This evening the staff and I are gathered around the fire (fed by the drafts of my rejected novels), enjoying good food and holiday spirits. We'll be taking a short break from our thankless quest for a few days to enjoy the season.
Happy Holidays, Merry Christmas, Happy Hanukkah, and etc. !
Monday, December 24, 2007
Thursday, December 20, 2007
It Takes a Decent Parent, Not a Village...
Season's greetings, all.
I've returned, once again, to cover a topic for politchief DeSalvo, who is too busy playing Halo 3 to cover his own column. I have elected to write his piece, and my editor has assured me that this entitles me to his share of the last bag of free coffee.
Today I'm going to address this story, aired by CNN earlier this morning. To summarize for those of you who opted not to follow my helpful link: two teenagers (sixteen and seventeen) have been arrested for the death of the sixteen-year-old's half-sister (nine). How did these two manage to kill a nine-year-old? They beat the child to death, allegedly by imitating moves from Mortal Kombat. I can already hear Tipper Gore gathering steam for another Senate testimonial in what is sure to be a tirade against video games and violence in entertainment in general.
Meanwhile, the Anti-Objectionable-Literature squad is taking a break from burning copies of Philip Pullman's His Dark Materials trilogy to consider making an offer of alliance.
Every time some horrible tragedy like this happens, somebody inevitably blames violent entertainment, specifically violent video games. This time it happened to be the alleged perpetrators, apparently. More commonly it is some investigator who discovers that a teenager who pulls out an uzi at a piano recital and brutally murders seventeen people after he misses a note in Fur Elise also happened to play Grand Theft Auto. Suddenly the public cries out as one that these video games are teaching our kids that it's okay to be violent.
People, a game does not make a child violent, no matter what its content might be. A kid doesn't commit murder because he saw it in a game or in a movie or heard it in a song, a kid commits murder for the same reason that an adult commits murder: he's lost his blessed mind, whether momentarily or from a pre-existing decline in sanity.
This is not to excuse such behavior by any means. It is an unfortunate and terrible tragedy that this young girl's life has been cut short at only nine-years-old, and the two teens are all the more deplorable for it. But they didn't do this because the game made them. They did it because they were flipping nuts.
That might have been a little glib for many of you. Allow me to clarify. Any sane child of seventeen, or even sixteen, should have the mental faculties to differentiate fantasy from reality (in this case, fantasy violence from real-world violence) and should know that if you repeatedly punch and kick and slam someone around that it will cause serious harm to that person. Simply put, they're old enough to know better. That fact makes them all the more deplorable, and I would wholly support a life sentence for both of them without chance of parole.
So who is blame? Who should be help responsible if a child fails to develop the sense to know the difference between fantasy and reality? Where is a child even supposed to gain such arcane knowledge?
Who brought the child into the world?
That's right, the parents. The children must pay for their actions, but if you truly want to place blame for a tragedy like this, place it upon the parents. A parent's number one responsibility is to ensure that a child learns responsibility, decency, morality, and (in this case) the sense to not pummel a nine-year-old for entertainment's sake. That's why we don't turn these hellions loose as soon as they learn to feed themselves like some other creatures do. Parents are the only ones responsible for teaching the child to tell right from wrong. The schools cannot, and should not, do it. Nor should the government or society in general. If we were to retrofit our entire society to make up for the child-rearing shortfalls of a few parents, the entire civilization would immediately collapse.
There are unpleasantries in the world. If a parent doesn't want their kid exposed to it that parent should monitor what the kid is doing. A revolutionary concept, I know, but it just might work. Decrying everything that is unpleasant in the world is not the solution to the problem. "Violent entertainment" serves an important purpose in our culture--it allows us to sublimate negative energies responsibly (instead of taking out our frustratiosn on our fellow man), and can also be used to create a cultural dialogue.
I won't belabor the point much longer. Let's not make a scapegoat of our culture. Certainly there are many things it can be blamed for, but inciting murder is not one of them. Ban violent entertainment? No. Ban bad parenting, instead.
Cheers!
