There’s an old supposedly Scottish proverb that goes,
“The only reason some people are alive is because is because it is illegal to kill them.”
This is perhaps truer of no one than former South Carolina Republican Party
executive director Todd Kincannon.
Now you’re probably all saying “Whoa there! Ain’t that more than a little harsh?“
To which I respond: no.
This is a guy so twisted I feel perfectly comfortable with slapping the label “evil” on him and not losing a moment’s peace of mind. Let me break it down for you.
And just to be sure there was no confusion as to his meaning, Kincannon continued on to post this:
Yeah, I’m going to give you all a moment to try to wrap your head around just how vile of a thing that was.
Ready?
Well, we’re moving on anyways.
Now I could spend the entire post breaking down Kincannon’s assumption that some high school kid gunned down by a gung-ho neighborhood watchman was a “thug” or that had he grown up, he inevitably would’ve resorted to “sucking dick” for “drug money,” but there’s oh so much more still to see!
Kincannon’s spent the past few days attacking Iraq war veteran Mike Prysner for his views on recently deceased Venezuelan president Hugo Chavez, offering such reasonable and level-headed comments as:
What makes it all worse is that when this guy is confronted over his statements, he resorts to “free speech” arguments to evade any responsibility. He is correct in that he has the freedom to say whatever he so chooses, just as I have the freedom to stick forks in my own eyes or kick a grizzly bear- just because I have the right to do something doesn’t mean it’s the right thing to do. As far as trying to play off his statements.
In one interview, Kincannon out rightly stated that “If you say something that’s borderline offensive or if it is offensive, the people that attack you and say just the awfulest [sic] things about you, they do the very thing that they accuse you of.”
Evan does try to keep the blog relatively profanity-free, but this was really the only gif I could find that quite captured the feeling…
For anyone wondering, that’s the equivalent of punching a guy and calling him a hypocrite when he punches you back. But there’s more to it than just that.
Even if Kincannon truly does believe he’s nothing more than a witty prankster, he does have a following and his statements do get reactions out of people, including such gems as:
So we’ve effectively jumped from “This vet deserves to have died for holding political views I disagree with” to “every soldier who has come back alive is a coward and a disgrace to the fatherland.”
Again, if this is all some elaborate prank being played by Kincannon, we can’t ignore that it’s not being taken to lightly by his followers. I don’t think J.D. Salinger should be blamed because a nutcases took Catcher in the Rye to be code for “Kill John Lennon,” but when most everyone reading your work is coming away with homophobic, racist, sexist, and generally reprehensible messages, it’s time to rethink your medium.
The “big hole” in this episode is courtesy of Oleg, whose leg punches through the girls’ ceiling due to him and Sophie’s vigorous lovemaking. That’s probably too delicate a word to describe what was going on, I mean, they were using a bowling ball. Anyway, that’s the cold open for ya.
Since Sophie and Oleg’s excessively cacophonous copulation leads to Caroline losing sleep [she didn’t strap sponges to both ears and get smashed on booze like Max did] she is 20 minutes late to her shift at the diner, which starts the first real conflict I can remember between the girls and their boss, Han Lee.
Now, I am not a person who enjoys the jabs every single character on the show makes at Han. They constantly attack a) his height, or b) his sexuality, and both types of joke been done to death. I don’t know who thinks they’re funny, but the show’s writers seem to think we live and breathe the stuff. What I do love, and you know this if you’ve been reading these reviews, is when Han dishes it back as good as he gets it. It’s great to see him as more than just the show’s whipping boy, and Matthew Moy almost always nails the delivery.
So when Caroline finally shows up, makes excuses about having to take a nap before badmouthing the diner she works at, Han gets a little upset. He makes a remark at their shop closing, which is sort of in poor taste, but Caroline calls his establishment a “dumb diner,” and he pulls out the big guns. By firing her.
“Well at least my diner is still open and successful, whereas your cupcake shop was so dumb it failed.”
“Oh really, you quit? You must be dumber than my diner because I already fired you.”
Which leaves Caroline unemployed, a change I would have enjoyed more if Max hadn’t gotten her fired in the last episode. She waits in front of the apartment door [like a puppy] for Max to get home so she can start complaining about how unemployed she is. Then the girls head upstairs to return Sophie and Oleg’s sex bowling ball because we’ve gotta keep this episode moving.
