Resemblance, No?

The season of amusement is upon us. Crying kids, sticky fingers, gross urine-tainted water splashing into your gape-grinned mouth as you plummet down a hill in a coated plastic "log" boat. Who among us doesn't crave such refreshment? You? Really? You don't like amusement parks? ("Um, hello is this the FBI? Yes, yes, I want to report suspicious un-American sentiments...")

For Americans and foreigners alike there is a funnel cake of universal fun waiting to be barfed up at the good ole standby Disney World. You can get married at the Fairy Tale Castle (even you gays are now allowed with a ceremony administered by Captain Hook and Mr. Smee). You can take pictures with child molesters in full Mickey Mouse drag. You can die on the Mission: Space ride. You can do it all! You can have a ball! (Though based on personal experience, Perfect Ratio suggests bypassing the Clam Chowder soup served by the sweaty, serpeant-tattooed ex-con at the Liberty Tree Inn)

I'm trying to get you all excited about this rat-faced symbol of your American heritage, because, as you may have heard before: The Brits are coming! The Brits are coming! The Brits are coming! Yes, those pesky English speakers across the sea who are always trying to steal our good ideas and pass them off as original ("Mmmm yes, Charles I think it would be simply lovely to go to war in Iraq. Please pass the biscuits ") are starting their own amusement park: Dickens World. I mean Jesus America Christ can they not come up with their OWN initials and syllabic emphasis?

But sweet, poorly-read Americans-- before you get lured out of country on Great Expectations of fancy waistcoats and greedy old men, let me impart a few tales of this Dickens character. He is no friendly cute mouse nor an anti-semitic sweetheart with a love of the animated. No, friends he was a writer. A writer of terrible plots which spurned love, orphaned children, and depicted place settings that are probably wholly responsible for today's global warming. This Dickens World will be a dark, forsaken place:

"Purists don't even appear that perturbed by a soft play area called Fagin's Den. That's the same Fagin who ran a petty-theft sweatshop and beat children with a toasting fork - not an obvious person to name a creche after. "There's something very attractive about Fagin and about the atmosphere that he creates for children in his employ," says Leon Litvack, trustee of the Dickens Museum and professor at Queens University Belfast. "There is a sinister motive but Dickens treats that with humour. Oliver's life there is better than it was in the workhouse."

Parents, they will kill you, orphan your children British-style, then use their blood to run the rides. Buy American.