"Harlan Ellison - Troublemakers" - читать интересную книгу автора (Ellison Harlan)

for instance, WWF wrestling; boy bands; idiot Image comics featuring prepubescent fanboy
representations of women with the vacuous stares of cheerleaders, all legs and bare butts, with breasts
like casaba melons grafted to their chests at neck level; horse-trank home-made mosh-pit Xtasy
kitty-flippinтАЩ dope; and Old Navy rags that make everyone look like a bag lady or wetbrain bindlestiff
with a sagging pants-load), inclined to respond to even minor inconveniences with anger or violence
because theyтАЩve been brainwashed into believing everything they want, they ought to have, and
everything ought to be given to them free, and oh yeah . . . did I mention theyтАЩre dumb? Did I mention,
also, that theyтАЩre ignorant as a sack of doorknobs? Which ainтАЩtexactly the same as dumb.

And isnтАЩt thatexactly what you needed today, on a day that has already been as friendly as a paper cut?
Smartmouth from some total stranger тАЩway older than you, some guy you never heard of before, comes
on fronting you with his тАЬyoung people suckтАЭ riff, tripping on you before you even know what you did
wrong to get this geezer so on a mission. Very nice, very cool. Yeah, you say: I gotcher cool right here.

So okay, IтАЩm not talking aboutall teenaged kids. Just the onesyou have to deal with every day. The
pinheads, the bullies, the mean little rats who laugh at you behind your back or right to your face because
youтАЩre too fat or too scrawny or too tall or too short or you canтАЩt control the farts or you bump into
things all the time or you got a helluva acne plague this week or your mommy dressed you weird or you
speak with an accent, or youтАЩre good at sports but the other creeps think youтАЩre just a big dumb ox, or
you really like to read and you get decent grades but the jocks and sosch skanks think youтАЩre the Prince
of the Kingdom of Geek.

Notall тАЬyoung people,тАЭ just the lames who bustyour chops. Yeah, all of тАЩem . . . they should itch forever
with no scratch available. They should break a leg or two.

When I was your age, they were on me, too.

ThatтАЩswho this guy snarling at you claims to be. The kid who was there, same place as you, before you
got here. And IтАЩve got this book of stories that definitely wonтАЩt save your life, or get you off crystal-meth,
or turn your academic slide into a climb back up, or even clear up your acne.

ItтАЩs a book about some of the kinds of trouble we all get into. The stuff that seems to be a good idea at
the time, but turns out to be six months in rehab or a beef in the juvie hall of your choice. Trouble has
been my middle name since I was two тАФ three years old. Yeah, that far back, I was the one they always
swore was gonna wind up in jail or lying in a gutter with UPS trucks splashing garbage and mud on my
wretched carcass. Well, it didnтАЩt happen. IтАЩve got fame and money, and skill, and a great wife, and a
boss home now they ask me to put together a book for youse guys.

Well, imagine my surprise. Not to mention my nervousness. I do a lot of high school and college
lecturing, and itтАЩs not at all like what it was, hell, eventen years ago. Today, when I confront an audience
of тАЬyoung peopleтАЭ I get more mood тАЩnтАЩ tude than a serial killer trying to cop a plea. So, like a jerk, I get
really honked at them and start insulting the audience.

And hereтАЩs whatreally fries my frijoles . . .

Theytake it!
They donтАЩt learn from it, they donтАЩt get openly upset by it, they just sit there and pout like babies. And
so, IтАЩve packed it in, pretty much. Not like it was when I did colleges in the тАЩ60s and тАЩ70s, when
everyone was questioning and smart about what was happening in this country, when тАЬyoung peopleтАЭ
really had things to rebel against, instead of being upset that theyтАЩre not allowed to play their Gameboy in