Monuments of Cringe

There are certain parts of your past where you should not plant your flagpole. There are certain hills you don’t want to die on. There are certain dumpster fires in your life that will burn you so badly that your ashes will blow away like a fart in the wind. The other day I discovered one of mine that I’m probably going to regret sharing with the world. I signed up for a Letterboxd account so that I could have a place to post my movie reviews. One of those reviews was for the 1985 film adaptation of Clue. I wrote this review when I was thirty years old, so I should have been mature enough to not go through with this horrible shit. But in this review, I…um…I, uh…laughed at Miss Scarlet’s “fruit” joke about Mr. Green (who’s gay) and I…suggested that it’s okay to ogle Yvette the Maid before you realize what she looks like now that she’s older.

That Clue review was what I like to call a Monument of Cringe, of which I have thousands of all over the internet. I read what I wrote and I cringed in disgust. My face was the color of zerg piss. My body shivered like someone dropped a toaster in my bathtub. My insides melted into whale slurry at the thought of someone eventually finding this review and broadcasting it out the world. And then the internet celebrates my past mistake with the hashtag “Garrison Kelly Is Over Party”, although my writing career won’t be derailed because I never went far to begin with. I’m grateful to have a small audience. But what if it grows overnight and they wade through this museum of cringe together? All of my embarrassment broadcast for the world to see. Hell, I probably said some embarrassing shit in this essay right now that I’ll get raked over the coals because of.

So what do you do when you realize that you have Monuments of Cringe all over the internet? What do you do when you realize your own published books are Stonehenges of Cringe? What do you do when you realize you built an entire legacy out of being disgusting and horrible in the way you’ve written? Nothing. You don’t delete your entire social media presence. You don’t pull your books off the shelves. If you must apologize to your audience, do so in a genuine and heartfelt way. Don’t make excuses. Remind your audience that they deserve better behavior from someone they look up to. And when you promise to keep growing, keep that promise and be the best version of yourself that you can be.

Because the truth is, a lot of art from the past doesn’t age well. Remember Ace Ventura: Pet Detective? Remember how the audience hee-hawed when they discovered that Einhorn had a boner in her underwear? Well, if you’ve made any effort to unlearn that behavior, you’ll see that transphobia is more harmful than funny and should therefore stay out of comedy forever. Remember all those jokes you heard from Boomer comedians about how much they hate their wives? Remember when the ultra-fat dinner guest ate the “wafer-thin mint” in Monty Python’s The Meaning of Life and then exploded all over the restaurant? Do you know why these things and many other pieces of media are now considered Monuments of Cringe? Because we’re (hopefully) learning more about the world around us. The more we learn, the more we apply it. And the more we apply it and grow into better people, the less likely we are to hold onto piss-poor nostalgia. That’s how life works: it progresses into the future.

I’ve decided after spiraling into disgust at my own past, I’m going to keep my Monuments of Cringe up. Not only do I have so many of them out there that I can’t get rid of them all, but I continue to create them in the present day and there will come a time when they age badly too. Learning to be a better person isn’t something that stops happening when you get to a certain point. It keeps going and going until the day you’re lowered into a wooden box with RIP scrawled across it. You can’t change the past no matter how hard you try. Yes, people will willingly see the ugliest parts of you before they see the best. But for every zergling and goblin that eats you alive, there are even more people who love you. You have to go out of your way to find them, but love is there if you look for it. Hell, there are people who still love J.K. Rowling even though she’s a transphobic bastard. There’s hope for you yet if you have even half the number of Monuments of Cringe that I do.

Perfection is a myth. Everybody has something they’re not proud of. Those who work on atoning for their worst behavior will successfully do so. Those who can’t admit it when they’ve fucked up? Well, let’s just say the over party will be complete with a disco ball and a bowl full of cheese dip. I’m telling you all now that if you happen to stumble upon my Monuments of Cringe and you think the worst of me, I apologize with all of my heart. If it’s years after the fact and another person finds them, I’ll apologize again. And if the future continues to roll on and I get called out for it again, I’ll apologize again. And again. And again. And again. While it is true that you can’t please everybody, you should at least try to be a halfway decent person even if perfection is indeed a myth. You may feel like you’re being looked at under a microscope. I do too sometimes. But if you think you feel alone, try being in the shoes of someone you’ve disenfranchised with your worst behavior.

But if you must hold an over party in my name, at least bring refreshments. Bring lots of Diet Coke. Bring enough pizzas to touch the ceiling. Bring enough bags of potato chips to give me the heart attack you’ve always wanted me to have. While I am sorry for every horrible thing I’ve said over my lifetime, I do indeed have a life to live. Will I live it with you? Will we eat potato chips together and dip them in a wading pool full of sour cream? Will we shove giant handfuls of cake in our mouths and talk about the world together (not with our mouths full, of course)? When I’m done atoning for my sins, I want to party with all of you. The Garrison Kelly over party has a conga line that I’ll gladly lead. Let’s party like it’s…a year that hopefully aged better than whatever god awful nonsense the 80’s and 90’s were. But if you ask me, I’ve erected more Monuments of Cringe in the 2000’s than at any point in my career. Remember Deus Shadowheart and Dr. Scott Cain? No? Good, let’s keep it that way.

IDK

We’re not damsels in distress. We’re not Mary-Sues and Gary-Stus. We’re not femme fatales. Whether we see each other this way or not, everybody in this lifetime is a three-dimensional character. One of the many things that make a character three-dimensional is a goal or an ambition, more than one, in fact. Why do you think we’re so prepared at job interviews whenever the boss man asks us where we see ourselves in ten years? It should be a piece of cake for me to know where I want to go with my writing career. I’m living in this body, so I know where all the brain neurons lead to. Therefore…my ultimate goal for my writing career is…uh…actually, it’s…(sigh)…

IDK, which either means I Don’t Know or I Decay, depending on how often you listen to Gemini Syndrome. As a burned out, low-energy sad sap, IDK is something I say quite often when confronted with questions ranging from the most difficult to bare-bones simplicity. “What are your plans for the day?” IDK. “Where’s your brother?” IDK. “How come you don’t know?” IDK. “What do you want to do with your writing career?” IDK. That last one is how we got to this essay. There are many reasons for wanting a writing career and all of them are valid. But the trick is finding which one suits you the best. I used to think I had a grip on it all, but then expectations vs. reality gave me the world’s hardest kick in the nuts. What once were good reasons for me don’t seem logical in today’s life, especially when factoring in mental health and financial resources.

So…what’s one common reason why people start a writing career? Fortune and fame? Sure, why not. If Stephen King can build an empire of cash, surely I could too. If JK Rowling can build a throne of bones that came from transgender people…wait a minute, bad example, never mind. Surely my skills could skyrocket me into the stratosphere and have me floating in space like Major Tom from a David Bowie song. Right? Well, I hate to burst your space man bubble helmet, but the authors who do go on to become legends are in a tiny minority. Everybody’s heard of Stephen King, but hardly anybody I talk to has heard of Brett Battles, a thriller author whose work inspired me to become a born-again bookworm. Brett Battles can crank out bangers, so why isn’t he Scrooge McDucking a pool of gold coins? Because meritocracy is a myth, that’s why.

But even if I could achieve worldwide fame where everybody knows my name like a Cheers character, not all of those people are going to love me or what I do. In fact, there are going to be a lot of trolls lurking in the shadows waiting to plant suicidal seeds in my head which eventually sprout into full-on schizophrenic hallucinations. There could be thousands of five-star reviews for one of my books, but if one hideous creep tells me I should get sodomized in prison, then my brain will self-destruct and spiral into ashes. Take that one bastard’s words and multiply them across billions of people. My head could explode just from the stress alone and so could my heart. Sensory overload isn’t good for an autistic brain with multiple mental illnesses. They call it meat with electricity inside for a reason, though it’s closer to soggy bacon or tapioca pudding.

