The Tears Of A Bullied Boy Go Viral: But Are They Enough To Move The Bully-Enablers?

Are The Tears Fake? At This Point, Who Cares?

Just as Jamey Rodemeyer's suicide touched off a firestorm against bullying by posting his "It Gets Better" video, so too has this latest one from Jonah Mowry. He posted his video back in August, but in the past 24 hours, it has gotten over 550,000 views on YouTube, not only because it was mentioned by Perez Hilton, Joe Jervis (Joe. My. God) and Michelangelo Signorelli, but also because it was posted by thousands of viewers on the facebook pages. 


It's the kind of video that dares you not to cry along with young Jonah: he never says a word, but relates his story through music and flash cards because he's trying to summon courage while tears are streaming down his face. Some people might consider it a ploy, an almost cloying plea for attention, but they would be dismissed as heartless. Some others might consider it a put up piece - too histrionic to be real, but Jonah answered the naysayers in a follow-up video thanking people for their support. That video (Thank You Everyone - 3) unfortunately, has been removed fromYouTube by Jonah for reasons that one can only speculate, but he disclosed the fact that spammers and bullies bombarded it's posting. 


So far, Jonah's parents have not come forth with a statement about the video, provoking comments like "where's the parents in all of this?" The 14-year-old may have a good relationship with them, but so far he has not given evidence on whether or not they reported the bullying to Jonah's school. In the video, his accounts of cutting (self-mutilation) go back 8 years.   


ON ITS OWN


The video is so powerful, however, that cries of "fake" are rendered moot: Jonah's emotions are clearly raw, demonstrating that an appeal for attention is not what's at stake here: even a fictional appeal can transcend itself and result in something good. And the good that it has done is touching hearts is enough for many people. 


If it is a fake, then, it is a fake appeal as a WORK OF ART.


The outpouring of sympathy, admiration and encouragement has definitely been one-sided ... so far. Elements of America's Christian Right will need to react (positively or negatively) if they are to seem "compassionate" at all. But compassion is sometimes not their forte: Bryan Fischer of the American Family Association may try to cast Jonah as the "real bully" since the teen must be considered part of the "homosexual agenda." Tony Perkins of the Family Research Council has flatly stated "We're not the cause of teen suicides," belying the fact that arbiters of morality has been the cause of hundreds of millions of suicides in the last 3000 years. Yesterday, the eponymous Christian Historian David Barton declared homosexuality to be completely "unnatural". 


One might argue that pharisees have never known when to shut up and leave well enough alone.  


In a brilliant open letter to the Christian Right, John Shore of LGBTQ Nation dares them all to respond:

Tell me that your belief system didn’t help but the hot tears on this kid’s cheeks. Tell me that the bullies who torment this kid aren’t in any way encouraged or empowered by your tacit approval of their actions. Tell me that the shame this kid feels about himself has nothing to do with the shame that you believe all gay people should feel for themselves.
Tell me that you can’t comprehend the connection between your conviction that God finds homosexuals repulsive, and the fact that this kid finds himself so repulsive that he habitually cuts his own flesh.
Tell me, please, how you love this kid. Tell me how you understand his pain. Tell me how when he cries, you cry.
Tell me how you want to do everything in your power to make sure that no one, ever again, feels free to in any way victimize a young gay person.
A Christian myself, I am pleading with you to be honest with me about this.
Tell me, please, how none of this kid’s anguish has anything to do with you.
I’m listening. I really am.
We all are.

Yes, we all are waiting, but the answers to this appeal will be lame, speaking of a "love" that transcends the needs of teens and even humanity. So we are not waiting with baited breath - or even anticipated amusement - but an impending sense of ennui. We will monitor the responses (or non-responses) of:


Bryan Fischer - Tony Perkins - Pat Robertson - Michele Bachmann - Bill Donohue (Catholic anti-Defamation League) - David Barton - Linda Harvey (Mission America) - Lou Engle ("The Call") - James Dobson - Peter LaBarbera (NARTH) - and yes, Ann Coulter. Maybe Cindy Japan-is-shaped-like-a-dragon Jacobs will chime in, babbling incoherently. 


And we will have to look for the response of Jonah's parents to his sudden celebrity. Jonah has not actually mentioned any support or antagonism from his parents. Perhaps this is the most glaring omission so far, prompting many to postulate that it was a fake. 


Whatever the responses from the Right, they're sure to be virulent and definitive.

To Quote or Not To Quote: When Is It WRONG To Quote The Bible?

