The Rotten Appal: From Poop to Fire

The "satirical" publication, known for its banality and badly crafted jokes, has once again proven that it can only handle one punch line a week. In the past, the Rotten Appal has had a fecal fixation, but they have recently shifted their focus to a hotter topic. Indeed, it would seem the writers of the self-proclaimed humor website got together and discovered fire all over again. Last week's update (I apologize for my absence) contained not one, not two, but THREE stories where fire was the badly delivered tag line.

I mean, shit, they didn't even TRY to hide it.

It would be different if these stories were connected by a similar theme (other than "HAHA FIRE BURNS SHIT") but it would seem that the creative stores at the Rotten Appal have run dry. The publication might want to watch out; a dry beached ship can go up in flames at any time.

The ACTUAL Actual Difference Between Women Who Are Hot And Women Who Are Beautiful

This isn't the only phallic symbolism in this article.

It seems that every few weeks, a new article written by someone halfway through college emerges on the internet. Never longer than four or five hundred words, it draws in readers with simple vocabulary and pretty pictures. This is, most likely, a product of Buzzfeed and responsible for the implosion of modern journalism as we know it. But, I digress.

The most recent article being passed around all over Facebook is an account detailing the difference between beauty and "hotness." It is titled "The Actual Difference Between Women Who Are Hot And Who Are Beautiful." Before I jump into the content of this piece, I want to talk about the title. The actual difference. "Actual" implying that it is in contrast to another aforementioned difference stated by.....who? The article doesn't link to a piece titled "The Difference Between Women Who Are Hot And Who Are Beautiful" so I have to assume that the writer of this article does not know the definition of "actual." An honest mistake for someone who doesn't write for a living. A stupid mistake for someone who does.

And speaking of stupid mistakes, the title has another nugget of idiocy. The title states "The Actual Difference Between Women Who Are Hot And Who Are Beautiful." This seems to state that the article is not about the difference between women who are hot and women who are beautiful, but the difference amongst women who are both hot and beautiful.  Now, the latter explanation could certainly be the truth, but considering the article that follows, this is obviously not the case. Twelve words into this piece and there is already a logical mistake and a grammatical one. Let's jump in and see how many brain cells we have by the end of it.

The article starts with a list of characteristics of women that would only make sense if there was a Rorschach test involved. Unicorns? The last time unicorns were relevant was in 3rd grade and even those girls would think this is fucking stupid. Furthermore, the list is meant to demonstrate how men describe women in constant sexual innuendo. Which is ironic considering the origin of the unicorn.

Yes, it's a penis. 

But, as we have already been made aware, this author is no stranger to logical fallacies. She goes on to bemoan how men no longer compliment a woman's soul and how everything is about sex these days. Ignoring the fact that we are but highly-evolved (relatively) animals whose sole purpose in life is to fuck and continue the species, let's talk about beauty in regards to the soul. Wikipedia describes "beauty" as "the characteristic of a person, animal, place, object, or idea that provides a perceptual experience of pleasure or satisfaction." 
That's pretty strict and difficult to attain criteria. It implies something incredibly deep and thoughtful. It implies familiarity with a subject. The description itself it, in my opinion, a thing of beauty. Beauty isn't something that can be found in everything. That would trivialize it and make it arbitrary. Beauty is something that evokes a feeling of bliss in he or she that views or experiences it. I agree with the author that beauty is more than mere physical attributes, but I don't agree that it should be applied to women more often than "hot" is. There are more hot women than there are beautiful ones. The former is easy to find. Physically appealing attributes are common in an age where getting plastic surgery is about as easy as clipping out the appropriate coupons. I see hot girls everywhere and I am perfectly content in pointing it out to my guy friends (albeit crassly) so that we may make crude comments for the following five minutes. But what I don't do is point out the beautiful women that I see. Partly because I would be branded a pussy and tormented for time immemorial. But mainly because I don't see it often in people walking down the street. Beauty can't be conveyed by a mere glance or a conversation. It is something that one must work to find, something that one has to find through familiarity with a person.

Thus, to posit that men are rude pigs because they can't seem to ascribe beauty to every girl they meet is a self-serving load of tripe that has been perpetuated by a horde of people who don't like that the spotlight isn't on them 24/7. To be fair, many men are rude pigs that see women as mere objects. But we don't have a responsibility to remove "hot" from the lexicon because you don't like that we aren't recognizing your staggering brilliance.

This piece was published on Elite Daily which has the barf-worthy tagline: The Voice of Generation-Y. The navel-gazers of my generation seem to adhere to the notion that every one of us is a special font of creativity and beauty just waiting to burst on to the scene and make the world fawn over us. Cynicism aside, you are certainly special and unique, but that doesn't mean you're beautiful to me. Beauty is a subjective thing and to expect me to see it in you is selfish and obnoxious. Do you know what's not beautiful? Whining about how no one understands how pretty you are underneath.

To conclude my musings, allow me to produce an alternate explanation of the difference between women who are beautiful and women who are hot. Women who are hot look good on the surface and give men whiplash. Women who are beautiful can't be described by the writings of a college-aged blogger. Stop trying to define beauty.

Glenn Greenwald Rolls Out New Site With a Bang

Glenn Greenwald, famous for leaking NSA documents/information given to him by Edward Snowden, debuted his new site today and wasted no time in dredging up more NSA secrets. The first two articles on his new website, The Intercept, are photos of the NSA and other intelligence agencies and a fairly in-depth look into the "U.S. Assassination Program." I will be quite honest with you and say that I have yet to read either. (I do plan on doing so, however)

Whether or not you think the NSA-Snowden debacle has been overplayed by the media is irrelevant. Greenwald, in his introductory post, promises hard-hitting investigative journalism and in-depth reporting on government and corporate secrets. Personally, this sounds like a great idea and I really hope he can do some good with his new medium. But only time will tell if this is truly an attempt at some sort of transparency in world behind closed doors or if this is just one more famous guy giving in to the cult of personality. Until then, I urge you to read his articles (do as I say, not as I do) and tell your friends to do the same. And while you're at it, send them my way. 

