Respect Authority

China mad about democracy? Never!

A newspaper published by China’s ruling Communist party blasted the much-anticipated Guns N’ Roses Album, Chinese Democracy, this week, calling it an “attack on the Chinese nation.” Delayed since recording began in 1994, Chinese Democracy dropped on Sunday, which is to say, devoted (and patient) GNR fans could pick up the CD at oh-so-cool Best Buy, the only retailer carrying it.

But not one to waste time, the Global Times wrote a story Monday with the headline “American band releases album venomously attacking China,” which aside from being far too long, credited anonymous Chinese Internet users with describing the album as part of a Western plot to “grasp and control the world using democracy as a pawn.”

Well, creepy accurate Chinese Internet users – all four of you – but unfortunately not entirely true in this scenario. While America is totally all about using democracy to gain favor, or power, in other parts of the world – Iraq, Afghanistan, the South – we as a country have yet to make Axl Rose our official spokesman, a move I consider remiss on the part of whoever’s in charge of this country’s public relations. So any efforts on the part of Mr. Rose to perpetuate democracy in any part of the world is purely coincidental. Read More ›

Does anyone else remember the XFL?

The short-lived football phenomenon was what many considered the beginning of the end for professional sports — I mean, besides curling. In a sort of “Smackdown meets Monday Night Football” style, the league played for but one unfortunate season in 2001. Founded, unsurprisingly, by Vince McMahon (owner of World Wrestling Entertainment), the XFL was football with harder tackles, more camera angles, retarded nicknames and on-player microphones. McMahon, who apparently didn’t realize that football players spend most of their field time talking about, well, football, was anticipating far more scandal in the game than actually exists. Even high-tension rivalries and on-jersey monikers that included the infamous “He Hate Me” (which doesn’t even make sense, to say nothing of grammatical accuracy) wasn’t enough to save the XFL.

So seven years later, with He Hate Me most likely serving cheeseburgers at a McDonald’s in the suburbs of Florida, football is at it again.
Read More ›

Okay, so it wasn’t like I didn’t know The Beach was bad. Even though this movie came out in 2001, when Leonardo DiCaprio was at the veritable height of his career as a teenage heartthrob (not to be confused with his current career as an adult heartthrob), all anyone really knows about it now is that it’s bad. Things like the mildly ludicrous plot, or the highly ludicrous editing, were lost as conversation topics over the years, replaced with the more vague and easier-to-remember “The Beach? Man, that movie fucking sucked.”

But Sunday wasn’t exactly full of television options, and in a hungover daze on Saturday morning, I actually watched The Truth About Cats and Dogs, so I figured the bar was already set pretty low. Read More ›

The future does freak me out, but sometimes the present is almost worse. The innovations afforded to us by scientific advancement these days can be as terrifying as they are mind-blowing, and when science advances beyond the realm of the necessary, all bets are truly off.

Robotic body parts, space technology, medical advancements - these are things I understood. Innovation for the sake of a better society. In fact, outside of the dozens of would-be inventors lining up to patent their latest get-rich-quick scheme, it does appear that the majority of scientific discoveries are made with an admirable purpose in mind. But there are exceptions, and probably have been ever since someone first realized they could use technology to maximize laziness. With useful-yet-unnecessary devices like the remote control fleshing out the bottom of the list, it takes something profoundly retarded to make it to the top. Enter Turducken. Read More ›

Zero Tolerance is a weekly feature, appearing on Saturdays, that briefly covers some unacceptable offense from the prior week. This is far from a hard science, in fact, it’s entirely likely that it’s not even fact based — indeed, this is pure opinionated ranting because it’s my website and I can cry if I want to. — RA

In the age of the Internet, print magazines’ place in the world is deteriorating rapidly. Every week another once-heralded publication trims its pages, reduces frequency, or in the hopelessly ironic case of PC Magazine this week, goes all-online. It won’t be too long before picking up the latest issue of Time or People simply means checking your e-mail.

Since RA is already a blog, we can’t explore the all-online option anymore than we already have, yet in the actual trickle-down effect of nationwide economics, our staff is just as beaten down as the underpaid and ever-laid-off employees of print magazines. After all, we have other jobs, and can only go so long before questioning how much time and energy to put into this little effort (once called masturbatory by a reader, who we’ve since killed) at the expense of things like social interaction, or excessive drinking. Seriously, I haven’t done any excessive drinking in hours because of this blog! It’s killing me. Read More ›

Sometimes someone else’s wit is so great that I have to defer to it, even on my own blog. Cracked, in a fit of sheer genius, listed the 25 men who most look like old lesbians, and holy shit are they right. 

Among their choices are pop culture aficionado (and God willing, my future husband) Chuck Klosterman, as well as Rick James, Tim Robbins and Dana Carvey. While their selections alone are stellar, the accompanying photos really seal the deal. The consensus by the way, is that 90s hair and large glasses do a lesbian make. 

So in the interest of being funnier than other funny people, I’d like to take a look at the lesbians who look most like old men. Except I’m only doing three because shit, I don’t get paid for this. Read More ›

These are parents.

