Something’s been bothering me lately and I’m just gonna come right out and tell you what that is. Why don’t people have rumbles anymore?

For those of you who have never read The Outsiders, or just don’t know what a rumble is, it’s when a bunch of young guys wearing leather jackets get into a big fight with a bunch of young guys wearing sweaters.

Back in the 1950s people had rumbles all the time. If someone was sweet on someone else’s main girl, they’d have a rumble. If someone ever wandered onto someone else’s turf, there’d be a rumble. If a bunch of’ “Socs” ever wandered upon a bunch of “Greasers,” there would definitely be a rumble. And in every situation that involved someone named “Pony Boy,” you can bet your ass there’d be a rumble.

Sometime around the late ‘50s or early ‘60s, the rumbles just stopped. Oh sure, people still fought each other, but they didn’t call these fights rumbles anymore. In my humble opinion, that was the beginning of the end.

When people went to a rumble, they brought bats and crowbars and switchblades; no one ever brought a gun to a rumble. It just wasn’t done. It would be like bringing porn to a church picnic.

As soon as the rumbles stopped, however, people started bringing guns to gang fights and here we are 50 years later in a world where people are shot in fights all the time in cities all over the world.

Sure, you bleeding heart liberals can whine all you want about the senseless loss of life, but how many of you are actually going to get off your flabby asses to do something about it? Well, I propose to do exactly that.

I have devised a brilliant strategy to significantly cut down on the number of gun-related murders every year in North America. My plan is simple: We bring back the rumble.

Because no one would ever even dream of bringing a gun to a rumble, all we have to do is reintroduce rumbles into our everyday lives. The best way to do this involves three key steps:

1. We need to reinforce socio-economic class distinctions, to create obvious divisions between rich and poor. This shouldn’t be too tough; we’re already headed pretty aggressively in that direction anyway, so all we’ll have to do for this one is stay the current course.

2. We need to concentrate pretty heavily on hating people who are not like us. This also shouldn’t be that hard. It certainly comes pretty naturally to a lot of people I’ve met.

3. We need to dress according to our station in life. The rich people in sweaters, preferably with large letters on them, and the poor people in leather jackets and wife-beaters with slicked back hair.

If we follow these three easy steps, I’m certain we will see a dramatic decrease in gun violence and at least a 70 per cent increase in awesomeness.

J. Williamez is a local musician who can’t wait for the time when being called “greaser” is again a matter of pride.