And of course, that much fame surely has to come with billions of dollars, right? I should be able to buy Twitter with that much money and tell Elon Musk to eat a dick that looks like a space rocket. But when I think about it, do I really need that much money? Is it not enough just for me to live comfortably and occasionally travel so that I can see my online friends up close and in person? Do I really need five thousand yachts and eight hundred rocket ships that look like dildos? Do I really need a limousine when a normal car driven by one of my family members would do just fine? Do I really need to attend parties full of hookers and blow, double entendre definitely intended? What about the homeless population who are struggling to stay alive? Shouldn’t they be getting low-cost housing? Shouldn’t people in general eat three meals a day and not have to worry about whether they’ll be there or not? I don’t need to be a billionaire. Nobody does. I need for the world to be happy and healthy. I need for children to have their needs met without worrying about dying. Not really a controversial stance, is it?

Okay, so fame and fortune aren’t realistic expectations for me as an author. Maybe I should focus on the love of the craft or having a positive influence on my audience. But in order for those things to happen, I have to have a bigger audience than I do now, which means opening myself up to swarms of trolls who overrun me like little zerglings from Starcraft. But if I stay in the shadows, then my work will reach nobody at all and I’ll never know if I’m having a positive influence on my audience. Yes, I could create my art and not share it at all. I could do it all just for me. But what’s the point? What kind of permanence will it have if nobody knows about it but me? Where’s my digital footprint? Where’s my immortality? I don’t want to take my writing to the grave with me, because I don’t see the point in writing it in the first place if it doesn’t immortalize me in some way. I want it to be for something. I want to make a difference in this world. Otherwise, why am I here in the first place? No, zerglings, this isn’t an invite for you to swarm me with death threats and pictures of my house.

Are there any reasons left? Did I cover them all? There could be more, but I don’t have access to them right now. I could take a quick trip to Google and find more, but we’d be here forever and a day and I don’t have that much time in my schedule. But even if the answers were readily available to me, I’d still give my typical IDK answer, which either means I Don’t Know or I Decay, depending on how badly my mind is rotting on any given day. I don’t know what I want to do with my writing career. There are pros and cons to every available reason. There is no one size fits all plan for me. But does this mean I want to give up and do something else for the rest of my life? Hell no. I want to continue. I want to keep shouting into the void with my literary skills. Even if the entire internet hates my guts because of a cave painting I created in 7 Million BC, fuck it, I’ll continue my career anyways.

But is it okay for me to have an aimless direction? Is it okay for me to be completely rudderless and constantly in zombie mode looking for the next brain to munch on? Is it okay to prioritize my mental health over fame and fortune? Is it okay to ignore the marketing part of my job knowing that the abyss will never respond to me in a meaningful way? Where do I go from here? I could just finish writing my current novel, but even once it’s over, then what? Do I write another hoping that one will rejuvenate my career? Do I write another poetry collection? Another short story collection? Do I just keep writing and writing in hopes that something will change? Do I even want things to change? Will I be happier when things change or will I stagnate some more? Say it with me now: IDK. Does it mean I Don’t Know or I Decay? Yes. Abso-fucking-lutely yes.

Limerence

“…”

Do you hear that? That is the sound of absolutely nobody being shocked by the news that I experience limerence on a daily basis. It is a condition defined as obsessively imagining romance with someone I have a crush on. Cigarettes taste like shit. Alcohol tastes like an entire outhouse. Heroin and cocaine are even worse for the brain than those two things put together. Limerence is my drug of choice because it costs nothing and it helps me cope with the stresses of life, whether it’s the pandemic blues or schizophrenia eating me alive long before that. Instead of traumatic memories, limerence gives me lovey-dovey scenarios to think about. One of these things is not like the other. A night of laying my head in a woman’s lap while she strokes my hair is very much preferable over reliving every insult that’s ever been said to me.

Who am I currently experiencing limerence for? A lot of women, not just one or two. I feel much more comfortable saying the names of super-famous celebrities than I do of You Tubers and people I know online. Celebrities don’t have time to read my social media posts whereas a You Tuber will know exactly who I am and will hit that block button with cat-like reflexes. To be fair to the You Tubers, how would you feel if you learned that a three hundred pound man who lives with his parents and is currently unemployed thought of you in an obsessively romantic way? While beauty is always in the eye of the beholder, I have a feeling it would be creepy no matter who I was. I could have flowing blond locks and abs that would make a great bulletproof vest. I could be a billionaire who cheats on my taxes, but never on my limerent object. It would still be creepy as fuck.

But what about the celebrities who have no time for me? What about the fictional characters who will never be offended by my romantic thoughts because they’re not even real? Well, that depends on what time period you’re talking about. In the late 90’s, it was Cammy White from Super Street Fighter II. In the mid 2000’s, it was Motoko Kusanagi from Ghost in the Shell: Stand Alone Complex. For the rest of the 2000’s, it was Tarja Turunen, the ex-lead singer from Nightwish. In 2018, it was Sarah-Jane Redmond, the actress who played Lucy Butler from Millennium. In the present day, it’s a bunch of lovely You Tubers whose names will go unchecked due to the fact that they might be reading this.

I’m sure none of you want to Google the names I did mentioned. After all, I’m supposed to be showing instead of telling when I write these nonfiction pieces. But there are many common threads among the women I’ve named and haven’t named. They’re beautiful, of course, but not just physically. They have something about them that keeps my limerent mind coming back for more. It could be the intelligence of political discourse, giving safe spaces and love in equal measures. It could be the wisdom of passionate fairytale storytelling, the paladin conquering the ogre and the dragons protecting the elven kingdoms. It could be the talent of singing like an angel from heaven itself, turning the phone book into sensual lyrics. It could be the strength of a warrior who will protect and mother any man she falls in love with. It could be the uncanny knack of seducing men just by being themselves, declaring love and giving kisses to calm the most nervous of men.

Anybody can be physically attractive. Anybody can have ruby red lips that taste like cherry pie, skin that’s soft and arousing to the touch, and hair that when stroked would leave both of your scalps tingling with pleasure. But if someone is physically attractive whilst being a shallow jerk, then that’s a huge turn-off. Nicole Arbour is physically attractive, but because of her fat-shaming rhetoric (“sweating Crisco” and “being unhealthy”), abusive behavior towards past boyfriends (punching faces and isolation from friends and family), and right-wing ignorance (white victimhood and minority bashing), she angers instead of seduces.

Another common thread among my limerent women is that none of my romantic fantasies about them have ever turned sexual. I would never want to taint them in that way. So instead, I imagine them squeezing my shoulders in a relaxing massage, sending tingles throughout my body. I imagine laying my head in their lap while they play with my hair, sending even more tingles throughout my body. I would do the same for them occasionally and earn a few swooning moans. I imagine giving them foot massages that make them close their eyes and drift off into dreamland, probably dreaming about being fed strawberries and cream like a goddess. I imagine laying in bed next to them, not for sex, but for the warmth of cuddling and the peacefulness of sleep. We could even have “A Pillow of Winds” by Pink Floyd playing in the background to accentuate this moment of love. 

These fantasies are especially important to me during moments of sadness and schizophrenic torment. Who wouldn’t want Chun Li from Street Fighter II squeezing their shoulders and lifting them up from a pit of despair? Mild, inoffensive touching at its finest. We could even hold hands together while walking through the desolate streets of either Port Orchard or Seattle. The warmth of her hand and the softness of her fingers would definitely feel good to me when I’m nervous at night. Of course, I would still be nervous about this beautiful lady wanting anything to do with me, but it’s not the same as feeling the danger of Seattle’s cyberpunk atmosphere.

I held off on talking about this topic as long as I could. I’ve already mentioned not wanting to gross anybody out with my lovey-dovey thoughts. But more importantly than that, I didn’t want to be written off as a whiny incel. For all intents and purposes, someone like me would fit in nicely with that clique. I’m overweight, a shy virgin, unemployed, and a lifelong tenant with my parents. I check all the boxes except for one: I’m not a misogynist who believes I’m entitled to free sex. Women owe me absolutely nothing. If they like me, fine. If not, then there’s nothing I can do about it. I certainly would never go on a shooting spree at a lingerie store or yoga studio. I wouldn’t run over random pedestrians with a van over my inability to be attractive. That’s just a LITTLE extreme, in my opinion.