The Bronx is burning.

Or at least it will be when area residents try to destroy the borough that now has the same name as the first child of Ashlee Simpson and Pete Wentz. Seriously Bronxites, it’s time to give up and start over.

Petashley, or whatever it is celebrity magazines are calling the couple these days, gave birth to little Bronx last night, at which point any sane doctor would have accidentally “lost” the child to a better family. I can’t imagine what life will be like in the Simpson/Wentz house, except for an excess of posturing and eyeliner. Nor, the more that I think about it, can I seriously picture a single time I’ve heard of either of the two actually traveling to the Bronx?

But the best part is the mainstream media’s coverage of the event. Despite her nose job and recent attempts at second-round pop stardom, publications like Reuters still refer to Simpson as the girl that lip-synched her way into infamy on Saturday Night Live, and Wentz’s music will be referred to as “pop-punk” until he dies.

Oh, and the kid’s middle name is Mowgli. Seriously.

In the interesting of proving to you loyal readers that I do much more than read local news and watch reality television (believe it or not, I actually have a day job), I’m taking it upon myself to broaden the scope of my Respect Authority contributions to include art. And no, not in the abstract “Everything is art; Rock of Love is totally art!” sense, I mean like actual art. The kind they put in museums, although I guess in this case it would have to be a fairly free-thinking museum.

I first discovered Edward Kienholz is high school, as an art history textbook I now consider fairly progressive, opined on “The State Hospital,” one of his more famous works.

Although I loved the piece then, for reasons fairly unknown to me and likely indicative of some deep mental disturbance, I have taken little time since to fully explore Kienholz’s other work, primarily because it’d be like watching House on Haunted Hill – on repeat. Read More ›

Twenty-nine points of compatibility, and not one was “Do you like penii or vaginii?”

Online matchmaker eHarmony will soon launch a separate Web site for those eyeing same-sex matches. (Don’t get your hopes up about the state of society – they were forced to, after losing a discrimination suit in New Jersey). Compatible Partners, the unexcitingly named same-sex site, will allow its first 10,000 visitors to register for free, after which the nation’s gay population can get scammed into paying for online dating, just like the rest of us. I mean …them. Not me. I only pay for sex. Read More ›

Only a few short weeks after a New York woman joined the ranks of ladies suing bars for their mechanical bull standards, this woman has an issue with the drinks themselves.

An Upper West Side bar left one woman “engulfed in flames” and — according to the New York Post, which apparently didn’t think being engulfed in flames encompassed this — “horribly burned,” after a bartender poured Bacardi 151 on the bar and then set it on fire.

Really, I’m surprised no one thought that would end badly.

Apparently the bar-fire gimmick comes into play whenever “Great Balls of Fire” comes on the jukebox, which is kind of a bizarre reason to put the lives of your entire patronage in jeopardy. Brother Jimmy’s pulled the drink of the shelves in all of its locations the next day and the victim’s lawyer said she’s trying to rid the city of 151 altogether.

While I can’t imagine I wouldn’t be more than a little pissed off if I was set on fire simply for trying to knock back a few beers, I have to believe someone will eventually tell this woman that more or less any liquor could be set on fire with a lighter, regardless of its potency. So knocking 151 off shelves won’t solve whatever fire bar-stunt epidemic there is out there. That said, after a brief flirtation with 151 in my youth, I have absolutely no problem with it being abolished in New York, or frankly the world. Even without a lighter that drink sets fires – in my throat.

In fact, I’m not entirely confident that a 151-hangover is any less severe than a third-degree burn, so perhaps I should look into a lawsuit against Bacardi for physical and emotional distress caused by getting tore up in freshman year of college. I’ll aim low: $15 million. 

"I'll find you."

I know this is about 12 years too late, but has anyone else ever really listened to the lyrics of Mariah Carey’s 1996 hit, “Always Be My Baby.” I mean, REALLY listened. One would think so, considering everyone and their mother - and potentially their mother’s mother - knows the words to this song. I certainly know them, and I consider that knowledge imperative to a surprisingly large number of social situations - throwback parties, weddings, long nights alone in my apartment. As far as I’m concerned, anyone under the age of 40 should be prepared to belt out ABMB at the drop of a hat. 

In any case, this morning on my way to work, I took some time - afforded to me by the fact that the train was so packed I couldn’t move my arms to change the song - to really have a listen to the words. Although the majority of the song is clearly about love, and everlasting love, and so forth, it’s this particular verse that gave me pause:

You’ll always be a part of me
I’m a part of you indefinitely
Boy don’t you know you can’t escape me
Oh darling cause you’ll always be my baby
….
No way you’re never gonna shake me
Ooh darling cause you’ll always be my baby

Creepy to anyone else? I know word on the street is that Mariah and Nick Cannon are doing exceedingly well which, considering I thought they’d be divorced before leaving the island they got married on, could simply mean they haven’t actively killed each other yet. Nonetheless, Cannon better not start wild ‘n out or anything, because it kind of sounds like Mariah doesn’t know how to let go.