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1957. That is the year Dr. Seuss wrote the "ultimate Christmas story". 2007. This year, people still remember that green old hermit today, and this cartoon does a good job of capturing new Christmas trends and old Christmas traditions. The cartoonist devises this small still-life story in order to show how Christmas has evolved from sitting in your home watching Christmas-themed movies to going out and buying the biggest and best gifts from the major retailers. The cartoonist has a good point though. Kids of today don't care about Rudolf, Jack Skellington, or even the Grinch for that matter; all they want is IPods, clothes, and video games, not a marathon of classic Christmas stories on TBS.
The two sides of Christmas are displayed here perfectly. First, you have the innocent mom with here Rudolph vintage Christmas sweater on that she probably got when she was a young "lass", combined with her ecstatic facial expression that shows she is not joking when she see the Grinch on TV. This is the old Christmas tradition the artist shows. Next, we have the transition period (mind you this is a still-photo) as the stereotypical mom hands her VISA credit card to the suit-and-tie clerk the present is shown to us. She carries her four bags probably each worth more than 100$ because she is paying with her credit card. Also, the clerk has the "another stupid show" look on his face cause he has seen it a million times and it was old the second time he saw it. Even without the words this cartoon tell the story of the fast pace of our American lifestyle. Now, excuse me I must go watch Nightmare Before Christmas, before its to late and they decide to burn all the VHS Tapes.
Very interesting article this week by Jason Whitlock about Sean Taylor's death. A reasonable person would assume that Jason would talk about the unfair and unjust killing of an innocent man and how we all should pray for his family and mourn this loss, but Jason goes down a different road. Instead of talking about the depressing circumstances surrounding Taylor's death, Whitlock discuses the anger and the blame that he feel should be put on his own race for this unjust death. He blames hip hop music and the "gangster mentality" of the new generations of blacks for Taylors death. Frankly, I couldn't agree with him more. He brings up the unheard of argument that his own race is what is corrupting our society today. He doesn't blame past discrimination or present prejudice, he blames the music that the blacks are creating and he blames the mentality that the new generation of blacks have about murder and the like. I believe he does a perfect job of bringing up an undiscussed topic pertaining to Taylor's death. He will likely receive criticism for his explanation, but at least he voiced his own opinion that others were unable to discuss, and bring this topic to the table of debate. Among the various parallels Jason uses in his article, this parallel speaks the most. "Meanwhile, our self-hatred, on full display for the world to see, remains untreated, undiagnosed and unrepentant." These words go directly to the heart and convey a summary of the whole article. If I was included in this group of people that Jason talks about I would be at a slight outrage but at the same time feel contempt with myself because I see that he is right. He is justifying his reasoning not only with one choice word but the parallelism used in "untreated, undiagnosed and unrepentant.", speaks volumes more than just saying "untreated". It is used in such a way to say that this hatred is spread far and wide and nobody has done a thing to fix it. It is only getting worse in Jason's eyes and he is displaying his feelings in one brief sentence to the entire black community. He uses this parallel very efficiently to clearly state his main point in one sentence for everyone to understand.
So now with one simple line from a song, Hip Hop is Dead by Nas: "What influenced my raps? Stick ups and killings, kidnappings, project buildings, drug dealings criticize that, why is that?" He says this without any regret at all. Now, we can clearly see why Jason Whitlock does not want his race and our world to go down this horrific road anymore.
