one would have to see an original of his to fully appreciate it.
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