Pranksters and Wiseacres

I've been reading Lisa Crystal Carver's Drugs are Nice lately. I mostly read it in bits and pieces when I'm on the can, because I don't have the luxury of spending long periods of time reading for enjoyment. I was aware of Suckdog and GG Allin in the late eighties when I was a nice, polite, shoe-gazing indie rocker. I always thought that any fool could get on stage and take a crap or insult people and pass themselves off as some kind of unique, demented genius. I had some respect for the guts it took, and the originality of it, but I always thought it would be better if it were done with a little more subtlety. Where’s the shock value if everyone shows up expecting you to shit onstage and flail yourself with the mic stand, and that is exactly what you do?

Another person mentioned in Drugs Are Nice is Lisa’s ex, Boyd Rice. He likes to piss people off by using quasi-fascist symbols and spouting social Darwinist ideas. But when you’re that ham-fisted about making people uncomfortable, you only attract people who either misinterpret what you’re doing (e.g. actual white supremacists or fascists who will eventually kick your teeth in once they figure out what you’re up to) or only have a fleeting attachment to being with the most “out” group they can find but will drop out as soon as they find something weirder or more shocking. Holding an opinion because it will make some people mad is no more original than holding an opinion because it will make some people happy.

Sometimes I do wish I was more of a rebel. But I’ve never felt like my life would be better today if I had managed to insult more people in the past. The people I’ve met who “aren’t afraid to say how they feel” and who “don’t hold anything back to protect other people’s feelings” are always the first to get insulted when you tell them to their faces that they aren’t clever because they are brutally honest, they’re just assholes. Not that anyone is going to accuse me of being too nice anytime soon. Maybe too safe, but not too nice.