But seriously, December was more or less an off month for me. And when I say ‘off,’ what I really mean is that I’ve been devoting the little spare time I’ve had lately to such leisurely and worthy pursuits as racketeering, jousting, the development of underprivileged third-world countries, pie-making (this one did not go so well), establishing a global network of like-minded individuals who also want to see the implementation of more strict requirements for individual fame, and finally, the massive watching of sports.
As you may or may not know, I only actually did one of those things. I leave it up to you, fair reader, to figure it out. I realize it might take some time. While you chew on that morsel of food for thought, I inundate you with my reflections on the decade that was. Since I’m only about the 57,213th person to publicly review the past 10 years, allow me to be the 57,214th person to reiterate how much this decade really just completely sucked ass.
Seriously, has there been an overall worse decade for most people than the double-ohs, or aughts, or whatever the hell we’re calling them now? Don’t get me completely wrong, there was some decent stuff that happened – mostly in the realm of entertainment. But in terms of what has gone down for most of us in the real world, goddamn it was not fun times for the majority.
Let’s just generate a list of some of the events that we would rather not have happened in the last 10 years: Y2K paranoia, 9/11, countless acts of other terrorism around the globe more or less stemming from 9/11, the Enron scandal, Hurricane Katrina virtually ruining, at least for a time, one of our country’s most beloved cities, a tsunami wiping out several hundred thousand lives in southeast Asia in 2004, the swine flu epidemic, turmoil in the Middle East having reached a peak none of us could have foreseen 10 years ago (not to mention the thousands of U.S. soldiers who have died because of this), one of the most wildly incompetent presidents to ever sit in the White House holding office as the leader of our country for 8 of the past 10 years, the housing-mortgage crisis, greed on Wall Street manifesting itself in the form of blatant thievery, the long-waged Health Care debate, the death of the ‘old’ music industry as we know it (making way for the ‘digital’ music age), the phasing out of newspapers/magazines as we used to know them (making way for the ‘online’ news-reporting age), and particularly in 2009, the deaths of many beloved celebrities – including Michael Jackson, the most iconic, recognizable pop super-duperstar of the past 25-30 years (regardless of how you may feel about his music or him personally). Oh and of course, right at the tail end of the decade, one of the most visible, admired athletes in the history of sports, one whose status virtually transcends competitive endeavors, was found to be a serial cheater, allegedly having bedded a bevy of women of all walks of life (cocktail waitresses, porn stars, nightclub hostesses, etc.), while his Swedish supermodel former-nanny wife watched over their two small children like a good little wife at home.
Did I cover it all? No way. I undoubtedly left out a lot of other ancillary shit-fests, but I think I hit all the major targets.
Of course, it’s not like nothing good happened. We will all forever recall our own individual highlights – such as those of us who got married, attended college, traveled, or perhaps purchased a home for the first time (one that WASN’T bought primarily through bank-lended ‘mortgage-backed securities’). And we all undoubtedly had many good times with our friends and family, and will continue to do so as long as we’re around.
But even in the world of entertainment, this decade was seemingly different than everything that came before it. Many would probably disagree, but it seems that overall, we had a larger amount of superior movies and cinema experiences in past decades. That’s not to say we weren’t graced with a lot of good films in the 00’s, but Hollywood just continues to become more stagnant through time, relying on sequels, remakes, and tried-and-true but crappy movie-making formulas that put asses in the seats but do little else to create thought-provoking art. It’s as though the bar is getting lower, but most of us are okay with that because we keep swallowing all the crap being spoon-fed to us. If movies like ‘Wild Hogs’ and ‘Bride Wars’ didn’t gross as many millions as they do, ideally filmmakers would cease to put out such garbage. But nowadays, you really have to seek out the good stuff, whereas it seems like it was always around years ago.
