The Death of Culture - Part 1 "Harvey"

September 24, 2015  /  Dave Frank

Reality Television is the death of American culture. That is a topic for another time. For now...

I sublet. I recently paid a grand as one month's payment to sublet my friend's apartment for what will be an unspecified amount of time. That's a great deal. I can talk about that another time as well. For now, just know that the apartment came equipped with one of those interactive, multi-featured TV's. I watch Netflix. I'm currently watching The Killing, which is surprisingly well done despite the melodramatic rainfall. 

However, before the TV launches into Netflix, it inevitably and with absolute conviction arrives at TMZ. TMZ is always on. TMZ is the worst program on television. It's worse than 2 1/2 Men. It's worse than that idiotic show about down syndrome nerds. It's worse than the Kardashians, which admittedly, I have never watched and until recently never realized that Bruce/Caitlyn Jenner was a part of and, in fact, while writing this still feel uncertain about. I may be completely wrong about Ms. Jenner's TV whereabouts. Either way, TMZ is worse than the Kardashians. And, finally TMZ is even worse than The O'Reilly Factor. It's hard to find anything endearing about Bill O'Reilly's smug, ugly, polarizing and seemingly endless visage, but perhaps I can say he at least inherently aides opposing voices in sounding that much greater. Harvey Levin, however, that is the man who has slyly taken a short dagger out from his breast pocket, crept silently past our moderately capable collective conscious, and from ear to ear, sliced the throat of American Culture. The Millennial Muckraker.

How did this hack attorney delivering shoddy legal explanations on The People's Court, a precursor to our omnipresent "Reality TV" world, take over the smut business? O.J. Simpson. He broke out on his own after covering, in absurd fashion, the O.J. case right here in my hometown. Perhaps, it is more accurate to call Harvey the godfather to the Millennial Muckraker... that individual has yet to appear in full. Speaking of which, does anyone ever TMZ Harvey? - I just verbed a noun, it's been done before - Someone must at some point break out the iPhone, catch this guy mid-bite, pimply, unshaven, stained yellow teeth, and throw it on YouTube for all to gawk over. Face stuffed with a crappy, overpriced Sunset Strip burrito, harassed, asked mindless, meaningless questions until he launches at his own unhinged creation. I really haven't investigated Harvey's eating habits, but somehow picture him occasionally digging into shitty versions of LA street food. 

Harvey Levin came out of his closet several years ago, which on the surface, at least, is a positive & brave act. Let's just give him that one and as tough as it is, not be cynical about his possible reasons why. Regardless of his reasons, it was much bigger than the act he puts on routinely while making millions of $$$$ at the expense of people who happen to be famous and walking. Actually, let's give him $$$. He's extremely wealthy, but not Koch wealthy. Anyway, I'm not starting a "cry for celebrity hardships" campaign, but if we ever want to investigate the Five W's (plus Ms. How) of our cultural death, well, we have our first defendant. 

Bi

September 12, 2015  /  Dave Frank

If you're with a girl and she says she's bi you should clarify if she means bi-sexual or bi-polar.

_ I can't take full credit for this because Marilyn Manson (probably amongst others) said essentially the same exact thing on the Bret Easton Ellis podcast dated 11/03/14. Memory is a funny thing, but I'm quite certain my statement was spoken independently after spending a couple of nights with a relatively unstable therapist named Marissa.