Shapeshifters, Sexy Ghosts, and Other Mysterious Blobs

Posted on 07/27/2008 by Jane Devin

I recently had cause to remember The Year that Blew My Mind. It wasn’t mind-blowing in a good way – the oyster of the world didn’t open up and reveal any grand pearls of wisdom – instead, my gray matter was challenged to find reason for the unreasonable, and causes for the inexcusable. The resulting implosion left my mind scattered across a parallel universe, in which people made no sense, and reality could shape-shift like Play-Doh. In that world, people could mold their own blobs of facts and opinions without any regard for the actual truth or evidence of a thing. They could believe that Elvis is still alive, the Holocaust never happened, and that George W. Bush was a great President.

One of the blobs I recall came from a philosophy class, in the form of a particularly stubborn student who sought support for his shapeshifting opinion. “Reality is all just what we believe,” he said. “If I didn’t believe this Pepsi can existed, then it wouldn’t exist.” No matter how others argued that the Pepsi can was a material fact that existed independently of his thoughts – that it would exist with or without his belief in it – the student persisted in a type of egotistical thinking that left him in charge not only of objects in his own path, but that gave him the God-like ability to change matter into non-matter.

Outside of that class, I had never run across people who were prone to believe that a Pepsi can – or any objective fact – couldn’t really exist without their permission. They may have had differentiating opinions and beliefs, but they were based on some part of reality, even if cherry-picked to meet a personal need, belief, or preference.

For instance, I once had a neighbor who was enthralled with Tammy Faye Baker. For reasons that escaped me, he just adored the heavily made-up Queen of PTL and religious scandal. When I brought up issues like 24K gold bathrooms, “seeds of faith”, and vulnerable, workaday investors, he didn’t deny the facts – he simply hand-picked which ones were more important to him. She was funny, and charismatic, and he thought she had paid enough for her crimes. He chose beliefs that best met his personal concept.

And we all do that to some extent, particularly for people we love or admire, or even hate. We often magnify either the good or the bad, until the good is shined to a heroic luster, or the bad is blown up to villainous infamy. Reams of poetry are written for new lovers, who are coddled in the glow of novelty, while scathing diatribes are written about former lovers, who became stale, hurtful, or disappointing in some way.

In the world of shape-shifting reality though, Tammy Faye Baker might be Mother Theresa in same-sex drag. Maybe those tears she shed were really the sweat of Jesus and his twelve drag afficionados.

Lovers, past or present, may be wiped from existence with the stroke of a new memory. Maybe that drunken one night stand didn’t really happen. Maybe people just woke up naked together because they were recreating Rodan’s The Kiss for artistic reasons when they were suddenly felled by the sleeping disease African trypanosomiasis. Maybe, too, the lover in question wasn’t really a human being, but a sex-starved ghost like the one who visited Anna Nicole.

After living through The Year that Blew My Mind, I gathered up my gray matter to ask a singular question about the shapeshifters: Why? The singular answer that came back to me was Motive.

As complex creatures, we are connected to each other not only by DNA, but by story, opinion, and belief. We lack no opportunities to hand-pick facts and beliefs that best fit our individual paradigms. We can overlook bad traits in those we love because their love makes us feel great, and feeling great is more important than finding fault. When the bloom falls off the rose, and love lessens, then the bad thing we once ignored suddenly overwhelms everything else. The wet towels left on the floor become a symbol of disrespect – the forgotten anniversary becomes evidence that he or she never cared in the first place. Opportunities to connect or disconnect abound, and are most often reasonable, even if often exaggerated. Wet towels and forgotten anniversaries are annoying, and can be symptomatic of a larger problem.

The question in the shape-shifting world, though, is why people seek to change material fact or create whole new matter altogether. The answers are as varied as the motives.

Recently, I heard a story about two friends who had a private conversation. One of those friends then went and shared that conversation with another friend. That friend then made their conversation public, and a joke was taken wildly out of context and used as ammunition against friends #1 and #2. People formed strong opinions based on misunderstood third-hand evidence, but no one – not a single person – thought to question the motives of friend #3, whose actions had a rolling stone effect of harm and damages. There’s little doubt that she knew it would, as the resulting fallout proved, yet the major role she played in creating strife went unchecked. Motive? To create drama and gain attention. Mission accomplished.

Closer to home, The Bastard continues to make up rules as he goes along, leaving devastation and despair in his wake. His motive is to feel more powerful, and to exert what power he does have in ways that buoys his flagging ego. Mission accomplished.

