Awareness Ribbons are Funny

Awareness ribbons have always been around, but they’ve really picked up in popularity since AIDS started (at least, that’s my guess).  I think people nowadays enjoy having a cause and a thing to wear for that cause.  It’s like being a fan of a football team, except instead of looking like this:

Oakland Raiders/GWAR Fans

you can just wear a ribbon and not know anything about sports (not that those guys do).

While I am all for causes, the ribbon color meanings seem to have been selected by someone really funny or someone really literal.  I imagine that whoever selected the colors was off to a good start, but then lost steam and by the end was like “eh, screw it, I’ll just do this.”

For example:

The moneymaker of 2009

The pink ribbon represents breast cancer awareness and is also a symbol for birth parents.  Okay, I get it.  Typically, breast cancer affects women and birthing is (allegedly) cute and fuzzy and those two things tend to gravitate towards a color such as pink.  Of course, that’s society grinding that into us at a young age, even going as far as to get your church youth group leader to yell “No purple!” on church trips.  For those of you who never understood what that meant and just pretended you did, mixing the color pink and the color blue makes purple.  And now…you know.

Next, we have:

AIDS? I guess red works

The red ribbon.  It symbolizes AIDS awareness, as well as, heart disease, strokes and substance abuse.  Okay, the drug thing makes sense, what with D.A.R.E. being red.  And, heart disease…red hearts…blood…yeah.  AIDS gets a little weird just because blood is usually connotative with that color and AIDS…I’m just going to let you take that one.

Let’s move on.  Now, here’s where it starts getting funny:

The gray ribbon stands for diabetes, asthma and brain cancer awareness.  Really?  I mean, I’ve used the term “my memory’s a little gray about that” before, but I didn’t mean actually gray.  And, sure, asthma, lungs, smoke, gray; I can see where they were going with that.  Either way, kind of insensitive of the ribbon people about the brain thing.

Okay, here comes the real kicker:

The brown ribbon stands for anti-tobacco awarness…and COLON CANCER AWARENESS. Really, ribbon people?!  You are just getting lazy here.  I mean, sure, tobacco is brown, but to relate that color to colons?  That’s just too obvious.  I applaude the person who had the guts to decide: Colon cancer?  Totally going to be brown.

So, there you have it.  Now, tell all of your friends: awareness can be beneficial and fun!

*And now, here’s me redeeming myself for what some people might deem offensive!:

Breast Cancer Awareness

Colon Cancer Awareness

Brain Cancer Awareness

Asthma Awareness

Flying Spaghetti Monster Awareness

A Note About Recent Events

I have been really bothered by the way that the past 24-48 hours have unfolded.  It’s really made me discouraged about social media and what exactly it’s future holds.

It feels like everyone has become the person in commenting sections that have to be the “F1RST!!1!” person to post.  Michael Jackson passed away and a frenzy ensued.  This was not just a small bit of insanity, but more like post 9/11 frenzy.  I mean, people were creating Twitter accounts just to Tweet about MJ.

Too soon, CNN.

And the news coverage.  More people talked about how fast the news spread than what the actual news was about!  It was a free-for-all to see who could report the best news about the coverage of the news about spreading the news of Michael Jackson’s death.  Get all that?

Has it become a journalists job to attach Twitter and it’s speed of information exchange to every single news piece?  There’s always the Twitter drinking game: take a shot for each time the word Twitter, tweet or any other variation is mentioned in a news piece.

Calm down, people.  Michael Jackson is dead and it is sad.  Let that be it.

Social Commentary

Comic courtesy of picturesforsadchildren.com

Intense and Genius

This is an ad from Amnesty International that only shows abuse when the person is not looking at it. It’s certainly got MY attention.

It’s a cool ad, but ultimately, action is what makes a difference. I’m not saying I’m some super activist, but here’s a link if you want to do something.

Welcome, Technorati users!

Here’s my code:

fy89krbpgm

My Childhood

Okay, so this isn’t me.  But, damn, that kid is awesome.

Facebook is Over

Facebook has reached it’s tip. Too much change is happening with little regard to user feedback. People are becoming more and more dissatisfied and, just like Myspace, it is going to see its demise as a result.

Thanks Facebook, it’s been a good run. I’ll see you on Twitter.

Michael Vick and Unemployment

The man has served his jail time, but while he’s under house arrest, he is FORCED to work 40 hours a week at $10 an hour.

Unemployment is so high right now! And the guy GETS a job that people are begging for. Talk about upsetting.

Limp Bizkit, Creed and Swine Flu

The sad thing is, I don't have to say anything.

Creed is getting back together.  Seriously.  And, so is Limp Bizkit.

This is NOT a test of the emergency broadcast system.

Now, enter the Swine Flu.

We are entering a time of human history that will later be known as the Dark Ages…2.0.

Dark Ages 2.0 is a new term that I have coined that all began with Fred Durst’s horrible statements in an interview recently.

“We decided we were more disgusted and bored with the state of heavy popular music than we were with each other.  Regardless of where our separate paths have taken us, we recognize there is a powerful and unique energy with this particular group of people we have not found anywhere else. This is why Limp Bizkit is back.”

Mr. Durst, I have one piece of advice for you:

NO

You are not allowed to make such claims without being a credible musician yourself.  You, the scum of a genre that doesn’t even have a following, think you can judge something that is better than you in every sense?  I think not, sir.  You can take your backwards hats and soul patches and march right back into “celebrity” abyss.

As for Creed,  a Bible verse:

“And the fifth angel blew his trumpet. And I saw a star that had fallen from heaven to the earth, and the key of the pit of the abyss was given him. And he opened the pit of the abyss, and smoke ascended out of the pit as the smoke of a great furnace, and the sun was darkened, also the air, by the smoke of the pit. And out of the smoke Creed reunited and came forth upon the earth; and authority was given them, the same authority as the scorpions of the earth have.

And in those days the men will seek death but will by no means find it, and they will desire to die but death keeps fleeing from them.”

Revelations 9:1-6

Just stop it.  I mean, the drummer from Creed, Hoop-Earrings McJewelry, had even said that, after the band broke up, getting them together would be like getting a bunch of Vietnam veterans back together; he never really liked Stapp, except for the sake of the band.

I think they're about to cry?

Now, Stapp is saying words like “rebirth” and “renewal” and we’re all rolling our eyes because we all know he’s still a horrible drunkard who couldn’t even be sober for television interviews when he was “flyin’ solo, dawg!”

All in all, with things like the swine flu, the world is bad enough.  Do we really need to throw a plague into the mix?  For the sake of the human race, stay away you two.

I haven’t updated in forever, but I am now updating from ping.fm and it is awesome. I hope, at least.