Category Archives: Missives to the Misguided

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Hello, 2010 (A Letter to My Peers)

February 6, 2010

Greetings, Besotted American Youth.

You are, as we are constantly, nauseatingly, reminded by the media, the future of this great nation. Despite all the nay-sayers, I, for one, am eagerly awaiting a future of creative spelling, efficient (non-existent) punctuation, and charmingly bereft of all but a few shreds of literacy. Im sure u wont disappint me. Bitch, pls.

That said, I do have some pressing concerns as we charge headlong into month two of this new year: first off, why did we suddenly stop talking about Michael Jackson’s death? I was just starting to get interested with the homicide trial. Secondly, we still have a SuperBowl? And people still care? Why?

In order to best express my multifarious opinions on this new year, I have condensed it into a handy What’s Hot/What’s Not guide, that you are welcome to print out and carry in your purse, glove compartment, or tucked between the pages of your bible (preferably next to the verses in Leviticus about sodomy). Lists are ALWAYS trendy.

What’s Hot in Twenty-Ten:

1. Blue people.
I mean, “Native Pandorians”. I am speaking of course, about Avatar, the movie that is currently the highest grossing movie of all time (recession, say what?). This was a visually stunning movie, and I will agree with anyone who praises it, as long as they do so with the clear caveat that the script and acting were sub-par (unnecessary explication, anyone? Anyone?). That said, people really killed themselves after watching it? Yes, I know Pandora is beautiful, and all sunshine and unicorns (well, mind-melding lizard-horses), but THERE IS SUNSHINE HERE, TOO! I understand the depth of emotion that can come after watching an unusually engaging film, but if you’re going to kill yourself because of a reaction to an artistic expression (pop-culture or otherwise), please make it a book. (WHAT? DUMBLEDORE DIES?! *STAB* *STAB* *STAB*).

2. Going green.
But trust me, it won’t be easy. “Rebuilding our infrastructure” and “sustainable energy” will be the key phrases of political and industrial sales pitches in 2010. This is actually pretty damn smart. A lot of people think that the economy runs on money, which is not true. It runs on hope and greed.

3. Adultery.
Infidelity will go out of fashion when the rich, famous, and beautiful cease to indulge in it. This will occur simultaneously with the immolation of the earth, therefore for the sake of the continuation of our species it is imperative that we encourage this. Thanks to Tiger Woods, sex mania became a household term for 2010 as waitresses and whores and business-professionals-who-look-like-porn-stars came out of the woodworks to cash in on a star’s crumbling reputation and unnecessarily humiliate his wife. The highlight of the debaucle was Brit Hume telling Tiger that he needed to convert to Christianity in order to be forgiven, because everyone knows that Christianity offers a “Get out of Hell Free” pass (I traded mine for $45 in Monopoly money). Of course, this whole mess is entirely the fault of the Christians’ unclear moral code. Christians are always railing about saving oneself for marriage, but they failed to specify WHOSE marriage.

4. JenniBradPittIston.
According to the trashy gossip rags I read, Branjelina is no more, which means that Brad will run crying to Jen, she will forgive him and take him back, and all will be right in everyone’s world, except the gossip industry, who will suddenly have to fabricate another scandal to keep us fascinated and flaccid for the next decade.

5. Whatever Apple says is hot, God dammit!
I won’t take the opportunity here to make vulgar analogies about just what Steve Jobs could sell the American people if he so chose, instead I will just say that our insatiable need for entertainment is probably a major factor in keeping our economy afloat. We may have trillions of dollars in debt and 10% unemployment, but, dammit! We HAVE to have the new iPad and cable TV! (I’m grateful for the latter - you’re all keeping me employed).

What’s Not:

1. Lady GaGa
Okay, we all hated her when she first became popular, but then it became cool to like her, because all the Indy kids hated her because she was popular (are you following me?). But now that it’s cool to like her again, we need to stop it. Got it?

2. Vampires.
I’m sure when Twilight’s Blue Moon: Rise of the Preternaturally Ageless Pedophile hits the big screen we’ll have to endure all the trauma of teenage girls swooning over whichever pasty star Hollywood dictates they must love next, but can we please all agree to loudly express our collective disgust? Ironic and self-deprecating praise of this travesty is no longer acceptable.

3. Middle-Aged Women Acting Like Teenage Girls.
This has NEVER been hot (vide: any Jane Austen novel), but it is worth re-emphasising this fact in light of the previously mentioned Twilight fanaticism. Screaming and fainting over teenage boys who have the physique of a twizzler is never laudable, and when you’re forty years old, with children older than the actors, it’s just plain creepy.