Bush, Cheney, and Company continue to reorder matter and facts in their Invisible Pepsi Can world, where an “axis of evil” exists against the backdrop of the All-Mighty, All-Good, All-Powerful capitalist structure of America. WMD’s exist, then they don’t. Soldiers die, but it’s not all that sad if they hide the coffins from public view. It’s not about the oil, but then it is – oil companies who haven’t been in Iraq for 36 years now have no-bid contracts. The mission is really, finally accomplished.

Those of us who believe in objective truth can’t let ourselves be undone by those who believe that the world spins on an shape-shifting, make-believe axis. The truth of both fact and matter will eventually bear out, no matter how many people choose to create blobs of something else.

The shapeshifters are frustrating (and even frightening when they hold power), but by examining their motives – by asking just that one question – we can better understand the world they live in and avoid getting caught up in their crazy-making blobs.

Share this:

Stalkerazzi Laws May Get Some Teeth

Posted on 02/13/2008 by Jane Devin

After the taxpayers of Los Angeles shelled out $25,000 in expenses to protect the public and a young celebrity during her recent trip to a hospital, L.A. Councilman Dennis Zine proposed a new “buffer zone” law that will effect the most rabid of paparazzi — namely those who gather in large swarms, blazing flashbulbs within inches of their target — going so far as to stand in front of vehicles, or engaging in dangerous road chases, all for the sake of a celebrity snapshot.

While California does have some paparazzi laws in place, photographers are rarely cited and when they are the charges are usually misdemeanor, rather than criminal, offenses. Zine’s proposal, at this juncture, looks like it would criminalize the ambush tactics used by paparazzi who fail to keep a reasonable distance from their target, or who engage in dangerous chases.

I believe that stronger laws are necessary and overdue. After Princess Diana’s death, the public was treated to a few moments of a tabloid-driven media that seemed to be examining its conscience. Unfortunately, those moments quickly faded. Since then, celebrities such as James Brolin and Barbra Streisand, Pierce Brosnan, and Lindsay Lohan have all had close calls with aggressive entertainment photographers, who have either run them off the road or struck their cars during a chase. It should not take another death, celebrity or passerby, for lawmakers, news outlets, and the public to recognize the danger.

It’s also a matter of respect. While the worst aggressors will lean on the 1st amendment to claim encroachment rights on another’s personal space, there is no constitutional or other legal right whatsoever to harass another person, or restrict their movements, or impede their activities — all of which the paparazzi has done, and continues to do, almost without restriction.

As I wrote last year, being a public figure of any sort should not negate someone’s right to privacy or freedom of movement. Several posters disagreed with me, basically using the argument that celebrities are different: that being ambushed is part of the career they’ve chosen.

I don’t know how that logic works. As far as I know, celebrities are not locked into a 24- hour contract with the public to entertain or be accessible. A successful career in any field, including entertainment, should not make someone a virtual hostage to the whims of the public or negate their rights as a private individual.

As for the media’s defense that excessive intrusiveness exists because the public demands it — that we “create the need” for aggressive, car-chasing, garbage stealing paparazzi — I can only say it’s an elaborate lie.

First, the public cannot want something it doesn’t even know exists. Most of us don’t know, until the media tells us, what a celebrity’s personal life is like, where they’re dining, who they’re dating, or what tattoos they have on their backside. We don’t know – and most likely would never wonder – what is in a public figure’s garbage can or how many Jack & Cokes they had at the Viper Room.

The type of microscopic scrutiny and bold intrusions into celebrity lives offered up by gossip outlets and their photographers are less a consequence of public demand than public manipulation. Sensationalism sells, but only because it is produced and promoted. If tomorrow, there were no more photographs of panty-less starlets falling on the red carpet or close-ups of celebrity cellulite, the public would be none the wiser, and no less interested in whatever other, less invasive, celebrity news came their way.

It is not the public that demands crotch shots and minute-by-minute coverage of celebrity breakdowns. It’s the media that sets that bar, seeking the most sensational story in the hopes of inflaming or piquing the worst of the public’s curiosity. And unfortunately, it’s that bottom line which informs many tabloid decisions.

Lastly, even if the public had an expressed curiosity in sensationalism — even if they were writing letters by the tens of thousands demanding upskirt shots and ambulance chases — it does not mean that the media should abandon common sense and ethics to cater to the basest tastes. That they do so daily, with or without “public demand,” necessitates the need for stronger, more enforceable laws.

Share this:

A Radical Notion: Children Come First, Period.