Lockhart
I've returned, once again, to cover a topic for politchief DeSalvo, who is too busy playing Halo 3 to cover his own column. I have elected to write his piece, and my editor has assured me that this entitles me to his share of the last bag of free coffee.
Today I'm going to address this story, aired by CNN earlier this morning. To summarize for those of you who opted not to follow my helpful link: two teenagers (sixteen and seventeen) have been arrested for the death of the sixteen-year-old's half-sister (nine). How did these two manage to kill a nine-year-old? They beat the child to death, allegedly by imitating moves from Mortal Kombat. I can already hear Tipper Gore gathering steam for another Senate testimonial in what is sure to be a tirade against video games and violence in entertainment in general.
Meanwhile, the Anti-Objectionable-Literature squad is taking a break from burning copies of Philip Pullman's His Dark Materials trilogy to consider making an offer of alliance.
Every time some horrible tragedy like this happens, somebody inevitably blames violent entertainment, specifically violent video games. This time it happened to be the alleged perpetrators, apparently. More commonly it is some investigator who discovers that a teenager who pulls out an uzi at a piano recital and brutally murders seventeen people after he misses a note in Fur Elise also happened to play Grand Theft Auto. Suddenly the public cries out as one that these video games are teaching our kids that it's okay to be violent.
People, a game does not make a child violent, no matter what its content might be. A kid doesn't commit murder because he saw it in a game or in a movie or heard it in a song, a kid commits murder for the same reason that an adult commits murder: he's lost his blessed mind, whether momentarily or from a pre-existing decline in sanity.
This is not to excuse such behavior by any means. It is an unfortunate and terrible tragedy that this young girl's life has been cut short at only nine-years-old, and the two teens are all the more deplorable for it. But they didn't do this because the game made them. They did it because they were flipping nuts.
That might have been a little glib for many of you. Allow me to clarify. Any sane child of seventeen, or even sixteen, should have the mental faculties to differentiate fantasy from reality (in this case, fantasy violence from real-world violence) and should know that if you repeatedly punch and kick and slam someone around that it will cause serious harm to that person. Simply put, they're old enough to know better. That fact makes them all the more deplorable, and I would wholly support a life sentence for both of them without chance of parole.
So who is blame? Who should be help responsible if a child fails to develop the sense to know the difference between fantasy and reality? Where is a child even supposed to gain such arcane knowledge?
Who brought the child into the world?
That's right, the parents. The children must pay for their actions, but if you truly want to place blame for a tragedy like this, place it upon the parents. A parent's number one responsibility is to ensure that a child learns responsibility, decency, morality, and (in this case) the sense to not pummel a nine-year-old for entertainment's sake. That's why we don't turn these hellions loose as soon as they learn to feed themselves like some other creatures do. Parents are the only ones responsible for teaching the child to tell right from wrong. The schools cannot, and should not, do it. Nor should the government or society in general. If we were to retrofit our entire society to make up for the child-rearing shortfalls of a few parents, the entire civilization would immediately collapse.
There are unpleasantries in the world. If a parent doesn't want their kid exposed to it that parent should monitor what the kid is doing. A revolutionary concept, I know, but it just might work. Decrying everything that is unpleasant in the world is not the solution to the problem. "Violent entertainment" serves an important purpose in our culture--it allows us to sublimate negative energies responsibly (instead of taking out our frustratiosn on our fellow man), and can also be used to create a cultural dialogue.
I won't belabor the point much longer. Let's not make a scapegoat of our culture. Certainly there are many things it can be blamed for, but inciting murder is not one of them. Ban violent entertainment? No. Ban bad parenting, instead.
Cheers!
Lockhart
Monday, December 17, 2007
'Tis the Season, After All...
My editor is forcing me to write about something topical today. Normally I would resist, because this is a Monday, and nobody wants to read anything topical on a Monday. However, my car's odometer hit 77,777 miles this morning on my way to the office. I considered this a sign of good fortune, so I was comply The Man's request.
My editor is also forcing me to note that he is not "The Man," but merely the pawn to an even greater "Man."
