Post by Zack Fantana on Mar 17, 2017 1:29:51 GMT -5
"God, so much has changed."
It all seemed foreign. During this brief respite from the cold, it appeared as though hundreds of families were taking advantage of the sunny day and partaking in some outdoor activities at the local park with their kids, but none of them familiar to Zack Fantana. The kites from his youth were replaced in the sky by RC helicopters and drones. The mountain bikes were swapped out for razor scooters, and the roller blades exchanged with hoverboards.
"My greatest fear is that I'll wake up one day and find out I've been rendered obsolete. You know, like maybe Dare Clemmens hasn't just replaced me as the Resilience Champion, but maybe he's replaced me in pop culture. He's only five years younger than me, but he seems so much more present. I mean, I just found out LFO wasn't cool anymore. Dare's hip to all the new music, cars, and social justice terminology."
Zack's brow furrowed and he stopped dead in his tracks.
"Is 'hip' even still... hip? Fuck me, I can't even think of a contemporary word to describe it."
"Relax kid. You sound like you're dancing with Mr. Brownstone."
Zack looked over his shoulder to see his mentor Bobby Franchise squatting down in his purple madras suit to pluck flowers out of the grass, and realized that Bobby was perhaps the wrong person to ask about modern day slang.
He looked off into the distance. Not far away, a sizable cluster of teens had congregated together. Each one seemed to be staring at their cell phone. Zack's eyes lit up.
"Oh, I know what this is."
Fantana briskly approached the huddle.
"So what is it, boys? A Squirtle? Snorlax?"
Soon enough, Fantana was encompassed by the crowd entirely, but re-emerged shortly thereafter, a dejected look painted across his face.
"What happened?", Bobby said while admiring a daffodil.
"It wasn't Pokemon, Bobby. It wasn't Pokemon at all. They had, like, an entire pre-teen fight club in there. Jesus, I really am out of touch."
Zack collapsed onto the ground and gazed into the blue sky.
"How did you get over this feeling?"
"What feeling?"
Bobby touched the daffodil to his nose, seemingly without a care in the world.
"Life passing you by."
"Pardon?"
"Maybe I'm just jaded. I feel like I'm losing my audience, because I'm not doing all these edgy stunts like Dare Clemmens.
It's probably hard to condescend to people about their life choices whilst carelessly darting through traffic at speeds upwards of 150 miles per hour, but Dare managed to pull it off. I guess that Testarossa only drives on the high road.
I wish you'd just consider how many lives you've adversely affected in the AWE with your little stunts, Dare. Your actions have repercussions. What if I told you that, because you sent Bradley Stokes that dick pic, he can't walk past a corn dog vendor without dry heaving? What if I told you that you're the reason the company clamped down on the dress code, and that because of this, I am no longer permitted to Jheri curl my hair, because it's just 'too provocative for television'? What if I told you that dick pic was the reason that, as part as AWE new policy, American Tommy had to attend sexual harassment seminars for 8 weekends in a row?
Why even ask? I know what you'd do - the same thing you always do, sweep it under the rug like your affiliation with Kassandrah by saying, 'That thing that happened 3 shows ago is ancient history. I'm a new person!', as if that somehow absolves you of your mistakes.
Or maybe you'll call me homophobic again. Or tell me that I lay down rhymes like a reasonably successful pop band in the late 90s. Well, for one, you should know that Summer Girls was my jam in high school, so whatever. The first part is where you lost me.
Understand, folks, that Dare Clemmens uses homophobia as a soap box that he can step on and off at his own convenience. Never mind that he treated gay gentlemen as props in one of his lewd dares for comedic effect. In Dare's defense, I'm sure he knows that gay folks are actually entitled to the same rights as any other human being when it comes to indecent exposure. But a dare's a dare, right?
And please forget that Dare eluded to Dom Lawson finding a 'pretty girlfriend' in a men's jail only a month ago. That's a lot to unpack in the short amount of time that I have left, but I'm sure you guys know that Dare would never circumscribe another human being into a certain gender dynamic based on his or her sexual preferences. It would be unconscionable to believe that Dare would disrespect the LGBTQ community. After all, we know that he's super progressive, because he beat everyone over the head with that Donald Trump/Austin Gale analogy a few weeks ago.
Just put those worries to rest, folks. Dare's one of the good guys and he wants you to know that it's me who's propagating homophobia, because - uh, well, he couldn't exactly pinpoint that either. He was too busy literally dancing around the issues again, so I'm going to do the work for him and assume he's talking about the time I made fun of the gusto with which he applied his 'Bindy Trent' get-up. I'm really out of touch when it comes to these things, but it must have been when I used that famous homophobic slur 'Buffalo Bill'. You know, that time I was mocking Dare's own 'I'd fuck me' reference about me from the day before.
Awkward."
Zack rested his head in the grass.
"I tried to let you down easy, Dare, but it still must suck to find out that you're a bigot this way. Soon you'll discover that the music you've loved for years is really quite lame, too. If you're lucky, you'll never notice."
Fantana nodded at the oblivious Bobby Franchise.
"But if you're like me, it'll tear you apart slowly. I pray you never feel what it's like to be replaced. Unfortunately for you..."
Zack rose to his feet.
