I have been declared Emperor of the World. Let us not waste time explaining why or how; let’s all simply accept the fact that we are better off, as a result; hence, my next decree:

Emperor’s Decree No. 222-134-56/66Q: When the Emperor speaks, he speaks indisputable truth; therefore, if he bans an artistic work, it is the right thing to do — we’re not talking about “censorship” by mere mortals, here; we’re talking about benevolent and infallible reasoning for the benefit of all. That said, the Emperor now bans movies about women, with perfectly kind and dedicated husbands, who go off on their own into some bohemian part of the city and meet a random, younger French guy in possession of an interestingly decorated apartment and a cool scarf and a shock of black hair that hangs down over one eye that causes him to flop his head sideways to get a decent look at his coffee and who, subsequently, reads the heroine some Rimbaud and then introduces her to a new world filled with the violent and breathless pleasure that is her birthright as a woman but that has been denied her by a life lived within the constraints of her oppressive role as wife and mother, especially if these movies show the cheating, self-centered strumpet in a sympathetic light. (And before ye — unwisely — try to cast the Emperor in the image of a perpetuator of the male-centered mindset, bear in mind that he highly recommends the work of Kate Chopin, if you want to see how these issues can be treated with insight, depth and artistic merit. It’s not “women’s issues” that the Emperor dislikes; it is morons creating puerile treatments of it that he loathes.)

The Punishment: Producers and directors and writers of these tedious and pretentious attempts at art will be forced to watch Romeo and Juliet, as rewritten by Paula Abdul (to “bring it up to date”) and starring Sylvester Stallone and Rosanne Barr as the star-crossed lovers — all without popcorn.

The Emperor will grace the world with a new decree each Tuesday morning.

Tags: art & entertainment, The Emperor decrees by Chris Matarazzo
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I have been declared Emperor of the World. Let us not waste time explaining why or how; let’s all simply accept the fact that we are better off, as a result; hence, my next decree:

Emperor’s Decree No. 56 ½: From this point forward, drivers and walkers are required to stop at any lemonade stand that is set up and run by children. All adults are further required to give the kids a dollar and to instruct said little ones to keep the change. For the love of Pete, it is summer and these kids are doing something industrious. Hook them up, if only to show your own vacuous, screen-gazing hunchbacks (lolling languidly in the back seat of your air-conditioned, multiple-DVD-spinning minivan) that hard, honest work should be rewarded. The Emperor supports the cultivation of productive thralls…uh, beloved subjects.

The Punishment: Anyone seen callously driving or walking past a lemonade stand will be sent to the Dungeon of Fate where he or she will be forced to choose between three glass goblets full of apparently identical yellow liquids. Only one of the goblets will actually contain lemonade.

(The Emperor would like to thank his faithful minion, Lara, for pointing out this common transgression.)

The Emperor will grace the world with a new decree each Tuesday morning.

Tags: family & parenting, The Emperor decrees by Chris Matarazzo
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I have been declared Emperor of the World. Let us not waste time explaining why or how; let’s all simply accept the fact that we are better off, as a result; hence, my next decree:

Emperor’s Decree No. 9000: Henceforth, no one is allowed to come up with asinine categories for types of music, especially categories that revel in their own masturbatory paradoxicality, like “folktronica.” Likewise outlawed are terms like “synthcore,” “shoegazer” and “melodic death-metal.” Creators of such silly genres need to be informed, in clear terms, that no level of verbal skullduggery will ever conceal the vapid, hackneyed and generally worthless nature of their insubstantial compositional flatulations. The Emperor, for instance, is The Emperor because he is intrinsically superior, not simply because he wears a blinking neon cape with ermine trim and exquisite silken underlay. (Although he does look dashing in his neon cape.)

The Punishment: Violators will be chained in the bowels the Dungeon of Serious Woe and forced to listen to their own pretentious drek for a period of thee years. If able to survive this heinous ordeal, they will be released into the custody of Barry Manilow who will keep them as pets until the end of time.

The Emperor will grace the world with a new decree each Tuesday morning.

Tags: music, The Emperor decrees by Chris Matarazzo
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I have been declared Emperor of the World. Let us not waste time explaining why or how; let’s all simply accept the fact that we are better off, as a result; hence, my next decree:

Emperor’s Decree No. 19: No person may attempt to “analyze” or “interpret” the “messages sent” by a media piece or by a movie or by a book — or to make similar attempts to explicate statements issued by prominent figures — unless he or she is a licensed non-idiot. (The Emperor, himself, will be responsible for determining who qualifies for the N.I.P. — the “Non-Idiot Pass.”) This decree has been written because the Emperor is getting a bruise from repeatedly slapping the royal forehead.

