Nasty Business

It is as I suspected:
White guys are verifiably weird!!

Today’s Calgary Herald carried an article about sexual predators and paedophilia and people – men – who collect and distribute child porn and made some comments about how those two things are related. Intimately, as it turns out.

If you’re sensitive, skip this part: I’ve often said to my girls that white guys are weird. As it turns out, if the statistics quoted in said article are to be believed, it would seem that white guys, particularly those over the age of 25 are indeed weird. (We’re white, by the way, but please see my article on the term ‘race’ before you race to any conclusions)

A study by the US National Centre for Missing and Exploited Children looked at 1713 people charged with possessing child pornography in the US between July1 2000 and July1 2001. This is what the typical child porn possessor ‘looks’ like:

• Almost all were male
  
• 91% are white
  
• 41% had never married!
  
• A further 21% were divorced, separated or widowed
  
• 86% are older than 25 years
  
• Only 3% were under 18
  
• 40% are dual offenders, meaning that they had also victimized children
  
• Another 15% had tried to victimize a child but hadn’t necessarily succeeded
  
• 73% were employed full time
  
• 89% had not been diagnosed with a mental illness
  
• 56% have a criminal record and of those, 24% have a record for sexual assault
  
• 91% were viewing child porn on their home computers.
  

More on this here: Missing Kids.com
And Here: Equal Parenting

What does all this mean? Well, that nice daddy down the street – the white guy who’s so computer literate? Yah, he’s a prime candidate.

So does viewing and possessing kiddy porn predispose a man (and the occasional woman) to violating a child? This link hasn’t been established as of yet, but 45% of those charged with possessing such material also had a record of molestation and that figure is considered conservative.

When I as at school for behavioural sciences, I ran into some research and stats on the predominance of white men implicated in sexual crimes: nearly all those engaged in incest are white as are nearly all paedophiles; a high percentage of men charged with rape are white too.

So guys; what gives? Why are white guys so weird??? Why are white men so likely to rape and molest? Is it genetic? Is it the food they eat or the education they get - or the lack thereof? What’s the scoop? Why is it that the very people who have the world by the tail – white guys – are so fucking weird?

To quote Arsenio Hall, this is one of those “Things that make you go ‘Hmmmm…’”.

LIES and VIDEO TAPE and YES, SEX

Bad! Lack of Truth in Media

Y’know what really sucks? The media – major TV, radio and newspapers – have agendas about what they’ll publish and in terms of the perception they have in the public eye; whether they’re right-wing, etc. Their owners dictate who they are and what ‘wing’ they’ll occupy in the public mind. They are not objective, however much they might like you, Mr. and Mrs. Grade-8-reading-level to thinks so.

In the last few years, I’ve written editorials and several letters to the editor on two specific, issues. None of them were published. Why? Not due to the quality of my writing; I’ve been published enough times by those newspapers to know that they’ll take my stuff.

The reason they haven’t published my writing on these issues is that my opinion was reasonable and potentially could have stopped the arguments, which in other terms means limited the discussion; essentially, the show-stopper commentary.

The first issue was about the Delwin Vriend case that happened back in 1998. Delwin Vriend was a teacher with a Christian Reformed Church school. The school knew Mr. Vriend is gay they hired him. They later fired him, however, because he became (or revealed that he was) a ‘practicing’ homosexual. As a side point, people don’t practice their sexuality. They is what they is but they don’t have to practice.

This case sparked a shift in the Canadian constitution with the addition of legislation that prevents discrimination on the basis of sexuality. This is good. Nobody should be discriminated against for reasons of whom they sleep with (or might, were they ‘practicing’).

The media spin on this legislation, however, was that it applied to ‘gay rights’ only and in saying so, the media did exactly what the legislation was out to prevent: it discriminated against me – a straight chick – by implying that the legislation didn’t apply to me.

My editorial pointed out that everyone has a sexual orientation whether they’re straight, gay, bi or asexual, and that everyone was protected by that legislation, not just people who are gay. Secondly, sexual orientation and sexual practice are not always the same thing. Many straight people dabble in the gay lifestyle and many gay people, particularly from a certain generation, have been married – maybe still are married - despite their orientation.

