I never read “The Perks of Being a Wallflower,” but my kid made me sit through the movie with her. I thought it was an awful film for the most part (and a criminal waste of the brilliant and hilarious Joan Cusack’s time). But there was one line in it that stuck with me because it’s so true: “We accept the love we think we deserve.” Yep.
So when I hear about someone who is romantically involved with an abusive asshole, I don’t understand it, but I try to remember that the person may have a gaping void where their self-respect is supposed to live and other issues I don’t know about. I try to keep in mind that abusers typically don’t come with a “Local Purveyor of Domestic Violence” tattoo on their foreheads, so I try to refrain from judging their hapless partners. But there are exceptions:
George Zimmerman allegedly threw a wine bottle at a woman he was intimately involved with in the incident which led to his arrest for aggravated assault with a weapon Friday night, according to new police reports released Monday…
According to the offense report written by one of the officers who interviewed the woman, she described Zimmerman as a “psychopath.”
Ya think? Sometimes people are just goddamned stupid, end of story.
C.V. Danes
I’ll try to remember that next time I watch The Bachelor…
Napoleon
hilarious!
Villago Delenda Est
Which of course begs the question why she’s within effective wine bottle throwing range of the guy.
Also, too, it’s George FUCKING Zimmerman we’re talking about. Is his infamy part of the attraction?
NotMax
A turd by any other name would smell as rancid.
Tenar Darell
@Villago Delenda Est: As far as I can tell, with situations like this all the way to serial killers in prison, yes, the attraction is the infamy.
Another Holocene Human
True, some people get into abusive relationships because they showed the abuser they lack boundaries (due to an abusive childhood) before the relationship even really gets started. But other people get into abusive relationships via a much more insidious track.
I’d be wary of commenting on partner abuse in this way. Shades of “battered woman syndrome”. It’s victim blaming bullshit. Plenty of people from good homes who don’t lack self esteem end up trapped in abusive relationships. You know what the constant of an abusive relationship is? An abuser.
srv
Every problem is an opportunity. Is there a NRAharmony or “It’s Just Lunch at the Gunrange” site yet?
There is a woman out there for George – I guarantee it.
CONGRATULATIONS!
There’s a certain kind of woman who likes “psychopaths”, and there are a LOT more of them than anyone is comfortable with acknowledging.
Witness the never-ending stream of women trying to get a hold of Charles Manson.
Felonius Monk
Georgie Porgie, Puddin’ and Pie,
Whacked the girls and made them cry,
Then the cops came out to play
They took Georgie Porgie away.
(Best I could do on short notice. Apologies to nursery rhyme purists.)
Another Holocene Human
@Tenar Darell: Yeah, that’s possible, or it’s possible that’s her diagnosis several months later. We don’t know.
It’s true, though, there ARE people who are obsessed with dangerous people (or dangerous animals–tigers, pit bulls) because they have this fantasy in which they can tame, control, or direct the violence of their love-object. Hell, there’s some special word for it, hybristophilia, thank you Google.
However, it’s a fallacy to assume everyone who ends up in a relationship with a freak knew they were a freak when the relationship started. Psychopaths (and malignant narcissists) are characterized by something known as superficial charm.
OTOH, who doesn’t know who this guy is? It does raise … questions. Maybe the stupid bugger thought he only hates Black people? White supremacist romance? Shades of Hutaree?
El Tiburon
What is wrong with you? Are you dead inside? I happened into this film and I thought it totally sincere and on-target. I thought the triumvirate of the girl from Harry Potter, the gay dude, and the troubled protagonist was spot-on.
And the soundtrack flowed nicely. My only beef was the story-line about the incestuous aunt. That just didn’t do it for me.
Otherwise, it was an excellent flick.
Another Holocene Human
@Felonius Monk: Last line should be Georgie Porgie lawyered up.
Another Holocene Human
It’s also called lion-tamer syndrome colloquially.
Felonius Monk
@Another Holocene Human: I wonder if there are any lawyers that would have anything to do with him voluntarily.
srv
Who says the Republicans don’t have any great thinkers?
geg6
I love that movie. Especially because it was filmed in Pittsburgh. And it stars Emma Watson, who is just truly awesome.
I’m 56 years old. I’ve known lots of stupid young women who, for some reason, always seem to hook up with psychos. Over and over and over again. Until they finally grow up and wise up or get killed.
trollhattan
@CONGRATULATIONS!:
Back in my school/early working dating days I knew a surprising number of girls/women who were drawn to “bad boys” to the exclusion of dating anybody who didn’t fit the type. Am not speaking of those with self-esteem issues who were vulnerable to the type, but those who insisted on it. Bungee jumping hadn’t been invented so maybe they didn’t have another outlet.
In any case it often led to predictable outcomes and in retrospect, I still don’t understand it.
sharl
Remember CNN’s Don Lemon asking that Islamic scholar whether he supported ISIS? Well, Arsalan Iftikhar has now had time to reflect on that interview and its aftermath:
I’d actually never watched the stupid thing, so that fact that Lemon asked that question after the guy just spent most of the interview denouncing the Paris attacks came as new information to me, making that question to Iftikhar even more stupid, which I didn’t think possible.
CONGRATULATIONS!
@srv: Knew that was coming the day the GOP decided the courts were stacked in their favor.
Guess today is that day.
dedc79
Anyone, woman or man, who voluntarily spends time alone with Zimmerman needs to get their head examined.
CONGRATULATIONS!
@trollhattan: I was one of the bad boys, so the phenomena is not new to me. The women were not messed up, every one of them that I’ve kept in touch with has a rock-solid life, but yeah…bungee jumping or something. They were in it for the thrill, for sure.
Belafon
I had an uncle who you would have thought gave off “don’t come near me” but he married five times. I think he gave off the vibe that he needed a mother.
