The Ignorance of a Commenter – ADELANTO: Mom hurt, fetus dead after domestic fight (The Anti reads and ponders the news)

http://www.pe.com/local-news/san-bernardino-county/san-bernardino-county-headlines-index/20111215-adelanto-mom-hurt-fetus-dead-after-domestic-fight.ece

From the comment section of Press Enterprise article at link above

“Rvr Side

3:09 PM on 12/15/2011

Strange, but when some poor sucker is assaulted and killed by the police then that person is a criminal and the cops are justified because they are in fear for their life. But god forbid some poor guy is dealing with an out of control woman who is a danger to her fetus and all of a sudden the tables are turned.

It looks like Willie Davis Hines of Adelanto should have put on a badge and strapped on a gun before he decided to try to protect his unborn fetus.”

Not only is this comment insulting to the men and women who have sworn to ‘protect and serve’ the communities they work for (Only a small percentage act in ways that compromise the integrity of the law enforcement profession!),  it also illustrates ignorance on the part of what appears to be a member of a growing segment of the population which seeks to correct inequality between the sexes in categories where women have been notoriously granted more privileges. While women focus on obtaining equal standing in wages and career status, their general treatment in criminal court processes and corrections tends to be significantly less severe in comparison to that of men. While it’s easy to say that ensuring equal pay and equal opportunity to gaining access to the highest career positions for women is more important in the long run, the little things, like the court system’s willingness to go easier on a female defendant than they are when the defendant is a man – those little things add up.

This article isn’t about a crime committed by a woman though. It’s about a woman who was attacked by a man (believed to be the father of her baby) and hospitalized, and that same man killed her unborn child in the process. For the commenter to suggest that this attack might have been in defense of the man’s unborn child is absolutely ludicrous – you don’t attack the mother to defend a fetus, and especially you don’t end up killing the unborn child you’re supposedly trying to defend! If the mother is truly a danger to her fetus, that’s when you call law enforcement and whatever local government agencies are assigned to handle cases involving pregnant women who pose a risk to their unborn babies. In the United States, most jurisdictions have policies and practices specified by LAWS written to be employed in circumstances involving children – whether they’ve yet to be born or are in their teens. In California, a person can be charged with first degree murder when the victim is a fetus (the exception being, in cases of abortion, neither the doctor nor the mother are considered to have committed the crime of murder in any degree – first, second, third, or accidental homicide, etc. – as the current law gives women the right of choice and the benefits of seeking the assistance of a doctor for such procedures reduce the potential for significant harm that is inherent in non-regulated sources performed without the involvement of a licensed medical practitioner.) Any man who was truly concerned about the welfare of his unborn child due to the mother’s actions and behaviors wouldn’t attack the woman, and he certainly wouldn’t decide to go on the run – running away, especially knowing that the police are going to want to, at the very least, talk to you about the situation…that’s not a sign of innocence. In fact, making the decision to disappear so law enforcement has to hunt you down just to talk to you about an incident (until they do, how are they going to know if you were really involved? They can’t just say “Yeah, he did it” based on what other people say – they have to follow procedure or there’s no way to make a case stick!) – that sort of behavior only makes a person look guilty.

In my opinion, the commenter is someone who is not just ignorant, but feels like they’ve been unfairly treated by the police (or, if preferred, ‘knows someone who’s been unfairly treated by law enforcement’). The type of ignorance displayed in the comment they made doesn’t help anyone – it’s not going to help any cause, enlighten others,  and it’s most certainly lacking in valid arguments.

Frustrated wife puts gamer husband up for sale on Craigslist – Thoughts from “The Anti” perspective

“Guys, be careful how involved you get with this season’s awesome crop of video games. Your wife may try to sell you off. Kyle Baddley learned this the hard way earlier this month, when his wife Alyse got frustrated by his constant Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 3 playing and offered him up to the highest bidder on Craigslist.

“I am selling my 22 year old husband,” the ad read. “He enjoys eating and playing video games all day. Easy to maintain, just feed and water every 3-5 hours. You must have Internet and space for gaming. Got tired of waiting so free to good home. If acceptable replacement is offered will trade.”…”

The photo is one of Alyse and Kyle, the young wife and her advertised military husband.

Earlier in November marked the passing of another year since I lost my husband, and looking at this couple, along with reading about Alyse’s ‘unique’ response to deal with her husband’s interest in gaming got me thinking:

Why can’t she see how lucky she is to have him home and alive, with her?

“The ad, of course, was a joke. But that didn’t stop people from replying.

One woman offered to retrain him. Another guy said he was willing to trade spots with Kyle, noting that he was both house-trained and preferred books to games.”