The Punishment: Violators will be strapped, for three days, into a wet, reclining chair and forced to watch the pithy cast of a daily, gang-hosted talk show discuss what they see as a racist stance against “hoodies” in Thomas Pynchon’s Gravity’s Rainbow (Sparknotes edition).

The Emperor will grace the world with a new decree each Tuesday morning.

Tags: The Emperor decrees by Chris Matarazzo
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I have been declared Emperor of the World. Let us not waste time explaining why or how; let’s all simply accept the fact that we are better off, as a result; hence, my next decree:

Emperor’s Decree 2341-3A: The Apple computer company makes superior machines; however, “Apple People” must be stopped. At all cost. Any person who incessantly advertises for or praises the Apple computer company (who is not an employee of said company or the spouse of an employee thereof), is, henceforth, declared an outlaw. (They charge you three-million dollars for a computer and you energetically and actively advertise for free for them? Come — as they say — on.) Any driver who displays a once-bitten Apple insignia on the back of his or her car or who is seen wearing a T-shirt displaying the same insignia shall be taken prisoner. Similarly, anyone who posts numerous Facebook stati which extol the wonders of Apple will be summarily arrested by the Imperial Police. 2341-3B: As a sub-decree, while the Emperor believes in freedom of religion, it is, nevertheless, henceforth illegal to become either a congregate or a clergy member of the developing Church of Steve Jobs — the reasoning for this being that if Leonardo DaVinci doesn’t have his own church, Jobs shouldn’t either. Further, Apple is a company, my minions, not your kid. Stop posting pictures of the new iPhone next to little Bradley’s First Holy Communion shots. It’s creepy.

The Punishment: The Imperial Wizard has conjured a room of infinite black space. Within this room, there is an illuminated podium on which rests a gleaming new iPad. Violators will be released into this dark chamber. When they droolingly approach the iPod — which they will — a giggling, naked doppelgänger of Bill Gates will appear, snatch the iPad, and scamper off into the darkness. When the violator is tired of chasing the prestidigitated dodecazillionare (whom he will never catch), he or she will be released for another chance at well-balanced, rational life.

The Emperor shall grace the world with a new decree each Tuesday morning

Tags: technology, The Emperor decrees by Chris Matarazzo
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I have been declared Emperor of the World. Let us not waste time explaining why or how; let’s all simply accept the fact that we are better off, as a result; hence, my next decree:

Emperor’s Decree No. 49: With summer coming, the Emperor feels it necessary to ban two distinctly summertime-ish behaviors related to apparel.

Behavior the first: Wearing sunglasses inside. This must cease, immediately. Sometimes we forget. Sure. The Emperor gets that. (Not everyone can be as perfect as he.) But repeated “forgetting” looks a lot like posturing. Just quit it. Leave the glasses in the car and, while we’re at it, cut the 75-ounce coffee barrel down to a 16-ounce and lose the neon key lanyard. You’re not convincing anyone that you are a wayward movie star on a caffeine-driven collision course with legend-making doom on some metaphorical “Dad Man’s Curve.”

Behavior, the second: Guys who wear their baseball caps sideways. There’s no way out of it…if you do this, you look like a dolt. If you think you look cool like this, you are a dolt. Also, you make people want to punch you. (This fact has been documented by the Imperial Psychologist; in fact, 97% of healthy young men feel compelled to smash the teeth of guys with their baseball caps on sideways.) The Emperor must foster peace among his subjects.

The Punishment: Offenders will be strapped down and forced to listen to Kevin Costner reading The Complete History of Fashion from 32 B.C. to Present (Volumes 1-80).

