(From back when my rent was $100 a month.)
When I was 16, I would scream in my dad’s face about the “Working Man” until he’d snap and throw me across the room. As I soared through the air I’d look down at the Leninist pins on my punk jacket and be proud of myself for standing up for the unions. Then I’d hit the ground somewhere near the front door, open it, yell “FUCK YOU,” and go to my girlfriend’s house to kvetch about how stupid my old man is. Though he worked his ass off his whole life and I had one job at a gas station under my belt, he was a moron who was blind to the oppression around him. Here’s some other impossibly stupid shit I believed when I was like you.
1 - BEING INFORMED IS ALL THAT MATTERS
I honestly thought digging a ditch all day would be fine if you were educated because you could sit there and think of Kierkegaard quotes. Then I dug some ditches and realized I was thinking about digging this goddamned motherfucker of a ditch all day.
2 - MONOGAMY IS A LIE
Anyone who tells you they are in an open relationship really means they are in a short-term relationship because nobody wants to eat someone else’s cum out of his girlfriend’s vagina more than once.
3 - THE WORLD IS TOO OVERPOPULATED TO HAVE KIDS
Though this is technically true, what are you going to do about it, subtract 3 from 6 billion? Thanks. Not having kids to be green is like recycling your coffee cups while your neighbor pours gallons of toxic waste out his window.
4 - WHO’S CRAZIER, THE MAN ON THE STREET OR THE CEO RIPPING PEOPLE OFF?
This teenage belief fails to recognize one rather large detail: Homeless people are fucking crazy. Like, they literally hear voices saying shit like, “God hated the Beatles because they knew his plan. They’re trying to warn you, Harry.” CEO’s may be greedy and unconscionable but all they hear when they’re out playing golf is the occasional bird chirping.
5 - THE UNION SAVED THE WORKING MAN
Yeah, maybe 50 years ago when they had those cool tweed caps on and inhaled soot all day. Now they leave at 3PM on a Thursday and retire at 40 while we all stay until 7 or 8 at night trying to pay off their indexed pensions. Like adolescence, this was a fun idea that got real old real fast.
6 - I’D RATHER HAVE MONEY IN THE GOVERNMENT’S HANDS THAN BIG BUSINESS’ HANDS
Sorry, the latter is the lesser of two evils. At least some of them have an incentive to not be totally incompetent.
7 - MARRIAGE IS JUST A PIECE OF PAPER
Whenever I start a project with someone I write out a “Crayon contract” that has all the worst-case scenarios listed on it, just in case. There’s something about signing a piece of paper that makes a brain go, “This isn’t fucking around anymore. We’re actually doing this.” Add to that: Family members flying in from all over the world, her dad paying $40k, tears galore, a big cake, a dozen speeches, clapping, cheering, and boxes of pictures and you have a hell of a lot more than a piece of paper. It’s more like being born into adulthood.
8 - I COULD RETIRE HAPPILY ON $100k
Yeah, I could if I was still living in the back of an apartment in Montreal filled with anarchist lesbians. College is a quarter of a million per kid. A New York apartment is about $1m. A place outside the city is about half that… The list goes on. To lead a normal Archie Bunker style life in NYC today is about 80k a year. That leaves $20k to spread over your 20 year retirement plan. Good luck with that.
9 - A ZOO IS A JAIL FOR ANIMALS
Though they look cute in cartoons, being an animal sucks. That’s why other cultures think, “Your uncle is a donkey” is the meanest thing you could possibly say. Animals experience a level of stress we could only understand if we spent five years in an Venezuelan prison. The pygmy shrew has to eat three times its body weight every day. Deers reluctantly suffer through every winter as gangrenous sores house dozens of maggots on their ass. Moose have nervous breakdowns from the black flies and will often go bucking into open clearings roaring like hysterical bears and begging God to strike them down right there.
Carving out a predator-free space where an animal can get free food every day may not sound like fun to us but our lives aren’t a living hell.
10 - VIOLENCE IS NEVER JUSTIFIED
Skinheads used to kick the shit out of us but whenever we got one alone we’d “Do them one better” and just scare the guy. Les (the toughest guy in our gang) once chased them on to the bus and even kicked one in the bum on the way up the stairs. We didn’t want to admit they were just tougher than us so we brainwashed ourselves into denying this basic truth: NOTHING says fuck off like a punch in the nose.
BUY GAVIN’S PHOTO BOOK HERE
STREET BONERS: 1,764 HIPSTER FASHION JOKES
SIMULTANEOUSLY POSTED ON STREET CARNAGE.
