Mykel's
Post
MRR Column no 34
“A
young outcast will often feel that there is something wrong with
himself, but as he gets older, grows more confident in who he is, he
will adapt, he will begin to feel that there is something wrong with
everyone else.” --Criss
Jami
Bully
by
Mykel Board
It's
1958. The school yard at Lee Avenue Elementary School... in
Hicksville. I'm off in a corner, as usual... trying to avoid being
dragged into some sport, like baseball (I like watching, but hate
playing)... or football,... (I detest on all counts).
Harvey
McConnell... who, in my 8-year old mind is Harvey O'Jerk... has
cornered me in the playground. Harvey probably isn't very tall, but
he looks tall to me... tall and wide as a house... with a blond
crewcut and the kind of square face only the goyim have.
“Okay,
you little faggot,” he says.
I
have no idea what faggot
means, except that it's not something nice.
“Your mommy gives you money for lunch,” he continues. “I watch you sometimes. You hardly eat anything... just suck up that milk and have a slice of bologna... I eat lunch. I need your lunch money. You don't.”
“Your mommy gives you money for lunch,” he continues. “I watch you sometimes. You hardly eat anything... just suck up that milk and have a slice of bologna... I eat lunch. I need your lunch money. You don't.”
“Fuck
you! If you want it, you're gonna have to take it from me,” I don't
say.
Instead,
I reach into my pocket and pull out three crumpled dollar bills. I
hold them out to Harvey. He laughs, takes them from my hand, turns
around and heads toward the guys playing baseball.
FLASH
TO NOW: I sit here at the Toshiba thinking about bullying and how
fashionable it is to complain about it. In liberal circles, The only
way you can establish street cred is to talk about being bullied.
You're nobody unless you've been bullied. The more, the better.
If
you played football in school... you're a loser. If you had kind
parents, were never bothered by your classmates, had a smooth
childhood... you're an unfeeling robot who can never understand what
it's like. It makes no difference what IT is... you can still never
understand it.
So
me and my flip-fone and my barely-this-century computer with my
MS-DOS database, need to establish ourselves before I continue with
my story. I did. Okay? Do I have my cred?
Yeah,
I want to talk about bullying? It's all the rage and people are right
to be concerned... but not in the way you think.
Let's
review:
I've
written about the verbal war I have with the lefty no free speech
to those who would deny it to others people.
They believe it's not censorship
if the government isn't the censor. As if getting fired for saying
something is less damaging in America than getting fined for the same
thing. Can you say Imus and
Curt Schilling?
That's not censorship... that's the market place, they say.
On
the right, people say it's not censorship, if iTunes, Amazon and
Walmart-- the only source for music for many Americans.... require
changes in cover art, or lyrics before they sell something... as if
that's less intimidating than a visit from the Sheriff of Mayville.
Lately,
I've been in facebook debates with progressives®
who say that slavery is where people are forced to work and
the benefits of that work go to someone else. Yet these same
progressives®
think some good ole boy Southern landowner with a whip is more of a
slave master than hunger... that Southern Negroes were slaves because
they had to work to live... but modern McDonald's workers are NOT
slaves, even though if THEY don't work, they die. Raise your hand if
you hate your job! If you work only because you need to have food and
shelter, tell me you're not a slave.
It
occurs to me that slavery is the ultimate bullying. Legal, as well as
physical threats. You work or you're whipped. Or maybe I'll whip you
for the hell of it. All depends on whose history of slavery you
read... or believe. But bullying didn't end with slavery. Even
slavery didn't end with slavery.
When
I was robbed in that playground... my lunch money ripped from my
hands back in 1958, of course, that was bullying. These days people
worry about more. We hear about microaggression
(aka microbullying). A
snicker, an elbow nudge, a raised eyebrow. In New York... according
to a recent law... the use of a wrong gender pronoun is bullying.
Bullying is something white hets do that makes others feel
uncomfortable. Anything they do.