Sophie answers the door roleplaying as Beyoncé, which was an image I did not need to see or want to write about. Upon hearing that Oleg was inside dressed as Jay-Z I fully admit that I expected him to be in blackface; this is not a show that has had a very good track record when it comes to race. Thankfully, he was not. The girls suggest that the two get their freak on at Oleg’s, and he worries, for some reason, that she’ll be disgusted by his place, an understandable sentiment if they weren’t already sleeping together. So Caroline offers to give his apartment a woman’s touch, for cash .
I spent actual time making this gif specifically for this blog, and you will appreciate it.
Subjectively, Oleg’s apartment is awesome. Sure, it has skeevy stuff like a sex swing and a sex chair and an anatomically correct “previously loved” sex doll, but it also has a sweet waterbed and some really awesome lighting courtesy of 1,500 tracer bulbs, most of which he tore out of the new Cineplex 14 on Queens. It’s got some good stuff going for it, is what I’m saying, and any logical person would assume that Sophie would be down with the whole deal. But Oleg thought it needed a bit of a change so of course Caroline wrecks it by covering it in beige.
Max realizes that she needs to get her friend her job back [theirony] and tells Han they should go get high and watch movies. In the most obvious plot twist since “they were planning a surprise party the entire time,” she gets both Han and Caroline into Oleg’s newly female-ready apartment to kiss and make up. Minutes later and they are hiding in a closet [cue joke about Han’s sexuality!] from Sophie and Oleg. Their hijinks crouched in a small space with a sex doll aside, we’re also able to witness another turn of events you all knew was coming, that Sophie was actually into the weird kinky sex stuff and “[likes Oleg] a little bit” for who he is!
Then Han admits that he overreacted and hires Caroline again.
Also the Current Total ends at $205, because apparently Oleg paid Caroline the money to make his apartment look like it was inhabited by a 70-year-old woman.
I guess I should probably talk a little bit about the episode as a whole. Yes, everything turned out exactly the way you thought it would, but what I’m more concerned about is what happened between the characters. Han is the butt of every joke in every episode, and it is fantastic to see him sticking up for himself for once. That being said, it is disappointing to have things resolved on the basis that Caroline “makes everything prettier,” and that he misses her. Caroline apologizes too, of course, but I doubt this will put an end to their sassing the man who signs their paycheques . As I mentioned earlier, it is kind of really stupid for Max to be trying to get Caroline re-hired when she cost her a pretty decent office gig just last week; it’s illogical and thinking about it still makes me angry.
Two episodes away from the car crashing in through their cupcake store wall and we’re still left without any real direction, though Caroline insists that cupcakes are still the dream. We’ll continue to stick around and see what happens, I guess.
Stray Observations:
Max makes a joke about asking Oleg to at least keep it in his apartment, and this one woman goes crazy. There’s this really loud high-pitched “WHOOOOOO!” and she is loving it.
Han has dubbed his employee handbook “The Han-book,” which is, as he says, super adorable.
So Max actually makes fun of CBS, their very own network, which was very . . . uh . . . I guess I’m gonna go with the age-old “Simpsons did it first.”
According to Oleg he has banged 1,684 women in that apartment. By the end of the 4th season of How I Met Your Mother Barney Stinson had only reached 200. I highly contest Oleg’s claim. I contest it so much.
Out Of Date Reference of the Episode: Sophie quotes the infamous Antoine Dodson “hide yo kids hide yo wives,” which went viral in 2010.
2 Broke Girls Cheesecake Menu: Caroline is once again in her skimpy all-grey sleeping ensemble, while Sophie re-enters this section by dressing up as Sasha Fierce. Though I guess this is technically pre- that album since she kept singing bits of “Crazy In Love.”
Now there’s no rant I can write which is going to effectively communicate just how psychotic it is that Richmond and Mays received minimum sentencing, so I’m going to forgo any attempt and jump right into a list of crimes receiving harsher penalties.
Sale of Marijuana in Amounts Under 50 Kgs:5 years.
Heck, Aaron Schwartz, an MIT student and internet activist who downloaded thousands of academic papers from JSTOR, was sentenced to 35 years in prison, in addition to a million dollar fine (Schwartz tragically killed himself in January of this year). Is what Schwatz did seventeen times more heinous than rape and dissemination of child pornography?
I don’t think so either.
And I don’t think people like Patricia Spottedcrow should be given twelve-year sentences for selling a dime bag of weed while someone who commits domestic violence may receive a maximum (in Nevada) penalty of 180 days in jail.
But I’m not hear to rail on our demented and irredeemably corrupt legal system.
I’m hear to talk about our values as a whole.
