I Noshed Too Much Key Lime Pie And Now I’m Feeling Queasy

A preview of the next installment of MTV’s Real World, shot this season on Pier 41 in Red Hook:

The look of the Red Hook apartment feels equally premillennial. It is in a converted old warehouse with a canoe propped up outside. The show introduces cast members in different spots all over Brooklyn — Brooklyn Heights, Coney Island — as if it were a single neighborhood spackled with pizza and Junior’s cheesecake rather than a place of varied neighbors. The fantasy is that the yuppies never invaded, and the $7 million brownstones and $25-a-pound wild salmon don’t exist.

As [Salt Lake City-raised] Chet explains when he lands in the borough, speaking just under the Brooklyn Bridge: “Brooklyn is usually spoken of as more of a place you don’t want to end up.” He is worried he might be shot. Some intervention would have helped him realize that there’s little chance of that outside the River Cafe.

Location Scout: Pier 41.

Ironic Brooklyn Just Folded In On Itself

Just like a three-card monte game where the rube walks away a winner:

I was trying to find out from a very harried looking cameraman why a full film crew was following around the worst dressed group of young people at last night’s packed Semi Precious Weapons show at Rebel.

“They’re nobodies,” said the cameraman trailing them around the club. A friend whispered to me that they weren’t just any nobodies, they were the cast of the new The Real World in Red Hook. The lights, cameras, VIP status, bottle service and fawning by wannabe socialites was explained.

MTV had the kids well trained. “I’m sorry I can’t divulge that,” the cast members would tell me when I pressed them for any details on life in the Pier 41 house. But Chet Bannon, the Mormon who the producers are trying to have de-flowered, was too nice not to talk. By far the most suave of the yahoos, he was wearing an H&M scarf, Elvis Costello glasses and had his short blonde hair spiked. Best of all, he admitted that they were indeed the cast of The Real World.

“I love glam rock,” Chet told me as he sipped a Shirley Temple, “you just don’t see anything like it in Salt Lake.” As if on cue, Justin Tranter, the mascara-wearing, teased, peroxide-haired frontman of the Weapons, put a medallion around Chet’s neck, whispered something in his ear, then strutted off.

“Wow, that’s just so cool,” Chet — who’s engaged to a girl back home — gushed.

There was trouble in paradise, however, and the young man needed to get something off his virginal chest. “When we go to Williamsburg we get harassed. The hipsters throw things at us and say ‘Why are you here? Go home! Ten years ago none of them were there either.'” He looked hurt and wondered, “Why are the hipsters so small minded?”

Look At Them Guys With The David Dukes On . . .

You know, the ones co-opting the white supremacist message of “not anti-black but pro-white”. This is obviously fake:

They’re straight, they’re proud and they want to beat up gay people.

Such is the mixed messages sent by the Reggae record label [name redacted so as not to encourage stupid publicity stunts] who announced this week that they’re planning a “Straight Pride Parade” in Brooklyn for late August.

The announcement came via a blog post, although the group hasn’t apparently taken any steps to make this dream a reality.

But the announcement alone may have given them exactly what they wanted -– press for their album “18 Karat Reggae 2008: Global Warming.” They have also ruffled the feathers of area Lesbian, Gay, Bi-Sexual and Transgender (LGBT) residents who have lashed out against the violent lyrics against homosexuals in their ditty “Hit Them Hard.”

The not-so cheery chestnut, written by [name redacted so as not to encourage stupid publicity stunts] -– the Reggae rapper, not the piece of office equipment -– encourages listeners to attack “all men who visit men backyard and leave all the women to starve,” according to the lyrics.

Officials from the independent record label defended the lyrics, claiming that the song is not homophobic, but “pro-family.”

Their parade is also going to be pro-family as well, they claim.

“The Straight Pride Parade is a chance for heterosexuals to gather together and proudly embrace their sexuality,” according to a statement sent out by the record label, who claims that the album has suffered financially due to criticism from the LGBT community. “Adults are encouraged to bring their children along for the celebrations, as the event will be family oriented,” the statement read.

Organizers said that the parade will celebrate “reggae, dancehall and family in love and unity.”

“I sat quietly and watched as they cancelled artists like Buju Banton, Sizzla Kalonji and Capleton,” [name redacted so as not to encourage stupid publicity stunts]’s president explained. “But when the gay community went after [name redacted so as not to encourage stupid publicity stunts] artists like [name redacted so as not to encourage stupid publicity stunts], [name redacted so as not to encourage stupid publicity stunts] and [name redacted so as not to encourage stupid publicity stunts] we decided that we must make a show of strength.”

“The Straight Pride Parade is a great idea,” said rapper [name redacted so as not to encourage stupid publicity stunts], who identifies himself as a “dancehall sensation.”

“When a song like ‘Hit Them Hard’ by my label-mate [name redacted so as not to encourage stupid publicity stunts] can be banned just because it stresses the importance of a male and a female in every family, it is a sign that heterosexuals need to wake up,” he said.

. . .

Terrance Knox, co-president of the Lambda Independent Democrats, the borough’s leading LGBT political club, said that the “so-called parade is nothing to be proud of.”

“My whole thing is that whoever you are, be proud about it,” said Knox. “But this Reggae song is steeped in homophobic rhetoric.”

. . .

Knox added that the anti-gay obsession of some reggae groups like [name redacted so as not to encourage stupid publicity stunts] raises the question of their own sexuality.

“The more these so-called artists obsess about gay men, the more they sound like tortured guys on the down low,” he said.

Upside: When The Reality TV School Reality TV Show Premieres, We’ll Finally Have The Black Hole Necessary For The Whole Enterprise To Collapse In On Itself

Severe ramifications from the recent writers’ strike continue to wreak havoc on a fragile American culture:

Dreaming of showing it all on reality television? A new school has opened to show you the ropes.

The New York Reality TV School — brainchild of theater coach Robert Galinsky, who has trained reality-TV stars for years — began classes on 19th Street in Manhattan yesterday, offering lessons in jumping from real world to “reality.”

The school — which claims to give students a “competitive advantage” over other potential contestants — provides one-time workshops for $139 and five-week workshops for $299.

Real World: Canarsie

Do it, do it, do it, do it:

It seems that Brooklyn might not be ready for the “The Real World.”

The MTV reality series is heading to the borough for its 21st season, possibly starting production this summer for four months, says Jim Johnston, the executive producer of the show.

Johnston says the network is considering various areas that are Manhattan-accessible — Greenpoint, Williamsburg, Dumbo, Park Slope, Cobble Hill, Brooklyn Heights, Carroll Gardens, Red Hook and even Coney Island — but nothing is locked down.

“Just the sound of ‘The Real World: Brooklyn’ [has a ring to it],” Johnston says.