>>Valley Patriot>> |
Pet Peeves
Here’s another: Don’t go to the Haverhill Post Office in Washington Square if you want to buy a stamp. They punish you for that. Here’s what happens. Usually there’s a line of at least a dozen people. Only two of the three windows are open. So you think to yourself that it would be easier if you go over to the machine and buy a stamp, easier for you since you could save time; easier for them since the lines wouldn’t be so long. But you soon find out that you can’t buy a single stamp from the machine. What did you think? That
the post office is here to make things convenient for
you? The machine offers a pack of stamps for $4.50 -or
$7.80 if the $4.50 ones are sold out. You can go back
into the line which is even longer now, and kill 20
minutes waiting to buy a single 39-cent stamp. It’s not an act of God, like being born with a club foot or being inundated by a tsunami. I have listened to people grumble about this for about two years. In an otherwise well-functioning post office with courteous and helpful staff, what prevents them from accommodating their customers? Here’s another pet peeve. The growing number of strip clubs. It is unnatural for a man to drink booze and watch nubile young women parade in front of him naked. It’s like going to a restaurant to watch food. Oh look! There’s some chicken turning on a spit! And over there some angus prime rib and potatoes roasting in olive oil! How cool! And how I love the delicious smell of frying onions in this place! But you can’t taste any of it, only look- or you get thrown through a door by a bouncer. The marketing of vicarious sex as a commodity is a degenerating aspect of capitalism. Far more natural would be the legalization of the world’s oldest profession. As a consensual act between two adults, where does the government come in prohibiting prostitution? True, it can be a sordid profession. One thinks of kids selling themselves for food in Mexico. Or human slavery in Thailand -or even the US. But it need not be so. There are places where it is run properly. In Nevada, for example, the practice is legal and regulated. My pet peeve with strip clubs is that they are emotionally unhealthy; they lead men further away from actualizing desire, and ultimately lead further away from the path of realizing the self, which is the goal of all human life. Why live in a world of vicarious thrills? I vote for having a real life, and anybody who is a regular at strip club doesn’t have one. Here is another pet peeve: The mental health-psychiatry- pharmaceutical cartel just isn’t making enough money with a mere 6 million kids in this country on anti-depressants. So President Bush has backed the “New Freedom Initiative.” Largely unreported in the mainstream press, this Orwellian provision would mandate mental health screening for all American citizens. (Bush should have himself screened first and have the findings published.) It sounds like a collectivist idea Al Gore or Hillary would dream up, but Bush is pushing this, which goes to show that no substantive differences divide the two parties where the elitist agenda is concerned. Our presidential elections, for instance, typically offer us a choice between New World Order hacks, kind of like the choice offered between Pepsi and Coke. If you doubt it, just look at the last election- which pitted one elitist, millionaire Yale guy versus another elitist, millionaire Yale Guy. Here is my final pet peeve: “I see in the near future a crisis approaching that unnerves me and causes me to tremble for the safety of my country. As a result of the war, corporations have been enthroned and an era of corruption in high places will follow, and the money power of the country will endeavor to prolong its reign by working upon the prejudices of the people until all wealth is aggregated in a few hands, and the Republic is destroyed.” Abraham Lincoln, letter to William Elkin, 1864. Mark Palermo is a professor at Northern Essex Community College in Haverhill and is the past vice-president of the faculty union. You can email him at markpalermo@lycos.com. *Send your questions comments to ValleyPatriot@aol.com |
I dedicate this column to pet
peeves. Here goes: Losers and miscreants at the May St.
spring water station in Lawrence that use multiple
spigots while others are waiting in line. I am tired of
arguing with people who do this. Nobody, least of all
elders, should have to wait while some jerk at the front
of the line takes three or even four spigots for himself.
I am finding that common sense is not so common.