Archive for the ‘evil’ Category

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A Foreign Policy Entry

January 16th, 2012 by Suzanne | No Comments | Filed in evil, other rants

April 16, 1994

[Still in DC...] I just heard on the news about our little “friendly fire” incident in Iraq. I suppose that I should write about it, but quite frankly, I don’t care. What I do care about, however, is the current situation in Rwanda. That is bad news.

I’m curious as to why there haven’t been any big headlines or magazine covers on the war down there. Are we really so Euro-centric that nobody cares? A shell falls in a Sarajevo market, killing 62, and we call it a tragedy (it is), and it makes big news. 100,000 people die in an African country, it is not a major story.

I realize that we can’t intervene in everything. But I also think that equal and fair coverage should be given to such events. The American people NEED to know!

Marriage Is Dangerous to your Health

January 10th, 2012 by Suzanne | No Comments | Filed in evil, other rants, those were the days

Oh, how young I was! My teacher’s comment: “Oh, don’t be so cynical – there are some success stories, too.” If only Mr. Chase could see me now, married for almost 12 years.

March 14, 1994

Once again the news talked about a woman who was killed by her husband. He whacked her over the head, sat down, and watched her bleed to death. Last week, a woman disappeared; her body was recently discovered in her estranged ex-husband’s house.

Unfortunately, these stories are all too familiar. I read somewhere that 40% of all women who are murdered were killed by their (ex)husbands. And how many women are killed by their boyfriends? I’m not sure, but it’s probably a lot. Stalkers are not uncommon and the law doesn’t do anything about them. Over and over again I find myself hearing or reading stories about women killed by their lovers.

It’s no wonder that I don’t want to get married. I could get killed. On the other hand, relationships are just as frightening. I used to be a peer educator on dating violence and I went around talking to high school kids about it. It’s scary to see my peers involved in such dangerous relationships already. Then again, it shouldn’t really come as any surprise to me: I was in a semi-abusive relationship my sophomore year and I’ll tell you, the boy is currently getting worse. I’m pretty scared for his current girlfriend. Someday, I expect to see his face in the news. I have no doubt that he’s going to hurt someone very badly in the not-so-distant future. Maybe he’ll get help before that happens, but I highly doubt he will.

Anyway, I’ve also been reading up on dating violence lately. The statistics are scary. I tell you, a girl is better off staying single. Safer, at any rate.

Heritage

December 19th, 2011 by Suzanne | No Comments | Filed in Damn, evil, Jewishness, other rants, random, those were the days

The optimism (and lack of knowledge beyond Ashkenazi Jews) in this journal entry for my AP Poli Sci class just kills me. This is probably the issue in which my views have most evolved over the last 18 years:

March 2, 1994

I am so disappointed and hurt by the psychotic actions of the crazed Dr. Goldstein* in Israel. How can we ever expect to be taken seriously when we complain about terrorism and then we commit the same heinous crimes that we condemn? It is because of people like Dr. Goldstein, extremists, that other people hate Jews. OK, well, maybe not, but we’ll never solve anything by acting the same way as our enemies. It is for that reason that I am glad that Rabbi Kahane** is dead.

It crushes me when a Jewish person commits an act of violence like that. I realize that no race is perfect, but it still makes me embarrassed to be Jewish. It’s really weird because I usually consider myself proud to be Jewish. Over the last few years. I’ve become very aware of my Jewish heritage. In the past, when people would ask me what nationality I am, I’d say Russian and Polish. But recently I’d begun to rethink my position. True, my family came from these countries, but we don’t have any of their customs. In fact, Jews were never considered to be Russian or Polish or whatever nationality, but Jews. They lived in separate towns (willingly or forced), spoke a different language, and had their own culture. They were a nation of people without a nation, scattered around the globe, connected by religion, culture, persecution, and language. Now when I’m asked what my background is, I say Jewish.

The point of all this is that every nationality needs a nation, and that’s why Israel is so important. I don’t want it to lose respect in the eyes of other nations because of some crazy. We have too much to lose. It just really upsets me that we’ve come this close to peace, and now it may be lost.

*This evil person killed 29 Muslim worshippers in Hebron: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Baruch_Goldstein
**I spit on his grave: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Meir_Kahane

“Never Again”

December 14th, 2011 by Suzanne | 3 Comments | Filed in Asshole idiots, evil, other rants, those were the days, What is wrong with people?

From the AP Poli Sci journal:

Feb. 6, 1994

At the end of World War II, someone promised that “never again” would there be a holocaust like the one that just ended. At the end of World War II, someone invented the word “genocide” to describe what had happened. Yesterday, 68 Bosnians were killed and 200 more injured when a market was bombed. “Ethnic cleansing” the Serbs and Croats call it. Not very much is being done to stop it.