I was going to comply, that is, until our morning staff meeting, wherein I was informed that, due to budget constraints, I would no longer receive compensation for my articles (meaning that the suits are taking away the free coffee). Ergo, I'm going to write about something entirely off-subject from what my brow-beaten and defeated editor intended.
What is it about Christmas that always brings out the worst in people?
Ostensibly, this is a holiday to celebrate, if nothing else, friends, family, and togetherness. It's a time of reflection, if you will, moreso even than Thanksgiving, about everything that's happened through the year, and a time to show the people we care about just how much we care about them (i.e. how much are we willing to spend). Of course many people attach all manner of religious significance to the season, which well and good and admirable, but analyzing or contrasting one religion's view against another's is not the point of this piece.
No, I'm wondering what it is about "the holidays" (if you will) that causes fist fights in a toy store? That makes bad drivers turn into angry drivers? That causes store clerks to judge customers by their attire? That causes us so much stress?
Perhaps it's that this holiday has grown larger than its month. We know that this is so because retail stores now start stocking and displaying their holiday fare in late October, when the ghosts, goblins, and naughty nurses are still lurking in the streets and barrooms of our fair cities. We also know this because how many of us can honestly say we spend two nights in a row in our homes doing nothing? There are presents to buy and wrap, Christmas parties to attend, decorations to hang, relatives to visit, parades and pageants to see--an ever-expanding, dizzying array of glitz and dazzle that becomes more and more like a gauntlet to be run.
Perhaps for some it is the sheer financial burden of Christmas. (I would include Hanukkah in this point, but from all appearances Christmas is tremendously more expensive than its Jewish counterpart). With all of the gifts (whose prices seem to increase pari passu with the cut-backs in my paycheck) and decorations and parties to be thrown and clothes to be bought and tips to be left, Christmas is a tremendous financial strain on the average celebrant. This is certainly true for this writer (who is not even paid with coffee any more). Christmas often reminds us where we are on the economic Great Chain of Being. Just yesterday this writer watched at a retail perfume counter as customers with less expensive-looking attire were passed over for wealthier-looking customers, as if to say, "You don't look like you can afford this, so talking to you will be a waste of time." Happy Holidays, Mr. Working Class. Your money's no good here.
Thus I ask you, gentle reader, what it is about the season of peace that escalates one's blood pressure to nadolol range? Should not this be a time for us to slow down the hectic pace of these modern lives we lead so well in order to appreciate (at the risk of sounding like an LDS commercial) the often-ignored joys of family, friends, and joyous fellowship? Should not this celebration go beyond economic and geographic barriers to be a celebration of humankind in commune, regardless of differences in religion, race, ethnicity, politics, ad. infinitum? Have we turned a delightful holiday tradition into a terrifying corporate juggernaut?
Just a few questions to ponder as you sit in traffic at the mall, slamming your fists into your steering wheel and spreading Christmas cheer with your horn and middle finger...all to get those last few gifts.
Cheers and Happy Holidays,
Lockhart.
My editor is also forcing me to note that he is not "The Man," but merely the pawn to an even greater "Man."
I was going to comply, that is, until our morning staff meeting, wherein I was informed that, due to budget constraints, I would no longer receive compensation for my articles (meaning that the suits are taking away the free coffee). Ergo, I'm going to write about something entirely off-subject from what my brow-beaten and defeated editor intended.
What is it about Christmas that always brings out the worst in people?
Ostensibly, this is a holiday to celebrate, if nothing else, friends, family, and togetherness. It's a time of reflection, if you will, moreso even than Thanksgiving, about everything that's happened through the year, and a time to show the people we care about just how much we care about them (i.e. how much are we willing to spend). Of course many people attach all manner of religious significance to the season, which well and good and admirable, but analyzing or contrasting one religion's view against another's is not the point of this piece.
No, I'm wondering what it is about "the holidays" (if you will) that causes fist fights in a toy store? That makes bad drivers turn into angry drivers? That causes store clerks to judge customers by their attire? That causes us so much stress?
