I just got back from seeing Gonzo with Marion.
Having gone in with only the dimmest idea of what Thompson wrote about or what he represented politically and morally in his private life (vs. what he represented in the public eye), I can only blame myself for actually sitting through it till the end, hoping to see something interesting. I need to quit my habit of being completely uninformed; I did this when I saw that Bob Dylan movie (ed: I'm Not There) and there was a giraffe in that one. The sharpest impression I'd had of Hunter S. Thompson going in was the one I got from the cover of the Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas movie.
What I know now, more definitively than ever, is that I'm tired of hearing about the 60's. I'm tired of hearing old people talk about how cool they used to be. The whole movie was masturbation and I paid six dollars to see it. Thank god I'm a student or it would have been eight, and even that would have been an overly generous contribution to the My Elders Have Nothing New To Say fund.
I'm tired of reading men and their dick jokes. I'm tired of their "...and then his cock slid into her pussy..." books. I'm tired of their concern with my birth control. Far be it from me to point my finger at anyone and call them vulgar, but the men that our culture is interested in reading are base. Tell me I'm wrong. Please, for the love of God, give me a book, written by a man, that isn't about sex. Restore my faith in them, and show me some words that don't spell out MY MOTHER DIDNT BREASTFEED ME LONG ENOUGH/ MY MOTHER BREASTFED ME FOR TOO LONG.
Thompson was yet another misogynistic, drug-addled jerk produced by a generation marred beyond repair by war, and lionized by the misogynistic, drug-addled jerks who came after him. It's no wonder to me in that case that literature is in the state it's in (looking at you, Frey) or that the world is run by people who get off on controlling my uterus.
If I ever have to watch another movie, or read another column, or another novel, or another (auto)biography about or by a man, especially one born anytime before 1972, I will scream.
3 comments:
Though I do love "Fight Club" (both book and film), I kind of loathe the guy that Chuck Palahniuk seems to be.
"Choke" comes to mind.
I, too, am tired of reading books or hearing about books written by men that look at sex in this really confident, brazen way. I don't get it. I mean obviously sex wasn't a super easy topic for me to tackle in my life, but most of the men I know (even if they're experienced) are totally self-deprecating and nervous about sex -- not all "She had tits that get an eight out of ten, but definitely a ten when my cum was dripping down them" or something like that. You know what I mean?
It gives men a bad name when modern "male" literature seems to be only written by over/undersexed, humorless (in a very specific way), overconfident assholes.
I don't mind works about sex if it handles it in a sensitive, honest way.
To be clear, I don't mean "honest" in the "cock slid into her pussy" way. I mean show me a guy who wasn't at least a little terrified about sex before he actually had sex and I'll show you a motherfucking liar. I haven't forgotten that, but it seems like a lot of these writers have.
This may be totally different from what you're talking about. I don't think it is because what you've written resonates with me a great deal.
But yeah, I think Hunter S. is an interesting guy, but he's certainly no role model of mine in behavior or writing style.
GOOD STORY.
Let's change tenses and write horribly, John!
OK, John, sounds good to me!
I did hesitate when I was typing that last bit about any literary works at all by men...specifically because of Palahniuk. And I own all of his books. He's definitely guilty of the "8 out of 10 tits...etc" approach to sex, but I enjoy the books anyway because he somehow manages to make a complete mindfuck out of the way society works every time. So I tolerate his characters always being able to give the disposable women their orgasms.
I agree with you that sex is...complicated and kind of scary. Honestly, I think it always kind of is. Or maybe I'm hopelessly damaged, haha. And that IS what I was talking about.
On one hand I get that sex is a central experience for all humans (...eventually...most of us...well, you know) so to write about sex is automatically in some way writing about something universal, and, as Aldus Snow put it, "both ancient and perennial".
But on the other hand, I'm tired of that being a cultural shorthand for Edgy Work (I'm pretty sure Bret Easton Ellis is at fault here), like a guitar-playing female is cultural shorthand for This Is A Girl That Gets Dudes. In this day and age, sex isn't taboo at all. Likewise, there are tons of girls who picked up a guitar because they knew it would make them look cool...not because they actually ARE cool.
If someone could accurately write about sex being extraordinary, "both ancient and perennial," and the most ordinary, normal thing in the world at the same time, then THAT would be something I could enjoy reading.
In the meantime, I'm still searching.
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