Posted on 02/07/2008 by Jane Devin

She had a felony arrest for child neglect last July, but the Department of Childrens Services was not monitoring Latasha Morris, or checking up on her children. In between December 2007 and January 2008, Morris was arrested four times. On February 6th, Morris, a chronic alcoholic and drug user, passed out on top of her 2 year old son, Sheldon Bartley. The toddler died.

It does not appear that Morris was without people who tried to help. Sheldon’s paternal grandparents often cared for the children, and were making plans to get Latasha into rehab, where she might receive treatment for her decade-long battle with alcoholism.

In the meanwhile, six year old Estajah and two year old Sheldon were left unchecked and in their mother’s care, with disastrous consequences.

My January 29th article on adoption garnered a lot of response, including some disturbing mail from an anti-adoption group which seems to be made up of a handful of birth mothers who resent their decisions. They rail at a society which, they say, does not do enough to financially support them. They rail at adoptive parents, claiming they are thieves. They rail at adoption agencies, claiming that they are a corrupt, money-making industry. They take a few stories from unhappy adoptees, and twist them into propaganda to buoy their anti-adoption creed.

It’s difficult to read their tales, because no matter how matter how vague their actual stories are, or how many gaps of logic are apparent in those stories, the facts of these women’s lives — and their regrets — are drenched in pain.

One wrote to me and said that my plea to young mothers to consider adoption would not be heard by those who would do harm to their own children, but only by those whose love was so encompassing that they would give their children up before subjecting them to any harm at all.

She’s very likely right. The majority of birth mothers that I have spoken to are women who love deeply, and whose thoughts were centered on what was best for their child. They chose adoption not because it was easier for them, but because it was gut-wrenching to consider raising the child they loved in anything less than good circumstances. To me, the love and care they expressed through adoption is heroic. Often, they placed themselves in the line of fire from others who questioned their decision – they struggled with their internal emotions and the perceptions of the outside world for nine months – and in the end, chose to put their children first.

There really should be another Mother’s Day just for them. One in which the whole of society acknowledges the unconditional, selfless, agape love of women who placed their faith and hopes in adoption in order to give their child the best possible parents, circumstances, and opportunities.

Not heroic was the note I received from a mother who is outraged that her children were “stolen” by the foster care system due to abuse perpetrated by the mother’s boyfriend. “Not my fault” was the tone of the letter, and “they had no right” was the message. Her children, her choices. She didn’t believe society should have any say in how her children were raised, but she did believe that none of this would have happened if society had supported her. If school was free, maybe she’d have gone, and gotten a better job so she wouldn’t have to live with others. If there was free daycare, maybe she wouldn’t have had the boyfriend babysit.

I don’t know what she expected from me, but she was writing to the wrong person.

I know a few things about pain. I know what it is like to be a child born at the wrong time, to parents who had their own personal problems. My body still carries the memories of their problems – their narcissism, impatience, and rage. At 45 years old, I still flinch when someone moves their hand too quickly or too closely to me. I startle easily, and always have to have my back to a wall in a crowd so that people cannot surprise me from behind. In personal relationships, I have a reflexive tendency to just slip away whenever a confrontation is impending. I go away easily. Arguments frighten me – I always fear they’ll end in disaster.

I know, too, the feeling of standing outside of life’s gate, with no clear way in, and no invitation. To be the girl who feels no sense of place in the innocent, carefree world of others. To be the one with the dark house, the bad teeth, and the worn hand-me-downs, who can only pretend a sense of normal, while dreaming, always dreaming, of being somebody-somewhere else.

And I know passion. I know that at some point memories became a protective instinct, dreams became missions, and that my perspective from outside the gate had a value, if only for those who had not yet seen beyond the iron slats of their own similar experiences.

No one wants to think they’ll be a bad parent. My parents, I know, like so many others, leaned on the bromide of “we did our best” as both excuse and salve. The truth is they did not. The truth is that they both had affairs, and decided to bring a child into the world that was the result of their lack of control, and their lack of love or respect for each other. Instead of being born with a blank slate, I was born into turmoil, shame, and bitter feelings. My coloring was a sign of guilt, and my character was questioned even as an infant. I was too quiet, not like her other daughters, but when I cried it was all wrong, it grated on her nerves. I read too early. I was too athletic. I was too dreamy, too willful, too different, and too much.

As an adult, I once asked my mother why she did not give me up. In a rare moment of honesty, she told me she tried to abort me several times, but it didn’t work. She thought about giving me up then, but it was too complicated. She was married, and people would ask questions.

Embarrassing questions, it seems, were harder for my mother than raising an unwanted child for sixteen years. Instead of temporary feelings of guilt, my mother chose – not just for her, but for me as well – years of despair and hurt.

