LeBron Kong?

LeBron James walks into a bar with a parrot on his shoulder. The bartender looks up from cleaning mugs and says, "Wow, where'd you get that thing?"

The parrot squawks, "From the cover of Vogue, they're everywhere."

A lot is being made of LeBron James on the cover of Vogue. He poses in mid-dribble, growling, and clinging to Brazilian supermodel Gisele Bundchen like... well, like she's a Brazilian supermodel. To some, it's racially insensitive. But why?

There are two claims that the cover is racially insensitive. The first charge is that it perpetuates the stereotype of the violent, angry, black man. The second charge is that the cover is overtly racist, portraying James as King Kong, or a gorilla, holding onto his captive white woman.

When dealing with perceptions, there really is no right or wrong. But it is useful to examine why people see what they do, and why it is different from what someone else sees. For instance, if looking at that picture, you see a black man posing as a gorilla, who is applying the stereotype? Does the photo have anything in it that a reasonable person would associate with primates? There are no bananas, no jungle in the background, and no swings hanging from the air. So what in your brain made you associate gorilla with LeBron James? Is that Vogue's racism at work? Leibovitz's? Lebron's? Or yours?

It reminds me of when Star Wars: The Phantom Menace was released. Some people were upset that a few of the aliens (non-humans)appeared to be stereotypes for Japanese and Jews. Mind you, these were aliens (non-humans) with bug eyes, wings, etc. So how could they represent stereotypes of human ethnic groups? "Well, that one sounds Jewish and he's greedy." So because it sounded the way some viewers percieved a Jew to sound, and acted in a way some viewers percieved a Jew to act, they saw a Jew. Nevermind that the movie took place in a time long, long ago and a place far, far away where there were no Jews.

But instead of recognizing their own racists perceptions, they blamed George Lucas for what they saw. George Lucas has done a lot to harm the world with those last three movies, but I don't think you can blame him for spreading racism or antisemitism across the galaxy. Nor can you blame Leibovitz, James, or Vogue for it. If looking at that cover you see a chest-pounding gorilla ready to rape-- and not one of our most gifted and competitive athletes holding onto a sexy woman, then maybe there is something wrong with your perception...

LeBron James walks into a bar with a parrot on his shoulder. The bartender looks up from cleaning mugs and says, "Wow, where'd you get that thing?"

"From Africa," James says. "They're everywhere."

Click Here To Read More On "LeBron Kong?"!

In Times of Crisis, Thumbs Make Tasty and Nutritious Treat

Stranded in the frozen wastes of North Dakota, on a frigid February morning, Michael Strenclaw thought his last days were here. At the tail end of a fourteen hour bread delivery trip, Michael's truck hit a patch of black iceand spun into a station wagon, killing the family of six inside. Michael's vehicle flew off the road and was engulfed in a snow drift. The snowy tomb prevented any doors from being opened, and obscured all signs of the vehicle. Lost, hypothermic, snow blind and starving Michael knew that his only hope of survival was to consume as much food as he could to generate body heat. But what do you do when your own body is the only food available?

"At first it was hard," Michael says. "But I just thought about those people dead on the street. I saw a kid in the front seat. He was probably 8. He'd probably taste ok." And with that image in his mind, Michael set out to save himself, by eating himself. Creating tiny tourniquets around his thumbs, Michael deadened all sensation to them by cutting off circulation. Every five minutes he would take a test nibble until finally there was no pain. But just because there was no pain, doesn't mean there was no flavor.

"Oh, my god! They were delicious!" Michael claims. "Seriously, I didn't have to put anyting on them at all. I just bit into them. At that point, because of the cold and lack of blood, they were pretty firm, so it was like biting into an apple. Only a meat apple." Three days later, rescuers discovered tracks leading to a large snow drift. There they found Michael on a bed of wonderbread loaves, chewing away on his right big toe.

How could Michael survive so long on so little flesh, and his own flesh at that? The thumbs are believed to be ultra-dense fat repositories. Despite their size, thumbs can contain up to 80% of a body's caloric reserve. This is why many diets and exercise plans fail, as thumb fat is the hardest to lose.

Even though Michael crippled himself to survive, he is thankful to be alive. He gives credit to the family he murdered on the road for saving his life. Had it not been for their mangled remains, he doubts he could have summoned the appetite to autocannibalize himself.

