Move On!

It's a blessing and a curse

Watch out, Eugene, you don't make things worse

Wild dreams come true, what to do then?

Confusion and glory ~Patterson Hood

My old partner in crime Hollywood and I once had an idea. It was one of those many ideas we cogitate after a long afternoon of drinking in the hot sun. The day before, we noticed the local news gaggle rushing to film a bunch of protestors at the state capitol. I cannot tell you what they were protesting, but to two moderately aged redneck hippies in a slight alcohol haze, the sight of cameras stampeding to capture the latest passion play was a source of great amusement.

We thought, if those yahoos can get on television, certainly we can. We were no uglier and on a good day, from the perspective of our warped little world view, we were a damned bit more interesting. As is our way, the plan germinated was quite simple. We would make some signs and head on down to the capitol. Once there, we, just the two of us, it was very key to only be two of us, would march back and forth, holding our signs and scream "LEGALIZE PROSTITUTION NOW!"

We didn't really care whether prostitution was legal or not. Although, we did fully support the concept. The goal was to see if we could lure some unsuspecting bobble head over to talk to us. And of course, get on T.V.

Little did we know we were pioneers.

Actually, pioneers might be a bit of an exaggeration. Our country has a long history of those who have been willing to make asses of themselves for a few minutes of notoriety. The difference between days of yore and the last five minutes is the near unfettered access to further the transmission of an individual's asshattery.

You can paint a sign and protest. You can Twitter your friends so they all come down to see. You can blog about it. You can Flickr the pictures. You can YouTube the video. You can Podcast the audio. If you are really lucky, your story will be picked up by some outlet of the old media.

This past weekend, Mary Grabar of Dekalb County witnessed some alleged asshattery at the Inman Park Festival Parade. Somehow, her disturbed moment led to a self-penned article in the Atlanta Journal Constitution's opinion page, wittingly or unwittingly, propelling Ms. Grabar into the swirl of stupid.

The dreadful moment? Somebody carrying a sign stating "Impeach Bush". Ms. Grabar claimed her liberal friend was as equally disgusted by the ugly horror. Although she does not claim to be a liberal herself, perhaps it was the typical liberal feeling of self-guilt that kept Ms. Grabar and her friend from also commenting on the people holding "YE MUST BE BORN AGAIN" signs. It is always easiest to pick on your own kind.

Instead, of rolling her eyes, snickering at the blow up doll on the hood of a sports car and moving on to buy smoothies and funnel cakes, Ms. Grabar felt compelled to write to the local news rag. Somehow, her action metastasized into a full blown article complete with snazzy head shot. And once again the circle of life in the new social media world was complete.

Yes, I know. Railing against asshattery and self-indulgence on a tiny blog written by a single man may seem hypocritical. Some might even find it ironic.

Don't like it? I advise you to take the same action Ms. Grabar should have.

Move on.