Lovato’s enlightenment is out of this world
Demi Lovato is an intergalactic language cop.
The singer, who is non-binary and changed their pronouns to they/them in May, believes it is high time another English word is scrubbed from the universe. (If “high time” is offensive to stoners, I apologize. And I apologize for using “stoners.”)
Despite not using drugs, I always feel stoned whenever I read about Lovato these days. It’s almost as if music is a hobby and their day job is to say weird stuff. This is especially true now that they are a UFO hunter — sorry, UAP hunter — with a new four-part series on Peacock titled “Unidentified With Demi Lovato.” It comes to the W Network on Nov. 7.
In the trailer, Lovato employs the Socratic method to arrive at a conclusion via rhetorical interrogation: “What if extraterrestrials aren’t travelling light years to visit us? What if they are already here waiting for us to reach out?”
I think I bumped into an extraterrestrial at Home Depot this long weekend. It was Saturday night and my wife dispatched me because we allegedly needed bags of black mulch for my fall yard duties the following morning, which was also news to me.
Yeah, Happy Thanksgiving. For Christmas, maybe she will send me to Gitmo.
Anyway, it was around 8 p.m. I was pushing my orange flatbed around the Garden Centre, which was spooky because it was caged off with giant bars, like a maximum-security jail. The seasonal shelves were barren.
Most of the lights were off, creating the moody vibe of a nightclub that smells faintly of fertilizer and leftover mums.
So I’m fumbling around in this big box haze, trying to find the stupid mulch. The only other customer — the extraterrestrial — was scrutinizing paving stones.
Now, on official documents, my eye colour is listed as “brown.” I’d say my peepers are closer to an astigmatic black. But this guy’s eyes were a black I have not seen in a human head before. They were like two lumps of glowing coal. He was also making a rumbling hum, like a Ryobi leaf blower just before the lithium battery dies.
His mask was undulating like a jellyfish. His gold sneakers were not of this world.
Now, I have no idea if this was an Earthling performing an Aztec paving stone ritual. Or if he was just seething because his wife sent him to Home Depot on Saturday night. But I was so scared I almost crashed my cart into a display of wrought iron plant hooks. My brain, addled by decades of paranormal curiosity, especially UFOs, screamed, “ALIEN!”
And if I had been shopping with Demi Lovato, they would have kicked me in the Chiclets.
Or as they recently told Australia’s Pedestrian.TV: “I think that we have to stop calling them aliens because aliens is a derogatory term for anything. That’s why I like to call them ETs! So yeah, that’s a little tidbit. A little information that I learned.”
And I, for one, welcome our new non-binary ET overlords.
Where did Demi learn this little tidbit? Have we reached peak political correctness on this planet and now are turning our semantic scolding toward the cosmos? Is there an intergalactic movement called LGMM — Little Green Men Matter? But wouldn’t that be problematic because it’s not gender neutral? W
hat about the Little Green Hot Chicks in the radioactive stilettos who can levitate and, with a blink of two or three almond eyes, turn you into the anamorphic art of an origami giraffe?
I love that we have progressed to a point where certain terms, especially those with etymological and ethnical import, are now verboten. I used to say “gypped” as a teen. I don’t say it anymore. “Excuse my French,” “Welsh on a bet,” “It’s all Greek to me,” “Mexican standoff,” these are idioms on life support. And let’s not get into “Get your Irish up” or “Chinese fire drill.” That said, it’s curious that “Going Dutch” is still no big deal. By contrast, for obvious reasons, I always hated “Indian giver.”
People, I’m just a giver! I don’t want it back!
If anything, Demi Lovato is guilty of species centrism. They are assuming if aliens exist, they will be as sensitive to the popular lexicon as we humans have become. The crazy part is that if there is verified contact, aliens will assume we call them “AHHHHHH!” That’s the only thing we will scream as we try to escape before a beam of light freezes us in time and hoists us up to the mother ship for genetic testing.
In this equation, in every
theoretical equation, the aliens have all the power. If that freak at Home Depot suddenly said, “Call me Butternut Squash,” I would have started to weep before replying, “I come in peace. I seek out only mulch. Let me go and I’ll be happy to pay for those octagonal paver stones, even though you’re making a huge mistake, Butternut Squash. Rectangles are your friend, my friend. Please don’t vaporize me. I am not an Indian giver. I am just so confused right now.”
Forget stoned. I’m feeling punch drunk. Maybe that’s because it’s Tuesday afternoon and my back is still aching from the Thanksgiving yardwork, and I just read this CNN story: “Demi Lovato thinks the term ‘aliens’ is ‘derogatory’ to extraterrestrials.”
Right. And I now think “Demi Lovato” is derogatory to Homo sapiens.
The aliens are clearly a superior life form. They are so past this nonsense.