If on any given day, I were to pick up a newspaper and read that Charlie Sheen had set an infant on fire and then dropkicked it into a pool of sharks, it really wouldn't shock me. Not even a tiny bit. And you people are running around with your mouths agape at the idea that the dude self-sabotaged his own career? Again?
If Charlie Sheen wanted to shock me, he'd probably have to give himself over to the church, invoke a vow of celibacy, and spend the remainder of his days devoted to spoon feeding quadrapalegic orphans in some third world country. And stick to it for longer than six months of good P.R.
We're talking about a guy that has held the title: Hollywood's Original Bad Boy for longer than most of the people reading this blog have been alive. Charlie Sheen has had to scrape himself out of the gutter more times than Michael J. Fox's bowling ball. This is a guy that got to go to bed every night with Denise Richards and managed to fuck it up. Denise Richards... her exercise show is probably the most masturbated-to non-pornographic program to ever grace a television set. I don't know what she can do for my buns and thighs, but I do know she made my forearms huge when I was a younger man.
In general, what I'm trying to convey is that; the media hoopla was just unwarranted. If anything, Charlie Sheen deserves an eyeroll and a smirk. "Oh Charlie, you did it again..."
Yet, to my uber amazement, people are genuinely upset. I blame the fact that Charlie made the move from films to television. In a time when even the most jaded television addict can admit that there just isn't shit worth watching, our boy managed to get one of the few remaining watchable sitcoms cancelled. It's a disruption to people that set their clocks by what is 'coming up next'.
Still, I was willing to forgive it all. Not waste my time thinking, talking or blogging about it. Chalk it up as just another media circus, in what must have been a slow celebrity month, that would pass the moment another of the elite crossed the barrier from icon to con, until someone said:
"I'll never watch anything with Charlie Sheen in it again. I'll be damned if he's getting any more of my money."
Oh. My. Jebus.
Maybe it's me. I'm a prodigal son of the 80's. I'm not giving up movies that have Charlie Sheen in them, I don't care if they tell me he dug up the corpse of Mother Theresa for perverse sexual pleasures and kept the body in the trunk of his car on ice, just in case he got randy on his way to his next score... Have you lost your fucking mind?
Ferris Bueller's Day Off, Platoon, Major League, The Chase, Men At Work, The Breakfast Club, Young Guns (Where everbody was Martin Sheen's illegitimate child and all had different last names. Awwwwkward), Cadence, Red Dawn... Just to fucking name a few of the movies I would watch repeatedly, despite the cast.
Listen, if O.J. Simpson can commit a brutal double homicide, publically humilate the most violent police in America, and single-handedly make a mockery of the American Justice System and football can remain the most watched sport in this country... I'm not willing to write off Charlie Sheen movies.
I'm not going to watch movies featuring Charlie Sheen because I have lost all respect for him. Well, strip me naked, paint me black and call me a jungle bug. You might not respect the world's best heart surgeon, but if you were getting your chest cracked, I bet that's the mother fucker you'd want looming over your anesthetized body. I don't particularly respect a great many of the people I work with on a daily basis. Not as people. But, some of them are good at their jobs, and I'd rather work with assholes that can than assholes that can't. Charlie Sheen can. The guy is a great actor. And, thats all I want from him.
But, again, maybe it's me. I'm not a star struck retard that feels the need to become embroiled in a celebrity's personal life. Prime example:
This weekend, the girlfriend and I went to the Flogging Molly concert. Prior to the show, we had dinner at a place that claimed it was a pub, but wasn't and then went next door for beers. The place was packed beyond belief and we wound up standing at a small counter, literally shoulder-to-shoulder with a member of Flogging Molly. I introduced myself, he shook my hand, we made a bit of small talk (yes, he opened with the weather. I forgive his transgression into this hated topic, however, as he was probably trying to gauge whether or not I was a psychopath) and had a few beers. When his dinner came, the girlfriend and I talked amongst ourselves and allowed the guy to enjoy his meal in peace. When he was done, there was a bit more conversation, then he shook our hands and thanked us for being fans. End of story.
At no point did I feel the need to press this man for an autograph or a picture. I respected his privacy while he ate. At no point did I use that incidental meeting to try and garner backstage privilges, or impose upon him. I was able to have a very personalized experience with a memeber of a band that I love, without coming off as a drooling idiot that wanted a picture for his facebook profile (in case any of my frineds are retarded enough to believe we hang together on a regular basis). And, that, to me, beats an autograph or picture any day of the week.
I'm just not a clebrity whore. I don't follow their personal lives. I don't give a shit what they do. The idea that someone walks around with more pocket change than I will make this year not thinking that they are above reproach or that they don't have to answer for their actions the same as the rest of the world, is more strange than the reality.
I'm a staunch evolutionist. And, among the sects of the Christian religion that really work my nerves, the Catholic Church has to be number one with a bullet. The fact that they imbue their followers with a need to feel guilt over their personal failings makes me want to pull out my fingernails with a pair of pliers. However, if I met the Pope, it's not like I'd teabag his ring. I'd kiss it, bow and shit... Because, the man deserves respect for his work. I don't give a fuck about his beliefs or politics. Nor do I care about the beliefs and politics of a movie star. Don't care. At all.
If Charlie Sheen believes it's okay to wake up every morning and self-destruct, thats his business. If he makes a shitty movie, then it's mine. Period.
Unfortunately, most of us seem to be so disheartened with our meager lives that we feel this need to live vicariously through the lives of celebrities. Hell, all week long I had to hear about the epic fail that was the Oscars. Um...and you're at home watching a bunch of elitist pricks give each other awards why? Is your life truly that empty? What kind of joy-gasm are you having when the actor/actress that you were rooting for won the award? And, do you realize that this is more retarded than the fact that you're watching the Super Bowl when your team didn't make it there?
I could easily blame the whole thing on the media. It is undeniable that they assault us with this garbage on a daily basis, forcing it down our throats the way a parent forces vegetables on a child. But, we, as a society, need to own up to our share too. If we weren't sitting around like a bunch of bored housewives with nothing better to do than hear the latest dish, maybe the media would get back to doing it's job and report some actual, unbiased fucking news.
If you guys want to knock Charlie Sheen for being a ticking timebomb of a human being that blows about every 5 years, go ahead. You're going to stop watching his movies? Awesome. You can mail me your DVDs, as I'm missing quite a few of the above mentioned films. For all the bashing I heard about Charlie this week, I never heard a single 'thank you' for the free entertainment. Because, that's what the guy gets paid to do. Entertain you. And, you've all had a free show for the last week or so.
Anyone that has drank tequila has a story just as, if not more, humiliating than anything Charlie Sheen is being crucified for at the moment.
This guy isn't Breaking News. He's Breaking Wind. He's just another fart disguising the shitstorm we're all refusing to look at. Wake up call, America. Charlie Sheen isn't your problem.
We've been embroiled in a war for 10 years that has absolutely no forseeable conclusion, we had birds dropping dead from the sky for a month, unexplained, and by summer, gas prices will hit $5 a gallon... and people are actively worried over the antics of a celebrity? Most of you need to get a grip on something besides your penis and demand more of your government than you do out of the guy that entertains you in 2 hour blocks. Right now. This second. Yesterday.
In a country where we find it inexcuable to watch a movie because the celebrity starring in it might get a few bucks in royalties, but the government can send any mother's son to an early grave in a war that lost our interest because it took too long...it's no wonder that a blog about stupidity is easy to write. Just a wonder that it's popular.
Hot damn (and I never say that) I wish this blog when Michael Jackson assumed room temperature!
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