Salisbury University students found out yesterday. Kudos for the dean who accepted the athiests' right to free speech. 

A Pre-emptive Strike In The Christmas War: AFA's List Of "Anti-Christmas" Companies. Guess Who Made It!

Banana Republic is doomed. So is The Gap, L.L. Bean, Foot Looker, Office Depot, Old Navy, Radio Shack, Barnes & Noble and... Victoria's Secret!! They're all doomed to perdition by the American Family Association (spearheaded, of course, by the ever-righteous Bryan Fischer) because they've been deemed to be AGAINST "Christmas." (Their emphasis, not mine)


The AFA hardly waited until the first "Happy Holidays" after Thanksgiving was uttered to deem these retailers unfit to carry the "true" Christmas spirit. Like some angry neighbor in a property dispute, it has fired a warning shot over an imaginary fence, telling people that their wrath will be appeased sooner or later. Their "criteria" for "good"  "marginal" and "bad" retailers is supposedly based on "print media (newspaper inserts), broadcast media (radio/television), website and/or personal visits to the store." But a closer examination to the "naughty" list produces another criteria: "gay friendly."
For example, Old Navy launched a "gay-friendly" line of clothing for Gay Pride and teamed up with It Gets Better for a t-shirt promotion. Banana Republic and The Gap (all owned by Gap, Inc.) are all considered to be "gay friendly." So is Barnes and Noble. And we all know what Bryan Fischer thinks of Home Depot ("Homo Depot"). And with the exception of Walgreens, Best Buy and Macy's, the "nice" retailers aren't too overtly pro-gay. If they were, they wouldn't be given the Bryan Fischer/AFA stamp of Christmas approval.


So if you're gay-friendly and don't say "Merry Christmas" in your ads and to every man, woman, child, dog and cockroach that comes into the store, you're going to hell. Well, maybe YOU won't go to hell, but your company will, because the tone of the AFA's ongoing articles on the subject is a loud whisper: "boycott."


On the other hand, maybe you WILL go to hell... after standing in the unemployment line.


Who will be on THE LIST in any of the three columns is anyone's guess - depending upon who encounters "friendly" or "unfriendly" retailers and reports them to the AFA. Will the Scottsdale Gun Club be on it? Hard to say since it depends on who the guns are pointed at when they say "Merry Christmas."


OWNING CHRISTMAS


Each year, the "War on Christmas" brings up one salient point: who owns Christmas? The Christian Right hammers away at the CHRIST part of the holiday name as proof that they and only they can lay claim to it. And any misuse or omission is a sign of sacrilege or worse ... persecution. There will be a three-part series on the subject for OpEdNews readers within the coming weeks, but for now, we can safely say that the Christian Right refuses to regard the Spirit of Christmas as transcending the holiday: Christmas, in all its goodness and holiness and charity is theirs and theirs alone. Righteous arrogance rears its ugly head during the season, overshadowing the essence of humanity that the season tries to embody.


And speaking of bodies...Victoria's Secret DOES mention Christmas in its ad - just not in the convention way that Bryan Fischer wants (see below) because it also says Happy Hannukah and Kwanza and all those other sacrilegious things that the AFA doesn't want you to know about. 


While the link to the list is HERE, it's just too good to pass up reprinting it along with this article.
Here is the actual list updated as of 11/30 (from the AFA website)


AFA's 2011 listing of top retailers and how they recognize Christmas


Color Code:
GREEN: Company uses the term "Christmas" on a regular basis, we consider that company Christmas-friendly.

YELLOW: Company refers to Christmas infrequently, or in a single advertising medium, but not in others.
RED: Company may use "Christmas" sparingly in a single or unique product description, but as a company, does not recognize it.   

 List updated on 11-30-11

Companies FOR "Christmas"  AFA Online Store ACE Hardware Amazon.com Bass Pro Shops Bed Bath & Beyond Belk Best Buy Big Lots Books-A-Million Cabella's Collective Brands Costco CVS Pharmacy Dick's Sporting Goods Dilliards Dollar General Dollar Tree H.E.B. Stores HSN.com Hallmark Hancock Fabrics Harris Teeter Stores Hobby Lobby Home Shopping Network JC Penney JoAnn Fabrics & Crafts Stores Kmart Kohl's Kroger Lowe's Macy's Marshals Meijer Menard's Michael's Stores Neiman Marcus Nordstrom Office Max Petsmart Pier One Imports ProFlowers.com Publix QVC.com Rite Aid Sears Scheels Sporting Goods Super D Drug Stores Target TJ Maxx Toys R Us True Value Walgreens Wal-Mart/Sam's Club Zappos.com