I survived. Too many children do not even have that opportunity. Many others will go through life feeling disconnected, lost, or alienated. Some will wrongly mistake rage for strength, and seek to become stronger than those who hurt them. Some will even end up with emotional and mental damages that are beyond repair.

The point I made in Dangerous Choices is, I think, clear to those who would hear its message. Children must come first, period. Children are not chattel, and they should not be considered the property of unfortunate birth parents who cannot, will not, or should not care for them. Childhood is a short-lived experience, a limited window of opportunity, and children should not have to suspend their needs, waiting on parents whose histories have already shown a propensity for neglect, abuse, and danger.

The foster care system needs a radical overhaul, and a new mission statement: Children Come First. Period.

Share this:

Marion Jones, Meet Halliburton

Posted on 01/12/2008 by Jane Devin

Olympic medalist Marion Jones was sentenced to six months in jail yesterday on two counts of perjury, after admitting to lying to federal investigators about her steroid use. Following the serving of her sentence, Jones will be on probation for two years and serve 800 hours of community service.

Somehow, I am reminded of Martha Stewart. Perhaps because in both cases, the judges wanted to impress on their defendants and the public the seriousness of lying.

“I want people to think twice before lying,” Judge Karas said to Marion Jones. “I want to make them realize no one is above the law.”

“Lying to government agencies during the course of an investigation is a very serious matter,” said Judge Miriam Cedarbaum at Martha Stewart’s sentencing. “A term of incarceration is justified and appropriate in this case.”

Lying to investigators and obstruction of justice are, it goes without saying, against the law. Jones pled guilty, and a jury convicted Stewart. Both begged for mercy from their respective judges and some would argue that their sentences were lenient. I won’t argue that point. (I won’t even talk about the dozens of (male) athletes who consistently denied steroid use, and who received only suspensions or a slap on the wrist, although I’m sure someone will – and should). Instead, what I’d like to talk about is Dick Cheney’s Halliburton and middle-class outrage.

One dead giveaway of a middle-class person is obvious sticker shock. When we see the prices at a high-end restaurant, or a brand name clothing store, our eyebrows raise and our mouths fall open in disbelief. We can’t help it. Our middle class sensibilities began when we first heard the word ‘no’ and realized that it applied to us. In prepubescence we learned that work is hard, money doesn’t grow on trees and that one day we, too, would appreciate generic cans of surprise fruit and “slightly-off” bargain basement jeans, even if we did have to hem two inches from one leg, or cover a cigarette burn on the calf with a Peace patch.

When we got our first minimum wage paycheck from that summer job we needed “in order to learn what responsibility means”, we began to understand that there’s no such thing as easy money. We began to look at price tags in terms of labor hours: a two-hour T-shirt, an eight-hour concert, a 40 hour leather jacket.

Now, as hard-working adults, we budget even our spontaneity. We faithfully add $10 a week to our Christmas Club accounts, and keep a cookie jar of “mad money” that rarely goes past two digits. Our impulse to buy the latest gadget is tempered by knowing we’ll have to pack our lunches for the next six months. And anytime we have to write a check that has more zeroes before the decimal point than after, we feel a little faint.

While it’s true that many of us are stunned by the $9,000,000,000,000.00 (nine TRILLION) dollar debt of our Bush-plundered nation, we understand democracy in action. When the majority of our peers (or the U.S. Supreme Court) hands us a President, he belongs to all of us, come prosperity and good times — or scandal, corruption, and war. We understand the give-and-take of taxes and government budgets, and know that eventually, even if it takes decades ( and it will), we’ll work together to ease this astounding debt.

It’s the obvious pillaging of our communal coffers by private corporations that really throws us into apocalyptic shock, and topping the list of thieving, ink-stained hands are those belonging to Dick Cheney’s pals at Halliburton.

Even though Halliburton moved their base of operations out of the U.S. in March, 2007 and into the friendlier country of Dubai so that they could save paying taxes on the billions of dollars of profit they enjoyed through their no-bid U.S. contracts – and even though they divested themselves of their most controversial subsidiary, Kellogg, Brown and Root (KBR), last April – Halliburton continues to be a source of angst for many Americans, particularly those who don’t like being gouged, exploited, lied to, railroaded, evaded, and shut out.

The list of Halliburton’s crimes and misdeeds against America is staggering. Billions of dollars are missing, billions more were wasted. Among the charges spelled out in Senate Democratic Policy Committee (DPC) hearings held from 2003-2006:

* Halliburton billed taxpayers $1.4 billion in questionable and undocumented charges under its contract to supply troops in Iraq, as documented by the Pentagon’s own auditors.