I actually heard about this story on the evening news broadcast after work on Tuesday (November 22, 2011) while I was pulling things out to start making dinner. Hearing the news anchor talk with them and discussing the story with the other anchor was annoying; reading about it made me angry. Yes, a silly and ‘insignificant’ little joke in the form of an ad on craigslist made me angry. This wife’s trivial problem led her to put an ad out about ‘getting rid of her husband’ and on top of that she thought it would be ‘cute’ to include the bit “free to a good home”.

In all marriages, at least those involving human beings, there are flaws and quirks. Each individual brings their own collection of these things with them everywhere they go and into every relationship they have in addition to the baggage they accumulate over their lifetime. When you’ve been raised and continue to believe that when you get married, divorce is not an option – you eventually must realize that the only thing that you can control or change is how good (or bad) this relationship that you’ve pledged to stay in for the rest of your life – that is, unless you already understood that truth on the day you made that vow to your spouse in the eyes of God and witnessed by your friends and family. Though they all witnessed this pledge between husband and wife, it is important for the couple to recognize that they are the only two people who can, should, and must make the decisions, choices, and bear the responsibility for this relationship, the marriage. They have made a vow – two individuals – become one, forsaking all others and leaving their family homes to begin this new life.

I wonder, how would Alyse feel if her husband decided to put an ad out to offer HER to the highest bidder – in trade for things that he could use and beneficial for himself alone, but not necessarily in actual cash form which is conveyed with the words “free to a good home”. What would SHE feel if her husband decided to put an ad out, hoping to get rid of her through a trade arranged to give her to someone else who happened to have something her husband wanted more than he wanted to keep her around. After all, he’s still young and could always find a new wife if he decided he wanted one – why not accept the offer of goods made by a stranger who was interested in carting off this wife Alyse, leaving him free to take a new one, one yet-to-be-explored by him whenever he wished? Perhaps his ad would list some similarly trivial reasons for putting up the offer – she let herself go, she was boring, she nagged him all the time, or maybe he wouldn’t give any explanation for why he decided to look for a stranger who would be willing to take her off his hands. If it were the latter, and suddenly one day there was a stranger at the front door – and her husband traded that person for a couple of new video games and a six pack of his favorite beverage, and sent her off with the stranger, saying “go, you belong to them now” before he closed the door and locks it behind him – how would that feel?

What would it feel like if something happened to him one day, and he never came home to her again, his life cut short, without warning or explanation. No way to prevent it. What would she feel then, would she think about when she put out the ad (joke or not) because she was ‘tired of waiting’ for him and thought to herself that if someone else would take her husband off her hands she might not mind so much?

“Among the unconcerned was Kyle’s mother. She not only encouraged Alyse to run the ad, she helped her write it.

Kyle, it seems, has learned his lesson and has pulled back a bit from his Modern Warfare 3 playtime. His father notes that the couple is headed to Florida to spend Thanksgiving with Kyle’s sister.

Kyle’s taking it in good humor — but he points out for the record that his wife was in line with him when the game went on sale.”

His dad should be ticked off about his wife getting involved in their son’s marriage – it’s not as though their daughter-in-law was being beaten or beating her husband, or beating the grandkids. The time that Alyse’s mother-in-law had any right to make rules or complain about her son’s activities was over when he got married. Just because his wife is someone that she can easily convince to do things which will give her back some of the control over her son that she lost, doesn’t make it right. Sadly, Alyse is accepting a marriage that is currently being manipulated by her mother-in-law for whatever reason. If she was smart, she’d ask her husband to take a stand – with her – where he chooses his wife and tells his mother not to interfere in their relationship again with complete and total clarity in the meaning of his words. He can’t simply escape or run away like he is by going with his wife to spend Thanksgiving at his sister’s house every time his mother decides she wants to exert some control over things that should be his and his wife’s alone. Even if he thinks he can.

 

**** Quoted sections taken from “Frustrated wife puts gamer husband up for sale on Craigslist (by: Chris Morris http://games.yahoo.com/blogs/plugged-in/frustrated-wife-puts-gamer-husband-sale-craigslist-192001926.html)” Italicized to emphasize the segments from the source article.

Sometimes traveling through the internet takes you somewhere funny AND awkward

The mystery is solved!

http://www.yahoo.com/_ylt=AoTsdbNzzgm.p7M9X3lEkLKbvZx4;_ylc=X3oDMTczbnBjY2FwBF9TAzIwMjM1MzgwNzUEYQMxMTEwMjkgdmlkZW8gZ3VpbHR5IGRvZyB2BGNwb3MDNwRnA2lkLTczNDczNQRpbnRsA3VzBGl0YwMwBGx0eHQDR3VpbHR5ZG9nZ2l2ZXNoaW1zZWxmYXdheQRwa2d2AzE2BHBvcwMwBHNlYwN0ZC1mZWF0BHNsawN0aHVtYmxpbmsEdGFyA2h0dHA6Ly9hbmltYWx2aWRlb3MueWFob28uY29tL3ZpZGVvLWRldGFpbD92aWQ9MjcwOTUxMzgmY2lkPTI0MDM3NzE0BHRlc3QDNzAx/SIG=12snkepi5/EXP=1320031770/**http%3A//animalvideos.yahoo.com/video-detail%3Fvid=27095138%26cid=24037714

New Approach to marketing kids products featuring fathers – what do you think?

