The Tattlesnake – Defending Charlie Sheen Edition

Is it crazy to stand up to corporations and media parasites that are trying to tell you how to live your life?

Charlie Sheen's gotten a bum rap from the media lately because he refused to play the corporate and tabloid-TV game: the Shamed Celebrity is supposed to enter rehab and emerge contrite and chastened and just so gleefully grateful his corporate employer stuck by him during his time of need. Instead, Sheen called CBS and his producers on their 'we care' bullshit, and told the media hypocrites that parasitically cover celebrities to stuff it where the moon don't shine. Here's a news flash you won't see on the MSM: When celebs enter rehab, it's mainly for PR, career, or project-insurance purposes and there is no shortage of drugs and alcohol at any of the well-known rehab ranches that cater to the famous. What are they going to do, kick them out and lose all of that money? No, they turn a blind eye and cooperate in the fraud that the celebrity is 'cured,' and everybody goes home happy. Charlie Sheen just refused to indulge in this fetid game and, for that, he should be applauded.

Is he crazy? Maybe, but no more than most of us, and he's not advising that we hurt or hate anyone. If you read his quotes below, he often makes considerable sense and he frequently lampoons himself, which the TMZ-style media are apparently too obtuse to recognize. He's certainly more honest and lucid than the demented wolfpack of politicians and pundits that appear on Meet the Press every Sunday and are treated as sane and reasonable.

If a Hunter S. Thompson had given Charlie's recent interviews, some of the same people pointing the 'nutjob drug addict' finger at Charlie Sheen and 'tsk, tsk' self-righteously shaking their heads over his sure demise, would be laughing with or praising him. But because he's known as a film/TV actor, and many of them don't want to offend Viacom/CBS for professional reasons, they toe the corporate line that Sheen is spinning out of control and needs help. Haven't we learned by now that large corporations do not have compassionate souls that take pity on their employees, and neither do the heads of Hollywood production companies? It's all about the money.

Aside from that, when did Charlie Sheen's personal life become the concern of anyone but himself and those around him? How would you like your personal problems exaggerated and splashed all over the TV beast and the Internet?

As you read the poem below, pretend they are the words of a beat poet rather than a movie star. It might give you a whole different perspective; "Droopy-eyed armless children" by itself is a line worthy of a Jack Kerouac novel or Allen Ginsberg epic.

"Winning"

The words of Charlie Sheen edited into poetry

I so desperately wanted to be
Mr. Somebody.
Instead, I was the little brother…
As kids we're not taught how to deal
with success; we're taught how to
deal with failure.
If at first you don't succeed,
try, try again.
If at first you succeed,
then what?
C’mon, bro, I won best picture at 20!
I wasn’t even trying.
I wasn’t even warm.

Fame is empowering.
My mistake was that I thought
I would instinctively know
how to handle it.
But there's no manual,
no training course.
The run I was on made Sinatra,
Flynn, Jagger, Richards,
all of them look like
droopy-eyed armless children!
Sure, I did a lot of things in excess.
But if you look at the core,
the foundation of what I pursued,
what red-blooded young American
male in my position wouldn't?
But you can't focus on things
that matter if all you've been
is asleep for forty years.
Funny how sleep
rhymes with sheep.

I'm tired of ignoring that I
march to a different beat.
I will not believe that
if I do something then
I have to follow a certain
path because it was
written for normal people.
People who aren’t special.
People who don’t have
tiger blood and Adonis DNA!
I’m tired of pretending I’m not
a total bitchin’ rock star from Mars!
Here's the good news:
If I realize that I'm insane,
then I'm okay with it.
I'm not dangerous insane.
I am on a drug.
It's called Charlie Sheen.
It's not available because
if you try it, you will die.
Your face will melt off and
your children will weep over
your exploded body.
What you come to discover is,
it isn't how you get there,
it's that you get there.
If that's what it took to get me
where I'm at today,
so be it.

People go,
'What's going on with this guy?
Why does he sound so weird?
What is going on in his brain?'
I don't know. Just one day I
suddenly woke up with a new brain.
I love it! It's original!
You don't have the right to judge me.
Look what I’m dealing with, man,
I’m dealing with fools and trolls!

'Can't' is the cancer of happening.
That's life. There's nobility in that.
There's focus. It's genuine.
It's crystal and it's pure and
it's available to everybody,
so just shut your traps and
put down your McDonald's,
your vaccines, your US Weekly,
your TMZ and the rest of it.
There have to be more important
things going on in the world than
my past.

Uncertainty is a sign of humility,
and humility is just the ability or
the willingness to learn.
I’m sorry, man, I got magic and
I’ve got poetry in my fingertips,
you know, most of the time,
and this includes naps.
You either love or you hate.
You live in the middle,
you get nothing.
Boom, crush!
Night, losers.
Winning, duh!
Bring me Dr. Clown shoes!

[End]

© 2011 RS Janes. LTSaloon.org.

What's Christmas Without Poetry?

Seasonal Greetings...or not.

THE GUY IN THE JESUS SUIT
(Another holiday rerun by 'popular' request.)

The guy in the Jesus suit
occupied space at the end of the bar
exuding waves of beneficence
and winey fumes to all
and sundry.

The suit fit comfortably,
38 Regular, relaxed-fit pleat pants,
with a seven-and-a-quarter halo on the side.
He muttered of Old Testament doom
and it wasn't even Sunday.

"I'm only here to fulfill prophecy,"
he remarked to the bartender,
who was taking his money from the bar.
On the jukebox Bing began to croon
'White Christmas'
and Jesus started to say,

"I'm very disappointed in you all,"
he turned to me and glared,
"As usual, you people just got it all wrong:
I was actually born in June,
and died at the end of May."

"I was a Jew preaching to Jews,
and so were all twelve original Apostles,
and then along comes Paul,
who was something of a loon,
and gives to the Gentiles a way

"to get into heaven.
Hey, the only person I said was saved
was a thief hanging next to me,
sometime before noon,
on my crucifixion day.

"And you can't even follow
the few simple words,
that I spoke in the Sermon on the Mount,
instead you fight about theological trivia
and spread horrifying gloom
and tell people there'll be hell to pay,

"Where any of you got the idea
you were wise enough
to judge anyone else,
I'll never know,
I talked about humankind's boon,
and said you should all
acknowledge your feet of clay,

"But, of course, you got it wrong again,
instead of being kinder and forgiving,
you dare use my name
to despise and complain
and drone the timeless tired human tune of
hate, vengeance,
and compelling others to obey.

"It doesn't matter how many times
you are born again, for, in truth,
you are born only once;
and it doesn't matter what
pious guise your words assume
nor any other homilies you bray,

"If you can't act on my philosophy,
you can baptize yourself 'til you drown,
and sing hymns until hoarse,
and cry to the stars and moon,
and it won't make even a whit's difference,
whatever you pray.

"You could, indeed, make of
this world a paradise,
but you choose differently,
but maybe someday you'll learn,
probably later rather than soon,
what a pity it is that
you could have created this world
two thousand years ago
or yesterday."

He finished his drink
and got up to leave the bar,
then sighed deeply and said:
"Whatever webs you weave
on deception's loom,
remember just this of what I say;
peace and love for one another
remain the only way."

Copyright 1999-2009 RS Janes. LTSaloon.org