White man on Stupid White Men!. Review on Stupid White Men - Michael Moore

I had solemnly decided after the horrific experience of last time that I would never ever fly the Maharajah again. However fate it seems had crueler joke to play; and I had to visit the Maharajah, Air India yet again. So when two weeks ago I had fly our national carrier back to India, I made sure that

1. I had a copy of Hanuman Chalisa with me (Just in case you know…)

1. A couple of good books which would distract me from Air-India’s in flight and out flight entertainment (read scare).

However my situation was not helped very much when I discovered that I had to sit besides a Gujju Old Couple whose first remark to me was – “Gujarathi cho ne?” (I assume you are a Gujarati only!) After settling down with kem cho and other pleasantries, I quickly decided to bury my head into the book I had to chosen to read in-flight, lest Air India or my pleasant companions decided to bug me.

The book I had chosen to read was “Stupid White Men”, written by Michael “On the Oscars stage who bushwacked bush” Moore.

STUPID WHITE MEN

In a nutshell, Stupid White men is about –

1. Stupid White Men (Glory to my brains!)

1. White men who are Stupid (Applause please, thank you!)

   
   




2. Stupid men who happen to be White (I am too much!)

   
   

In a screwshell, the book is a big eye opener on Corporate America and how some Stupid Corporate Americans are making ordinary citizens look, well – Stupid.

Stupid White Men though begins with a Stupid man from Texas who got elected to be the President, it traces back and forth between different scams and hams of the American Life. Moore takes a dig at everything that has made the country America. Though being the most developed nation in the world, the country Americans still don’t belong anywhere, half the world hates them, live a life driven my media, have no sense of culture in their lives, and still support a stupid man who has brought more misery to the world than Hitler himself some eons back. In a way, I fully endorse what Mr. Moore has to say about the sorry state of affairs burgeoning in the country.

Stupid White Men doesn’t take the normal road in telling you about the vagaries and scams of America – Instead of writing a book, Moore simply talks to you. He talks for a good 300 pages, and yet you never ever tire of him. His premise is simple – Most of world’s chaos within and outside America has been caused by Whites, and by that he means Corporate Whites. Moore knows he gets a lot of flak for what he says, yet he goes about publishing books which he says what he means.

In a clean sweep, Moore addresses the following issues with superb spice and humor backed with some excellent research work –

1. How Bush got himself elected in 2000 – The details and intricacies of how the election was flawed and how Bush got through the elections

   
   




2. General American myopia in knowing about the world and their world knowledge as good as zero

   
   




3. How should men of America behave and live. He also suggests that Men should give up their places to women and let them do the ruling!

   
   




4. Corporate Scandals like Enron and how Americans were duped into the stock market; the stock market cost millions of Americans their livelihoods

   
   




5. How Economy not doing well is a quite a lie when all the big companies in the last five years and their corporate heads only raked in more money in millions

   
   




6. That the education spending in America is gone to dogs – why in some schools there aren’t no drinking water too?

   
   

The above is just a breather as to what Moore addresses in this book!! And he does it in great style, with dollops of bush-whacking and cheney-slapping.

Sorry for digressing, I just thought I did put this here to make my review longer!

• In a recent survey they found that 12 % of pet owners called their pets home from work!

  
  




• Around 24% of homosexuals smoke! Wait there is more – out of the 24% more than 60% who smoke and are gays have equal chances of getting an STD!

  
  




• People who are distracted while driving have more chances of meeting an accident! (This one takes the cake!)

  
  




• There was one in TOI today morning, though not American in nature – People who fail in love are equally to lose in gambling!

  
  

It would be unfair for me to say what kind of political aspirations this man has, but nonetheless the book provided a good dose of humor. I was more concerned with the hidden information and the humor and less about the political inclinations. I least cared what Moore thought for others, but yes, when he whacks bush, then its immediately my interest too! More on his political inclinations follow in my next review.

Moore’s style is simple, and to the point. He doesn’t use flowery language, nor does he fail to call a spade a spade! He simply presents the facts and then asks his readers to do the thinking. He writes letters to Bush, Arafat, God, Sharon and other leaders and while using humor suggests practical suggestions to end the world’s troubles. That is the greatest success of the book – practical and humorous!

In epilogue Moore mentions that success withstanding, this would be the last book he did write. The book went on to become the highest selling non-fiction book of year 2002, showing there are more sensible people in America than he thinks! He keeps his promise – he wrote another humorously witty book, this time completely devoted to dubious dubyaman – “Dude, where’s my country”!

And that’s what I am going to review next! Till then, grab this one immediately! And by the way, the old couple weren’t finished yet…