There's nothing funny about racism. I'm looking at you BOOK.

Remember when you were a dumb kid and you saw someone who looked a bit different?  You couldn't help but stare, because as a child you are socialized to be a jerk.  Well what if there was a book which captured this awkward experience from your past and colored it over about 17 pages?  My friends and readings I would like to present you with "There's Something Funny Going On."

I am not the creator of these images, and that showing the pictures from the books are for entertainment purposes only.  All of the pictures belong to the English Vine Corporation.

Daddy why is the pickle man naked?

The story follows a boy named Henry and his creepy emotionless father as they move to a new town after the father loses his job at the local newspaper.  Thanks Obama.  Henry lived in East Point, and would be moving to a small town in the middle of nowhere named Fort Ridge.  Henry was understandably upset he would not get to spend the summer with his friends sitting around bored playing on their cell phones while sitting next to each other at the mall.

How much is that Henry in the window ARF ARF.

The drive was long and Henry spent the whole time sadly looking forlorn out the back window to all of the beautiful things in life passing him by.  Would he ever beat his old high score in Anipang?  Who would poke the homeless guy at the park with him gone?  What will happen to the slice of ham he hid behind the boiler in the basement?  So many unanswered questions.

God I can't get over how creepy his dad is.

So after arriving and settling in Henry and his creepy father decided to go for a drive, leaving their poor mother to do all of the unpacking.  Jack Daniels is her only company now.  Henry noticed there was basically no one on the street despite it being a pretty nice day outside.  This confused Henry since he was used to a healthy crowd of listless teenagers hanging about doing nothing with their lives except be up to no good.

Holy crap its someone who looks different then me!

Luckily though Henry spied a man who caught his eye.  He looked different then Henry, so Henry immediately jumps to the conclusion that he must be a monster of some sort.  He spends the rest of the car ride telling his father how ugly the man was and how he was probably foreign, you know how those foreigners are.  His father just looked forward, face unchanging as his son continued with his rant.

Who runs like that?  Seriously kid I think you may be the one with the real problem here.

When they arrived home Henry ran inside like a weirdo and his father suggested Henry get a paper route so he has something to do over the long summer stuck in the middle of nowhere.  Henry agreed only replying that he knows real work ethic unlike those lazy "monsters."  Over the next several weeks Henry gets up and does his paper route, until the fateful day that his boss decides to have Henry do a different route in a new neighborhood.

Hey look a cave, lets go spelunking!

While Henry is delivering papers he comes across a cave, and being a teenage boy he decides to explore it hoping to find half drank booze and discarded nudie magazines.  He however finds something much much worse.

Those lazy "monsters" always stealing and using welfare.

He comes across an entire colony of those filthy "monsters" he always hears about on the news.  Playing with objects they obviously stole from us hardworking humans.  Henry was so mortified he didn't even see one of the monsters approach him and ask him if he wanted to play with a doll.  Henry being a rational adult called the poor green boy a filthy monster and ran away.  Who knows what could have happened if he actually tried to be friendly with those types.

You smell like your mother.

Henry rode his bike all the way home and told his father about the incident.  His father told him that he should take a few weeks off from his paper route.  Then his father called his editor and began to write a new column for his old paper.  He decided to all it "My Son is a Crazy Racist, One Father's Grief."  He got his job back (Thanks Obama!) and the family was able to move back into their old house, just in time for Henry to start school back in the Fall.  

Run Henry he followed you back home! Racist.

However on Henry's first day back the principal of his school came in and introduced a new transfer student from Fort Ridge.  Oh god it was one of those monsters!  The book ends with Henry's face dropping as he worries about the property value of his families house being affected by a monster moving close by.

Obviously I took some liberties with the plot of this book, but to be honest the story is about a kid whose pretty obviously racist however it has no part where Henry becomes redeemed and sees the monsters aren't something to be feared but just people like him.  He never tries to talk to the monsters, and insults and runs away from one that was only trying to be friendly.  These aren't great values to be teaching our already xenophobic Korean children.  Just my opinion anyway...

Much like everything I write, I expect my next post to turn to solid gold.