Blogs that Appall Me, # 2

It's been almost a year since I wrote my first Blogs that Appall Me post. As I said then, I had mixed feelings about the whole thing. I was hesitant to provide links and publicity to a blog I found appalling, and pointing out the negative is generally only useful if it leads to some kind of productive action--this didn't seem like it would. So, after that initial post, I let the idea languish. But I've once again run across a blog that so horrifies me that I just can't keep my mouth shut.

Today's nominee is called "WTF Are We Going to Do Now?" It's about having a baby, and it's NOT tongue-in-cheek.

Before I go on, let me remind you that the Internet is forever. Our kids are stuck with what we've written, whether that means someone Googling their names and turning up information they'd rather have kept private or it means making ugly discoveries themselves. We've all seen movies in which some adolescent child hears a story or stumbles across an old letter or journal entry and discovers that the circumstances of his birth weren't what he thought. But tomorrow's kids won't even have to work that hard.

Brad's child, for instance, will only have to visit the "about Brad" page (or the version of it that's archived on the Wayback Machine or some other archiving site) to learn that his father was "not excited about this baby" but had decided to "do his best" to love it since that's "a father's job". Just what every kid wants to hear, don't you think?

I want to give him the benefit of the doubt on referring to his upcoming child as "the new pet". I'm hoping that's just a matter of concealing the news from their older child until he's ready to share.

Brad's wife, Katy, is a little softer. She only refers to this new child as her biggest "life interruption". And she gives her husband props for "giving up most of what he wanted to do with his life" in order to support her and their existing child. My first reaction to that was just a wave of pity for her and that child, to feel that they were an onerous obligation that kept this man from the life he wanted instead of...you know...BEING the life he wanted. But then I thought a little further, and I couldn't even make sense out of it.

You see, in another post, Brad shares that he's been a stay-at-home dad for almost ten years. Apparently at the moment both parents are at home, but he's hoping the wife will go back to work soon. Based on his ten years of experience, he offers all kinds of sage advice about how it's our responsibility as parents to suck it up and pretend that we're enjoying time with our kids when we'd rather be playing xbox.

I have to admit that I feel a little sorry for Brad and Katy. When my daughter came tumbling into my life (also unexpected, and at a very bad time for both medical and financial reasons) it was like a little piece of the sun had unexpectedly landed in my house and just stayed around lighting the place up and spreading warmth. It's painful to think that there are parents who are so focused on what they're giving up that they can't take that kind of joy from their children. But it's all the more troubling that they choose to share it with the world and, ultimately, probably with their children.

For once in my life, I'm glad to see a deluge of full-page pop-up ads. Maybe people will give up before they get to the actual text, and the bots won't be able to wade through the crap and archive these atrocities.

The Biggest Set-Up in American Political History?

There’s been a lot of back and forth about whether McCain’s outrage over Obama’s “lipstick on a pig” comment is phony or Obama’s outrage over McCain’s outrage is phony, but I think the outcry from Democrats misses the point…and the outcry from Republicans is intended to ensure that the rest of us do.

In Sarah Palin’s convention speech, she referred to herself as a “hockey mom” and devoted a lot of time to talking about her family and her PTA experience and such. That begged for a response—and McCain had to know it before Palin ever opened her mouth to speak. And maybe that was the plan, because the moment the Democrats (and other rational people) said, “Being a hockey mom doesn’t qualify you to be President”, crises of sexism rang from sea to shining sea. Never mind that NO ONE had suggested that being a hockey mom disqualified one from being qualified for public office. Sarah Palin identified herself as a hockey mom, loud and clear, and then the Republican spin-machine went straight to work repositioning “hockey mom” as a sexist term.

It’s brilliant, really. In her speech at the RNC, Sarah Palin artfully couched her greatest weaknesses in terms that wouldn’t allow anyone to point them out without raising the diversionary cry of “sexism”. Never mind that millions of the people now being accused of sexism were fervent supporters of Senator Hillary Clinton for the Presidency.

It wasn’t limited to “sexism”, either. Palin analogized herself to a pit bull and then when the moniker stuck, Republicans came out in force to protest the way Democrats were attacking her by, among other things, calling her a pit bull.

And it worked. Millions of Americans think those who don’t feel “hockey mom” is a credential worth boasting about in the Presidential race are sexists. Millions of Americans think it’s unprovoked meanness when someone points out that Sarah Palin compared herself to a pit bull. Suddenly, her weaknesses are her strengths, because anyone who points them out must be mean, sexist, or both…and therefore not worth listening to.

