Hitting my Head Multiple Times with a Brick Would Not have the Same Effect

Have you ever watched Desperate Housewives? Have you ever used a fire hose for an enema? Which do you prefer? To tell you the truth, I'm not privy to the latter. However, I think I'd rather solicit myself outside the local volunteer fire department than watch another episode of Desperate Housewives. I hope they bring out one of those jet-powered trucks our boys used in the Gulf War to put out oil well fires. Give me that deep clean feeling. I want my sphincter to shine like well-polished bronze!

Desperate Housewives brings together two things that should never be mixed:

1. Upper-middle-class suburban life
2. Television

Add to that the necessity for the audience to be predominantly Christian, white and/or inbred, and we have the makings of the Republican party. Come to think of it, aren't these the main ingredients for the Mayan apocalypse? It's always hard to tell what ancient runes mean when all means of interpreting them were burned alive 450 years ago. But I'm going off on a tangent...

The real reason for my deep hatred for Desperate Housewives, however, is not the fact that it exists (though that one is way up there), but the fact that everyone who watches it absolutely INSISTS on subjecting others to their brain-dead habits. The show irritates me even if I don't have to listen to it--just seeing all of those white women whine about being in proximity to other white women makes me want to hurl.

That brings me to the real point of this post (the fact that I just thought of this point makes it no less real or pointy). I've always had a deep, unwavering interest in human psychological experimentation. This is not to say that I want to subject anyone (e.g. children, etc.) to some random tests (e.g. non-stop, blood-curdling screams in a dark, wet room followed by an hour discussion with Prince in a very dry, well-lit room, etc.). I'm just interested in the ethics of human psychological experimentation (e.g. whether or not I can get away with it, etc.). But if you REALLY think about it, I don't even need to run those experiments. Many people already subject themselves to extremely mind-altering conditions. All I need to do is to take a poll. It's that simple.

Take, I don't know... Desperate Housewives for an example. If we wanted to observe the psychological effects of a person seeing his/her own life from a relatively objective viewpoint, all we'd have to do is take a poll of upper-middle-class white bitches. This is not to say that Desperate Housewives is an accurate depiction of u-m-c white bitch life, only that u-m-c white bitches THINK that Desperate Housewives accurately depicts their lives. Show me an u-m-c white woman who doesn't think this, and I'll show you someone who isn't a bitch (or at least doesn't know she's a bitch).

Now, some of you may think I'm being rather sexist, so without going into my theory of how you're a bunch of slobbering idiots, I'd like to say that I'm not, probably. To prove it, I'll break down the phrase "upper-middle-class white bitch" for you. "Upper-middle-class" denotes a subsection of society that is more or less synonymous with "malignant prostate tumour." These are, with few exceptions, the people whom most of us have in mind when we think about the United States, and they have approximately five percent of the spending power in this country (I pulled that figure out of my ass). "White" obviously denotes their cultural mindset, and not the colour of their skin. "Bitch," as we all know, refers to anyone who constantly whines for more and yet doesn't deserve what s/he already has. Combined these words describe a surprisingly large group of individuals who are very deserving of an eleventh plague (I suggest tape-worms).

~I should have stopped here. I just randomly did a word count, and with "tape-worms" I was at 666. WOO! Now back to our regularly scheduled programming.~

Now, you can probably imagine all kinds of polls that could be taken in order to better understand the psychology of our country. That is the beauty of television (emphasis on "the"); all psychological problems can be explained away with television. Bitches? Desperate Housewives! Assholes? ESPN! Sarcastic bloggers? House! Need I say more?

The only problem, of course, is that the psychological problem has to come before the television show. How else would the networks know how to gear certain shows to certain people? You don't think that television shapes people's personalities, do you?

Actually, that's exactly what I think. Television does indeed shape people's personalities, to an extent. Admittedly, there were bitches, assholes and sarcastic people way before television came along. I'm not talking decades before, I'm talking millennia, eons! The first bitch was a primeval snail, the first asshole was a cockroach, and the first sarcastic creature was Gilbert Gottfried (he's been around that long). Alternatively, if you believe in mythology, the first bitch was Adam, the first asshole was Eve, and the first sarcastic creature was still Gilbert Gottfried (he sarcastically told Eve to eat the Apples, and blamed it on a snake when she and Adam stupidly did. God was so pissed that he condemned Gilbert to eternal life with a whiney voice).

How does television shape your personality, you ask? Well, first tell me what your favourite TV shows were while growing up. Mine were (in order of appearance) The Simpsons, Married with Children, Beavis and Butthead, The Angry Beavers, Modern Marvels, Science/Discovery Channel documentaries, Penn and Teller: Bullshit, Black Adder, and, finally, House M.D. Add to this the fact that I used to watch an average of five hours of television a day, and the fact that my favourite playmate used to be a bird, and you have yourself the psychology of Andrew Fassett. To be fair (or to make myself look better), nowadays I only watch on average maybe five hours of television a week, and my favourite playmate happens to be my girlfriend.. She's ignoring me right now--watching Desperate Housewives with hear headphones on. NA NA NA NA NA NA NA!

I'm a fairly stable person. I'm not very likely to become depressed, and I'm often euphoric. I'm not likely to snap at you, though I say the odd facetious comment from time to time (I come off as sarcastic merely because people confuse facetiousness with sarcasm). I give most people a chance, even if I tend to talk behind their backs (honestly, who doesn't?). I aspire to making people laugh (which is why I'm so facetious and why everyone thinks I'm sarcastic), and I try to stay calm even when angry (again, due to my facetiousness everyone thinks I'm always angry). I'm incredibly lazy, but I try to get things done if other people depend on me (they often confuse my forgetfulness with apathy). Now, even if you can't honestly believe that I'm being completely candid, you can still tell me one thing. Who would you rather have sleeping with your daughter (or son)? Me, or some moron who watches Desperate Housewives, ESPN, American Idol, Grey's Anatomy, etc.? Be honest now; one of us may already be sleeping with your daughter (or son), and we want to know.