Sometimes limerence is only a fantasy that will never come true. Sometimes we have to accept that we’re not right for everyone. Not everybody deserves a lifetime of cuddling and hot sex with Wonder Woman. Not everybody deserves a shoulder massage and passionate kisses from Tifa Lockhart. And you know what? That’s okay. If we got whatever we wanted all day every day, life would be boring as hell. There’d be no excitement or realism. If everybody is sexy, nobody is sexy. If everything is romantic, nothing is romantic. All the good things in life will come in moderation, which seems cliché to say until you do take it to the extreme and completely fuck up your life because of it. You hear that, Jake Davison? Of course you don’t, because you’re dead.

So why do I have limerent fantasies about people I don’t stand a chance with? Wouldn’t it be easier just for me to go out and meet somebody, pandemic aside? Well, that’s where the shyness and lack of confidence comes in. I don’t enjoy being creepy and I can see if me flirting with a woman would be perceived that way, no matter how mild or harmless it may seem. Being rejected by someone who thinks I’m creepy sounds like the worst kind of pain there is. It’s actually been scientifically proven that romantic rejection activates the same receptors of the brain as physical pain. It’s not as easy as moving onto the next one. It hurts. It can hurt for weeks, months, even years, especially if you’re like me and you’re neurodivergent. Autistic people generally feel pain at a higher capacity than neurotypicals. Criticism and rejection are both necessary parts of life, but goddamn, do they hurt worse than getting kicked in the testicles.

So what do I do about this? Stay in the shadows and partake in the drug known as limerence, of course. What else would I do? Why bother with someone who’s guaranteed to hate me when I’ve got Anette Olzon scratching her nails down my back and setting off my ASMR triggers? Why put myself through unnecessary pain when I’ve got Amy Lee slow-dancing with me at the prom, whispering sweetness in my ear and kissing my cheeks while doing so? Not a tough decision, as you can see. While loneliness may suck and limerence will always be fake, it beats the emotional trauma of rejection any day of the week. This makes me sound like an incel, I’m sure, but mark my words: I despise that ideology and want nothing to do with people who conform to that label. Maybe I’m not that creepy after all? Nah! Of course I am! Lzzy Hale, here I come! What flavor of ice cream sandwich do you want: vanilla, chocolate, strawberry, or all three at once?

Food-Mindedness and Body Horror

In case it wasn’t already abundantly clear from my 300 lb. belly, I’m very food-minded. Almost everything in my life reminds me of food in some way. Hell, the word Life will conjure images of the oat square cereal swirling around in milk. The word swirling will remind me of frosted cinnamon buns, keyword being frosted, as in enough frosting to cover the whole fucking thing. At least those words make a modicum of sense, but then there are names of people that remind me of food for no reason at all. Marcus reminds me of hotdogs and mustard. Brad reminds me of French bread. Rachel reminds me of apple juice. Erick reminds me of birthday cake-flavored milkshakes. How did this happen? Was it the constant advertising? Was there some trick of the brain during childhood I wasn’t aware of?

Already, my relationship with food is off to a rocky start. But then there are the things I find disgusting in life and how they find their way into my food. Not literally, but I imagine that they do and my imagination is powerful enough to make me vomit in some cases. For example, if you’ve ever seen the movie Clerks, the View Askew Productions logo at the beginning will serve as nightmare fuel to haunt you at every stage of life. There’s nothing wrong with men dressing in fishnet pantyhose, high heels, and leather thongs…even if they do have grotesque body hair. But it’s the unwanted sexual attention and creepiness of his flirtation that makes it such a traumatic logo. After seeing that logo for the first time, I kept involuntarily picturing his hairy disgusting body in pieces of my lunch meat. Every time I take a bite of ham or turkey, I imagine I’m taking a bite out of that man’s body. My stomach is aching and my fingers are convulsing just thinking about this.

But that’s just one example. If that was the only one, then I wouldn’t have been inspired to write an entire essay on it. What about the Calcobrena Puppets from Final Fantasy IV? You know, those creepy leotard-wearing dolls with buzzed heads, bloodshot eyes, zombie movements, and murderous intentions. They look like they could be Pee-Wee Herman’s children based on their buzz-cuts alone. Pee-Wee Herman once taught his audience how to make peanut butter and jelly sandwiches on his show. Therefore…all of my peanut butter and jelly sandwiches will taste like the bodies of the Calcobrena Puppets. It’ll be like eating right off of their skulls, head lice, fleas, and maggots be damned. It’ll be like giving French kisses to each and every one of those dolls…while passing pre-chewed sandwiches back and forth! Again, my stomach is boiling and rotting while I’m typing this.

And what about the Simpsons from their Treehouse of Horror Episodes, particularly the ones where they turn into pale zombies. They chew flesh, they lose limbs, they groan like exhausted monsters, and did I mention that they have pale skin? You know what else is pale in color? Pasta covered in white sauce, whether it’s American cheese or Alfredo sauce. Every bite that I took of those macaroni shells made me believe I was eating pieces of the zombie Simpsons. I took a long time to swallow knowing that zombie flesh was going down my throat and was going to poison me to death. The macaroni turned to mush in my mouth, so when I finally swallowed, I gagged and brought up a little bit of bile with it.

If I rattled off every example of food-related body horror, then we’d be here forever and a day. I could talk about the faceless masks from Pink Floyd the Wall reminding me of melted cheese. I could talk about the diarrhea blasts in The Human Centipede reminding me of chocolate ice cream (that one’s too obvious, though). I could talk about dead flies reminding me of Butterfinger ice cream. How did this all happen? Why are these disgusting things finding their way into my every meal? Am I so linked up with food that every trauma will remind me of such? Suppose I was more inclined towards Legos instead of food. If I touched a Lego piece that had three holes in it, would it remind me of the Pink Floyd masks? What if I was geared towards clothing? Would the View Askew drag queen’s body hair remind me of a wool sweater that’s literally hugging my chest?

I can already hear fatphobic assholes using my food horror as motivation for me to lose weight…or is that just my schizophrenic voices? Nah, I’m pretty sure someone has thought of exploiting me at one point or another. To those fat-shamers, I say watch the Human Centipede and eat a bag of shit and then watch Pink Floyd the Wall and eat an entire McDonald’s Double Quarter Pounder with Cheese (there has to be cheese in it, no exceptions). Unlike drugs and alcohol, food is actually necessary to survive. A cheeseburger will carry you over into the next day. A pack of cigarettes will not. A pepperoni pizza will give you the nutrition you need, even if it’s bad. Alcohol will not. If I gave up all of my favorite foods due to the body horror I’ve witnessed over the years, I would die of anorexia. Imagine that: fat-shaming actually hurts people instead of helping them find motivation. It’s almost as if people are only fat-shaming to satisfy their sadistic urges and are just using motivation as a cover-up for their shitty behavior. Bullying never went away; it just adapted to the new world.

I could tell you all that I’ve found the perfect counter for body horror-induced trauma, but I haven’t. Yes, I’m still alive and eating like a pig, but that’s only because the trauma went away on its own. I eat ham sandwiches whenever I damn well please even though the View Askew drag queen lusted on me through the TV screen as a kid. I eat stuffed mushrooms despite the fact that it feels too much like I’m eating Phanto from Mario Brothers 2, the evilly-smiling little bastard. Trauma going away on its own is not a typical outcome for most people, especially if schizophrenia is a factor like it is for me. Sure, you can take away the stimulus and hope for the Law of Diminishing Returns to kick in, but it doesn’t always do that. I have no solutions for your body horror trauma. As a matter of fact, I may have given you some of that as I described examples of how they make their way into my food.

