Hate Day
Welcome to my New Holiday.
Soon enough it will be appropriated by all the artificial sentiment assembly lines and Hallmark-induced quasi-event.
I hate it already.
For the moment, I’ll stomach one revulsion while I revel in many others. These are the things I hate today. Try not to take a bite out of your monitor as you’re swept up in the spirit of the occasion.
I’ll start things off with mosey, before I get into a gallop.
I hate people.
There’s an expression I use from time to time: ‘A person is intelligent but people are idiots.’ I’m not certain who said it, but it’s in this context that I hate people. I hate the way people regard other people. We have an instinct to assume the worst or the inferior quality from those around us. At some level an instinct of survival tells us not to rely on others, assuming our own superiority, instead giving us the benefit of ___doubt.
I get a crook in my eye every time I see a driver gesture something needless and offensive because someone in front of him did something to impede his egocentric progress. Every time I see someone cut in line, hypocritically pull some thoughtless insult from their holster or get away with something needlessly profitable, not because it’s mean, but because whenever we do it, and we all do it, we think we are entitled to it.
I hate it because I see the version of them and us on the other side thinking: ‘how dare they.’
People suck and get my hate because they lose objectivity. We are somehow designed to forget we are surrounded by persons, and we become driven by thoughtless emotions, not the logic we all deserve.
People loose logic, they generalize and stereotype… they can’t drive! I hate them.
I hate things.
I hate how important things, also known as stuff, have become. A great line from a great movie*: “Why do I know what a duvet is? How can this possibly help me as a person?” The characters follow with: “We are polishing the brass on the Titanic.” While problems surround us like a herd of icebergs, we concern ourselves with the ornate. I am convinced that things, the clutter rising around us, in unrequested glossies in the mailbox, in insipid jingles bashing against my face through the car stereo, and in the micro-methodically constructed market identity that has decided what I’ll drive, wear, eat, hum to, live for, and listen to, are all only getting in the way.
A better television screen should not be considered innovation.
I hate the things I want but don’t have, how I talk myself out of them and salivate for them again. I feel like we’re all dieters at a dessert buffet, some of us uncontrollable, some unconvinced, but none entirely immune.
I hate trends for the same reason I hate things. I hate the thoughts we dedicate to fashion, in all its forms, none of which contribute.
I hate __gate.
I can’t stand how every scandal since the early seventies, political or otherwise, is labeled with the snappy suffix ‘gate’. Watergate’s biggest crime is in bringing us Waiter-gate, Sewer-gate, Lewinski-gate, Governor-gate… I’m now waiting for an intense senate hearing-style fracas over someone’s offensive white picket fence.
I know what we’ll call it… wait for it… Gate-gate.
Damn you, Woodward and Bernstein.
I don’t know about you, but I’m getting pretty pissed. I just noticed my fingertips digging into the top of my desk.
I hate hate.
Slightly contradictory perhaps, but please continue.
It could be the worst word in the English Language. It represents an evolution of our species that has never been necessary. Survival has never required hating another person or an object, or even a pop-singer. Even the use of ‘hate’ in a passing colloquial-dalliance doesn’t make sense.
You can’t actually hate cooked vegetables, you can’t hate an unfashionable trend, and you might think you hate an anti-popular Hollywood idol, but it is nearly impossible to hate the perception that represents them. You can dislike whatever you please, you are not required to like everything, in fact if we all liked the same thing I would probably hate that too, but can the negativity. Saying you hate the little things makes it slightly more okay to hate the big things. Give your over-developed hate muscle a little alone time.
Aside from the occasional appearance razor-sharp satire, why do we have hate? I hate hate.
Do as I say, not as I hate, in this case.
I hate Super-Fans.
This hate includes most deep conversations about sports. Professional athletic excellence is among the last great showcases in our society. A good game is the last bastion of true unpredictability. Some of the great examples of modern poetry and expression are drawn from the heroism of athletic achievement. Aside from the celebrity garbage that tends to follow many of its figures, which I also hate, there’s a perception many fans have of their own involvement that bothers me.
Super sports fans seem to have this feeling of entitlement over their team. Sometimes I overhear of am drawn into a discussion that involves a group of players they’ll never meet, and how ‘We’re really going to get them this year,’ or ‘We’ve really gotta get rid of this player.’ My least favorite is how they seem to attach an awareness on to the players’ personalities as though they know them. They sound like teenage boy band fanatics: ‘He’s so spoiled,’ or ‘all he cares about is the money.’ It’s often fascinating insight considering they see them only through a hockey visor.