Mike in NC
Nobody indicated whether the thrown wine bottle was full or empty. If empty, was it some Three Buck Chuck merlot from Trader Joe’s, or something more upscale?
Peale
@sharl: obviously Muslims need to include things in their condemnations that our news media can understand and want to discus. Otherwise it’s merely words that the press knows not to trust.
“I condemn ISIS and I’m thinking of getting breast implants!” I think Don Lemon would start to listen then. He can understand someone who can touch on his values and areas of interst.
Liberty60
@srv:
I finally bookmarked this post “Not a Tea Party, a Confederate Party” because it explains the GOP and Rand Paul’s worldview better than anything, except perhaps Corey Robin’s thesis about the Reactionary Mind.
They are a revolutionary group, that views as illegitimate anything except their being in power.
So judicial activism is only a problem when it goes against them, federalism is great until it isn’t, the free market is wonderful until it overturns the Divine Order.
They aren’t inconsistent fools or hypocrites; they have only one single guiding pole star, and that is the restoration or perpetuation of the landed aristocracy of the antebellum. Everything else is just a means to that end.
trollhattan
@CONGRATULATIONS!:
Heh, that makes you “Leader of the pack.”
In Zimm’s case, I’d advise any potential mate, “Whatever floats your boat, just make sure he doesn’t shoot a hole in that boat.”
dedc79
@Mike in NC: I think it was a nice Chianti. He was planning to drink it with liver and fava beans…
Betty Cracker
@Another Holocene Human: Sorry, but I’m fresh out of fucks to give about any idiot who would knowingly date George Zimmerman. As I said, I’m aware there are people who have genuine issues. And then there are straight-up dumbasses. Unless Zimmerman had plastic surgery and was dating under a false name, his latest victim likely falls into the latter category.
Amir Khalid
@Peale:
Now you’ve got me wondering: what sort of implants should Arsalan Iftikhar have said he was getting, in order to hold Don Lemon’s interest?
JPL
@srv: Paul is correct and that’s why the federal exchange will be gone come springtime.
Medicine Man
@Betty Cracker: I was thinking along same lines. Given how well known Zimmerman is, you have to wonder what the woman’s thought process was when deciding to get involved with him.
Josie
@trollhattan: My mother used to call it “the missionary instinct.” She thought that many upstanding citizens of either sex were sometimes attracted to unsavory members of the opposite sex because they thought they could “save” them.
NotMax
@dedc79
IIRC, it was another wine altogether in the original book, changed to Chianti for the film because the thought was that an unsophisticated audience would be more likely to recognize that as a wine.
Another Holocene Human
@trollhattan: In terms of the thrill seeking, some of them may have been on Axis B themselves.
Roger Moore
@CONGRATULATIONS!:
Too late, ladies, he’s taken.
Another Holocene Human
@sharl: Dick biter Don Lemon was jealous when Dim Jim Hoft was christened SMOTI/DMOTI and wishes the same title for himself:
DMOTV–Dumbest Man On Television
ETA: He went on a quest to the holy land of the Arch to seek it, but found the natives and other pilgrims entirely too polite, despite mispronouncing their names and talking down to them as hard as ever he could.
Shalimar
@Medicine Man: Well known, not particularly physically attractive, and also unemployed. It isn’t like he has something else that would attract her other than “hey, aren’t you that famous guy?”
Peale
Jeff Goldberg is on Charlie Rose on my TV worrying that individuals have too much power in open societies.
Jeebus.
Another Holocene Human
@Belafon:
And I have an aunt who’s been that mother. Repeatedly. Sigh.
Another Holocene Human
When the oldest of my brothers was going through his wild teenage years he had girls hitting on him who wanted to fix him.
He was really insulted. I laughed. I admit it.
Peale
@Amir Khalid: any combination of condemnation and desire for plastic surgery will do.
Amir Khalid
@NotMax:
In my recollection, the line in the book was “A census taker once tried to measure me. I ate his liver with fava beans and a nice Chianti.” And this was exactly what Anthony Hopkins said in the movie. But I can’t find my copy to confirm it. Does anyone here have theirs?
Alex S.
@CONGRATULATIONS!:
Actually, the opposite is true. The Obama government has put a record number of democrats on the bench, so that now a majority of appeals courts have a democratic majority.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/…..democrats/
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2014/12/17/obama-judicial-nominees_n_6328390.html
http://www.npr.org/2015/01/01/371900570/2014-yielded-bumper-crop-of-judicial-confirmations
Buddy H
I don’t watch fox news. Can anyone tell me if there has been any comment from those on that station who supported Zimmerman, like Hannity? Or are they silent on the subject?
jl
Sure, you can criticize women who get involved with abusive men, and physical abuse is a particular problem. And you can criticize men who get involved with abusive women, though women are usually abusive in other ways.
But Zimmerman is the guy who (allegedly) threw the bottle. And who has acted violently with no reason, all they way back to confronting a kid just walking back home from the store, for no reason whatever, under fraudulent pretenses, and shot him dead after getting into a pointless fight.
He seems to be off using guns as the weapon, so maybe they will be able to nail him for his assaults in FL, sooner or later.
Is he allowed access to guns right now? I forget.
Better put that guy away, or get him some mental treatment before he gets his hands on a gun again.
Peale
Jeff Goldberg is working overtime to prove that Obama is Not Charlie.
Where the fuck is my remote. I’m home sick today. I don’t need this.
Ivan X
I don’t know that someone has to have a gaping void where self-respect is supposed to be in order to find themselves in a relationship that’s bad for them. Physical abusiveness, in my mind, is just an extreme form of that kind of relationship. Having been in one relationship in which I was treated badly — never physically, but certainly emotionally, and I think that happens all the time — I am actually grateful for the firsthand experience of having some insight into “why don’t they leave”? Because what I was able to see only after I did eventually leave was that as a good partner who understands you well can help bring out your best through their knowledge of you, a bad partner who understands you well can use all those same tools to bring out your worst. So while I might have what I imagine to be standard areas of weakness or insecurity in my personality, after a while this person had so eroded my self-respect and self-confidence that I bought into her worldview and distrusted my own or those of my friends and family, and believed that I needed her to survive in the world. Once you’re thinking that way — and it’s shocking to me that I once did — you don’t have the external perspective or resources to even see that the person is insane, abusive, unfair, disrepectful, or what have you. You think the problem is you, not them.
