I'm on MySpace. No, I'm not trying to pick up on 13-year-old girls, or even trying to get on TV by picking up on a decoy who is working with Chris Hanson of Dateline NBC. I find MySpace helpful because it gathers together many different elements of online communication into one place. I can share pictures and communicated with friends and family all over the world. I clearly state in my profile that I'm happily married and not looking for romatic or sexual attention outside of my marriage.
Anyway, one of my "friends" is a woman with whom I went to high school, for three years at least. She's divorced and raising two boys. Not long ago, she decided to move herself and her boys into her boyfriend's place.
Bad move, of course. But do you think she would listen to reason? Of course now.
I've noticed how much she badmouths her ex. Just recently her update was "[name redacted] IS AT HOME TRYING TO MEND MY KIDS BROKEN HEART FROM THERE FATHER WHO IS AN A-HOLE"
Notice the use of "THERE" instead of "THEIR", and the singular "HEART". But that's not really important.
What's important is... she picked this "A-HOLE". He turned her on enough that she married him and let him impregnate her... twice. Did he magically turn into a jerk after the second kid? My guess is no. He was a jerk all along, and that's what turned her on about him. Until she finally realized that jerks don't make good husbands or fathers.
So her boys are left without their father, and a mother who dates and posts inappropriate stuff online. And now they are living with a man who is not their father and is not married to their mother.
Now, I'm not going to sit here and tell you I haven't made some major mistakes in my life. Oh, I've blown it big time over and over again. There's no doubt about it - I need a Saviour, and I'm so thankful I know Him. But just because I'm not perfect doesn't mean I'm not going write about mistakes other people are making, too. I pray that I will stay focused on Him, and treat my wife in a way that represents His love, so that our marriage will stay strong and happy, and we never subject our children to the pain of divorce.
Finally... ladies... remember.... that jerk turned you on enough that you had sex with him. In some cases, the sex was so good that you married him.
This is one reason why some men consciously act like jerks. It gets the results for which they are looking.
Showing posts with label MySpace. Show all posts
Showing posts with label MySpace. Show all posts
Sunday, June 22, 2008
Tuesday, January 08, 2008
Get With It on Technology, Dr. Laura
As I’ve written before, although Dr. Laura is usually right-on, she’s off on her contempt for certain technologies, such as interactive games, social networking sites, instant messaging, and blogs. Yeah, I know there is a lot of pure dung out there about her on blogs, but blogging should not be dismissed with a broad brush. She even has her own blog. Kind of. It’s really more just columns stacked on top of one another. Kind of like right here.
Anyway, there was a caller on today’s show who was complaining that her husband spent a lot of time on games, MySpace, and instant messaging with his friends, and without finding out exactly how much time or exactly what he was using the technologies for, Dr. Laura immediately dismissed him as a “15 year-old” and advised that the woman tell her husband that it was time to put away childish things.
I’m not going to rehash everything from my previous post. But just because the youth is quickest to adapt to new technologies, doesn’t mean using them should be equated with immaturity. I realize that Dr. Laura long ago “made it” and is very successful and got through much of life without these things, but many successful, mature adults with balanced lives find social networking and instant messaging to be a great way to keep in touch with family and friends, work jointly on projects, develop professional contacts, and share experiences with other people in the same situation (expecting mothers in the same month of pregnancy, for one example, or people losing extra weight, for another). In some industries, if you don’t have an online presence you simply don’t exist.
I also fail to see how playing games should be automatically any different than watching TV or reading a magazine, activities during with most people don’t interact with other people in the room.
Dr. Laura understands that men have a need for sex. That drive is there at 15. But she doesn’t accuse horny husbands of being 15. Likewise, some men enjoy playing games. Me? I gave them up when I was a teen, but I know others my age who still play them.
So while some things, like moral rights and wrongs, don’t change and Dr. Laura should stick to her guns, other things, like technology, move on, and change should be embraced, as long as it isn’t illegal, immoral, or fattening.
As for the caller – if that’s the way her man was before they married, she should have discussed what her expectations would be in the marriage BEFORE she ordered the wedding cake. There are very few things about a man that should or will automatically change because he went through a wedding ceremony. I'm sure there are things she does that he doesn't understand.
