In the last decade or so, modern technology has given us many innovative tools to greatly facilitate the process of friend making. First it was chat rooms. Then America Online- “You’ve Got Mail!” Then came buddy lists, text messaging, video chatting, yadda yadda yadda. But I think there’s one major resource we’re all looking right past. It doesn’t present itself in the most obvious form, but make no mistake, its there for your emotional support. Ladies and gentlemen, I give you the latest in companionship since speed dating: The Patriot Act.
According to the federal Wiretap Report of 2007, wire tapping was up 20% in 2007 compared to the previous year. Tapping phones and even emails has gotten so prevalent that one can almost fully assume that at any given time he or she is being listened to or having their emails read by someone else. Upon realizing this, it’s easy to begin to feel like the Big Brother is more of a reality than ever before, looming over us everywhere we go, like a big black cloud (one capable of traveling indoors)…
…awesome!
You mean to tell me that all I need to do to be able to vent my frustrations and my juiciest, most hidden secrets is to pick up the phone and start talking to “no one”? Send an email to an erroneous address? Tap some Morse Code into the wall outlet with my iPod charger? What a great way of de-stressing! It’s kind of like talking to your dog, but this is way better.
Insert sob story here. Put it behind you.
And, I mean, you can confide in these people! That’s what they’re there for- to listen. They have the ability to deem your special issues “top secret,” in those fresh manila folders, adorned with some sort of ultra-serious governmental seal. They don’t interact with anyone besides their fellow “patriotistas”, as they call themselves. In fact, if one patriotista is ever seen talking to a non-patriotistas, he will be exported to Canada or possibly somewhere even worse… eeek! This is why patriotistas are so respected and trust-worthy in America.
- I’ll be your friend.
So how do you get these pale hipsters to be there for you whenever you want, where ever you are? I’ll be honest, a deal this sweet doesn’t come easy. Most patriotistas tend to be attracted to the serious bad-boy type. So I’ve outlined a few good tactics to get the patriotistas, or “smiling patties,” as me and my friends call them, to start homing in on you and eventually become your “silent buddy” for life. Some of these points may seem a bit odd, even frightening at first. But I assure you, once you get their attention, you can lay off these tactics and just begin to vent yourself to them. This is how you get them to be all ears:
- Smoke cigarettes. It will give you a raspier voice, and sound more like the quintessential bad guy they’re looking for. If you want to go a step further, take the filters off the cigarettes before you smoke them. Filters sometimes filter out “bad guy chemicals,” and you want to be as bad as possible.
- Change your legal name at least three times. Don’t worry, the last one you change to can be your original name. It’s just to make them think you are having emotional troubles so that they’re more inclined to listen to you.
- Develop a creepy accent. There are a plethora of ways this can be accomplished. I try to imitate the voices of people on TV such as The Count from Sesame Street, Borat Sangdiev, Osama bin Laden, and John McCain.
- Order lots of industrial metals and chemicals to your house. Any true friend would want to make sure you’re not wasting your money on rubbish you don’t need- and the patriotistas are no different.
- Fly around a lot. It will give the appearance as though you are becoming an overly capricious individual, which the Patriotistas will take note of.
- Have celebrations at your house whenever something bad happens to the United States. This creates the illusion that you are so removed from society that you don’t even know whats going on in the world.
- Burn American flags in your back yard. Just do it.
And that about does it! If you stick to these guidelines you’ll have Patriotistas as friends in no time. They’ll listen to everything you have to say to your friends on the phone, spell check your emails, and perhaps even loiter outside your home in window-tinted vans just to make sure nothing bad happens to you. It’s a great American privelage that no one should take for granted, including you!