Steven Spielberg has come out with his masterpiece “Schindler’s List.” He said in an interview that he hoped that people would be moved to action by it. He said that what is happening in Bosnia now, this “ethnic cleansing,” is genocide. “Never again” doesn’t mean that we will never allow another JEWISH holocaust, it means that we should never allow genocide again. Period.

Someone – a priest I think it was – wrote a poem. He said, “When they came to take away the Jews, I said nothing.” It continues about how they kept coming back to take more and more groups, and still he said nothing. It ends with, “Then they came to take away me, and nobody said anything.” The Talmud says, “He who saves one life saves the world entire.” Spielberg said that he hopes that “Schindler’s List” would wake the world, or just one person eve. Because one person makes a difference sometimes.

When I think about what happens in Bosnia, I cry. I see my family’s experience. I see people in trouble and the world turning their backs on them. When I think about Bosnia, I get angry. There people want democracy. The world claims to fight for democracy. When Iraq invaded Kuwait, a NONDEMOCRATIC country, we wasted no time getting our asses over there to “defend democracy.” Huh?!? Nice try. We just needed to defend our oil interests. We then stood by as the Iraqis slaughtered the Kurds, even though we provoked it. Ah, but silly me! I forgot that oil means more than human life. (Where are all the “pro-life” forces now?)

Silly me! I forgot that some people count more than others. I forgot that “never again” meant, “Well, only if we stand to profit from it.” What a beautiful world we live in!

I AM PRO-LIFE

December 13th, 2011 by Suzanne | 2 Comments | Filed in Asshole idiots, Damn, evil, other rants, those were the days, What is wrong with people?

From the journal I kept for AP Poli Sci, and I am glad that my thinking is a little more sophisticated now…

Feb. 3, 1994

19 kids found living in horrible conditions, fighting for food with the dog, crawling with cockroaches, etc.* The DCFS did nothing. My [relative] is a teacher in [a low-income suburb]. She told me that she knows of other children who live in similar situations. She told me that it recently took DCFS over SIX MONTHS to get one of her students removed from the CRACK HOUSE he lived in with his crack-addicted parents. What is going on here?!?

I’m so angry. I am also very bitter. So many issues are relevant, even contributing to, this disgusting abuse and neglect of kids. My relative pointed out two things. First, she said, DCFS is stuffed with too many burned out workers and people “who just don’t give a shit.” Second, she thinks that many families are not adequately taken care of because they are black. She feels the DCFS lets more bad things happen because they don’t care what happens to black children. I think that a lot of the mistakes DCFS makes is due to the screwy philosophiy that some members hold. I read a quote from a DCFS caseworker in some magazine (for the life of me I can’t remember which one) a while ago. He said that they feel it is more traumatizing for a child to be taken out of an abusive situation than to leave him with the ones he loves and is familiar with. Hmmm… when people who are in charge of protecting children from harm think such perverse, backwards theories, it’s amazing that anything gets done!

What makes me angriest, however, is the so-called “pro-lifers.” If they are so concerned about protecting life, where are they when children are forced to live under the poverty line, in misery, surrounded by drugs, gangs, prostitutes, and god knows what else?!? Are they down there working to clean up the neighborhoods? Are they clamoring for more health care benefits for these kids, better schools, better standards of living? Are they fighting for day care so that the women forced to bear children they don’t want can go to work to earn a living? Do they want to provide welfare so that mothers can stay home and care for their unwanted children? Are they adopting every single child who is born unwanted? If so, why are there more than 500,000 kids available for adoption that no one is taking? If 1.5 more children, unwanted by anyone, hated by society, are born EACH YEAR, where are they going to go?

Yes, all of this ties in to the 19 children who were found in their own hell. Because until our society is ready to care for every child who is born, we have no right to demand that women bear them.

PS – let’s not forget that poor women should not be able to have abortion because they can’t afford it. After all, they are the least able to raise children – with no resources, no education, small housing, etc. Women who can afford abortions are unaffected by the Hyde Amendment are allowed to plan their families. They can stop having children whenever they choose. (They also have better access to birth control.) Oh, never mind! I’m so frustrated!!!

*http://www.thedailybeast.com/newsweek/1994/04/24/why-leave-children-with-bad-parents.html

The ‘Gates of Hell

December 12th, 2011 by Suzanne | No Comments | Filed in Asshole idiots, evil, other rants, those were the days, What is wrong with people?

