“Hey Javi, my buddy, life is good?” I asked.

He didn’t smile. “It’s a little rough lately. My mom can’t find a job. My parents are thinking of putting me to work shining shoes.”

“How old are you now?”

“Twelve.”

“Well that sucks. Someone was telling me the other day that your neighborhood is one of the poorest in Buenos Aires. You’re going to be a man a lot sooner than kids in my country.”

“I’m already a man!” He flexed his little bicep muscle.

“Very good. Well I know you’re interested in America and how life is like there. I wanted to tell you a cool part of our culture.”

“Okay.”

“Cupcakes.”

“Cupcakes?” He looked confused.

“Cupcakes! I’m surprised you don’t know. Cupcakes are huge in America. The largest cities have several shops that focus exclusively on selling handmade cupcakes.”

“You mean the little round pieces of cake with frosting on top?”

“That’s the one. But in America we make luxury cupcakes that are just incredible. The best cupcakes you’ve ever had. They only cost $2 or $3 each but if you buy them by the dozen you get a nice discount.”

“$2 can feed for me for the entire day.”

“Oh really, that’s pretty interesting.”

“I mean do they have meat in it? How big are they?”

“No meat, and they’re not very big. I can finish one in about four bites, three bites if it’s especially tasty, which they usually are.”

“Is this a joke?”

“Javi I’m not joking! In my city there is a store called Georgetown Cupcake and people my age line up around the block and wait twenty minutes to get a taste of their amazing designer cupcakes. Another shop opened up nearby and the competition is awesomely intense with people choosing sides over who has the best cupcakes in town. Friendships have been strained. The number one cupcake shop used to be this shop called Cakelove, but now everyone agrees their cupcakes are worse than the ones they sell at the Korean supermarket.”

“Line up for cupcakes? I line up for meals from the government when my parents run out of money. These cupcakes must have drugs in them then.”

“No, no drugs. Just the highest quality ingredients: sugar, butter, eggs, flour, and sprinkles. Delicious!”

“And this is popular in America?”

“So popular you wouldn’t believe. There are articles written about cupcake shops in newspapers. On the internet people furiously debate which shop has the best cupcakes. Talk shows do pieces on cupcakes. They are web sites about cupcakes with close-up shots of cupcakes. Soon there will be cupcake franchises across America like Starbucks and McDonalds. There are even bus tours that stop at culturally significant cupcake shops. It’s fun!”

He didn’t respond. I had trouble convincing Javi that I wasn’t bullshitting with him.

“Javi, remember these are the best cupcakes. I’m pretty sure you’d get caught up in the cupcake craze if you lived in America and weren’t so poor.”

“I miss eating chicken and steak,” he said.

“Um that’s nice.”

Stupid little kid. He just doesn’t get it.

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Hey cool! You made a socio-political observation and statement through satire! I agrre. Cupcake stores are stupid. The best thing about the economy tanking is that we can expect these places, as well as dog-grooming studios and enough Starbucks stores so that you can no longer see two others while standing in front of one, to shut down within the next year. With any luck they will be replaced by much more useful bars and diners.

You forgot about Hello Cupcake… I mean those are totally worth it. Screw the starving kids.

Lemmonex’s last blog post: Revenge.

Things like this always tear me up inside.

20 years ago I was that little boy. Living a life of little opportunity filled with hunger in a small country in east Africa. I was fortunate. My family was able to immigrate to this country and now I find myself living an American upper-middle class existence where I often find myself engrossed in the obscure and trivial perks that only a small percent of the world is able to; be it cupcakes, 300 dollar jeans, and a Starbucks habit that could literally feed multiple families on a daily basis.

If even someone who experienced both sides can be susceptible to this kind of behavior, how can there be hope for those who have only known a life where cupcakes are perceived as important?

Rudy’s last blog post: You can.

Nicely written…..if Javi didn’t hate America, he will now.

I hate cupcakes…..

I am indifferent to Javi’s suffering…

You know what cupcake should be baked, if not already?