Companies marginal on "Christmas"  1-800-Flowers.com Bath & Body Works Cooking.com Dollar Tree Hy-Vee Stores Limited Brands Safeway Starbucks UncommonGoods.com Whole Foods

Companies AGAINST "Christmas"  Banana Republic Barnes & Noble Family Dollar Foot Locker Gap Stores L.L. Bean Limited Brands Office Depot Old Navy Radio Shack Staples Supervalu Victoria's Secret

Can We Stop Laughing Now? GOP Hypocrisy Campaign Hits New High With Herman Cain and His Campaign Manager Mark Block

The stupidity goes on ...and on...and on... and on...

"No individual, whether a private citizen, a candidate for public office or a public official, should be questioned about his or her private sexual life." - Herman Cain campaign spokeperson (who was presumably sober when he made the statement)

Thumbing your nose at the American public is extremely stupid if you're running for office, and the GOP presidential candidate lineup has been doing just that. 

The primary debates - if you can call them that - have brought out idiocies and ineptitudes to such a degree that the entire GOP looks to be populated with clowns. And not very good clowns either. Oh, they've made us laugh, but along with the laughter, they provoke resentment at being so oblivious to public sensibilities and intelligence. For example, did Rick Perry never think that someone would uncover his "n*ggerhead camp"?* Did Michele Bachmann never put two and two together when it came to one nellie husband running an unlicensed pray-away-the-gay clinic? True, these two candidates are fairly stupid to begin with, but to have their campaigns dole out the stupidity as if it were candy is an insult to Americans.


Then there's Herman Cain, who looks to be the dumbest of the dumb: a corporate Uncle Tom who has frequent lapses of memory and doesn't seem to know anything about countries east, west, north or south of Sandy Springs, Georgia. He's a would-be politician who relies on America's trust: a man who can turn around giant corporations can certainly help the country out of its economic woes, can't he?


The problem with the above idea: America is not a corporation to be trimmed and re-packaged: it's very diverse and has more goals than just making a profit.** It's team of workers has to multi-focus or whole segments of its population will suffer.


So now that fragile trust in Herman Cain has been overshadowed by his pride, his arrogance and ... his stupidity: as he saw opponents like Perry and Bachmann falter by not covering their lives up sufficiently, he should have taken stock of his own life and covered up the accusations of harassment or dealt with them head on. But now that Ginger White has come forth with allegations of a long term affair, dealing with it all has been rendered moot: it's all over but the spin from a campaign that was built on sheer hubris.


And the spin will continue to include inane comments like the one above. Bill Clinton, stop laughing now or you'll hurt yourself!


Mark Block, The Funniest Man In America


Herman Cain's campaign manager is Mark Block, a man whose ineptitude in managing Cain's campaign is matched only by his arrogance: he is the one person responsible for the awful "Libya interview" that Cain painfully plowed through, admitting lack of focus. He did not insist on a strategy session with the Milwaukee Sentinel outlining what topics could and could not be covered (which is normal in professional promotion and publicity), but instead threw Cain under the bus and, from all accounts, thought that the interview went well! He also went on to Sean Hannity's FOX news show claiming that the second harassment accuser, Karen Kraushaar, was in cahoots with POLITICO (not true).


For arguably the best laugh anyone can have over the disastrous Cain campaign, I've presented its most hilarious video below. It's talking points:


"Tomorrow, he's one day closer to the White House"- or an outhouse
"We will put "United" back in the United States of America" - united for what - pizza?
"We've run a campaign like no one's ever seen." - thank God for that!
"But then, America's never seen a candidate like Herman Cain."- let's hope not!


Block then finishes by blowing a puff of cigarette smoke into America's face. Has SNL done a sketch on this insipid wreck yet?


So can we stop laughing now? Have we been insulted with ineptitude and mindlessness enough to get back to Mitt Romney's flip-flopping or Newt Gingrich's sudden compassion for illegal immigrants? For the sake of the country's health, can we refrain from the pathological laughter brought on by the likes of Cain and Block? 


Because this campaign is no longer a fun-filled pizza...


...it's toast.

* So prevalent is the American philosophy that politicians always have something to hide - especially sexually, porn king Larry Flynt is willing to pay $1 million to the person who proves that Rick Perry has had an extramarital affair - gay or straight. We're waiting.


