The Peoples News

By Bill Matthews

Lacking peg legs, gold earrings and even parrots, African pirates are just boring.

(OFF THE SHORE OF SOMALIA) For more than a century, white pirates who pillaged and murdered on the high seas were depicted as devil-may-care scoundrels who would save a maiden’s virtue or even give up their share of the treasure if honor was at stake.

Somalian pirates, it seems, have a lot to learn.

“It’s as if these guys have never seen a movie,” Pirates of the Caribbean star Johnny Depp told The Peoples News. “I mean, they don’t wear eye patches, they don’t carry around talking parrots, and I bet none of them sounded anything like Keith Richards. How can they call themselves pirates?”

Before April, most Americans didn’t even know real pirates still existed, except as Pittsburgh’s baseball team. But after pirates off the coast of Somalia hijacked the Maersk Alabama, people were initially titillated by the thought of some peg-legged rascal waving around a cutlass.

Instead, they got AK-7 wielding kids–none who had the curly long locks of Orlando Bloom.

“They could have at least sported dreadlocks, but no, they couldn’t even put that much effort into their appearance,” said Dimitri Ashker, who helped bring the Maersk to shore. “I mean really, the only time one of them went ‘argh’ was when he got stabbed.”

Somalian pirate Daud Nure blames his countrymen’s inadequacies on their unfamiliarity with pirating. He’s opened up three schools to teach the principals.

“First, I try to tell them to stop being so menacing. I mean, we’re pirates, we’re here to rob and steal and make people feel uneasy as we wave our weapons around, but come on, fellas, I tell them, we’re not trying to hurt anybody,” said Nure, who, in his billowy shirt and knickers bore a strong resemblance to Prince. “White pirates, I tell them, have this panache, and we have to go for that same gusto.”

For now, though, Americans will have to get their pirate thrills from the movies.

“Give us our Long John Silvers and Bluebeards and Captain Jack Sparrows any day of the week, and tell those slackers in Somalia to lay off,” said moviegoer Arland Texiera. “I mean, the way they’re going, pretty soon people might think that Hollywood’s depiction of white pirate as wayward scamps merely out for a lark is actually wrong.”

Note: This article is satire, brought to you by the creative minds at The Peoples News.

© 2009 The Peoples News

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