The Obama face cupcake…

hahaha

Have you ever had cupcakes from a Dominican bakery? Pastries are very popular in the caribbean, in case you didn’t know. My guess is all the sugar we grows down there. My people might be poor but we sure can afford too throw back back some rum and sweet things

Great story.

DC isn’t even that idiotic with these type of things.

You want to see stupid?

I remember in Newport Beach, CA, years ago they had dog kennels with TV’s in them and amenities like Ocean Views. (I can only imagine what they have now.)

Now I like Spuz Mckenzie as much as the next guy, but it is mind blowing how our “culture” (I use that word very loosely in regards to Newport Beach or Orange County) treats pets better than humans.

Another reason why I heist rich people.

I have always been an advocate of Redistribution of wealth.

- MPM

The G Manifesto’s last blog post: My President is Black, Young Jeezy featuring Nas.

it’s easy to forget about the other half’s life when you’re mired in student loans and concerns like scraping together change for Starbucks/gas for the SUV your parents got you in high school.

Benedict Smith’s last blog post: Girls who publicly brag about being slutty.

The problem is that if that kid’s neighborhood miraculously became prosperous, within a generation they’d be doing dumb shit too. It’s just a side effect of lots of money.

T. AKA Ricky Raw’s last blog post: Open Thread on the Election.

Cupcakes are indeed quite tasty. If Javi wants to make himself useful he can send me some of that tasty Argentinian beef.

Awesome

I feel like you’re too hard on the US (and on it’s people), you always compare it to South American countries. I mean, can you have a discussion about citizens wasting time and money on superfluous food items without talking about France?

And if you want to talk about people blowing money 6 ways from Sunday with people starving/dying all around them, Libreville is the best example.

dchero’s last blog post: What If Michelle Obama Was White?.

Timely post over at one of DC’s food blogs: http://amandamc.blogspot.com/2008/11/georgetown-cupcake-on-martha.html

So I wasn’t even aware that there was a cupcake craze. Am I just culturally oblivious or something?

France? Superfluous food items? In France it is rude to eat in public, and to not eat at a table. Including in bars and clubs. All working citizens have at least an hour for lunch. It’s not like in North America where there is this widespread presence of food everywhere.

In France working more then 35 hours a week is a new development that was greated by thousands of protestors. The idea of opening stores late hours and on weekends is scandalous because believe it or not, France remains a country that is extremely family oriented, so much that divorce is still something that people do not talk about. The average salaries are much lower then in North America, and the population is not only well aware of this, but is quite contente to chose that way of life. In France people work to live, and do not live to work.

He’s not hard on the States he’s simply well traveled. Try it sometime.

myr’s last blog post: Strangers can bond too..

Lines to buy cupcakes?
I lauhght when someone told me, once upon a time that was huge line one day before they start selling a awesome machine that you could have your music, internet, camera, memories, e-mail everything and anywhere and just for only 500 bucks! Plus montly fees!
Cupcakes?! I rather buy a apple.

“So I wasn’t even aware that there was a cupcake craze. Am I just culturally oblivious or something?”

I was too. But then this girl from LA couldn’t shut up about them. I tuned out where the place was.

This post was the 2nd time I really heard about it.

Now it just seems like another fixture in our decaying culture.

- MPM

The G Manifesto’s last blog post: My President is Black, Young Jeezy featuring Nas.

I think Sex and the City and its fixation on Magnolia bakery in Manhattan started the nationwide cupcake crazy, as every wannabe Carrie around the nation wanted to find her own little Magnolia in her own little corner of American. That show has so much to answer for.

T. AKA Ricky Raw’s last blog post: Open Thread on the Election.

that was weakly written compared to your writeups on game

Hey, be nice to Roosh. He’s the only man I’d ever consider fucking, and I’m not even gay or bicurious.

Dude, please tell me that you gave the kid some money? Or hell, at least bought him some frigging meat for him and his family.

David Alexander’s last blog post: Seven Minutes in Heaven.

