I was thinking about gatekeeping today. It was because of a memory. I was home sick from school, and watching the video cassette of Austin Powers, The Spy Who Shagged Me. I got to the part where Dr. Evil raps "Just the Two of Us," but changes the words to be about him and Mini Me. I thought it was funny. But I felt like if I watched this with someone and only kinda knew the words, I would be lame. So I kept pressing rewind and going back and watching it again to get the words. I spent an hour of my life rewatching Mike Myers dressed as a crazy guy rap and whine about how excited he is to have a clone of himself because his son created in a lab doesn't love him.

I did that because of gatekeeping. I didn't care about the rap. I didn't even like the song. I just didn't want to be at a sleepover and not know the lyrics, in case it made me look foolish.

And today, as I was trying to force myself to get some mindless work done, I got it in my head. The song. The rap part with the Dr. Evil lyrics. I didn't like it then and I don't know. It's grating on my ears. But thanks to the dangers of gatekeeping, it's too late for me to live without hearing those dumb, dumb words.

Gatekeeping. Not even once. Second hand gatekeeping annoys.