...don't be stupid you dummy...
“I'm a meathead, man. You've got smart people, and you've got dumb people. I just happen to be dumb.”
-Keanu Reeves-
It was 7am, the sun had barely sniffed the pantyline of the horizon, when I felt the first punch of my best friend hitting my face. It was randomly “beat up your buddy day” at the first grade Prairie elementary school playground in Buffalo Grove, Illinois. Over the next three minutes a barrage of tiny boy hands ripped at my shirt, kicked at my tiny ass, and slapped poorly at my face. I just got the shit beat out of me for no reason at all.
Crying, confused and hearing the ringing school bell beckoning us inside, I did what felt right for the moment and told my friend that his newly dead mother was glad she passed away and then left him with a punch in the back of the head. And with that I had won that day’s war, or so I thought. Proudly I walked away from the moment knowing I had left him feeling like shit too. A couple hours later his older brother found me in a stairway and threw me down 12 steps into a brick wall. I woke up in the principal’s office waiting to be sent home.
All of this was incredibly stupid.
I am a dumb guy. You know how I know I am a dumb guy? Because people tell me I am smart. There is no better way to placate and distract a dumb guy than to tell them they are smart. This isn’t gaslighting, but rather it is a smart guy move. The smart guy tells the dumb guy he is smart because the smart guy is so dumb he doesn’t know better. We live in a world filled with dumb guys. And stupid gals. The world's a puppet stage production of Guys and Dolls called Dummy Guys and Stupid Dolls.
“It takes a smart man to play dumb.”
-Mr. T-
We are so dumb that our present is now closer to our past than it is to our future. When you were born, no matter how old you are, at some point you were told of the future. The future holds so many possibilities. You could be anything you wanted. Great things awaited you. And the future would be accompanied by technologies unknown and amazing. Flying cars, robot assistants, time travel, living talking dinosaurs, full Michelin star dinners in the size of a pill that give you a hand job for course number nine.
But here we are, in the year 2023, and everything is just so incredibly stupid. This weekend Hamas started a war with Israel. Last year Russia started a war with Ukraine. In the meantime there have been hundreds of thousands of armed conflicts between friends, neighbors, and upset teenagers trying to out-edge their friends on fortnite chat boards. We are in the year 2023 and we are still playing with guns and bombs like they are toys created to blow up dummy guys and stupid dolls.
They say don’t talk about politics, religion or things you don’t understand. But I told you I am dumb. An idiot. Like truly stupid. A dummy dummy. Doofus. Dillhead. Dwonko. Dipshit. I read Garfield when I am too scared to sleep. I thought Eyes Wide Shut was a documentary. I think Leonard Part Six should have had a part Seven. I can’t take a shit until I spend at least 20 minutes considering what soap bottles to read on the toilet and by the time I make it to the toilet I don’t even know how to read anymore so I sing shitty songs (like anything by Taylor Swift…go ahead and cancel me now you friendship bracelet wearing cretins…I told you I am dumbbbbbbb).
“I'm stupid, I'm ugly, I'm dumb, I smell. Did I mention I'm stupid?”
-Eminem-
I’m dumb enough that I am going to talk briefly about politics, religion and other things I don’t understand. Let’s start with religion. I went to Armenia three times between 2021 and 2022 and many things hit me when I was there. A small slippery bat hit my face when I was running through a dark tunnel home from the office. A small pillow hit my chin as I passed out from the 24 hour commute from Oakland, and the endless glass of cognac my gruff airplane bartender poured for me. And then I was hit by how old and historic everything was around me.
Religiously speaking Armenia is a largely Christian country. Lots of 12th century churches (and even earlier) in mountainsides are all over the landscape and amazing to see and visit. While visiting those churches I was also hit by something, I’d call it GOD, but I think it will be more fun if I call it BRANDY. Brandy told me “Check out how old all this shit is you dumbass. You know the things you care about? Not old at all man. You only know baby history and new shiny thing stuffs. But all this history right here has been around for centuries dude.” God [Brandy] talks in mysterious ways.
In Armenia the religion is so old you walk into caves and it just exists. In America on the other hand our longest standing religion is professional sports. There is no faith stronger than the millions of robed & hatted denizens of the tailgate praying for a football to be kicked through a pair of poles on a couple dozen sundays every year.
So sitting in a cave where some 800 year old ghost was probably praying, Brandy reached over and whispered into my ear. “Religion is sports you moron.” I would call it an epiphany if I knew what that word meant, but what I did know was that Brandy had a point, and that also she was being incredibly rude with all the insults.
“I may be dumb, but I'm not stupid.”
-Terry Bradshaw-
I am from Oakland, born in 1852, home to the Warriors (not anymore), the Raiders (not anymore) and our beloved Oakland A’s (not anymore). And in this town, like thousands of towns all over America we celebrate professional sports like it is a religion. We get down on our knees and pray for great outcomes. We share chants and songs and repeated phrases that have so much meaning to us, but that are completely foreign to anyone outside of that ball shaped sphere. I’ve leaned the Bernie lean at an A’s game, danced the thizzle dance at halftime of a warriors game, and watched two dudes a gallon deep in Cuervo beat the dribbling piss out of each other at a Raiders game. Inevitably all faith will give way to violence.