**Or at least it's supposed to have more goals.

Yes, This Ad About Equality Says It All

Skeptical at first, when I saw so many people who lauded this as a wonderful, sightful ad on marriage equality, but it really DOES say it all, because it brings in all of life's emotions and doesn't sugar-coat same-sex relationships. The young man is stunning, but not in a drop-dead gorgeous way. He's funny and sensitive and, most of all ... 


LOVING.

Life Begins After Thanksgiving

Yes, it does. 


Life does not, as many think, come to a grinding halt after eating too much turkey. In fact, whether you eat turkey at all has nothing to do with your life's continuance: it's a fact that life continues. Especially after you eat something.


It continues...and continues. 


And so has mine. 


That's why I'm continuing to write.


Continuing to have faith in humanity.
Continuing to help people out of the morass of a Christian Right-dominated country.
Continuing to look for a job. Writing.  Because I want one. Because I need one. 


Really.


Actually, life begins each time we think it might likely end. It surprises us by continuing and in continuing from a moribund state, it begins anew. It's rather insidious that way, life is. 


But I'm not complaining: I love life as long as it gives me purpose, which is, right now, kicking the Christian Right's ass every second it breathes and makes precious life so miserable for everyone with its righteous arrogance. 


Ah, there's an apt phrase: righteous arrogance. It connotes total sin, or rather the cause of so much sin. It has been the cause of wars, genocide and suicide. It founded the Ku Klux Klan. It furrowed the Trail of Tears. It decimated Meso America. It caused a young man to leap from a bridge after his sexual encounter with another man was posted on YouTube.


It started Hell Houses. 


So I've begun, after Thanksgiving, to restore my crusade (ok, wrong word) against righteous arrogance and its perpetual perpetrator the Christian Right. Oh, I may get strident enough to call it the Christofascist Right, such is my abhorrence of the group, but I vow not to become so strident that I lose sight of my second goal: humor. For we are at war, the Christian Right and I, and I have chosen one of the best weapons of modern man: laughter. For as Mark Twain put it:

"Against the assault of laughter, 

nothing can stand."

Dumb and Dumber...and Dumbest: FOX News Creates America's Only Journalistic Black Hole

WE ALWAYS KNEW...

"Rather, the results show us that there is something about watching Fox News that leads people to do worse on these questions than those who don’t watch any news at all."

A scathing report by Fairleigh Dickinson University - a PublicMind Poll - discloses the fact that not only have FOX viewers been LESS informed about national and international events than other news viewers, but  they have also have been MADE less informed than others who do not even follow the news via broadcast "journalism." It seems that in its driving force to keep people misinformed - "fairly unbalanced" - FOX has actually made its viewers dumber.

A BENEFICIAL BLACK HOLE

Of course, for most of the politicians who frequent FOX, this may not be a bad thing: "analysts" like Mike Huckabee feel safer in their niches than they would be at, say MSNBC: at FOX, they're never really questioned nor are their "analyses" really scrutinized. 

FOX's jumble of misinformation and no information has actually been beneficial to some people: while the general public suffers from current affairs blindness, pundits, politicians and religious leaders of the Right have benefited. Overly supportive attitudes and softball interviews have been the boon to the likes of Tony Perkins (Family Research Council), Mike Huckabee, Sarah Palin, Sean Hannity, Glenn Beck, Newt Gingrich, Rick Perry, Michele Bachmann, and Ann Coulter. 

To be fair, it would be unwise for these same people to court, say, Anderson Cooper or Lawrence O'Donnell. Honest analysis with hardball questions are too tough for them unless, like Ann Coulter, one has an overabundance of self-esteem and thinks that there is no such thing as bad publicity. FOX always avoids the most detrimental subjects or frames them in the manner of an attack from the other side ("why do you think you were so viciously attacked about ____by____?"). 

Jon Stewart Was Right

So, let me tell you what's going on. So, two Sundays ago, I do an interview on Chris Wallace’s show, and along with some really salient, dynamic points that I made, I mentioned Fox News viewers were the most consistently misinformed viewers in every poll. PolitiFact took issue with that, and said I really shouldn't have said every poll. Just most. So, I accepted it, I then I brought up a 21 lie salute of PolitiFact Fox fact-checking. So I assume that Chris Wallace now begins the work of apologizing for Fox's many false and misleading statements. They’ll probably do a few per show and carry us into the 2014 midterms with a clear conscience.

UPDATE:

As is usual with FOX, there has been no response as to the FD report.