Talk about sexism. I can’t recall there ever before being a major-party political candidate at the national level whom we weren’t allowed to find fault with.

And it’s working. It’s such pure genius that I’d almost think Plain was qualified to be Vice-President, in a twisted, Machiavellian kind of way…if I thought for a minute that she was doing any more than reading what was put in front of her.

Universal Truth

I was struck today by a quote from someone on a blogging forum I frequent. A brief, brilliant, clear, illuminating statement in that, "Well...enough said" sort of way that doesn't roll around very often.

This is what he said: Palin believes a lot of stupid shit.

It was a standalone comment, too. No elaboration, no examples, as if that were all there really was to say.

The author's blog is primarily about atheism. I'm an old school Catholic. The author is a teenage male. I'm a middle-aged mother. In a dozen or a hundred ways our perspectives and foundations and world views differ...and yet, the single sentence is so resoundingly, clearly complete and accurate that both of us can look at it and said, "Yep, that's pretty much all there is to say."

Out of the Mouths of Babes - Sarah Palin

As we were leaving a store this afternoon, my 12-year-old daughter pointed out a headline saying that Lindsey Lohan and her girlfriend were having a baby. Now that I have a 12-year-old, I know a lot more than I ever expected (or wanted) to about teenage celebrities, but when she talks, I listen and engage. She's an adolescent, and opportunities may be limited.

I mentioned that I'd heard Lohan had been blogging about Sarah Palin, and the tone sounded positive.

"Why am I not surprised?" my daughter asked.

That surprised ME. "I'm very surprised," I told her. You know, Sarah Palin is very conservative and religious..."

"But," my daughter cut in, in that well, DUH tone of voice, "she's a wack job.

Identity politics at work again?

Colorado Amendment Question 48 - What's the Point?

I have to admit that when I first heard about the proposed amendment to the Colorado Constitution that would redefine "person" to include human embryos from the moment of fertilization, I got a little excited. It wasn't for any of the reasons you might expect from a normal person, though--it was because I foresaw a HUGE legal glitch. You see, if the Colorado Constitution defined "person" in that way for purposes of Colorado law, there would have been a teeny, tiny problem: the state's murder statute would have been effectively rewritten to include first-trimester fetuses and would thus have violated the current interpretation of the U.S. Constitution. Just like that, the statute could have been struck down and all murder could have been legal in Colorado.

I guess I wasn't the only one who thought of this, though, because the proposed amendment DOESN'T redefine "person" for purposes of all Colorado law: it only redefines the word as it's used in specific provisions of the Constitution.

Thus, no major legal snafu...just a whole lot of nothin'.

The provisions specified are, of course, those that relate to inalienable rights and such...but what to do? Life, for instance, is an inalienable right. And the Colorado Constitution may well be amended to extend that inalienable right to a fetus at the moment of conception. But then what? The current interpretation of the U.S. Constitution--the interpretation that's prevailed for decades--says that states can't limit the right to elective abortion in the first trimester. Thus, the state of Colorado can deem that unborn child a "person" and say it can't be deprived of life without due process of law, but what due process is available? The only due process permissible under the U.S. Constitution would be a hearing or other process to determine that the woman was, in fact, in the first trimester of her pregnancy. Once that was determined, the U.S. Constitution would prevent any further regulation of her access to an abortion.

Doesn't do that "person" a whole lot of good to have been renamed, does it?

Naturally, lawmakers and lobbyists alike know this. So what are they doing? What's the point of spending time and money and commanding the time and attention of Colorado voters as if this were a serious issue, when they all know that the practical effect of the amendment will be nonexistant?

I guess it looks good on a resume.

Why Would White Supremacists Fear Obama?

Earlier this week, three white supremacists were arrested and, although they haven't been charged, officials appear to believe that they planned to attempt to assassinate Barack Obama. At a glance, the idea of white supremacists wanting to assassinate a black Presidential candidate makes a lot of sense; upon reflection, it makes it appear that they lack the courage of their convictions.

After all, don't white supremacists believe that whites are...well...superior? Isn't it, in their view, a natural superiority, granted by God or nature or some combination thereof?

But if they're so confident that whites are superior and blacks are inferior, then what do they have to fear? Even if a black man could win the Presidency, he wouldn't be up to the job in the way that our "superior" white Presidents have been, right? And wouldn't that just prove their point?

