Enter The "Twitter-Bully"

I have always been a big fan of Robert Greenwald... and have floated in a couple of the same circles as Art Greenwald... So when I saw that there was a gay left-wing blogger and fellow South Floridian writing for Salon.com named Glenn Greenwald, I figured he'd be a winner for sure.

Not so much, as it turns out...

I'm sort of new to Twitter and my blog's Twitter account has only above 80 followers thus far. A few of those followers have a propensity toward showing me their breasts... They evidently don't read my tweets or they'd know they're barking up the wrong tree.  I'm still learning and only recently learned about how Tweetdeck helps a person.

I had avoided establishing myself on Twitter for the longest time because the only things I knew about it were that it limits your thoughts to 140-something characters or less and that it was, fittingly, the communications medium of choice for Sarah Palin.

Now, I know you're anxious for me to get to the point, so let me just brief you about my thoughts on "bullying" in general real quick.  I'm not totally sold on the idea that bullying should be or can be legislated out of existence... but I do believe that bullying in it's myriad of forms is wrong.  This might strike some as a bit hypocritical coming from me but I assure you it's not.  As Dorothy Parker once said, "Every morning when I wake up, I brush my teeth and sharpen my tongue."  That doesn't make me a bully, it just makes me one not to mess with.

Although I'm used to shaking things up politically and can hold my own in internet flame-wars... I support an organization called NVEEE that seeks to make life a little bit better for those who aren't so thick-skinned.

Now, here's where Glenn comes in... And I'm really sort of picking on him because he picked on me first.  He's not at all the only Mainstream Media personality who does this.  And what he did wasn't really all THAT terrible but it was immature and it was technically a form of cyberbullying.

He and I got into a day-long heated discussion argument about Jimmy Carter drone strikes.  He's steadfast against them and I'm wishy-washy on the subject.  In my opinion, we elected a President who assured us that he'd "bring a scalpel" to the war on terror and "not a sledgehammer" as George W. Bush had done.  I think Drone Strikes might accomplish exactly that... provided there's enough transparency regarding their use.

Well, it didn't take Glenn Greenwald very long at all to start denouncing all Obama supporters as vicious child-murdering unsympathetic warmongers and yaddita-yaddita-ya... Of course, the terrorists who use children as body armor are just trying to get some long-awaited respect as far as Glenn is concerned... but I digress...

That part, I can handle - but where it got curious is when Glenn did what I've seen Michelle Malkin do before... He kept re-tweeting his responses to me over and over again. Now, I didn't know at first why he was doing this. I thought maybe his keyboard got stuck or something... (he might actually look at the pictures of the "cam people").  And when somebody "re-tweets" themselves using an application like Tweetdeck, Twitter doesn't tell them not to.  Furthermore, the re-tweeted tweet just moves up on the feed again but retains its original position on the (twitterers?) account page, so it kind of even looks like they're not doing anything.

Then his "followers" started joining the conversation one by one... Some of them were very nice and some of them were "on my side" too.  But not all of them. I suddenly realized that Glenn Greenwald was "Twitter-Bullying" me... He was taking advantage of his stature by using his number of followers to launch an attack in an effort to intimidate me and make me change my opinion.  His staunch defenders - dare I call some of them "sheep" - would now commence unto bleating in my general direction.

Once I indicated to him that I was aware of what he was doing, he immediately stopped.

But let's not make this all about Glenn, ok?  Let's imagine for a moment how this scenario would go down in a high school setting... In this alternate reality, I am the dorky fat gay kid and Glenn is the beautiful prom queen who has everything.  Need I go any further with this?

As I've already stated, Glenn is not the only "blogosphere celebrity" doing this on Twitter, I've seen Keith Olbermann sort of do it too... and I've seen Cher come dangerously close.  In Keith's case, he didn't re-tweet over and over again, but he made his responses to his detractors a little too personal to be comfy with. If you've been following this blog at all, you also know that I first pointed out the hypocrisy or at least the audacity of Dan Savage entering the nation's "bullying" dialogue - long before Breitbart did.

Now, I understand, that to those Twitter Superstars, they got #99Probs and a ___ aint one. Poor Meghan McCain was bullied by some of Michelle Malkin's evil minions (and other people I'm sure) and felt the wrath of Twitter... but I didn't say much at the time... because I know that Meghan's a big girl and she has lots of followers. But what if Meghan isn't the only person viewing the attacks against her?  What if some random *other* heavy-set girl who supports gay rights was exposed to the attack?  See, it's a problem no matter who does it or to whom...

