Why I'll Never Make it in the White Collar World

The Appolonians are making their last stand. Glaucus stalks back and forth, sword in hand.

"Soldiers of Troy! You men are warriors! To lead you has been my honor!" He pounds his chest as he says this, and they scream their doomed reply.

Paris enters the torchlit chamber, and he and Glaucous exchange stares and handshakes.

"My prince!" He turns to the remaining men, who stand shirtless and furious.

"The boatman waits for us! I say, we make him wait a little longer!"

He pounds his sword to his shield as his men scream again, and the Greeks break into the room, and Glaucous gets a sword between his shoulder blades courtesy of Odysseus. They fight until none remain alive.


Where, oh where, have men gone? Where are the men who would pound their hardened spears to their shields and welcome honorable death at the point of a sword? Where are the men who would stand firm as the shadows of darkness drew near, fighting without hope because that is what they were meant to do? We are gone, gone in the dim light cast by the headlights of BMW's and the fancy comfortable houses born too large. We have forgotten hardship, sacrifice... we have forgotten what being men actually means.

When the deep snows drift and you huddle around a crackling fire for warmth, looking at your cracked knuckles and your aged face... maybe we think that not all is lost, that the office buildings and pussified yuppies will always, always take second place to those of us who they know could beat their asses into a bloody mashed pulp.

Tell me nothing of where the power lies. It lies not with money or prestige or the illusions of grandeur that so many of my generation share. It lies not with their apartments overlooking the City, nor with their jobs paying 100k right out of college. It lies on no stockholders' floor, on no computer screen. It lies in the scarred hands of us, for they all fail to realize the simple truth that those of us on the underside have long known: The power lies, and will always lay, in the hands of those of us that are physically stronger. It lies in our hearts and our muscles, the ones who know, even though you may drive a motherfucking Land Rover and have some fucking spoiled cunt wife who doesn't tip.... you know that if it was me and you in an alley way, and only one of us would walk out alive.... it wouldn't be you.

There is no man that shouldn't be put in this position at least once in his life. I have put my fist in someone's jaw; I've put my knee into their eye sockets and watched them fall limp backwards. I've beaten guys till they couldn't fucking move, and I've choked them until they puked on hardwood decks. I know I won't win every time.... but at least I know what I'm made of, what I'm capable of if put into that situation. Sadly, that seems a rarity in today's American world.

Some say there's too much violence on TV; I say that there isn't enough in real life. This world is a terrible, dangerous place. No amount of preparation is too much...