As for the discrimination part, I have been discriminated against in a public place based on my straightness. I was not particularly bothered by the discrimination because it was minor and really didn’t affect my life in any way.

Here’s what happened: three of my friends and I decided to go to a great gay bar in our city. Three of us hadn’t been there before and one was a regular patron. At the door, a very large lesbian woman said that I couldn’t go in because it was a gay bar…. I replied that I was with “her,” being my female friend. Our two other companions, a gay guy and a very obviously straight guy didn’t even catch the door watcher’s eye. Weird.

The editorial I wrote based on this event was submitted several times to both our city’s majors but was never acknowledged or published. It was read on air, however, by a radio guy on a major station. This guy was constantly receiving mail from outraged listeners accusing him of being a woman hater, a gay basher and a misogynist. He was none of those but he was gay!

The point of my editorial is that no one, regardless of their sexual orientation or practice should have to suffer discrimination. I will make the point here that paedophilia is NOT a sexual orientation; it is a bona fide, and, in my opinion, incurable illness and so does not fall under the anti-discrimination legislation.

The second issue is that of choice, as in pro-choice. I take great offense and am embarrassed by my so-called sisters who wave their “I have the right to choose,” and “It’s my body,” banners but who do NOT make choices. Any woman who becomes pregnant when she doesn’t wish to, but because she has not made any pre-act choice, is a hypocrite in the highest degree. I say this from the point of view of a woman who became pregnant by not making a simple choice to walk down the road to the chemist to buy a box of condoms.

There is no excuse for unplanned pregnancies. If you don’t want to have a baby, then do something about it BEFORE you’re pregnant. And don’t wait for the man to get his act together. IF it is your body and IF it is your choice then ACT.

“It just happened” is not an excuse and it is definitely NOT a reason for an abortion. Period.

The newspaper will not print this point of view, however, because both sides of the argument would have to agree that if women actually did believe any of the ‘pro-choice’ or ‘pro-life’ crap they spout, there would be MANY fewer abortions. The media loves the pro-life/pro-choice argument because it has provided nearly half a century of good press. There’s no way they’re going to kill their gift horse, now, is there?!

The moral of this story is be careful what you believe about what you read in any media. The ultimate goal of any newspaper is to attract readers; radio wants to attract listeners. The media will do whatever they must to attract you, not limited to lies, coercion and frank manipulation of the facts and suppression of truth and reason.

This is a bona fide rant!

Sometimes, not often, thanks be, things go so seriously off the rails in so many ways at so many junctures that a person is left reeling, sleepless and drained. Thus was my January/February.

In late December, my gorgeous kid, Alex, came home from three months abroad. I tell yah, she's the greatest kid and I missed her too much for words.

It was apparent, however, that she was bored and frustrated and hadn't exactly landed, so I was not surprised -- gutted but not surprised -- to find out that she was doing everything she could to get herself back to the UK as soon as possible.

By mid-January, she'd found several Au Pair opportunities, one of which was in Leigh on Sea, about 40 minutes east of London. My cousin lives there so I had some peace about Alex going there, as she'd be around family. In the end, She didn't go there. She went to Inverness, in the wild, beautiful highlands of Scotland.

By the beginning of February, I'd begun to get my head around her leaving again. Just around that time, I met by phone with a realtor, one with whom I wanted to develop a professional relationship with. I had called her once and she immediately began sending referrals my way, about which I was thrilled. Not to pin it all on her, but it seems that was where life curved in a big way.

The first client the realtor sent me was a person from another country - a civilized country, which I why I think this person left; lack of civility. My boss describes the client as a 'director' personality, which is bang bloody on.

Suffice to say, that deal went sour when the client found he had to negotiate - just a bit, mind you. Sadly, the realtor chose to farm the client out to another broker just when my deal was complete.

That blew me apart. I was super disapointed as was my manager, as we'd been nursing the budding relationship with the realtor's brokerage, but "onward" we thought.

That was a tuesday. Saturday night, my lovely spouse and I went to a great restaurant we go to a lot, followed by a couple hours great skating at Calgary's Olympic Oval. I had my skates sharpened while there and was having a hard time with them but put it down to a new feel. By 10:30 p.m. I was feeling crappy.

