OH, ME-DIAAA! COME OUT AND PLAY-EEYAY!

Pam Delirium from Animalville out in Tree County, Oregon writes:

"Shifty­ I just can't see Portland media being the insidious ethics-bereft hellhole of manor-born snobs and empty posing and posturing you seem to feel it is."

Why, no, not with that kind of defeatist attitude you can't, young lady.

THE MEDIA STALKER REFLECTS...

I listened with disgust and dismay to the news a while back that Saddam Hussein had "won" the "election" in Iraq with "100%" of the "vote" in a race in which he was the only candidate. I thought how fortunate we are to live in a country where we have no choice at the polls, either, but at least get to be delighted and entertained by non-party candidates in the voter's pamphlet.

Hmmm. The socialist dishwasher-poet-punk rock musician-hippie dipshit? The 400-pound libertarian, "sex writer," "pansexual," registered masochist? Or the business-as-usual brutal despot? It's a no-brainer!

You know how all Portland papers back the same political candidates and ballot measures? It's all one paper, I keep telling you: Politically, socially, culturally and philosophically...literally the same handful of tired old names tossed back and forth between them. And their people and policies always prevail, but just barely.

That means a couple things: a) these papers' influence is miniscule at best, and representative of no one, and b) our elected officials come to power care of a small group of undiscerning, easily-duped shitheads who just go along with whatever's presented to them as the prevailing position.

According to Willamette Week publisher Richard Meeker's mortifying, mealy-mouthed annual state-of-the-repulsive-alternative-newsweekly address, the Portland Tribune lost only $4 million to $6 million this year, down from $8 million to $12 million last year. Not because the public or advertisers gave any more of a shit about it than they ever have, but due to their own cost-cutting measures.

And the Portland Mercury "loses upwards of $250,000 a year."

Congratulations, Portland Mercury and Portland Tribune!

No matter, you understand. They're sponsored by a convictionless business community and don't have to make money, thereby circumventing the pesky problem of having to put out something that people might

actually care about, relate to, or be inspired by. That's an interesting vantage point to be commenting on society from. So, put a lot of stock in what they've got to say, folks. If Portland papers don't make your skin crawl, you haven't got a shit-detecting bone in your body.

The Oregonian's Steve Duin kicked up a shitstorm by reporting that the police had given "awards" to cops involved in fatal shootings, including that of Mexican national Mejia Poot last year. Journalists were particularly incensed because Poot used to mow their lawns.

Is there a more self-congratulating business on the planet than "journalism?" Forever bestowing dubious "awards" on themselves and accountable to no one--least of all you?

John Kitzhaber, who's Oregon's chancellor or something (I thought we were through with him), issued an official apology on behalf of the State of Oregon for the forced sterilization of lower-class state-determined undesirables throughout much of the twentieth century ("Our bad!").

Congratulations, forcibly sterilized!

The final word in the Oregonian's front-page story on same was given to Basic Rights Oregon, representing the opposite end of the sociopolitical spectrum than those people who had the Auschwitz-style experiments done on them by always-progressive Oregon. Its spokes-lesbian asked Oregonians "to honor those victims by telling the gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgender people in your life that you love them and accept them."

So much for that "people are people" crap.

Darling, you're cute when you're being strident, but I'd wager that 99.9% of gay, lesbian, bi-, tri-, poly- and trans- people (you know, the ones we never hear from or about because they have fucking lives) probably aren't pathetic fucks who need the self-appointed likes of you to speak for them. Or need a hug anytime someone other than themselves garners a moment's recognition or sympathy.

Fascist organizations like Basic Rights Oregon and its house organ, Just Out, don't represent people of certain sexual dispositions, they're for people with fucked outlooks and self-images, regardless of whom they sleep with. Which is fine until they're telling you at every turn that it's your fucking fault, via your media or your government.

The issue isn't sexual fairness, it's through-the-roof favoritism. A handful of well-connected, monied, extremely white people are dictating whose thin-skinned sensibilities should be tiptoed around and whose should be run over. And with the full cooperation of a supposedly impartial entity like the Oregonian. And make no mistake--they don't fucking like you.

"Part of me is satisfied to see the America I was never a part of suffer in a way I have lived with for years." Thus reads a letter-to-the-editor published September, 2001, in Just Out. Prior to that, the magazine was calling for a boycott of financially-floundering Macheesmo Mouse for not carrying their cheery, warm, welcoming, all-inclusive paper. Later it snarled that a couple of local DJs were "playing with fire" because one made a clearly humorous, non-malicious play on the word "homo" and another dressed in drag.

"Basic rights" my fucking ass.

Fortunately for all these unelected bigmouth "spokespersons," barely-elected politicians, barely solvent "newspapers" and self-titled "victims," Portland is a city of somnambulant zombies who confuse "nonjudgmental" with noncommittal and passive acceptance with "tolerance."

And you're being had right and "left."