Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Gang

Thug Life is not as glamourous as Tupac would make you think.

Reading Native Son, I have been thinking a lot about gang violence. What really fascinates me is how someone can transform their sadness and emptiness into such a violent hate. Maybe that is why this article from National Public Radio caught my eye. Despite the fact that the interview is not of the race specified by my assignment, I believe that at the core of the story is something human that any race, sex, or religion can relate to. 

NPR interviewed Susan Cruz, a former member of MS-13, a Salvadorian gang the began in the early 80’s. My attention was grasped in wanting to know the origin of this woman’s “gang-ship”. She begins by describing a very vivid memory of her United States life, one that any person that is different can relate to. In a game of Four-Square, Susan, at the age of eight and being a girl who has no idea of the rules, and barely a grasp on English, was stunned on the playground. Being surrounded by those different than her, she was stunned and unable to do anything. Wanting the ball back, a blond-haired blue-eyed girl walked up to her and punched her in the nose. Susan punched back and got a day’s suspension for it. The Salvadorian kids banded together as a survival method. Here’s the part that got me. “After being victimized people get tired and they start taking stands”. Her life taught her “switching roles from predator to pray has a lot to do with feeling like you have no other recourse”. So, I thought of a cornered animal, a last stand, the 300 Spartans- anything that where the victim has no where left to run, so they must fight.

Not many Americans would find America to be a “hostile environment”, but Susan most definitely did. She reminds me of Bigger, the protagonist of Native Son by Richard Wright. They both feel caged by the stereotypes that America give them – while Susan is portrayed as incompetent , African Americans are portrayed as undomesticated beasts. Both are poor, both are ashamed, and both turn to their fellow discriminated for help. Unfortunately, their feeling of belonging leads to crime.

No matter who you are or where you come from, anyone who feels alone will seek others who feel the same. Whether it is a language barrier or stress from family life, a person can only take too much before turning to an outlet for their anger. Susan’s schoolyard fight reminds me of Bigger’s constant fighting with his mother. It is because of their creation of a barrier that our protagonists feel suffocated and that they try to find a way out. Not only does gang violence not help relieve their stress, but it also adds another factor of remorse and paranoia to their lives. Is a feeling of belonging really worth the extra stress? Sounds like extreme desperation to me.

Cruz, Susan. "Former Gang Member Details Life Inside MS-13." Interview with National Public Radio.
Talk of the Nation. National Public Radio. NPR. 22 Apr. 2008. 18 Mar. 2009
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The Todd Comes Out of The Closet. Hilarity Ensues.

Scrub’s character “The Todd” is one of the most enigmatic, yet straightforward characters in all of television. His constant stream of innuendos (which he once played off as “in-you-end-o”) and brainless macho attitude makes him seem like the perfect candidate for a straight, yet sex-crazed, dude. Despite his super manliness and his constant hitting on nurses, his heterosexuality comes into question in the pivotal episode “My Lunch”. Carla and Elliot discover that he has never actually slept with any of the people he claims to have slept with. This leads to their wondering about what he was compensating for- his homosexuality.

After easily “outing” him, he becomes their “new gay best friend” and he starts to hang out with Elliot as she does embarrassing things with him (well, they would only really be embarrassing if The Todd was straight…). While Carla and Elliot expect him to turn his overcompensating sexual attitude off, he simply redirects it to men, hitting on every guy he sees. When Carla and Elliot confront him about this, he simply motorboats them both and says “Chicks dig gay guys”. He then strolls down the hall, saying that he would tap every guy or girl, no matter the situation. When asked “What are you?”, he simply responds: I’m The Todd!

The Todd is all about sex, you can tell that from any episode. While The Todd is treated differently as a homosexual, these differences are social, not legal. He utilizes closet anxiety to get close girls only to profit through his own perversions. While some may say he was a victim of Heterosexual Privilege #12 (The Right to Public Affection), I would argue that he was not, being that he was shouting pick-up lines to co-workers and commenting on their ‘packages’. The show satirizes homosexuality and The Todd by combining the two. While The Todd does appear to be homosexual, he does so in an obviously manly and upfront manor, such as asking Turk out of nowhere if he wants to have sex.

This subplot was used as a comedy device in the show, because the main plot, about Dr. Cox taking the death of his patient very badly, was one of the saddest in the show’s history.