La La Love You, Don't Mean Maybe

The Russell Brand-hosted VMAs have come and gone, and while I found him pretty funny, and he makes Lyndsey want to give up her chastity ring, others weren't that impressed. Most notably the Associated Press:

Russell Brand seemed a little out of place as the host at the MTV Video Music Awards. Not because he's British or relatively unknown in America, as most of the chatter was about before Sunday night's show from Los Angeles.

It was because Brand injected the VMAs with blunt politics, self deprecation, unabashed sexuality, and, yes, plenty of off-color remarks.

Didn't he know where he was? The VMAs? In La-La Land?

No, this was no place to voice anything like an opinion on world affairs or joke about young Christian pop stars. This is a place to look cool and thank the almighty for the honor of little moon man statuettes.

Okay, AP writer Jake Coyle, let's slow down for a sec and make note of the little LA dis you snuck into that third paragraph. Why, all we do is look cool and love our awards from the most superficial cable network around! We're in LA, where we only care about shallow pretty things! Didn't Russell Brand know where he was?

The only problem is that this is the first time in ten years that the VMAs have been held in Los Angeles, spending the intervening decade in Las Vegas, Miami, and New York City, and they've always been frivolous no matter where they're located. Unless you're prepared to defend Madonna kissing Britney and Christina as the height of intellectualism, please don't make this city-specific.

Secondly, you've committed the grievous offense of calling us "La-La Land." Uh uh. I know, "L" and "A" make "La," but there's also the convenient added benefit of making us seem like a bunch of tra-la-la airheads. Tell you what: Until the AP Style Guide says you can refer to New Orleans as "No-No Land," let's do without the cutesy names.