December 31, 2013
Alice Munro
One crime-related novelty? The “white Hispanic.” George Zimmerman was acquitted of murdering Trayvon Martin, then turned out to be the giant embarrassing goof I warned everyone he might be. Although his brainstorm to become, shall we say, Andy Warhol for fifteen minutes? Power move, dude.
Otherwise, crazy Muslims were crazy. Gay activists continued to be the leading cause of homophobia.
Even new news seemed old. Lance Armstrong finally confessed to blood doping. In 2023, he will admit what I’ve suspected all along: that he never actually had cancer.
This is the part where a normal person would nominate their favorite movie of 2013. Except the best movie I saw this year came out in 1953.
Today’s obnoxious audiences keep me out of theaters, but the films themselves don’t help. We’re offered either sentimental junk history”see The Onion‘s “New Jackie Robinson Movie Probably Has Scene Where People Yell Things And He’s Upset And Wants To Fight Back But Doesn’t””or corporate franchise cud that doesn’t even try to make sense.
Come on: Why don’t those heavily armed kids in The Hunger Games just assassinate the tyrants? Why doesn’t All Powerful Wheelchair Guy in the X-Men just cure his own paralysis?
Television isn’t much better. Somehow, millions of supposedly intelligent viewers bought into Breaking Bad, a show about the only public-school teacher in the Western world who didn’t have health insurance.
Instead, lots of us watched The Walking Dead (or, as I call it, The Daryl Show) just for one character: a redneck woodsman who wields a mean crossbow. You just know this un-manscaped Southerner oozing testosterone definitely did NOT vote for Obama before the “outbreak.”
Which brings us to Daryl’s real-life (more or less) counterparts: the even more beloved Duck Dynasty clan. Phil Robertson”not Rob Ford, not even the Pope”was probably more worthy of the title “Man of the Year.”
Much has been written about him this winter, except maybe this:
Anyone who thinks A&E’s backtrack is a long-term win for “our side” and not GLAAD is delusional.
And had he looked and sounded the same, but his name was “Mohammed,” a whole lot of us, left and right, would”ve been arguing from other side. I predict more of the same for 2014.
