Riding the Cliche Train All The Way Down. Downtown, All The Way To Chinatown!

We're going to try a new thing here at A Ton of Bricks: fake blog journalism! You all know what I mean. I am talking about the bloggers who think of themselves as "journalists" but all they do is post links to REAL journalistic sources and write about the stories that others have written. By the way, I don't care if you have a journalism degree, if you do this it does not make you a journalist any more than the fact that I have a Chemical Engineering degree makes me an engineer when I pump gas into my car.

So, I'm sure you've all heard about the riots going on in France over some new jobs law. I'm not really sure how I feel about it. If you don't want to follow the links, basically, the new law allows employers to fire younger workers for almost any reason during the first two years of employment, a so-called "at will" relationship between employee and employer. My first reaction to this is "so?" I have an at will contract. It is absolutely typical nowadays, so stop whining and get a job. If you perform well, you'll last longer than two years anyway. I feel like these French youth are just lazy (one poll has 75% of them saying that their ideal job would be a government job, ugh) and they need to live in the now. This is how the world works, and besides, don't you have anything better to do than riot? Or is it just that you felt left out last fall when it was the non-European ethnic kids who got to do the rioting?

But my second reaction is a lot different. All these kids are asking for is to be treated the same as everyone else. It is not their fault that the system they are in is essentially unsustainable over the long run. Someone will have to pay the price eventually, they just don't want it to be them. It's a generational thing. They see their parents having lives of ease, living on the government dole and they want the same thing. Is that so bad? I just hope they know that the stuff will hit the fan eventually. Probably for these kids' kids, but then who cares about them? We'll be sitting pretty!

Speaking of kids, did you all hear about that shooting out in Seattle? The one where this crazy dude shot up a post-rave party at someone's house on Capitol Hill? It's just a tragic thing all around. I'm not sure if we'll ever know why this guy decided that it was time to kill a bunch of people. But here is the thing that struck me most, two of the victims were young teenage girls. When I say "young teenage girls" I mean a 14 year-old and a 15 year-old. I am in my later 20's so every teenager is "young." Seriously, kids that are seniors this year were born in 1988. Anyway, the shooting happened at 7 AM as an all-night party was winding down. What were two very young girls doing at an all-night party with grown men? I'm not blaming the victims here, or their parents. That's not fair. But still, how did this happen? Who are the party-throwers that thought it was appropriate to have a 14 year-old there? A lot of 14 year-olds are in THE EIGHTH GRADE? Also, to any of you who want to blame the parents ("I would never let my child go to a party like that, no how, no way!"): stop being a prick. Are you saying that neither you nor anyone you know ever pulled that classic teenager trick of "you tell your parents that you're spending the night at my house, and I'll tell my parents I'm spending the night at yours! Then we can stay out really late and just sleep at someone else's house! It's genius! How could this plan possibly go awry?" Sure it's a stupid plan that will almost always end in getting caught, but if you don't get caught until the next day, well at least you had that one great night! This is how teenagers think. It may sound completely irrational, and really it is, but it is definitely not any more irrational than they act normally. Also, I don't think it's fair to blame this on drugs/raves/guns/raves. Yes, I said raves twice because that will be what this event is most remembered for, which will probably lead to even more obscenely restrictive ordinances in Seattle, the beautiful city of forced politeness and NIMBYism. (Don't get me wrong, I love Seattle, but there are some problems with the place too.) Blaming this tragedy on any sub-cultural thing is like saying that, if someone shot up a church, it's the fault of the church culture. Well, actually that's a retarded argument, but you see where I'm going with this, right? Simplisticicity is like shotgun blast to the head of reason.

Wow. That was incredibly boring, but tantalizingly easy. I can see why so many people only ever do this stuff on their blogs. Lots of words, very little effort. It's a beautiful thing. Sorry to have saddled all three of you, my readers, with this obnoxious post. I won't do it again. This kind of blogging is like watching Practical Magic: you might do it once just so you can validly talk about how sucky it is.

Finally, I'd like to mention that I appear to have a reader in Columbus, Ohio. I know exactly zero people from anywhere in Ohio, let alone Columbus. The only person I know OF that lives in Columbus is the amazing Drew. If I found out that it was him that was reading this, I would just about pee my pants from excitement. I mean, this is the guy that writes Toothpaste for Dinner! Do you understand me? TOOTHPASTE FOR DINNER!