People care so much about a bunch of millionaires playing a ball game that they will fight and kill themselves for it. And as Brandy whispered her ancient boozy breath into my skullhole it hit me like a Bud-drunk Yankees fanboy might hit the face of a vaping Red Sox dupe. When you care about stupid shit way too much you do stupid things. And killing someone for what they believe in is an incredibly stupid thing.
“I was deaf and dumb and blind to all but me, myself and I.”
-Loretta Young-
We are all fucking idiots. The inevitability of death scared us all to the point of creating fables and myths to distract from that inevitability. We got so into these fables and myths that we gave them outfits, and buildings and stained glasses and caves. And that is cool. Stained glasses, caves and robes are super cool. Fashion week should just be models in robes. The word robe is even cool. Robe. Say it. Robe. Super cool. A shirt sounds like shit when you say it next to the word ROBE.
But no matter how cool the outfits, or the stadium, there is nothing cool about beating the living shit out of someone who doesn’t like the color of your robe. We live in the year 2023. We should have talking toothbrushes that do taxes for us, but instead we have a grown man wearing a big boy shirt that says JETS attacking another grown man because he is wearing a different big boy shirt that says COWBOYS.
We live in the year 2023. We should be hoverboarding with Marty McFly1. But instead we are concerned with some Coloradan senator giving a vaping handjob to her boyfriend during a Beetlejuice musical. We should be more upset that there is even a Beetlejuice musical. Also quit doing that theater people. Quit making old fanboy nostalgia movies into musicals. The world doesn’t need a Back to the Future musical.
We live in the year 2023. In the sci-fi future movie Total Recall, I was promised talking robo-taxi-drivers named Johnny Cab. But instead I get robot cars so stupid they can be stopped by dropping a cone on their face2. We should be teleporting by now. Instead we have telemarketing. If we really want to go to war, why don’t we start with the shithorses trying to steal my grandma’s last bingo quarters.
“I'm not dumb. I just have a command of thoroughly useless information.”
-Bill Watterson-
On the planet earth, in the past year, there were 57+ different conflicts, wars, and skirmishes that led to over 500,000 murders3. When we are children and we decide to fight, the fight ends when someone breaks it up, pulls you aside and tells you that it was wrong. Kids are the stupidest. They don’t even know how to drive cars, drink whiskey or lose $1000 betting the wrong side of a Mets game. But even they know better than to kill each other when they have an argument. Bite, sure. Pull hair, why not. Pinch, fuck yes. But kids seldom fight well or seriously enough to land a murder charge.
But here we are, in the year 2023, and every adult in the world is acting like a total dumbass. We are all permitting, funding, or choosing sides on conflicts that could be settled by a couple hours of sitting silently in the corner after getting a good spanking. I mean seriously, wouldn’t war be so much better if we just got all the soldiers gussied up into leather and ass whipped each other? Toss every willing warrior into a pile of lube and let's see what happens. I’ll bring champagne and a chocolate rose for the victor.
“One man alone can be pretty dumb sometimes, but for real bona fide stupidity, there ain't nothin' can beat teamwork.”
-Edward Abbey-
Teams come and teams go. The city of Oakland lost its last professional sports team this year and it felt like I lost a family member. I was angry and dreamed of the opportunity to beat the flesh out of the men who were making it happen (a trio of dumbasses named Dave Kaval, John Fisher and Rob Manfred in case you want to punch them). But sports and religion are only invested in us as much as we invest in them. Change a robe and you can become a member of any new religion overnight.
Justify murder. Argue for your tribe. Root for the Bears, Browns and Bengals. There is no amount of team work you can do as a human on this earth that will erase the fact that you are human. You have to piss and shit the same way I do (secretly in a box I leave in my neighbor’s backyard).
If a kid knows better than to do what you are doing, then you are doing it wrong. I don’t know what compelled my friends to spank my face that ill Illinois morning, but I do know that it was stupid. And what I did in response was even more stupid. It is the year 2023 and as adults we can make a better future than the one we are bombing and beheading at the present.
The Philadelphia Phillies hit a homerun on my tv screen, and I punch my fist in the air. Not because I am rooting for this team, but because I remember I bought a liter of aged Ararat Brandy as I left the airport in Armenia. I pour myself a four finger tall snifter of the burnt browned booze, press the glass to my lips and I whisper into its ear “Moron is my religion dear sport”. Thank god I am so dumb.
“With all due respect, I am against dumb.”
-John Kennedy-
FOOTENOTES
https://interestingengineering.com/science/9-potentially-world-changing-inventions-that-never-came-to-be
https://slate.com/business/2023/07/autonomous-vehicles-traffic-cones-san-francisco-cruise-waymo-cpuc.html
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_ongoing_armed_conflicts
"We are so dumb that our present is now closer to our past than it is to our future." Apparently talking about how dumb you are makes you a lot smarter than the average person.
"the sun had barely sniffed the pantyline of the horizon" is the best opening line since A Tale Of Two Cities
This piece was fucking awesome. You are SO smart