POP QUIZ FROM THE NO BUTTS ABOUT IT REALM Quick! Which of the stories below ran in the November 12, 2014 edition of TIME magazine? U.S., China Reach Deal for New Targets on Capping Greenhouse Gas Emissions Funding Shortfall Threatens Up to 1 Million Refugees in Iraq, Syria Israeli Settlers Torch West Bank Mosque; Soldiers Kill Palestinian Demonstrator U.S. Strategy On ISIS Comes Under Fire At Congressional Hearing Missouri Gov. Threatens to Deploy National Guard After Grand Jury Decision Michael Brown’s Parents Appeal to U.N. Panel on Torture NYC Doctor Released from Hospital After Beating Ebola Gay Man In Critical Condition After Being Beaten, Robbed, and Set On Fire Kim Kardashian’s Butt is An Empty Promise I’m gonna go off the rails here, and quote the great Kate Clinton. In one of her very old comedy routines, I recall how she postulated that more malls were built during the Reagan years than at any other time in our history. “Some of these things are more essay topics than jokes,” she quipped. Kate? We need ya, baby. Our culture is serving up a hot one. When TIME magazine sees fit to run an essay about Kim Kardashian’s derriere in its “Ideas” section, it’s time for a nation to regroup—or at least to have its intellectual meds balanced. Now…you all know me. I’m about as far from “prude” as our Siberian husky, Lucy, is from “well-behaved.” But some things just rattle my chain—and I guess this is one of them. Don’t misunderstand. There’s nothing whatever wrong with the story written by pop culture writer Brian Moylan. In fact, it’s downright funny. But reading it alongside accounts of world events that have more…gravitas…just makes me want to tear out my hair and ask what on earth has happened to our national conscience—not to mention our collective aesthetic. Oh…did I mention that TIME also saw fit to repost the magazine cover photo that started all the hoopla? I mean…just in case anyone on the planet missed seeing it the first 847,000,000 times. “The rose is a rose, and was always a rose,” Robert Frost wrote. “But the theory now goes that the apple’s a rose, and the pear is, and so’s the plum, I suppose.” Regrettably, we seem to have reached the place where Technicolor coverage (no pun intended) of a honey-glazed, bare ass meets the threshold for “newsworthy.” “…we’re always upset by the lack of substance,” the TIME essay states. “We want there to be something more, some reason or context, some great explanation that tells us what it is like to live in this very day and age, but there is not.” True words, Mr. Moylan. I just wish you had written them about something other than Kim Kardashian’s ass. This now concludes todays exercise of pique and umbrage. I shall now rejoin the rest of my life, already in progress.
Posted on: Fri, 14 Nov 2014 13:54:45 +0000
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