Anyway, there was a caller on today’s show who was complaining that her husband spent a lot of time on games, MySpace, and instant messaging with his friends, and without finding out exactly how much time or exactly what he was using the technologies for, Dr. Laura immediately dismissed him as a “15 year-old” and advised that the woman tell her husband that it was time to put away childish things.
I’m not going to rehash everything from my previous post. But just because the youth is quickest to adapt to new technologies, doesn’t mean using them should be equated with immaturity. I realize that Dr. Laura long ago “made it” and is very successful and got through much of life without these things, but many successful, mature adults with balanced lives find social networking and instant messaging to be a great way to keep in touch with family and friends, work jointly on projects, develop professional contacts, and share experiences with other people in the same situation (expecting mothers in the same month of pregnancy, for one example, or people losing extra weight, for another). In some industries, if you don’t have an online presence you simply don’t exist.
I also fail to see how playing games should be automatically any different than watching TV or reading a magazine, activities during with most people don’t interact with other people in the room.
Dr. Laura understands that men have a need for sex. That drive is there at 15. But she doesn’t accuse horny husbands of being 15. Likewise, some men enjoy playing games. Me? I gave them up when I was a teen, but I know others my age who still play them.
So while some things, like moral rights and wrongs, don’t change and Dr. Laura should stick to her guns, other things, like technology, move on, and change should be embraced, as long as it isn’t illegal, immoral, or fattening.
As for the caller – if that’s the way her man was before they married, she should have discussed what her expectations would be in the marriage BEFORE she ordered the wedding cake. There are very few things about a man that should or will automatically change because he went through a wedding ceremony. I'm sure there are things she does that he doesn't understand.
Thursday, August 02, 2007
Dr. Laura Blames Technology When Users at Fault
I like Dr. Laura. I understand why she does her show the way she does. I find it entertaining radio. I listen. Also, I agree with almost everything she says. I particularly like to hear calls from people who clearly have no idea who they are calling, and they get shocked that she doesn’t give them some touchy-feely New Age answer-du-jour, but rather a cold dose of reality.
I know, I know. Some people hate her because she doesn’t spend half an hour coddling the feelings of each caller.
Or they hate her because she thinks of marriage as holy matrimony and thinks that sex is best saved for marriage. Or they hate her because she thinks they ought not to slaughter their own babies. Or they hate her because she encourages parents to raise their own children. Or they hate her because she encourages husbands and wives to tend to each others’ needs. Or they hate her because she thinks we should kill terrorists before they kill us. Radical positions, I know. I don’t have a problem with any of these.
Every once in a while, though, I think she is completely wrong about something.
Today, I heard Dr. Laura bash/summarily dismiss MySpace.com as being “juvenile”.
Now, I understand that she’s had at least one really bad experience with MySpace. Her deployed paratrooper son’s MySpace page (or at least a page that claimed to be his) gained negative attention when it displayed offensive material. I don’t know what the ultimate conclusion was – whether or not he put the material there or someone else did. Let’s assume for the sake of this argument that someone else put it there against his will.
So what?
We’ve had harmful impersonators, frauds, and identity thieves around for a lot longer than MySpace.
MySpace isn’t the problem. MySpace is nothing more than a convenient collection of online features - many of which previously existed and were typical - in one place. MySpace is a web space host, an e-mail host, a photo album host, a search engine, etc. combined. Dr. Laura has her own website that takes e-mail. It isn’t at MySpace, but most people can’t hire a professional to design and run their own website. MySpace does it for them. Hence, the popularity.
I see “the Internet” get blamed for a lot of problems when it is really nothing more than a street corner, a post office, a library, a TV, and a store. Freaks, criminals, immature people, and liars hang out in those places, too. Saying that they "met on the Internet" is like saying "they met on the street corner". Do you stop using the streets?
Predators existed before chat rooms. While online communications have given them the ability to communicate with the children of strangers and show them inappropriate material from the comfort of their own homes, things like MySpace are hardly the problem. The problem is the evil predator.
There are ways to avoid having your child preyed upon online. Keep communication devices, such as networked computers, in common areas of the home. Don’t let them be home alone. Make sure they have enough sense not to go somewhere without an adult to meet someone they’ve never met. In the event they are home alone, make sure they have enough sense not to allow someone to come over. Don’t let them hang out unsupervised in the homes of kids who don’t have enough sense in these areas. You can protect yourself from those who prey on adults by using some common sense. Always meet someone new in a safe public place until you know enough about them to be in private with them.
