Wednesday, October 12, 2005

Rage War

Every now and then, I’ll recognize that I have a lot of anger stewing within and I don’t know where it comes from. There are those people who see a sea of traffic on the highway or long lines at the grocery story and they just shrug and go with it. I’m not one of those people. I have rage. I have all kinds of rage about all kinds of things, not just how no one cares about feminism anymore or a sense of community or what were at one time common courtesies, but a Whisky Tango Foxtrot kind of rage. This rage that's worse in the morning with a coffee fueled serotonin rush, where I can be driving to work and on the radio hear 2005 Factory Cash Back on Sienna and I get mad. For no reason. Okay, well, there's clearly a reason there - it should be 2005 Factory cash back on A Sienna or on THE Sienna but they just say ON SIENNA like we're all just supposed to intuitively know that car names don't need articles before them anymore.

Or sometimes just the word Toyotathon can enrage me.


Or that whatever lane I’m driving in on highway is the lane that ISN’T moving! Or that people no longer comprehend the need for “braking distance.” Oh yes, slow moving beater of a Mazda plastered in BUSH/CHENEY bumper stickers and support our troop ribbons, those three inches between my car and the car in front of me is exactly where you should be!

Or, and this is really the point of this entry, how NPR can glibly spout a story on Nationally Puzzling Radio (known by the masses as NPR) this story about the new “craze” for plastic surgery in Iraq where apparently “well-off Iraqis are seeing Western-style pop music videos featuring thin women with small noses and deciding to go under the knife."

This is apparently explained by the Iraqis' powerful "hope for the future," and as a "small sign of a larger trend." A "steady diet of pop culture" has made Iraqi men dissatisfied with the bodies and faces of their wives, and rendered women unhappy with their own appearances, and somehow this is "a sign of progress" for Iraqis who "don't know what the future will hold, but can at least control what they will look like," without a trace of irony or commentary on the cruelty.

Among the many other astounding assertions, the story seemed to suggest that lots of Iraqis are much wealthier than they were "under Saddam," so now they have disposable income to spend on luxury purchases like plastic surgery, and access to western television makes Iraqi women want to look more like western women.

Despite the Faux News Channel's constant stream of propogandic drivel, nothing has given me the impression that things are very good in Iraq at the moment. The delivery of water, electricity and other municipal services is still lagging behind what it was "under Saddam." Violence, and attempts to control the violence, are huge impediments to industry and commerce. Oil production still has many challenges. So how is it that Iraqis are, as the story said, wealthier now than they were "under Saddam"? Where is this alleged money coming from?

My real disgust comes from the media's (and now even NPR's party to this!) attempt to reassure us that, just like American women, Iraqi women are also easily brainwashed into self-hatred of their bodies, and deep down they want to be just like us, and surely will begin conforming to U.S. mores, and doing what we tell them, soon. Rest easy. The "audio" is available at the NPR website. I must listen to this again to see if it was as stupefying as I recall.

Oh, so much anger and nowhere to vent it.

But hey, if I didn't have my anger, I wouldn't be me.

Maybe a little plastic surgery will cheer me up. Jeeeezus!

No comments:

250words_150w BS_Button