Click Here To Read More On "In Times of Crisis, Thumbs Make Tasty and Nutritious Treat"!

George Bush is the Smartest Man on the Planet?

Last week General Patreus gave congress a sobering report about the state of the war in Iraq. Not only has the Iraqi government failed at nearly every task in securing itself, but the General could not say if the war made America safer, the sole purpose for the military to be engaged in any conflict. A common theme used by the White House, and echoed by the General, was that if we leave Iraq now, as is, Iran will step in and fill the void. Each week we've been fed more reports about Iran. They are building a nuclear weapon. They are supplying Iraqi insurgents with weapons to kill Americans. And they are possibly working with Al Qaeda in Afghanistan. It would seem that, rather than defending the war in Iraq, the White House is laying grounds for another war with Iran. They have all but declared the Iranian army a terrorist organization. And each time Iraq or Afghanistan is mentioned, Iran is quickly inserted into the conversation. It would seem the White House is bungling itself into another conflict in a tense region, with an overly-stressed military, and an unsupporting electorate. But what George Bush has really been doing is the culmination of a 4 year plan to sucker the French into a war with Iran.

It started in 2003 when America invaded Iraq without UN (French) approval. They were insulted. Called us war mongers. We countered with freedom fries. After the invasion, the French asked to be a part of the rebuilding process. We told them to fuck off, then completely dismantled the Iraqi Army, Police Force, and national government. The American image was tarnished, we were seen as incompetent, imperialist bullies, but the French were emasculated.

The second part of the plan was to bolster Iran. A lot of saber rattling from the US gave Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad the attention he needed to seem a threat. And exercising diplomacy instead of carpet bombing showed the world that this is a threat America was not prepared to take on. This opens the door for the French. They've been humiliated and ignored by the President. They've had thousands of years being the rude, arrogant assholes of the world, and now the Yankees come in and kick them to the curb. Well, they're not going to take it anymore. If America is too cowardly to take on Iran, the French will show them how it's done.

That's the plan, and it seems to be working. Sunday, French Foreign Minister Bernard Kouchner said that the world should be prepared for war if Iran goes nuclear. However, proving that there is still at least one guy in France still without his balls, Prime Minister Francois Fillon said everything needed to be done to prepare for war.

Screw that, I say. France needs to get that war machine going. Have some pride. Go shoot someone. Because if this isn't the Bush plan, if we really are the incompetent bullies we appear to be, and George Bush really isn't the smartest man on the planet, then we're in for a lot of shit. So, please. France. Beat us to the punch. Show the world you really are a bigger bunch of assholes than we are.

Click Here To Read More On "George Bush is the Smartest Man on the Planet?"!

Promoting Your Sport

Major League Baseball's midsummer classic was on last night, and once again the National League got stomped. It sold out, but this is not any sign of its popularity, rather the number of corporate sponsors pumping dollars into what I'm afraid is a dying sport. Those aren't fans in those sits, doing the wave and eating brats. They're employees.

In an interview by Dan Patrick on ESPN Radio, MLB Commissioner Bud Selig said that baseball was more popular than ever. Somehow I doubt this is true. When talking to other sports fans and baseball is brought up, the general reaction is that baseball is about on par with golf as a spectator sport, and just above bowling for athletic ability. It saddens me that our National Past-Time, even when injected with performance enhancing drugs and amphetamines, barely rates a yawn from today's sports fans.

To be sure, baseball has its fans. What it doesn't have, which other sports (football in particular) have, are the non-fans bullied in to following a sport they're too afraid to admit they don't like. I'm talking about the guy who goes to work Monday morning and isn't talking about Sunday's games. "Dude, you didn't see the Raiders game yesterday?" No, he was busy painting his war game miniatures and watching the Stargate marathon he Tivoed from the night before. To some, this might seem a reasonable way to enjoy a Sunday afternoon. To a football fan, this guy is a fag. "What are you, queer?" He might be, but the insinuation isn't that there is something wrong with being queer, but that there is definitely something wrong with not watching football. And so each week this guy feels compelled to follow a sport that has been out of his life since high school; a time when bullying and football were most likely synonymous. Everntually, his web browser's anime and manga bookmarks are slowly replaced by fantasy football sites. The half naked woman with the cool sword and dragon he had as his desktop background is gone; in its place is the logo of the team he's pretty sure he's supposed to follow. And every Monday morning he turns down the World of Warcraft podcast he's been listening to for two years so he can eavesdrop on the guys and their talk about Sunday's game. All so he won't be a fag.

