Bullied to Death

I'm sure everyone has seen on the news at this point, the suicide of that poor girl in South Hadley, MA. 9 teens have been charged with crimes relating to her death.

Phoebe was a pretty Irish girl who had started school this year as a freshman at South Hadley High. She had a fling with a senior football player, which apparently made some other girls jealous, because when it ended, the rentlentless bullying began. This girl had her books pushed out of her hands, cans chucked at her head, was continually called a slut, often times following her up and down hallways to do so, etc. etc. etc. A lot of this happened in front of teachers. Who apparently did a whole lot of nothing. Her mother called school administrators twice to complain about what was happening to her daughter, again, no result.

Proof positive that America has just become numb to how horrible high school students can be to one another. I remember high school, and I remember how mean kids can be to one another. And it is much easier in that environment to agree with other students that so-and-so is a slut, rather than stand up for her. Because standing up for someone may cause bullies to dump you and land you in the bullied group instead.

And maybe I have rose coloured hindsight, but in all four years of my high school, I don't think anyone was as awful to anyone as these kids were to Phoebe. Yeah we may have called people sluts, but it usually wasn't to their faces, and screaming it at a girl in front of a teacher would have ended someone with detention and some counselling sessions. And while there were fights, I don't recall a lot of one way, never ending assaults, and again, pushing someone's books out of their hands or throwing a can at them would have gotten you punished. Yet everyone seems to have looked the other way with these 9 nasty children.

I think social media has a lot to do with bullying getting worse. When I was in high school, there was no myspace, no facebook, no twitter. If you wanted to call someone a slut, you had to actually say it to someone. And it was sure as shit going to get back to that person that you had done so. Then came myspace, and the ability to belittle people without ever having to face them. They say at 42% of kids have been cyber bullied these days. All you had to do was create a fake page, with some easily grabbed fake pictures from the internet and start harassing whomever you felt like behind the shield of anonymity. It went so far that there was that crazy mother who helped her daughter trick another school girl into thinking that she had an internet boyfriend and then pretending that the boy suddenly hated her. This cause Megan Meier, also 14 at the time to hang herself in her closet as well.

It became so easy to bully someone online, that everyone became desensitized to it, and bullying in real life just gets worse and worse. And while some people say that these 9 teens did not cause Phoebe's death, it was a suicide, I say horseshit. Yeah, Phoebe has to take some of the blame, because she made a choice. But she was a 15 year old, in a new country at a fragile age, tormented by children so hateful and unfeeling that they continued to mock her on a facebook page set up in her memorial AFTER HER DEATH! They then proceeded to brag on their own facebook pages that they had "fooled" the cops when questioned. What are parents, and we as a culture, doing these days that kids have come to this?

While I don't think that these kids are guilty of manslaughter or anything similar. I do think that there need to be serious consequences to what they did and a serious amount of counselling as well, otherwise we could be looking at tomorrow's sociopaths.

Legalize it!

In an effort not to write about the health care legislation, which I feel has been overdone, and really, if I hear one more opinion about it, I may just scream, I choose another topic...

It looks like California may be voting on legalizing pot. And not just in the medical sense (excuse for a minute here while I stop my siblings from packing their bags and loading up the caravan).

Today, Los Angeles County elections officials must turn in their count of valid signatures collected on a statewide legalization initiative. The Los Angeles Times reports that the number is virtually certain to be enough to qualify the initiative for placement on the November ballot.

Now, I'm not a pot smoker, but I say go for it, California. I'm not a pot smoker, but I am for the legalization of marijuana (and across the board, not just medically). Because I think it has the capability to take a chunk out of our defecit, create new jobs and generally boost moral. Because honestly, who's happier than stoners who aren't worried about being caught? And I think it has the benefit of making sure that all the pot sold would JUST be pot, you wouldn't have to worry about your kid accidentally smoking some sort of laced pot and getting addicted to crack/rocks/speed/whathaveyou.

Now, I think there should be serious limits and regulations put upon it. I think you should have to be 21, same as beer. I don't think you should be permitted to drive high, go to work high, or do any of the things you should not be doing drunk, while high.