As for music, my God don’t get me started. Music always has been and always will be one of my great passions in life, but it simply doesn’t exist now in the same way that it once did. And the overall quality of it doesn’t seem to be what it once was – or if it is, then we just basically don’t have musicians coming out in this day and age that generate the same icon-like status that musicians once did. Everything is i-tunes and ring-tones. Countless record stores have gone out of business. The compact disc is rapidly becoming a thing of the past. And very few artists have come along in this decade that deserve ‘household name’ status. This list of popular musicians that have started in this decade that I can personally endorse strongly is VERY short (Kanye West, MF Doom, The Arctic Monkeys, Them Crooked Vultures, Amy Winehouse, and especially, The Strokes).
I’m sure there are others and I’m just unaware of their presence, but that, in and of itself, is a real problem. Go back 15 or 20 years or more, and good stuff couldn’t be missed or buried in the morass of mediocrity. Now – not so much the case.
There are 2 areas in which this decade, however, was especially strong. I’m talking about TV entertainment and sports.
Let’s start with TV. Quite simply, there has been some outstanding original entertainment programming in the 2000s, comedically (Curb Your Enthusiasm, The Office, 30 Rock, It’s Always Sunny in Philadelphia, Arrested Development, Chappelle’s Show), dramatically (The Wire, The Sopranos, Mad Men, Breaking Bad, Lost, Dexter), and even shows that blend comedy and drama effectively (Entourage, Big Love). This was, unfortunately, also the decade of Reality TV. But whatever – there are clearly enough people who love it.
On that note, this was also, unfortunately, the decade in which the requirements for being famous were little more than having a pulse, being semi-literate, and having a reason to be put on TV (in some cases, not even that last one is totally applicable). All one needed was to be related to a famous person in some way, or the direct offspring of someone who was hot for a minute in the 70s or 80s (or even 90s). Never has the word ‘celebrity’ been expanded to cover so many different types of people, very few of whom actually deserve the moniker. How about this – in the new decade can we please redefine the word ‘celebrity’ to refer only to individuals who have some sort of special talent? Talent, by the way, is something that not just anybody possesses. Let’s keep that in mind people. Being the niece or son/daughter of a famous person doesn’t make you a celebrity, and doesn’t entitle you to your own 30-minute show in which nothing really happens, besides some complaining and shopping.
Let’s get on that, you know, together.
As for sports, never have we had so many memorable moments (not all of them good) packed into one 10-year span. In baseball, we had the black cloud of steroids and performance-enhancing drugs, as well as the infamous Red Sox-Yankees ALCS in 2004, culminating with Boston’s first World Series win in 86 years, not to mention the Chicago White Sox and Philadelphia Phillies, two other long-suffering franchises, bringing home world championships to their respective cities (twice in a four-year span for Boston). In NFL football, we had the undefeated, 18-0, villainous New England Patriots lose the Super Bowl to the underdog, everyman-team NY Giants in fascinating fashion in February of 2008 when David Tyree’s miraculous helmet catch set up the winning score. We also saw the Pittsburgh Steelers cement their status as the league’s signature franchise with a fifth and sixth Super Bowl title, under different head coaches no less (first Bill Cowher, then Mike Tomlin). We saw the Patriots, in the first half of the decade, establish a legendary run of success by winning three championships in four years, largely due to the coaching genius of Bill Belichick and the steely nerves of quarterback Tom Brady, a two-time Super Bowl MVP who was born to win big games (and impregnate, then immediately dump, actresses). We saw a lot of other unbelievable events – I could spend a whole entry on that alone.
But it’s sufficient to say, sports is always fascinating, and always entertaining, no matter how shitty is the world around us. It’s one of the only experiences that isn’t scripted, that doesn’t have a pre-set destination when the journey begins. And if it does (i.e. biased/paid-off referees or conspiracies to ‘fix’ games), then please let us all remain ignorant to it. Let us have this. Come on. Let us live in blissful ignorance. And let the next decade be an improvement on the last one, by God. Almost anything would be.
"good stuff couldn’t be missed or buried in the morass of mediocrity"
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