Back in 2011, during the teacher’s union strikes in Wisconsin, a complaint I heard a lot was “That teacher makes more than I do, has better benefits, and wants more money? That’s just greedy!” or “I saw that teacher driving around in a <insert fancy car here>!”
Now I honestly don’t know where these figures were pulled from; I have yet to see a wealthy teacher, let alone one who drives to and from work in a 1965 Chevy Impala, but that’s not really the point.
I do get being ticked off at people demanding more money when there aren’t enough hours in the day to spend all that they already have. Believe me, that resonates.
But if that’s the case, then where’s all the righteous indignation during the NBA lockout in 2011? No matter which way you slice it, those players were making millions, and pretty much shut down the NBA for half a year because they felt they weren’t making enough.
Now I’m not trying to pass judgment one way or the other, partly because I don’t know enough about the politics of the sport, and partly (mostly) because I think everyone involved makes and obscene amount to begin with.
So do actors, for that matter.
I frankly don’t see why actors should be paid millions to act as teachers in the ghetto while real teachers in the ghetto wouldn’t make that kind of money if they worked until their deaths. The same goes for doctors, civil rights lawyers, independent journalists, and so on. Pay an actor $5,000,000 to pretend to be a teacher, and everyone’s fine with it. Pay a real teacher $50,000 and the world is apparently coming to an end.
A professional footballer makes about $2,000,000 a year. Y’know how much a grocery store clerk makes? $28,000 (if we’re going ridiculously high). And you’d best believe my life is impacted more by any grocery clerk than anyone catching/kicking/hitting a ball for a living.
Now all this is to say we need to step back and take a hard look at our value system. What do we really consider to be a terrible crime? Is selling weed or beating your spouse senseless a more awful crime than rape? Is the work done by actors really so much more valuable than that done by teachers and nonprofit works *cough*? And even get me started on our military budget and the perks we give our politicians.
Again, I’m not here to pass judgment (not until tomorrow, anyways). I’m here to simply present the facts before you. Do you think we’ve got our priorities in order?
If any of you saw X2 [known internationally as the more sensible X-Men 2] I’m sure you remember the following scene starring the very talented Alan Cumming as the mutant Nightcrawler:
The YouTube uploader’s choice of music aside, I think we can all agree that a) that was awesome, and that b) we all like watching people teleport. If we look back a little more recently to the 2006 fever dream that was X-Men: The Last Stand we see that the bamf-ing blue mutant was not actually present among the plethora of mutants presented. Continue reading →
Our blatant disregard for the poor. Our willful ignorance in the information age. Our hypocritical sense of morality. Capitalism. People who have perfect eyesight but wear glasses for “fashion.”
Worst. People. Ever.
But for all of that, I genuinely do think we’re making some (small) progress as a culture. Don’t get me wrong, I fully believe that beneath every person’s thin veneer of civilization lies a seething volcano of barbarism, cannibalism, and baby-punching-ism waiting to be unleashed at any minute. There’s no changing that.
Nevertheless, we are getting better in some regards. Specifically, I’m thinking about an image I saw not too long ago.
You can’t really argue with that. When something is wrong, it’s wrong. “Injustice anywhere is…”
Well, you get the idea.
Now this guy deserves some applause on his own, but it’s really the bigger picture I want to direct the spotlight to. It’s the simple belief that there’s a basic set of expectations for human behavior. Being morally outraged not simply when the news is covering one story, or during a particularly heinous scandal- but for every act of injustice out there.
Let me break it down a bit.
Chances are, you’ve run into some post on Facebook or any other social networking site in which someone attempts to make a supposedly bold or heroic stand, voicing their support for gay rights or the body positive movement, or something of that nature. While this doesn’t typically happen on any of my feeds, when I do see it, I’m usually pretty underwhelmed. Wow, _____ is coming out in support of gay rights? Brave move, next thing you’ll know he’ll be speaking out against segregation!
I know that sounds needlessly harsh, but more often than not, I feel proclamations and manifestos of that nature are looking for applause more than anything else, and that’s the whole problem. Is it good to be a tolerant, passionate, socially, and environmentally conscious person?
Yes, it is.
What do you want, a cookie?
There’s a 1994 movie by the name of Quiz Show, a drama based off of the true story of a rigged gameshow in the 1950s. While I only ever saw the tail end of the movie (and that was years ago), there’s a scene that stuck in my head. The character who had been cheating at the game is called before congress to testify. Standing up, he offers an eloquent “soul-searching” speech on how he struggled to reclaim his integrity and self-respect after having been a pawn in this entire sordid affair. The congressmen congratulate him on giving such a moving speech- all but one. A congressman by the name of Derounian leans forward and states states that he doesn’t see why the contestant should be commended for simply having told the truth.
