We'll Have A FUN Old Time!

This week Hallmark made the news as a result of their yearly crop of holiday ornaments. 

Hallmark's "Ugly Christmas Sweater" ornament features a line from the Christmas carol Deck The Halls printed on the front, but they saw fit to change the traditional lyric from "gay apparel" to the less offensive "FUN apparel." 

Obviously Hallmark was terrified that their stores would be brought to a standstill by the huge crowds of homosexual males who'd be attracted by the original line. Not to mention the incessant snickering they'd have to endure from the packs of wild fourteen year olds who roam America's malls.

Honestly I have to side with Hallmark on this one. You just can't be too careful these days when it comes to song lyrics. These old Christmas carols have been around for hundreds of years now and they're just far too out of touch and insensitive for our modern genteel and delicate society.

To prevent any more unfortunate shocks to the system of the public at large, the following changes to these traditional Christmas carols are to be implemented immediately:

• From this day forward the song White Christmas will be known as All Inclusive Pan-Ethnic Winter Festival.

• Rudolph The Red-Nosed Reindeer will henceforth be called Rudolph The Differently Abled Reindeer Who's A Valued Member Of Society.

• The song O Come All Ye Faithful will be changed to the much less provocative Arrive All Ye Faithful. In a similar vein, Here Comes Santa Claus will be called Santa Claus Has Been Spotted In The Vicinity.

• Lastly, the highly inappropriate I Saw Mommy Kissing Santa Claus will now be called the much more acceptable I Saw Mommy Publicly Greeting Santa Claus In A Consensual And Non-Sexual Manner.

I realize it may take some time to get used to these new lyrics, but I'm sure you'll agree it's for the good of the public.

Gay Lantern

Last week DC Comics was crowing loudly about the fact that during one of their semi-annual company wide reboots of their entire comic universe, they were going to reveal that a MAJOR character was gay.

Fans began speculating wildly. Who would it be? Batman? Robin? Wonder Woman? She lives on an island full of women after all. What about Batman? The Flash maybe? How about Batman? Maybe Batman?

Or possibly The Gay Ghost? Nah, that would statistically improbable. Could it perhaps be Batman?

Once the DC brass determined they'd squeezed all the free publicity out of the situation that they could, they announced that the winner of the 2012 Forced Orientation Adjustment was none other than... Alan Scott, the Golden Age Green Lantern.

chirp... chirp... chirp... chirp... chirp...

Yep, good ol' Alan Scott, the most important Green Lantern there is, right after Hal Jordan, Kyle Rainer, John Stewart, Guy Gardner and the one who looks like a chicken with a fin on his head. You know, Alan Scott, the incredibly MAJOR character who's not really part of the main DC Universe, but is tucked away on a parallel world called Earth 2, where all the other Golden Age superheroes live. THAT Green Lantern!

Way to be provocative, DC Comics! What bold, courageous, social-conscious thinking!

I guarantee that the general public has absolutely no idea that there's more than one Green Lantern, or that there's one living on a parallel world. When they hear, "Green Lantern's gay!" they're going to do a spit take and exclaim, "Holy crap! Did you say Ryan Reynolds is gay?"

For the record, I'm not a fan of this development. Now now, put down your torches and pitchforks, and take the tar off the stove. It's not that I object to the idea of a gay superhero per se. I don't. My problem with the whole business is that I don't want to know about the sex lives of ANY of the superheroes I read about, gay or straight.

Superman and Lois Lane had an "understanding." That's all I needed to know about their relationship. Mr. Fantastic and Invisible Woman are husband and wife. Enough said. The Alan Scott Green Lantern is now a "confirmed bachelor." I don't need to know any more than that.

Comic books are escapist fantasy. They should be epic and larger than life. I want to read about a guy dressed as a clown hanging a guy dressed as a bat over a vat of boiling acid. I want to read about whole teams of superheroes repelling alien invasions. I want to read about superheroes defeating a giant purple guy who wants to eat the Earth, or shrinking themselves and having adventures on a planet inside an atom. You know, the way comics used to be. I know, I know, get off my lawn.

I want stupid, goofy FUN comic stories. The more ridiculous and outlandish, the better. I think that can be accomplished without knowing which team the fifth most important Green Lantern is on.