Google Shows Support For Gay Olympic Athletes

In a really cool move by Google, the search engine giant has proudly displayed their support for gay rights today with their latest doodle. However, as indicated by the quoted Olympic Charter below, the doodle is more than merely a show of support. It is a direct shot at Putin's controversial anti-gay stance. This, of course, became apparent this past summer when the Russian "President" signed a law banning gay "propaganda" from children.  Because he's an asshole.

But, for every huge asshole in this world, there is a ray of sunlight emitting from it. In this case, Putin's shithead actions have brought together a lot of people in support of gay rights. I would even go so far as to say that this will go down as a turning point for the LGBT community in terms of progress forward. Even Canada's getting on board.

But this doesn't mean the fight for LGBT rights is over and I think the Olympic Charter, while intended for sport, is applicable to us all right now. It reads as follows:

"The practice of sport is a human right. Every individual must have the possibility of practicing sport, without discrimination of any kind and in the Olympic spirit, which requires mutual understanding with a spirit of friendship, solidarity and fair play." –Olympic Charter

Rotten Appal Swings, Misses, and Flails About Helplessly

As you may have noticed, the Rotten Appal went un-snarked last week. This is due in part (mostly) to a hectic schedule in which I didn't have the time nor the effort to write up a blog post concerning their comedic transgressions. However, it is also due in part (slightly) to a vast improvement in content. While still humorless and worthy of a mass protest, it was, for all intents and purposes, a step in the right direction. If you write for the Rotten Appal and are reading this A) Leave while the ship is still afloat and B) Your concepts of humor are improving but the execution is still lacking. Fix that.

But, as you might expect by this post you are currently reading, with every step forward must come two steps back. In the case of the Rotten Appal, they inched forward slightly before being propelled backward by a jet engine of mediocrity. This week's batch, while certainly bad, is mainly weighed down by dry delivery and awkward phrasing coupled with concepts that just don't have much humor to extract.

To begin, the Canadian PR bit is tired and unworthy of further exploration by the comedy community. Yes, Rob Ford smoked crack and Bieber is a little shit. This has been dragged out and commented on for several months now. In other words: It's old news and everyone that has already done the bit has done it better than you ever will. With this sort of medium, you can't afford to engage in the same humor tactics as a Twitter commenter. You need to address far more obscure concepts. Think observational humor with less apparent self-awareness. That said, there is such a bevy of current events to choose from in terms of making jokes about pop culture that it's almost insulting and lazy to go for the Canada joke. We have the Olympics (which, admittedly, got a half-assed article), the State of the Union, the recent 150 point drop in the DOW, the media's weird obsession with heroin following the death of the late, great Philip Seymour Hoffman. You had no excuse to dredge up old news for cheap chuckles. I digress.

The other article that struck me as particularly bad was the one concerning the sorority girl and her phone (or lack thereof). Never mind that the delivery was, as expected, awkward and that the writing was subpar. The true source of my distaste for this article was its laziness. This bit could have been written by an alien who only used a gif-filled Buzzfeed article titled "20 Things Sorority Girls Love" as reference and it would have been equal to or better than the original story. This piece takes a well-known stereotype and then surrounds it with words written by someone whose only experience with sorority girls must have come from a TFM article. Now, here, I would normally come up with an insulting description of this article in order to best display my utter dislike for it. However, in the interest of inclusion, I have created a list below with some of my favorite insults and you may choose which one best suits your reading experience. 

1. This piece is about as funny as the official police transcript of a 3 pm jaywalker.

2. Listening to Charlie Rose read the ingredients off of a ketchup bottle is exactly twice as interesting as this article.

3. The sound Tom Waits makes during a self-administered enema is, coincidentally, the only sound that can aptly describe this article.

4. Up until 1690, writing these words in this order was punishable by upside down crucifixion.

5. If you shoot yourself against a white background, 9 times out of 10, the blood splatter will look exactly like this article.

Assuming you've chosen your joke/insult of choice, thank you so much for reading and be sure to check in every Wednesday for my review of the Rotten Appal. I didn't cover nearly as much as I wanted today but, as I said, I'm short on time and I can only muster up a modicum of shits to give about the Rotten Appal. Until next time!

Zuckerberg Has Already Made $3.4 Billion This Year

On January 31st, the DOW dropped 150 points, marking the worst January in years. It would seem, from a financial standpoint, that 2014 has had a rocky start. That is, unless you're a social networking wunderkind who traded his Harvard diploma for a Silicon Valley startup. Mark Zuckerberg, the man who invented complicated relationships, started off this year with a bang. In 2014 alone (keep in mind, we are one month and three days in), Zuckerberg has increased his wealth by $3.4 billion. In. 2014. Alone.

Bloomberg reports. 

He’s gained $3.4 billion since the start of the year—nearly all of it materializing on Jan. 30, when Facebook reported its quarterly earnings, which showed more than half of revenue coming from mobile devices for the first time.

This is, of course, merely a small addition to his now $28 billion fortune, making him the 22nd richest person in the world. And he's only 29.

On the other side of the Valley, Google's Sergey Brin and Larry Page have only managed to net a profit of $1.4 billion each. My heart goes out to them.