Robert Brockway
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Here at Cracked, we love badasses. Either because we recognize a kindred spirit when we see one, or possibly because we adore the things that we can never be. Judging by all the crying and non-karate in here, it's almost certainly the latter. But as we quietly sob witty retorts we didn't have the balls to say at the time into our moist, shameful pillows, it gives us hope to see evidence that anybody can be a badass. Even children.
Holy shit, especially children:
This looks like a screencap from the Bollywood version of
Nope.
This is
He's had decades to grow that immense pair of balls. But the little kid - with his mad scientist goggles, yak fur sash and presumably wise-cracking horse - is still holding his own, even in the company of a man who looks like he's going on robot safari. As children, we complained when our GI Joe didn't come with all of the packaged accessories, and here's this little kid, jury-rigging mountain-gear so he and his post-apocalyptic sniper/father can
If I were China, I would be intensely worried by this picture, because it is quite obviously prophetic. One glance, and we all know how this is going to play out: At some point the father will sacrifice himself, likely while shoving a clockwork handgrenade down the throat of a screaming Chinese steam-yeti, and the son will be forced to grow up half-feral in the merciless mountains, periodically emerging to fire-bomb guard outposts while delivering sermons comprised of equal parts howls and headshots.
Update: The old entry in this spot, "angry sports kid," has been replaced, due to...ah...is there a fancy editorial term for "just plain got my shit all wrong on this one?" No? Okay, let's go with "conflicting sources" then.
This is Varsha Vinod from Purakkad, India, and that is not a picture of a child in pajamas being violently hucked into the face of a passing Caucasian. That picture is exactly what it looks like: A 5 year-old girl (now seven,)
But all this still leaves one question unanswered: If the guy in the back isn't, in fact, hurling that little girl across the room like a precocious ninja star, what is he doing? Well, he could be doing anything - practicing his own forms, or advising the unlucky opponent in proper defense strategies, or just sneezing at a hilariously inopportune time - but we all know that's not the case. He's just doing exactly what we'd be doing in his place: Flawlessly executing the Chris Tucker "aw! You got knocked the fuck out!" maneuver.
This is Enal.
If you need more information than that, perhaps you should take a step back from the computer and contemplate how fucking spoiled modern-day media has made you - that a boy gleefully riding a shark like a little Thai Aquaman is somehow not "enough" for you.
But okay, fine, details: This image was not taken out of context, and it was not a once in a lifetime thing. Enal begins every single day by slapping on a pair of goggles, slipping into the penned area beneath the Indonesian fishing community he's a part of, grabbing the nearest shark by the tail, and then steering it around like a murderous jet-ski. There is no further purpose for this action - it's not training for anything, it's not a show for tourists - the only benefits that daily shark-wrangling provides Enal are a quick and energizing way to wake up, and presumably an unflappable sense of invulnerability that borders on madness.
This is Daisy Mora, an 11 year-old girl, pulling some commando crap so crazy that you'd call bullshit on it in a video game.
In fact, her whole village has to take this dilapidated, rusting cable, precariously strung roughly the height of the empire state building above the valley floor, because it's simply the only way to get around. There are no roads or bridges to their village, and not enough people live there to warrant further construction. So to get to school, Daisy straps on her self-built hook and harness, grabs the bit of stick that is her only brake in one hand and her travel sack in the other, then hurtles down a rattling steel cable at highway speeds across certain death.
Oh, and that travel sack? It's not school supplies or lunch or any such nonsense; it's her 7 year old sister, who's too small to take the zip line herself, so just
This image is referred to as 'Disaster Girl' in the dark, musty corners of the internet where people communicate entirely in retarded strains of hieroglyphics that consist solely of recirculated pictures and hasty, tangential photoshops. The Disaster Girl meme, in the few short years it's been around, has already been driven into the ground like the fucking Technodrome. But
Some of the kids laughed and played at fireman, some were even allowed to hold hoses, while some simply listened to lectures. But some children were not content with games. Some children did not respond to logic, or reason. Some children did not want to play, learn, or listen.
Some children? Some children just wanted to watch the world burn.
Zoe was one of them, but she was far from alone...
The Riot Kid photo has become an icon for resistance despite overwhelming odds. It's easy to see why: This is a pure visual representation of the most powerful thing in the world - that unique slurry of bravery, fury and complete lack of self-preservation that can topple governments and tear down entire societies. The riot kid is simultaneously inspiring, funny, and awesome, and if you don't want to whip a bottle into a corrupt wall of faceless facist automatons after seeing this, then congratulations on finding this website through the ReThink filter, worker #264XJ6, but authorities have been alerted and are on their way. Please remain calm and fill out form 27b stroke 6 while you await their arrival, to best facilitate your transition to the Purification Factories.
For the rest of us, Riot Kid is emblematic of every wandering fuck not given. He's scrawny, alone, half the size of his enemies, and he just does not seem to care. Those cops are going to get their god damn heads bashed open, and that is just a fact; the sun rises in the east, sets in the west, and some motherfuckers are going to get their mullet-helmets caved in today.
Once again, this kind of photo doesn't seem to need context, but context still changes everything. The picture originally comes from
So not only was he actually standing out in that street, alone, hurling rocks at the police (which is way more impetus than they need in Sao Paulo to beat some ghetto kid to death,) but he was so overcome with rage afterward that he stripped to the waist, slammed his jacket to the dirt, puffed out his chest and dared them to make a move. This was not a joke, or a childish prank. This was life or death.
Literally.
The photographer has this child tagged as a 'street boy.' That's not a generic descriptor. In Sao Paulo
And while that knowledge is incredibly awful, and gut-churning, and heart-dropping, and just makes you want to burn this whole miserable species to the ground and hope that nature knows enough to start from scratch this time, it also drastically magnifies the importance of this image.
This is not the same as a white, English-speaking child playing at revolutionary because he's got the implied protection of society. This boy is not joking, and he is not safe. If he's really a 'street child,' then those cops he's challenging are the men that might make half a week's pay for murdering him, and would face little to no reprisal for it. And if he really is a 'street child,' then he is utterly alone up there: It's unlikely any of the other people in those photos have a vested interest in whether he lives or dies.
And he simply does.
Not.
Care.
Because there is nothing on this earth - not overwhelming odds, nor brutal police states, nor fear, nor violence, nor the kind of horrible, devouring apathy that makes things like death squads for children possible - that will ever, from now until the heat death of this whole screwed universe, force this kid to sit down and put his fucking shirt back on.
If you were going to spend any time looking for places to follow Robert or buying his stupid book, please instead spend that time visiting and possibly donating to a fund for street children, like Action for Brazil's Children.
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