Off The (Great) Wall: All Hail Bieber!

Here at Running Wolf’s Rant we pride ourselves for celebrating the utterly brilliant, ignoring the mediocre and completely annihilating and shaming those who do absolutely nothing to advance the cause of humankind. Now before you go asking who appointed us the authority to do such, the answer is “Nobody.” Yes, nobody said we could do it and nobody is saying that you yourself cannot do it – we just feel that we might be slightly better than you at it. There are many reasons that fuel this belief; so choose however many of them from us being seriously cool to us practically not caring what you had for breakfast or lunch.

Now the Interweb has been littered with pictures of Justin Bieber. The kid is a phenomenon and his bulging bank balance wouldn’t embarrass him in the company of Sheikhs’ sons and daughters of Russian oligarchs – he’s straddling that line between rich and wealthy, and all before he’s turned old enough to drink. Lucky bitch! Okay, this particular writer admits that there is a hint of jealousy there – some in the industry have called the kid the reincarnation of James Dean, and in a few years (probably 5 years at most) the same women I find attractive will find him attractive. That’s a bitter pill to swallow.

It is however the latest pictures of the boy who’d grow up to be Ellen DeGeneres’s doppelganger that have me scratching my head. The photos show him perched high up on the shoulders of two giants of men who wouldn’t look out of place in an NFL change room. These offending images were shot on the Great Wall of China, and the reason why his Royal Bieberness is seated precariously on the shoulders of these men is because he is “tired”. TIRED! The kid said he’s “TIRED”! Fuck me. At first I laughed and then I got angry with myself for laughing, and then proceeded to severely reprimand myself for having laughed. Maybe it was all out of disbelief. Yes that’s what it was – disbelief!

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Anyways, he was tired and I’m trying to let it go – people get tired all the time. But then I start thinking about it again. This is the equivalent of me heading all the way to the Canadian side of that big wet hole in the ground called Niagara Falls and getting some obese woman from Nova Scotia and her overfed family to stand in front of me because I am not keen on getting wet. Well not the equivalent, not even close. Nobody dug that hole and poured water down it – a bunch (okay more than a bunch) of Chinese people built that wall. One of the wonders of the world, and many paid with their lives. Did he not know that the Great Wall was, how do I say it… Great?

I know I am not the only one who saw the pictures and thought to themselves that something was inherently not right with this world. Here’s a kid who has the ability, and time, to do things that the average human being will not be able to do in their lifetime without incurring huge mountains of debt, or mortgaging the educational futures of their yet-to-be born children. At some point in my incongruous thoughts and anger, I was left thinking of Marvin Gaye’s music. Although Marvin is well-known for his sexy time hits “Let’s Get In On” and “Sexual Healing” he also had a song called “What’s Going On”. I came to the conclusion that had Marvin been alive today he’d not be asking “What’s Going On” but rather “What The Fuck”.

The more I looked at the pictures and thought of the 19-year old being “tired” the more I found myself in agreement with Joel McHale’s assessment that Bieber’s change room must smell of “scented entitlement and puberty”. After this latest stunt or show of “star power” I am left wondering what will become of this kid. Yes he’ll be deliriously wealthy and he’ll probably learn that it’s the Sistine Chapel and not the Sixteenth Chapel as he thought on the David Letterman Show. He’ll probably have a growth spurt and he’ll be the height of a normal teenager, his voice will fully break, he’ll never master the art of growing facial hair and probably most disturbing of all, he’ll hook up with that train smash Miley Cyrus and they’ll be the new Courtney Love and Kurt Cobain.

My conclusion is that this kid should do his best to get his GED (matriculate), not because he’ll need it (unless he pulls an MC Hammer) but because no matter how much you look like James Dean – dumb is just not a cool look. And pull your pants up!

Disclaimer: Let the record show that the writer, like everyone else on the planet, did utter the chorus from that song that goes “Baby, baby, baby ohh…” even for a second; and he’d challenge anybody who denies that they did. There is also no denying that the people or marketing machine that sates the screaming teens and their creaming older sisters has done one hell of a job. There are many of us who would not have hated them at all had they slacked at their jobs like public servants – actually it’d be great if Bieber’s people were bunch of public servants, bank tellers and supermarket cashiers.

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Menzi Hlongwa

Music. Film. Art. Literature. Current Affairs. Culture. I document. Speak out of turn. Think. Engage. Offend. Witness.