If it's sexy, they will come

California governor Arnold Schwarzenegger was once quoted as saying that if being environmentally friendly was going to be successful, one had to make it "sexy" and attractive in order for the general population to pick up on it. And he's right, of course. Our hunger for more things and status and bling and the comments like oh-my-God-where-did-you-get-that will only be satiated when Mercedes makes their vehicles hybrids and Calvin Klein uses green energy to produce and deliver everything straight off the runway. Without using carbon credits, Mr. Al Gore, you silly man.

But the real point is that you have to make lots of things sexy for them to become mainstream. You say I can make my own web page, populate it with all things me, and people will come admire it?! MySpace and Facebook, welcome! You mean I can post videos of myself and earn instant viral fame?! YouTube/GodTube/YouPorn, my savior! (Yes, YouPorn really does exist. Yikes.) You mean I can actually learn to be grammatically correct and feel like I'm rubbing elbows with the stars at the same time?! It really does exist!!

My sister-in-law was recently voted by some friends on Facebook to Most Likely Correct One's Grammar, and both of us know where to stick our apostrophes. It seems there is a small movement to get Americans to care about their dangling participles and remember when to use to/two/too. See also Truss, Lynne: Eats, Shoots and Leaves; Grammar Girl; Grammar, Dr.; Grammar Aquarium, The; Grammar Blast; Grammar Bytes; Go Fug Yourself (Lohan, Lindsey). It probably seems ridiculous, but they're out there. No matter what, there is still that tiny movement of people who are silently correcting your storefront windows that say "Come Get You're Free Sample Today!" and loathing the fact that your "apostrophe's" are given possession when they only deserve a bit of plural healing. Let's face it, America has turned into a bunch of grammar slobs, and not to mention the fact that no one has yet made dieting and exercise sexy enough for us to become at least less fat than our First World country counterparts. We like vice. We like torture. We like cheating and guns and big scary vehicles with loud, rumbling, sexy engines. The movies give it all to us; you don't see Mr. and Mrs. Smith driving Prius hybrids as a getaway car, do you?

So, does this kind of "sexation" of the uncool appeal to our deepest, darkest selfish needs? Of course. We all just want to fit in, and being part of the so-called Grammar Police is only a term of admiration from others who just want to forget the sentence diagramming they did for an entire year in 8th grade. But don't worry. Once some of us admit that being green really is sexy and cool, we'll be sitting in the heart of America with the coasts coming closer than ever, bumming cigarettes and smoking them as though we're being watched through a lens, reminiscing about the good ol' days when LA use to shine brighter than the sun. Because that was the cool thing to do.