Because of this cruel bullying, this demeaning of people with different interests and hobbies, football has become the most popular sport in America. Rather than appeal to people with the precision, skill, team work, strategy and tactics football demonstrates, fans resort to name-calling, shunning, and public humiliation to convert the masses to their cause. So why can't Baseball have fags, too?

These non-fans, or fags, account for 90% of a sports popularity and revenue. Wrestling has employed the tactics of football, and look how far it's come in the past twenty years: from Saturday morning cartoon for 8 year olds, to tits and beer for white trash across the country. It's what happens when Pop Culture meets Sports. It doesn't matter if you really like something, or even if it's any good. The important thing is that you buy it and show it to everyone, so they know you've bought it. God help you if you didn't buy it. Just ask Rv. Fred Phelps, God sends fags straight to hell whether they're homosexual or not.

For baseball, the sport I love, I've experimented with this method. When I ask people if they like baseball they usually say, "Baseball? It's so boring!" And I reply, "What? Are you a fucking idiot?" It is both demeaning and legitimate. But as most people are fucking idiots, and don't really mind being called one, it has had little to no impact. I won't go the fag route, since they'd probably say "No, I watch football." So I'm going to try for "What? Are you a bitch?" I suspect basketball already has claim to that one, but if the last NBA final is any indication, they're either not using it properly or it doesn't work.

Perhaps the real reason baseball is dying isn't because we haven't bullied the fags into our sport, rather we are the fags being bullied out of ours. Our numbers are dramatically being culled by football, basketball, wrestling and their cavemen supporters. I say it's time for a change. I say their is nothing greater than a 12 to 6 curveball, or a perfectly turned 6-4-3 doubleplay. I say we fire the corporate dicks sitting in our seats, eating our brats, drinking our beer. I say we beat the cavemen at their own game, and make them all our bitches.

Click Here To Read More On "Promoting Your Sport"!

The Secret Grace

Tomorrow is the 100th birthday of John Wayne. Walmart is calling it an anniversary on their dvd displays, which I like. Birthdays are so "me, me, me". An anniversary suggests that the event is a communal one. It is an event that we all share and celebrate. I think from now on I will stop having birthdays. Instead, each year I will have an anniversay of the glorious day that I graced the world with my presence. That way, it's not just about me. It's really the worlds day. It's a day you can celebrate, too.

So in the current issue of Time (May 28, 2007) they have a little blurb about three of the Duke's movies. One in particular struck me as idiotic, and just shows how little Time thinks of John Wayne Anniversary Day. The caption they have for The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance concludes with "This is pure Duke, showing a secret grace only the audience could see." Gee, why not say "This is pure Duke, showing a secret grace only people with eyes could see." Or "This is pure Duke, showing a secret grace only people watching this movie could see. Everyone else would see trees, cars, or whatever else they might be looking at at that particular time not The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance". Maybe the writer meant "This is pure Duke, showing a secret grace only paying ticket holders could see." And if you somhow saw The Secret Grace of the Duke outside a movie theater, some Hollywood goon would break your kneecaps and steal whatever cash you had on you.

I am just trying to imagine a secret grace that anyone besides the audience could see. I picture planes crashing, cars exploding, and mayhem errupting everywhere anytime someone turns on The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance. Just as American Airlines flight 2424 begins it's acent from LAX, John Smith puts The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance into his portable dvd player, thus causing The Secret Grace of The Duke Effect. Suddenly, a rough and tough Cowboy miracullously appears in the cockpit sending the pilots into a panic and the airplane straight into the ocean.

So on John Wayne Anniversary Day let us all be thankful that this secret grace can only be seen by those watching the Duke's films. For that, I recommend True Grit, Rooster Cogburn, and The Shootist. Rooster Cogburn also stars the Secret Grace of Katherine Hepburn. The Shootist also stars the Secret Grace of Jimmy Stewart. Opie is in it, too.

Click Here To Read More On "The Secret Grace"!