* Halliburton charged taxpayers for services that it never provided and tens of thousands of meals that it never served.

* Halliburton employees burned new trucks on the side of the road because they didn’t have the right wrench to change a tire — and knew that the trucks could be replaced on a profitable “cost-plus” basis, at taxpayer expense.

* Halliburton chose a subcontractor to build an ice factory in the desert even though its bid was 800 percent higher than an equally qualified bidder.

* Halliburton actively discouraged cooperation with U.S. government auditors, sent one whistleblower into a combat zone to keep him away from auditors, and put another whistleblower under armed guard before kicking her out of the country.

* Under its no-bid contract to rebuild Iraq’s oil infrastructure contract, Halliburton overcharged by over 600 percent for the delivery of fuel from Kuwait.

Before he became Vice President, Cheney sold his stock in Halliburton to the tune of $20 million, and assigned any future profit to an irrevocable charitable trust. The question is not whether Cheney is now profiting from government contracts – the answer would appear to be no – the question is how Halliburton became the beneficiary of such wealth in the first place.

It can hardly be denied that Halliburton has a long history of corruption and war profiteering. Under Cheney’s guidance, the company engaged in fraudulent accounting practices, which added $89 million dollars in revenue to their bottom line. Halliburton paid 7.5 million as a settlement to the Securities Exchange Commission to avoid a lawsuit, even as former employees stepped forward to indicate the problem was much deeper and more pervasive than the SEC originally thought.

While Cheney was leading Halliburton, millions in allegedly illegal payments were made to Nigerian officials by Halliburton’s subsidiary, KBR, for the construction of a natural-gas plant in Nigeria. There’s also the $73 million dollars that Halliburton is accused of making when, again, under Cheney’s reign, they defied U.S. sanctions and did business with Iraq, Iran, and Libya. Then there’s the $7 billion dollar no-bid contract awarded to KBR, and more – so much more that we, the wide-eyed, mouth-agape middle class have to wonder — who’s going to jail?

While judges are busy making big public examples out of small-time crime mavens like Marion Jones and Martha Stewart, the wheels of justice in Washington seem to have skipped off the wagon .

In 2005, Senate Republicans defeated a measure that would have established a special committee to investigate Halliburton, but promised that hearings would be held by a subcomittee of the Armed Services Committee, led by John Ensign, R-NV. They also stated that Special Inspector General for Iraqi Reconstruction would conduct an investigation. Two years and two months later, the American public is still waiting.

Bunnatine H. Greenhouse is waiting, too. Greenhouse, you probably (don’t) recall, was the chief civilian procurement executive for the Army Corps or Engineers, who was removed from her job after criticizing the no-bid contract the U.S. signed with Halliburton-KBR. “I can unequivocally state that the abuse related to contracts awarded to KBR represents the most blatant and improper abuse I have witnessed,” said Greenhouse during the DPC hearings. Those strong words, coming from a twenty-year government veteran, have faded into the background of diversionary politics, including overall debate about the Middle East and Senate tub-thumping during an election year.

Those of us who remember Whitewater – the Republican-led witch hunt against the Clintons which took 12 years and cost taxpayers $70M (and which Ken Starr, lacking sufficient evidence, gleefully turned into a sex scandal) – have to wonder at the hypocrisy. The Clintons lost money on the Whitewater venture, and it was their own money, not the U.S. taxpayers. In the end, fourteen people were convicted on various charges, many not related to Whitewater. There was no evidence of financial or ethical wrong-doing by either Bill or Hillary Clinton.

Where’s the call to investigative arms with Halliburton and KBR? Where’s the fiery outrage of the conservative moralists now? How is it possible that those who claim to hold taxpayer money in higher regard than their “tax and spend” liberal counterparts have turned a blind eye to the outrageous thefts perpetrated by Halliburton and company?

The same right-wing politicians who screamed impeachment over one President’s private sexual activity, have stood in vocal and voting solidarity with a President and Vice-President who have lied to the American people, thrown our military into an unjust war, brought the country to the brink of financial ruin, usurped the U.S. Constitution with the Patriot Act, arrogantly defied the Geneva Convention, ignored the United Nations, advocated torture, and broken both promises and treaties.

