What A World We Live In

I'm on one today about this poor 15 year old Irish Emigrant who was driven to suicide by her monstrous classmates.

A brief recap of the story in case someone hasn't heard...

A mother and her children move to America (Massachusetts) from Ireland 6 months ago, in hope of allowing her children, most particularly Phoebe, to be able to experience America and what it has to offer. Sadly, experience it she did. Pretty much from the get go, Phoebe became the target of harassment and abuse from a group of popular girls who self-proclaimed themselves to be "mean girls". These girls did not like that certain boys at the school liked Phoebe, and they felt she needed to be shown her place. The "mean girls" began to torment Phoebe at school by knocking her books from her hands, calling her names, and bullying her till she would run from the room crying. These sorry excuses from humans would torture her to and from school as well, and then began to seek her out on the internet and persecute her there as well. From what I understand, a couple of older boys raped her as well. For 6 months this poor thing endured the torture laid upon her relentlessly, including comments that she should kill herself, until one day a boy one of the "mean girls" liked, ask Phoebe to a dance, and that did not fly. After a rough day at school, Phoebe was walking home and one of the girls drove past and launched a can of Red Bull at her and yelled something terrible at her. Phoebe, mentally bruised and broken, promptly finished her journey home, walked inside, and proceeded to hang herself in a stairwell, where her sister later found her.

TRAGEDY!

This angers me on SO many levels! First, before I launch into my biggest beef, the administration at the school, KNEW about the bullying, and did NOTHING!! Apparently this is not the first time either. This school is notorious for having bully problems, and the administration NEVER does ANYTHING! One article I read mentioned how one student, after being interview on camera at the school, was promptly approached and punched in the face once the camera was off for having done the interview. This same article also mentioned one student's claim that he was punched in the stomach for befriending a student who was currently being bullied, because they didn't want him to even have friends. HELLO!!! Excuse me moron adults, what is the FREAKING point of you even being in the school in you don't do a DANG thing to protect those kids!? Those people need to be prosecuted!

THEN, there are the malevolent student themselves! WHAT THE HECK!! Who are the fools raising these spawn of Satan? These children have obviously missed the lessons about kindness, tolerance, and love for others, and the have begun to take joy in throwing their weight around and seeing what they can make other people do. These kids should also be prosecuted and charged with second degree murder and any other charges that would fall under the abuse they caused.

Of course, like any enabling parent with no control over their child would, the parents are each claiming their child's innocents, because they are too sweet to do that. YEAH RIGHT! If any child of mine did that crap, I'd hand them over to the law and ask them to please let them feel the full weight of what they have done!

I've seen the correlation drawn between this story and another from a few years ago, and it's sickening. If you will remember, there were 2 girls who had a falling out, once having been BEST FRIENDS, and the mother of one decided to torture the other girl. She was a cyber stalker and bully, and repeatedly told the girl to kill herself, and one day she did. The horrible woman was prosecuted, but escaped all punishment. I think it's sad that she got away with mentally and psychologically abusing this girl, regardless of the medium, she should have gotten second degree murder and abuse of a minor charges brought on her as well.

Not only am I truly embarrassed that someone would come to our country and be treated with such incivility and primate like mentality, but I'm truly distressed about the world we live in today.

Let's face it, we live in a world where bullying is the norm. Someone wants something, so they will try to get it, but if the other person won't cooperate as they would like, they take by force. Everyone thinks they are entitled to any and everything they want without giving anything in return, and they've learned that the weak will crumble when enough pressure is applied. Whether it's a free meal at a restaurant, a giant discount at a local retailer, or the return to the top of the "hotty" list in the public High School, once these animalistic terrorists decide they want it, they don't care who they hurt in the process, they WILL have it.

Working retail I see it all the time, someone comes in throwing out wild accusations and making a scene and trying to pit people against each other, whether in the same store or at another, in hopes of getting something for free, even though they don't really deserve it. People will sue anyone at the drop of a hat anymore, and I've seen tactless ogres in restaurants make a scene and blow crap WAY out of proportion, just so they can have their meal for free, and these immoral youngsters were no different. They knew what they were doing and they were hoping for they outcome they got. They saw her as an obstruction to what they wanted, and knew the next best thing to killing her, was to have her kill herself, clean hands, right? These apes felt no remorse, after her death. A friend of Phoebe's made a memorial page to her on Facebook, and the freaks still hadn't had enough, they had to slander her with appalling comment there as well.

Why is there no control in the school, or the homes? It should be done at home, but the children with uninterested parents should be caught up in the next filter, the schools. The kids needs to be protected from themselves and others. I have had an interested in shows that investigate real life crimes and real life criminals, and delve into the nitty-gritty of why and how, for sometime now, and I would have to say that 90% or more of the people that commit heinous crimes (I don't mean petty crimes, I mean big ones) come from homes where they were either treated poorly or entirely ignored, even when they were being bad in hopes of getting attention.