Plus, can you imagine the jobs that would be created while scientists discover what the legal limit of being high is? Previously, unproductive, pothead members of society could be employed to just smoke pot all day while scientists poke and prod at them like monkeys. (Because I honestly don't think you could get a monkey to smoke pot, and therefore, humans would have to be used.)

And, instead of paying cops to head out and destroy marijuana farms and pot gardens, (which can be a deadly form of employment if the pot farmers are heavily armed) we can pay those same police to just inspect whether or not pot farms have licenses, and if they don't impose a big old fee, which will also help us out of the national deficit.

And I don't think we have to worry about our kids starting on coke or speed, because suddenly pot is legal. If properly restricted to age groups, it will still be as "cool" as booze is to teenagers. And kids are smart these days, they just want to be in an altered state, they don't want to be dead.

And it's not just California (although they are definitely getting the most buzz) Nevada has measure for 2012 which would allow state licensed pot stores. And a campaign in Washington State hopes to put a legalization measure onto the fall ballot as well. And I say go for it. Let's use drugs to dig this country out of its deficit.

This week in stupid lawsuits!

Alright, apparently this week is the week to file the stupidest, most frivolous lawsuit you can thinkg of. . .

Let's start with LiLo, as I'm sure you all know, Lindsay Lohan is suing E-trade because of the Milk-a-holic Superbowl commercial. She and her idiotic lawyer apparently feel that the Lindsay baby obviously represented Lohan, and as such, she is due 100 million dollars. First of all Lindsay, I'm sorry that Labor Pains is all you've put out (well film wise at least) in the past few years, but really, you can't be this hard up for cash. I mean, I hear you've been on Project Runway. And I know you must be miffed that the Obama administration told you that you were not the positive role model they were looking for when they were campaigning, but this is not the way to stage a comeback.

First of all, you are not Madonna or Cher. Get the hell over yourself. When I hear Lindsay, I don't think about you. I think about people I know with the name, or the E-trade baby, matter of fact. When I hear Madonna, I think of Madonna. Hell, even Angelina's got a better claim than you.

Second,in your birth year Lindsay was the 39th most popular name. That's 39 out of about 1 million names people could have chosen for their kids... pretty damned popular. And apparently it's maintained it's popularity through to today, with many baby naming sites calling it "a very popular name for girls" and ranking it 302 out of 4276 today. And while Baby Name Wizard does note you as a famous Lindsay, it also calls you "tabloid fodder."

And third, what does it say about you, that the second you see a slutty, substance addicted character, you instantly jump to the conclusion that it's all about you? Do me a favor, go get your tubes tied, today.

And to the Lohan lawyer, even if you had a leg to stand on, it's call a parody. Did Tiger sue Saturday Night Live? Does Bill Clinton attempt to sue the NUMEROUS TV commercials and radio ads that impersonate the hell out of him, and poke fun at his extra marital affairs and loose ways with the truth? I hope Lindsay paid you up front, cash money, cause otherwise, you're as dumb as she is and you two deserve each other.

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My second favorite, remarkably stupid, favorite lawsuit of the week, was filed by Karen Salmansohn, a self-proclaimed, self-help guru. She, is apparently trying to sue her ex-fiancee because he pledged to leave his wife and have a baby with her.

Ms. Salmansohn, I have known from a young age, that men, will say anything, and I mean ANYTHING to have sex with you. Hell, they might even buy you fertility treatments. Why did no one tell you this growing up?

You told this man on your SECOND date, that you longed to have a child. Well there is mistake number one. You KNEW he was still married. Mistake number two. You fell for the line "I wish aliens would come down and remove my wife so I could marry you right away." Mistake number three. (And lady, I've fallen for some dumb lines, but that takes the cake!)

This man was playing your game, figuring you could not get pregnant, (I mean, you're 49 and it's a first child!) sure he dumped cash and presents and all sorts of stuff on you. He was nailing you. He was happy. Sure he promised you all sorts of things about a baby he never thought would appear. Empty promises are easy to make. When you got pregnant, his little dream world shattered. He remained with his wife, he stopped paying for your high ticket lifestyle. Go figure, it's happened to millions of women. Get back up off your ass, and go back to work.

