Wednesday, January 03, 2007

Why I hate Oprah

I started this rant on Pajiba.com, but have now decided to unleash my full vitriol on my home turf.


Start here.

Oprah built a school in South Africa, a lovely, elite estate for 150 girls to attend. For 30 MILLION EUROS. THIRTY MILLION. 30,000,000.00 Euros. That's almost 40 million US Dollars. For 150 students. It will apparently have luxury accommodations.

So, because I'm South African too, and have to watch my family who still lives there struggle to afford an education, I did a little research. My curiosity was spawned by a post by a fellow Pajiba reader. Here's what I learned.

There were 3500 applicants for Oprahs little compound. Whoops, I meant school.
She picked 150 of them. To spend 30 million Euros.
30 million Euros/3500 = around 8500 Euros per person.

Had she chosen to, she could have instead spent 8500 Euros per applicant.

Annual tuition for the undergraduate program at University of Cape Town (on of SA's top schools) is approximately 11,000 Rand (Rand=South African currency).

8500 Euros= about 78,000 Rand.

So. Fucking SO. Oprah could have instead sent 3500 kids to study for FOUR FULL YEARS at UCT, paid for their books, lodging, and probably bought them fucking cars as well.

OR, she could have sent 7000 kids to UCT for four full years.

But instead she's dumping it into this pathetic fucking vanity project, where she can create 150 little fucking elitist automatons. And the remaining 3350-6850 kids can go fuck themselves.

So, why do I hate Oprah? Because she has the same elitist Western egotism that makes so many people worldwide resent people like her. She has this vast fortune, and could do so much good. But instead she makes these little pet projects that she can plaster her fat fucking face all over, and tell the world, "oooh, look how fucking good I am for helping the little poor kids". When instead, had she done a little fucking research, she could have accomplished something phenomenal, and helped thousands more. But of course, those kids wouldn't have had her face on every goddamn book cover. Congratulations, Ms. Winfrey, on creating a brand new class of haves and have-nots, you egomaniacal fuckhead douchebag*.

Fucking hell. I'm gonna need a dozen drinks to calm me down now.


*Thanks to Deus Ex Malcontent for reminding me of the brilliance of this word.

9 comments:

Chez said...

Don't even get me started on Oprah.

Anonymous said...

TK, 1. You're absolutely correct about the mitigating factors on that Mormon douchebag (but he still looks like Marty McFly). 2. Great rant about Oprah. 3. Physical coordination is a curse, not a blessing. 4. You're mom and my mom should go out for coffee, if either one remembered about it.

TK said...

I gotta tell you, the month I spent when it hurt to breathe didn't feel like a blessing.

Maxine Dangerous said...

I loathe Oprah. More so now.

Anonymous said...

God, I hate Oprah too, let me count the ways!

Anyway, I rather randomly stumbled across your blog actually on a boring afternoon at work and found myself amused!

Here's a site I thought you might enjoy, following the whole Oprah theme and all:

www.livingoprah.com

Cheers
Elisha
http://roadwork_ahead.livejournal.com

Timothy Cunniff said...

It takes a lot for me to say hate. Dislike is better. Something has always bothered me about Oprah. Maybe it's the fact that she is always on the cover of her own magazine, your so vain Oprah. Maybe it's her way that sways almost all of America to agree with her like we are her puppets. Maybe it's her tone that I dislike, it seems she talks down to middle America and everyone just seems to take it. She acts like we are all as loaded as she is. If she ever lost her money she'd be humbled. I take it back I dislike Oprah and I fucking hate her with a passion. BITCH

Anonymous said...

Matt mentioned a Mormon. I do not see in the article a Mormon mentioned. Perhaps he could enlighten me and others to whom is he refering. Myself I am Lutheran if that makes any differance. Also I served in the US Army in Germany and am not allowed to donate blood dur to exposure to mad cow disease.

Anonymous said...

You are so fucking right. She tries to play God and its going to bite her on her fat ass one day. People do whatever Oprah tells them to do. Buy a dress, eat a brownie, vote for Obama and they actually do it. Her ratings are dropping by the minute though and I can't wait to her magazine goes under.

Anonymous said...

Thank you. You are absolutely right. It's too bad that you are right.