June 17, 2011
--It's now two days in a row that the Times Argus has featured children on its front page. Yesterday it had one of them wearing a shirt that said "Rock Art," and today it's got several of them standing in a river with the title "River Recess" over the picture.
I hate the Times Argus. I don't like the idea of them getting death threats or other threats of violence, but I do like the idea of them huddling nervously in that building; I like the idea of them being held accountable in some way for what they're doing.
--Yesterday, after my disappointing day at Vermont Works for Women, I went somewhere else for a while. When I walked into the building, an overweight woman who works there who wasn't nice to me the one time we ever had an interaction was on her way out. We exchanged the usual "How are you" hello-type greetings, and I thought her voice sounded the way people's voices can sound when they're saying something polite in the words but not in the tone. Not that I would know, since I'm never sarcastic and never take refuge in such things.
I said something before I even stopped to think about it; when she asked me how I was, I said "Fine. I'm nice and thin; it's great."
I hate that; I've noticed that my rude or cruel responses to people are getting easier for me to say. Strangers cough at me and I'll cough back; it's actually better that I said "Yeah, you're SUCH a genius; it's such a GENIUS things to do" to the guy in line at the bank who did it yesterday, rather than coughing back at him.
Hopefully, I can keep the upgrade to telling people how stupid and disgusting they are, rather than doing the same things they do.
Everything that's happened over the past year is making the world a worse place. That's the "difference" that it's made; to make people worse, to bring daily interactions between them to the level of.....it's like grunting. It's PRE-LANGUAGE, and when language is used, it's distorted and ugly and gross. And, it's ALL been deliberately done by the people in power who are doing it; it's not as if it's some kind of natural or inevitable societal progression. It's been a deliberate destruction of boundaries and of civilized behavior.
The same staff/volunteer who made the "wine" comment last night is talking to her guinea pigs, saying "I need to clean you. I'm going to get you nice and clean. I'll go and get the cleaning supplies, and then you'll be clean again." She's just a few feet away; that's how she's decided to start her morning, by nattering on to her guinea pigs in the hopes of upsetting me and I guess also getting another mention on my blog.
There you go; congratulations. You and your guinea pigs are famous.
Copyright L. Kochman June 17, 2011 @ 6:20 a.m.
--Pink sweater
I wore a pink sweater for some of the morning. I wore it because someone had donated it to the shelter in the past few days. It went with what I was wearing; I don't really have any other sweaters that do.
I'm mentioning this to say that my wearing pink didn't have any meaning besides the fact that it was chilly out this morning.
--More about Vermont Works for Women
When I got back to the shelter tonight, I had a phone message from the coordinator for the program. I don't know if she's following the pattern that she's read about other people perpetuating that I've written about, or if it's just the way the bullying happens now, but she wanted me to call her back "before Monday," and when I talked to her on the phone a few minutes ago, she said she was calling because she "wasn't sure what had happened" yesterday. I said "I'm not going to go through this with you; I'm sure that you're aware of the larger situation, and either you're willing to have me in the program or you're not." She said "It's best to be upfront with people; I want you to tell me what you think happened." I said "I'm not going to let you try to humiliate me. I'll be there on Tuesday; if you don't want me to show up, you can tell me before then."
Then I pressed "End" on the phone, to end the conversation.
(June 17, 2011: I took out a few sentences that I had written here. I don't know that I need to spend time trying to figure out what someone's motives for being unprofessional and cruel are; whatever the reasons, it's wrong. @ 10:59 p.m.)
I have body issues of my own. In addition to other things that I made a few jokes about last year on the Internet and that were immediately turned into a seemingly endless procession of jokes, ads, and everything else that the harassers create in malice about me, I have spider veins on my legs. I got them for the first time when I was 31. I had never had them before. I had spent much of that year eating fast food a few times a week, as an experiment. I had never eaten fast food more than a few times a year before that. Then, I got a desk job in an office for a few days, where I had to sit for the entire work day, and that was when I got my first, visible veins.
I think that probably poor nutrition contributed to my body being more susceptible to problems like that. They're worse now; I think that probably if you don't treat them when you first get them, they get worse.
They hurt, and also, it's too bad because my legs always constituted one of my best features and now they're eyesores.
At least some version of the story that I have imperfect legs reached the ears of more than one individual harasser last year. I think I might know when it happened. I had gone to a supermarket in shorts or a short skirt, and soon after that, I saw references to my having spider veins from some of the harassers. Ads for "laser vein removal" started appearing on my Friendster profile, which I was still actively using then.
At least one of the film critics for The New Yorker around that time wrote something such as "I can't deal with the hairy spider." I know there were other people who made other comments; this is the first time I've talked about it.