It seems to me that if white supremacists think a black man is enough of a threat that they want to assassinate him, they must fear that he'll prove them wrong.

Who's Raising that "Perfect Child" Now, Sarah?

In the hours since John McCain announced that Alaska Governor Sarah Palin would be his running mate, there's been a cacaphony of pro and con discourse. Was Palin chosen for her credentials, experience, positions and talents, or was she chosen because she's a woman and McCain hopes to court voters who previously supported Senator Hillary Clinton? Palin is low on experience, but she has a reputation for pulling out all the stops, and just might restore some of McCain's lost maverick image. Perhaps more significantly, she's a good looking woman with the kind of life and history that makes other women nod and say "You go, girl!"

But through all the buzz--positive and negative--one thing has been troubling me: one thing that I haven't heard mentioned by anyone else.

Just this past spring, Palin gave birth to her fifth child, a child with Downs Syndrome. As a pro-life politician, Palin gained points and gathered accolades simply for having her child--after all, many Downs Syndrome babies are aborted. But what is she doing now?

One of the things that has always troubled me about a large sector of the pro-life movement is the idea many pro-life activists seem to have that it's only their business for as long as it takes to make sure that the baby is born alive. Sure, some people active in the movement work to provide support to those new mothers and make it possible for them to raise healthy children, but for many, the victory is achieved and the battle over when a woman safely passes into her second trimester and can no longer obtain an abortion on demand.

It's always seemed to me that if those people were really so "pro life", they'd be worried about the babies and the toddlers and the adolescents, too...not JUST the unborn.

I don't know enough about Sarah Palin to judge her sincerity one way or the other, but her actions right now are reminding me quite a lot of those people who want to bar the doors of the abortion clinic but then consider the child "not our problem" once it's actually born. She's been applauded and patted on the back by all those "pro life" and "pro family" organizations for giving birth to the child, and now she's...going off to run for Vice President. How, exactly, is it "pro family" for a woman with a special needs infant to hit the campaign trail vying for one of the most demanding jobs in the world? Maybe it's just me, but I've always thought that part of being pro family was putting the needs of your family ahead of your own ambitions.

Huh..I Guess 4016 Diggers CAN Be Wrong...

Yep, 4016. That's how many Diggs a single article on my webzine, Rational Outrage, got not long before Digg decided that the domain was spam and banned us.

My webmaster inquired right away. After all, our site is entirely non-commercial--we're not selling anything, and there's no advertising at all on the site. And to the best of our knowledge, about a dozen of our posts have been submitted to Digg since Rational Outrage launched on March 17. That didn't seem excessive.

The response from Digg stated: As you know, Digg is a community-driven website – our community has consistently reported the domain to which you refer as spam.

Uh huh.

"Consistently", while they were upvoting our school bus rape story 4016 times: http://digg.com/world_news/7_Year_Old_Raped_On_School_Bus_School_Court_Don_t_Care Apparently those 40,000+ Digg visitors who crashed our server and left dozens of comments were just doing spam research.

So then, if that doesn't count for anything, surely the little ones won't, either:

Not the police taser abuse story with 225 Diggs.

Not the maverick composter article with 125 Diggs.

In fact, five of the twelve stories submitted to Digg received more than 100 Diggs. Surprising "the community" could find time to "consistently report" this domain as spam, what with all that upvoting going on.

The cut and paste from Digg also suggested: While we welcome users to submit their own content, overdoing it often incites the users to mark the user as a spammer, the site as a spam site, and otherwise decent content as blogspam.

12 stories. Six months. Submitted by six different people, three of whom have no connection to the site.

I've always pointed out that sites like Digg are private companies and free to make whatever decisions they like within the bounds of the law. If they want to ban us because they don't like our politics or our color scheme, they're perfectly free to do so. But guys...you don't gotta LIE.

UPDATE: On Wednesday evening, August 27, we received a brief email from Digg apologizing for the "confusion" and saying that we should be clear to submit pages from Rational Outrage again. We did not receive any explanation, either from Digg or in response to my requests in the Digg comments for one of the people who had been "consistently reporting us as spam" to explain on the forum or via email. However, we do seem to have been unbanned.

Remember Roe v. Wade?

Or perhaps the better question would be: Did you ever know what Roe v. Wade says?

