Motley Moose – Archive

Let me preface all this by saying that, since I grew up with hardcore white Republicans (family and friends) in the Deep South, I’m pretty familiar with distasteful “humor.” I’m not trying to stereotype — I’m just speaking from my experience. I have heard more… questionable jokes in my lifetime than I can count. Racist jokes, sexist jokes, “dead baby” jokes, and plenty of other nasty attempts at humor.

That said…

I am hard-pressed to think of an occasion when I’ve come across a more offensive attempt at getting a laugh than this one:

Hi everyone!

I’d like to pen something super-serious and politically relevant, but I don’t have the attention span at the moment. So instead, I’ll just ask you all to describe your holiday traditions this time of year. What, if anything, do you do? Songs, movies, decorations, presents, family, food, rituals… what do the holidays entail for you? Anything you can think of. Any culture, any religion, any background, any upbringing, or any lack thereof. Tell me about it!

I have touched on the topic of stigma against the mentally ill before, so I’m taking bits and pieces of research from that previous diary. But I’d like to revisit it here in a slightly different way. There was a statement made in another diary the other day that brought this to mind. Someone elsewhere in the blogosphere suggested that the mentally ill should be imprisoned “just like sex offenders” until doctors could determine that they were safe for society. I’m assuming that it was not intended as it was written (I certainly hope not), but unfortunately, there are many out there who do actually think this way.

Ouch.

Hillary Clinton is no stranger to Republican animosity. She has arguably endured harsher and more frequent criticism from the Right, over a lengthier period of time, than any other modern public figure. She is also no amateur when it comes to navigating her way through Congressional hearings. She has always been proficient at holding her head high in the face of controversy, whether or not any of the “fault” for such turmoil truly rested on her shoulders. After months of vilifying the Obama administration and demonizing Clinton over the Benghazi terror attacks, Republicans have been eagerly awaiting the opportunity to theatrically grill her in front of plenty of cameras. When her testimony on Benghazi was briefly delayed due to illness, she was accused of faking it to avoid facing Congress.  One can’t help but wonder whether these buffoons are suffering from concussions of their own.

Stigma is a more complicated concept than one might initially guess upon mere casual consideration. Definitionally relatively simple, the causes, mechanisms, and consequences of social stigma are myriad and complex. You can find stigma, of one sort or another, most anywhere you look. Stigma will thrive in society wherever ignorance or fear or hatred of that which is “different” are acceptable mentalities. The tendency to stigmatize, label, and set certain groups/individuals apart from the rest of society as “other” is, to an extent, human nature. The need to categorize people, places, and things is normal — it’s just a function of how our brains work. We run into problems, however, when we begin allowing categories and labels to exclude and define people.

Ummm, I guess I haz been volunteered?

Hey there all you Moose!

Don’t anyone FP this on impulse or anything… this is not some profound philosophical treatise on the origins and journeys of humankind.

I mean seriously, where the hell is everyone?

Every time the Moose got slow in recent years, I said to myself, “Just wait til election season 2012.” Now here we are and most folks are… uh, where?

I see some of you piddling about with a comment here, a comment there… but… where is everyone? Where is my John? Where is my Holz? Where are you all?

What is happening in everyone’s lives? I know what’s happening in mine. An abridged version: I got dumped, I moved back to my hometown which caused me to lose the job I’d held in my former living situation, and am now working at the first place that would take me… an ophthalmologist’s office. (I absolutely fucking HATE it, in case anyone is wondering.) I am tired and stressed and defeated, but I am alive (enough).

But where… where… where is everyone else?

Just for overflow since the other threads are getting long and heading toward confusing-ish.

Yammer on if awake and bored.