I’m happy to report that due to some fortuitous circumstances I extracted myself from that situation, but it’s made me forever sympathetic to the people inexplicably in relationships with people who treat them poorly, but understand them well, and abuse that understanding, consciously or unconsciously (in my story, she was definitely unconscious). Once I was on the outside of it, I could see it clearly, but only once I was outside of it. That perspective also gave me the opportunity to make sure it never happened again, and indeed am now partnered with someone who expresses their love with love, rather than control, violence, or manipulation.
We have our buttons, and if the wrong ones get pressed under the wrong circumstances, I think we’re all too vulnerable, and malleable. Some might be more naturally disposed towards finding abusive partners, but I don’t think anyone is necessarily immune if their weaknesses are identified by a good sociopath and their frog gets cooked slowly enough.
Another Holocene Human
@Betty Cracker: And Zimmerman is a special case! But you made some pretty sweeping comments in the OP. Just because Zimmerman is a famous woman beater (and child molester) doesn’t mean every abuser comes with a neon sign over their head about their proclivities.
My mother is an abuser. Where’s her rap sheet? Where’s her 15 minutes of infamy? My dad may be shy and lack social skills but I don’t think he has a “please abuse me” complex. He stayed because he loved his kids. That’s human, that’s not a sign of some sort of weird narcissistic complex.
Amir Khalid
@Shalimar:
George Zimmerman is not handsome and not employed, true. But he killed a person, and they do say that having an air of danger makes a man sexy.
Buddy H
@Amir Khalid:
Yes, but didn’t he sell a “painting” for a million dollars? I thought he was rich from his various media schemes.
Another Holocene Human
@Amir Khalid: Also his dad seems to pay to give him a roof over his head and you can’t discount that we’re talking about Central Florida.
Another Holocene Human
@Buddy H: Wealthy or broke? Grifters gotta grift. You tell the law you ain’t got shit, you tell the ladiez and the lads you are the shit.
Peale
Wow. Just wow. Now he’s convinced that if we had bombed Syria, the french would be happy.
God. He’s managed to gloss Israeli interests on top of France. This is bizarre.
No, the French have not consistently seen GWOT as a clash of civilizations. No, the French are not worried that their open society has a limit. But apparently the French are longing for the return of Bush freedom. No the french were not trying to get I to Syria.
This is bizarre.
Another Holocene Human
Just being honest, honest to god here, there are people in my town who pay women to stay with them, cook and clean and provide ‘additional’ services (or not), way low down on the income scale, and there are women who take it, rode hard and put up wet, a decade away from social security and in need of a situation or they could end up homeless.
There is great inequality, great economic deprivation here, and all the depravity that follows. Sanford, itself, is quite the little shithole. He’s probably moved somewhere lousier.
I’m not going to defend anyone dating him, it’s Florida, how could they not know? Still, it’s an exaggeration to say he has nothing … gramps has him living in a nice house. White supremacists buy him shit … griftin’ is real Florida livin’.
trollhattan
OT & BTW, Kamala Harris has announced for Boxer’s Senate seat.
OzarkHillbilly
My ex is one of those women who stayed in an abusive relationship for reasons that neither I nor her sons could fathom (outside of “she liked the adrenalin rush that comes with a fist fight”, probably why we got divorced) but I am very cautious to try and read into another person’s relationship. The danger is always we want to put people into pre-labeled boxes, all the while ignoring that people don’t fit into neat little boxes with all their complexity.
Betty Cracker
@Another Holocene Human:
I made that exact point in the OP, only using a tattoo metaphor rather than a neon sign. By all means, take offense if you insist, but I was talking about a “special case” — that’s the whole goddamn point of the post.
OzarkHillbilly
@Amir Khalid: “A census taker once tried to test me. I ate his liver with some fava beans and a nice chianti.”
Here
Another Holocene Human
@trollhattan: Huh. No Gov Harris, then. Gavin Newsome. Gag.
Another Holocene Human
@Betty Cracker: I’m not offended, and maybe I’m a bad reader because your point was made with too great subtlety for me.
Amir Khalid
@Buddy H:
As far as I know, George Zimmerman has neither talent nor artistic training. His painting wouldn’t have been worth more than its novelty value, except to someone who wanted to donate towards his expenses. I don’t remember what it did fetch, but surely nowhere near a million dollars.
Yatsuno
@trollhattan: Wonder what was up with the coy act. Still, Senator Harris does have a nice ring to it…
Litlebritdifrnt
@NotMax: I hate it when they do that, i.e. dumb stuff down. Happened with Harry Potter, US audience didn’t know what “philosopher” meant and James Bond, License Revoked became License to Kill because US audiences didn’t know what “revoked” meant. *facepalm*
jl
@Another Holocene Human: You want Gavin Newsome representing the Great State of California in front of the whole country? And I think Newsome would be worse Senator than he would be Gubernator.
So, odds are that it will be Harris, which is fine with me, versus Villaraigosa if he wants in.
If Villaraigos decides to pass and go for Governor, then I think he has a better shot than Newsome, who has less success than Harris in getting people to understand who he is in Southern California.
Others thinking of CA Senate seat, maybe Garamendi has a shot, others like Tauscher, I don’t think so.
But other than Newsome, I think all the Democrats reported to be thinking about it would do a good job.