New Ad Campaign for GoGurt – Recognizing Fathers’ increasing numbers in the role as primary or equal share of caretaking for their children, too little and possibly too late, or requires more time and evaluation to decide?

GoGurt is a portable, low fat yogurt introduced by General Mills’ licensed Yoplait in 1999 marketed to children. Time Warner Cable subscribers living in the Southern California region recently may have noticed that the back-to-school advertising for GoGurt is a little different this year. This year, the commercial features a father in the kitchen and putting together a lunch to send out the door and off to school with his child. Yes, there’s still the implication that fathers need some guidance (Really, dad’s don’t need every surface from the hall and actually inside of the refrigerator to be plastered with post-it notes to remember things. My dad and every dad I’ve known/met through the present time hasn’t required more than two reminders at most – it drove him crazy when my parents were having their kitchen gutted and remodeled some years ago because even though they weren’t for him, seeing all the post-it notes my mom wrote saying the same things twice; one in Spanish and another in English and stuck to the appropriate places or items before she left for work were everywhere he looked until it was time for him to leave for work. All those little yellow post-its, with their tendency to get moved or fall off a surface weren’t the best option to my dad, and of course he was the one that my mom complained to when something hadn’t been done right – part of his job in their marriage is to see that mistakes and issues in everything from car repairs to work during a kitchen remodel are fixed. It’s not important to him to choose which pattern or color a new couch is, so he always tells my mom to pick whatever one she likes – all he cares about is having  her there with him, which is far more important than the couch being striped, floral, or plaid). It’s not about the product in the advertisement that’s interesting to me – I hope that putting dads in more commercials will grow and quickly start reflecting fathers as competent parents who can handle the caretaking needs of their children just as well as mothers. The family structures in the United States have changed from what those from the baby boomer generation typically had when growing up and then sought to ‘escape’ from – divorce should never be anything but a last resort with the real emphasis on couples making sure that they really want to get married, which takes time to truly determine. But we can’t go back and change the past, the only thing we can do is put things in place to support our single fathers and our single mothers that honestly focus on what’s best for children; at the same time we should put serious effort into preventing future divorce by changing how people approach marriage – taking time before entering such a major commitment or marrying despite doubts/it’s expected of them/all of the arrangements are made and invitations mailed out (and any other trivial reason).

From General Mills’ website:

“General Mills is proud of its reputation as a “family-friendly” advertiser. We will not produce advertising that would undermine the role of parents and family, or respect for community authorities. General Mills will air advertising only on programming it deems suitable for the family-oriented nature of its brands and products. Special care also is taken to ensure that all marketing messages are inclusive and respectful of ethnic and religious affiliations.”[1]

What do parents, especially fathers who have the role of primary caretaker for their child(ren) – single parent or otherwise – think of this new approach in marketing? Is it a good start towards recognizing that women aren’t the only gender reshaping and redesigning roles? Does it demonstrate that dads are equally important as parents and encouraging them to take an active part in the day-to-day things that are involved with raising their children? Or, is it too little and too late for many – perhaps it needs more time to determine where this approach is going? It could be the start of something truly inspiring on many levels, or it could end where it’s at right now – it’s up to us to decide what kind of future we want our children to live in.

(*note*: the author of ‘the anti’ blog recognizes that T.W. cable provides service throughout the United States, and advertising may or may not vary in a substantial way depending on the region. For information on the policies and advertising practices engaged in by other cable/communications providers in the course of delivering services to subscribers, contact the company operating in your area)

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[1] http://www.generalmills.com/Responsibility/MarketingandAdvertising/Responsible%20advertising.aspx

Some Advice for Young Women Heading Off to College

Whether you’re a student taking classes at a community college and living at home, attending a local private college that requires students live on campus during the first year, or will be going to college on the opposite end of the country so you’ll be as far from home as humanly possible, amongst other options – the end of August and early days of September have long been a time of transition from child to adult. There are different perspectives and though I may be opening myself to attacks from all sides, I think it’s important to address some of the concerns that young women new to college and adulthood are facing from feminists, the social pressures to date and have sex, and other young women.  Young women today have more choices yet as they face an even more uncertain future than ever before, the things that they may be giving up without even knowing it in the early phase – things that may ultimately be lost forever and bring only regrets. College is the practice stage for adult life, and there’s more to learn than what’s taught in the classrooms, but we’ll start with the campus sentries from “women’s studies” and go from there.