Also; there's a character in Inception named "Ariadne;" that was just a continuation of the same pattern of abuse demanding to be incorrectly recognized as love from the same person around whom the movie revolved
People who love other people don't CONSTANTLY try to degrade them. I'm really tired of it; I couldn't be more sick of being treated as if I'm the bad person in that situation.
As far as Vermont Works for Women is concerned; even though there are plenty of things about my body and my life that aren't fun and that I wish were better, you don't see me trying to upset and degrade women who are doing absolutely nothing but trying to be productive and to move on with their lives. To try to sabotage someone who's trying to be productive and self-supporting at all is bad; to do it to someone when it's your job to support and help that person reach healthy goals is disgusting.
She brought up my simple assault charge yesterday, too; she worked it into the general conversation. We were supposed to sign something that said we'd agree to a number of things in the program, including that we respect other people, and I said "What if we're not being respected? How do we handle that?" Of course she knew what I meant, and the conversation took a turn of "You do have to deal with it when customers are rude to you; otherwise, you could end up getting a simple assault charge." We had talked about that situation in private, when I was interviewing with her and then at least once more at a time when I'd gone in to see her. It's been a few months that I've been in contact with her every so often. However, I hadn't gone into detail about what the charge was called, aside from saying it was an assault charge, and I had just written about it on my blog.
Yesterday, in person after class, when I confronted her about her in-class comments that a "work dealbreaker" for her is "cleaning up urine and vomit," and then again today, on the phone, she pretended that she had no idea what I meant.
The conversation about respect at work going both ways between employers and employees and also customers to a reasonable extent resolved with her saying that it's never good to stay in a degrading situation. It was interesting to watch her realize what a hypocrite she was being, and then to watch her correct herself, and then to watch her go back to being a hypocrite. To see her say speeches that she's said to other classes at other times, about "how important respect is to her," and then for the whole class, me included, to participate in activities which are meant to help women build their self-esteem and self-knowledge; it was like a microcosm of what's been going on in the larger situation, with one person visibly undergoing the process of regression back to a time when women had no rights.
It's obvious that she's planning to bully me, and that she will allow and encourage any woman or clique of women in the class to bully me, too. It will be her bullying me, and either I can sit through it or be driven out by it, or she'll try to get me to say something true about her behavior that she'll then deny and say "You know, Lena, what you're saying doesn't make any sense. I don't know what you're talking about, but it's obvious that you're not comfortable and it's not working out. Maybe it's best if you just leave."
I did what I was supposed to do while I was there. I participated in the activities, I raised my hand to talk most of the time, even when other people weren't. I took notes. I had no "attitude" toward her at all.
How polite could anyone stay while being constantly antagonized and betrayed? It's always worse when it's someone that you trusted or hoped that you could trust.
Unfortunately, there are a lot of half-feminists like her in Vermont. As I've said before, Vermont has an undeserved reputation for being socially enlightened; there's a lot of ignorance and small-mindedness here.
Also, as I've said before; the overall situation is bringing out the worst, the absolute worst in people. It's like watching a monster movie, the kind where you can't tell if you're talking to the person you think you're talking to or if the person has become one of the monsters or is in the process of becoming one of them.
If the larger campaign to destroy women's lives continues, and is successful, women are going to be made to give in to being abused. They will be pathologized and/or treated as if they're doing something wrong (and both) if they object to being abused, especially by people such as teachers, bosses, men in general, or other, more powerful women in any capacity. The campaign has second-class citizenship for women as one of its primary objectives; there isn't any room for doubt about that, anymore.
I think it's worth mentioning that there's no code at all intended by me on this page so far, whether in words, numbers, or themes.
@7:26 p.m.
--No public record of my interactions with celebrities
As I mentioned the other night, there's no public record of my interactions with most of the famous people that I interacted with over the past two years. That makes it much easier for the big harassers to accomplish their malicious goals.
--People from my distant past
Lately I've done a few Google searches on the names of someone from my past and his wife who I think were at one time responsible for some of the bad treatment I've gotten from the big harassers. I hadn't looked them up before I excused them from any responsibility for the larger situation; I assumed that they couldn't possibly want things to have gotten as bad for the world as things have gotten, and I haven't seen any indication from them one way or the other on the Internet about their feelings about it.
If they are still speaking ill of me, then I have to say, they've been doing that for too long. I've taken all the responsibility I deserve for it, I've been more than fair to them, and what's more, there is nothing that they or I can do about anything that's in the past.
Everything was resolved between them and me until I got famous; there were no arguments, nothing.
--(June 18, 2011 I took out more of what was here. I might rewrite the whole thing, though, or tell the story again in another way if I have time; I am beyond sick of being abused. @5:40 a.m.)
