(no subject)

[bubosquared]

How not to get help from a call center: hang up every time you're put on hold for ten goddamn seconds.
How to confuse the fuck out of a call center agent: call in just as the fucktard above hung up, thus making me think I was taking said fucktard off hold when instead I was picking up a new call (for a different client, too. Gah.) Not this guy's fault, but still. My poor head!

This Joe Geeling story, and specifically the way the media seems to be covering it, is bugging me for reasosn I can't quite put into words, augh. The BBC story isn't too bad, but the version in the Metro (which I can't find on their website) opens, and I quote: "A teenager who murdered an 11-year-old boy because he rejected his sexual advances was jailed for life yesterday." The BBC also mentions the "rejection of sexual advances" bit, andit just ... it bothers me, because it strikes me that they'd not be writing this if the victim'd been a girl. Maybe I'm wrong about this--I have no rational explanation here, just a sense of bugging.

(Of course, in the case of the Metro article, there's just sloppy writing going on in general. "Detectives have suggested Hamer picked Joe because he was an easy target -- someone who 'in many ways was his polar opposite' at school." How the hell does being popular make you an easy target? Gah.)

And on a lighter note: Cavalcade of Cats. Favourites include: IraKitty, ShowerCat, ScaryKitten, and of course MoonCat.

Comments

[perhael.livejournal.com]

Um, I'm really pretty sure the sexual advances things would never have been left out, even if it'd been a girl. The press love that shit, man, no matter who the people involved are.

[bubosquared.livejournal.com]

It's not the mention, it's the phrasing that bothers me. "Sexual advances" just seems like a really ... adult? weird? way to phrase it when the kid in question is eleven. (I fully admit I'm probably being irrational about this, however.)

[perhael.livejournal.com]

I don't see anything weird with the phrasing. Actually, it sounds like a really BBC way of putting things ;)

[perhael.livejournal.com]

P.S. Even in my day, eleven year old kids were having sex. It may seem young, but there it is... and nowadays, kids grow up even faster than they did back then. So yes, sadly, 'sexual advances' and 'eleven year olds' do go together.

[dantesvendetta.livejournal.com]

OH MY GOD! KITTENS! *squee*

I like that a lot :D

[bubosquared.livejournal.com]

SO MANY KITTENS! Cute and funny!

[troubleinchina.livejournal.com]

It's been rubbing me the wrong way, too. I hate sensationalising the whole thing, and the implication is that it's gay crime.

[bubosquared.livejournal.com]

Yes! That was the impression I was getting too, more from the Metro article than the BBC one, but some there as well. The "sexual advances" thing seems to imply there would've been a possibility of the kid consenting (does that make sense?) and--the kid was eleven for god's sake.

The Metro article is problematic in other ways as well, like the "popularity = easy victim!" thing mentioned above, and the fact that the victim is consistently referred to by first name, whereas the perpetrator is referred to by surname only.

[sparklebutch.livejournal.com]

Ignored news and stupid news people.

Instead concentrated on kittens. Am now in overload of LOVE. Head might explode. But with love.

[bubosquared.livejournal.com]

Kittens make everything better. Always. The world would be a better place if everyone had kittens, I firmly believe.

[carelessmemory.livejournal.com]

KITTIEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEES!!!! I love your favourites, and also the screwdriver one. Hee.

[bubosquared.livejournal.com]

KITTEHS! Innit they CUTE?