Barring an unforeseen political catastrophe, a Democrat should win the seat. Maybe if the CA GOP could nominate Oscar the Grouch, then Oscar would have a shot. But I understand that Oscar is a Muppet, which complicates things.
srv
@Liberty60:
I think our own Dengre on the Republican Party did it better:
https://balloon-juice.com/2010/05/08/open-thread-670/#comment-1750442
dedc79
@Amir Khalid: I was going to take a look at my copy when I got home tonight. I remembered it as Chianti, but wouldn’t be surprised to learn otherwise.
Amir Khalid
@Litlebritdifrnt:
I think it was some idiot editor at Scholastic, Rowling’s US publisher, who took that decision. So now it says “… The Philosopher’s Stone” on my bookshelf and “… The Sorcerer’s Stone” on my DVD shelf. Sigh. They didn’t change “philosopher” to “sorcerer” in the text too, did they?
SiubhanDuinne
@Litlebritdifrnt:
And not forgetting that the play “The Madness of George III” became the film “The Madness of King George” because filmmakers were afraid US audiences would be upset that they had missed “Madness” Parts I and II.
Roger Moore
@Peale:
That is his schtick. It’s always about Israel to him.
Mandalay
@sharl: Speaking of idiots at CNN, I know Jake Tapper has already been shredded here for his bizarre "ashamed-as-an-American" line, but this quote from him (when appearing on FoxNews) astounded me even more:
I don’t mean this as a criticsim of Jake Tapper, but Jake Tapper is lying. I suspect CNN decided that he had crossed a line when he ran his mouth and gave him a finger wagging, so now he is pedaling backwards as fast as he can.
trollhattan
@Yatsuno:
I think it’s largely kabuki. Boxer surely communicated her decision well before the announcement and the suitors have been in discussion with the national and state Democratic parties. Not to say that decisions to run or not were made long ago, but unlike the cat-herding we the public see, the Dems do have a handle on things. At least in California.
Yatsuno
@Amir Khalid: Yes. They did. And yes. It’s pretty bad.
Amir Khalid
@Yatsuno:
Facepalm.
ETA: The philosopher of the title is Nicholas Flamel, who must be the one person mentioned by name in both Harry Potter and The Philosopher’s Stone and The da Vinci Code.
Roger Moore
@Amir Khalid:
They did indeed. They also replaced a fair number of British words with their American counterparts, e.g. jumper->sweater, rounders bat->small baseball bat, etc. Once she hit the big time, Rowling was able to stop them from making further changes, so American audiences got to hear about snogging and skiving, but they kept the changes they had already made.
a hip hop artist from Idaho (fka Bella Q)
@Another Holocene Human: I think you are confusing Axes and Clusters. Personality disorders were known as Axis II diagnoses through the DSM IV – as opposed to the Axis I mood disorders. The DSM 5 eliminated axes and delineates personality disorders by clusters. Cluster B is called the “dramatic, emotional, and erratic cluster,” and includes Borderline Personality Disorder, Narcissistic Personality Disorder, Histrionic Personality Disorder, and Antisocial Personality Disorder. Disorders in this cluster share problems with impulse control and emotional regulation.
The new Simmerman woman is likely to be in Cluster C, the “anxious, fearful cluster,” with a dependent personality disorder – intense fear of losing a relationship makes them especially vulnerable to manipulation and abuse. Cluster C also includes the Avoidant, Dependent, and Obsessive-Compulsive Personality Disorders. These three personality disorders share a high level of anxiety.
/pedant
ETA: @Another Holocene Human: As you should have! It’s hilarious that he was insulted.
Mnemosyne (iPhone)
@Ivan X:
That does make sense, and I’m wondering if that’s some of the same dynamic that’s gotten my sister-in-law to stick with her boyfriend for 20+ years now. The aspect that we’re all having trouble with is that she HAS gotten out. Repeatedly. And then she seeks him out and convinces him to move back in with her. It’s not him coaxing her into it — she actually talks to his friends, drives around, etc. to find him.
Honestly, I’m starting to think undiagnosed mental illness plays a huge part in some of these intractable relationships. She said one time that her therapist thought she might be mildly bipolar, and I turned to my spouse and said, “Called it!” She never bothered to get treated for it, of course. The boyfriend is back in jail once again for domestic violence. He has finally been officially diagnosed as bipolar, and he’s probably severely ADHD into the bargain since all of his known children are. Sigh.
SatanicPanic
@jl: Newsom has “young Bob Filner” written all over him
Kylroy
@Josie: Thing is, I don’t hear about this sort of thing happening to men with wild women very often; only example I can think of off the top of my head is Kelsey Grammar (jerk, but not a violent jerk to my knowledge) getting attacked by his former-stripper-future-ex-wife. Do we just not hear about this going the other way because women rarely do the kind of things that get the police involved in your relationship?
NotMax
@Amir Khalid
Per here and here (and probably other places; didn’t look that extensively) it was originally a “big Amarone.”
Wouldn’t be at all surprised if later editions changed that to Chianti.
Randy P
Blasphemer. Emma Watson is adorable. End of story. However, I’ve been castigated on BJ for not finding Audrey Hepburn adorable, so I recognize it’s a big world.
I did like this film a lot however.
SatanicPanic
@Roger Moore: in the publisher’s defense, those books were supposed to be for kids. kids will survive if they don’t learn random British slang.
Mnemosyne (iPhone)
@Yatsuno:
I’m guessing there were negotiations behind the scenes by party bigwigs to decide who would run for what. Part of the calculation may also have been that we have two women as US Senators but have never had a woman as governor in the history of the state. She may have decided she didn’t want to try and jump that many barriers all at the same time.
a hip hop artist from Idaho (fka Bella Q)
@Amir Khalid:
–Dr. Hannibal Lecter in The Silence of the Lambs (book version)
Link, since I can’t find my copy either.