Perhaps it's that this holiday has grown larger than its month. We know that this is so because retail stores now start stocking and displaying their holiday fare in late October, when the ghosts, goblins, and naughty nurses are still lurking in the streets and barrooms of our fair cities. We also know this because how many of us can honestly say we spend two nights in a row in our homes doing nothing? There are presents to buy and wrap, Christmas parties to attend, decorations to hang, relatives to visit, parades and pageants to see--an ever-expanding, dizzying array of glitz and dazzle that becomes more and more like a gauntlet to be run.
Perhaps for some it is the sheer financial burden of Christmas. (I would include Hanukkah in this point, but from all appearances Christmas is tremendously more expensive than its Jewish counterpart). With all of the gifts (whose prices seem to increase pari passu with the cut-backs in my paycheck) and decorations and parties to be thrown and clothes to be bought and tips to be left, Christmas is a tremendous financial strain on the average celebrant. This is certainly true for this writer (who is not even paid with coffee any more). Christmas often reminds us where we are on the economic Great Chain of Being. Just yesterday this writer watched at a retail perfume counter as customers with less expensive-looking attire were passed over for wealthier-looking customers, as if to say, "You don't look like you can afford this, so talking to you will be a waste of time." Happy Holidays, Mr. Working Class. Your money's no good here.
Thus I ask you, gentle reader, what it is about the season of peace that escalates one's blood pressure to nadolol range? Should not this be a time for us to slow down the hectic pace of these modern lives we lead so well in order to appreciate (at the risk of sounding like an LDS commercial) the often-ignored joys of family, friends, and joyous fellowship? Should not this celebration go beyond economic and geographic barriers to be a celebration of humankind in commune, regardless of differences in religion, race, ethnicity, politics, ad. infinitum? Have we turned a delightful holiday tradition into a terrifying corporate juggernaut?
Just a few questions to ponder as you sit in traffic at the mall, slamming your fists into your steering wheel and spreading Christmas cheer with your horn and middle finger...all to get those last few gifts.
Cheers and Happy Holidays,
Lockhart.
Friday, December 14, 2007
It's the Queen's English, Man!
Much to the chagrin of our entertainment and geek culture columnist, I am going to opine about a subject that involves both of our respective areas of expertise.
Merriam-Webster, those purveyors and recorders of our beloved English language, recently announced their "Word of the Year for 2007." And what might that word be?
w00t.
Yes, readers, you read that correctly (assuming that, by reading this, you can read). Our E & GC columnist is telling me that I should define this term for those of you not steeped in video game culture. "w00t" is an exclamation of joy, victory, delight, or success. Such is usually proclaimed after one team has thoroughly massacred another team with all manner of barbaric, destructive, and wildly fanciful weaponry. It is the gamer slang parallel of "yay."
The E & GC columnist also desires me to inform you that "w00t" is only properly spelled with double zeros, not the letter "o."
Now...I'm not sure who it is that gets to work for the Merriam-Webster Dictionary these days. I'm not sure where these people might come from, nor could I even hazard a guess as to their educational backgrounds. However, I do know how much pot one would have to smoke to choose "w00t" as the word of the year: A lot.
For such a person would have to be higher than a freshman on Spring Break to overlook the cornucopian wealth of real words in the English language to arrive at "w00t," or any other bit of gamer slang.
To be fair, this is not to malign the gaming community, nor its self-accepted modes of communication. It should also be noted that the contest was submission-driven; individuals were allowed to write in their choices for "Word of the Year," and the one with the most votes wins, just like a politician. Once again, democracy disappoints in its insipidity.
That "w00t" won by what was essentially a popular write-in vote is perhaps the saddest part of this debacle, and is indicative, in the estimation of this contributor, to be both an indictment of our educational system and telling evidence of the decline of Western culture. Not because it is slang. Not because it is pointless slang (as yay, is one letter shorter and quicker to type). No, the crux of the problem with choosing "w00t" as "Word of the Year" is this:
It has zeros in it. Two of them.
