The Chuck Norris Phenomenon

The word on the street isn't about war, who’s dating who, or celebrity gossip. These days, students are talking about Chuck Norris. This superhuman immortal being is sweeping the nation in epic proportions. The butt-kicking star of Walker, Texas Ranger and late-night Total Gym infomercials recently had his career revived by a Brown University freshman named Ian Spector.

Since last summer, Ian has been spreading jokes like: "Chuck Norris puts the ‘laughter’ in "manslaughter". Ian has collected over 40,000 jokes like that. The "facts" tend to involve absurdly exaggerated claims of Norris' toughness, attitude, virility, and masculinity.

In early 2004, Late Night with Conan O’Brien began airing clips of Chuck Norris in action. Conan O’Brien’s network, NBC, bought Universal and gained rights to air clips of Walker, Texas Ranger without paying royalties. The “Walker, Texas Ranger Lever” could be pulled whenever O’Brien wanted, and a random clip of Norris in action would pop up. One of the last and most popular clips to be shown was one where a young Haley Joel Osment uttered the sentence, "Walker told me I have AIDS."

If you are reading this newspaper article, it is highly likely that Chuck Norris is behind you; crouched over, waiting to give you a single fatal roundhouse kick to the jaw. Chuck Norris does not like to wait. You are lucky you have even read this far.

People everywhere are joining the Chuck wagon, even if the karate guru is no longer in his prime. Teenagers all across the country, many of whom have never even seen Walker, Texas Ranger, are telling Chuck Norris jokes. These jokes are not only giving Norris the reputation of a deadly roundhouse kick, but of pop culture’s new pop icon.

Chuck Norris does not have a birthday, he has always existed. March 10^th just marks the 66^th anniversary of the day Chuck Norris became a weapon of mass destruction. Eyewitnesses report that Chuck extinguished the candles on his anniversary cake with a single blink.

Most fads die, and this one is no exception. Eventually, us short attention-spanned teenagers will move on to something more entertaining, and will completely forget about the menace that is Chuck Norris. I hope that does not happen, but perhaps one day, he could roundhouse his way into our hearts again.

With that note, I shall end you with the genius lyrics of the theme song of Walker, Texas Ranger

In the eyes of a ranger,
The unsuspecting stranger,
Had better know the truth of wrong from right,

'Cause the eyes of a ranger are upon you,
Any wrong you do, he's gonna see,
When you're in Texas, look behind you,
'Cause that's where the rangers gonna be.