We shouldn’t be surprised that the demagogues of the right-wing have turned blind, deaf and dumb when it comes to the abuses of Halliburton and Company, but we are. We’re surprised that the issue of anabolic steroid use received more Congressional attention in 2003, 2004 and 2005 than the issue of billions of missing dollars and Halliburton’s war profiteering. But what really throws us for a loop is the spinelessness of the Democrat-majority Congress we elected in 2006, which has not stood up to the Bush administration as we expected it to, or taken the type of swift, immediate action we wanted to stop the hemorrhaging of U.S. tax dollars.

Election year or not, divided or not, our nation owes its taxpayers a strict accounting, and it’s the job of Congress to ensure that we get one, and to see to it that those who are responsible for perhaps the largest and most collusive theft in the history of the United States are brought to bear.

That would be an example worth setting.

Share this:

Jonestown, Guyana: Effect & Reflections, 29 Years Later

Posted on 12/11/2007 by Jane Devin

I. The Horror of Jonestown

I was sixteen years old, and just months into an emancipation that was all at once frightening, peaceful, and confusing. I had no idea what I was doing, but was determined to let experience be my teacher. After a few fits and starts in the foreign territory of Northern California, I found a decent job and a furnished apartment. I signed contracts and opened accounts – and was absolutely giddy when I received my first box of checks.

I had a charged-up kind of confidence that came from years of hopeful and escapist reading. Positive thinking mantras, bootstrap philosophies, self-informed destinies. Think it and be it. I had scars, deep ones, but I was determined that they would fade. That as an adult, I would bury those crushed and diseased layers of childhood under so much happiness, love, and positivity that they would cease to exist in any real dimension, and become only distant memories.

Then, Guyana. Jonestown. A Utopian dream for those disenfranchised or disenchanted by society – a dream that somehow went terribly wrong – leaving over 900 people dead, including 287 children.

I didn’t really believe the news when it came blaring through my tiny black and white television. Adults die, but children – we bounce back. Adults are screwed up in a thousand ways, with their alcohol, their deceptions, and their rage, but children – we know, don’t we? We run, we escape, and when we can’t – we bounce back. We hold our thoughts and dreams in a special place they can’t touch. We make promises to ourselves, and take pleasure in every new inch added to our height. Soon, we will be grown-up. We will reach the magical age, and no one will harm us anymore.

I was so mad at the media. The newscasters wouldn’t shut-up, even after hours, about the dead Congressman and the camera man, their lives, and their families. It seemed to me that the media was pronouncing that these men, who lived professional, distinguished lives, deserved to be mourned, while 900+ other people existed only as a sensational backdrop – nameless, faceless, without stories to tell, or families left behind. I needed to know: Who were they? What happened? Why? How? Did they try to run, did they struggle, did any children escape, did anyone, in a moment of revelation, scream for others to stop? How could one man, who originally led others in a quest for equality and harmony, lead them into murder and suicide?

287 children. Really dead. Not able to bounce back from the sickness of adults.

I used my bus money to buy every newspaper and magazine available, and became frustrated and obsessed with the story of Jonestown. The answers were sparse and shallow, and the children remained largely anonymous. Adult survivors who were interviewed still seemed blinded by a charismatic madman and a broken promise of Utopia. At sixteen, I found them selfish and weak, and despised them for fleeing into the woods without carrying so much as one defenseless child with them.

Jonestown was thousands of miles away from the Silicon Valley, where I, like thousands of others, spent my working hours in a sparkling clean factory filled with diodes, capacitors, and motherboards – cutting edge technologies meant to make life easier and more efficient. While the horror of Jonestown was being broadcast, cars stalled at their usual pace on crowded highways, people fought for parking space at the malls, and billboards and radio stations hawked their usual wares.

People made jokes about the “Kool-Aid drinkers” as if there really was no more to the story than a bunch of really stupid, worthless people who followed a delusional madman into a murderous pact. But there were bent and broken syringes, showing signs of struggle. Reports of parents screaming, children screaming, and being forced to swallow. Tiny teeth marks on plastic syringes tell a story very few people had the heart or mind to tell.

They took the children first. 287 of them. Agents of Jones, for the most part, led them; a few parents. They led them to the podium like little lambs – and lions – to slaughter. It was a coldly calculated move, designed to make the bereaved parents easier to manage, more willing to let themselves be killed.

The dead and dying were placed out of sight, to painfully convulse to their deaths under the warm Guyana sun. They say it took about five minutes for their hearts, even the tiniest, to stop beating.

I grew up after Guyana. I changed, my dreams changed, and my thoughts shifted outward. My introverted nature turned itself inside out, and I began to demand answers for every unfairness, injustice, and act of cruelty I saw, experienced, or heard about. I became, to some, a hellion; a thorn. Others found my passion admirable, but “too much,” too “intense”. I was urged (and often warned) to be more diplomatic, to temper my tongue, and slow my thoughts.