Sure, people can put up a false front online, but they can do that in person, too. You think meeting someone (even regularly) in a bar, a club, a restaurant, a class, or even a church really reveals the totality of who they are as a person? No way. You learn who they are by spending time with them in different situations, communicating, meeting their friends and family, etc.
It’s okay for adults to meet each other online. What’s not okay is letting yourself believe that chatting, e-mailing, sharing pictures/audio/video is the equivalent of a face-to-face relationship. It’s not. Meet online, and if there appears to be potential, move along to actually spending time together. Otherwise, you are pen pals and nothing more.
Then there are the reports that try to shock us by telling us how many “sex offenders” are on MySpace (or in a given neighborhood). There are many who have cell phones and postage stamps, too. Run for the hills!
Seriously, though, yes, it is good thing to know who the rapists, flashers, and child molesters are so we can avoid them, and to keep them from contacting children. But the term “sex offender” includes much, much more than that. Homosexuals were legally sex offenders not long ago. It’s illegal in some places to have sex toys. I’m not really concerned that streetwalkers or their customers will be contacting my children via MySpace. Having (consensual) sex with a 17-year-old, no matter what your age, can get you labeled as a sex offender in some places, even though the public schools will hand them a condom and teach them how to use it. I’m not condoning fornicating with underage persons or with anyone, for that matter. Just making the point that there is a difference between someone who rapes seven-year-olds and an 18-year-old guy who fornicates with the 17-year-old.
Getting back to Dr Laura – the call that prompted her comments was from a young woman who was upset about comments her boyfriend made before he was her boyfriend on another woman’s online picture, calling her beautiful. Dr. Laura said that her boyfriend was being juvenile. Really? Having told other women in the past that they look beautiful or that they look good in a picture is juvenile? I don’t think Dr. Laura was thinking clearly at that point - I think her emotions were clouding her thinking.
She did say something during the call that was more to the heart of the matter – the youth (and not-so-youth) culture these days that promotes immodesty and promiscuous “hooking up” and glorifies partying and posting evidence of your partying online. That’s a cultural problem, not a problem with MySpace.
Dr. Laura’s line of reasoning could be used to scrap the Internet entirely, phones, and even cars. After all, while the pill was an accelerant of the sexual revolution, the automobile was the real start of the fornication culture we’re now in.
Don’t blame the technology. Don’t shoot the messenger. It’s the people. And although it is true that online communications have now allowed freaky perverts to network around the world, it also allows those who seek to protect and nurture children and uplift culture to network as well.
Like I wrote at the start of this post - I like Dr. Laura. That's why I hate to see her lessen her credibility with a growing number of people who now use sites like MySpace the way people were using ISP-provided websites ten years ago. She needs to promote the cautious and positive use of technology, not the broadbrush dismissal of it.
I know, I know. Some people hate her because she doesn’t spend half an hour coddling the feelings of each caller.
Or they hate her because she thinks of marriage as holy matrimony and thinks that sex is best saved for marriage. Or they hate her because she thinks they ought not to slaughter their own babies. Or they hate her because she encourages parents to raise their own children. Or they hate her because she encourages husbands and wives to tend to each others’ needs. Or they hate her because she thinks we should kill terrorists before they kill us. Radical positions, I know. I don’t have a problem with any of these.
Every once in a while, though, I think she is completely wrong about something.
Today, I heard Dr. Laura bash/summarily dismiss MySpace.com as being “juvenile”.
Now, I understand that she’s had at least one really bad experience with MySpace. Her deployed paratrooper son’s MySpace page (or at least a page that claimed to be his) gained negative attention when it displayed offensive material. I don’t know what the ultimate conclusion was – whether or not he put the material there or someone else did. Let’s assume for the sake of this argument that someone else put it there against his will.
So what?
We’ve had harmful impersonators, frauds, and identity thieves around for a lot longer than MySpace.
MySpace isn’t the problem. MySpace is nothing more than a convenient collection of online features - many of which previously existed and were typical - in one place. MySpace is a web space host, an e-mail host, a photo album host, a search engine, etc. combined. Dr. Laura has her own website that takes e-mail. It isn’t at MySpace, but most people can’t hire a professional to design and run their own website. MySpace does it for them. Hence, the popularity.