--It's now two days in a row that the Times Argus has featured children on its front page. Yesterday it had one of them wearing a shirt that said "Rock Art," and today it's got several of them standing in a river with the title "River Recess" over the picture.
I hate the Times Argus. I don't like the idea of them getting death threats or other threats of violence, but I do like the idea of them huddling nervously in that building; I like the idea of them being held accountable in some way for what they're doing.
--Yesterday, after my disappointing day at Vermont Works for Women, I went somewhere else for a while. When I walked into the building, an overweight woman who works there who wasn't nice to me the one time we ever had an interaction was on her way out. We exchanged the usual "How are you" hello-type greetings, and I thought her voice sounded the way people's voices can sound when they're saying something polite in the words but not in the tone. Not that I would know, since I'm never sarcastic and never take refuge in such things.
I said something before I even stopped to think about it; when she asked me how I was, I said "Fine. I'm nice and thin; it's great."
I hate that; I've noticed that my rude or cruel responses to people are getting easier for me to say. Strangers cough at me and I'll cough back; it's actually better that I said "Yeah, you're SUCH a genius; it's such a GENIUS things to do" to the guy in line at the bank who did it yesterday, rather than coughing back at him.
Hopefully, I can keep the upgrade to telling people how stupid and disgusting they are, rather than doing the same things they do.
Everything that's happened over the past year is making the world a worse place. That's the "difference" that it's made; to make people worse, to bring daily interactions between them to the level of.....it's like grunting. It's PRE-LANGUAGE, and when language is used, it's distorted and ugly and gross. And, it's ALL been deliberately done by the people in power who are doing it; it's not as if it's some kind of natural or inevitable societal progression. It's been a deliberate destruction of boundaries and of civilized behavior.
The same staff/volunteer who made the "wine" comment last night is talking to her guinea pigs, saying "I need to clean you. I'm going to get you nice and clean. I'll go and get the cleaning supplies, and then you'll be clean again." She's just a few feet away; that's how she's decided to start her morning, by nattering on to her guinea pigs in the hopes of upsetting me and I guess also getting another mention on my blog.
There you go; congratulations. You and your guinea pigs are famous.
Copyright L. Kochman June 17, 2011 @ 6:20 a.m.
--Pink sweater
I wore a pink sweater for some of the morning. I wore it because someone had donated it to the shelter in the past few days. It went with what I was wearing; I don't really have any other sweaters that do.
I'm mentioning this to say that my wearing pink didn't have any meaning besides the fact that it was chilly out this morning.
--More about Vermont Works for Women
When I got back to the shelter tonight, I had a phone message from the coordinator for the program. I don't know if she's following the pattern that she's read about other people perpetuating that I've written about, or if it's just the way the bullying happens now, but she wanted me to call her back "before Monday," and when I talked to her on the phone a few minutes ago, she said she was calling because she "wasn't sure what had happened" yesterday. I said "I'm not going to go through this with you; I'm sure that you're aware of the larger situation, and either you're willing to have me in the program or you're not." She said "It's best to be upfront with people; I want you to tell me what you think happened." I said "I'm not going to let you try to humiliate me. I'll be there on Tuesday; if you don't want me to show up, you can tell me before then."
Then I pressed "End" on the phone, to end the conversation.
(June 17, 2011: I took out a few sentences that I had written here. I don't know that I need to spend time trying to figure out what someone's motives for being unprofessional and cruel are; whatever the reasons, it's wrong. @ 10:59 p.m.)
I have body issues of my own. In addition to other things that I made a few jokes about last year on the Internet and that were immediately turned into a seemingly endless procession of jokes, ads, and everything else that the harassers create in malice about me, I have spider veins on my legs. I got them for the first time when I was 31. I had never had them before. I had spent much of that year eating fast food a few times a week, as an experiment. I had never eaten fast food more than a few times a year before that. Then, I got a desk job in an office for a few days, where I had to sit for the entire work day, and that was when I got my first, visible veins.
I think that probably poor nutrition contributed to my body being more susceptible to problems like that. They're worse now; I think that probably if you don't treat them when you first get them, they get worse.
They hurt, and also, it's too bad because my legs always constituted one of my best features and now they're eyesores.
At least some version of the story that I have imperfect legs reached the ears of more than one individual harasser last year. I think I might know when it happened. I had gone to a supermarket in shorts or a short skirt, and soon after that, I saw references to my having spider veins from some of the harassers. Ads for "laser vein removal" started appearing on my Friendster profile, which I was still actively using then.
At least one of the film critics for The New Yorker around that time wrote something such as "I can't deal with the hairy spider." I know there were other people who made other comments; this is the first time I've talked about it.
