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mentaires.info "America's Real 'Zoo': An Innocent Trip to the San Diego Zoo Unexpectedly Reveals the Fate of the Nation"
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- Created on Wednesday, 01 June 2011 04:21
THE BEASTS roared with fearsome bellows... The animals seethed with fury; their hair smelly and matted; yellow teeth snarling; eyes glazed with primordial inertial... But enough about the visitors at the San Diego Zoo.
Correct. While on a relaxing vacation to San Diego last month I was lucky enough to visit its world-famous zoo. The animals were amazing, the exhibits were breathtaking, the zoo itself is very
beautiful and well kept. Its patrons on the other hand... What can I say? I came to the zoo to see a once-in-a-lifetime array of wildlife. What I left with was a frightening vision of the future of America.
Being in southern California set aside, I was still shocked to find the search for decent, normal looking, non-rancid, respectable middle class Americans to be damn-near impossible, let alone grueling. In fact, the most normal, amiable people I encountered were not American at all, but Korean, Indian, and Japanese tourists. Besides them, there was a family from Colorado and some military veterans, including a soldier in a wheelchair. He had brought along his wife and daughters. His legs, however, he had left in Iraq.
These people were a diamond in the rough on this day. They were about as out of place as the penguins in sunny California. As for the rest of the zoo's crowd...
The orangutans played and wrestled with each other gleefully. The site must have been so endearing that it prompted the two anorexic men next to me to start French kissing. On to the beasts of the African plain, where fat, feckless faces of proletariat Americans glanced down at some African deer, exposed gnarled teeth in a supposed smile, then after a second's inspection pronounced, "Wow, horses! Let's move on."
A doomed troupe of teen gangbangers, who would never be caught dead in a zoo save for the misfortune of obtaining free tickets and travel to it, prowled around shouting supposed English, but allowing only 
"motherfucker" to be audible. It must have been quite a struggle for them to resist the urge to pick-pocket the other tourists.
A Burmese python flicked its tongue about as it peered back harmlessly at the three butch lesbians with tattoos on their pale, swollen flesh, one of which not mincing words in its declaration: Fuck You Dad
The Asian large cat exhibit thoroughly titillated the father and teenage son with matching neck tattoos. The Wahhabi Muslim women next to them didn't even bother trying to see the massive felines through their face-erasing burqas, and so just sat down with their daughters as their men enjoyed their privilege of seeing the animals and reading about them on the zoo's plaques (at least they knew African deer when they saw them). And speaking of reading signs, I realized the zoo's were also written in Spanish not so much to help those visiting the U.S. who may only speak Spanish, but to kowtow to people living here who have no intention of ever learning English (nor their children, either).
Passing by the large pen where sub-Saharan warthogs munched grass and gazed at us humans, I couldn't tell if the 20-year-olds next to me were more intimidated by the warthogs, or if the warthogs were more intimidated by the 20-year-olds, bedecked with blue hair and a blinding mosaic of nose, ear, eye, lip and tongue rings.
On to the beautiful birds of South America, where a mother of about forty, dressed rather glamorously and obviously well-to-do attempted to draw her monosyllabic son's attention from some hypnotic game on his phone. Her attempt failed. I never once saw the adolescent wretch lift his eyes from the device. The birds chirped, perhaps squeaking out some hysterical, deriding bird-diatribe on the mother's exorbitant nose job, ballooning collagen injections, and near-exploding breast implants. A thousand feet away someone wearing earphones blaring Lady Gaga was seriously wondering why the zoo couldn't spare the resources to give the aging gorilla in front of her breast implants, too. And a thousand feet down from that there was an already herpetic 16-year-old girl in shorts so tight the camels before her were staring down at their own toes in utter humiliation.
Outside the polar bear exhibit zoo police were arresting two teens who were caught shoplifting an assortment of rubber toy animals, while inside the exhibit a man in his 30s had looked at the polar bears eating carrots and inexplicably roared, "Shit, look a' da' shit! Dat shi' crazy, yo!"