FLASH
TO MIAMI: I'm with my friends in Wynwood... a fashionable part of
Miami, gentrified through graffiti. Instead of building ugly new
buildings and keeping them
pristine through jail for artists (like Guiliani did in NY) or with graffiti-rejecting paint (like in San Francisco)... Wynwood has embraced graffiti artists, turned 'em loose, turned the town into a sea of color... a river of big eyes, sexy ladies and sexy men... funny aliens... slogans... a feast for the eyes. It's a joy to be here.
pristine through jail for artists (like Guiliani did in NY) or with graffiti-rejecting paint (like in San Francisco)... Wynwood has embraced graffiti artists, turned 'em loose, turned the town into a sea of color... a river of big eyes, sexy ladies and sexy men... funny aliens... slogans... a feast for the eyes. It's a joy to be here.
The
only problem is parking. Richard is driving. He's a Cuban-American
pal who knows Miami better than I do.
He
drives around the block... another block... back to the first. We're
trying to get to Wynwood
Brewery, fine makers of one of my favorite American Porters.
Ah here's a parking space...
Richard slides in.
I
know the tricks. They charge for parking, sometimes hide the meters.
You gotta go to a machine someplace, get a receipt, put it in the
window. The city makes a ton of cash by towing cars whose owners
thought they got free parking. Richard pulls out his smart phone.
“Who're
you gonna call?” I ask. “Can't it wait? Let's get some beer!”
“Mykel,”
he says. “I gotta pay for parking.”
“I got quarters,” I tell him.
“I got quarters,” I tell him.
“Mykel,
Mykel, Mykel,” he says, shaking his head like a parent wiping the
face of a chocolate-guzzling toddler. “You can only pay by phone.
You need to download the app, register a credit card, then put in
your location and pay.”
Richard
points overhead. I look up. A sign: To pay for parking, please use
PARKPAY. If you don't have the app, download it to your smartphone at
parkpay.com.
What
if you don't have a smartphone, motherfucker? This is bullying! I
can't park here if I don't own a smartphone. I'm being bullied into
buying something I don't want. How much longer before I won't be able
to get into a movie theater... or board an airplane without a
smartphone?
This
extortion... several hundred dollars if you include the contracts,
the accessories and the other shit... is worse than any innocent
white guy calling his wimpy classmate “a faggot.” It's certainly
more expensive.
“What?”
I say. “The city bullies you into having a credit card, a
smartphone, and downloading an app that knows where you are every
second?”
“BINGO!”
he says.
“I
have no smartphone,” I say. “Does that mean I can't park in
Miami?”
He
nods, pointing his finger at me in a YOU GOT IT gesture.
BINGO!
is right.
THAT
is the kind of bullying people should be complaining about. I got
over my lunch-money theft decades ago, but technological bullying
never ends.
Is
this the first time?
You
bet your walkman it's not. You're too young to remember when we were
bullied into buying CD players because companies stopped making
vinyl... or into buying DVD players because of the end of videotape.
The
bullying never ends.
FLASH
TO THE SCHOOL I TEACH IN: It's my first class of the day. I stumble
through a hangover haze from last night at BAR BACON.
My
brain feels like it's trying to escape my skull. My stomach is so
churned it doesn't know which end is up... and doesn't care as long
as it can spill something. I can feel my eyebags dragging on the
floor. Kiko, the receptionist, squints as I enter.
“What
are you doing here?” she asks. “Your first class was canceled.”
“What???”I
say, trying to both speak and hold down the vomit at the same time.
“I
sent you an email,” she says.
I
should be glued to my email ... my computer, my smartphone, my
brain-implanted chip? I should check my email, or respond or be ON 24
hours with a PING if something new comes to gmail or if someone LIKES
my vasectomy photo on facebook.
I'm
being bullied into NOT using email as a convenience... sent, like a
letter, when I'm able to... responding in time. They're making me a
slave to email.
Other
people say DON'T SEND EMAIL AT NIGHT, don't text me after 10. Why?
Because they don't shut off their smartphones! They're already
slaves... slaves to the technology. On the plantation, THOSE slaves
could sleep at night. They could stop and eat, the slavemaster had to
keep them in good shape... they were expensive. They had plenty of
time to sleep to get ready for the next day of cotton picking.
Slaves
of today are as disposable as videotape players. Use it up, hire a
new one... there are more where they came from. Today's slaves are
on call 24 hours. They don't have to be cared for. Waddaya mean you
want to sleep? I sent you an email.
