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I feel like I should post an entry, but I can't think of a single damn thing to say. I've whiled away the hours by surfing the Internet and reading various horrifying news articles(and what is the purpose of the Internet, if not to spring nausea-inducing news on unsuspecting surfers, usually in the guise of an "informative" link provided by fellow bloggers?). This week, the Internet has taught me that gun manufacturers make guns for children, and that children's books printed before 1985 are being pulled from library shelves for fear that someone's unattended, knuckle-dragging, chromosomally-deficient troglodyte might eat one if left to their own devices and thereby contract lead poisoning. Isn't that nice? Darwinism is once again thwarted by a merry band of hand-wringing nincompoops bent on saving the children. Now bright, inquisitive children will be deprived of one of life's earliest and most enduring pleasures so that the stupid, undisciplined hellions won't reap their just desserts when they decide that eating a book is what nature intended.
And people wonder why we're getting markedly stupider with each generation. Because the first generation of absolute morons is now in charge. And the alpha morons at the head of the table have come up with shortsighted garbage like this. If these folks had envisioned Dr. Who, his time machine would be called the RETARDIS, and the telephone booth would have a familiar blue-and-white drawing on the door. And the rider would be required to wear a helmet and carry a goddamn dribble cup.
I don't like children. They're too loud and energetic for a nervous system ill-equipped to handle sudden noises and protracted periods of bedlam, but I pity them, too, because one by one, their childhood pleasures are being confiscated by paranoid, controlling adults so frightened by the disappointments in their own lives and the terrible specter of Doing It Wrong that they're willing to exchange the possibility of happy childhood memories for the cold reality of one more miserable, plastic day. I'm glad I was a child when it was still possible to be a child and not a neurotic, overstimulated and often ignored mess looking for the monster behind every bush and lurking inside every toy or bottle of bubble bath.
I have terrible memories of my growing up, yes, but I've got good ones, too, ones I made for myself with books and and handful of empty shampoo bottles in the bathtub. I used to pretend I was mixing potions(it was all water) and test them by pouring one bottle into another and taking a swig. I never died. I never even got sick. The worst I got was a mild, soapy aftertaste. If I tried to do that now, some harpy would materialize from the medicine cabinet, have my stomach pumped, and report my mother to CPS. My imagination would certainly not have been encouraged, because activities that foster imagination--like reading(reading, for fuck's sake)and playing witch in the bathtub with empty bottles of VO5--are just too dangerous. Better that Muffy be an empty-headed but unblemished porcelain doll than a scratched, dirty Weeble who wobbles and occasionally falls but has the grit and the life experience to get up again.
Books are too dangerous because they might contain lead, but guns, which contain enough hot, lethal lead to build the careers of Charles Bronson, Clint Eastwood, and Bruce Willis, and which are absolutely dangerous to anyone, are perfectly acceptable items for children.
What's wrong with this picture? The barbarians aren't at the gate anymore. They're in the goddamned penthouse, pulling the strings and waiting for the next big boom.
And people wonder why we're getting markedly stupider with each generation. Because the first generation of absolute morons is now in charge. And the alpha morons at the head of the table have come up with shortsighted garbage like this. If these folks had envisioned Dr. Who, his time machine would be called the RETARDIS, and the telephone booth would have a familiar blue-and-white drawing on the door. And the rider would be required to wear a helmet and carry a goddamn dribble cup.
I don't like children. They're too loud and energetic for a nervous system ill-equipped to handle sudden noises and protracted periods of bedlam, but I pity them, too, because one by one, their childhood pleasures are being confiscated by paranoid, controlling adults so frightened by the disappointments in their own lives and the terrible specter of Doing It Wrong that they're willing to exchange the possibility of happy childhood memories for the cold reality of one more miserable, plastic day. I'm glad I was a child when it was still possible to be a child and not a neurotic, overstimulated and often ignored mess looking for the monster behind every bush and lurking inside every toy or bottle of bubble bath.
I have terrible memories of my growing up, yes, but I've got good ones, too, ones I made for myself with books and and handful of empty shampoo bottles in the bathtub. I used to pretend I was mixing potions(it was all water) and test them by pouring one bottle into another and taking a swig. I never died. I never even got sick. The worst I got was a mild, soapy aftertaste. If I tried to do that now, some harpy would materialize from the medicine cabinet, have my stomach pumped, and report my mother to CPS. My imagination would certainly not have been encouraged, because activities that foster imagination--like reading(reading, for fuck's sake)and playing witch in the bathtub with empty bottles of VO5--are just too dangerous. Better that Muffy be an empty-headed but unblemished porcelain doll than a scratched, dirty Weeble who wobbles and occasionally falls but has the grit and the life experience to get up again.
Books are too dangerous because they might contain lead, but guns, which contain enough hot, lethal lead to build the careers of Charles Bronson, Clint Eastwood, and Bruce Willis, and which are absolutely dangerous to anyone, are perfectly acceptable items for children.
What's wrong with this picture? The barbarians aren't at the gate anymore. They're in the goddamned penthouse, pulling the strings and waiting for the next big boom.
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