Sometimes I think I’m the only one who experiences things like this until I Google it and find entire communities full of people who share my problems. But that’s assuming I’m not too lazy on any given day to use Google. It’s such an easy thing, yet I find myself too lazy sometimes to type words into a search engine. If you’re out there and you’re as food-minded as me, I’m sorry I can’t provide solutions for you other than the occasional animal picture and some digital hugs. You know who can provide more than that? Your therapist. They can talk you through your trauma. They can encourage you to face your food-themed fears. They can be there for you when you feel like others would laugh at your plight. Yes, therapy can be expensive at times, but it’s worth every penny if it means you’ll be okay in the end. If you’re not okay, it’s not the end. Life is better alive. It’s a dumb thing to say, but the truth won’t wane away. Okay, now I’m just ripping off quotes and lyrics. I should stop doing that before I get sent to prison for copyright infringement and have my vanilla pudding remind me of my cell mate’s semen. Uh-oh! More body horror!

Terrible Flaws

 Anytime a book, movie, or TV show receives praise for having “flawed characters”, it makes me wonder what exactly those flaws were. Are all flaws created equal or are some more forgivable than others? Can characters with the least forgivable flaws find redemption by the end of the story or does that come off as forced? Are some character traits considered flaws when they don’t deserve to be? Do villains’ flaws (aside from the obvious) have to be conquered just like the heroes’?

I’m asking all of these questions because I’ve been in this writing game for many years and I still haven’t mastered the art of the flawed character. I’m always afraid of making a character so flawed that they’re no longer likeable in any capacity. Even dumpster fire human beings can be liked by the readers, but how do I achieve this? Well…let’s run these questions through a battery of tests, shall we?

Suppose you have a protagonist (like every story does). He’s got acrobatic fighting skills, he’s got magical powers for days, and he’s perfected the art of the insult. He wears spiked metal armor and carries a sword bigger than his entire body. He’s got long purple hair that has probably been washed with Head & Shoulders more times than he’s been in combat. He’s got striking golden eyes that can weaken the knees of every woman around him. His major flaw? He’s a genocidal lunatic. He doesn’t just go in for the kill. He destroys entire groups of people until they’ve gone virtually extinct. He feels no remorse for his actions and openly mocks any group that he’s wiped off the face of the earth. 

Are you cringing in disgust yet? Why? You like flawed characters! Killing large numbers of people is a HUGE flaw for somebody to have. I certainly hope he can overcome it! Now that I think about it, there is an example of someone like this. His name is Vegeta and he’s from the Dragon Ball franchise. In the beginning of the series, he killed off entire populations from any given planet and sold the planet for a quick buck. Near the end of the series, he’s a loving father and husband, but he’s still salty as fuck. Despite his murderous past, Vegeta is still the most popular character in the series.

Alright, alright, alright, that’s just one example of a successful flawed character, though. Maybe genocide isn’t enough to turn people off (which actually scares me a little bit). Okay, how about this: you’ve got a protagonist (noticing a theme here?). He’s rich beyond his wildest dreams. He’s got more abs than he knows what to do with. His business suits, sports cars, and summer homes all cost him more than the national debt allows. He can sex up any woman from the moment they smell his cologne. 

His major flaw? He’s got a serious case of flatulence that could trigger climate change and successfully take away Greta Thunberg’s future. What? You like flawed characters! His farting gets in the way of his romantic life and political aspirations, so it’s a real flaw! He can easily overcome it by getting a colonoscopy and finding out what the fuck is going on in his ass. But once he finds out what’s actually in there…then the plot thickens quicker than one of his diarrhea dumps. Could you get behind a character like this? Hopefully, not literally since we’ve established that his farts smell like dead skunks and toxic waste.

Okay, maybe bathroom humor isn’t your thing. It certainly isn’t mine. So how about this: you have a protagonist (yet again). He’s a five-star general who commands the respect of everyone he meets, even people outside of his jurisdiction. When he tells you to do pushups, it won’t matter if you just got your COVID vaccine, because you’ll do them anyways. When he tells you to run ten miles without stopping, it won’t matter if you’re bound to a wheelchair, because you’ll find a way. 

His major flaw? His voice is so cartoonishly annoying that subordinates only do what he says so that he’ll shut up and leave them alone. That’s not respect for authority; that’s hatred for irritating people. When the time comes to actually take him seriously, nobody listens to reason, because the general’s voice shatters their eardrums every time. Do you still think all flaws are created equal?

Now I don’t want any of you to think that I’m advocating for Mary-Sues and Gary-Stus. Maybe there was a time in my childhood when beefy barbarians who never lose were appealing to me. Maybe there was a time when undeniably hot chicks won me over just because. But as I got older, the shine wore off in a big fucking hurry. You think Alex De Large from A Clockwork Orange would have become as iconic as he was if he took the role of an axe-wielding ninja-knight who remained undefeated forever? You think Vic Mackey from The Shield would have been convincing as a corrupt LAPD detective if he didn’t occasionally lose from time to time? We don’t want to see our favorites lose, but if they don’t, then the story becomes boring and nobody cares.

But at the same time, we have to come to terms with what flaws we’re willing to forgive and which ones make a character impossible to love. Maybe the flaws we can’t forgive are overcome by the end of the story. Maybe a Klansman who uses the N-word five hundred times in a two-minute conversation can see the light and become so far to the left that he falls off the spectrum completely. Maybe a CEO who makes money off of his impoverished employees can become homeless and experience the plight of his underlings firsthand. So maybe the question isn’t, “Is this flaw bad?” Maybe the question is, “Can this flaw be redeemed?”

By that logic, even Cthulu can be redeemed despite the fact that he’s an intergalactic squid who destroys worlds effortlessly and drives the survivors to infinite madness. Maybe Cthulu has a slight moment of guilt when a feral child tries to reach out to his heart. It’s one thing to drive adults to madness, but feral children never had a chance to even acquire a first language. So Cthulu’s heart is broken beyond repair, but his universe is not, so he creates paradise out of his destruction. Would you still find it in your heart to forgive this flawed character despite what he did to get to this point? Did Hitler need a hug? Does Donald Trump need tender loving care? Does Vladimir Putin need a girlfriend who will cradle his head in her lap and stroke…whatever hair is left on his head?

I guess it all boils down to whether or not you as a reader believe in redemption arcs. I personally can’t get enough of them as long as they’re not rushed and forced. If you don’t want spoilers for A Dog’s Journey, then stop reading and have a nice day. Gloria is a toxic mother who spends her nights partying and drinking rather than taking care of CJ and her dog. So what does Gloria do? She gets sober and reconnects with CJ, giving her letters from her father that later serve as creative fuel for her songs, thus launching a successful music career. That’s one example of a redemption arc I can get behind. Gloria is indeed a flawed character, downright disgusting at times. Neglect and abuse are horrible things to do to a child. And yet, she won me over by the movie’s end. Well done!

Perhaps the lesson I’m trying to teach myself is to not be afraid of the flaws I give my characters. I have enough faith in my writing abilities that the characters can be redeemed by the story’s end. And if I haven’t done that, it’s okay, because that’s why our stories go through multiple drafts worth of edits and rewrites. Unlike a brain surgeon, you don’t have to get it right the first time if you’re writing a story from scratch. Be bold. Be brave. Let your book babies take flight. You can’t cradle them forever and if you do, you’re worse than the mother from Pink Floyd the Wall, a movie with a VERY flawed protagonist, yet one who is easy to root for.

Characters Without Aspirations

 If somebody is living a “normal” life, it’s seen as a positive. If somebody is living an “average” life, it’s seen indifferently. However…if somebody is living a “mediocre” life, then shame on that person. Normal, average, and mediocre all have the same meaning, yet their connotations are different across each word. Normal and average characters are relatable, but mediocre ones are looked down up with disgust. But when a critic is talking about a mediocre character, they’re not usually talking about the character’s upbringing, education, or work life. Mediocrity often means the character has no ambitions, dreams, or aspirations. Three-dimensional characters are the best kind and a character cannot be three-dimensional without at least one feasible goal or lifelong dream. That’s what we’ve been taught as writers because that’s what makes a story interesting to begin with.

