[Previous entry: "Children Use Their Fingers Instead Of Words"] [Next entry: "Prease Fuck My Yellow Vagina: The Book"]
12/12/2005: "Unrepentant"
While there are plenty of benefits to living in a Capitalist society (the
pure Schadenfreude of seeing a former celebrity turn up in a late night
infomercial, women who'll make out with each other for Jell-O Shooters,
betting on Orphan Fights, etc), the major drawback is that, as Capitalism
evolves into a religion (at least here in America), society's wealthy
become its Saints and its poor become its Sinners. Think I'm being overly
dramatic? OK then, Mr. I-Was-In-The-Honors-Program, who got the bigger tax
cuts last year: the folks in New Orleans who, following Hurricane Katrina,
were standing on their roofs waiving their hand-me-down underwear in a sad
attempt to attract the attention of passing helicopters *, or the people
who watched the drama unfold on their high definition flat-screen TV's
from the comfort of their McMansions?
Sweet Beggar-Kicking Jesus, I'm starting to sound like one of those crazy
old hippies who show up at a Green party meetings, eats all the snacks,
and then launch into an epic tirade about how Dick Cheney is fixing the
prices in the bulk food section of the supermarket. Well, just because
something sounds insane doesn't necessarily mean that it isn't correct.
I'm sure, in retrospect, all of those people in Daly Plaza who were
pointing in the direction of the grassy knoll must've looked a little
silly to some of the other bystanders, but I feel confident that, if they
were alive today, they'd be saying "See? I told you so."
Anyhoo, never is this divide between "Haves", "Have Nots", and "Have: But
What I Have Is A Huge Pile Of Debts" more visible than at Christmas Time.
[Shit Luther, even the people who do have enough money to buy presents (or
maxed out their credit cards in order to do so) run a better-than-average
chance of hearing "I hate you! You've ruined Christmas!" because they
didn't make it perfectly clear to Santa that little Billy wanted an Xbox
and not a PS2] I'll spare you the sermon about the irony of this disparity
being highlighted during the celebration of the birth of a man who, by all
accounts, didn't have two shekels to rub together and whose advice to his
fellow poor consisted partially of "If you bums can't afford to buy a
sword, sell your frickin' clothes, ya' morons.". Instead, I'd like to
focus on me, or, more specifically, the things I would've purchased for
myself for Christmas, if I only had the cash. Please note: this is
not a pathetic to get one or two of you to buy me these things.
Not that I'm above that sort of thing, it's just that I'm well aware that
the only people with less money than me are my readers.
The List:
National Geographic DNA Test: This would come in extremely handy
for finally answering those nagging questions which have plagued my family
for years as to our ethnic origins (while, perhaps helping to explain the
fate of the Neanderthal). Cost $100
The God Who Wasn't There: Even two years after its release, well
meaning Christians still try to get me to watch Mel Gibson's Law & Order: The Passion of the Christ; somehow thinking that spending
Jew Patrol
three hours watching some Hippy get his ass kicked (he should've followed
his own advice and bought that sword) is going to make me suddenly drop to
my knees and denounce the rational part of my brain. If I owned a copy of
this documentary, I could say "OK; first we'll watch your movie, then
we'll watch mine. Cost $24.95
Allllllllllrighty, that's all your friend and humble narrator wants for
Xmas. Let me just break out my calculator and see what that comes to. Got
it, roughly $125.
Now, at this point, you're probably thinking "Sweet, starving Jesus in a
bread line, you can't be that poor. If you don't have the cash, why not
just put those things on your credit card?"
First of all, yes, I am that poor: we all are, in the sense that we
continuously spend money that could be going towards our bills on crap
that we don't really need.
The difference between most poor people and me is that I am what I like
to call "unrepentantly poor". In other words: unless something is an
absolute necessity, or unless I can get it second hand (which, in the case
of the DNA kit, would not only be impractical but pretty fuckin'
disgusting), I don't want it. It's not that I'm cheap; it's just that, if
society is so determined to canonize the likes of Donald Trump and Paris
Hilton, then I'd rather be a Heretic.
Lord Byron once claimed the title of "England's Greatest Sinner". Well,
whoopy-fuckin-doo. If you consider the times in which he lived, that was
really no great accomplishment: especially when you take into account the
fact that England's Second Greatest Sinner, one Dr. Tertius Lydgate of
Middlemarch, earned his title by "having once gotten a good, long look at
a woman's bare ankle. In the ballpark of sin, Lord Byron was a Minor
Leaguer.
With my unrepentant poverty and my refusal to play by Society's consume
'til you puke rules, I'm hoping to one day nab the title of "America's
Greatest Sinner".
This would be a good time to remind all of you that Saturnalia begins
this Saturday, December 17th. Io Saturnalia!
* Remember all those reports about New Orleans' poor firing on Nation
Guard helicopters? Did you know that there was only one actual incident
of a helicopter being fired upon, and that was by a twenty-year-old
man with a history of mental illness?
