Mr. Sleazeball

Have you ever met Mr. Sleazeball? Well, I have. Now, before we start, there are many sorts of Mr. Sleazeballs in existence. I want to talk here about the sort of Mr. Sleazeball you can often find on any creative field of life (show business, if you want). This branch of Mr. Sleazeballs usually works as a sort of impresario: a manager, promotor, agent; generally Mr. Wheeling-and-Dealing whose business is to "connect people".

He may not actually be a greasy, fat, cigar-chomping middle-aged man, but that's usually the mental image he creates of himself. Even though the first impression of him is that he is a charmer, a sort of person who can talk your pants off. He will pat your back, he will flatter you, he will tell you how much he admires your work. In other words, he will strike you as an extremely nice guy. But beware! The troubles are just beginning.

After you have been duly enchanted by Mr. Sleazeball's charms and been promised the world, the moon and the stars, now follows the part of you signing the contract. Either metaphorically or literally. (Of course there are cases where this persuasion has not been that friendly, as in "making you an offer you can't refuse", but this is not exactly our concern here, though with Mr. Sleazeball this is more than likely to happen later on.) You are now officially under Mr. Sleazeball's influence.

Little by little, you start to smell a rat. Gradually you will find out that Mr. Sleazeball turns out to be not a such nice guy after all. You will find out Mr. Sleazeball is just a bullshit machine with no substance to his words. There are various ways he can fuck you over or rip you off with. He will break all his promises to you. He will treat you like dirt. He will be hell to be around with. When he's drunk, his hellish side will be revealed in all its ugliness: he will try to pick fight with everyone and constantly harasses women (Mr. Sleazeball himself just thinks he's the natural centre of party and a bundle of joy and fun for everyone). When it's time to receive your payment for your work, Mr. Sleazeball will be nowhere to be seen.

In other words, Mr. Sleazeball will turn out to be just your regular every-day psychopath, a guy from hell; mad, bad and dangerous to know; someone best to be avoided. Unfortunately, there was no way for you to know this in the beginning; otherwise you would have just run like hell on your first encounter with Mr. Sleazeball. Now you are wiser by experience, also sadder; with a little less trust for people.