Marty Beckerman is a Bitchy Slut (cont.)

A_P: So are you pro-life? I can see your argument that when you make abortions more readily available, then more people are going to have sex.

MB: The first chapter of my next book is going to be called "Bitch Nation." I go to the March for Women's Lives, which is this huge abortion march here in DC. I'm not pro-life because of instances where it's necessary like to protect the life of the mother and [because of] rape, and I've actually heard the argument that abortion should be illegal if the woman is raped because the child is innocent. But I would say it's way too casual in the culture. I'd rather have it be left up to personal choice than government intervention, but I think it's something that's not treated seriously enough. That's how I feel torn between the left and the right. I think when you stick to hard-line ideology that says no abortions should be legal or abortion is the greatest thing in the world, abortion is freedom, abortion is liberation, I think both of those world views are really sick.

A_P: What does your mother think about your work as a writer now?

MB: She cries herself to sleep at night (laughs). My mom says to me, "I'm proud that you're published, I'm not necessarily proud of what you've published." She hasn't even read Generation S.L.U.T. She read like five pages and was like, "I don't think this is the book for me."

My Dad usually likes my writing. I get my sense of humor from my Dad. I probably get my empathy from my mother. My Mom is a really, really caring person but she's really, really sensitive and so she doesn't really react well to the language. She doesn't like the cursing. She doesn't like the graphic sex. She's proud of what I'm doing, she just wishes I could've been a lawyer.

A_P: Why do you consider yourself to be a humorist more than a journalist?

MB: I'd like to consider myself as a funny commentator. When I was 15 or 16 writing for the Anchorage Daily News, I pretty much did straight humor and opinions about stuff and ranting. I feel like you can complain about something and people will read it as long as they're entertained. The most annoying thing in the world is to read bitching that's not fun. I've been trying to move into the direction of someone like P.J. O'Rourke. I guess my Hunter S. Thompson phase is kind of over, but something like that where it's like there's real substance in my writing but I don't want it to be dry or real condescending. I want to be something that even if someone doesn't agree with me, they can at least enjoy it and get a good laugh out of it.

A_P: I read in an interview that you're next book was going to be called "Jewboy Goes to Hell."

MB: Yeah, I couldn't get funding for that. No publisher wanted to pay me to go get killed (laughs). The book that I'm working on now, Nation of Retards, I'm still going to Israel for one chapter. It's a possibility still that I might get to sneak into Baghdad.

A_P: Can you describe the book?

MB: Nation of Retards: America's Sexxxiest Young Journalist Exposes the Bastardly Forces Keeping You Stupid, it's about the cultural war between the far left and the far right, with a focus on how they won their way into the public education system and into the kids' media because they're too pussy to fight over the minds of thinking adults. They have to go after children before they know anything about politics or propaganda. I've got a chapter on feminism; I've got a chapter on the military. Some chapters kind of explore both sides.  I've got one, like I was talking about before, these people who are trying to say age is a social construct and are trying to decriminalize child rape -- so I've got a chapter called "Child Molestation Nation." I think this book is the perfect evolution from teen angst writing to political commentating [and] also funny. And I think it'll get me out of that trap of being Blink-182 and writing about my prom when I'm 30.

A_P: Where do you see yourself when you turn 30?

MB: Hopefully alive.

A_P: Has anybody threatened you?

MB: Yeah, I've gotten lots of death threats. Ever since high school, football players threatening me for making fun of their stupid beauty queen or cheerleader girlfriend. Maybe now that I'm politics, the death threats could be a little bit more successful.

I want to keep writing. This is the best gig in the world where I can stay at home all day and look at porn. I don't need to wake up at any time. There's a lot of people who want to make it as a writer, and I feel a responsibility to them. I know people who've been in my position and wasted it. They've got huge advances when they were 16 years old and they wrote a shitty book and they could've done a lot better. So I'll keep writing and hopefully, by the time I'm 30, I can keep writing and maybe I'll be President of the United States of America.

Danny Gallagher is a freelance reporter and humor writer living in Texas, where nothing is messed with. His website is www.dannygallagher.net