But is that always the case? Do characters HAVE to have big dreams and aspirations? Commonsense would dictate that a character-driven story would mean having the MC pursue an end game. But what if the character had no dreams or aspirations at all? Sounds pretty boring, doesn’t it? Until you dig a little deeper into why that is. Maybe the character is so depressed that he can’t see a future for himself. Maybe he’s older and subscribes to the “don’t follow your passion” rhetoric that conservatives of his generation like to preach. Maybe he’s a younger child who’s been brainwashed by the school system into believing that STEM jobs are the only kind that matter. With the latter case, the brainwashed child in question has a goal, but not the one he originally intended. Does that count? Not if he’s going through the motions.

Mediocrity isn’t fun to read about, but the reasons behind it can be. In fact, the reasons alone could turn an otherwise dull character into someone to root for. Maybe the goal is to break the cycle of mediocrity and become his own person. Maybe the goal is to murder the people responsible for creating his dull situation. Wait a minute. Did that get a little too extreme for you? Is it really reasonable for a mundane character to go around stabbing people to death if they forced him into a life of boredom? Maybe it is. Maybe it isn’t. Either way, you’ve got a compelling story on your hand. 

Conformity through brainwashing or creative suppression can be a powerful thing. That’s why millennials and Gen Z people tend to dislike Mike Rowe, because he’s using his platform to encourage capitalistic conformity. Conforming to society will make you more presentable in the eyes of the CEO’s writing your checks. Okay, Boomer, enough is enough.

While most people do want to break the chains of capitalism and tell Mike Rowe to suck a big fat one, there are legitimate slackers in society. I’m sure you, my lovely audience, have gone to school with a few of these guys. They don’t do homework. They spend their time in class shooting spitballs and fucking around. They mouth off to the teacher when they’re receiving genuine criticism. While these students don’t make up an entire generation nor can they not be saved, they do exist and they can often be interesting characters to read about. 

It’s easy to tell this lackadaisical student to “get a job” and “stop screwing around”. But have you ever been inside the mind of one of these students? Maybe the sour attitude is a cover-up for suppressed trauma. Maybe he doesn’t feel like there’s any hope for him after all. Or maybe he just wants to play videogames and fuck the world. Even the latter of those choices can be made into three-dimensional character work if an author knows what the hell he’s doing.

You’re probably reading all of this and are digging into the recesses of your mind trying to find examples of mediocre characters that are fun to read about. You want to find the difference between being lost in a dream due to aspirations and lost in a dream because he doesn’t want to wake up and face the world. Not a book, per se, but the 1994 comedy Clerks is a good example of this. Dante works at the Quick Stop Convenience Store and has no plans of bettering his life, yet he constantly complains about the situation he’s in. His friend Randal works at RST Video Store and doesn’t mind slacking off every once and a while as long as he gets to anger the customers. 

Two mediocre workers, different clashing mindsets. They have little goals here and there. Dante wants to get back together with his ex-girlfriend Caitlin while still dating a superior woman in Veronica. He wants to play hockey on the rooftop. He wants to go to a funeral to say goodbye to one of his exes. But are any of these goals really going to get him out of his depressive funk? No fucking way. Even if he somehow achieves these goals, he’ll go right back to where he was the next day: tedium and shitty customers. Dante and Randal have painfully ordinary lives, yet Clerks is considered a cult classic and Kevin Smith’s best movie of all time.

But if you’re going to intentionally write a mediocre character and have him lead the charge, his uncaring attitude should mesh well with his environment. If the character is a humanoid dragon barbarian fighting for his life in a dark fantasy kingdom with demons, devils, and zombies chewing on his flesh, that MC cannot afford to be mediocre for even a second. Yes, Gary-Stus exist, but in a fantasy or sci-fi setting, they’re frowned upon. Speculative fiction is known for having colorful worlds where the author’s imagination runs wild. Crystal castles in the sky, fireball magic spells, temptress witches, electromantic dragons, sneaky goblins, they’ve got it all! If a character is mediocre in an above-average setting, then that’s a problem.

But…what if a character is mediocre in a BELOW-average setting? What if the fantasy world has turned to absolute shit and the character gives into his urges to give up all hope? It doesn’t even have to be a nuclear apocalypse, no, no, no. It could be worldwide blight. It could be constant darkness. It could be monsters and zombies overrunning everything. Or it could be an actual world of shit, because there’s nowhere else to go to the bathroom. Losing hope and giving up easily would be perfectly understandable in a below-average hellscape. At that point, the character has two choices: give up entirely and submit to the Lovecraftian negativity, or find smaller goals to achieve if only to make life a little more bearable than it was before.

By choosing the latter of those two scenarios, your characters cease to be mediocre. An example of this is a 2009 movie called Zombieland. As the title would suggest, zombies have taken over the world and are chewing on humans like bubblegum. Fuck hope, because it’ll never come back no matter how many shotgun shells are popped off at these undead cannibals. The world will never return to its normal state. So what do the characters do? They cope. They don’t solve everything. They cope. Woody Harrelson’s character wants to find Twinkies and eat them like he was a zombie himself. The two girls in the zombie-escaping team want to go to a theme park and party it up. The main character? He just wants to see his family again. By having these little goals to keep them company in an otherwise shitty world, a run-of-the-mill comedy has become a three-dimensional story that deserves all the praise it gets.

In case it wasn’t apparent by now, mediocrity itself isn’t good or bad (that’s the very definition of the word). It’s what an author does with it that counts the most. Hell, it can even apply to real life, even in a nonconformist setting. It doesn’t have to be all about brainwashing and Boomerisms. Sometimes those big dreams aren’t what they appear to be when examined further. I had lots of dreams when I was younger, but didn’t realize how damaging those pursuits will be until I grew older. I wanted to be a pro-wrestler, but that would involve exhausting exercise, injuries, tedious travel, and bullying from the higher ups. I wanted to be a heavy metal singer, but that would also involve tedious travel, along with clashing egos, heavy criticism, potential drug and alcohol use, meaningless sex, and yes, sometimes injuries. I wanted to be a screenwriter, but that would involve traveling to Hollywood and potentially being molested by Harvey Weinstein or someone just like him. 

After all of those options, the one I decided was least detrimental to both my mental and physical health was the life of an author. I can still indulge in my creative fantasies. I can still tell Mike Rowe to get fucked. I can still be a productive person. And above all else, no injuries! Have you ever heard about an author who broke his neck while typing a novel? No, and you never will. Maybe mental injuries could be more prevalent with worldwide criticism and general trolling, but that’s not enough to keep me from pursing my dreams of being an author. I live a normal life without submitting to mediocrity. I guess I could be a three-dimensional character in someone’s novel. Or I could just do a complete self-insert, one of the two.

Finding Treasure

 Every last page of the treasure map has led you to this. Gold, glorious gold, beautiful gold, showers of gold…wait a minute…Anyways, now that you’ve found these mountains of lovely gold coins underneath the waterfall, you send your pirate crew to haul it onboard your vessel. As you sail away with the precious treasure, you fantasize about what you’ll spend your newfound fortune on. A much-needed vacation? An elaborate mansion? Women? Lots and lots of women? Men? Non-binaries?

Your mind races at a million miles an hour at the possibilities. And then...your train of thought has been derailed when your ship snaps in two like a twig. You and your crew are left floating around the seven seas like turds in a punchbowl. Yes, you’ve got your treasure after all of this hard work…but even your mighty vessel wasn’t strong enough to store it all. You overloaded your fucking ship and sank the damn thing. Way to go, champ! You truly are a million dollar baby and the seven seas have gotten even choppier with the addition of your salty tears.

