It’s no secret that I’m a patriotic person who gets so aroused at the thought of freedom that I may or may not have tried to look up the Statue of Liberty’s robe to see her labia of liberty when I visited New York City for the first time (more like Snatch-ue of Liberty, am I right?). In fact, I’m so patriotic that “I love America” was one of only three things I included in the online dating profile I made a few years ago that lead to exactly 239 dates (if you must know, the other two things were “I am terrified of every kind of mustard” and “My penis is somewhere in between 4 and 17 inches long”). I’m well aware that my patriotism could sometimes be interpreted as if I’m playing some sort of character and only pretend to care about America to be funny or something, but the truth is that I really do have a strong passion for my country. While foreigners (and even a majority of Americans) scoff at how ridiculous it is that the cast of Jersey Shore are all millionaires, that singular fact epitomizes why I love the US of A so much (even though I also agree that it’s ridiculous that they’re rich) – it’s the only country in the world where literally anyone and everyone has a chance to make a name for themselves, even alcoholic douchers from New Jersey (like you, Barrale). Simply put, this is the land of opportunity, where anyone can be anything they want to be. Sure it helps to be born into a wealthy family or to be given freak athletic genes if you want to make it to the big leagues, but at the end of the day, every American is born with a blank slate and a world of opportunity ahead of them. It’s on us to make the most of these chances.
(One more thing and I’m done with this part of my rant: I was watching coverage of the royal wedding last week – but only because [insert acceptable excuse here]!!! – and I saw something about how Kate Middleton’s mom was chastised by the British media a few years ago for chewing gum in the Queen’s presence. Now, I respect British traditions and actually do find the history of the royal family to be fascinating stuff, but I think I speak for all Americans when I say that I’m thankful I live in a country where I can not only chew gum in front of the president, but I can also tell him to lick my chode without any real repercussions if my heart desires. I know Kate Middleton’s mom didn’t actually break any laws and wasn’t arrested or anything, but still. The fact that she got chastised in the media was bad enough. By comparison, disrespecting and disagreeing with the president is actually some Americans’ favorite pastime, not to mention a great way to get your own show on Fox News. So yeah, just another reason why America rules.)
With all of that being said, because I’ve made it clear in the past how patriotic I am, I seem to be the guy that the Trillion Man March turns to whenever something happens that could warrant a USA chant. No matter the time of year, I get all sorts of emails, tweets, Facebook messages/posts, etc. from the TMM whenever you all see a patriotic YouTube video, a news story that triggers national pride, or a badass picture of Teddy Roosevelt shooting bigfoot while smoking a cigar. For many of you, I’m apparently your patriotic correspondent who you turn to when America is kicking ass and taking names. So when the news broke that Osama bin Laden had been killed in Pakistan, I knew I’d get bombarded by the TMM, which was ultimately exactly what happened. And so, because of this reaction, I feel obligated to address bin Laden’s death, since I’m sure it would be a huge letdown for some of you if I ignored it altogether and didn’t at least offer my thoughts. It still baffles me why anyone would care about my opinion on anything that could even remotely be considered a serious topic, but nonetheless some of you apparently do, so here’s how I feel about it.
On the morning of September 11, 2001, a librarian from my school came into the classroom I was in and whispered something to my 8th grade US history teacher that left him visibly shaken. Once the librarian left the room, my teacher somberly relayed the news to us: someone had flown a plane into the World Trade Center. Being an ignorant 14-year-old, I had no idea what the World Trade Center was and therefore thought something along the lines of, “It’s sad and all, but plane crashes happen all the time. Why did our librarian interrupt class to tell us about a random plane crash?” This was the prevalent thought in our classroom, as pretty much nobody other than our teacher had the slightest clue what the World Trade Center was. As it turned out, though, it didn’t really matter that I didn’t know what the WTC was, because even when I did ultimately learn that planes crashed into the tallest buildings in NYC, I still didn’t give much thought to it all due to the fact that I wasn’t mature enough comprehend the magnitude of death in general, let alone the deaths of thousands of people at once (regretfully, I remember being more concerned about whether or not we would play our football game the next day than anything else). But now, almost ten years later, I can comprehend death, which is why the death of Osama bin Laden is such a big deal to me. I can now comprehend the magnitude of all the deaths he caused, and in turn can comprehend the magnitude of his own death.
The fact of the matter is that because 9/11 happened when I was just 14-years-old, Osama bin Laden has been the most wanted man in the world for almost half of my life. That is truly incredible for me to think about. What’s even crazier to think about is that there are very few things I remember before 9/11, which means that it’s difficult for me to remember a world in which bin Laden wasn’t the most dangerous man on the planet and didn’t have his sights set on bringing total destruction to the country I live in. So nevermind the fact that he was supposedly just a figurehead at this point and didn’t have all that much power with Al Qaeda. Nevermind the fact that killing him doesn’t mean the war against terrorism is over. And nevermind the fact that the terrorists will most likely try to retaliate. At the end of the day, the most evil person to walk the face of the earth in my lifetime – a man singlehandedly responsible for thousands of innocent civilian lives and public enemy #1 for the American people – is dead. That in and of itself is a very big deal and is reason to celebrate.
There are a lot of self-righteous people who are trying to say it’s a disgrace that people would cheer the death of another human being, no matter how evil he may have been. And there are also people who think bin Laden deserved a fair trial and killing him makes us just as inhumane as the terrorists are. God bless these people. I think it’s awesome that there are people in this world who are compassionate and have such a strong moral fiber that they’re willing to treat Osama with the same respect as they would a loved one. But I’m not one of these people. The way I see it, bin Laden has repeatedly made it clear that he’s not actually a human but is instead a monster. And the last time I checked, the protocol when dealing with monsters/zombies isn’t to slap some handcuffs on them, waste time and money on a trial that would obviously result in capital punishment, and then just shrug our shoulders and ho-hum as someone who has been terrorizing us for years dies. No, the protocol is to put a bullet between his eyes, throw his ass on the express train to Hell, and rejoice that the world is rid of one less demon.
Let me lastly say that I’m not naïve in thinking that America is suddenly fixed now. We are far from perfect and still have a bunch of problems that need to be addressed. But this doesn’t mean we shouldn’t celebrate a significantly historic victory. The bottom line is that I would make absolutely no difference in the war on terror if instead of celebrating in the streets and partying at Mirror Lake, I decided to stay focused and try to figure out how to fix America. The beauty of our country is that I can sit on my lazy ass and play FIFA all day while the big shots in Washington figure out how to fix our problems (for the record, I couldn’t care less about politics. Everyone I know who is interested in politics basically just bitches all day about how the other party is wrong. I’m not interested in bitching so I just stay out of it altogether). Whether or not I riot in the streets in celebration has literally zero effect on the American mission to end terrorism.
Sorry for the rant and sorry for being serious with all of this, but I honestly do view this as a historic time in America and felt compelled to quickly write about it, not only because it’s a significant time in our country’s history but also because some of the holier-than-thou people who are criticizing the majority of Americans for being excited kinda piss me off. We aren’t necessarily excited that a human being died – we’re excited that no matter what else happens with this war on terror, the man who killed thousands of our innocent civilians and caused one of the most somber times in American history will never again hurt a single one of us. Screw every other detail about the situation. That alone is enough for me to be absolutely ecstatic. Sorry I’m not sorry.
God bless our troops and God bless the United States of America.
Proud To Be A Buckeye But Even Prouder To Be An American,
Mark Titus
Club Trillion Founder