Just a few days before our country was rudely disrupted by terrorists, I was at home watching the MTV Video Music Awards like I do every year. I watch them because I claim to be an entertainment writer, but really I have a crush on Christina.

Not to mention the VMAs make for good drinking games, but that’s beside the point.

As I was watching Fred Durst receive an award for best rock video, I got kind of sad.

Poor Fred has had a rough year between Eminem deciding he doesn’t like him and fans calling him soft and his music pop. Then Fred responded on Limp Bizkit’s web site by asking why everyone is drinking “hatorade.”

Good one, Fred.

In response, Limp Bizkit released “Boiler,” the darkest, heaviest song on “Chocolate Starfish and the Hot dog Flavored Water” paired with a video as equally out of the box. This was obviously Fred’s attempt to try and reclaim his hard rock image. And it probably didn’t work.

I’ve been following Fred since before Limp released “Faith,” its first hit, back when its label got in trouble for paying radio stations to play its music – back when Limp Bizkit rocked.

I saw Limp get booed off the stage in Des Moines when they opened for the Deftones.

I’m not going to lie. I love all three of Limp’s albums. But I, like most people, got sick of Fred and his whiny voice pretty damn fast.

As someone who follows entertainment as a religion, it is annoying how much Fred is in the media for pointless reasons. And his friendship with Carson Daly is sick.

But it all depends how you look at it. It’s pretty much a given that a musician’s fame is shorter lived than it used to be. So why not cash in when you can? And isn’t the frontman of a band often the one who wants the most attention? Why not get it when you can?

I have two theories on Fred. The first is that he’s a moron, and will forever be annoying and hang out with all the boy bands in the world and have fame and money but no respect.

Along with this theory comes an interesting comparison between him and Vanilla Ice. For instance, neither are good rappers or lyric writers, but they think they’re the shit. Oops, I mean cool.

They both had a hit to get them noticed. “Play That Funky Music” for Vanilla and “Faith” for Fred, and then a breakthrough hit which put them on top of the world. “Ice Ice Baby” for Vanilla and “Nookie” for Fred.

After their success they both released crap. Vanilla with his movie, “Cool as Ice,” and Fred with “Rollin'” or “My Generation” or “Boiler.”

They are both hated by Eminem. They both still think they are super cool. And they have gone through image changes – Vanilla with the drugs, and Fred with the rock to pop back to rock.

The comparisons are endless, which is just sad.

My second theory is that Fred is playing the music industry cleverly. He is doing something that fellow rockers Korn did and what his prot‚g‚ Staind is doing.

Start out by being hard rock, go pop just to get popular, then go back to being rock. When I say pop, I am referring to “more popular” or “mainstream.”

For instance, Staind came out with “Mudshovel.” Then the band members went on to release “Outside” and “It’s Been Awhile” to gain mainstream success and now they say they will come back with more rocking music.

Korn’s follow-up album to the mainstream breakthrough “Follow the Leader” didn’t produce any hits, but rocked hard and still sold millions because of the mainstream success it already achieved.

Now if Fred and company want to get back the respect they once had as rockers, it’s going to take more work than Korn had to put in or what Staind will have to do.

But it can happen. Just as long as everyone forgets about Fred’s duet with Christina.

As this has been a time of putting things into perspective, here is my shot at it: Fred gets more ladies and has more money than almost any guy on this campus will ever see, with or without respect from the music industry. So who really cares?

God bless America.

Kyle Moss is a senior in journalism and mass communication from Urbandale. He owns a fitted red hat but swears he never wears it.