"w00t" is not a word. It's a mathematical expression. I never learned much from Algebra, because my teachers always wanted to tell me about at 8:00 in the morning, and there was no way I was going to learn anything that early, no matter how much coffee I'd had. But one thing I do remember is this: words are composed of letters, calculations are composed of numbers. And anything that combines the two needs to be solved for x, taking care to show one's work for full credit.
- Cheers,
Lockhart.
Merriam-Webster, those purveyors and recorders of our beloved English language, recently announced their "Word of the Year for 2007." And what might that word be?
w00t.
Yes, readers, you read that correctly (assuming that, by reading this, you can read). Our E & GC columnist is telling me that I should define this term for those of you not steeped in video game culture. "w00t" is an exclamation of joy, victory, delight, or success. Such is usually proclaimed after one team has thoroughly massacred another team with all manner of barbaric, destructive, and wildly fanciful weaponry. It is the gamer slang parallel of "yay."
The E & GC columnist also desires me to inform you that "w00t" is only properly spelled with double zeros, not the letter "o."
Now...I'm not sure who it is that gets to work for the Merriam-Webster Dictionary these days. I'm not sure where these people might come from, nor could I even hazard a guess as to their educational backgrounds. However, I do know how much pot one would have to smoke to choose "w00t" as the word of the year: A lot.
For such a person would have to be higher than a freshman on Spring Break to overlook the cornucopian wealth of real words in the English language to arrive at "w00t," or any other bit of gamer slang.
To be fair, this is not to malign the gaming community, nor its self-accepted modes of communication. It should also be noted that the contest was submission-driven; individuals were allowed to write in their choices for "Word of the Year," and the one with the most votes wins, just like a politician. Once again, democracy disappoints in its insipidity.
That "w00t" won by what was essentially a popular write-in vote is perhaps the saddest part of this debacle, and is indicative, in the estimation of this contributor, to be both an indictment of our educational system and telling evidence of the decline of Western culture. Not because it is slang. Not because it is pointless slang (as yay, is one letter shorter and quicker to type). No, the crux of the problem with choosing "w00t" as "Word of the Year" is this:
It has zeros in it. Two of them.
"w00t" is not a word. It's a mathematical expression. I never learned much from Algebra, because my teachers always wanted to tell me about at 8:00 in the morning, and there was no way I was going to learn anything that early, no matter how much coffee I'd had. But one thing I do remember is this: words are composed of letters, calculations are composed of numbers. And anything that combines the two needs to be solved for x, taking care to show one's work for full credit.
- Cheers,
Lockhart.
Thursday, December 13, 2007
A Clarification
An unfortunate side effect to blogging off the cuff (and at midnight) is that one often finds that, after a day in existence, one's work is somewhat incomplete. Ergo, in the spirit of gracious correction, I would make a clarification to last night's posting, "The Enabler."
While I have accused "Face/Space" of being an enabler for stupidity, it was, by no means, intended to malign all users of either service. A careful reader will note that I have only mentioned three groups of attention-seeking users, these being the "online secret agents," the "irresponsible photography," folks, and the "kings and queens of drama." That said, it should have been made clear that there are millions of users who simply use the service to stay in touch with far-flung friends and relations. I am, myself, a member of these sites so at worst I am poking fun at myself as well. I would like to think, though, that I am one of the "normal" users who simply use the service to stay in touch. As my co-writer and editor inform me that I am correct in this belief, I shall take it as fact.
Thus, to clarify, we wish to hold blameless all of the users of both Facebook and MySpace (and any other similar service, for that matter) who resist the temptation to spy on their friends and enemies, who do not upload embarassing photos of themselves in a bid to enter the social spotlight, and who refrain from causing scandalous and dramatic problems for everyone around them. Not only this, but we wish to praise such users and models of online etiquette.
Kudo's, Normal Users.
Cheers!