Feminists like to get started on whipping the incoming freshmen into a frenzy as early as possible. Don’t be surprised if you’re a female student and just opened the first thing you’re about to unpack and out of nowhere someone is giving you a flyer listing the schedule of ‘sex safety’ presentations at the student center on campus. I couldn’t tell you why, but for whatever reason, they’ve always got a few weirdos who say something happened a certain way when it didn’t, and that’s WRONG:

I’m not saying that every young woman reporting to campus or local police that she’s been raped is lying – if a rape happens once that’s one time too many. But I do have a problem with someone who chooses to lie about being raped for whatever reason, because there’s no acceptable, justifiable reason EVER to cost real rape victims even a fraction of their credibility or permanently damage someone in the ‘court of public opinion’ because you were angry/hurt and wanted to get back at them.

There is such a thing as overreacting though – men shouldn’t be expected to constantly monitor their behaviors to ensure that none of it can be considered even remotely threatening, creepy, or displaying that he is sexually attracted to a woman. Men should be able to walk behind women on the same side of the street without being considered possible rapists closing in on their prey. Young women don’t need to be paranoid about every little thing and fear every possible rapist that might be waiting around the next dark corner – though the feminists on campus would like them to believe differently – they simply need to start learning how to take responsibility for themselves. (Yeah, I know some people think that is easier said than done – get college girls to take responsibility in anything, from the grades they earn to the reputation their behavior is getting them!? Impossible!) Well, scaring the HELL out of them hasn’t worked might as well try showing them that there’s another way. Being aware of your surroundings, avoiding situations where heavy alcohol consumption takes place, NEVER separating from the friends that you go out with – arrive together, leave together; no paranoia needed, no worries that the guy that just got into the elevator is a rapist (he just wanted to ask you out for coffee). I’m not claiming that we don’t have plenty of bad things going on in the world, or that it’s impossible for any one individual to end up being a victim of a sex crime. Whether it’s statistically more likely to happen during any particular time in a person’s life? That question seems to result in more questions and few (if any) real answers.

It’s a sad fact that other women are a woman’s worst enemies. It starts on the playground when little girls start forming groups based on popularity determined by their looks and having the “in” style of clothing, followed by their scholastic and athletic/physical-related activity such as dance. Girls begin competing with other girls early on; as they mature, other dynamics begin to show up as well. In recent years, violence between girls has been so much more visible to the public than ever before – it was going on just as much previously although no one went public after taping it. In college the way women will hate on each other manifests in a wide range of ways. When we give anyone our trust without them earning it, we are inviting them to betray us. For all of the women who hate on other women: there will always be someone prettier, someone smarter, someone better – and you will be prettier, smarter, and better than someone else (pretty is a relative term) – hating on people won’t change your dna or fix your life. If you only got the lead because you pushed someone down the stairs, you’re going to lose it to someone else the same way you got it. How is this relevant to young women going off to college? Well, from the dorms to sorority pledging, there are a lot of young women and a lot of competition going on. They compete for attention, friends, acceptance, guys, etc. Sometimes, that competition can get downright mean. If you don’t want anyone to know about something you’ve done, or have sworn someone to secrecy about it – you’ll see who has been spending a lot of time on making a list of reasons why they hate you, and keeping detailed notes about what you tell them in confidence – when it’s most beneficial for them and the worst timing for you. (…Things were going really well but I had a falling-out with one of my best friends and she decided to e-mail him every gruesome detail about what I had done to betray him. And by every detail… I mean EVERY detail, including some pretty disgusting lies…http://bittersingleguy.com/the-bsg-sides-with-cinderella/)

The final topic for this post is dating while in college. I’d personally advise college students of any gender to focus on their studies and earning their degree with minimal distractions or delays – unless you’re independently wealthy, or your family is, and hence the immense costs associated with going to college are irrelevant for rich kids such as yourself. And you don’t need to feel as though you have to be friends with everyone you meet during your college years – but you don’t have to succumb to the pressures of dating and having sex, whether in a relationship or casually. Many young women leave college carrying a ton of emotional baggage from their sexual encounters and romantic relationships where sex was involved – it is difficult to overcome this weight, which is necessary if they wish to have a successful marriage relationship for their future.

ARE YOU A COLLEGE STUDENT WITH QUESTIONS OR LOOKING FOR SOME ADVICE? ASK AWAY – I CAN’T PROMISE PERFECT ANSWERS, BUT I’M WILLING TO GIVE IT A SHOT.

(Ms.Exceptiontotherule wrote and 1st published to this blog; 2011/2012)

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