Sunday morning I woke up to my first ever bout of food poisoning! It sucked and that's all there is to say.

By Monday afternoon I was feeling good enough to go into the office so headed out about 1:00 p.m only to find some idiot had used my car for target practice. My driver's side window wasn't shattered yet, but the small hole in its centre and the huge striations made it pretty clear that any sudden movement would immediately send glass flying everywhere. I enlisted the help of my still-home Alex to sweep up the glass, called the city police (who said there was nothing they could do), called the insurance co and booked in with the glass company for the next day. Didn't get to the office.

The next day I got the car in for window repair. The gal at the desk said the window would be in by 2:30 but called shortly thereafter to say the part they had ordered for me was defective. She said they'd have it done by 5, which they did, but while repairing the window, they broke the door lock!

The following Friday, thinking that my luck had finally turned, I had lunch with my lovely friend Laurie. It was a bit rushed due to a client Laurie had referred me to and who wanted to see me right after lunch. No real problem. We ate and I took off with plenty of time to spare.

As I tried to pull away from the parking lot I realised that my driver's side tire wasn't doing well -- really not well. It was totally flat. I quickly decided to drive to the gas station one block away, only to find their air pump out of order. The next station was three blocks away but by the time I got there, my tire was quite gouged. I filled up and took off to meet my client, who'd given me the wrong address and who's address is not on the map as their community is very new. I stopped to call them but in that short time, my tire again decended.

The short story is that I never made it any closer than 10 blocks from the client. I had to get the tire repaired or I'd be stuck up there and I had another meeting later that day.

Needless to say, following missing the meeting and having to get a tire repaired and then rush to another meeting, I was worn out by 5:30. We'd been invited to my spouse's mom's for dinner, which was perfect because I didn't want to cook.

We left her house at 11:00 and by 11:45 p.m I was leaving the house again to go to the hospital. My great friend, Barry, called to say his mom was in hospital and had had surgery that morning. Something in his voice caught at me so I went to be with him.

Sadly, his mom, also my friend of 16 years, died while we were there with her.

The following day, as sad as we were, we welcomed our family from England. We were to spend three days skiing with them at Lake Louise. Wouldn't it just be like Calgary: no winter to speak of until the English family steps off the plane, then? 30 below! Man.

We did ski one day but the next day was far too bitter so we spent it wandering about Banff. Friday, my spouse and I rushed back into town to attend my friend's funeral.

Meanwhile, one of my client deals was slowly cratering -- a deal sent by the realtor from above. I was desperate to help this client but there wasn't a thing I could do for her over the weekend. To make matters worse, I was leaving for Toronto on Sunday and there was a proincial holiday on Monday.

That didn't go well, nor did the other file -- the client I never met -- and by the end of the week in Toronto, by which time Alex had left for Inverness in my absence, I was completely cratered and on the so-called watch list at work! OI.

I read my Chinese horoscope last weekend. It seems this year of the dog is not going to be my year, but a year of pushing stones up hill. There were many feng shui 'cures' suggested in my horoscope, to which I would not normally the least attention. Given the events of the last month however, I think my Karma is kicking me in the butt a bit.

Kids...

OH Yeah, and another thing!!!

Yah, so next time I hear adults moaning about how teenagers are bad and all messed up and cause all this trouble (‘kay, sometimes that’s true), I’m gonna ask those adults if they know where their 15 and 16 year olds are at night – ‘cause I’d say that a few adults didn’t know where their kids were on Saturday night or early Sunday morning, when those kids were out shooting BBs at the cars in MY neighbourhood!

Y'all can refer to my 2004 blog on here, which is about how bad adults make for bad kids.

Thanks to Cartoon Stock for the great, pertinent cartoon.

Nice job, jerk

more wreckage. Nice, hey? Some idiot's idea of what to do on a Saturday night.

This is where the entry point went. That diamond looking thing is the piece the apparent BB shot flung into opposite rear passenger side of the car - on the opposite side of the vehicle, in the BACK seat.

My wrecked window

Point of entry

Yah, so this is what some idiot thinks is a good time; breaking out the window in my car.

People SUCK