America the Extreme
by Chris Sprow

Shielding your wind-burned eyes as you walk through downtown Chicago, you see countless billboards, large and small. This month — a credit to its maker — one stood out. An ad for Time magazine displays opposing photos of Michael Moore and Mel Gibson, their heads framed in the familiar red rectangle of a Time cover page. The sign asks: "Is America supporting extremists?" It supports propagandists, surely. For Gibson, this makes sense, though he may not realize it. The word has roots in the Roman Catholic faith. Moore knows propaganda well.

But do we support extremists? Well, sure. But perhaps we're also simply bored with factualists.

Time is providing good advertising, but also a conundrum. The idea of selling authoritative journalism under sensationalized pretenses is old hat. While most advertising today can leave one longing for the gouged-eyes end of an Oedipus complex, this at least leaves us with a question worthy of an answer.

An easy one.

To ask if our great nation is a supporter of extremism is to ask if Cuba is a supporter of economic repression. We do not support extremism. We breed it. Extremism is our version of Geraldo's moustache. We have other characteristics, but this is one that defines us.

The New York Times' Paul Krugman calls our newly elected president not a conservative, but a "radical." Finally, a leader who defines our most noble trait.

Seriously.

That Time would insinuate that Moore or Gibson are extremists is troubling. One re-told the greatest story ever told with a few added props (namely blood) and mystical Hollywood trickery. The other re-created the greatest story ever manufactured with a few added props (namely unknowing Republicans) and mystical Hollywood trickery. How is the "extremist" label troubling in this case? Applied to either man, it requires a leap of faith. One for God, the other for self-contradictory fiction.

Sadly, Time, from a historical perspective is simply guilty of giving in to trends in terminology. They are, as Robert Louis Stevenson wrote, "Blown by all the winds that pass, and wet with all the showers." Faster than they can run a David Koresh retrospective as a cover story, they should grab some perspective, acknowledging that America always has been extreme. Simple colonists defying the most powerful government in the world.... "By the people, for the people...." Separation of church and state.... Now that's extreme! I need a cold shower.

With a historical perspective on America the Extreme, the Gibson and Moore ticket is like a Woody Allen vs. Stephen Hawking arm-wrestling showdown. It would generate hype, but is still contextually, well, quite lame.

How lame?

It's lame in comparison to economic extremism. The American free market system is still the world's model. The evolution of this system has been extreme, and has spearheaded any number of technological and industrial innovations, revolutions and back-room conversations. It has driven the economic, technological and scientific growth of the free world, and has built in enticements to further such progress. In this country, with an economy still based on a system of risks and incentives, even writers can make money. Preposterous!

Cervantes noted that to attain the impossible, one must attempt the absurd. For example: A society that banned booze and gave women the right to vote in a year's time. Absurd! Extreme!

America has always attempted the extreme.

Our separation of church and state is extreme in a free democracy. Sure, one could argue that this isn't revolutionary, but such separation is bold in a country where most people have faith, and is near meaningless in agnostic, secularist societies. And this from a country whose founding fathers included some who were deeply religious. Imagine the foresight that required. And in a state such as this, America has given rise to almost unprecedented religious extremism.

How extreme? Try Mormonism. Want funky? Read L. Ron Hubbard and "Dianetics." Want to get weird? Try Heaven's Gate.

Mass suicides by people seeking to attach themselves to the back of Haley's Comet, adorned in synchronized sweat suits and tennis shoes, their bodies covered by velvet purple sheets in the shape of your Viagra. And Mel Gibson is an extremist?

Speaking of Viagra, what culture on earth is more sexually extreme? Well, perhaps a couple. But again, our sexual extremism, or sexual commercialization, exists in the face of a powerful religious base and movement. Or should we say sex-focused. Sure, none of our leaders have died while copulating with horses (myth or not), but our culture is consumed with the stuff.

We also support inventors. America the extreme has taken the technological advancements of the entire world, and within two centuries time, fostered a culture that has exponentially trumped that progress.

If Moore and Gibson are to be called extreme, then what do we make of an American artist who takes a crucifix and places in a tub of urine and calls it modern art? This in our American, self-appointed "capital of the world." Surely a dash of blood and a dalliance with political deception can't be compared to this. And we combine art and sex in extreme forms. From Elvis to Madonna to Janet and Justin, we've intertwined the two through the last fifty years of music.

We could go on, but let's be un-American, and un-extreme, and stop while ahead.

Time magazine does something correct here. They ask a proper question. Because your first grade teacher did, in fact, lie to you. There are stupid questions, and stupid people to ask them. What Time should realize, is that theirs is not a stupid question. It's simply — and typically — sensational, and also ironic. Moore and Gibson understate our extremism. Ah, but it does have a simple answer.

America is a blood-covered, peace-seeking, lying, virtuous, wonderful land of extremes. It makes us. It breaks us. God bless it.

E-mail Chris Sprow at csprow at chisport dot com.