Fight like a man or fly away like some kind of super man?
RYAN: I’ve seen my fair share of fights, and every time I think to myself “you’re doing it wrong”. See, despite no formal training or experience whatsoever, I’m kind of a self-proclaimed expert in fighting. Every now and again I’ll tune into UFC and well, let’s just say I’ve picked up a few moves. Now, combine that with all my natural, God-given talent and oh, man, you don’t want any of this. Now all you tough guys out there are probably asking how much I can bench and all that other garbage you like to brag about. Well guess what, suckers, I don’t waste my time and money on some gym when I’ve got everything I need right in my home. My workout routine consists of lifting chairs over my head, opening and closing doors really fast, and curling cans of soup before I eat them for dinner. And not those dainty Campbell’s condensed soup. I’m talking the real deal. The Campbell’s Fully Loaded. Those things probably weigh like 20 pounds each. Minimum. It sounds tough, and you’re right, it is. But it’s all worth it to keep my body in peak fighting condition. And just so I won’t even be tempted to run when things start going down, I don’t even bother doing any cardio workouts.
SHAWN: Maybe if you threw a couple minutes of cardio in there every day or two, you wouldn’t be a beer-bellied big-armed freak who can still wear his skinny pants. But I digress from an argument I haven’t started yet. Fighting may be all well and good, as my personal foray into the WWE has taught me, but you know what’s better? Flying. Fucking flying. Humans took years, even months, to develop a flying machine, after millennia of staring into the sky, wishing, praying they could be like the birds. And you know what? We still do that. With airline prices these days, who hasn’t stood on the top of their office building, arms outstretched, wishing, hoping they’ll take off into the clouds rather than getting tangled in the awning again? Although there is one human who mastered flight and we call him Superman. Yeah. Super. Without flight, he’d just be Batman, which is a bit of a misnomer it itself, as the man can only fight on the ground. Hell, when you run out of Campbell’s, don’t you just wish you could fly to the store? Yeah. You do.
Someone wants to fly, but he's scared of heights.
RYAN:The only people standing on top of their office buildings with arms outstretched are bankers and stock brokers, and I don’t think they’re trying to fly when they jump. See, even though it hasn’t been around that long, flying is already overrated. Security checks. Layovers. Aisle seats. Turbulence. Little tiny cans of Coke and Sprite. It’s just plain ridiculous. Thankfully, fighting is as timeless as it is awesome. Monkey knife fights. Pillow fights. Cripple fights. It doesn’t matter. They’re all cool as hell and amazingly fun to watch. That’s why the Romans built the Colosseum, and that’s why UFC, boxing, and even wrestling (for the record, trying out to be a WWE diva doesn’t count as a “foray”) are so popular. In high school, we’d randomly start chanting “Fight!” in the hallways to see all the people who would come running. The best part wasn’t laughing as they walked away; it was seeing the disappointment in their eyes as they realized there really wasn’t a fight. Even the mere hint of a fight gets people all riled up. When was the last time you got pumped up for flying? When you realized the in-flight movie was Last Holiday?
SHAWN: Thanks for not actually reading my argument, by the way; I really appreciate that. I agree that airplane flying is pricey and overrated, which is why Superman and I support ACTUAL FLIGHT—soaring through the sky like a strong eagle, swooping down to snatch up fish or babies, and then suddenly landing squarely in Hawaii fourteen minutes later. There’s a reason we invented skydiving; we crave flight and understand that, yeah, it’s pretty much the most awesome thing ever. And if you thought kids came running in high school when you chanted “fight”, imagine who would come running if suddenly a kid started flying? Like the mute kid in that movie you probably aren’t familiar with because it doesn’t involve people slapping the hell out of each other. Plus, flight would take fight to a new level. Imagine punching and cutting…in mid-air! How cool would that be? Yeah, flight is so superior a concept that those Romans long ago couldn’t even fathom how to make it happen. That’s why they built an arena and sat back and watched people kill each other. Even we realized that’s a little sick and rejigged the rules, calling it football.
Yes, we are entertained.
RYAN: Just to summarize, your argument for flight centers around skydiving, where people jump out of a plane and plummet straight to the ground—never actually flying—and how cool it’d be if people could actually fly? Unless you think we all live in the Matrix, I don’t think people flying will be happening anytime soon. And even if we did, I highly doubt you’re The One (Keanu’s way more man than you). But yeah, it would be cool if we could all fly. Oh, you know what else would be sweet? If we all had the ability to teleport anywhere we wanted. Or, what if we could all crap out gold bars? That’s be kickass. Oh, and know what else rocks? Unicorns and leprechauns and a mutant turkey-duck-chicken (what would we call it???). Flight may be a cool concept, but damn, here we are stuck in stupid reality, where none of those things exist. You go ahead and keep dreaming. I prefer to keep myself grounded in reality. A reality where I don’t have to imagine what’d it be like if people could fight. All I have to do is watch TV, see a movie, search online, or go to any public place and start shoving people (preferrably children) to the ground.
SHAWN: Fine. You know what? DON’T read my argument; I don’t even want you to. It’s easier this way. I’m not pro-skydiving; I’m just saying it’s one of the many ways us poor humans attempt to simulate, even for a second, the one hope and dream we all share: flight. And funny that the one man who once cherished his entire childhood because he was enamored with a Looney Tunes-ridden dream world would so openly reject fantasy. OHHHH, DID I JUST REFERENCE A PREVIOUS DANGER? Well, readers, I bet you thought that would never happen, but there you go. Besides, every time you get in one of those fights with children you either (a) lose, or (b) end up in prison again. Fantasizing about flying certainly doesn’t hurt other people and, when humans eventually evolve wings, your petty fighting will be deemed useless as escape would be simple for those poor, poor kids (even you, Little Tommy, whether or not Ryan apologizes). Besides, some of us have been out of high school for more than two months and don’t see fighting as a viable solution for all of life’s problems. Oh, but flight. No one’s too old for flight.
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