This post is fiction, though I did know a Javi (javier)

Petty people create petty pursuits to occupy their petty little minds.

This reminds me of an email I got from a girl I dated a couple years ago. It was so stupid I saved it. This is her talking about her weekend:

My weekend was good, but really busy! On Friday I had dinner with a former co-worker (she is also a good friend) in town from Ontario. We went to Eight – they have a new menu, it’s yummy! Saturday involved dog school (very cold!), shopping, and then meeting some friends at the Mercury. On Sunday I took Luca to get Halloween pet pictures professionally done – hang on a minute! Don’t judge! It was a charity event!! Then we went to Crave in Kensington to get cupcakes (have you ever tried them? So good!!!). My friend had never had one before and I told her she couldn’t go back to Edmonton without trying one. She actually left today at lunch cause she kind of got snowed in yesterday! I am not really a snow person and I wish it would all just disappear now :o(

So, that was my weekend in a nutshell!

Oh myr, help yourself.

In France it is rude to eat in public…

Maybe you should look up superfluous?

but is quite (sic) contente to chose that way of life

You are completely out of touch with the French psyche, and couldn’t be more off base. Ask any French citizen about their experiences at CDG and watch them unleash a tirade on incompetent workers who literally can’t be fired. Let me guess, you went to Paris once and you saw a Michael Moore documentary? Why don’t you go read up on the race riots before you pretend to know anything about France. There’s a White cupcake-eating France, and a Muslim disenfranchised France.

he’s simply well traveled. Try it sometime.

I feel like his directed criticism towards the US and away from other 1st world countries is undue. Your passive-aggressive nature here is uncanny. It seems like you’re trying to say that well-traveled people grow to hate the US more than they did before their travels. Of the people I know, the effect is usually (but not always) the opposite.

dchero’s last blog post: BREAKING: Barack Obama Wins 2008 Presidential Election.

i agree this mentality is idiotic – magnolia bakery in the west village is a great example. they’re friggin cupcakes, not platinum nuggets. but i really don’t get the thrust of this post.

we all get it, roosh – we should feel guilty about being rich. being prosperous. being in a position to line up around the block for stupid cupcakes that make us even fatter and lazier than we are. we should really take that $5 for a cupcake and donate it to the united way or something, and we should be ashamed at how fat and lazy and ignorant of the rest of the developing world’s plight we are. right?

i think by writing this sort of stuff, you’re lowering the bar on your readers. you’re assuming that we’ve never thought these things, or we’re more ignorant than you imagine.

maybe try another approach next time. throw us some statistics on quality of life in the developing world, then maybe compare/contrast those with the life of the poor in the u.s. it’s a little less on the nose and a little more thoughtful.

Diego Maradona will do more to wreck this little fucker’s life than any American cupcake fetish ever will, believe me. That’ll end in tears, give it 4-6 months, right after they get pounded by Brazil in the qualifiers.

Stupid goddamn idea, any numbskull can see how it’s gonna turn out.

Sorry to threadjack but I must vent

I am a French citizen. Weirdo. Please, try and teach me more about my own culture.

Ta gueule, Amerloc! J’nique ta mere.

Oh man, it’s been too long since I’ve been called Amerloc. So you’re not ignorant, you’re just delusional.

dchero’s last blog post: BREAKING: Barack Obama Wins 2008 Presidential Election.

AJT, good comment… most people will call you mean, but they won’t do anything about it… they don’t give a shit

Dude, you just gave me the best idea on how to get my way through college.

Mandy! XD’s last blog post: Very Guilty Satisfaction.

Lets not get those cheese eating surrender monkeys invloved, The french, a nation of collaberators and cowards have no moral high ground over Americans. The only saving grace for France is that at least they can find America in a map , a thing most Americans would struggle to do in reverse.

You know why American chicks like cupcakes, right? Because they can eat cake without feeling like they’re getting fat. Because it’s smaller than a whole cake. Trouble is, they eat half a dozen at a sitting and each one’s much more fattening than a single slice of regular cake.

Oh, and the French should all die.