I did / I didn’t. I tried / I failed. I burned hot and cold, got burnt, and burned myself out for months, even years, at a time. Often, I stepped up only to get shot down. Sometimes, I rallied back, fought harder than ever, and succeeded. There are rarely any easy choices in a life that’s determined to make a difference, no matter how small, limited – or even eventually inconsequential – that difference might be.

II. Naming the Rage

I raged most, and still do, against those in positions of power and authority – including parents, religious figures, CEO’s, celebrities, media moguls, politicians, judges, and those in law enforcement – who misuse and abuse their positions and then hide behind the many protections they are afforded in order to prevent their misdeeds from being discovered or, in the case of the wealthy or powerful, to escape punishment when they are caught.

I name as my enemies those who neglect, abuse and even kill their children, leaving scars, blood and tears in the wake of their negligence or violence. Those who pilfer and steal the hard-earned money entrusted to them – those who purposely distort the news millions of people rely on – those who make shady backroom deals to line their own pockets – those who bring their personal prejudices to bear in deciding the fates of others – those sworn to uphold the law, but who hold guns to their wives heads, torment their children, or beat handcuffed citizens to a bloody pulp, and then hide behind their badges.

I name you as my moral enemy, if you are one of those who are so dazzled by the light of power or celebrity that you will invent blinders or a different set of rules for privileged others. If you are one of those who will create excuses for authority figures that you would not create for your own friends or neighbors. Those of you, for example, who would support the torture at Abu-Ghraib as a justifiable means to an end, yet loudly proclaim America to be the near-infallible and supreme promoter of Human Rights.

I name you hypocrites – those of you who would line the streets to cheer for a perverted star like Michael Jackson, but who wouldn’t hesitate to demand the harshest sentences for sex offenders in your own communities. Those of you who would make heroes out of someone like (the now-dead) Kurt Cobain, or other drug-addled stars – but who want the poverty-stricken crack addicts in your own neighborhoods locked behind bars for years. (A disease is a disease regardless of how much money or talent a person has).

I name you selfish, those of you who vote only for the lowest taxes, and the least dent in your wallet, even while you claim to care about the most defenseless among us – the poor, the children, the disabled, the elderly.

I name you cowardly, those of you who choose blinders and invent excuses for even the worst acts perpetrated by those whose talents, lives or positions – or even whose looks – you idolize. Those of you who, although fully capable, won’t stand up in the face of adversity or injustice, but instead cower when there’s any perceived threat to your time, your peace, your reputation, or your resources.

There are many violent, abusive, power-hungry, corrupt, degenerate, illogical, dishonest, and cowardly people in this world. If I have enemies, it is because I do not care to make such people my friends.

III. A Fighting Spirit, a Fighting Chance

287 children died in Jonestown on November 18, 1978. The last remnants of my childhood died with them, and out of the tattered, torn spirit of a young adult sprung the heart of a fighter. I will fight for you, I promised them. You’ll see, we’ll make it right, we’ll make it matter. We’ll show others how to bounce back.

Twenty-nine years later, I carry my own battle-worn legacy, and it’s unremarkable really, except for the strength of convictions born out of the ruins of tragedy, and the long-reach of lessons learned. The intensity of my beliefs and feelings will die with me, and even the strongest of my words will fade into oblivion or obscurity. I will one day leave the earth as most people do – as the children of Jonestown certainly did – largely anonymous, leaving behind barely a ripple. Stronger, younger, and perhaps better-situated others will pick up the sword. I hope so, and pray that they will have more success than I did. At the same time I would not wish anyone into a life of prolonged struggle.

IV. Braving the Fears

Once, when I lived in the country, I made a hesitant companion out of a lone red fox. She would often come near my porch in the early hours of morning. Fascinated, I began to set out bowls of dog food for her, and watched her from behind the window whenever she came. If I spoke, or moved too quickly, the fox would startle and take off running. I watched her then, in silence, for several months. One morning, I opened my door to find the tiny, lifeless body of a fox pup on my steps. He was still somewhat warm but had gone stiff. I could not revive him.

I never saw the mother fox again, but I thought – if even the wildest creature can brave her most ingrained fears to try to save her young – what is wrong with us?

What the hell is wrong with us?