And it makes sense, doesn’t it?
We’re patting each other (and more than that, ourselves) on the backs for what? Decrying injustice? Raging against waste and greed? Supporting equality? Should we be praised for this? For briefly rising out of ignorance and selfishness to meet the minimum requirements for human decency?
Seriously, do you think you should feel a sense of pride over not being a racist? Should we applaud ourselves for not clubbing a baby seal to death?
I don’t think so.
And it seems like people are finally starting to get it. Moral outrage for the purposes of fashion are being attacked. Not, perhaps, on a grand and noticeable scale (barring, perhaps, Jon Stewart), but quietly; with caustic jabs like that picture up above. And it’s about time, too.
Best movie of all time.
And yes, I’m fully aware of the hypocrisy of commending basic human decency not being commended. Consider this more of a public service announcement, if you must.
EVAN: Alright, people of the internet, it’s time to stop correcting each other’s grammar in YouTube comments sections and start tuning in to the wisdom we’re about to drop out of our mouth-holes/fingertips.
On this installment of E> we will be discussing the ever-popular C2H5OH, more commonly known as alcohol, and how it’s treated in Western culture.
GORDON: Now right here we’re running up against a problem: “Western” culture isn’t exactly united on the subject of drinking. I mean, for the most part we’re fans, but there ARE some pretty distinct differences. For example, a severe alcoholic in Canada or America would in Europe be simply known as an Englishman.
EVAN: You make a very astute point, so I’m going to propose we boil this down to how North America [barring Mexico, sorry (though to be fair they should be used to this by now)] treats alcohol.
GORDON: Poor Mexico.
But let’s get right down to it and try to get a handle on the general stance we have on drinking in the west. We certainly like drinking, but drunkenness is largely viewed as something either juvenile or to be relegated to the weekends. Is that fair?
EVAN: Somewhat debatable.
GORDON: Then let’s debate.
EVAN: I suppose the question you have to ask yourself is who thinks it’s juvenile? I know a fair amount of people who consider it fairly normal to drink until they can’t see on the weekends, as regular and sacred a routine as my going to church on Sundays.
GORDON: I’ll admit freely that this does happen, but I wouldn’t say it’s what the average person does. In fact, the only people who really have the time and/or physical ability to do so are usually young people and students, bringing me back to the original point.
WHAT’S THE DEAL WITH YOUNG PEOPLE IN AMERICA [AND CANADA] AND BOOZE?
EVAN: I agree. So let’s talk about that. What’s the deal with young people in America [and Canada] and booze? Imagine I said that in a Jerry Seinfeld sort of voice.
GORDON: Well, Canada I can’t speak to as much, but I’d argue that the fact that booze is forbidden until the age of 21 has a lot to do with it. It turns alcohol, and to a similar degree, inebriation, into a taboo pleasure and a sign of rebellion and… well, I don’t want to say “maturity,” but I guess “adulthood” is gonna have to suffice.
EVAN: You’re preaching to the choir. A drinking age of 21 is levels of ridiculous, I mean, the only thing you can’t do at that age is rent a car [that’s at 25]. In Ontario the drinking age is 19, which is more or less what I imagined it would be when I was a kid.
GORDON: I’m guessing drinking doesn’t have quite the same mystique that it does in the US, huh?
EVAN: Well, to paint a picture of underage drinking, I visited Toronto for a summer while I was still living in Thailand. I must’ve been . . . sixteen, I guess. When I hung out with some former schoolmates a lot of what was talked about was fake IDs, and something called “drunk dial,” or something, which was apparently a number you could call where people of age would bring you booze for cash.
GORDON: Booze for cash? As opposed to what? Beads and trinkets? You have forever altered my image of Canadian society.
Youth drinking is such a small/easily dismissed part of drinking, though. What else is there to say?
GORDON: So says the hyped-up Hollywood media. High school is nothing but a drug-frenzied orgy to listen to ’em.
EVAN: Dude, when people become of age a lot of them get smashed, this is a true fact.
GORDON: Hence the need to get rid of the drinking age.
EVAN: Okay, so we do away with the drinking age altogether. Now what?
