Broadcasting suicide??

Ok, so surely the will or intent to kill oneself is up to the said person and noone else. The usual want or need to terminate your own life would come from a fit of depression, or a fit of slight insanity, whichever - there would usually be some underlying cause for this. So, why do A) people promote this possible mental condition, and B) broadcasty it over the internet.

I found two posts which angered me about said subject:

One: Teen broadcast suicide over internet
Two: How to kill yourself like a man



In the first link, it shows you a post in the New York Post about a guy in Miami who killed himself over the internet on a livewebcam stream, this is the part that got me: "while some users egged him on". Why would anyone do that? Sure, friends joke with each other, but for people to actually egg someone on in killing themselves is just WRONG! - But, who's to blame? This raises two points for me: a) who's to blame for the suicide? and b) should anything happen to the people that egged him on ?

Since suicide is (surprisingle and rather wierdly) a criminal offence should the people egging him on be held nd prosecuted for aiding a criminal?

- The second post is just stupid, and yes most likely a comedy thing - but people will take this seriously if given the right mental conditions and so should not be allowed on the internet, now I'm not saying that people should be constantly monitored as to what they put up on the net in this age of "freedom of speech" but surely something should be down to take down the offending page - I mean offering "fun" ways to kill yourself? Why would someone put that up? Maybe THEY have the underlying mental condition.

Comment on Laura's blog - Abortion Advertisements

Laura's blog

Ok, so to the actual point about abortion being advertised on TV, probably not the best idea - I mean, surely the adverts would be saying how easy it is, and how it protects the young females life for so many years because they won't be laden witht he child that she had just created.

To be honest, with the whole abortion issue itself, Im prettymuch Pro-Choice, if a woman wishes to do that, she wishes to do that, but I'm under the complete and utter guise that a guy who helped create said foetus should also be alerted to the decision of the woman, no matter what the decision is and who it hurts in the long run.

Laura stated a case about a guy being allergic to Condomns. know someone who is allergic to latex yes, and there are latex free condoms available from your local GUM clinic. I, myself, can't stand using them - but that said I've never forced a girl to have sex with me without using them, it's her problem too if she agrees or consents to having sex with the male while not using a condom.

Yes Laura, abortion is not an alternative to condoms, but the injection and the pill possibly are.

What kind of a role-model is Barbie really?

The first thing I want to bring your attention to is this: Tramp stamp Barbie, now this is a youtube video of a guy reviewing one of Barbies more... intriguing little doll lines. Tramp stamp Barbie?! Come on. Yes, it's real, yes girls buy this - and as we all know (apparently) all girls wanna be just like the dolls that they buy from Woolworths, or from other stores that haven't actually closed down.

I'm not the first person to think about Barbie in this way, there's numerous articles over that thing we call the inter web about Barbie being a little whore - but there also ones of a contradictory note - one of the more interesting finds was this: Barbie as a role model.

Now, here the author states that Barbie is not to blame for anorexia, bullemia, social anxiety and eating disorders, peer pressure and other thoughts about a child needing to look perfect in every way.

...Personally, I don't know. I mean, surely things such as "Tramp stamp Barbie" should not be around, but that would be more of a morla high ground - exposing children to something that shouldn't really be talked about or thought about until after a certain age. So what do we do? Censor Barbie? Say "you can't have Tramp Stamp Barbie until you are at least 16 years of age or sexually active"? Hm, I can't see that happening. And then there's the fiasco of a child saying "but mum, I have teenage pregnancy barbie, why can't I have tramp stamp barbie". - All sorts of questions will then arise.

Maybe Barbie is to blame for children wanting to look good, I mean, at the end of the day she is the stereotypical image of a sexually attractive girl - but, thats nothing to do wit the makers of the doll wanting to change social outlooks on women, it's more the simple fact that people prefer to buy aesthetically pleasing figurines - would you realy buy a barbie doll if it looked like someone who would be considered too ugly to pass for the ugly stepsisters in cinderella? - No, you'll be much morelikely to buy the beautiful Cinderella herself.

So, I'm not too sure about this one. Maybe certain lines of the barbie products are wrong, but all in all I can't see that Barbie is solely responsible for girls wanting to look pretty - thats just natural, guys like attractive women.

Comment on Zoe's comment on Claire's blog

Ok, I don't know if I'm allowed to do this, but I'm doing it anyway.

- The whole Jade Goody fiasco is terrible, a woman gets diagnosed with cancer, she's given a prognosis, the prognosis rings true and she leaves her family, friends and kids behind. Terrible situation, don't get me wrong - it truly is awful. Probably one of the worst things that you can imagine, as a parent, leaving your kids behind, and as a kid watching your parents go.

Guess what? - - She isn't the first woman in the world to get that type of cancer, she isn't the first woman in the world to die of an early age and she isn't the going to be the last. Is it really right that the whole nation should apparently mourn so much over the fact that a "celebrity" contracted cervical cancer? What about the other hundreds of people affected by it?