I see “the Internet” get blamed for a lot of problems when it is really nothing more than a street corner, a post office, a library, a TV, and a store. Freaks, criminals, immature people, and liars hang out in those places, too. Saying that they "met on the Internet" is like saying "they met on the street corner". Do you stop using the streets?
Predators existed before chat rooms. While online communications have given them the ability to communicate with the children of strangers and show them inappropriate material from the comfort of their own homes, things like MySpace are hardly the problem. The problem is the evil predator.
There are ways to avoid having your child preyed upon online. Keep communication devices, such as networked computers, in common areas of the home. Don’t let them be home alone. Make sure they have enough sense not to go somewhere without an adult to meet someone they’ve never met. In the event they are home alone, make sure they have enough sense not to allow someone to come over. Don’t let them hang out unsupervised in the homes of kids who don’t have enough sense in these areas. You can protect yourself from those who prey on adults by using some common sense. Always meet someone new in a safe public place until you know enough about them to be in private with them.
Sure, people can put up a false front online, but they can do that in person, too. You think meeting someone (even regularly) in a bar, a club, a restaurant, a class, or even a church really reveals the totality of who they are as a person? No way. You learn who they are by spending time with them in different situations, communicating, meeting their friends and family, etc.
It’s okay for adults to meet each other online. What’s not okay is letting yourself believe that chatting, e-mailing, sharing pictures/audio/video is the equivalent of a face-to-face relationship. It’s not. Meet online, and if there appears to be potential, move along to actually spending time together. Otherwise, you are pen pals and nothing more.
Then there are the reports that try to shock us by telling us how many “sex offenders” are on MySpace (or in a given neighborhood). There are many who have cell phones and postage stamps, too. Run for the hills!
Seriously, though, yes, it is good thing to know who the rapists, flashers, and child molesters are so we can avoid them, and to keep them from contacting children. But the term “sex offender” includes much, much more than that. Homosexuals were legally sex offenders not long ago. It’s illegal in some places to have sex toys. I’m not really concerned that streetwalkers or their customers will be contacting my children via MySpace. Having (consensual) sex with a 17-year-old, no matter what your age, can get you labeled as a sex offender in some places, even though the public schools will hand them a condom and teach them how to use it. I’m not condoning fornicating with underage persons or with anyone, for that matter. Just making the point that there is a difference between someone who rapes seven-year-olds and an 18-year-old guy who fornicates with the 17-year-old.
Getting back to Dr Laura – the call that prompted her comments was from a young woman who was upset about comments her boyfriend made before he was her boyfriend on another woman’s online picture, calling her beautiful. Dr. Laura said that her boyfriend was being juvenile. Really? Having told other women in the past that they look beautiful or that they look good in a picture is juvenile? I don’t think Dr. Laura was thinking clearly at that point - I think her emotions were clouding her thinking.
She did say something during the call that was more to the heart of the matter – the youth (and not-so-youth) culture these days that promotes immodesty and promiscuous “hooking up” and glorifies partying and posting evidence of your partying online. That’s a cultural problem, not a problem with MySpace.
Dr. Laura’s line of reasoning could be used to scrap the Internet entirely, phones, and even cars. After all, while the pill was an accelerant of the sexual revolution, the automobile was the real start of the fornication culture we’re now in.
Don’t blame the technology. Don’t shoot the messenger. It’s the people. And although it is true that online communications have now allowed freaky perverts to network around the world, it also allows those who seek to protect and nurture children and uplift culture to network as well.
Like I wrote at the start of this post - I like Dr. Laura. That's why I hate to see her lessen her credibility with a growing number of people who now use sites like MySpace the way people were using ISP-provided websites ten years ago. She needs to promote the cautious and positive use of technology, not the broadbrush dismissal of it.
Tuesday, February 20, 2007
Let's Just Be Friends
This is one of those things that gets sent around in e-mail and on MySpace. It’s bad enough when schoolgirls do it, but for grown women to send it around is ridiculous.
====================================
Am I pretty enough now? sad but true
Girl:I have to tell you something.
Boy: What?
Girl: I really like you. And I... I think I'm falling in love with you.
Boy: Ok...
Girl: What do you mean "ok"?
Boy: I don't like you like that...