Turgidson
Agree with this post. A close family member might finally be ready to divorce a spouse who has been a complete monster for over a decade now. Intellectually and logically, I’ve never understood what was keeping them together, but emotionally, this family member has a lifetime of, uh, complicated relationships, that created a whole lot of guilt and regret, and probably a belief, whether conscious or not, that a wretched, abuse marriage was all s/he deserved.
But, George Zimmerman. He’s a piece of shit, end-o-story. After all the shit he’s started, I don’t get how he managed to find anyone willing to be “intimate” with him in the first place.
Amir Khalid
@SatanicPanic:
My nephew, who wasn’t quite ten when the movies started coming out, used to say “bloody hell” a lot in imitation of Ron Weasley.
ETA: The changes Roger Moore notes aren’t even slang, actually, but everyday British English words.
Kylroy
@a hip hop artist from Idaho (fka Bella Q): Somehow, replacing “big” with “nice” does seem to work better with Lecter’s cultured menace.
And uncultured idiot that I am, Amarone sounds more like a foreign candy than a wine. Though I doubt I’d have any idea what a chianti was if not for that line seeping into the cultural consciousness.
Roger Moore
@Kylroy:
There was the case of Chuck Finley and Tawny Kitaen. He filed for divorce after she was arrested for domestic violence. He caught quite a bit of shit about being hit by a woman, though he probably would have been made out to be the villain if he had tried to defend himself. It shows why other men in the same situation wouldn’t want to publice the reason they wanted a divorce.
Turgidson
@Another Holocene Human:
Let us hope that one of the many qualified Democrats in California not named Gav will keep him out of the big chair.
I mean, he’s obviously way better than a Republican and I still have a (very small) soft spot for him for getting the gay marriage ball rolling when it was shrill and uncivil to do so (not to mention getting unfairly blamed for losing the 2004 election). But he’s since proven to be a scumbag and not a particularly reliable or effective progressive.
He can hold less consequential statewide offices if he wants, but not the governor’s chair, please.
jl
@SatanicPanic:
” Newsom has “young Bob Filner” written all over him ”
I’m not that pessimistic, but could be. I do think Newsome has “i’m a-gonna do it my way, and right now, with wonderful me right out in front” written all over him He already did it with gay marriage, which was a good thing. But I don’t see him working well in a legislature at all.
Maybe he could bounce around the CA cabinet for awhile. He could win a few of the executive branch elections and make himself useful for 8 or 12 years. Lt. Goverernor, he doesn’t have many real responsibilities, and he can only get publicity making noise on various commissions and boards that the Lt Guv is on.
Newsome gets himself Insurance Commissioner, for example, he would have a real day job again.
Edit: Looks like I agree with Turgidson.
Tenar Darell
@Another Holocene Human: Agreed. A woman who ends up attracted to an abuser, may not be in the special subset who wants to fix or tame such persons. I really only meant to refer to the cases like Zimmerman, where there’s big red warning signs like this. I should have made that clearer.
Mnemosyne (iPhone)
@Kylroy:
IIRC, physical abuse is fairly uncommon female to male just because of the size differential, so emotional abuse is more common. There are cases of physical abuse in lesbian couples and of course cases of women physically abusing their children, so it’s not necessarily that women are less physically abusive and probably more that female physical abusers pick targets they can successfully intimidate.
Couldn't Stand the Weather
@Betty Cracker:
I can respect that.
I’ll flip the script, here. There are a decent amount of guys out here in my town who seem to only like “bad girls”. I have seen a more than a few of these relationships go full, indisputable, nothing-left-standing train wreck (whether it took two weeks or two years), so I have no pity at all for the guys when that happens.
People know, on some level, what they’re getting into. Like I know what’ll happen to my gastrointestinal tract after way too much tequila. Back in the day, I did that more than a few times. And my gut (and my doctor) finally told me to cut that shit out.
Elizabelle
And they say all the good ones are taken.
Roger Moore
@SatanicPanic:
OTOH, Scholastic is supposed to be a publisher of educational books. Including British usage- it was mostly not slang, BTW- exposed the readers to the differences between British and American English and maybe expanded their minds just a bit.
SiubhanDuinne
@Buddy H:
And it now seems his latest bottle-throwing argument was over a painting, maybe one of his.
http://news.artnet.com/art-world/vigilante-george-zimmerman-arrested-over-a-painting-219223
According to the article, his “American Flag” painting sold on eBay slightly over a year ago for $100K+
Turgidson
@SatanicPanic:
In Gavin’s defense, he gives off more of a “womanizing cad” vibe than a “skin-crawly creep” vibe. And Newsom has a fairly gorgeous wife and a kid now, so maybe his days of doing stuff like plowing his top political aide’s wife are over. Ha.
SatanicPanic
@Amir Khalid: Well, OK, but my point is that it’s not great literature where every word matters and it’s aimed at kids, so why not just make it easier for them to read?
I don’t know, edits to Harry Potter are probably a bad example of how Americans are rubes in the first place. I mean, really guys, I wouldn’t call British people stupid if I heard Marvel was editing Spider-man comics so that “Peter Parker was snogging Mary Jane” or whatever.
gvg
only thing I can add is it seems to be a different woman each time. I am not sure but I think this is girlfriend #2 since wife left him. I also think he is spiraling down as he was with his wife for years before this mess started. Possibly guilt although its also possible he is one of those guys who doesn’t handle attention well.
I’ll add that he doesn’t seem to have been too successful before even though he is the son of a judge. Usually being connected gets you a better life than a wanna be cop who apparently was turned down before this happened.
I have talked to a few women who have been in bad relations and they have described men who were good at manipulating. One woman’s ex was a psychiatrist. I guess some violent men are not good at manipulating people and others are…the ones that we are talking about are good at it but they aren’t all. So its not just a partners issues…
I’m glad I stayed away from this type. But it is luck too.
SatanicPanic
@Roger Moore: Scholastic Books? Publisher of the Captain Underpants series?