I've seen pro-life literature that says, "Did you know that Roe v. Wade allows elective abortions up to the seventh month of pregnancy?" Nope, I didn't know that. And I read the case.

I've seen seen pro-choice people insist that if Roe v. Wade were overturned, the whole country would be immediately cast into a dark world of back-alley abortions...overlooking, of course, the fact that before that happened, each state would have to enact independent legislation prohibiting abortion.

With the Presidential election around the corner, the issue is once again getting a lot of press, but little (if any) of it accurately represents just what Roe v. Wade said or the role it plays in the future of abortion law across the country.

The law that was challenged (and struck down) in Roe v. Wade criminalized abortion in all cases except where it was a life-saving procedure. The United States Supreme Court found that such a restrictive statute violated the 14th Amendment Due Process Clause and that states could exercise varying degrees of discretion in regulating abortion, depending upon the stage of pregnancy.

During approximately the first trimester, states could not limit the right to abortion--that was to be left to the "medical judgment of the pregnant woman's attending physician."

From the end of the first trimester to viability, the state could "regulate abortion in ways that are reasonably related to maternal health".

After viability, the state could regulate--or even prohibit--abortion except where necessary to preserve the life or health of the mother.

One interesting point is that the regulation allowed post-first-trimester was required to be reasonably related to maternal health, whereas that shifted post-viability and the state interest in preserving the "potentiality" of human life was deemed sufficient reason for the restrictions.

It is important to note, however, that the Supreme Court ruling only placed a limit upon the regulations a state could impose--it did not impose any regulations itself. Thus, for instance, when pro-life activists say that Roe v. Wade "allows" for abortion minutes before birth, it's technically true...because Roe v. Wade doesn't put any restrictions on abortion; it simply sets forth the circumstances under which a state may do so. And that's as it should be; health and welfare provisions are specifically reserved to the states under the U.S. Constitution (and in any case wouldn't be the purview of the judiciary). What Roe v. Wade said about late term abortions was that states could forbid them, except where the mother's life was in danger. Period.

On the flipside, if Roe v. Wade were reversed, it wouldn't mean that abortion was illegal--it would mean that if states so chose, they could MAKE abortion illegal.

Obviously, Roe v. Wade was a landmark decision that changed the face of abortion law across the U.S. But abortion law is made by the states, within the parameters set forth in Roe v. Wade and subsequent cases. Before millions of Americans--pro-life or pro-choice--base their votes in the Presidential election on the chance that the next President might appoint Supreme Court Justices who might have occasion to rule on a case that might impact the Roe decision, we should all understand what the case says, and what that means to the states.

And Now, For Another Perspective...

In my last post, I shared with you a touching and reality-based view of Bosnia from someone who'd been there. Today, I can't help but share a much more humorous (but nearly as serious) description of the inner workings of the U.S. Postal Service.

This may have rung especially true with me because of my own past experiences with the U.S. Postal service...experiences that once led my five-year-old daughter to tug on my sleeve as I stood at the counter in my local post office and say innocently "How 'bout FedEx?" But somehow I think that if you've ever tried to ship a package...or pick one up...or figure out why one with someone else's name on it was left on your porch...this post is for you.

Bosnia Up Close and Personal

This post by an American lawyer who worked in Bosnia in 2001 brings home the destruction wrought by Radovan Karadzic. Maybe his crimes aren't so far away after all--in time or space: Karadzic's Destruction of Bosnia Last Long After War

Are you REALLY entitled to your opinion?

I'm inclined to say no.

Not to everyone, of course, and not even to those who disagree with me. No, I just want to cut off this whole "right to my opinion" thing for people who don't have a freaking clue and can't be bothered to get one.

Again, whether or not I think you have a clue does NOT depend on whether or not you agree with me. It depends entirely upon whether or not you have a basic understanding of the basic factual information necessary to FORM a meaningful opinion. If you'd prefer not to be bothered with the facts, that's fine: just acknowledge that you don't know enough to have an opinion and SHUT UP. Or, if you really, really feel strongly about your "rights" (even though you're probably misusing the term), go right ahead and form an opinion without any of the necessary information...but then keep it to yourself. Please. Don't confuse others, who might assume that you know what you're talking about.

And here's a tip: it's not a good investment of time to go around forming strong opinions about things that never happened.

Just a few examples:

The Supreme Court did NOT make a recent ruling relating to victims of domestic violence--rather, it made a ruling with universal applicability to the admission of certain kinds of testimony in criminal cases.

