Death By Comments, by Rosicky Jones

A 7-year-old child called me ugly because I wouldn’t take him to the park. I told it that the only reason I was at his house was because I was bedding its mother. But that didn’t sit well with him; he called me ugly again, then it added a melody, and ran around the room half singing half yelling “you are ugly, you are ugly.” It was a catchy tune that sickened me, sort of like any time a Lady Gaga song plays.

Sort of like any time Paul McCartney blunders his way through a medley of hits.

Sort of like any time Lil Wayne whines about “Lil Tunechi or Young Tuna Fish.”

Sort of like anytime I get drunk and convince my friends to tape me screaming my way through a Red Hot Chili Peppers song.

I adore the Pepps, so much so that I regret referring to them as Pepps. I adore the Chili Peppers. Did you know that their first album came out in 1984 – one year after Madonna’s first album came out, yet she looks like Betty White’s vagina and Anthony Kiedis looks more badass than ever, he has a fucking mustache now!

I have been transfixed with the band and their empty-ass message since I was a child. I remember screaming “give it away, give it away, give it away now” as a babe; even though I had no clue what I was giving away. The thing is that I don’t think the Peppers knew what they were giving away either. All their songs are about drugs, California, and fictional women who were mean to Kiedis – as if any women would ever be mean to that chiseled-inky-haired-emo-surfer. I couldn’t relate to any of their songs, the lyrics barely made any sense, but I was mesmerized by them. The Peppers’ lyrics are shattered, sunny, and shallow – damn, maybe I could relate to their lyrics.

The Red Hot Chili Peppers managed to cut deep into my soul without saying anything substantial, sort of like the 7-year-old. His taunts had naught to do with anything, but the emptiness of his heckles cut deep into my soul. I knew that a 7-year-old’s spoiled attitude wasn’t a legitimate referendum on my ugliness, but I also didn’t know that, and I wanted to punch him in the face and yell, “Who’s ugly now! You are so ugly that your daddy left you!” But I didn’t. I just stared in the mirror trying to recreate the facial contortion I had when the child called me ugly. I recreated a few ugly faces, but the actual face he found ugly was my normal face, u-g-l-y, I had no alibi. I obsess over throwaway comments far too often in my life. Writing on this site and a few other places on the web has brought throwaway comments into my life on a daily basis. I felt just like Dani California when Kiedis crooned:

Push the fader, gifted animator
One for the now and eleven for the later
Never made it up to Minnesota
North Dakota man was a gunnin’ for the quota
Down in the badlands she was saving the best for last
It only hurts when I laugh
Gone too fast

Holy shit, that makes absolutely no fucking sense, yet I am thoroughly mesmerized by those words. The fascination I have for dead lyrics and the criticisms of shitty little kids manifests itself when I read comments on my columns. The way I read and am affected by negative feedback on my work exceeds anything I felt for Kiedis or the disparaging comments of a child; it is the sum of the two events. It’s like having a tiny-mustachioed-baby-Kiedis in my living room running around singing, “you are ugly, you are ugly.”

Last week I had a column go live on another site. It was a safe, even-keeled column, devoid of my biting wit; my best line was even edited out: “Herman Cain’s wife is the latest example of a black woman being lied to by a Republican.” The column made fun of Herman Cain’s campaign, all of his 9s, his regressive initiatives, and logically explained why I would never vote for him. It was liberal, decently-written, completely factually accurate, and elicited the meanest goddamned comments I have ever received in my tragic little life. I live alone, I have empty relationships with vacuous women, I grew up in foster care, and I have a shitty credit-score – the comments on my writing are all I got. So having this happen really hurts:

These are just three of 36 comments that alluded to my homosexuality, my death, my lack of literary skill, or a hate-medley of all three. There were over 50 decent, civil comments, but the 36 evil ones stuck with me. I wanted to tell JesseJaymes not to call me a faggot and that I wasn’t from Kenya. I wanted to tell 999OnYourFace that my math is never wrong, that I am not a homosexual dumpster for cum, and that I type on a computer sans pencil, so I could never feasibly carry out his suicide request. I wanted to tell RightWingPimp that I loved his screen name, that my writing is bi-curious and not gay, that I don’t know my mom or the whereabouts of her basement to overtake for blogging purposes, that I feel lugubrious about Googling big words, and that I am very well aware how many people don’t read my shit. It was last week Wednesday when my column went live and I sat around for three-hours repeatedly clicking refresh. They broke my heart, I have no clue why, I realize that the people who callously attack people behind the anonymity of the internet are just as shitty if not more so than I am. I know that I shouldn’t let that bother me, but I was all alone in my apartment scrolling through my phone for a whore to come over and not call me a faggot or wish death upon me. I didn’t want sex; I wanted a booty-call for my feelings. I mean, why the fuck are they so damn mean? They make the web seem like a festering petri dish full of all that is immoral in the world. I would have considered suicide if I didn’t think that my death would just ignite hundreds of snide comments about my disappointing life and depressed death – “He died like a queer ass fag socialist cumdumpster!”. Even my suicidal fantasies are tarnished by the existence of anonymous comments.

Once I woke up on Thursday morning, I had Amy sit her son down and explain to him that while not classically good-looking, I was technically beautiful as the symmetry of my face perfectly exhibited the scientific standard of koinophilia. And that I didn’t have to look like Bieber to be attractive. I also bought the new Red Hot Chili Peppers album, got drunk, and had my friends tape me scream-sing the utter nonsense they call lyrics. And I have forced myself to not refresh the comments section to any of my columns. I can rectify the stupidity of a child calling me ugly; I can rationalize adoring all the hokum Kiedis masquerades as poetry, but the meaningless words from anonymous internet commenters, well, dealing with that is beyond my emotional capacity.

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