*raises right eyebrow
sharl
@Mandalay: Hahaha, that’s excellent. But man oh man, just what must that network sausage-making processing look like where they determine when their on-air “talent” has gone over the line? Especially considering the crap that routinely gets green-lighted?
I don’t know what’s wrong with my aesthetic sensibilities – some kind of brain-afflicting mutation, maybe – but I would LOVE to see more writing from people behind the scenes at these big media orgs. You know, photo/video editors, assistant producers, mid-level execs, folks like that, who all must have some great/hilarious/horrible “war stories” that never make it into the books the on-air people turn out. Like this thorough piece on Ashleigh Banfield, who is now back in good standing with The Village and probably regrets giving that interview during the time shortly after her “exile” from Big Cable.
Those behind-the-camera people probably had to sign NDAs, but I can dream. (I guess this is why I am so fond of the movie Network.)
scav
@Kylroy: Huh, Still don’t have instant name recognition, but I’ve actually had some Amarone recently and rather entirely liked it. It’s a straw wine, but not one of those sweet sweet ones, like the ice wines and Sauternes. Wonder if this additional fact will help stick the name in my brain or not.
And why did anyone worry about snog and ease of reading when we’re dealing with books larger than phone directories filled with muggles, quidditch, and and Expelliarmus?!
Roger Moore
@SatanicPanic:
I did qualify that with a “supposed to be”. They do publish a fair amount of more serious academic material, but they’re better known to the public for publishing kids books with the intent of encouraging reading.
Turgidson
@Mnemosyne (iPhone):
It can be both. I knew a couple where the woman manipulated and abused the man emotionally and psychologically, and also went after him physically on a regular basis. The man outweighed her by a good 150lb. but didn’t retaliate – only did enough to stop her (grab her arms to stop her from hitting him, etc.), and was embarrassed to admit any of it for quite a long time. Partly the “you’re a man, wtf is wrong with you, letting a little woman whale on you?” and partly that she, irredeemable bitch that she was, would threaten to go to the police and show them the marks on her arms where he had restrained her and claim he was the aggressor. And that BS probably would have worked.
A real catch, she was. Real charmer.
jl
@sharl: What bothers me about Tapper is first, the editorializing, and second, ignorant editorializing, and third, isn’t he supposed to be, to some very small extent, a reporter, who is supposed to know at least some facts, or have some curiosity about how facty things come about?
Tapper shows no curiosity at all about how a number of those heads of state, particularly some of the high profile ones, came to be at the demonstration. France asked Netenyahu not to come, but he defied the French request when he found out two of his political rivals would attend no matter what the French wanted (edit: probably because an Israeli election is coming up that may be rough for him), and that seems to have created a cascade of invites and announcements of heads of state showing up.
Many of the heads of state were not there out of some noble gesture at all.
But, hey, this is our failed US corporate news media experiment, which is ever more becoming a particularly bad and boring reality show.
The Uninvited Guest
http://talkingpointsmemo.com/edblog/the-uninvited-guest
SatanicPanic
@Roger Moore: I’m just teasing you guys. I too lament the lack of cultural knowledge of my fellow Americans, just thought Harry Potter was a funny choice for making the point.
Couldn't Stand the Weather
@SiubhanDuinne:
@Buddy H:
I truly despair of the people out here who buy such “art”.
You got a burning need to waste $100,000? Give it to the Red Cross. They’ll buy pricey furniture with it.
Kylroy
@scav: Before the books had the recognition and the author was immune to editors, I think it’s a legitimate concern that American’s in the book’s target 10 year old audience would have difficulty telling what words were from the wizarding world and which ones were from Britain.
Remember most of this happened when JK Rowling was just another author with a kid fantasy novel to sell, not the world-bestriding-colossus she became. And the Philosopher’s/Sorceror’s distinction strikes me as an equally big concern on the other side of the pond; is medieval alchemy a bigger part of pop culture in Britain?
Amir Khalid
@SatanicPanic:
Well, JK Rowling is British; in her natural writer’s voice, she uses British English words and turns of phrase. Americanise those, and you dilute the Britishness of the story and its setting. Similarly, a Stephen King novel with its spelling and prose made British just wouldn’t feel right to me.
Roger Moore
@scav:
I think they did. The Britishisms in the books were not intended to be unfamiliar to the target audience of British school children, so they could be used without introduction. In contrast, the made up words used in the Wizarding world are assumed to be unfamiliar and are almost always introduced together with their meaning. Seriously, if you pay careful attention when reading the books, you’ll see that spell words are almost always introduced while the kids are learning that spell, and other words are patiently explained to Harry, who doesn’t know them because he was raised by muggles. The handful of exceptions are cases where the word is intended to be a surprise to the characters as much as to the reader. Wizarding words are never introduced as something the characters all understand and the reader is expected to pick up from context.
Mnemosyne (iPhone)
@Turgidson:
That’s why I said “less common” and not “doesn’t happen.” I wouldn’t be surprised if she was only (ahem) emotionally abusive in other relationships because she didn’t think the guy(s) would hold back like your friend did. Serial abusers tend to be very good at picking their targets.
Turgidson
@jl:
Ah, more Tapper abuse. I’m game. As I said in last night’s Tapper-bashing thread, he is so high on the smell of his own farts that he thinks saying shit like that is deep, tough-minded journalism Murrow would be proud of. Other incidents include defending FoxNews’s honor against that evil man Robert Gibbs, and thinking he’d broken the story of the century when he suspected Obama had smoked a cigarette. If he just went about his business as the glorified tabloid fodder writer he is, he wouldn’t be so insufferable. But he really thinks he’s a paragon of hard-hitting journalism.