I think it's wrong for mainstream media personalities (or even just popular people in general) to victimize their detractors (or random people) by inciting their "fans" to do their dirty work for them.  What we can do to prevent this is three-fold:

1) When you see someone being "bullied" on Twitter, tell the participants to stop.
2) Unfollow the bully and start following the bullied victim.
3) Try to avoid the temptation to pick people apart personally. Stay focused on your point and not what you think of the other person when you argue.

I might just unfollow Glenn if he gets out of hand with this.

Rick Scott's Cuts To Mental Healthcare Have Led to ACTUAL Zombiism

In a terrifying real-life headline from CBS News, "Miami Police Shoot, Kill Man Eating Another Man’s Face". The article quotes sources describing the most grizzly scene one can imagine - a naked man on the MacArthur Causeway is chewing on the flesh of another naked man's face in broad daylight.

Police made multiple attempts to stop the horrific scene before resorting to gunfire whereupon they shot and killed the apparent "Zombie", thus saving his victim who is currently being treated at Jackson Memorial Hospital. The wounds suffered by the victim of the attack are apparently not superficial either - one source says "the man had virtually no face and was unrecognizable".

One must pause when reading a story like this and wonder, first, whether such a story could be true. (I checked the URL to make sure I wasn't reading The Onion or some other farce.) The next thing that a person must wonder is "What causes this sort of thing?"

In an attempt to explain that latter question, I'll direct you to the fields of mental health and politics. Governor Rick Scott is infamous for, among other things, his budget cuts to the healthcare system in Florida. Cuts to programs such as ADAP (the state/federal cooperative program to subsidize the cost of HIV/AIDS medication) have real life consequences and many patients were left unable to afford life-saving medication. Those cuts were only shocking and frightening to people who know and love someone who has HIV... or at least they should have been. But as we can see now, the beginning effects of life without adequate mental healthcare can have truly disastrous consequences for the general public. Shock and awe, indeed.

Here are just a small few of the $142 Million line-item cuts that Governor Rick Scott personally made to the State budget back in April:

• University of Miami brain and spinal research: -$400,000

• Florida Medical Schools Quality Network: -$3,000,000

• Inpatient hospital reimbursement ceiling exemption for community hospitals: -$2,006,000

• Florida Council Against Sexual Violence to fund rape crisis centers: -$1,500,000

• New Horizons Community Mental Health Center: -$100,000

• Seminole Behavioral Health: -$350,000

• Psychiatric medication assistance: -$500,000

• Recovery House Central Florida: -$1,560,000

• Alzheimer’s Family Care Center of Broward County: -$250,000

• Mt. Sinai Brain Bank: -$100,000

• McKnight Brain Institute Brain Tumor Registry: -$500,000

• Sarasota Fetal Alcohol Clinic: -$100,000

• Autism Center of Miami: -$100,000

• WestCare substance abuse treatment program: -$150,000

Anyone who reads national news headlines can tell you that Florida is NOT the state that one should cut funding for mental health services in... Our headlines are a source of national embarrassment - everything from psychotic moms killing their babies to family Thanksgiving day shoot-outs. We have headless bodies washing ashore in Fort Lauderdale and kids partying on ecstasy with the bodies of their murdered parents in Port Saint Lucie.

Republicans these days are largely all on board with cuts to any program that is funded by taxes. Miami's Republican Mayor, Tomas Regalado, rarely protests the drain that Tallahassee has placed under his city. When questioned about how Republicans view things in the larger scheme, he gives answers that leave little hope for humanity. He says things like: "Miami is what the United States will look like in 25 years from now... and there's nothing we can do about it."

A Personal Thank You to The President of the United States of America

Dear President Obama,

It is with great pride and sincere gratitude that I write these words.  I began campaigning for you in the Summer of 2008 knowing that you were far and away more tolerant and equality-minded than your opponent John McCain.  Like you, I thought that America was not quite ready to embrace gay marriage and I often explained to my friends and fellow activists that your administration was one that we could count on but shouldn't "expect too much from".
Yesterday, you proved me wrong about the latter half of that statement. You've proven to the LGBT community that we can not only "hope for change" but shoot for the stars!  You could have just as easily taken the politically expedient route of holding Same-Sex Marriage back like a carrot on a string.  You could have withheld your verbal support as incentive for LGBT persons to elect you to a 2nd term and in today's political climate, it would work.  But instead, you chose to do the more politically risky thing because it is also the most honorable thing.
For this bold, meaningful support on your behalf, I say Thank You.  I don't think I'm being excessive in saying that you have done more to advance my civil equality in this country than any other President I've had the experience of living under. 
In closing, I pledge my support not only for your re-election to a 2nd term, but also to elect a Democratic Congress that will help you to achieve your vision of America... a vision I know we share.

- Sincerely,
Jarrett Terrill
Fort Lauderdale, Florida