The New New Rules: A Funny Look at How Everybody but Me Has Their Head Up Their Ass (11 page)

HEAVEN CAN HATE

 

New Rule:
Death isn’t always sad. This week, the Reverend Jerry Falwell died, and millions of Americans asked, “Why? Why, God? Why . . . didn’t you take Pat Robertson with him?” I don’t want to say Jerry was disliked by the gay community, but tonight in New York City, at exactly eight o’clock, Broadway theaters along the Great White Way turned their lights up for two minutes.

I know you’re not supposed to speak ill of the dead, but I think we can make an exception, because speaking ill of the dead was kind of Jerry Falwell’s hobby. He’s the guy who said AIDS was God’s punishment for homosexuality and that 9/11 was brought on by pagans, abortionists, feminists, gays, and the ACLU—or, as I like to call them, my studio audience.

It was surreal watching people on the news praise Falwell, followed by a clip package of what he actually said—things like:

“Homosexuals are part of a vile and satanic system that will be utterly annihilated.” “If you’re not a born-again Christian, you’re a failure as a human being.” “Feminists just need a man in the house.” “There is no separation of church and state.” And, of course, everyone’s favorite: “The purple Teletubby is gay.”

Jerry Falwell found out you could launder your hate through the cover of “God’s will”—he didn’t hate gays, God does.

All Falwell’s power came from name-dropping God, and gay people should steal that trick. Don’t say you want something because it’s your right as a human being—say you want it because it’s your religion.

Gay men have been going at things backward. Forget civil rights, and just make gayness a religion. I mean, you’re kneeling anyway. And it’s easy to start a religion. Watch, I’ll do it for you.

I had a vision last night. The Blessed Virgin Mary came to me—I don’t know how she got past the guards—and she told me it’s time to take the high ground from the Seventh-day Adventists and give it to the twenty-four-hour party people. And that what happens in the confessional stays in the confessional. Gay men, don’t say you’re life partners. Say you’re a nunnery of two. “We weren’t having sex, officer. I was performing a very private mass. Here in my car. I was letting my rod and my staff comfort him.”

One can only hope that as Jerry Falwell now approaches the pearly gates, he is met there by God Himself, wearing a Fire Island muscle shirt and nut-hugger shorts, and saying to Jerry in a mighty lisp, “I’m not talking to you.”

 

 

—May 18, 2007

 

RED POISONING

 

New Rule:
If you were surprised that the Chinese don’t care about toy safety, the child who needs protecting is you. Over the last couple of months, American consumers have been learning a shocking lesson about supply and demand: If you demand products that don’t cost anything, people will make them out of poison, mud, and shit.

Since April, approximately seventeen million toys in the United States, all of them made in China, have been recalled. Which is amazing, considering that no one in the Department of Justice can recall a thing. Now, believe me, I was devastated when Mattel recalled almost everything in my Barbie Dream Closet, although I had suspected something when Ken discovered a lump on his testicle.

Until recently, I never worried about being harmed by the Chinese, unless they were in the left-hand turn lane. But then we found out that their dog food was deadly and they were making toothpaste out of antifreeze. And that the number 62A over at the Szechwan Palace is beef with bronchitis. They don’t care if your precious little Britney sucks a little lead. Because in China, their kids aren’t playing with the toys. They’re the ones in the factory all day making them.

Now, I know you’re saying, “But, Bill, I don’t have time to ponder whether these $12 jeans are the product of child labor. I just know I’m an American on a budget, and our lifestyle is a blessed one, and I want to look nice while standing in line for my iPhone.”

But there is something to be said for thinking about why these bargains are such bargains. Walmart is the most American thing in the universe, but all it sells is crap from China. Walmart wouldn’t exist without the American consumers’ endless thirst for the cheapest stuff China has to offer, like $30 DVD players and Jackie Chan.

In America, there is nothing more sacred than a bargain, and that even includes the war. There’s too much lead in the kids’ toys but not nearly enough on the Humvees in Iraq.

Let’s have a war and cut taxes! What could go wrong? Let’s give mortgages to the homeless! Sounds like a plan! Let’s buy toys from a communist police state. You just know they’ll put in a little extra love. Speaking of which, do you know why today’s modern Chinese capitalist puts lead in the paint that goes on toys? Because it makes colors brighter. You gotta love America: a country that’s literally being killed by the stuff that makes objects shiny.

 

 

—August 24, 2007