Against my better judgment, I took a look at his Twitter puke funnel…I mean feed…last night, and lo and behold, he was defending his bullshit and trying to shut down criticism by saying, in effect, “obviously I was right, because the administration admitted they should have sent someone higher up” rather than addressing the substantive accusation, which is that he’s treating a minor PR snafu as if it was super-duper-important earth shattering news. Ron “severe dementia” Fournier does the exact same fucking thing. He also blocks good Samaritans such as myself, who beseech him to get his head trauma treated by medical professionals.
Ernest Pikeman
@jl: Protip: you might want to check how many e’s the current CA lt. governor’s last name has if you want to write about the guy and come off as remotely knowledgeable. HTH.
SatanicPanic
@Amir Khalid: for adults, yeah. But kids just want wand fights and love stories. I know I didn’t sweat the language in those abridged Robin Hood and King Arthur books I read as a kid. As fun as the HP books are to read, they’re still meant for kids. I’m just saying, it doesn’t say much about adults in America that the publisher thought they had to abridge some kids’ books.
Turgidson
@Mnemosyne (iPhone):
To be completely honest, my guess is that she hadn’t been in more intimate relationships than I can count on one hand. Maybe even none at all (she was in her 40s during this mess). Long story, but in addition to all the endearing qualities I alluded to above, she was the most antisocial person I had ever met, and it isn’t even close. Also the most angry person I’ve ever met for reasons I never comprehended, if there even were any.
Mnemosyne (iPhone)
@Amir Khalid:
I think most of my Wodehouse books have American spelling, but they still come across as very British. Of course, some editions decide to stay completely faithful to the early 1930s origins of the books and keep the n-word intact. “Thank You, Jeeves” is probably the worst offender since it involves Bertie’s love for the “banjolele” and minstrel shows. Sigh.
Amir Khalid
@SatanicPanic:
I think you’re misunderestimating young readers.
jl
@Ernest Pikeman: You don’t have anything better to do with your damn time? I caught my gaffe after the edit time expired, Sorry I did not double post the whole damn thing for your persnickity pleasure. Go yell at some clouds.
chopper
@Ernest Pikeman:
OH GOD A MISSPELLING!
stone the crows, the missus will never believe this ‘un.
scav
@Roger Moore: I still think there’s a point that a lot of kids seem to respond to the length and complexity, rather than be put off by them. Those books took off.
Mnemosyne (iPhone)
@Turgidson:
Yikes! She sounds like a real winner. That’s one of those that makes me wonder if there were some underlying mental health issues, either for your friend, his (fortunately) ex, or a combination of the two. If I were less of an introvert, I probably could have made a tasty target for an abuser during my period of severe clinical depression.
SatanicPanic
@Amir Khalid: mmmmm, probably not. maybe some kids appreciate learning about what in the heck treacle tart is, but if JK Rowling had to rely on just those kids for sales there wouldn’t be nearly so many zeros in her net worth.
Mike in NC
@Turgidson: Should the network suits ever decide to yank Chuck Todd off of “Meet the Press” for incompetence, odds are the first person they’d turn to as a replacement would be Jake Tapper.
trollhattan
@chopper: Zoot alures, a tie-poo! Haven furfiend.
Amir Khalid
@scav:
Indeed. And kids didn’t mind that the Harry Potter movies were long, either, because they were all damn good movies.
SatanicPanic
@scav: the complexity is part of what makes em fun. kids love gibberish words.
Mike J
@SatanicPanic:
Nobody ever translated Chronicles of Narnia for kids to lazy to figure out Turkish delight is a sweet. People, even kids, can figure these things out from context.
Patricia Kayden
@sharl: Wow. Don Lemon is worse than I thought. He should just sit there and smile since he’s a pretty good looking guy. Obviously not too bright though.
a hip hop artist from Idaho (fka Bella Q)
@gvg:
But he’s not as connected as it might appear. His father was a magistrate judge in VA, where they are more comparable to justices of the peace; magistrates are judicial officers, but they are not considered “judges” and do not possess trial jurisdiction: Link
Most importantly, there is no requirement that a magistrate be an attorney:
link
The elder Zimmerman did not even need a bachelor’s given the dates of his employment, per DU:
SatanicPanic
@Mike J: don’t look at me man, I’m not the one claiming that Americans can’t figure that stuff out, I’m just saying I don’t care if they do or don’t.
Turgidson
@Mnemosyne (iPhone):
I suspect an “all of the above” situation. He’s a solid guy, but I think he’s had bouts with depression. Also an introvert and lacking a bit in self-confidence. And my wife, a psychologist who does not throw words like “crazy, insane, etc.” around lightly, called this woman crazy all the time and was fairly certain she had a bunch of undiagnosed DSM things going on. Ehh, bad memories.
Amir Khalid
@SatanicPanic:
No one else is claiming that either, as far as I can see.
Mandalay
@sharl:
Me too, but I don’t know of anyone. I guess if you were blinkered enough to play that game for years then you would, by definition, eliminate yourself as being someone with anything useful to say as an outsider.
However, copyranter left the mainstream advertising world, and has gone rogue. He now spills the beans on that equally sordid world with a nice mix of ego and contempt.
drkrick
@SiubhanDuinne:
I used to love that one, but it turns out to be more or less an urban legend.
http://www.snopes.com/movies/films/george.asp
SatanicPanic
@Amir Khalid: the conversation started with a comment on dumbing things down for unsophisticated audiences.
ETA- naturally, I took offense hehehehe
Patricia Kayden
@Alex S.: That’s great to hear.
AxelFoley
I don’t feel sorry for any chick dumb enough to hook up with this murdering fuckwipe.
Origuy
@chopper:
I saw what you did there, in a discussion about British slang.
trollhattan
Republicans, stayin’ classy.
“I now realize…” Right. Shorter Randy Weber: Oh crap, I pissed off the Jews.
scav
Similarly, I spent part of the holidays getting repeatedly pop-quizzed on the greco-roman gods, both their names and attributes by an 8-year-old because of the Riordan books. I’m really going to be in trouble when he gets to the Norse gods, because most of those I picked up from Doug Adams and I don’t think he’s canonical. And Homestuck? Oh golly — that promises to be an entire Zodiac-full. The narrative style of that amuses because I keep thinking of Adventure. plugh.
trollhattan
@drkrick:
As it turned out the confusion revolved around George Ill, a rapper.