A UK court did NOT sentence a man to one day in jail for the murder of a prostitute--it sentences him to one day in addition to approximately thirty months of time already served.

The woman who burned herself with McDonald's coffee did NOT win millions of dollars--and she did suffer very serious injuries necessitating reconstructive surgery.

Bottom line: learn the facts. Or don't. It's your call. But if you choose not to know anything then please, please, please...also choose not to share your ignorance.

Look How Far We Haven't Come

You've probably seen a lot of press coverage over the past few days concerning the Connecticut man who was struck by an automobile and then lay paralyzed in the street while bystanders went on about their business and passing cars switched lanes to go around him without so much as slowing down.

Despite the outrage all of us seem to feel while sitting in our living rooms and watching the inaction of the people on the street, it's impossible to ignore the fact that there were a lot of people out there--people who weren't together, weren't conferring, were of various ages and presumably various other demographics...and they all behaved pretty much the same way. They are us. And I know the inclination is to immediately protest that WE would have done something. I feel the same way.

But do we honestly believe that those people who stood there on the street and did nothing wouldn't have said exactly the same thing if they'd seen that clip on their televisions instead of finding themselves in the middle of the action? I think the vast majority of them would have.

44 years ago, a woman named Catherine Genovese was murdered in Queens. "Kitty" Genovese became something of a poster child for what's wrong with our society today...err...I mean...what was wrong with our society 44 years ago...because 38 people watched her being attacked and ultimately killed. The attack reportedly went on for half an hour, but not only did no one intervene, no one called the police until it was over and she lay in the street, dead from 17 stab wounds.

The public, of course, was horrified.

And here we are, 44 years later, still shocked by the same kind of reaction.

Maybe it's time to stop shaking our heads in disgust and wondering what's wrong with other people and try to take an honest look at the roots of this kind of reaction BEFORE we find ourselves in circumstances in which we'll have to find out what we're really made of.

What Passes for Inspiration

I've probably mentioned before that I don't turn on the television very often, but this evening I wanted to watch John Edwards endorsement of Barack Obama and then I didn't turn it back off. Big mistake. What came on afterward involved some soap opera actress who'd gone in for lap band surgery.

Even (insert name of big celebrity magazine), they told us, was covering her "inspirational journey".

In the interest of full disclosure I will say that I have some feelings about lap band surgery, and they're not positive ones. But that's not what this post is about. It's about the "inspirational journey" of someone who paid $12-25,000 for a surgical procedure to make weight loss easier.

Have we really fallen that far in this country, that a 45-minute surgical procedure and the weight loss that follows is an "inspirational journey"? Have we really grown that weak? Are we that short on true inspiration?

We Have a Winner

Since I started this blog about a year ago, I've written about the outrageous, the unbelievable, and the just plain stupid. It's often seemed that there were so many varied things wrong with our world today that they fell into an undifferentiated mass. Until today, that is.

Today, a co-worker sent me this link, and everything changed.

Yes, that's right. For a mere...well, okay, for several thousand dollars...you can have "the carbon from your loved one" made into a synthetic diamond and...you know...wear pieces of your dead friend or family member.

The process is simple, really. You just have your beloved cremated, ship the ashes off to LifeGem with a small boatload of money, and the company uses its "patented process" to press your loved one's carbon into a synthetic diamond just for you. You can also buy settings, of course, and cases, and everything else you might need to go with your chunk of dead relative beautiful new piece of jewelry.

The LifeGem website contains testimonials that I can only hope are faked. Here are a few excerpts:

"I've requested in my will that my children turn me into a diamond when I die."

"Knowing that my mother is in the stone and I can take her with me is an awesome feeling."

Some are even more...disturbing. I don't want to recreate those here because these letters, if they are real, were written by people who have suffered terrible losses and evidently are finding some comfort. Unfortunately, that comfort is being offered in a way that is not only disturbing, but extraordinarily expensive. The least expensive loved-one-turned-diamond that I was able to find on the website was $2,699. That's just the diamond--no setting or anything--and there's only one that comes that cheap.

Our loved ones, of course, are more than their carbon. It's unfortunate that a company has sprung up to capitalize on the pain of people in mourning by pretending that crushing a bit of their organic matter into a diamond is what remembrance is all about...and that if you REALLY loved your husband (or mother, or child, or wife, or cat), you'd go with the SEVEN thousand dollar diamond....