As for the meatheads that wear only body paint to a subzero football game, I keep waiting for Darwin to come and save them.
I’m officially mad now. I really hate those guys. Just picturing the dopey bastards…
I hate Wal-Mart on a Sunday.
This is really a love-hate thing. I keep going. I tend to be confronted with the absolute worst of society in mere steps on to the ‘purchase pathway’. I can walk around for two minutes and be stocked with material, and resentment.
I hate how some parents look at their kids as a burden in department stores. I hate this mostly on Sundays, in Wal-Mart. I just want to grab their slappy, crappy parental hands off that clutch of their kids’ shoulders, take them back in time, and take all their own fuckin’ toys and burn them. I know childcare is tricky for a lot of parents, but if they’re that much trouble, if you can’t relate to how cool the toy section looks to someone who doesn’t understand the concept of money yet, one of you stay with them in the car, and stay out of my universe.
I hate pump-action toy shotguns.
Why do these exist? A handheld conveyance for spraying water or suction-cup darts or foam puff balls or light-up laser effects is different to me than a toy replicated from a firearm carried only by police, criminals, and action movie stars. It’s replicated from a device designed and perceived to harm other humans. Why do we have a version for kids to practice with?
The thought of some nasty bastard at Nerf getting some wild x-mas bonus because of his breakthrough shotgun design makes me want to punch a dog.
I hate PDAs; the public affection kind. Sorry, I just do…my essay. I hate the text message kind too. Who named them after fruit? I hate them too.
I hate that movies ran out of originality ten years ago; there must be no good books left.**
I hate the overt misuse of our great language: ‘youse’, ‘whole ‘nother’, ‘you ain’t never gonna get it’, etc. I dislike people using the letter ‘Z’ in place of ‘S’ and thinking it’s clever. English is the most nuanced and grandly verbose form of communication on the planet. Frankly, I believe it and each of us sharing it deserve the proper respect.
The next time someone uses ‘seen’ in the wrong tense… “I seen this great show today,” I’m going to punch them in their teeth.
I hate faux-hawks.
I think I just crushed my mouse.
I hate blister packs. I bought a package of ‘energy-saving’ light bulbs recently wrapped in three square meters of rigid plastic. What energy has been saved here? Everything comes in this impenetrable crap. The other night I saw a commercial for a cutter specifically designed to open this packaging. I hate commercials.
Here’s an idea: Loose the space-age polymer, Mother Earth’s been through enough agonizing irony.
I hate greeting cards. Mentioned earlier, I know. I hate that you can buy a sentiment. When I know one is required I look for the one with the least written on it, scratch that crap out, and try to say something meaningful. I mostly just get them for the envelope.
They have potential for redeeming themselves when they introduce the hate card.
I hate makeover shows. TV needs a bunch of obnoxious quasi-experts to invade unannounced and show every friggin’ channel how to find its true beauty.
I hate people who stop walking in a progression. Do you ever find yourself moving with the rhythm of the crowd, through a sports arena, to the subway, or towards the top of an escalator, and the person or couple in front of you JUST STOP? They’ve decided to take an ignorant little moment to discuss the rest of their lives, forcing you to crawl over and around them while you get people crowding your back like you’re on a bobsled team.
Be aware of your surroundings, be decisive in your progress, but above all be thankful, that I didn’t shove your tongue into the top of that escalator.
I hate chest hair sprouts. I hate them mostly because I can’t not look at the nasty bastards. Rediscover the crew neck undershirt, gentlemen. Your body hair is not my business. Sadly, the obnoxious self-righteous makeover-naughts are heading to your house next for waxtime.
I hate childishness. It’s different than playfulness. Children are egocentric and are learning to be capable of selflessness and consideration of certain consequences. No excuse from an adult.
I hate Reality TV, mostly because of the stupendous contradiction. I hate addictions, I hate attractions, I hate affectations. I hate perfume for men, SUVs with TVs in them, excessive use of the color pink, black stereotypes, gay stereotypes, lame white-guy stereotypes, the price of gas, the cost of alternatives, dog clothes, mailbox flyers, theatre lineups, politicians’ pensions, talk radio, people that don’t know how to use four-way stop signs, everything above DOUBLE, people that don’t know when to shut up, and people who don’t finish essays.
...I pretty much hate everything that has the capacity to be stupid or is the result of stupidity. So... yeah, I hate everything today.
I don’t hate you.
Keep your dukes up.
Patrick
* The movie is Fight Club
** My Novel: The Valiant Unheroic - Find it at www.chapters.ca -