Finally: not an American, not even a person, but the unmistakable aroma of marijuana struck my face sporadically throughout the day, providing the airy icing on the cake for the occasion. It wasn't bad enough that nearly every (supposed) American I saw was depressing or repulsive in some way, shape, or form. No...no, that wasn't good enough —I had to endure smelling their drugs at the zoo as well. In a moment of morbid desperation I saw an old man in a Korean War Vet cap clasp his chest in a panic, only to realize he had left his all-curing flask at home.
THE FUTURE, ACCORDING TO THE SAN DIEGO ZOO
I had come to the zoo this day not expecting to see this. I had come to experience America's greatest zoo, not to have a stinging, internal metaphysical meltdown over the fate of America. But I could not help it... As I meandered throughout the zoo I encountered wave after wave of people who had more interest in being there so they could get ideas for what should be their next ass tattoo than to actually learn about nature and the world they unfortunately inhabited. A twisted but oh-so true realization struck me: these people are on the WRONG side of these exhibits.
I had come to the zoo to see and explore the animal kingdom, not to feel like Jacque Cousteau trapped on the set of The Hills Have Eyes.
Again: aside from the soldier who had given his legs for these people, and the humble, respectful, well-mannered, well-raised, hard-working Asian tourists I saw, I felt like I was standing in the middle of some colossal drainage ditch. Into that ditch poured the essence of the country; of humility, of dignity, of respect —for oneself and others—, of fortitude, intelligence, initiative, motivation; of the very concept of 
class and classiness, and its subsequent concept that just because someone may not hail from much of the former does not mean he or she cannot behave like they have an abundance of the latter; of morality, piousness, temperance, industriousness... every trait that has ever had anything to do with the greatness of this nation and what has caused people to risk life and limb to reach it.
Indeed, I felt like I was standing in some gigantic drainage ditch, and beyond that ditch was the surreal, endless sphere of national oblivion. Only these creatures on the same side of the exhibits as I would be left after all the decent, self-respecting, conservative Americans had died off. And to top it all off I realized this while walking through the "extinct" exhibit, dedicated to North American animals that had lived during the Ice Age.
Thus I realized: if this is the future of America then America does not have a future. And if America does have a future with these people, it is a future that will be without me. I will pack up my national pride, my love and self-respect (and money) and donate them to a land and people who actually deserve them, like Swaziland, Guyana, South Korea, or Papua New Guinea. I am quite serious.
AMERICA'S GREATEST ZOO...In 50 Years
I saw the future of America on this day at the San Diego Zoo. I saw it as plain as the Scarface T-shirt on the obese 10-year-old Hispanic kid by the penguin tank, and the shirt on the pre-pubescent White girl which read, "I'M BRINGING SEXY BACK."
I had come to see the animals of the world. I left having seen the future of a country. I saw the San Diego Zoo in fifty years. I walked out of its gates in 2011 and saw what it would be in 2061: the San Diego Zoo is 100-times larger, remodeled, synthetic, gaudy, banal....but large. Incredibly large.
The zoo is designed and built by the Saudis.
It is owned by the Chinese.
Brazilians provide its electricity.
Indians run its marketing and customer service.
Its janitors are still Mexican because they never bothered to learn Mandarin or Hindi. But regardless, they all will still have to bow five times a day to Mecca.
The only tourists who will be able to afford tickets will be Indians and Koreans.
The main exhibit will be the descendants of the Americans I saw in 2011, caged in with their neck tattoos, nipple piercings, collagen injections, hepatitis, diabetes, Lady Gaga's Granddaughter's albums and third-grade reading capabilities.
Out from the dark recesses of some nest in some cage a man hollars out to the Asian tourists viewing him, "Eeew, loo' a' dat shit! Dat shi' crazy, yo!"
......As for the U.S. soldier who gave his legs for this country —for the people now rightfully behind the fences and cages—, the Korean War vet, the Colorado family, and the rest of us red-blooded, respectful, normal Americans...? We will be found in the zoo, too...in the Extinct section. Or perhaps I'm being too optimistic.
—Nick Taxia
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