Also; there's a character in Inception named "Ariadne;" that was just a continuation of the same pattern of abuse demanding to be incorrectly recognized as love from the same person around whom the movie revolved
People who love other people don't CONSTANTLY try to degrade them. I'm really tired of it; I couldn't be more sick of being treated as if I'm the bad person in that situation.
As far as Vermont Works for Women is concerned; even though there are plenty of things about my body and my life that aren't fun and that I wish were better, you don't see me trying to upset and degrade women who are doing absolutely nothing but trying to be productive and to move on with their lives. To try to sabotage someone who's trying to be productive and self-supporting at all is bad; to do it to someone when it's your job to support and help that person reach healthy goals is disgusting.
She brought up my simple assault charge yesterday, too; she worked it into the general conversation. We were supposed to sign something that said we'd agree to a number of things in the program, including that we respect other people, and I said "What if we're not being respected? How do we handle that?" Of course she knew what I meant, and the conversation took a turn of "You do have to deal with it when customers are rude to you; otherwise, you could end up getting a simple assault charge." We had talked about that situation in private, when I was interviewing with her and then at least once more at a time when I'd gone in to see her. It's been a few months that I've been in contact with her every so often. However, I hadn't gone into detail about what the charge was called, aside from saying it was an assault charge, and I had just written about it on my blog.
Yesterday, in person after class, when I confronted her about her in-class comments that a "work dealbreaker" for her is "cleaning up urine and vomit," and then again today, on the phone, she pretended that she had no idea what I meant.
The conversation about respect at work going both ways between employers and employees and also customers to a reasonable extent resolved with her saying that it's never good to stay in a degrading situation. It was interesting to watch her realize what a hypocrite she was being, and then to watch her correct herself, and then to watch her go back to being a hypocrite. To see her say speeches that she's said to other classes at other times, about "how important respect is to her," and then for the whole class, me included, to participate in activities which are meant to help women build their self-esteem and self-knowledge; it was like a microcosm of what's been going on in the larger situation, with one person visibly undergoing the process of regression back to a time when women had no rights.
It's obvious that she's planning to bully me, and that she will allow and encourage any woman or clique of women in the class to bully me, too. It will be her bullying me, and either I can sit through it or be driven out by it, or she'll try to get me to say something true about her behavior that she'll then deny and say "You know, Lena, what you're saying doesn't make any sense. I don't know what you're talking about, but it's obvious that you're not comfortable and it's not working out. Maybe it's best if you just leave."
I did what I was supposed to do while I was there. I participated in the activities, I raised my hand to talk most of the time, even when other people weren't. I took notes. I had no "attitude" toward her at all.
How polite could anyone stay while being constantly antagonized and betrayed? It's always worse when it's someone that you trusted or hoped that you could trust.
Unfortunately, there are a lot of half-feminists like her in Vermont. As I've said before, Vermont has an undeserved reputation for being socially enlightened; there's a lot of ignorance and small-mindedness here.
Also, as I've said before; the overall situation is bringing out the worst, the absolute worst in people. It's like watching a monster movie, the kind where you can't tell if you're talking to the person you think you're talking to or if the person has become one of the monsters or is in the process of becoming one of them.
If the larger campaign to destroy women's lives continues, and is successful, women are going to be made to give in to being abused. They will be pathologized and/or treated as if they're doing something wrong (and both) if they object to being abused, especially by people such as teachers, bosses, men in general, or other, more powerful women in any capacity. The campaign has second-class citizenship for women as one of its primary objectives; there isn't any room for doubt about that, anymore.
I think it's worth mentioning that there's no code at all intended by me on this page so far, whether in words, numbers, or themes.
@7:26 p.m.
--No public record of my interactions with celebrities
As I mentioned the other night, there's no public record of my interactions with most of the famous people that I interacted with over the past two years. That makes it much easier for the big harassers to accomplish their malicious goals.
--People from my distant past
Lately I've done a few Google searches on the names of someone from my past and his wife who I think were at one time responsible for some of the bad treatment I've gotten from the big harassers. I hadn't looked them up before I excused them from any responsibility for the larger situation; I assumed that they couldn't possibly want things to have gotten as bad for the world as things have gotten, and I haven't seen any indication from them one way or the other on the Internet about their feelings about it.
If they are still speaking ill of me, then I have to say, they've been doing that for too long. I've taken all the responsibility I deserve for it, I've been more than fair to them, and what's more, there is nothing that they or I can do about anything that's in the past.
Everything was resolved between them and me until I got famous; there were no arguments, nothing.
--(June 18, 2011 I took out more of what was here. I might rewrite the whole thing, though, or tell the story again in another way if I have time; I am beyond sick of being abused. @5:40 a.m.)