From my AP Poli Sci journal:

Jan. 31, 1994

I am so damn sick and tired of reading about “Whitewatergate.” The whole thing is SO blown out of proportion that it’s not even funny. Yes, fine. Maybe the Clintons did a little financial dance or maybe they didn’t. I don’t care. I can think of many more people who screwed around with money in the ’80s and weren’t punished. The catch phrase of that sick and decadent ear was aptly coined by Michael Douglas in the movie “Wall Street”: “Greed is good.” A lot of people, then, deserve to be punished for the ’80s.

At any rate, this is nothing compared to the corruption of Ronald Reagan. This man is the ultimate evil.* If he didn’t have a role in the Iran Contras, my name is Bob Dole. This man is responsible for the bad shape of our country today. (Actually, I’m getting off the subject.) Why are there no special prosecutors investigating Reagan and Bush for their roles?!? Why are we wasting time on a stupid and annoying issue (Whitewatergate) when these people are getting away with murder? And good old Oli wants to run for Senate?!?! Excuse my language, but these crooks can just kiss my ass.

Another thing that annoys me about this whole every-scandal-from-now-on-must-end-in-the-word-”gate” thing, is that it really undermines what Watergate was about. It was about the President believing that he was above the law – he’s the President and can do what he wants. Nixon deliberately subverted the laws he was supposed to defend. How can one compare Clinton to Nixon? One (Clinton) works to make life better for people, while the other (Nixon) used his powers to make his enemies’ lives a living hell.

Clinton is a good, for the most part. This “Whitewatergate” (say in dumb guy voice) is just a pathetic effort by Republicans to discredit him. Truly, they’ve stooped to new lows by biting at every “scandal” that just suddenly conveniently pops up. If I were (stupid enough to be) a Republican, I would be quite embarrassed by my party’s desperate measures.**

*Oh man. If only I had known back then what was to come with George W. Bush….
**Ah, the good old days. I almost look back on that level of interaction with fondness. Yeesh.

Atonement

October 7th, 2011 by Suzanne | 6 Comments | Filed in Damn, evil, Jewishness, mortification, other rants

Yom Kippur, the Jewish day of atonement, begins tonight at sundown. Tonight, people will recite the Kol Nidre, an Aramaic prayer that asks God, “May all the people of Israel be forgiven, including all the strangers who live in their midst, for all the people are in fault.” It is a haunting, beautiful prayer, which can be heard here.

As a society, there is a lot to atone for this year, as every year. My top priority is the chasm between the rich and everyone else. I was particularly struck by this last night, when Husband and I received an appraisal for our apartment. (We are refinancing.)

We’ve lived in our place for almost nine years. In the time, the value has increased by more than 200%. In theory, I should be jumping for joy, but I’m actually appalled. When we went to buy a place, we stretched a little, but it was at least feasible. We could never do that now. I don’t understand how anyone can.

Decades ago, my neighborhood was a little microcosm of society. There were wealthy people on Central Park West, middle class people on the side streets, and mixed in with that were single room occupancy (SRO) buildings and halfway houses. My former boss lived in a brownstone on Columbus and 85th Street in the late 1980s, and across the street was a crack den. Homeless people lit trash fires to warm themselves at night. I’m not saying I want the crack dens back, but a studio apartment in that building now rents for $2000 per month and renters have to show the landlord that their yearly income is 40 times that amount before they can sign a lease. It’s a rich people ghetto and it’s morally wrong.

This whole situation is unsustainable. The real estate market is a house of cards. The only way to keep price up is to have inflated salaries in certain industries, like legal, banking, and medicine. But as a whole, we can’t afford that and we should not have to mortgage the future of the country so that an elite class can afford a one bedroom apartment on the ground floor facing the street if they stretch a bit. It’s sick.

I won’t be attending services for Yom Kippur. However, I will be hoping that not only are my family and friends inscribed in the Book of Life this year, but that some true miracle will happen and this nation will wake up and say that everyone deserves an equal shot at more than merely breathing.

Gmar chatima tova.

Know Your Audience

June 29th, 2011 by Suzanne | 4 Comments | Filed in Asshole idiots, evil, hilarity, I am a bad person sometimes, other rants, random

Last year, not long before graduation, I went to a supplemental seminar at school. The topic was how to give good public readings, which for reasons beyond me, I always first thought of as how to give good head. That would have probably been a more interesting class.

The instructor began by telling us that we needed to know our audience. “A is for audience” he said, and I rolled my eyes. “U is for understanding,” he continued. “Who is in the audience? You should understand what they expect.” Clearly, he did not know his audience because as he went down the list (“D is for…”), we all tuned out and pondered what a class about giving good head would have been like.

However, the lesson of knowing one’s audience is actually important. I was struck recently by two ludicrous pieces of junk mail that I received. The first, and most pernicious, was from a crazy-town anti-choice group called Live Action. It was some nutso rant against Planned Parenthood and their abortion mills and blah blah blah. They sent me their ravings because they wanted me to write about them, their “victories” for the dead babies or whatever the fuck they think they are doing rather than harming the world. Their leader, Lila Rose, is a cuntface moron with her fake “sting operations” and heavily edited “undercover exposes.”