So what does that say about people today if there are more and more criminals and such? HELLO! The problem is in the home! Get it together people! Take care of your kids! Maybe it's time for parents to start taking some responsibility in their own life as well as in the lives of their children. There is no pride in being a good person anymore, just in being good at being bad, and the parents are either the same, or too busy shooting up, getting drunk, making the next big buck, or finding a new lover, to care if their kids are living life right. Those are some AWESOME priorities people!

And that is my rant for tonight. Goodnight.

Oma Darling

(I don't have a picture of Oma on here, so I stole this from my cousin.)

Yesterday (March 11, 2010), my Charlott Spencer, my Great Grandma (we called her Oma, German from 'Grandma'), died at the ripe ol' age of 98. Oma was 4 short months from making it to her 99th birthday.

Oma is my dad's, dad's, mom. Oma lived in Michigan where my dad's family is from, and lived in a retirement home type apartment building. Oma was a social butterfly, and she didn't let age stop her from living her life. She hung out with her friends and played games (her favorite was Uno), and she got out with her freinds and road the bus around town.

Oma had 3 children, and many grand children and great grand children. Oma's daughter, my great aunt Bev, passed on before her, as well as her husband and many other loved ones, that I'm sure she is thrilled to be with again now.

I LOVE that Oma lived so long and well. She was as sharp as a tack and as happy and funny as anyone I know. I have a few memories of Oma that I just can't help but smile over, and I love to tell them, so I will now too.

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One day we were in Michigan, my family and I, and my sister and I were in the kitchen at my grandparents house. Oma was visiting us there that day, and she walked into the kitchen from the living room, and stopped part way through her journey to look at something that was on the floor.

"What is that?" she asked.

My sister and I walked over and looked down to see a little black rock on the floor at her feet.

"A rock." we said. "

"Chocolate?"

"A rock."

"Chalk?"

"A rock."

"Chocolate? Like from a cookie?"

Giving up, we finally agreed, "Yes Grandma, chocolate from a cookie." We picked it up and threw it away giggling at how cute Oma was.

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Amanda (my sister) had hiccups one day (again, in Michigan), and Oma became concerned about her health, and suggested she go see a doctor about those hiccups.

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Last time I was in Michigan, we went to visit Oma at her apartment. We always made sure to eat a good meal before we went to visit because we wanted to have a good/true excuse not to eat her food, because she would always offer us expired food (makes me smile to think of it). Well, on this particular day, we walked into Oma's apartment to find her with a bad wig on. It was brown and short, and it was not on straight and was poking up in places. No one wanted to say anything because we were afraid she was making an atempt to look younger. After offering us food with no takers...

"You better eat up, you'll be hungry later!"

She decided it was time to play a game of Uno with us. The cards were delt, and as we began to play, Oma suddenly exclaimed;

"No one said anything about my wig, don't you like it?"

We all looked up at her and she began to laugh and pull off her wig. She was trying to be funny, and was waiting for someone to say something about her wig, but we didn't wanted to hurt her feelings, so we remained silent. What a funny lady. :)

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Well, there are other stories, but those were the ones I wanted to share. I'll miss Oma, but I know she is better off. I'm sad she is gone, but we all knew it would happen sooner or later, she couldn't live forever, and we were lucky for all the time we had with her. We were prepared for the day she would leave us, but we will still miss her so.

I love you Oma!

What a sad day!

Well... we went through a scare with Lilly, they told us she more than likely had a incurable disease that would kill her after torturing her, and we would have to put her to sleep. As I prepared myself to put my little puppy to sleep, they ran some tests on her brain fluid, and found that she really didn't have that disease, and that she in fact had a disease called Hydrocephalus, which she was born with. Hydrocephalus causes her to produce excess fluids on her brain, which was putting added pressure on her brain, and all around messing her up, but, it was treatable. So now Lilly is doing better, she will be on steroids the rest of her life, but she will be okay.

Then we got hit again. Saturday night Junior (Lilly's brother, and my sister's dog) starting acting sick, and then Sunday morning he could use the back half of his body, he was dragging himself around.... he was paralized. We frantically called my mom and one of the vets at her work, and got them to meet Blake and Amanda at the clinic with Junior. They tried to help him and make him better, but it just got worse, and he was in SO much pain. Today Blake and Amanda had to make the difficult but humane choice to put him down and relieve his suffereing.

Our loveable little guy is gone. We are all very sad, naturally Amanda is more so, since he was her dog, but we are all feeling the loss. Lilly doesn't know what is going on, but I'm sure she'll start to wonder where he is and why he's not around to play with her and cuddle with her. It's all so sad.

I wish Junior wasn't gone, I hate that it had to happen, but I know he is okay, and he is playing with our other dogs, Sadie and Pern, and free of pain.


I love you guts Jun, and I miss you happy little face.