The Writing and Research Department
While I have accused "Face/Space" of being an enabler for stupidity, it was, by no means, intended to malign all users of either service. A careful reader will note that I have only mentioned three groups of attention-seeking users, these being the "online secret agents," the "irresponsible photography," folks, and the "kings and queens of drama." That said, it should have been made clear that there are millions of users who simply use the service to stay in touch with far-flung friends and relations. I am, myself, a member of these sites so at worst I am poking fun at myself as well. I would like to think, though, that I am one of the "normal" users who simply use the service to stay in touch. As my co-writer and editor inform me that I am correct in this belief, I shall take it as fact.
Thus, to clarify, we wish to hold blameless all of the users of both Facebook and MySpace (and any other similar service, for that matter) who resist the temptation to spy on their friends and enemies, who do not upload embarassing photos of themselves in a bid to enter the social spotlight, and who refrain from causing scandalous and dramatic problems for everyone around them. Not only this, but we wish to praise such users and models of online etiquette.
Kudo's, Normal Users.
Cheers!
The Writing and Research Department
Wednesday, December 12, 2007
The Enabler
For our first topic, I would like to talk about something which I find curiously fascinating. I shall introduce this by posing to you a riddle:
What serves as a porthole into your life, allows you to spy on your enemies and friends alike, can endanger your job, and turns adults into fourteen year old girls in under thirteen seconds?
The answer is, of course, MySpace.
Yes, you, MySpace. And Facebook, you're not blameless here, either! You two and others like you who masquerade under the title of "Social Networking," are more accurate called "Enablers," because you are enablers...for stupidity.
Consider: millions of people maintain accounts on MySpace and Facebook (many of these users have accounts on both) in order to stay in touch with friends, to meet new people, to post embarassing or over-the-top photos of themselves, or to whine about their individual melodramas to an anonymous audience. Many of these users are teenagers, who may be excused for their dramatic episodes and fits of caprice because they are teenagers. Many more of these users though, are adults, who should know better.
At the surface, the mere fact that both MySpace and Facebook serve, essentially, as dossiers on people makes it all too easy to spy and be spied upon. Our banks and credit card companies are quick to caution us on safeguarding our private financial information. But I am far more worried about my ex-girlfriends trying to find me on any of these sites. Compared to a jealous ex, identity theft doesn't seem quite so bad....
Being an adult is about many things, and one of these things (or so I'm told) is being "responsible." Responsible, of course, can mean many different things to many different people, but overall, I believe the general concensus would agree that people who present themselves sloppily, promiscuously, scandalously, or in some infantile fashion, are not being responsible. If you want to be taken seriously, don't put publish pictures of yourself half-naked and three-quarters drunk doing a keg-stand on Canal Street at Mardi Gras while a crowd of strangers encourages your foolishness by cheering, chanting, and hoping that you pass out so that they can take even more embarassing pictures of you for everyone (including people in Djibouti and most parts of Nepal) to see. You will, by Monday morning, have lost your cushy job in banking or advertising or portable toilet sales (despite the photo of you demonstrating the uses of such a product).
The reasons for this are manifold, but foremost among them is that nobody will take you seriously after seeing you do something that ridiculous. Secondly, the rest of us just don't care. I'm a busy man, as I'm sure many others are. I have so little time to keep track of my friends and family and current events in the first place that I don't want to waste any precious seconds looking at you proving your foolishness, even if I don't know you. If I am unfortunate enough to know you, you can bet I will have lost all respect for you.
As if this was not enough, Face/Space (as I shall call it) is, essentially, a forum for dramatic stupidity. There are, walking among us in disguise as normal humans, people who believe that their lives should be lived as a bad telenovela. If they are not embroiled in some scandal of their own devising, they are not living aggressively enough. How often have you heard about one person getting into an argument with another person over a message on Facebook, or because someone took someone else off of their Top Friend List, or even simply because someone didn't accept a friend request? I'm certain that you have.
So certain am I that you have, that I wish to pose a question to you: When did we, as a people, reach the point where the most important thing we have to worry about daily is why we were moved from #3 to #4 on a list of friends? At what point does a grown adult devolve into a teenage girl? Not only that, but at what point does a grown adult, who should be handling grown adult problems such as taxes, bills, and what happened on Grey's Anatomy last week, invite teenage girl problems for him/her-self? Let's demonstrate just a small grasp of realism here and ask ourselves who cares.
