By John Shannan
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Our Founders House stooge in Standard nine (grade 11, I suppose) was a man by the name of John Shannan. Besides being a few years older than us, he could buy booze and had genuine stories about naked women - so it didn't take long for us to believe that John was "cool". He pretty much won us over from day one - smuggling in beers (Hunters), letting us watch movies and even turned a blind eye when we bunked out at night to go to Naughty's in Rondebosch. Not only that, John also had a car and talked about actually boning chicks (ahem...Fabrics Guy). Look, he played hockey, but The Chief had brainwashed us into believing hockey was cool years before, so we didn't know any better.

He was an eager beaver and at four or five years our senior, happened to be the most fucked oke at The Advertising Guy's 18th. Naturally, it all ended in tears when he decided to play garden cricket using wine glasses as balls. True story. He has the scars to prove it.

I got an email from John (now living in London) about four months ago, telling me about a BOOK he had written, called "Modern Man is a Wimp." Describing the book, he explained that it , "takes a look at all the things going on in the world today that have changed since we were kids." The chapter outline is: Political Correctness, Metrosexuality, Homosexuality, Advertising and the Media, Modern Day Fads, Raising Children, Drugs and Celebrity Culture".

Right up my street!

I told him to rush me a copy, which finally arrived the other day. I took note of the sub-title, "How male moisturisers, political correctness and Britney Spears have turned the modern man into a brow-beaten apology."

Hmmm, I see...

It looked very interesting so I found a quiet moment, put on some Celine Dion, and got stuck into it.

"Right....what do we have here?"

And what a satisfying read it was! Whilst John would be horrified at the cost of my particular brand of moisturiser (let alone the mere fact that I use one), I certainly do support him in his various arguments.

It's not often that authors have the balls to openly discuss and argue topics that we raise amongst our peers. It's about time someone attacks the all too PC ridden topics others would be too scared to write about. He confidently, humourously, and yet fairly, questions topics including why, exactly, angry minority groups have more power than the masses - often resulting in changes in legislation. Brave.

The general theme of the book has to do with how the modern man is not able....sorry...NO LONGER ALLOWED to stand up for himself. A good example of this is how it is perfectly fine for ads on TV to openly ridicule men, whilst John argues that mockery of any other group is strictly taboo. South Africa has a car insurance group that insures only women - imagine if they had one strictly for guys? Precisely.

I wore blinkers during the chapters about metrosexuals, Paris Hilton and Britney Spears, but he made a comeback in his support for weed and spanking of children (my arse was introduced to, and broke many a wooden spoon from an early age).

When tackling political (in)correctness and how we are now restricted from sensible discussion, he mentions something that has happened to me on a number of occasions. I have met people in the past who, when trying to point out a particular person in a large group, have said things like:

"The guy in the red shirt."

And I'd go, "the guy at the door?"

And he'd go, "no, the guy with the sunglasses on."

"That guy?"

"No, the guy next to him"

"Oh", I'd declare, annoyed. "The black guy!"

"Jesus, bru, you can't say that!"

That is how pathetic it has all become. Why would you be scared of describing someone by identifying his most telling feature? If someone had a penis instead of a nose, you wouldn't fuck around describing his shirt colour.

And so it goes on.

This is, quite simply, the book you've been wanting to read. The book that finally discusses the annoying things - the things we think can't be discussed. Apparently they can. You'll spend most of the book shouting in ecstasy, "YES! EXACTLY!"

Do yourself a favour and get this book ASAP. At 150 pages it is short enough for you to tackle, and long enough for you to be able to join those what-book-did-you-read-last conversations.

Available online:

CLICK HERE TO BUY THE BOOK
ONLINE ON THE UNIWEB

 
Seth Rotherham
Editor
2oceansvibe.com
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