The Emperor shall grace the world with a new decree each Tuesday morning

Tags: fashion & clothing, The Emperor decrees by Chris Matarazzo
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I have been declared Emperor of the World. Let us not waste time explaining why or how; let’s all simply accept the fact that we are better off, as a result; hence, my next decree:

Emperor’s Decree No. 34-A: While directors of automobile commercials will continue to be permitted to cast the ubiquitous “slightly-graying-youngish-but-not-old man” in order to send a message of a certain level of maturity which doesn’t preclude the ability to woo and subsequently satisfy multiple women several times each in one evening, said directors may no longer instruct these actors to drive the car whilst wearing a self-satisfied and slanted “knowing smile.” The Emperor has found that every car commercial made in the past twenty years has contained an exact duplicate of this smile and he has had quite enough. (Worse, such a smile implies that the character in the car knows everything about everything and, as anyone who is likely to avoid the Imperial Dungeon of Eternal Woe knows well, only the Emperor himself has this quality.) Further, that smile is downright nauseating. Directors shall find another way to induce the impotent sheep in the purchasing world into buying a car–some method other inspiring them to say: “I will be like that handsome and no-doubt sexually successful guy who knows everything, if I drive that car.”

The Punishment: Violating directors (and, what the heck, the actors, too) will be forced to have dinner with Rush Limbaugh. Twice.

The Emperor will grace the world with a new decree each Tuesday morning

Tags: television, The Emperor decrees by Chris Matarazzo
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I have been declared Emperor of the World. Let us not waste time explaining why or how; let’s all simply accept the fact that we are better off, as a result; hence, my next decree:

Emperor’s Decree No. XXIV: If there is a microphone provided, use it. Enough with the [begin nasal, whiny voice]: “Can you hear me back there? I don’t want to use this thing if I don’t have to…” [end nasal, whiny voice]. It’s 2012. Use the freaking microphone. Luddite. You’re not “warm” for not using it. You’re not “more personal.” You’re not lovably uncomfortable with technology. The only thing you are is “not loud enough,” so snap out of your naturally-acoustic hippie trance and take a courageous leap into the present tense.

The Punishment: The punishment (which shall not be described here, in detail, for fear of shocking those with sensitive constitutions) is, shall we say, one that is inspired by the generally tubular shape of your average microphone. Let it suffice to say that those metal windscreens are not, strictly speaking…comfortable.

The Emperor shall grace the world with a new decree each Tuesday morning

Tags: technology, The Emperor decrees by Chris Matarazzo
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I have been declared Emperor of the World. Let us not waste time explaining why or how; let’s all simply accept the fact that we are better off, as a result.  Hence, my decree:

Emperor’s Decree No. 3487: Henceforth, parents and coaches are no longer allowed — either enthusiastically or casually — to say “Good eye!” when a child leaps out of the batter’s box in order to escape the spiteful hiss of a four-seam fastball rocketing toward the bridge of his nose. One might as well compliment a person for giggling upon being tickled on the foot with a feather: “Good laugh! Well done!” [clap…clap…]. The Emperor has serious problems with anything that contributes to the creation of vapid mediocrities among his youngest subjects. He wishes, some day, to be able to stop writing these decrees and that will never happen if parents and coaches continue to produce knuckle-dragging foot-lickers who crave praise for instinctually diving to the ground in order to avoid having their frontal lobe impaled by a Rawlings-propelled septum.

The Punishment: Violators will be doused in a delicious garlic and herb sauce and dropped onto an island inhabited by cannibals (where they will quickly learn that the phrase “Good eye!” has quite a different, and rather intensely literal, meaning).

Now: Go forth and obey.

The Emperor will grace the world with a new decree each Tuesday.

Tags: family & parenting, The Emperor decrees by Chris Matarazzo
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I have become Emperor of the World. Let us not waste time in questioning how; let’s all simply accept the fact that we are better off, as a result; hence, my first decree:

Emperor’s Decree No. 1: No one is permitted, anymore, to say “I’m so over it” if they are not, indeed, “over it.” How will the Emperor’s spies know whether or not someone is indeed “over it”? Simply put, if one angrily yells “I’m so over it” and then breaks a coffee table with one’s fist, one is clearly not over it. Saying that one is “over it” should be a declaration that one is finished with “it” — done expending time and emotional energy on “it”; at peace with “it.”

The Punishment: Violators will be slapped, repeatedly, on the left cheek, by a burly, noisome man with large and calloused hands. Before each successive slap, up to slap one-thousand, the Imperial Deliverer of Slaps (“Pete”) will say, “I am so done hitting you now.” Prisoners will be released after the final clout.

Now, go forth and obey.

The Emperor shall grace the world with a new decree each Tuesday morning.

