Brendon Burns - Pompously Lectures Americans (download)

When Brendon Burns sets out to “Pompously Lecture[s] Americans,” he finds an introduction to his home country, Australia, is a bit indispensible. Global ignorance is not a good foundation for an argument or a good excuse for not getting a joke. So it’s time we all learn how the women of Melbourne sound like Ann Coulter (a funny man if ever there was one), how the country generally only makes international news when some Yank gets eaten, and how quietly a quarter of a continent can be on fire without getting much of a notice. But every culture has stuff that only makes sense in context. For instance, Americans can’t talk about religion sensibly, but they feel proud for talking about gay rights, a topic the rest of world’s rather gotten over, what with worrying over being on f*cking fire.

Burns goes on to reveal to Chicago’s Lakeshore Theater how, in rest of the world, people have to defend being conservatives; only in America would someone reflexively defend compassion (“Hey, hey, I’m all for hatin’…”) while also demonstrating a fundamental commitment to taking offense (in Australia, “Oriental” is the least of your semantic worries, especially when it might get turned into an accidental Crocodile Dundee joke). As far as he can tell, the rule should just be: if your people screwed some other people over in history, you don’t get to give ‘em a nickname. Then again, political correctness hasn’t arrived in Australia, so he may not yet know the entirety of this business.

A bit of an outback fancy-man, with all his teeth and the high-fallutin’ spaces he puts between his words, Burns is the first to admit that he—and maybe all of us—come from idiots. But it’s okay, it’s the idiots who make history, doodling graffiti in French caves and setting up giant dominoes in England and becoming governors in large American states. Just keep it interesting, and try to pick up some of the local slang.

1. We're on Fucking Fire!
2. Melbournians
3. Ann Coulter
4. American Revelations
5. Arnold
6. Paedophiles in Prison
7. Not Quite Atheist Yet
8. Racial Slurs Around the World
9. N-Bombs and Meow Meows
10. Steve Irwin
11. British House of Lords
12. Posh Aussie
13. Stonehenge
14. To Death!X