4. Secession.
I must confess, I was a willing and passionate participant of the radical libertarian-cum-conservative movement that spawned the Tea Party protests, threats of secession and revolution, and all the yelling about birth certificates that Fox News STILL gleefully covers as front page news. (I still have a Ron Paul bumper sticker on my car, for God’s sake). My political change of heart to move from supporting Republican-Libertarians to voting for our current president came when I realised that I had been allying myself with people who, if given power, would ultimately seek to destroy my freedom because (horror of horrors) I don’t worship their God. Despite the Tea-Partiers claims that they love America more than those damn liberals, if you talk to many of them, their vision is for a white, patriarchal, Christian America - we had that, it was ugly, and I want nothing of it.

5. Sarah Palin.
She’s still just as dumb as she was during the elections, but much less entertaining now. Palin is proof that little girls can grow up to be beauty queens and governors and almost-Vice-Presidents and STILL manage to set back the feminist movement about 60 years. Bitch, pls.

Happy new-ish year. I hope you’re ready for the same old shit.

Love,

Megsie

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Letter to Taylor Swift: A Plea For Basic Literacy

March 2, 2009

I have decided to do my Celebrity/Entertainment section in epistolary form addressed directly to the offending celebrity, who will, of course, never read it. I hereby dub this segment “Missives to the Misguided”. Today’s addressee is teen Pop/Country sensation, Taylor Swift, whose song “Love Story” has caused me countless seconds of grief.

Dear Miss Swift,

I recognise that American public schools are probably more concerned with reducing astronomically high drop-out rates and trying to stop adolescents from reproducing like bunnies than requiring that high school students read Shakespeare, or even, apparently, summaries of Shakespeare. That said, while our crummy education system may be to blame for your apparent failure to read the most famous work of one of the most famous authors of all time, there is no excuse for penning a song invoking the tragedy of Romeo and Juliet without even taking the time to Google the original story. If you had, perhaps you would have read the very first sentence of the Wikipedia article on Romeo and Juliet and realised that they fucking died. Maybe then you would have also realised that your little Love Story has less in common with those famous lovers than you seem to believe, and maybe, just maybe, you wouldn’t have written the song (ah, Fates, how you tease me!). This frustrating discrepancy notwithstanding, there are definitely some other major issues with your illiterate lyricism.

“[Y]ou were Romeo, you were throwing pebbles
And my daddy said stay away from Juliet
And I was crying on the staircase
Begging you please don’t go
[Blah, blah, blah...]
So I sneak out to the garden to see you
We keep quiet ’cause we’re dead if they knew”

Although every adolescent in the throes of bunny-love believes that parental disapproval of her tattooed, drug-running boyfriend means THE END OF THE WORLD and, omigod, I will DIE if I cannot see him, the hyperbolic invocation of death in that last line seems especially absurd when juxtaposed with the actual threat of death the famous lovers faced from their beloved’s relatives. Your father is not going to murder your punkass boyfriend. Your virginity is a pretty cheap commodity these days and you’re really not worth the jail time, so quit worrying about it and go back to fucking like the fuzzy little mammals you are.

“‘Cause you were Romeo, I was a scarlet letter”

I may have to rescind my harsh words about the public school system, since it appears that they at least presented the titles of famous works to you. I feel obligated to point out that, even if you are averse to actually opening a book, often times the back cover will hold some sort of clue about the contents, which you may want to peruse. Now for a brief quiz. Please check the box if any of the following apply: you are (a) a young, adulterous wife (b) living in a 17th century Puritan Boston village who (c) banged the local pastor and (d) spawned a she-devil child. No? Not sounding familiar? I’m not surprised. I realise that you probably think that likening yourself to a scarlet letter is some sort of highly literary way of drilling in your point that all the universe is conspiring against your pimply, hormone-driven romance with your crack-addicted Romeo, but really it just makes me wish I could spontaneously combust every time your song comes on the radio.

“Romeo save me, they try to tell me how to feel
This love is difficult, but it’s real”

So tell me, what was it like to fuck a Jonas Brother? Did he take his purity ring off first? I’m genuinely curious.

“He knelt to the ground and pulled out a ring
And said, marry me Juliet
You’ll never have to be alone
I love you and that’s all I really know
I talked to your dad, go pick out a white dress
It’s a love story baby just say yes”

Silly Romeo, why didn’t you just ASK Mr. Capulet if you could marry Juliet? Think of all the unnecessary drama you could have saved.

In closing, Miss Swift, I know that reading actual books can be both time-consuming and headache-inducing, but before you pen another atrocious song (set to surprisingly catchy music), please, do me a favour and use Google. Having a second-grade reading comprehension level can hurt: Wikipedia and SparkNotes can help.

Sincerely,

Megan

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