@Kristinkles Ingabogovinanana: Ambien is weird. I took it for a while because of a strange medical problem which is thankfully gone, and it was definitely a drug that led to odd behavior and blackouts. It's not like other sleeping meds.
@mariamariamaria: I know, right? I always check under my breasts whenever I feel like there's something I'm forgetting.
@Khrushchev: Oh god. Come on. I know that you're playing and all that, but why get on someone for just noting that, despite how far we've come, there are still serious problems? One problem, for instance, is that when someone has a sincere thing to say that isn't cutting or sarcastic enough, she gets shit on by someone who feels that they're a "better" feminist that she is.
@taranwanderer: Blech, it's this whole trend of being "empowered" by being overtly sexual. I wish I could trace that phenomenon back to its disgusting but effective inception and crush it where it started.
@doit2julia: You've really gotten to the heart of the problem here - the real issues aren't new at all, but now there's a digital trail that forces people to pay more attention to the bullying. When I see the statistics, that kids that experience digital abuse are 3 times as likely to have suicidal thoughts, I know that those kids are experiencing non-digital abuse by their friends as well, abuses that have gone unnoticed for time immemorial. It's terrible, and it's not hinged on texting or naked pictures, no matter how much people want to believe that it's a 'new' problem.
@yourfriendandneighbor: Oh come now. Let's not just decide that most men act like jackasses, please; or at least, let's decide the same thing about women, because I'm female and I've seen similar patterns to what token_illiterate seems to have seen: more female friends cheating than male. I'm comfortable saying that most people have the capacity to act like assholes at least once their in lives; I'm not comfortable being sexist about it.
@A Small Turnip: After this long thread, I have a very banal thing to say re: the first quote from RPattz that you put up here:
"creamed"? Are we saying that again? I hope it was just a glib throwaway. I'm not sure my vocabulary can accommodate that anymore.
@clevernamehere: Agreed. And in my life, I've known many more women who cheated than men.
@snugbug: I think you're right about Berlin being a center of awareness on this issue - I too lived there, and the western cities that I visited were less political in many ways, and especially on this point. Berlin is really hyper-aware of the fact that in order to rebuild their city, they have to be conscious of the very recent past. I love it. Berliners are incredibly responsible with their future, in a way that I've not seen in any other city. #berlin
@ivorytusk: I agree. I was sure someone was going to mention that. Even the braiding was totally Uli. #projectrunwayseason6
@Eric Northman is mine: Ugh, I hadn't heard about that; I've only been following this story out of the side of my eye, and I can't watch even a second of Wife Swap without getting really agitated. The more I hear about this guy, the more I think CPS needs to step in and put the kids in a different situation. I know they've got a lot on their hands, but he's really crossed the line. #richardheene
Looks like an old flop of mine. The rent was super cheap, though. #willidorner
I've always wondered - why can't it be "float like a bee, sting like a bee"? Or, more succinctly, "act like a bee"? Bees float quite well. They're like the helicopters of the insect world. #barbiestore
Don't stare, guys. He's really insecure about it. #friezeartfair
@Little Green Frog (Wise Latina): My thoughts exactly. This guy is working with a lot of insane preconceptions... heh, get it, "pre - conceptions"? Sorry, I'm having an off-night. #interracialmarriageinlouisiana
I completely agree that something more substantial than a drive-by is called for, especially being that it's his first visit to the city as president. When he came into office, he inherited a lot of mess and breakage, so maybe this is just one area that's not high-profile enough to merit his attention yet? I call BS on that. NOLA folks have been consistently dismissed for 4 years, and it's shameful. #barackobama
The way that these new campaigns are blatantly appealing to insecurities and suggesting that we're not loved if we're not small is so hateful and insidious. I suppose any day now we'll return to foot-binding....which will, incidentally, make it much more difficult to the get to the top of the Eiffel Tower.
@KATE!: Completely, that too. When I was living in England, I had a friend who called the police numerous times regarding a stalker, and they treated her the same way: told her she was overreacting and that maybe she was just misreading the signs. It was utterly reprehensible, and I know that she was in no way overreacting. She really hated calling the police and being called "dearie" while they went about their condescending way...
In one case police reported back that Pilkington had been "overreacting" — in another case she was simply told to draw her curtains.
This statement, too, should raise some serious questions about the police reaction to her calls. If they saw her as overreacting or unstable at all, then they should have responded for the children's sake, especially given the fact that she called multiple times. If the police believed that the mother was unstable, then, in effect, they were ignoring the fact that the children were being bullied AND the fact that the children were living with (according to the police) an overreactive and unstable parent. This is a failure on so many levels.
@Gumbina80: On the other side of the issue, a friend of mine was doing graffiti alongside a train track on a much-grattified stretch and was shot in the stomach by an anti-graffiti vigilante. The friend who was shot is neither a gang member nor a violent person, while the vigilante was a crazy man. The moral of this story is that spray paint or not, people can be insane. My anecdote in response to your anecdote is meant to show that we could tell anecdotes until the end of time and they are not going to change the fact that some graffiti is art and some graffiti is just vandalism, or the fact that there are lots of crazy, violent people, some of whom do street art and most of whom do not.