You don't get to sue a guy because you were dumb enough to believe that he'd actually leave his wife and family. Sure he gave you an engagement ring, but last time I checked, bigamy's totally not cool in these United States, and ummm YOU KNEW ABOUT HIS WIFE AND KIDS! Sue him for child support if the kid is his. But as for you, you're dumb, and I would never hire you as my life coach. Maybe that's why you need this lawsuit, all of your customers have walked away huh?

I also hope your lawyer is charging you upfront! Cause there's another case I would not take on contingency.

And that is this week in remarkably stupid lawsuits. Anyone else hear about other stupid lawsuits?

Tiger Woods, Sorry for all the wrong reasons

I know I'm late to the game on this, but it took me awhile to collect my thoughts. Did you know, that the little stunt that Tiger Woods called an apology two weeks ago, drew more viewers than the Winter Olympics and the war in Afghanistan COMBINED? Granted, EVERY major news station and channel shut down what they were doing to play this man's forced, scripted, crap excuse for an apology. Now, I for one, don't really think he owes the public an apology, merely his wife and his sponsors, but if you're going to do it... do it right, don't do what Tiger did ...

I happened to be at the tire place when this garbage came on, and both me and the man I was sitting and chatting with in the waiting room thought it was going to be about Joe Stack, flying his plane into the IRS building in Texas. However, nope, it was Tiger. In the words of the crazy man I was talking to "REALLY? This shit trumps wars, plane crashes and Haiti?"

However, as we soon found out that it was on every station, we settled down to watch and ridicule it. What I find most disgusting is that Tiger does not appear contrite at all. Sure, he's sorry he got caught. He's sorry he's losing MILLIONS in endorsements and publicity. But is he sorry he cheated on his wife and made the paprazzi even more eager to chase his children around? No. He's sorry he got caught. If he could go back, do I think he would change what he did? No, I think he would find a better way to hide it, so that he wouldn't get caught. I don't think he would alter his ways one stinking bit.

What I believe truly drums this point home, is that he didn't even WRITE that apology. It was clear from his amateur reading of it, that someone else penned it. Including stage directions. (Now pause, Tiger, look at the camera, attempt to well up some tears)

Also proving he's not sorry, was his refusal to take questions. Tiger, in an extremely childish move, chose the press, and informed them that there would be a statement, no questions. C'mon Tiger, even children get questioned by their parents when they sneak candy before dinner.

It was a bad call, all around. I mean, two months after being caught? You should have either apologized the next day (black eye, golf club wounds and all) or not apologized at all. With all the bimbos out there telling us you're every move, if you hadn't said anything, half of the nonsense would have been chalked up to rumor. If you had apologized the next day and THEN hid out, you could have gone the way of Elliot Spitzer, who sure, had to resign; but is now appearing on Colbert, and in other public venues, managed to keep his law license, and is raking in the cash again. And Spitzer broke the LAW, Tiger, he's guilty of soliciting, paying for sex, and breaking the Mann Act (which while ridiculous, is funny) ... you, you just cheated on your wife. Bill Clinton lied to the public, committed perjury. You, again, just cheated on your wife. I know you have more money than both of these men, how is your choice in PR guys so poor? Both these men took questions, lived their public shame, and came back up. They're both on top of the world right now, and their wives stayed with them. (And stayed docile during their apologies.)

I didn't think you owed the world an apology to begin with, but since you chose to make one, you should have done it right. Take the questions, live the shame and get over it. Don't hide behind a scripted apology. Because all it really said to the public was "please buy things with my name on it again one day"

Also funny was that Playboy model Loredana Jolie Ferriolo was upset that Tiger did not apologize to his mistresses. Really Loredana? You KNEW he was married, you KNEW he had kids, you KNEW who he was. You KNEW you were supposed to shut up about it and not talk to anyone about it from the get go. If anyone owes anyone an apology, you owe his wife one. And I agree with Elmer Smith about you... go "file a classless-action suit on behalf of all Tiger's spurned sluts" ... see if you can't grab some of the cash he's so worried about losing.