• "In 2005, 2,803 women in the UK were diagnosed with cervical cancer.
• Cervical cancer caused 941 deaths in the UK in 2007." - taken from Cancer Research UK

So, more to the point, why is Jade so different to the other 941 people that dies in 2007, or the other 2,800 plus people that were diagnosed witht he same illness in 2005 ? Because she has money, because so many people recognise her face? How many other mums had been diagnosed with this illness and suffered in silence with everyone else not knowing or caring how they died.

Yes, she's a celebrity and yes she's an idol for some... strange people out there i suppose and yes she said she's doing the reality shows for her kids to be able to go to college and whatever else. But there are people out there that didn't get that chance, there are people that lost their mothers and had no other parents, had to go into foster homes ETC. Why is it SO different and SO much more tragic to have stuff like this happen to a celebrity?

Comment on Claire's blog - Drugs

Claire's post

First and foremost, you said "the idiots that abuse them" - You know, some people take dugs because they have a problem, an they don't get prosecuted as such, they get help like they need. Other people take drugs because they feel as though they need to, they feel that without them there life is simply not worth living and it helps them to carry on.

I have known people who take Marijuana to such extent that when they have not had a smoke, or when they are not "stoned" they actually seem normal, it is when they have not had any of the said drug that they seem different. Strange concept and notion I know.

I think that people who take drugs... well, it's up to them, no point in us getting worried about it, so long as it doesn't bother anyone. - Ok, maybe when its getting to the point that the person is so hopelessly addicted that they would go out and mug old ladies in order to come up with the money for another gram of cocaine, or another needle then it's probably getting a bit much...

Then there is the question which lingers... why? - why do people take drugs? why do people try them? why do people continue to do them after years of abuse and damage, and knowing that on average for every gram of street-sold cocaine there is at least 60% of unknown subtances in it that it has been cut with. Why would people put themselves through that?

... Addicted? Possibly. In the same way that people become addcited to caffeine, alcohol, and nicotine. Now, nicotine is actually the single most addictive drug used on the streets? Is smoking that bad? Yes. But it's legal.

"Based on the level of dependence, the most common measure for determining the addictiveness of a drug, the substances ranked as follows, from most to least addictive:

1. Nicotine
2. Heroin
3. Cocaine
4. Alcohol
5. Caffeine
6. Marijuana"

- Taken from here.

Hm... So, the first, fourth and fifth most addictive drugs that we have are currently on sale n the UK so long as you are over 18. - Why not go the whole shabang?

Protesting for pay rises

Soooo, who out there works a minimum wage job? More to the point, who out there currently is working more than one minimum paid job, while trying to live in a rented accomodation on their own, without family support?

I used to work minimum wage up until about 4 weeks ago when i got bumped up to the amazing wage of £7 an hour, while studying full time - Now, my big big peeve is people complaining. At the moment, especially with current situation how it is, people protesting for rises in wages. I know graduates that currently can only get one job, waitressing, and this is one of the lowest paid jobs in the country. I happen to know, that the union that covers this particular job role DOES NOT protest for wage increases. Because it cimply won't happen, obviously the people that work for approx £6 an hour, need £6 an hour and can't afford to not work in protest to try and get more.

So, why do teaches always seem to be protesting for more money? Sure it's a specialised job, and you have to have degrees in order to do it, but there are people working out there for much less who never say squat about protesting in order to attempt to get more money. And some times, the people earning less are more qualified than the people in the said profession who are protesting for money.

The reason I'm saying this is that while surfing the Guardian website I came up with the following article:

Article

and the part of this article that really caught me out was "I am fed up with being overdrawn,' one teacher told conference. Photographer: Graham Turner" - this is the text, by the way, sitting underneath the picture.

So is just about every student in the country that isn't relying on mommy and daddy to get them through the recession and more to the point, so is just about every person who isn't an upper class person in an expenisve suite at the moment. Why do teachers deserve such a rise? Is the job they do truly that life threatening, mentally and physically exhausting? - Don't worry, I'm not an over-zealous anti-teacher, anti-academia nut job, my mums a teacher also and she works extremely hard at their job, but why do they deserve SUCH a huge increase? "10% or £3000, whichever sum is greater" - I'LL HAVE EITHER!

- Discuss =P

Comment on Laura's blog post - Stalking

Laura's post on the subject of stalking stated a lot about the extreme cases of stalking, I think there is a lot of possible... leniance. When does stalking become an infringement and intrusion on someone elses personal space, when does one person stop being a mere harasser or follower, or even fan in the case of a celebrity and become a stalker. Does stalking always lead to harm, if you are in a relationship with someone and you follow them somewhere in order to see wether or not the y or having an affair or if they are lying to you, is it still stalking?

The dictionary describes the word stalk as: "to pursue or approach prey, quarry, etc., stealthily" - now in the case of stalk being used in a predatorial sense, then yes there is always some intent to harm.

I Just think personally that a lot of things need to be considered before calling someone a stalker, or saying someone is stalking you, do they intend to harm you? Are they intending to harm? Is it always a bad thing? Armed forces will always stalk their foes.

http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/stalker