No matter the precise definition of the term, we seem fascinated by it in this culture. I use the term 'trailer' to mean what some of you call white trash. I actually lived in a trailer down by the river for a while, so Ive seen the culture up close for an extended period of time. And it seems that trash (white or otherwise), or 'trailer', is in these days.
It's everywhere.
Remember when the Fox Network presented the show, Celebrity Boxing, which featured, among other matches, a three round bout between erstwhile figure skater and sometime goon wrangler, Tanya Harding and southern "socialite" and gubernatorial femme fatale, Paula Jones. The combatants launched perfunctory "punches" at one another in a nap-inspiring contest that ended with Harding emerging as the victor. But the ratings were so high that Fox decided to air another installment of the program to accommodate the mouth-breathing, knuckle-dragging, cretins that made the first program so successful.
Celebrity Boxing Part Deux featured a match between Nabokovian auto body man, Joey Buttafuoco and an ex female wrestler named China. Poor John Wayne Bobbit was schedule to fight China, but had to pull out because apparently he decided to train for the bout on his current love interest, and sadly was taken away for it. (A better fate than he has suffered in the past by the way.)
Now this type of spectacle is all well and good, if you're wearing a housecoat with a soft pack of Marlboro 100s in the pocket and making a nice batch of macaroni and cheese while your stories blare in the background. But I can't help but wonder if it speaks worse of the state of refined civilization that self-serving, inbred dolts, like Harding and Buttafuoco, are abusing Warhol's fifteen minute limit, or that we keep tuning in. Why has the cult of celebrity become a clearinghouse for the mullet-sporting, wife beater-clad, chain-smoking sect that used to only thrive in the mobile home park where I once lived? And why have we embraced them so thoroughly? Do we see them as a curiosity? Or has the entire world gone trailer?
Several of our most visible information sources and entertainment venues seem to suggest that it has. Stop and think about the prominent media in our current culture. American television is without a doubt the biggest purveyor of trailer fare on the planet, offering such morsels as The Jerry Springer Show and its ilk, professional wrestling (pronounced "wrasslin"), a show where people eat worms called Fear Factor, Bass Masters, Monday Night Football, the Tough Man competition, tractor pulls, The Price is Right, Jack Ass, Cops, People's Court, and the list goes on and on.
And aside from the tube, you can find healthy doses of trailer in the music industry. Of course when you talk about trailer in music, one brand easily stands head and CAT cap above the rest. "Oh, we have both kinds, country and western." In all fairness though, the country stars of today are trying real hard to shirk their trailer heritage, striving instead for homogenized pop star status, like Tim MacGraw or Shania Twain. (By the way, did you know Shania Twain is just a stage name? Her real name is Samuel Clemens.) But I'd rather live in a world where Merle Haggard goes to prison, and Hank Williams and Keith Whitley drink themselves to death, than watch Kenny Chesney priss around in a tight, sleeveless T-shirt and a pooka shell necklace. At least the true trailer country singers had real, hardass demons to contend with, and didn't use cutesy ambiguous sexual orientations to position themselves in the mainstream. This established, traditional faction of trailer is attempting to shed the double-wide mentality everyone else seems hot for. Hey guys and gals, stick with what you do best. After all, you are trailer and trailer is you. There is no shame in being the first at something.
But trailer has leaked over into other music genres as well. Remember when rock stars were rock stars and rappers were rappers, and we could easily tell them apart. Lately there's been an odd trend in the music industry where the two types of music are being melded together, usually by white trailer kids, like Eminem and Kid Rock that think they can fool us into thinking they're street or hardcore rock n roll. But your hybrid music is not rock and it's not rap, and a wife beater and baggy jeans is trailer, no matter how many gold chains and backward baseball caps you add to the ensemble.
It's not bad enough that we can't seem to get our fill of the Budweiser lifestyle on television and in music. Trailer is just as popular in other areas as well. A certain contingent of the yuppy set has embraced NASCAR and Winston Cup racing. Their goal it seems is to indoctrinate a movement that could be termed Trailer Chic. But I got news for all those pretenders: it's not working. Your fascination with Joe Dirt doesn't make you trailer. I mean, when you step onto the infield at Talladega, that dried brown stuff on your chin better be Copenhagen juice, your jeans better be showing a good portion of your ass crack, your eye better be lazy whether you finished 43 beers or not, bleach better never have touched your underwear, let alone your teeth, your sunburn better be real and present year round, that better be a bologna and white bread sandwich you're eating, and when you say, "You wanna cold one," it better come out of your mouth as one word. Otherwise, you're just playing a game. Hey, I lived in a trailer. I worked with trailer. And Senator, you're not trailer.
But the question is, why is anyone playing that game? Have we lost all inclination toward refinement? All desire to be classy? Do we feel we've taken art and culture as far as they can go? Are we simply saying what's the point of even trying anymore? Do we care what the rest of the world thinks of us? Should we care?
Fear factor and Monday Night Football will probably get high ratings per usual. And Springer and Riki Lake seem to still be going strong. But why will their ratings be so high? What is our fascination with these types of things? How do these shows stay on the air?
Perhaps there's a little trailer in all of us.
P.S. For further reading on things trailer, use your Internet search engine and enter the following: Roseanne and/or Tom Arnold, Busch beer, John Rocker, tornadoes, child custody, El Camino, cheerleader moms, hockey dads.
is what I say to you.