And The Loser Is...

I was just pondering the replacement of 'and the winner is' with 'and the Oscar goes to'. I can't recall exactly when that happened, but I do recall noticing, and thinking it unnecessarily PC. So I was just letting that thought percolate through my newly awakened synapses when I wondered what it must be like to be the sort of person who gets offended at stupid stuff like that. How malformed an ego must one have to object to an implied slight, for I'm sure the logic, if I might call it that, of the change had to do with the fact that calling one person a winner implies that the other 4 or so are losers. This is the same mentality that has us white folks wondering just what the hell we are supposed to call people of color this year, or if someone in a wheelchair will try to run us down if we don't use the current euphemism for their particular condition. I have no doubt that the vast majority of people who fall into these categories couldn't give two bowel movements about the issue, and that it is a very vocal minority that get all up in arms when Tiger Woods isn't referred to as a Poly-Ancesterous-Golfing-American or some other outrageously non-threatening epithet, but what is it like to go through life offended at every unimportant adjective? Is it overblown self-importance, an underdeveloped sense of self-worth, or are they just plain assholes? I know that I get a bit miffed when someone calls me a Trekkie...everyone should know by now that all rational Trek fans prefer the moniker Trekker, but I don't write letters to TV stations every time that particularly unforgivable misnomer makes its way onto the nightly news.

Anyway, what do you think? Do you know anyone like this? Can you offer any insight into the sad existence of these people who must daily suffer the slings and arrows of words hurled from talking heads that they'll never meet? This is one Follicle-Challenged, Temporally-Advanced, European-American who wants to know.

TTFN, Kiddies.
Marius