This
is the bullying you need to worry about. You'll get over your boss
frowning when you say my partner. You'll get over someone
complementing your ass when you walk up Fourth Avenue. You'll get
over someone using the “wrong” pronoun when you ask directions.
But
you WON'T get over technological bullying. You won't get over being
forced to BUY BUY BUY and then throw out what you just bought. You'll
get over having your lunch money stolen on the playground. You won't
get over the extortion from Apple, Amazon, facebook, Microsoft or
Google.
Don't
talk to me about how my “privilege” (penis, roundish eyes,
easily-sunburned skin) protects me from being bullied. Bullying is
the name of the game, and if you live in the modern world... you have
to play the game.
ENDNOTES:
[You can contact me by email at god@mykelboard.com. Through the post
office: send those... er... private DVDs..or music or zines... or
anything else (legal only!) to: Mykel Board, POB 137, New York, NY
10012-0003. If you like my writing, you can be notified when anything
new is available by subscribing to the MYKEL'S READERS Yahoo group
readmboard-subscribe@yahoogroups.com]
-->Who
needs Trump dept: The Pew Research Center reports
that more Mexicans are leaving the US than entering.
Says
the report: From 2009 to 2014, 1 million Mexicans and their families
(including U.S.-born children) left the U.S. for Mexico. This
according to data from the 2014 Mexican National Survey of
Demographic Dynamics (ENADID). U.S. census data for the same period
show an estimated 870,000 Mexicans left Mexico to come to the U.S., a
couple hundred thousand fewer than went the other way.
-->Special
Congrats Dept: My very long-time friend, performance artist, and
half of my blog proof-reading staff, has finally graduated from
Columbia College in Chicago. I was there, and Sid's
fish-hat/mortarboard was the hit of the show! Sid Yiddish, (who it's
looking more and more like I'll be voting for for
president) got his Masters in Interdisciplinary Art... while the
bachelors looked on. Omedeto, Sid!
-->Right
again dept: I'm often wrong in my predictions. Can you say,
“America will never have a colored president?” So when something
comes out right, it brings an ear-wiggling smile to my face.
Several
months ago I wrote
a piece about the left's tendency not to binge and purge, but to
purge and purge. All lefties better get used to watching their backs,
because being a lefty requires a tattoo of a target there.
Now
I hear that Gilman Street, the totalitarian club started by Tim
Yohannon at Maximum Rock'n'Roll (bands have to submit their
lyrics for approval before they can play there), is the victim of a
boycott.
The
boycott organizers didn't like that some bands were offensive.
This is PUNK ROCK! It's SUPPOSED to be offensive. But these humorless
overlords don't get it.
I'm glad to be right this time.
I'm glad to be right this time.
-->Speaking
of Bar Bacon dept:
I
had a great Drink Club a Bar
Bacon. Great crowd and great irony that there were two Jews and two
Muslims (among others) together in a Bacon Bar.
One
of the Muslims was the great Joe Kidd. In case you don't know, Joe
Kidd is the Malaysian Luk Haas. Mr. Punk Encyclopedia, Joe is the
hero of everyone in Asia. He's written about them all. He's lived on
more islands than I have, and taken the obscure and let everybody
know about it. He writes (used to write? I don't keep up with the
purges anymore) the Malaysian scene reports in MRR. You can contact
him on facebook... and you should.
---->Your
cheatin' heart dept: A Spanish mattress maker called "Smartress"
has invented a mattress that "detects rhythmic patterns."
Any...
er... extra curricular rhythmic activity will be reported by
smartphone. In order to avoid "false positives," the
mattress also reports the number of people on the mattress at the
time of the rhythm.
Yet
another reason to keep smartphones out of the hands of spouses,
lovers, and other jealous people.
-->
Keeping
the Pressure on Dept:
I want to thank reader George Metesky for suggesting a continuing
Bring Back Mykel effort directed at Maximum Rock'n'Roll for censoring
me.
As
their revolving editrixes move on to commercial ventures, each blames
her predecessors for my demise... as if they had no control over the
business... and couldn't simply invite me back.
Send
your comments to
mrr@maximumrocknroll.com (or
post on their facebook
page)
with the subject line: BRING BACK MYKEL! Let me know how they answer.
-end-