Colbert/Outside reading project

“Desperate I started praying—mostly to God, although it’s possible a prayer to Santa may have snuck in there. I prayed He would bring my parents home and make our family whole again” (Colbert 3). This quote summarizes what the whole first chapter is about. It’s about what Stephen Colbert thinks of his family, his pets, his religion which is shown in this quote, and old people.

“We’ve become a nation of sperm donors and baby daddies. But there’s more to being a father than taking kids to Chuck E. Cheese and supplying the occasional Y-chromosome. A father has to be a provider, a teacher, a role model, but most importantly, a distant authority figure who can never be pleased” (Colbert 7). This quote shows Stephen Colbert’s view on a successful father. He continually states throughout his portion on the family, that our families are becoming less together, and more individual. He also thinks that the father has to be more of an authoritative figure than a caring father.

“Point is, I’m writing about seniors here, and old folks can’t read anything that’s not printed in a 30-point font or above. To them, this paragraph looks like an ant fight. Sad thing is, if they try to use a magnifying glass, the page catches on fire.” (Colbert 21). This quote represents Colbert’s ongoing thought of old people as less than us. He continues to rag on them as much as he can, putting in cheap, unfair insults whenever he can.

“The daily beatings lost some of their intensity during the football season, when my jock tormentors were able to split my torso from their locker-room hijinks. This lull allowed my swelling to go down, and it turned out I had facial features. The girls noticed. Soon I was a regular on the debutante circuit where I tried scoring a few “touchdowns” of my own” (Colbert 69). This quote represents the second chapter of Stephens’s book, which is about sports, school, sexuality, sodomy, and the silver screen. He touches base in this beginning on his daily beatings in high school as well as his quest for girls which he continually rants about in this chapter.

“But here comes the Women’s Studies Brigade, railing about how Colbert is reinforcing gender stereotypes. Well, ladies, we have those stereotypes for a reason—a reason I can’t remember right now because I’m too busy thinking about sex more than you do. Don’t be a knuckle sandwich. The sooner we accept the basic difference between men and women, the sooner we can stop arguing about it and start having sex.” (Colbert 90). This quote basically sums up the sexism that Colbert adds throughout his book. In case you haven’t figured out yet, most of the stuff he writes about is extremely controversial. Anyways, Colbert continues to make fun of women and there minor flaws throughout the book, which is why I chose to add this quote.

“Now I knew a lot of yard guys were illegal immigrants—Blue Collar Banditos stealing manual labor jobs away from Americans who had moved onto something less strenuous. So I let them do the lawn, then asked to see their green cards. They didn’t have any, so I went inside and called INS. When Los Federales rolled up, I shouted from the window ‘Enjoy mowing Mexico” (Colbert 149). This quote represents what the third and final part of the book is about, Socioeconomics, Segregation, Science, Immigration, and Media. Colbert continues to rant about the immigration problem, as well as the problem he has with his new house, the Science it takes to live in his house, and the Media which plagues him.

“The greatest threat facing America today—next to voter fraud, the Western Pinebark Beetle, and the memory foam mattress—is the national news media” (Colbert 152). This quote basically sums up the anger that Colbert has at the media. I can’t take anything he says seriously, because it is such brain-washing garbage, however he writes this most likely because he really doesn’t like the media. This quote also shows his crazy thought process as well as his extremely controversial view of life.

“You’ve learned about the forces aligned to destroy America—whether they be terrorists, environmentalists, or Kashi brand breakfast cereals. You’ve learned how to detect left-wing media bias by looking at the media, and saying “It’s biased” You’ve learned that my dog’s name is Gipper. What’s more, you’ve learned many things that will anger you when they are left out or altered in the eventual movie adaptation of this book” (Colbert 213). This final quote sums up the entire book and how pointless it was. I still think this is one of the worst books I’ve ever read, but some of the ideas in it were a bit interesting. This quote shows how extremely controversial Colbert’s views are as well as how stupid some of the points he makes. In summary, this book was a waste of my time, and I strongly recommend that you never read it.