The answer is no one. No one cares. No one cares because it's not important. Real people don't rank their friends in the first place. Real people don't And while I'm on the subject of real people--real people don't have 763,482 friends. The average size for a real person's social group is seven people. Honestly, sit down, open up, and crack open a big can of reality cola.
Moreover, let's all grow up.
What serves as a porthole into your life, allows you to spy on your enemies and friends alike, can endanger your job, and turns adults into fourteen year old girls in under thirteen seconds?
The answer is, of course, MySpace.
Yes, you, MySpace. And Facebook, you're not blameless here, either! You two and others like you who masquerade under the title of "Social Networking," are more accurate called "Enablers," because you are enablers...for stupidity.
Consider: millions of people maintain accounts on MySpace and Facebook (many of these users have accounts on both) in order to stay in touch with friends, to meet new people, to post embarassing or over-the-top photos of themselves, or to whine about their individual melodramas to an anonymous audience. Many of these users are teenagers, who may be excused for their dramatic episodes and fits of caprice because they are teenagers. Many more of these users though, are adults, who should know better.
At the surface, the mere fact that both MySpace and Facebook serve, essentially, as dossiers on people makes it all too easy to spy and be spied upon. Our banks and credit card companies are quick to caution us on safeguarding our private financial information. But I am far more worried about my ex-girlfriends trying to find me on any of these sites. Compared to a jealous ex, identity theft doesn't seem quite so bad....
Being an adult is about many things, and one of these things (or so I'm told) is being "responsible." Responsible, of course, can mean many different things to many different people, but overall, I believe the general concensus would agree that people who present themselves sloppily, promiscuously, scandalously, or in some infantile fashion, are not being responsible. If you want to be taken seriously, don't put publish pictures of yourself half-naked and three-quarters drunk doing a keg-stand on Canal Street at Mardi Gras while a crowd of strangers encourages your foolishness by cheering, chanting, and hoping that you pass out so that they can take even more embarassing pictures of you for everyone (including people in Djibouti and most parts of Nepal) to see. You will, by Monday morning, have lost your cushy job in banking or advertising or portable toilet sales (despite the photo of you demonstrating the uses of such a product).
The reasons for this are manifold, but foremost among them is that nobody will take you seriously after seeing you do something that ridiculous. Secondly, the rest of us just don't care. I'm a busy man, as I'm sure many others are. I have so little time to keep track of my friends and family and current events in the first place that I don't want to waste any precious seconds looking at you proving your foolishness, even if I don't know you. If I am unfortunate enough to know you, you can bet I will have lost all respect for you.
As if this was not enough, Face/Space (as I shall call it) is, essentially, a forum for dramatic stupidity. There are, walking among us in disguise as normal humans, people who believe that their lives should be lived as a bad telenovela. If they are not embroiled in some scandal of their own devising, they are not living aggressively enough. How often have you heard about one person getting into an argument with another person over a message on Facebook, or because someone took someone else off of their Top Friend List, or even simply because someone didn't accept a friend request? I'm certain that you have.
So certain am I that you have, that I wish to pose a question to you: When did we, as a people, reach the point where the most important thing we have to worry about daily is why we were moved from #3 to #4 on a list of friends? At what point does a grown adult devolve into a teenage girl? Not only that, but at what point does a grown adult, who should be handling grown adult problems such as taxes, bills, and what happened on Grey's Anatomy last week, invite teenage girl problems for him/her-self? Let's demonstrate just a small grasp of realism here and ask ourselves who cares.
The answer is no one. No one cares. No one cares because it's not important. Real people don't rank their friends in the first place. Real people don't And while I'm on the subject of real people--real people don't have 763,482 friends. The average size for a real person's social group is seven people. Honestly, sit down, open up, and crack open a big can of reality cola.
Moreover, let's all grow up.
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