In a way, they did know their audience: here I am writing about them. I am pretty sure they did not intend for me to write something that calls their leader a cuntface moron, so in that sense, they probably should not have sent me anything demonstrating that she is, in fact, a cuntface moron. If there is anyone I hate in this universe, it is cuntface morons and their minions.

The sillier junk mail arrived via the postal service. It was an ad from Bank of America for a new Cubs credit card. “We know you are one of the Cubs’ biggest fans,” it said, or something like that. (I threw it out, so I’m paraphrasing here.) My first thought is that if I am one of the Cubs biggest fans, than the Cubs must have some extremely pathetic people rooting them on. Now, in 1984, I was a huge Cubs fan, and I followed them closely through the 1980s. But that was a long time ago, and I probably should not have had a credit card when I was eight. I seriously wonder what database the brains at B of A were using for that campaign.

Anyway, know your audience. I am pretty sure that the readers of CUSS will not mind me calling Lila Rose a cuntface moron or mocking B of A. If you do, tough shit – you are probably the wrong audience.

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That Smell

June 14th, 2011 by Suzanne | 4 Comments | Filed in Damn, evil, mortification, other rants

My worst moments of subway ridership involve the times that a homeless person in the saddest stages of humanity pass by me. It is heartbreaking to see people in such base conditions. The smell of people who have gone without basic care for a long time is overpowering. Even after the person passes, the smell of rotting peaches, rancid garbage, and decaying small rodents clings to the air for a long time. It is really the worst stench I have ever encountered, and that it comes from a fellow human always upsets me.

Until today. I was at the gym this evening, running on the treadmill. It’s been more than a week since my last run, which was the half marathon. I was excited and nervous to get back to it. Would I have lost my stamina? Could I handle running again?

Everything was going great. I was about 1/2 mile into my planned 1.5 miles and feeling comfortable running a ten minute per mile pace. The movement was incredibly enjoyable, and I felt great to be running again. Then the smell permeated the air.

I looked around. What the fuck in my absurdly overpriced gym could be generating the odor of 10,000 rotten eggs mixed with vomit? I realized that it was the buff blond guy who just stepped onto the treadmill on the other side of the woman next to me. It blew my mind that someone who was otherwise in impeccable condition could emit such a foul smell. The woman next to me pretended that she didn’t notice anything, but she got off the treadmill within two minutes and moved to other equipment.

I didn’t want to end my run. On the other hand, it was really hard to breathe when all I inhaled made me gag. I decided to ramp it up, get to a mile as quickly as possible, and move to another machine on the other side of the gym.

The good thing about that was it led me to realize that I could run much faster than I thought. Once I was safely breathing clean air on the other side of the gym, I decided to go another mile, which I loved. But I’m curious what I will do if I ever see that guy again. Husband had been working out further away from him, and he smelled the man, too. I did feel bad for the guy, as probably there is something wrong with him that he would smell so god awful, but at the same time, I figure he has the resources to do something about it. It’s a weird situation.

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Tattling

June 6th, 2011 by Suzanne | 1 Comment | Filed in Asshole idiots, evil, fuck, I love New York, other rants, What is wrong with people?

Dr. H and I were walking up 8th Avenue, chatting about the high and low points of “The Hangover Part II,” which we had just seen. As we crossed 42nd Street, a bus shot in front of us. It had made a reckless left turn and almost plowed through a crowd of people.

“HEY! WHAT THE FUCK?!?!?” I yelled.

“What are you fucking doing?” screamed the guy next to me.

All five of the people who were nearly mowed down made similar comments. The bus driver never even looked at us. It was scary.

As he sped west on 42nd, I made a mental note of the phone number written on the back door. (It’s 201.945.0556, in case anyone is interested.) Once I was safely on the sidewalk, I fished out my phone and tried calling the bus company to complain about their lunatic employee, but – shocking! – no one answered. Dr. H and I discussed how upsetting it was to nearly be run over and how little the driver cared.

A block later, I noticed two cops standing on the sidewalk.

“Maybe I should mention it to them,” I said to Dr. H.

“What good would that do?” she replied.

“None, but I want to anyway.” I thought I would feel better if I vented. And these happened to be super cute po-po. I felt that it might soothe my raw nerves to chat up some nice looking dudes. As expected, there was nothing they could do, but they weren’t surprised. They knew exactly what I meant.

When we walked away from the cops, Dr. H and I chatted about how hot they were. It made us giggle a lot and feel better.

Sad, I know.

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