IN RE: RETARDS

When I was a kid and would tell a joke or a story, my father would look at me grimly and tell me that I was "as funny as a broken back." Being a child, I would ask him, "But, broken backs aren't funny are they?" To which he would give no reply. After years of his silence, I decided that no answer was forthcoming and set about to unravel this riddle on my own.

As a young man, after seeing my share of the maimed and the crippled groveling in their humiliated states, the first part of the riddle was revealed to me. Broken backs were certainly NOT funny. Yet I was still confused because if life had taught me anything, it was that I was VERY funny, indeed.

Years passed and I gradually came to understand that humor and suffering were essentially linked. This may be old news to you. But let me tell you that terrible experiences and gruesome tragedies are, at their core, extremely humorous. Especially when they happen to other people.

Words, too, can convey misery and pain, and a person can get into plenty of trouble for using even one word in a way which is deemed inappropriate. I'd love to make a long list of them here, but for the purpose of getting to the point of my letter, let's just focus on one: the word "retard."

The following is a comment that I made to Flagpole in March 2001 about punk rock's impact on Athens and was reused for last week's issue in an article about the band Community Chaos

"I think that it's probably given a few rednecks from Madison County the excuse they needed to come into town and act like retards, but beyond that it probably hasn't affected things much."

Out of all the things I've said out loud in my life, I'm pleased that the one somebody bothered to remember, write down, publish and reuse two years later ["Community Involvement," Flagpole, Aug. 13] contained the words "redneck," "Madison County" and "retards." And as much as I relish the thought of inadvertently hurting someone's feelings, I must say that my comment, which so emotionally smited the lil' feller from Community Chaos, while quoted accurately, was sorely misunderstood.

First of all, I didn't call anyone a retard. I merely said that certain people were acting like retards. It may seem small, but it is the critical point. For example, I can act like a horse all day long, but does that actually make me a horse? Well, no. No, it doesn't.

Additionally, anyone offended by my observation that they had come to town and were acting like retards can take heart in the fact that they are part of a proud and venerable Athens tradition. Yes, the educational, musical, political, artistic, financial, culinary and athletic communities of the Classic City owe much to the fact that so many of their numbers came to town to act like retards.

Look around you. You are surrounded by the culmination of the dreams of those who took as their example the mannerisms, foresight and logic that only the mentally handicapped truly possess.

Consider, if you will, the ACC Planning Commission, Prince Avenue convenience store operators, Baxter Street strippers and fry cooks, the mayor, commissioners of districts 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9 and 10; the Volvo driving Buddhist crowd, The Friends of Five Points, gum smackin', Lumpkin Street bank tellers; pushover parents, local Frisbee "enthusiasts," the UGA lacrosse and football teams and their attendant coaches and lackeys, WGAU's morning talk show hosts, crusading vegetarians, Danielsville Road used car salesmen with ill-fitting false teeth, Loop 10 lawn care tycoons, a drooling frat boy in an air conditioned townhouse, Eastside incense stinkin' burrito moguls, the staff of the Prince Avenue Baptist Church and their teenaged mistresses, "expressive" drummers and bongo players, a baldheaded Oglethorpe Ave. landlord that I could name whose last name begins with "L," two-abreast hippie cyclists in their day-glo superhero outfits, anyone wearing khaki shorts and a white t-shirt, all guitarists, several of my friends, me, the Clarke County Police Department and their UGA campus police toadies, 785 local songwriting lyric "geniuses," Mr. South Campus Socks 'n' Sandals, Diet Coke and ranch dressing bitches, the complete musical and administrative lineup of AthFest and all holders of wristbands for said event, the Boulevard Homeowners Association, the local physically fit, the exercise-addicted, the corpulent and the trivia obsessed.

To my knowledge, none of these people are actually retarded, yet many of them moved to Athens and began acting like retards and will probably continue to act like retards in the future. Where do YOU fit in?

Curtiss Pernice

Athens

SCRAP THE DOGS

Dear Pete: Now that I have read your opinion on the "Classic City Eyesores," the UGLY fiberglass bulldogs which are sprinkled all over town, what can we do to rid ourselves of them? They aren't funny, cute, artful, adorable or well crafted. On top of that they are nearly all painted in a dysfunctional way. It would be more fun if they were blow-ups of Cinderella's "Seven Dwarfs." At least we could get a laugh out of them.

Solution #1. Take them ALL to the Classic Center and group them around the "Athena" sculpture which would at least allow some of us to drive on other streets in order to avoid seeing any of them.

Solution #2. If children in Athens find them so wonderful and neat to climb on and play with, take them ALL to Bishop Park where kids could convene with them every day and also keep them out of our sight.

Solution #3. As you have suggested, "Scrap them!" The best solution of all!

WAM

Athens

UTTERLY ABYSMAL

I must compliment Pete McCommons on his City Dope article in the Aug. 20 Flagpole, with regard to the disgustingly bad customer service, and service in general, of Charter Communications. High speed cable Internet access offered by Charter Communications (the cable TV company with no local office in Clarke County) is utterly abysmal. We have had their Internet services for a year now, and hardly one week has gone by during that time without the service going out for hours, days, or even weeks at a time. It is very difficult to run a home business that is Internet-dependent without Internet access.

This company is a monopoly in Clarke County, so we have very little consumer choice in the matter. I actually have their technical support number programmed into the speed dial of our telephone, because we have to call it so often! Please, please, please do something about Charter's absolutely deplorable customer service! Fed up with the situation, I finally reported them to the Better Business Bureau on-line at www.augusta-ga.bbb.org/ and I urge your readers to do the same! Thank you.

Scott Foshee

Bogart
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