* * * *

Share this:

Megan Meier: Targeted Even After her Death

Posted on 12/09/2007 by Jane Devin

By now, most people are familiar with the story of Megan Meier, a vulnerable 13 year old girl who committed suicide after a particularly detestable internet hoax, concocted by the mother of one of her acquaintances, led to a massive online bullying session.

Recently, prosecutors announced that there would be no charges filed against Lori Drew , her eighteen year old employee, or her teenager, who all participated in an online game that seemed purposely designed to do emotional harm to Meier, whom Drew knew was already being treated for depression.

Drew’s claim of moral and legal innocence is that she didn’t create the fake MySpace profile of “Josh” as an act of cruelty, but instead simply to “monitor” what Meier may have been saying about her own daughter online. She perpetrated the hoax, she claimed, not to be cruel, but to “protect her daughter.” However, the topic of conversation between Meier and Drew’s fictional character was not about Drew’s daughter. Instead, “Josh” began a campaign of compliments and adoration that played to the young victim’s insecurities.

Megan, who was on her way back up after recovering from a miserable seventh grade year, in which she was derided for being overweight, seemed to take solace in her new internet romance — a solace that abruptly ended when “Josh” told her that the world would be better off without her, and called her “fat” and a “slut.” After the two engaged in an online fight, the MySpace friends of the fictional boy joined the fray, adding their abusive messages to Megan in the comments section of Josh’s MySpace page.

Shortly afterwards, Megan Meier hung herself in her bedroom closet. Lori Drew busied herself with warning the participants in this online tragedy not to talk. Drew and her family attended Meier’s funeral, and kept up a pretense of sympathy and friendship with the Meier family. Drew even asked them if she could store some Christmas presents in their garage. Tina and Ron Meier agreed.

A neighborhood girl who was aware of the hoax perpetrated by Drew then stepped forward and informed the Meiers’ of the truth. In a fit of hurt and rage, Ron Meier smashed the Drew’s Christmas presents. When the Drew’s complained to police, Lori Drew’s involvement in the internet hoax was confirmed.

For a year, the Meier family kept silent as the FBI investigated. In the end, laws governing the internet were not adequate or substantial enough to charge Lori Drew and her accomplices with a crime. A New York Times article quotes the St. Charles County Sheriff’s Department spokesman, Lt. Craig McGuire, as saying what Drew did “might’ve been rude, it might’ve been immature, but it wasn’t illegal.”

Many people don’t understand that position, given that there are laws meant to address cyber-stalking and internet harassment, both federally and under Missouri state law. However, according to attorneys specializing in the internet, the few laws that are in place are vague, subjective, and widely open to interpretation. Further, many law enforcement agencies are not well-versed in or trained to handle internet cases, which tend to cross jurisdictional lines, and may involve multiple states. While there are reporting mechanisms in place, such as the FBI’s Internet Crime Complaint Center , people who have have filed reports complain that there is rarely a response, and that the ICCC is more geared towards handling multiple complaints of online fraud, rather than individual cases of internet harassment.

Adding more burden to those victimized, most complainants end up being referred to civil court for resolution, which can be a long, cost-prohibitive and unreasonably burdensome process.

Megan’s hometown of Dardenne Prairie, MO recently passed its own law in response to the deficiency of Federal and State laws, making internet harassment in their community a misdemeanor, punishable by up to 90 days in jail and a maximum fine of $500.

The ordinance makes it illegal for an adult to contact a minor in a way that would cause a reasonable parent to fear for the child’s safety. Anyone engaging in a pattern of conduct that would cause a reasonable person to suffer “substantial emotional distress” would also be charged with harassment.

In an ironic twist, Newsday is reporting that the first beneficiary of Dardenne Prairie’s new ordinance against internet harassment may be none other than Lori Drew.

A blog entitled “Megan Had it Coming” appeared on the internet on November 18, 2007, purportedly written by an acquaintance of Megan’s who called herself “Kristen”. However, on the third and last posting on the site, written December 3, 2007, the author proclaims herself to be Lori Drew, and explains that she began the blog because she was “so angry at the world for being so unfair, especially when it came to my daughter whom I had sworn to protect from all of this. I took a low blow at Megan’s memory because I desperately wanted the world to at least get a glimpse of the truth.”

Questioned by reporters, Drew vehemently insists that those low blows, which included calling Megan a “bitch”, “a total psycho”, and a “monster”, didn’t come from her but an imposter. While neither Drew nor her family asked for an investigation into the matter, St. Charles County prosecutor Jack Banas is determined to find out who is behind the vengeful blog about the deceased child. Both the Drew family and the Meiers, who have recently separated, told reporters that they welcome the investigation.

Share this: