I Should Have Known Five-Hundred, Twenty-Five Thousand, Six Hundred Minutes Ago that You'd be my Ex-Boyfriend

My high school boyfriend loved RENT. At the time, I'd never seen the play, the movie didn't exist yet, and I had very little idea of what it was about. I knew vague things like, it was about AIDS and homosexuality. Being the superliberal I am, I figured, well, all these people like it, its about counter-culture-ish topics, its probably good, right? Fast-forward a few years, boy, was I wrong!

I am a bleeding heart, tree-hugging liberal atheist, who also loves musicals. Granted, the musicals I like tend to be more of the "My Fair Lady," "Singin' in the Rain," Gene Kelly-esque persuasion. But I HATED RENT. Seriously, I'm expected feel sorry for a bunch of lazy, good-for-nothing "artiste" types who don't want to pay their damn rent? Really? Really? What makes them so special that they don't have to pay rent like the rest of the world? Oh, sorry, I forgot. It's because they are bohemian, misunderstood "artists." Please disregard the fact that they fail to produce anything resembling art. One guy pieces together home movies. Yeah, my fiance's sister did that for her family's Christmas presents last year. It was entertaining for those of us who knew the people, but I would scarcely call it art. Another manages to write one song and carries a guitar around all year, but the most you hear from it is a couple of chords. Oh, and the martyr of RENT kills a dog for money. Yep, these are very sympathetic people. Frankly, by the time the AIDS stuff became a major theme, I'd already grown to despise the characters so much I couldn't have cared less that they had AIDS or Ebola or Dengue fever.

Seriously, societal norms exist for a reason. They make the world function (relatively) smoothly and peacefully. I dislike movies/plays that try to convince people that following society's rules is "selling out" (God, I hate that phrase). Sure, I can support and applaud art that points out and condemns discrimination and other things that are truly harmful. But paying the fucking rent? Are you kidding me? Get a job, hippie.

A far more effective play/movie would have been about a group of 20-somethings, all gainfully employed or trying hard to become so, struggling to make ends meet, while still trying to embrace life and live what they have left to its fullest. I would have responded far better to a story about adults acting like adults than I did to RENT, a story about adults acting like children--but I don't wanna pay my rent.

So most of this has been a rant about why I hate RENT, but the point is, my ex loved RENT.Had I known then what god-awful tripe RENT is, I could have saved myself a lot of time. Knowing what I know now, I feel wholly justified in judging people who like RENT--and would certainly never date one again.