A Little Entrecard Humor

If you use Entrecard, you're probably accustomed to seeing those little gold bars at the bottom of the card reading "Drop yours" or "Thanks". If you don't use Entrecard, you may see those cards and not know what they are--some of them are pretty mysterious looking, just images with no explanation or seemingly random taglines.

I'm using Entrecard with varying degrees of seriousness on four blogs at the moment: this one, Catholic Inside, RockStories and The Search Engine Question Pool. Since, as Entrecarders know all too well, each blog requires a separate account, that means four accounts for me--so I'm usually logged in to one or another.

Today, though, I visited one of my blogs from my work computer, and so wasn't logged in to any of my many Entrecard accounts...and I got to see what non-participants see. It wasn't all that much different; I hadn't realized, though, that if you weren't logged in to Entrecard, that gold bar at the bottom of the card said, "Get one".

It might not even have registered with me today, except that my widget happened to be displaying a card with no tagline, no text at all...just a close-up of a very lovely Asian woman. With, you know, a gold bar that said "Get one" under her picture...

Call for Submissions

If you're a regular reader of this blog, you know that I think there's a lot wrong with the world we live in today.

You also undoubtedly know that I'm not a fan of rhetoric, and I think important messages get lost when people start throwing around dramatic terminology where it doesn't belong.

I'm convinced that I'm not alone in this, and that there are rational people out there with legitimate points to make about the insanity that surrounds us. That's why I'm starting Rational Outrage, a webzine dedicated to identifying the insanity without jumping on the bandwagon.

If you've ever read this blog and thought, "Yeah, and what about....?", you may already have a Rational Outrage article in your brain. Check out the Rational Outrage submission guidelines!

The Accidental Social Networker

When Alan from The Thin Red Line posted a message on Blog Catalog saying that he and Dane Morgan were running a writing contest at Chain Drop, my interest was instantly piqued. After all, I'll take any excuse to write, and this excuse had the added benefit of being sponsored by a couple of bloggers I like and respect. What a deal. Or so I thought until I read the description and discovered that they wanted me to write about social networking and how to use it to your advantage.

That deflated me a bit for a moment, because...well...I DON'T use social networking. I just kind of go out into the blogging and Internet forum world and do what I do in real life. It took about sixty seconds for me to see the irony in my assessment. There I was, contemplating how sad it was that I had nothing to contribute to the effort set forth by these two interesting, knowledgeable bloggers I'd really come to appreciate in the Blog Catalog forums...you're way ahead of me, right?

So I thought I'd stop over and check out the actual rules, and this is what I found about midway through the opening paragraph: "Dane says to me 'what we need is to bring in all those Writers like in Tiffany’s writing group….They would write good pieces about how they use social networking'. " I guess that writers' group had slipped my mind for a moment. It's part of my non-social-networking campaign, I guess. It currently has 627 members.

So while I'm not doing any social networking, rarely thinking about driving traffic to my blogs, and posting to my blogs when--and only when--the impulse strikes, I am in fact getting regular traffic from a couple of social networking sites, meeting a lot of interesting bloggers, and amassing a writing group of several hundred members. Here's my secret: I show up in online places and do exactly what I'd do in real life. I talk to interesting people whose thought processes intrigue me and I answer questions when I can and lend a helping hand where I'm able. And people respond--at least a fair number of people--by visiting my blog and commenting on my posts and linking to me and Stumbling my posts, and the next thing I know, there's traffic.

Don't get me wrong. I'm quite sure that if I took a more calculated approach, there would be MORE traffic. But I think on some level, the foundation is the same as it was when our parents were whispering advice as we headed out the door to kindergarten or on our first dates: Just be yourself.

Cut the Drama

I have to admit that there was a part of me--a fairly large part--that wanted to title this post "Please Don't Say Stupid Shit Anymore". I thought I'd reined it in, but apparently not, since I felt the need to share that with you all. Still, "Cut the Drama" seemed appropriate. That's what my mother used to say when I, at 12 or 13, wailed that she was "ruining my life" because she wouldn't let me go to some slumber party or mortally embarrassed me by picking up the phone and saying it was past my bedtime while I was talking to a boy. In my mind, that's a pretty good analogy for the drama that's sweeping the Internet right now.

