A World Without Writers = Hell

You, unlike me, might like to watch TV all the fucking time.

You might even find the stale jokes on modern television satires, sit-coms and African-American minstrel comic variety shows to still be funny, twenty-something years after the ideas were first stolen, then re-introduced to our society, then manipulated by corporate executive board members into everlasting money machines for witless stockholders and commercial advertisers.




I have a great respect for comedians, because they have always been brave enough to say something super fucked-up, knowing that you'll probably just laugh their jokes off as harmless comic relief from modern life. But secretly you agree, because these jokes are true, which makes them funny in the first place, I guess. These are our great orators and public speakers, because they are willing to expose their scariest creative thoughts to the public, knowing that they are nothing more than water cooler folly for the next work day. And nothing sucks like being a genius among Gumps, especially when they don't get the pun of your jokes and you never see the monetary benefits from being brilliant in your craft.





Some of our generation's dead greatest comedians first introduced the ideas of racial and cultural differences to society as grounds for comedy, just to have them stolen and abused, over and over, by the corporate suit society that controls modern media. Maybe that's why I support the writer's strike going on in Hollywood right now. Not just because I'm a writer, but mostly because I believe in equal pay for equal work, especially when it comes to creative minds. Whether the business counts blacks, Mexicans or women as its underling employees, we as "the talent" shouldn't be considered as just "help", at least in my opinion. We drive commerce.





You see, the truth is that Hollywood and the entertainment industry as a whole - not just comedy - is a comedy of errors, and the creative society has been essentially re-selling the same jokes around for the last forty years, acting like we can't come up with anything new. In my opinion, this is mostly because the writers want more for their hard work, which they deserve. Ask Dave Chappelle. 50 million just ain't enough. Put another zero behind that bitch's ass, and then I might hit it for life. If not, go get another welfare-happy sucker, because I want more for my mind - especially if you're getting 500-million for my ideas and I'm stuck with a measly 10%.




The truth about this whole stand-off is that the business is changing, and the suits don't want to include the talent in their estimates of incoming cash flow. They want us to be ignorant, yet the writers are infinitely smarter than them, so we figured out their scam and decided to rebuke their offer of little-to-nothing. We figured that it's high time to renegotiate those old-ass contracts so that they reflect the age of the internet. But of course, the suits will never go fully along with overturning power and financial freedom to the creatives. We're just not capable, at least in their minds, of keeping the lights on while pondering the next great gift to the entertainment media community, so they say. So the geniuses of new ideas will always be at odds with the prodigies of the old money establishment. But that's the great war anyway, so who am I to act like I won't fight for my freedom? If my ancestors did it - under hella worse circumstances - who am I to fuck tradition up?





I knew you'd understand. And if you don't, I always knew you were an imbecile.

Creative minds come with deep issues, oh my brothers and sisters. Better yet: uneasy lies the head that wears a crown. You already know my opinion on this one; the writer is the landlord. Without my shit, Mr. or Mrs. CEO, you have no floor upon which to stand.

Oh yes, THE UNDERWRITER is just that arrogant when it comes to his craft, and I figure that you should get like me. My advice for new writers is simple; get behind (nolo) any talent that you possess that can uplift you from the depths of society's sicknesses. I mean, the elites killed Jesus back in the day; why the eff wouldn't they destroy Hip-Hop and urban culture's finest? Hollywood is burning right now, and all the liquor in the cabinet couldn't make an arrogant Hollywood powerbroker capable of creating a hit television series on his own. The creative pen burns eternal, and if you won't invest in a Montblanc, you'll be stuck with a Bic.





There are at least two partners involved in the development of any successful new entertainment idea - those who fund it and those who create it. In the entertainment business, those who make the production connections sometimes feel more important than the very talent upon which they rely to make shit happen. Which is fucked the fuck up, if you ask your homie.

It is the ultimate negotiation point that without the creative minds of the writers, the enterprise of entertainment would wither and fall. So pay like you fucking weigh, bitches. I can write something that I own for free, whether I get paid or not. Tell that to the home audience.


Signed,
Michael Jordan
"THE UNDERWRITER"