GORDON: Now drinking isn’t something you get to do, it’s something that has to be earned. 21 isn’t some magical number at which you can do no wrong and drink as much as you’re able. Abuse will still be there, but ideally we’ll see a drop in a lot of the stupid binging for binging’s sake.
EVAN: Wait, so how would we earn the right to drink?
GORDON: Well, naturally there’s not going to be any universal standard. I’m hoping decent parenting and societal pressure will enforce general standards for drinking. An eighteen year old who doesn’t drive recklessly and maintains a general balanced perspective on life shouldn’t be barred from having a glass of wine with dinner, especially when his twenty-four year old brother who still acts like a four year old has no limitations in this regard.
EVAN: I just realized that in many Canadian provinces drinking with parental supervision is permitted. I cannot find anything to the same effect for the US. Wait. Hold the phone.
“…17 states do not ban underage consumption, and the remaining 18 states have family member and/or location exceptions to their underage consumption laws.”
GORDON: I’m pretty sure there’s one state somewhere in the Midwest with an old prohibition-era law stating that a minor can buy alcohol if accompanied by an adult, though only in very select situations; it’s pretty archaic.
Though let’s hash this out a bit- I’m guessing that most families aren’t going to be hosting chugging contests, or having little Timmy do tequila shots off the baby-seat.
EVAN:I don’t think that’s what people are worried about, though. I think the concern is more about fourteen-year-olds heading down to their local liquor store and buying a bottle of something that would kill an elephant.
Not to that extreme, of course, but at my old high school there was at least one kid who turned to drinking as a way to deal with stress.As to how, let it be known that you can buy beer at 7-11s in Thailand.
GORDON: You can buy anything in Thailand.
EVAN: You are not wrong.
GORDON: While I do absolutely agree with you, I think we’re asking the wrong question. It’s not “How can we stop kids from drinking” it’s “Why are kids drinking (stuff that would kill an elephant)?”
EVAN:It’s because, as we’ve said, it’s a taboo thing. I think what needs to happen is for us to somehow, in America and Canada, bring alcohol back to the level it currently is in Europe, where you can have wine on a table alongside your water and not have the kids think anything of it.
My question to you is how we change that Western way of viewing hooch.
GORDON: Well, I think the first step is to, like I said, abolish the drinking age.
From there I think it’s a matter of getting people to see drinking more realistically. Again- demystify
EVAN: I get what you said about nixing the drinking age, and we both admitted there may be a few issues there. How exactly are supposed to demystify, though? That was my question to begin with.
GORDON: Well, I don’t want to say we institute a campaign trying to portray the downsides of alcohol, but I imagine that’d backfire more than anything else. As surreal as it might sound, I’d say that more open drinking and easier access to drinking would be the answer. You get to see drinking in it’s entirety- the good stuff and the bad- without an agenda being shoved down your throat.
EVAN: My counterpoint to your suggestion that we should let loose on the public drinking is that we work on the institution that has so demonized the bottle.
Southern Baptists have been down on booze for quite the while, in spite of the fact that our Lord and Saviour partook of the fruit of the vine more than a few times in the Good Book.
GORDON: And the Wesleyans share their part in this. Though in regards to that, I’m not exactly sure how to argue with those people- what argument can I make that hasn’t already been made in the past couple hundred years?
EVAN: Yeah, I don’t know.
“You guys, Jesus drank. He drank with friends and enjoyed it, but he never got drunk. It’s cool, you guys.”
Anyway, we should start wrapping up. Do you want to give us a recap of what we’ve discussed?
GORDON: We’ll as great minds think alike, we’ve pretty much bagged on the existence of drinking ages, agreed that drinking among underage kids is a problem resulting from alcohol’s taboo nature, and batted around a few ideas for solving that problem- generally concluding that we need more drinking and exposure to it. That sound about right?
EVAN: I don’t necessarily think more people need to drink to increase awareness that it’s not a bad thing, but that’s more or less correct.
I wish I had a beer right now.
GORDON: Mmm. New Belgium is coming out with a new stout. It looks fantastic.
EVAN: Yeah, I don’t know a lot about beer past the fact that I wouldn’t mind a cold one right now.
GORDON: It would be refreshing. And speaking of which, we need a new topic for next week. I’ll keep with our discussion of vices and offer up the topic of Smoking and Society.
EVAN: That’s a pretty good one. I’ll propose that we discuss . . . dangit . . .
I’d say we should discuss this new season of Community, but that’d require you to watch all of the new season before next Tuesday night.
GORDON: I have way more free time than you think. It shall be done.
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