Mandalay
@trollhattan:
He certainly did, and that (rather than the Republican leadership) was what eventually prompted his lukewarm apology.
The national director the Anti-Defamation League issued an excellent rant against the hapless fool:
Well said.
Turgidson
@trollhattan:
Amazing. He didn’t actually apologize for comparing Obama to Hitler. He just said it wasn’t his intention to invite the comparison.
Memo to both-siderist assholes – this is an elected GOP representative. The caucus also features, in leadership, a former buddy of David Duke who voted not to apologize for slavery. You’d better get to work finding your “but the Democrats are worse” exemplar. Maybe just head straight to the Democratic Underground comment sections this time.
Southern Beale
Aaand speaking of stupid: Libertarian Bitcoin entrepreneur renounced U.S. citizenship, pissed we won’t let him back in the country. Today’s schadenfreude!
Roger Moore
@scav:
Bear in mind that the first two books were fairly modest in length and complexity. I think it was the success of those two that gave Rowling the position to stand up for the drastically longer and more complex later books. I would certainly say that the success of the series is evidence that length and complexity don’t necessarily scare kids away, but that’s scarcely something that started with Potter. The thing about the Potter books is that they were so fabulously successful that it was impossible for people to ignore the obvious point that the main thing that turns kids off reading is lousy books. Give them something worth reading, and they’ll devour it.
mainmati
@srv: Of course, the idea that the Roberts Court (or the Rehnquist Court for that matter) have shown judicial restraint is completely laughable. The 2000 Selection, Citizens United, Hobby Lobby, the list goes on. Tossing aside long-established precedents, inventing new judicial persons and, in the cases of Scalia and Silent Sam, openly colluding with right-wing corporations and activist Conservative groups. This Wingers on this Court have already seriously damaged the SCOTUS’ reputation.
J R in WVa
@Litlebritdifrnt:
Revoked means taken away in the sense of a driver’s licence revoked for Driving Under the Influence (DUI) in the USA.
If it’s different in England/Britain, what does it mean there? And if it means taken away or cancelled in Britain, how does Bond, License Revoked work, because I don’t understand how Revoked can mean able to kill under any of the circumstances I’ve brought up so far…
Thanks, I hope Omnes comes around to party with you soon! I see you guys very late at night when I don’t sleep normally…
trollhattan
@J R in WVa:
My vote the most significant word having different meanings: redundant. Phrase: knocked up.
Elizabelle
@SatanicPanic:
Great shorthand comment. Yeah. There’s something creepy about Newsom.
Go Kamala!!
scav
@Roger Moore: Interesting. I knew her later books got longer, but I’d never bothered to check how much they expanded numerically. Actually, it’s a little depressing how much apparent energy seems to be spent in fine-tuning word-count for novels rather than quality of writing, but I shouldn’t be surprised by it. Metrics metrics everywhere. Similarly on the success front, Jasper Fforde wanted illustrations and finally got them in the US books once he’d proven himself (had to bother amazon.uk for a while, yes I can be that obsessive. The ads were a highlight.)
mainmati
@SatanicPanic: Sorry, not to belabor the point but most of the British words used were not “random slang” but longstanding English words that you can find in the OED. It was another case of “the soft bigotry of low expectations”, i.e. not expecting students to look up words they don’t know. I read a lot of English literature as a student and it had a lot of non-American words. I was not brain-damaged as a result.
Roger Moore
@J R in WVa:
The point of the “License Revoked” vs. “License to Kill” is that in the story Bond is actually suspended and consequently loses his license. So the original “License Revoked” title is accurate and points to a key plot point. The stupid distributors didn’t think people would know that that meant, so they changed the title to “License to Kill”, even though that’s a terrible title given the story line. That’s why the decision arouses such contempt.
Tree With Water
I wonder if Zimmerman has nightmares that include Trayvon Martin. Demons haunted Dan White, assassin of San Francisco mayor George Moscone and supervisor Harvey Milk. Not long after being released from his short incarceration, White committed suicide.
J R in WVa
OK, Thanks guys. That makes a little sense. I didn’t pick up on the suspended, even tho I read all the books pretty early in the bond saga. The books were pretty good, Fleming remembered stuff he wasn’t allowed to tell us, and made stuff like it up, I think.
Of course the SF magic aspects were just hot air, and not that well done because he didn’t have the techy bent in his interests.
mclaren
Watch ZImmerman get 500 marriage proposals from drop-dead-gorgeous women while he’s in prison.
Smart women, foolish choices…
cckids
@SatanicPanic:
I’m desperately late here, but “make it easier for them to read”? WHY? One of the charms & delights of the Harry Potter books is that they pull readers into a world that is fully realized. Several publishers turned Rowling down because “kids won’t read such long, hard books”. Yes, dammit, they will! If the books are good, they will. And I speak as a mom of 2 who started Harry Potter 1 in 1st grade & kindergarten & grew up with them. The desire to read the series by themselves really pushed each of my kids to become better readers.
Also, too, Twilight. So I guess they don’t really HAVE to be good.
Mnemosyne (iPad Mini)
@cckids:
I can see the rationale for changing some of the words that might be misconstrued because the reader is applying the U.S. definition of the word. Admit it, when the books talked about Ron’s mother knitting “jumpers,” you didn’t immediately realize it meant “sweaters” and not, well, jumpers, and it took a minute to figure out why high-school aged kids would be wearing jumpers in public.
Paul in KY
@Mnemosyne (iPhone): Ask her if the sex is really hot. That’s what I think drives a lot of it: Those kind of men really twist their screws (either mentally or physically).