Everybody wants to find treasure. Everybody wants to live beyond their means. Everybody fantasizes about the high life. But in the midst of their fantasies, they forget the logistics of undertaking such a quest. It’s like the episode of South Park with the underpants gnomes. Phase one, steal underwear. Phase two...Phase three, profit. The gnomes don’t know what phase two is and neither do the pirate captains looking for treasure.

That scenario I painted for you in the above paragraphs was actually the ending scene for Captain William Kidd from the 90’s fighting game World Heroes 2. He got so greedy for his beautiful gold that he took too much of it and it sank his ship. Captain Kidd is a lot of things in that game. He’s a great fighter, no doubt. He’s got friendly dialogue. Now we can add one more quality to his resume: dumbassery. Is that a word? It probably could be if English snobs are willing to let words like “avast, ye matey” float by without examination.

So…when constructing your story about treasure hunting, you first have to ask what it is your sea captain is looking for. It doesn’t always have to be ultra-heavy gold coins. It doesn’t even have to be multiple items. It could be a magical gem. It could be a weapon. It could be a key to the gates of heaven. It could be a book. If you think Potterheads camping outside of Barnes & Noble takes dedication, you’ve never met a sea captain who searches far and wide for a book of secrets beneath the Atlantic Ocean.

Anything can be a valuable treasure if you put enough stock into it. Even another human being can be considered a valuable treasure. Maybe the sea captain is looking for a sexy siren who when discovered will become his wife for all eternity. Sounds great in theory, but it’s not exactly healthy relationship material if one party has too much power over the other.

Okay, so you know what you want your sea captain to look for. How do they get it? Do they have access to a treasure map? If so, how difficult was it to find? Did they have to wrestle it out of the hands of an orcish army? An ogre bruiser? A sneaky goblin? What about the map itself? Is it just one sheet of paper or is it a fucking novel the size of Webster’s Dictionary? Is the map even in plain English or does the captain need a translator to accompany him on his treasure hunt? Does the translator know how to fight or will they be swallowed whole by a bloodthirsty kraken? If you really wanted to be a dick to your main character, you could have the map come in the form of a thick novel with missing pages scattered all over the world, each of them in a different foreign language. How many times can your sea captain’s patience be tested before they say, “Fuck it, I’ll live on the streets?”

As if finding the missing pages to a treasure map wasn’t enough of a pain in the ass, getting from point A to point B is full of obstacles that grind the captain’s patience down to nothing. I’ve already mentioned bloodthirsty krakens who’ll eat entire armies alive with just one bite, but not before they’re wrapped in the pirate ship’s mast and eaten like Hot Pockets. What about other pirates, though? Surely, you’re not so arrogant to believe you’re the only one who wants the treasure, right? That’s why psychology experts warn You Tube consumers not to fall in love with content creators: because there’s an army of watchers who feel the same way and the chances of you being chosen are pretty fucking slim. 

So who are these other pirates going after your forbidden treasure? Skeletons? Orcs? Zombies? Dragon people? Or maybe they’re just ordinary humans. You can breathe a sigh of relief if the latter is the case, right? Not if they’re armed with AK-47’s and all you’ve got is a measly cutlass. I guarantee you Captain William Kidd wouldn’t stand a chance against Somali pirates. He can only throw the Shark Knuckle and Shark Upper so many times before he’s pumped full of lead. Those fighters in World Heroes 2 never really accounted for firearms, did they?

If the other pirates don’t kick the shit out of you, I guarantee that the oceans and general shitty weather will. Have you ridden on a boat with choppy waves before? I have. I was vacationing in Mexico in 2017 and part of my vacation was riding on a banana boat. Because the waves were rough and heavy, I fell off the damn boat and screamed for help until the lifeguards rescued me. The only reason why I didn’t scream earlier was because my head was underwater and bubbles don’t exactly translate well to above-surface lifeguards. 

If you’re sailing the seven seas, chances are good that you’ll be bounced up and down by the rolling waves. Your crew will be jostled around so many times that some of them may even fall off the ship never to be seen again. And that’s just the ocean. What about the rain? And the lightning? Suppose the only translator you have for your overly-complex map gets struck by lightning and dies? Then he gets tossed overboard by the nasty-ass waves? You talk about being lost at sea? Bitch, you’ll be lucky if you’re ever found again. The Coast Guard ain’t going to save your ass, because if they were capable of doing so, they would have found the treasure long before you ever did.

You know those motivational quotes that tell you to take risks without thinking too much about the consequences of failure? They seem inspirational at first, but overall, it’s shitty advice, especially if you’re a sea captain. You have to think about the risk-reward factor all the time. Is it worth the danger of being swallowed whole by the sea? Is it worth being gutted alive by a skeleton crew’s cutlasses? Is it worth the sleepless nights? Is it worth being so tired that you’re constantly on the edge of having a stroke, heart attack, aneurism, or all three at the same time?

What will you do once you’ve found this sacred treasure? Will you save it for a rainy day (one that preferably doesn’t take place during your travels)? Will you spend it all at once on hookers and beer and be right back to where you started in a week’s time? Will you use the mountains of gold coins to pay your bills? Does your landlord or debt collector even accept gold coins as currency? Suppose your landlord says, “Sorry, we don’t accept Canadian money.” Your ass is out on the streets in a big fucking hurry. But at least you found your treasure! Right?

Even if you as an author don’t plan on writing a treasure hunting story of any kind, this can still be a valuable lesson in thinking things through before you rush into a project. If you improvise everything, you’ll have a shitty first draft and a lot of work ahead of you. If you plan everything in advance down to the finest detail, you’ll still have a shitty first draft, but you won’t have nearly as much work to do. I wish I heeded this advice when I started pumping out first drafts left and right. 

One of the biggest criticisms I’ve ever received (aside from having too many saggy jowled dogs and fat male villains) was that I don’t take authority and culture into account when creating my worlds. I’ve often been asked, “Where are the cops?” My logical answer would have been that I want the MC to get the credit for the victory, not the cops. If the cops can solve everything, why have a story at all? Fair point, but the cops and authority figures still matter in every story. Or maybe the country is 100% anarchy and everybody solves their own damn problems. No matter what the case, it’s good to establish these things so that they’re clear to the reader.

But just because a fine eye for detail is required for any writing project, doesn’t mean you have to explain every…little…thing to the reader. There are some obvious parts of your world that you can trust your readers to form pictures of by themselves. Your book shouldn’t be overly long explanations sandwiching the crucial action and drama of your story. That shit just gets boring after a short while. I’ve DNFed books that took too long explaining everything, case in point, the first Game of Thrones book. The author wouldn’t shut his yap about the details of the characters’ clothes and histories, so the action suffered because of it. I would argue that Empress Theresa is the worst offender when it comes to over-explaining things. Then again, Empress Theresa is the worst offender no matter what category you’re talking about.

Finding a nice balance between over-explaining and not thinking at all about the extra details is paramount to a readable book, whether you’re writing about treasure hunting or not. Treasure hunting is just one genre that deserves this middle ground. It could also be true of contemporary dramas where the world-building details are the same as what we experience in real life. So maybe when Captain William Kidd washes up on the shore, he can build another pirate ship and only take half the gold this time around. And then he’d have to find a way to convert that gold into modern day money. If he really was the devious pirate he claimed to be, he could start his own pyramid scheme with that amount of gold. And then when he finally gets taken to court, he can bypass prison altogether and wind up in the safety of a nut house, because no modern day human being talks or dresses the way he does unless it’s Halloween. See? Details matter!

Mourning the Loss of Beauty

 My name is Garrison and I don’t think of myself as an attractive person. I held off on saying that for as long as I could. It’s not that I don’t think men’s beauty standards are an important idea to dissect and analyze, no, no, no. I was more afraid of potential responses I could get for saying such a thing in public. Some might be kind and say that I don’t look THAT bad. Some might accuse me of being shallow. Some might be realistic and say that every type of beauty fades away eventually. Some might be well-intentioned and say that beauty is in the eye of the beholder…which doesn’t sound promising if the beholders refuse to acknowledge me in any way.

