I’ll admit. I’ll ‘fess up, I’ll cave, I’ll spill it all: There are days that I’m not sure if I’m the one going cuckoo, or the rest of the world. Today my bets are on the latter.
Two things spur this mildly adolescent (and trite?) rant: American Idol and Big Money. The first is simple and harmless, but a barometer of something nonetheless, though I can’t quite put my finger on it yet.
Being married has afforded me many things, and one of them that I would rather do without is TV time. If I had my druthers, the TV would serve as a host to a monthly DVD or at the most, a host vessel for two shows a month pumped in over archaic airwaves in so-so clarity. I hate television. But The Wife™ loves it. So it stays.
Because of this, I’m subject to crap on the television, radiating my way as I meander the web at night. The Wife™ watches stuff that I could care less about, included in such is American Idol. And while I have lots to say about the show, I’ll shorthand it to this: When in the hell did the American public begin to think so damned much of themselves? I mean I know we get a bad reputation around the world for that very fact, but I thought it was the collective public!? Clowns on a bike…
Every epsiode (at least during the beginning of the season?) is filled with countless numbers of chowderheads trying to sing terrible songs in wretchedly horrible keys, tones and styles. The worst part is, there is a direct correlation between the the suck-factor of the singer and the size of the ego. People who have no business singing, even to an audience of turkeys, are repeatedly, 100% convinced that they are *true* superstars, and the judges are simply wrong for thinking otherwise. Complete, utter, unabashed denial. Showcasing hour after hour of drivel, under the pretense of “discovering the next true talent,” this flippin’ show instead feeds the American Idle a steady diet of bloated egotism and blind narcissism. And we’re supposed to think it both entertaining and enviable?
I was totally unaware that the majority of (young?) people in this country were missing the critical Self Awareness gene.
Secondly, and far more frightening, is the tale of a CEO who is blatantly lobbying to extort the average home internet user. If you don’t care to read the short article, I’ll sum it up for you: CEO of AT&T thinks it’s cool to convince Verizon and other telcos to not only charge an arm and a leg for internet service, but then charge the web companies (i.e. Google) to let users access their sites. His reason? “No free ride,” and Google, etc. can simply pass the cost to the user, thus we pay twice for something that should already be a cheaper utility, all while fattening his already bloated pockets.
Apparently the Midwest breeds ignorant fools, because this type of behavior not only seems unfathomably wrong, but almost inconceivable. How one can conciously convince themselves of something so counter-intuitive, so opposite of common sense, is beyond me.
So for all the TV enthusiasts and CEOs of the world, I humbly submit my apologies. I didn’t realize that all it took to be right in action was to think that you’re right. The rest of the world can go to hell, I guess.
Therefore, I think that this post should be over. If you think otherwise, too f****ing bad. Okay?