"Replacing you may be the only hope I've got left."
It all seemed foreign. During this brief respite from the cold, it appeared as though hundreds of families were taking advantage of the sunny day and partaking in some outdoor activities at the local park with their kids, but none of them familiar to Zack Fantana. The kites from his youth were replaced in the sky by RC helicopters and drones. The mountain bikes were swapped out for razor scooters, and the roller blades exchanged with hoverboards.
"My greatest fear is that I'll wake up one day and find out I've been rendered obsolete. You know, like maybe Dare Clemmens hasn't just replaced me as the Resilience Champion, but maybe he's replaced me in pop culture. He's only five years younger than me, but he seems so much more present. I mean, I just found out LFO wasn't cool anymore. Dare's hip to all the new music, cars, and social justice terminology."
Zack's brow furrowed and he stopped dead in his tracks.
"Is 'hip' even still... hip? Fuck me, I can't even think of a contemporary word to describe it."
"Relax kid. You sound like you're dancing with Mr. Brownstone."
Zack looked over his shoulder to see his mentor Bobby Franchise squatting down in his purple madras suit to pluck flowers out of the grass, and realized that Bobby was perhaps the wrong person to ask about modern day slang.
He looked off into the distance. Not far away, a sizable cluster of teens had congregated together. Each one seemed to be staring at their cell phone. Zack's eyes lit up.
"Oh, I know what this is."
Fantana briskly approached the huddle.
"So what is it, boys? A Squirtle? Snorlax?"
Soon enough, Fantana was encompassed by the crowd entirely, but re-emerged shortly thereafter, a dejected look painted across his face.
"What happened?", Bobby said while admiring a daffodil.
"It wasn't Pokemon, Bobby. It wasn't Pokemon at all. They had, like, an entire pre-teen fight club in there. Jesus, I really am out of touch."
Zack collapsed onto the ground and gazed into the blue sky.
"How did you get over this feeling?"
"What feeling?"
Bobby touched the daffodil to his nose, seemingly without a care in the world.
"Life passing you by."
"Pardon?"
"Maybe I'm just jaded. I feel like I'm losing my audience, because I'm not doing all these edgy stunts like Dare Clemmens.
It's probably hard to condescend to people about their life choices whilst carelessly darting through traffic at speeds upwards of 150 miles per hour, but Dare managed to pull it off. I guess that Testarossa only drives on the high road.
I wish you'd just consider how many lives you've adversely affected in the AWE with your little stunts, Dare. Your actions have repercussions. What if I told you that, because you sent Bradley Stokes that dick pic, he can't walk past a corn dog vendor without dry heaving? What if I told you that you're the reason the company clamped down on the dress code, and that because of this, I am no longer permitted to Jheri curl my hair, because it's just 'too provocative for television'? What if I told you that dick pic was the reason that, as part as AWE new policy, American Tommy had to attend sexual harassment seminars for 8 weekends in a row?
Why even ask? I know what you'd do - the same thing you always do, sweep it under the rug like your affiliation with Kassandrah by saying, 'That thing that happened 3 shows ago is ancient history. I'm a new person!', as if that somehow absolves you of your mistakes.
Or maybe you'll call me homophobic again. Or tell me that I lay down rhymes like a reasonably successful pop band in the late 90s. Well, for one, you should know that Summer Girls was my jam in high school, so whatever. The first part is where you lost me.
Understand, folks, that Dare Clemmens uses homophobia as a soap box that he can step on and off at his own convenience. Never mind that he treated gay gentlemen as props in one of his lewd dares for comedic effect. In Dare's defense, I'm sure he knows that gay folks are actually entitled to the same rights as any other human being when it comes to indecent exposure. But a dare's a dare, right?
And please forget that Dare eluded to Dom Lawson finding a 'pretty girlfriend' in a men's jail only a month ago. That's a lot to unpack in the short amount of time that I have left, but I'm sure you guys know that Dare would never circumscribe another human being into a certain gender dynamic based on his or her sexual preferences. It would be unconscionable to believe that Dare would disrespect the LGBTQ community. After all, we know that he's super progressive, because he beat everyone over the head with that Donald Trump/Austin Gale analogy a few weeks ago.
Just put those worries to rest, folks. Dare's one of the good guys and he wants you to know that it's me who's propagating homophobia, because - uh, well, he couldn't exactly pinpoint that either. He was too busy literally dancing around the issues again, so I'm going to do the work for him and assume he's talking about the time I made fun of the gusto with which he applied his 'Bindy Trent' get-up. I'm really out of touch when it comes to these things, but it must have been when I used that famous homophobic slur 'Buffalo Bill'. You know, that time I was mocking Dare's own 'I'd fuck me' reference about me from the day before.
Awkward."
Zack rested his head in the grass.
"I tried to let you down easy, Dare, but it still must suck to find out that you're a bigot this way. Soon you'll discover that the music you've loved for years is really quite lame, too. If you're lucky, you'll never notice."
Fantana nodded at the oblivious Bobby Franchise.
"But if you're like me, it'll tear you apart slowly. I pray you never feel what it's like to be replaced. Unfortunately for you..."
Zack rose to his feet.
"Replacing you may be the only hope I've got left."