But there’s one response I’ve always feared throughout my entire life. I don’t know the official name for this trope, but I call it the Disaster Porn Excuse. It’s where you talk about your problems with someone and that same ignoramus reminds you that others have it worse. Of course other people have it worse! What is this, the Sadness Olympics? Do I only get a bronze medal for believing myself to be physically ugly? The Disaster Porn Excuse goes something like this: “You know, Chud…there’s a Corona Virus pandemic going on…there’s police brutality all over the country…wildfires and other natural disasters are happening at an alarming rate…and you’re bitching and whining about your lack of good looks? Hyuk, hyuk, hyuk! Get a life!”

Not believing in my own physical beauty (or lack thereof) isn’t anywhere near as devastating as a Corona Virus pandemic. I get it. But that’s not what my brain said to me the other day. Just because someone has it worse, doesn’t invalidate your own problems. Does there have to be an earthquake and a volcanic eruption happening at the same time in Port Orchard for me to have a say in my own personal difficulties? It’s not right to compare and contrast problems. And yes, even having said all of this, not being physically attractive still sounds like small potatoes. It does sound shallow and whiny…until it’s not.

My senior year of high school was pretty much the only time in my life where I was confident in my sex appeal. I had a hairstyle that was parted down the middle and curled at the tips. I wore sunglasses even indoors. I wore a leather jacket that I had no business owning given my family’s income. I had a beard that made me look older than my teenaged years. I had and still have hazel eyes that could be stared into for hours. Judging from all the smiles, giggles, and flirting I got from other girls at my school, I think a few of them caught feelings for me. They didn’t come out and say they were in love with me, but I got hugs from a few of them, they petted my shoulders, one girl drummed on my back with her hands…and you know what? As shallow as it seems now, getting this kind of attention is addictive. It’s validating. It makes me feel like anything other than an outcast. After a freshman year where I was almost bullied into suicide, not feeling like an outcast was pretty fucking amazing.

That is until the voices in my head started getting louder and louder. The voices threatened to kick my legs and break them. They threatened to kick me in the ass and make me shit myself. They threatened to make me their bitch, this being the worst of my schizophrenic insults due to my strong sense of individuality at the time. The voices got so bad that for the second time in my life, I threatened to kill myself. Thank god I was able to get the medication I needed and start the long hard road to recovery. That should have been the end of my misery…until it wasn’t. The thing about schizophrenia medication is that it numbs your emotions and makes you gain weight. Remember the smoking hot sex god that I was all throughout my senior year of high school? He was replaced by a three-hundred pound zombie who couldn’t cut it in a college sociology class or even technical writing. Technical fucking writing! But if I didn’t take the medication, I’d either be dead or in a nuthouse, so being a three hundred pound invalid was the lesser of two evils. It’s a classic case of death or chi-chi.

Losing my beauty was going to happen eventually as it does with every person on the planet. I just would have liked to keep it for longer than my teenaged years. College is supposed to be a time when the real magic happens, when partying, sex, and love are the cornerstones of good education. I had my fair share of crushes, but I never acted on them. Not once. I didn’t believe I had the right to. Why? Because my good looks were stolen from me. I didn’t get my face bashed in with a baseball bat and needed reconstructive surgery. My looks were stolen from me by an invisible force that happened at random. It was complete and utter bad luck that the public ignored me and went out of their way to sidestep me. I had very few friends in college and I owe all of that…to bad fucking luck. Remember how addictive being sexually fawned over was? I was still addicted, but had some serious fucking withdrawal.

It wasn’t until after I graduated from college that I started my own personal education with You Tube videos and internet research. You know that feeling when people treat you differently because you may or may not look good to them? There’s a name for that: the beauty bias. It’s something we all have whether we want to admit it or not. When an employer has to choose between a pool of candidates, he’ll go for the sexiest one. When people decide what friends they’re going to connect with, they’ll choose the sexy ones. Even in celebrity culture, the sexier musicians, actors, and influencers are the ones who get the most opportunities. 

Would Nightwish have become a successful heavy metal band if Tarja Turunen had a bulge in her neck the size of a basketball? Would Evanescence be a worldwide phenomenon if Amy Lee’s face was disfigured by a wood chipper? Would In This Moment have been a smash hit if Maria Brink sharted herself onstage at every show? I hate saying this, but the answer to all of these questions is no. That’s not my answer. That’s the public’s answer. It’s sick, it’s wrong, it’s unfair, but it’s reality. While nobody would come out and tell me I was too ugly to fit in, I knew deep inside that’s what they were thinking.

So what do we do to curb this bias? Honestly, I don’t have the one true answer to that. Sure, we could share Body Positivity memes all day long. We could call out shallowness in magazines and TV shows. We could be more inclusive even if we’re not feeling it at first. But these are all surface-level solutions that can only work if everybody gets involved, which they won’t. That’s why I never watch You Tube videos from fitness influencers: they’re the biggest offenders when it comes to making fat and ugly people feel like shit. Many of those exercises are impossible for an obese person to do on a consistent basis. Food addiction is very real. But hey, it’s all our fault, right? We’ve got nobody to blame but ourselves according to these fitness influencers. We don’t lift enough weights. We don’t run far enough. We don’t eat enough rabbit food. But most importantly, we don’t inject enough steroids into our bloodstreams. You know what? Maybe I’d rather be fat and lazy than look like Hulk Hogan and The Ultimate Warrior. Come to think of it, if you do these super-intense exercises, you too can look like The Ultimate Warrior…in 2015…a year after he passed away from heart failure.

Since other people won’t fight our battles against poor self-esteem for us, we have to find ways to do it ourselves. We can surround ourselves with people who believe in Body Positivity. We can self-talk ourselves into feeling at least marginally good. During the days where we do feel good, we could hold onto that feeling for as long as we humanly can. Or if you’re schizophrenic like me, you can use your imagination to your advantage. When I came up with the idea for this essay, my mind was in the shitter. I didn’t want to get out of bed. I wanted to curse myself until I believed in my own bodily mediocrity. But I did something the other day to make myself sing a different tune. Will the feeling last forever? Probably not, but I take my little victories where I can get them.

I imagined a scenario where one of my online crushes confronted me in a hairdresser’s salon after I’ve spent the entire time doubting my own beauty. She said to me, “Your attractiveness doesn’t come from your soft hair…or your lovely eyes. That’s not where you draw your strength from. You draw your strength from your quietness. You’re an enigma in public. You have an air of mystery about you. You keep women at a distance because you’re considerate of them. And the more mysterious you are, the more they want to learn about you. And the more they can unlock from you…the more likely you are to trust them. Attraction has nothing to do with physical appearances. It’s about feeling comfortable and calm around whoever you’re with. If a woman can get you to be yourself around her without any filters…that’s when you know you’ve succeeded.”

Is any of this true? Maybe, maybe not, I couldn’t tell you firsthand. But does it make me feel good for the time being? You’re damn right it does. Being crushed on in high school made me feel good at the time. Now I have to find other ways to feel good. And when I find them, I want to hold onto my happiness for as long as I can. Finding temporary happiness may not always be attractive to the world around me. Then again, it doesn’t have to be. At the end of the day, the only one who gets to decide my worth is me. The sooner this is hammered into my brain, the better off I’ll be. Maybe happiness isn’t six-pack abs and a leather jacket. Maybe happiness is a bottle of Diet Coke and two pepperoni pizza Hot Pockets. I can do this…I have to do this…

If I can get one more jab in to solidify my TKO victory over poor self-esteem, Bill Maher has no business calling fat people ugly when he himself looks like a creature that crawled out of a mausoleum because a necromancer told him it was a good idea. He would know what a necromancer is if he didn’t thumb his nose at genre fiction. But even with his willful ignorance towards my generation, he knows deep down that he should be the one mourning his loss of beauty, not me. Oops! I guess the beauty bias is alive and well! Uh-oh!

