Each Thursday, your Crap Archivist brings you the finest in
forgotten and bewildering crap culled from area basements, thrift
stores, estate sales and flea markets. I do this for one reason:
Knowledge is power.
The O'Reilly Factor For Kids
Author: Bill O'Reilly and
Charles Flowers
Publisher: Harper Collins
Date: 2004
Discovered at: DAV Thrift Store,
Southwest Boulevard
The Cover Promises: Someone's
going to have to break the bad news about The O'Reilly Factor
to America's children, so it may as well the man himself. ALSO: Want to win over today's youth? Pull on a sweater!
Representative Quotes:
"My father shamed me, and I got the
message. Nobody should bully anyone, and no one should have to suffer
through it either." (page 16)
"I didn't have sex until I was
twenty years old! Can you believe it? I was kind of a shy guy around
girls, and I had absolutely no 'moves.'" (page 76)
The O'Reilly Factor For Kids offers many surprises. Its
very existence, for example. Or the way O'Reilly reconciles his
belief that people shouldn't "suffer through" bullying with his
belief that people should watch his television program. Or his assumption that America's children should have
thought often enough about when he might have lost his virginity to have formed prior
opinions on the matter.
Or that he makes creepy-uncle promises like this: "If you enjoy
doing something that a friend thinks is 'nerdy' or 'gay,'
know that your secret's safe with me."
All that's surprising, but the biggest shock is how much this
book -- despite the co-author -- actually sounds like Bill O'Reilly. It's written in
the barking, pugilistic style of his TV and radio shows. When he
writes "The bottom line is that this sex thing is big-time
serious," he manages to drag the written word to his own spoken
level.
The O'Reilly Factor For Kids
is a scattershot guide to all the things O'Reilly thinks kids should
do: toughen up, buck
"the self-esteem police," ignore stereotypes, stop listening to
rap music, and allow Chuck Knoblauch (!) to serve as an inspirational
example.
O'Reilly also:
him by "religious maniacs."
newspaper article about his leaving
Inside Edition forHarvard's Kennedy School of Government.
kind, smart, hardworking, and trustworthy. Sure, and I'm Brad Pitt."
He even pretends to send you some
Goofus & Gallant-style Instant Messages illustrating good and bad
behavior. He divides the world into "Pinhead"s and "Smart
Operator"s.
Here's a sample
pairing:.
"A Pinhead is a kid who shoplifts."
"A
Smart Operator remembers the birthdays of friends and family
members."
And one more:
"A Smart Operator is a kid who
looks past her neighborhood, town, state and country to see the world
outside."
"A Pinhead is a kid who finds a
way to use the word 'butt' in every other sentence, especially when
shouting in the halls at school."
So that's what O'Reilly thinks a pinhead is. I have to admit, I prefer the old Gabba-Gabba definition.
Shocking Detail:
In a chapter misleadingly titled "Fun,"
O'Reilly instructs his young readers to:
"Write down a list of all the things
you find the most fun, even the stupid things. If you really enjoy
sticking a French fry in your ear in order to get a disgusted
reaction from a girl, write that down, too. No one but you will see
the list, so have fun with it."
This list, he promises, "presents a
snapshot of who you are inside." Also,
"Your finished list will
be like a profile -- you know, the kind the FBI puts out when they're
looking for a serial killer. (Okay, I'm just having some fun with
you here.)"
Your Crap Archivist followed O'Reilly's
instructions:
Next, I subjected it to O'Reilly's follow-up questions to see what I could learn.
He writes, "You should
reconsider any items on your list that make you uneasy. If you were
afraid to write them down, that says it all."
, "You should
reconsider any items on your list that make you uneasy. If you were
afraid to write them down, that says it all."
So: It is unhealthy to engage in fun
things that you would be ashamed to admit to your imaginary friend,
Bill O'Reilly.
This excludes the following:
Arguing fairly.
Understanding what "socialism" means.
Pointing out that even Rush Limbaugh compared this schmuck to Ted Baxter.
Highlight:
A preface titled "Direct
To You From Bill O'Reilly" promises a rare event: The chance to learn what's on the mind of a man whose thoughts fill five hours of TV
a week.
In it, he makes a
case for this book's existence. He quotes a couple letters to him
from [purportedly] real kids and then explains,
"I wish I'd had
this book when I was a teenager because, like Elizabeth, I had many
concerns. Unfortunately, no one had written a realistic book for
kids. So I made dumb mistakes, got into trouble because I was too
stubborn to know better, and did things I wish I could forget ...
Maybe you'll laugh at my boneheaded behavior, but that's okay, as
long as you end up smarter than I was at you age."
Think
about it.
If our youthful experiences shape the adults we eventually
grow to be, O'Reilly is, in this book, doing the world a great favor.
If our kids don't make his mistakes, maybe they won't grow into him.
Thanks, creepy uncle teenage-virgin Bill!
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