Girl: Why not?
Boy: I can't tell you... maybe another time...
From then on, the girl kept asking the boy "Why not?" whenever she saw him, and he kept answering the same answer of "I'll tell you later." Finally the girl got fed up.
Girl: I'm tired of this! Tell me why you don't like me!
Boy: Do you really wanna know why?
Girl: Yes!
Boy: It's because you're uglier than ANYTHING! What's the point of going out with someone when they're not pretty?!
Girl: But... I...
Boy: Just shut up and leave me alone!
The boy leaves and the girl is sitting there alone, crying her heart out. Then her cell phone rings.
Girl: Hello?
Mom: Sweetheart? I want you to go home, ok? I'lI be home from work in a few hours.
Girl: Alright Mom.
Mom: I love you.
Girl: I love you too, Mom.
Mom: Bye Bye.
Girl: Bye
The girl heads home and once she got there, she went in the bathroom and looked at herself in the mirror.
Girl: I'm not pretty enough...
She set to work, knowing fully well what she was going to do. 2 hours later, her Mom came home and heard the bath water running. She went upstairs to find the hallway flooded so she knocked on the door.
Mom: Honey? Are you alright?
She opened the door and was shocked at the site. The bath was overflowing onto the floor, and the water was tinted red. She walked over to see what was inside and screamed. There, her little girl was lying with cuts all over her face and wrists. Her Mom backed away and was going to run to call the police when something caught her eye. On the mirror, am I pretty enough now?
No one deserves to be told that by someone they love. If you find it messed up then forward this to everyone you know.
A person's appearance doesn't count. What counts is their heart inside of them and their personality. No one wants to be told they're not good enough...
Repost this in 5 Min or something bad will happen 2 U tomorrow
=================================
Yes, it was finished off with the always-lame threat that you’d better forward it our something bad would happen.
Any girl who’d kill herself over this already had problems, and it isn’t the responsibility of every boy in the world to lie to her and tell her he’s attracted to her when he’s not.
Well, I think it is time to offer a similar story from a male perspective. I don’t hate women, I don’t hate girls. I’m just a man who needs to vent and needs to mock such tripe, and I do disdain women who shun traditional roles, use and manipulate men, date and marry jerks, and then have the audacity to expect men to still live by old rules and to treat them like ladies. Here goes
Am I rich enough now? sad but true
Boy: I have to tell you something.
Girl: What?
Boy: I really like you. And I... I think I'm falling in love with you.
Girl: Ok...
Boy: What do you mean "ok"?
Girl: I don't like you like that...
Boy: Why not?
Girl: I can't tell you... maybe another time...
From then on, the boy kept asking the girl "Why not?" whenever he saw her, and she kept answering the same answer of "I'll tell you later." Meanwhile, she ran to the school administration and filed a sexual harassment complaint, and the boy got kicked out of school. Finally the boy got fed up.
Boy: I'm tired of this! Tell me why you don't like me!
Girl: Do you really wanna know why?
Boy: Yes!
Girl: It’s because you don’t have any money. Look at your CAR! What's the point of going out with someone when they can’t buy me an expensive dinner?!?
Boy: But... I...
Girl: Just shut up and leave me alone! I have a restraining order!
The girl leaves and the biy is sitting there alone, crying his heart out. Then his cell phone rings.
Boy: Hello?
Mom: Sweetheart? I want you to go home, ok? I'lI be home from work in a few hours.
Boy: Alright Mom.
Mom: I love you.
Boy: I love you too, Mom.
Mom: Bye Bye.
Boy: Bye
The boy heads home and once he got there, he went in the bathroom and looked at himself in the mirror.
Boy: I'm not rich enough… time to get over that chick.
He set to work, knowing fully well what se was going to do. 2 hours later, his Mom came home and heard the bath water running. She went upstairs to find the hallway flooded so she knocked on the door.
Mom: Honey? Are you alright?
She opened the door and was shocked at the site. Her teenage boy was in the shower with the neighborhood tramp, too involved in his sin to notice that they were no longer alone. And now he has the clap.
A person's bank account doesn't count. What counts is their heart inside of them and their personality. No one wants to be told they're not good enough...
====================================
Am I pretty enough now? sad but true
Girl:I have to tell you something.
Boy: What?
