What first drew/turned you on to pirates?

     Being raised on a ship, pirates were a reoccurring theme in decor.  My personal interest made all the more substantial by both my mother and uncle's obsession with piracy.  The game "Monkey Island 2, Lechuck's Revenge" showed me my, to date, favorite pirate universe.  A splendid blend of true to form history, romanticized piracy, and modern cameos to add age/time applicable humor into a canvas where it will look out of place (the source of most of life's comedy.)
     The pirates had a resolute fear of God, while maintaining the most sinful of existences.  This is not to be admired, but it is to be noted.  I feel this way often, as I imagine others do as well.  Herein, for me, lies a great truth about God.  We all gotta do what we all gotta do, and with God on our side, what need have we for fear? We all want to be fearless.  We all want to be without judgment.  We all want to be free, (which if you've never been at sea, there is no freedom like that on the water) and in that freedom, we have choices to make.  No matter who you are, or where you are you can find life is us vs them.  
     When at sea, the "us" is the crew.  You'll work together or die together. Every man both serving his own need and the need of every other man on board, because here each man sees that it's the same thing: serving the crew is serving the self is serving the crew.  We're all in this together.
     "Them" is anyone.  Anyone that's not "us".  It's likely true that if all of "Them" would share their wealth, "we"'d not have to fight for it.  If "we" don't take back from "Them" what "They" have stolen, "They" will have already won.  I never liked the feeling of surrender, myself. 
     It's no respectable position, to be sure, but it is a common one.  Strangers transmogrified into brothers (thick as thieves) by common nemesi. In the pirates we see ourselves as we want to be: fearless against opposition, brave enough to find fortune rather than hiding safe in poverty at home, while selfish like society/wisdom/life will lo longer tolerate.  We make heroes of pirates because we want to be selfish.  We don't always want to be a hero.  We wish there was someone to fight for what we want- Everything, right here, right now!
     In the real world, there are consequences for such behavior, and we're smart enough (evolved enough, wise enough, whatever) to act selflessly, or at least we see the benefit in it.  But the part of us that resents justice every time we can't kill the "son-uva-bitch that has it comin'", sees a hero in the man willing to kill for what he believes in.  Johnny Cash sang of these men, and to these men.  They are anti-heroes.  Heroes to the part of the soul we wish we didn't have, but do. When mankind forgets how to enslave mankind, the free men of tomorrow will be confused why we ever respected pirates. 

Till then, it seemed a genius way to inspire the wit and imagination in anyone. Once I read up on history's pirates, (Roch Brazilliano and Bartolomew Portugues being 2 favorites) and saw that the true pirate tales were grander than anything Hollywood could cook up, I gleaned inspiration for life and song.  I was a street
pirate for years before the band, wearing slouched boots with modern jeans, with billowy white shirts and scarves.  Being a pirate assisted in the worlds perception of me.     As a pirate, my flaws are considered charming.  (Drunkeness, classless humor, horny tit-glaring, unkempt features, sleepiness, clumsiness, of quick temper, fearless and/or foolish) It seemed rather natural, and being that a pirates life is full of only the grandest adventure, a cure for the most dreary monotony. Piracy glorifies dreary, foodless, restless days.  Piracy is like the Blues. Singin' em doesn't make any of the worries get any better, it changes the way you look at your worries.  We can all feel good singin' about the worst times, because suffering together sometimes feels better than thriving alone.  

When my prior band broke up, I had to fill that need for wild exhilaration, fearless movement, and delightful musical stage antics elsewhere, and piracy seemed the best canvas to paint that picture. 
     In truth I am a gentle, loving, giving, and forgiving person.  I am obsessed/ intrinsically tied  with the divine and supernatural.  Piracy is fun because there I pretend to be mean.  I'd say it's quite natural- Diggity just always does what I would not, say what I would not, and be brave where I would not.  The contradictions between the "real me" and the "stage me" are not contradictions at all, but rather like most of life- One is the shadow of the other, outlining the same idea.


-Spoo