Just a couple of days ago I wrote about free speech, and how everyone whose language is criticized or whose post is removed from a message board starts howling about the 1st amendment, having clearly missed the little part about how it only restricts governmental agents. And yes, I'll be honest: part of the problem is simply that inaccuracy makes my brain explode. I'd swear that I actually felt my brain melting a little this afternoon when someone in an online forum protested that Paypal had "labeled him a criminal" because they'd asked him to supply proof of identity. But there's a much bigger problem.

Let's take censorship, for instance. Censorship is a serious political issue. Governmental censorship can prevent the population of a country from obtaining accurate information about economics, international relations and much more. It can eliminate the conduits for information that allow people to cast educated votes, and even to make more dramatic decisions if and when they're called for. It once was, and should be, a powerful term. When someone suggests that censorship is taking place, we should all sit up and take notice and take steps to learn whether or not that allegation is accurate. But do we? Of course not. And the reason is crystal clear: every whiny-ass college kid who has ever had an article pulled from his association newsletter because he gratuitously used the f-word a dozen times or bored housewife whose comment was moderated on someone's blog is yelling "censorship!" With all those clamoring voices shouting the same word (and most of them coming to nothing), how would we ever be able to distinguish the occasional true voice in the crowd? Would we be able to reclaim that word and use it correctly if, for instance, the United States government prohibited publication of photographs that might tend to illustrate the number of young citizens we're losing in Iraq? Would we be able to separate out that kind of censorship?

This week alone I've seen multiple references to censorship on message boards and in discussion forums. I've read an allegation that someone's free speech rights were violated when a discussion thread on a privately owned forum was deleted. I've read the sad tale of the man "labeled as a criminal" by the big bad financial company that wanted to be sure he was who he said he was. And I've been asked (in a group setting) whether I'll miss my "free will" because California is considering energy saving measures.

Do we really live in a world where our biggest problems are having comments rejected on blogs and being asked to conserve limited natural resources? I hope so. I really do. And it's not just because that would be an awfully cushy world to live in. It's because we've expended so much energy and drama, used up so much powerful language and overworked our soapboxes on those little issues that we won't have any way of getting people's attention when something more serious rolls around.

Freedom of Speech...Let Me Tell You What It's NOT

The right we refer to as "freedom of speech" is, as you probably know, a Constitutional right. It's part of the 1st Amendment to the Constitution, one of the amendments known collectively as the Bill of Rights. Do you know what it says?

If you do...if you're really, really sure you do...you don't need to read any further. But if you're like the dozens and dozens of people I seem to encounter in online forums every day, you'd better check this out:

Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances.

It's a short little amendment packed with important concepts, and maybe that's why one of the most critical concepts of all tends to get overlooked. You might have noticed it this time around. Yep, I'm referring to the introductory clause (Who pays attention to those? You just write those to help stretch your paper to meet the minimum page requirement, right?) that MAKES IT CRYSTAL CLEAR THAT THE FIRST AMENDMENT LIMITS ONLY GOVERNMENTAL ACTION.

In fact, if you simply look at the language of the amendment itself, you'll note that it refers only to Congress. What about states? Surely states are limited, too? And, in fact, they are. That's because the restrictions on Congressional action set forth in the Bill of Rights have, in large part, been explicitly extended to the states and other governmental agencies.

They have not, however, been extended to your next door neighbor. It is NOT a "violation of free speech" when he tells you to stop screaming at your wife in front of his kids. It hasn't been extended to your local video store owner--he's free to decide not to offer titles that contain material he considers offensive. It's NOT a "violation of free speech" when a message board administrator or blog hosting company takes down your comment. It's not even a "violation of free speech" when a wholly unreasonable right-wing religious leader points a gun at you and tells you to repent your liberal leanings or burn in hell forever. Some of these things are perfectly legal. Some fall into gray area--for instance, the message board administrators and blog hosts are typically bound by their own terms of service. Some--like the guy with the gun--are flat-out whacked and criminal offenses to boot.

But none of them...not a single one...implicates your free speech rights. Why? Because there was no governmental action. Period. A website cannot infringe on your free speech rights (unless it's operated by a governmental entitity). Another user on a message board or in a forum cannot infringe your free speech rights (unless he acts "under color of law", representing some governmental entity). A restaurant owner cannot infringe your free speech rights...you get the idea, right?

Fifty times a day, someone on the Internet yells "what about free speech?" in a context that has nothing to do with governmental entities--and those are only the ones I see. The only viable answer is, "What about it?"

Taser / MP3 Combo - What More Could a Jogger Ask For?