Girl: I really like you. And I... I think I'm falling in love with you.
Boy: Ok...
Girl: What do you mean "ok"?
Boy: I don't like you like that...
Girl: Why not?
Boy: I can't tell you... maybe another time...
From then on, the girl kept asking the boy "Why not?" whenever she saw him, and he kept answering the same answer of "I'll tell you later." Finally the girl got fed up.
Girl: I'm tired of this! Tell me why you don't like me!
Boy: Do you really wanna know why?
Girl: Yes!
Boy: It's because you're uglier than ANYTHING! What's the point of going out with someone when they're not pretty?!
Girl: But... I...
Boy: Just shut up and leave me alone!
The boy leaves and the girl is sitting there alone, crying her heart out. Then her cell phone rings.
Girl: Hello?
Mom: Sweetheart? I want you to go home, ok? I'lI be home from work in a few hours.
Girl: Alright Mom.
Mom: I love you.
Girl: I love you too, Mom.
Mom: Bye Bye.
Girl: Bye
The girl heads home and once she got there, she went in the bathroom and looked at herself in the mirror.
Girl: I'm not pretty enough...
She set to work, knowing fully well what she was going to do. 2 hours later, her Mom came home and heard the bath water running. She went upstairs to find the hallway flooded so she knocked on the door.
Mom: Honey? Are you alright?
She opened the door and was shocked at the site. The bath was overflowing onto the floor, and the water was tinted red. She walked over to see what was inside and screamed. There, her little girl was lying with cuts all over her face and wrists. Her Mom backed away and was going to run to call the police when something caught her eye. On the mirror, am I pretty enough now?
No one deserves to be told that by someone they love. If you find it messed up then forward this to everyone you know.
A person's appearance doesn't count. What counts is their heart inside of them and their personality. No one wants to be told they're not good enough...
Repost this in 5 Min or something bad will happen 2 U tomorrow
=================================
Yes, it was finished off with the always-lame threat that you’d better forward it our something bad would happen.
Any girl who’d kill herself over this already had problems, and it isn’t the responsibility of every boy in the world to lie to her and tell her he’s attracted to her when he’s not.
Well, I think it is time to offer a similar story from a male perspective. I don’t hate women, I don’t hate girls. I’m just a man who needs to vent and needs to mock such tripe, and I do disdain women who shun traditional roles, use and manipulate men, date and marry jerks, and then have the audacity to expect men to still live by old rules and to treat them like ladies. Here goes
Am I rich enough now? sad but true
Boy: I have to tell you something.
Girl: What?
Boy: I really like you. And I... I think I'm falling in love with you.
Girl: Ok...
Boy: What do you mean "ok"?
Girl: I don't like you like that...
Boy: Why not?
Girl: I can't tell you... maybe another time...
From then on, the boy kept asking the girl "Why not?" whenever he saw her, and she kept answering the same answer of "I'll tell you later." Meanwhile, she ran to the school administration and filed a sexual harassment complaint, and the boy got kicked out of school. Finally the boy got fed up.
Boy: I'm tired of this! Tell me why you don't like me!
Girl: Do you really wanna know why?
Boy: Yes!
Girl: It’s because you don’t have any money. Look at your CAR! What's the point of going out with someone when they can’t buy me an expensive dinner?!?
Boy: But... I...
Girl: Just shut up and leave me alone! I have a restraining order!
The girl leaves and the biy is sitting there alone, crying his heart out. Then his cell phone rings.
Boy: Hello?
Mom: Sweetheart? I want you to go home, ok? I'lI be home from work in a few hours.
Boy: Alright Mom.
Mom: I love you.
Boy: I love you too, Mom.
Mom: Bye Bye.
Boy: Bye
The boy heads home and once he got there, he went in the bathroom and looked at himself in the mirror.
Boy: I'm not rich enough… time to get over that chick.
He set to work, knowing fully well what se was going to do. 2 hours later, his Mom came home and heard the bath water running. She went upstairs to find the hallway flooded so she knocked on the door.
Mom: Honey? Are you alright?
She opened the door and was shocked at the site. Her teenage boy was in the shower with the neighborhood tramp, too involved in his sin to notice that they were no longer alone. And now he has the clap.
A person's bank account doesn't count. What counts is their heart inside of them and their personality. No one wants to be told they're not good enough...
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