Cancel Culture Doesn't Exist

There are two potentially toxic mantras that are competing for the most real estate in my not-so-heavenly brain. One of them is, “It’s only offensive when I do it.” The other is, “Everyone’s excited to learn that I’m an author, until they actually read what’s inside my books.” In case you couldn’t tell, my hands are covered in blood when it comes to offensive content that could easily get me in trouble. It doesn’t matter how many bars of Chandrika soap I keep in my bathroom closet, and goddamn do I have a lot of them, because blood doesn’t come off without a fight. Or a war, depending on how deep my offenses run. I’ve tiptoed across the thin line of discussing both sides of “cancel culture”. Am I against it? Am I for it? Do I not have an opinion of it at all? After wrestling with my brain in a match that could break Dave Meltzer’s five-star scale, I’ve come up with a suitable conclusion: “cancel culture” doesn’t exist. I can’t have an opinion on something that isn’t real. It’s like the boogeyman, three little pigs, and Pinocchio: a complete work of pure fiction, I mean, perfection.

Sure, there are celebrities and authors who have a less than stellar record when it comes to disgusting beliefs. J.K. Rowling and her transphobic tweets come to mind as well as John Cleese’s support for her. Rosario Dawson and her mother beating the shit out of a transgender handyman is even worse, for obvious reasons. Marilyn Manson being an abusive boyfriend to every woman he’s ever come in contact with? Cue the shivers. Some offenses are worse than others, but unless the public figure is dead or in jail, their career isn’t really going to suffer much. Sure, the first wave of criticism will hurt like hell, but these celebrities and others have their core base that will stick with them through thick and thin. They know that. They take advantage of that, because they know they can get away with it. No matter how rotten a celebrity acts, they will always have their supporters despite a large chunk leaving for higher ground.

Even if a celebrity does get fired from whatever job they’re doing, it won’t be long until they find another. Adam Blampied was accused of sexual harassment when he was working for wrestling website Cultaholic, so he was fired. You want to know what he’s doing now? Working for Wrestle Talk instead, although he has gone to great lengths to redeem himself, so there’s that. You know who doesn’t give a shit about making amends? Louis C.K., who was accused of masturbating in front of women whenever he damn well felt like it. You know what he’s doing now? Same thing he’s been doing for years: standup comedy. He even has some new punch-down material handy: talking shit about non-binary people, the Parkland shooting victims, and Auschwitz. Lovely. Just fucking lovely. Being “canceled” is not the end of the world. It seems like it at first, but facing mass criticism can easily be deterred by either listening and making amends or staying off of social media for a while.

Do some celebrities deserve mass criticism? Absolutely. But will they go away forever because of it? Hardly. If cancel culture really was as effective as everyone fears it is, then Donald Trump would have never been elected president. His bigotry, insensitivity, and predatory behavior would have gotten him canceled a long time ago. Calling Mexicans rapists and murderers would have kept him out of the white house forever. But it didn’t, because cancel culture doesn’t exist. Jair Bolsonaro would have been thrown out on his ass for threatening to punch a woman. Vladimir Putin would have been eighty-sixed decades ago for being a dictator who assassinated his political enemies. Kim Jong-Un wouldn’t have an entire country brainwashed and obedient if cancel culture really cost people their livelihoods.

While mass criticism isn’t the end of the world, it isn’t completely without merit. In a free democracy, we can criticize whoever we want for whatever reason we want. People call cancel culture censorship when really it’s just the other side of free speech, which is supposed to be a double-edged sword. If one racist celebrity gets to spew their venom, his audience has the right to criticize him for it. By the same token, refusing to watch a standup comedian’s shows because of their vitriol is not the same as censorship. It’s not like Ryan Long’s standup specials are required viewing for college. It’s not like they contain important material for a top secret mission. People can pick and choose what they watch and what they don’t watch. Nobody is owed an audience; they have to work for it. Bill Maher complains about cancel culture all the time, yet he doesn’t produce anything worth watching. He called comic book nerds little children, he called fat people virgins who couldn’t see their own dicks, he calls millennials entitled and lazy, and he called COVID-19 a Chinese virus. Is his show over? Hardly. But do people have the right to not watch it? Absolutely. This isn’t A Clockwork Orange. There are no eye-bracers or straightjackets.

Cancel culture being nonexistent is something I’m going to have to remember for myself going forward. As I’ve said earlier, I’ve got some serious blood on my hands when it comes to my creative writing. I’ve used words in my poetry that I’d never say in a public space. I’ve written about undesirable characters even in the eyes of the reader. I’ve misrepresented sex and romance, sometimes to an absurd degree. Maybe there’s some truth in the idea that my audience will sing a different tune about their excitement for me once they crack open one of my books. I could give the perfectly acceptable answer of, “I’m sorry and I’ll do better next time” and that’s something I should be doing anyways. I should be improving my work. I should own up to my mistakes. I should make amends with the people I’ve hurt with my writing. I’ll do all of that. In fact, I’ll apologize to you all right now for fucking up as badly as I did. Will I be forgiven? Maybe. Maybe not. Honestly, being truthful and kind to my audience is more important to me than potentially losing my career. Yes, cancel culture doesn’t exist, but that doesn’t mean you all don’t deserve a sincere apology. Take notes, J.K. Rowling. You too, John Cleese. Make amends while you still can. We’re not too sensitive; you’re just too disgusting.

That’s something else that needs to be addressed: if the audience doesn’t like a celebrity’s work, it’s not the audience’s fault. It’s the celebrity’s fault for not putting out a decent product. Blaming the audience for your failures says to the world that you’re unable to take criticism. While cancel culture is still nonexistent, I know deep in your heart you don’t like to hear criticism. The more you listen to criticism and improve from it, the less likely you are to hear it in the future. Everybody has room to be better at their crafts. Stephen King may be the most recognizable author in the universe, but the way he sexualizes women in his books is absolutely atrocious. He doesn’t have to lose his career over it, but he owes it to himself and his audience to improve his writing. That’s what we all should do: improve ourselves. Life is evolution. You either fold or you get better. I don’t know about you, but I think getting better is the superior choice. Unless of course you’re like Harvey Weinstein and you raped every woman you came in contact with, in which case, your career is not only over, but you’re spending the rest of your life in prison. Some things can be atoned for, others are too late. Hitler didn’t need a hug. Trump doesn’t need a redemption arc. Vladimir Putin doesn’t need self-improvement. When human life is at stake, prison is the answer.

But no matter how bad things get, people and their legacies will always be subjective. Trump has his supporters despite everything he’s done. J.K. Rowling still has her defenders. People still watch WWE despite the fact that they have a business relationship with Saudi Arabia…and that they did necrophilia comedy in 2002…and that they made fun of Jim Ross’s colon surgery in 2005…You know what? I could go on forever when it comes to WWE’s offenses. But no matter how many times they win the yearly award for Most Disgusting Promotional Tactic, they’ll still have their defenders and supporters. Vince McMahon would have been canceled a long time ago, but he wasn’t, because cancel culture doesn’t exist. He can be criticized. He can be protested against. He can be pressured. But kicked out of the WWE? Hardly. While the audience does have the loudest voices, they’re not the boss who makes all the decisions. They can influence decisions, but they don’t get the final say. Even in an American democracy, that proves to be the case over and over again with our politicians.

We all want to have our dream careers to carry us through life. We don’t want that taken away from us. It’s natural to feel that way. But a dream career isn’t everything. Some things are more important, like integrity, honesty, kindness, and humility. There’s always room in your life to be a good person. If you hurt somebody unintentionally, apologize profusely. Don’t do it to save your career. Do it because you’re a good person who values love. Don’t do things in the name of mass support. Do them because they’re the right things to do. Everything we do has a consequence even if it doesn’t always mean the end of a career. J.K. Rowling has millions of dollars and won’t go away anytime soon. But the damage she’s done with her transphobia has grave consequences for the world at large and undermines every progressive belief she had before that side of her came out. Her readers will be afraid to be themselves. They may even resort to suicide if they believe there’s no avenue for help. We as creators have the power to influence the world. Use it wisely.