Tags: language & grammar, The Emperor decrees by Chris Matarazzo
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If ever I run this town, even before I take revenge on my enemies I will have a statue commissioned. A bronzed Anne Cox-Chambers already man’s the traffic island outside my front door, permanently enjoying a newspaper as only an owner of one could do. Around Underground there are life-size bronzes from the ’30s and 1890s. Naturally we have a smattering of Civil War heroes (or villains), some artsy friezes and a Phoenix both in abstract and figure. There is at least one missing. The subject has not been gone long enough to become historic but I remember and will see her commemorated. She was always in the company of statues when I saw her, usually Herman Talmadge. She stood quite nearly as a statue; an elderly woman, clearly a nifty number from the Mad Men era would stand unmoving in a parka and gloves in the winter, in a sundress with a wet hanky on her head in summer, holding a stack of leaflets in each arm. She didn’t hand them out. She couldn’t have since both hands were full, the half-reams perfectly her cubit. Sometimes they were single sheets and sometimes it would be a stapled pair. Did I mention the rocks? She also had a rock on each pile to act as a paperweight. Around her neck hung a small sandwich board explaining in meticulous print how the private ownership of land was the source of near all of man’s troubles. [Read more →]

Tags: politics & government, The Emperor decrees by Ken Watson
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What would you think of a monetary system with NO borrowing, NO taxation and NO reserves? It is simplicity itself. When the government needs some dough to build a fighter jet or provide orthodontia to a retired race horse, they just print it up. All bonds will be retired, on schedule and as issued (except TIPS, we’ll have to do something about them) but no more will be sold. Taxes? A dusty anachronism. And since this is fiat money, not based on crappy Italian cars but rather on the forceful declarations of government, there is no need to keep gold or silver stocks as the US currently does. We will call this Infinity Money, an appealing brand name. Inflation? Oh hells yeah! Hyperinflation? Perhaps so but now in the computer age the handling of numbers forty digits long is no great chore and as in the Weimar Age, once the numeric string is too long and the tail end isn’t worth a single grape we just cut off a dozen or so zeroes from all accounts on a date certain, I’m thinking midnight every Friday so you can restart the melting of your valuables fresh on Monday. This solves many, many problems. For one, we are constantly told that the billionaires and krillionaires are maliciously keeping trillions in their vaults so they can lounge among the greenbacks and deprive Danish Lit majors of productive employment. No more. Anyone who hoards our un-earned money will see it evaporate like dry ice so high-risk, high-growth investments will be the only recourse. The consumer likewise will not keep his money in his pocket because his pocket (or more accurately, his card) now has an extra-dimensional rift within it that will empty out the value at the pace of a flushing toilet. Consumer spending spikes. Investment spikes. Savings? Well, there won’t be any actual savings but there will be investment in goods and services. It is said in Weimar Berlin that the streets were awash in cocaine and prostitutes of all descriptions. Now that is an enviably energetic economy! [Read more →]

Tags: money, The Emperor decrees by Ken Watson
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Ok, enough already. 

Enough with malls putting up Christmas decorations before Halloween. 

It’s insulting enough to somehow suggest cheap tinsel horns and stars* mounted to parking poles will swing my attention away from driving past the mall enough to make me realize, “hey, I need to shop,” if I didn’t already. It’s insulting to think it’s OK for giant ornaments strung from the rafters to take precedence over and crush the meaning from my kids’ (and my own) anticipation of Halloween and Thanksgiving.

Anyone remember Thanksgiving decorations?

Halloween is kinda silly, though, so I’ll say this: Let me and my children look forward to Thanksgiving — a holiday that holds some sentimental nostalgia — without steamrollering it into a mental wasteland by making my kids think they’re getting toys any second now.

If they’re so effective, Malls, then just leave them up year-round. I suppose there has been some psychological study that says it’s effective. But I bet they haven’t figured out what happens if you just beat people over the head with it. I’d love it if everyone got jaded and went back to bed instead of waiting in lines at 4:30 in the morning to buy this year’s Kick Me Elmo.

I know, you say, “But you don’t have to shop at the mall. It’s free speech.”** And I don’t, and it is. 

But we do go to the mall. It’s still in very poor taste.

Appoint me King. I’ll fix it.

*Yeah, there’s Channukah too. But let’s face it: we don’t get overrun with giant dreidels. Not as much, anyway.

**Maybe you don’t say this. Someone does, though. 

Tags: diatribes, The Emperor decrees by Andrew Turner
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