Looking for a little gift for the jogger who has everything? Why not a nice taser holster / mp3 player combo? Think of the space it saves! And, if you're on the fence, surely the fact that it's available in a nice leopard print will tip the scales for you. Yet another benefit to the combo is that taser victims tend to make an unpleasant screaming sound, and the mp3 player will help to drown that out.

It's interesting that Taser International, which until recently had successfully defended every lawsuit brought against the company as a result of a taser death, has opted to start quietly settling taser lawsuits at the same time that the company is actively marketing tasers to the general public. Aren't police departments across the country injuring and killing plenty of people with their tasers? Do they really need reinforcements? And do WE really need to hand them an excuse to use force against every kid with an mp3 player? ("I thought he had a taser, your honor--honest I did!")

Customer Service...Need I Say More?

Recently, I saw a forum discussion on how difficult Paypal was to work with, and I was very surprised. I've done tens of thousands of dollars worth of business through Paypal, and I've never had a problem.

But did you catch what I just said? I almost didn't.

It seemed to me that Paypal couldn't be more user friendly. It was easy to get someone on the phone, and to talk to the same person more than once. Phone calls were returned; emails were answered promptly, and in such a way that it was obvious that they'd been read by a real human being.

That contrasted sharply with my experience of some other online businesses. Amazon.com, in particular, served as a counterpoint to Paypal in my mind. About a year ago, I purchased eight books all at once through Amazon. For reasons I still haven't been able to sort out, seven of those books were correctly billed to my current debit card and the eighth charged to a checking account I'd closed several months earlier. The ensuing nightmare still hasn't been fully resolved, and I'm an attorney with a background in consumer protection work--I can't begin to imagine what dealing with Amazon is like for the average person.

First, because I lived in the modern-day, real-world equivalent of Mayberry, the bank paid the charge despite the fact that the account had been closed for several months. However, the bank also sent notice to Amazon that the account was closed. So Amazon sent the charge on to Certegy for collection.

When I got a collection letter from Certegy (requesting, of course, my original $9 plus a $25 charge), I called them and pointed out that the charge had been paid, and that I had documentation from the bank to prove it. They told me I'd have to take that up with Amazon, because they got their information from Amazon.

Except when I called Amazon, they told me that it was "out of their hands" and I'd have to resolve it with Certegy. They seemed entirely oblivious to (or more likely, impervious to) their potential liability for passing along false information to Certegy and then refusing to correct it. All together, I spent more than four hours on the telephone with Amazon and Certegy. Amazon never budged an inch. No one at either company was interested in seeing my proof that the charge had been paid. Certegy, at least, was a bit more sensitive to the legal ramifications of trying to collect a debt that had never existed, and they went away.

Well, for the moment. I did hear from them again a few months later with a required disclosure letter letting me know that they'd had some sort of breach and personal data had been disclosed (good thing for me this all related to an account that had, by that point, been closed for more than a year, hm?)

So I was loving Paypal. I was STUNNED to hear someone describe something very similar to my story above. Why didn't they just call Jen? She was always such a help. It sounded like we were dealing with two different companies.

And then it hit me.

We were.

I might never have caught it were it not for my experience with Dell. A few years ago, I ordered a computer from Dell, and then just a few months later, my mother ordered a similar computer. There was only one significant difference: I purchased my computer through a corporate discount program offered by a multi-national corporation, and my mother ordered hers all by herself. MY computer was listed under the name of a company with hundreds of locations around the world, and it rapidly became clear that when I called customer service or tech support for issues relating to my computer, I was routed to an entirely different department than when I called about those same issues relating to my mother's computer.

Perhaps "I've done tens of thousands of dollars of business through Paypal and I've never had a problem" isn't evidence at all. Perhaps it's an explanation. And I'm not okay with that.

That doesn't mean that I think your biggest and highest-paying customers shouldn't get special perks. That's only good business. If you want to have a gold circle support team that assists the major accounts, that's fine with me. If you want to send them little gifts at Christmas time and offer small services for free that others might have to pay for, it's all good. But that all assumes a basic level of competent, well-intentioned customer service for everyone. We don't seem to be in a place anymore where the general public gets the basic service and the big spenders get perks--we seem to be in a place where the general public can't get service at all, and the big spenders get what used to be perceived as the basics.

I have a growing list in my head of what I think those bottom line offerings should be, but this post is already so long that it's in danger of being mistaken for an e-book, so I'll save that for another day. Suggestions are welcome.