We are good people zombies.

Left 4 dead is a great online, multi-player co-op, first-person shooter set in a zombie apocalypse. The tension from moment to moment is visceral; I have never been so immersed in the game world before. My (over)use of voice communication might be part of the reason for my fervent, often irate, involvement. Yelling at people online presents otherwise inaccessible insight into gamer psychology. My own included, of course.

But let's talk about other psyches. On the No Mercy campaign, which follows the survivors' escape from street-level start to helipad-atop-a-hospital finish, there is a sequence where you have to activate an event and fight off a horde of zombies. BUT, the ever-diligent crowd of gamers found that they could skip this event completely with a tempting exploit. In Versus mode, you take turns doing the same scenario. My team went first and we decided not to exploit and play it fair, fighting off the horde. Their turn. They started trying the exploit. I tried guilting them into playing it the same way we did. Surprisingly (or not?) it was easy to guilt them into doing the right thing and playing legitimately. ("How?" you might not be asking. I took the low road and called them "pussies" and more boorishly "VAGINAS." Sexist, but on the Internet it is ridiculously practical and effective to get the guilt stream going.) Their team shortly died after they started playing fair. Awesome.

I had to explain the basics of the game to make that story work. But that story didn't really work, since I came off sexist and glib, instead of profoundly observant and hopeful for humanity.

I aim high and shoot myself in the foot.

All the single ladies

Do I get a treat of some sort, noticing what I think are the awesome ironies and apropos silliness of things that happen now and then?

This lady deserves so much more in life: So my underappreciated coworker is enjoying "Single Ladies" on the radio. She sings along but instead of boldly leading the "call" of the call-and-response chorus ("All the singles ladies!/All the single ladies"), she sings the later "response" only, wistfully affirming her identity as a single female. Life can be frowny-face sometimes.

Truck drivers

Sparks has decaffeinated itself. What a concept, though: caffeine and energy drink chemicals in an alcoholic beverage. I wonder what effects on the liver binging on Sparks might have.

Energy drinks! You drink to keep your day in a stereoscopic focus. A patch for the mistakes you have made for the night before. Plan B for your sleeping habits. They're looking out for you, bro.

And this...

Thought you might want a little bit of this.

via MetaFilter

Sasha Grey Nude in American Apparel Ads

I disagree with the blog's point that the ads should not incite outrage from feminists. I think that's what she's saying. But yeah, it's a strange situation when you have a revolutionary like Sasha Grey posing for these American Apparel ads. She's pretty darn savvy when it comes to navigating the treacherous social, reputational, and legal realms of the porn industry. She takes control of her career and does everything on her own terms, people say. That's cool.

The ads themselves definitely give out a bad vibe, despite the tough chick at the center of them.

I think anyone visiting the store's site either gets the creeps or gets a hard on (which one did I get, dear readers? Ho ho!). Either way, the woman being positioned just rubs me the wrong way (or do I rub myself... the position.. the right way... Ho ho!). It's art, perhaps. Surrendering your curves and pelvic bones to a clothing company's marketing campaign. You draw attention to Ms. Grey's body and the consumer associates the feeling of arousal with the company name.

Just note that the ad campaign is limited to a few websites.

I think my incoherence is worsening. Night classes at the local community college, here I come. (Ho ho!)

Sasha Grey nude in AA ads (via fimoculous)

Show and tell

Emily Yoffe has a column with Slate called "Human Guinea Pig" where she goes around and does stuff that us normal folks probably wouldn't sign up for, if we had options. And everyone has options? Right? That is correct.

She became a standardized patient for a bit. Her duties were letting second-year med students give her their first physical exams. She held all of the aspiring doctors in high regard and had fun watching them fumble nervously.

Before standardized patients there was this:

I talked to a 50-ish physician friend about my experiences, and he said when he was in medical school and it was time for the first rectal/genital exam, the students were told to pair off and examine each other. "So, do you pick someone you like, or someone you don't like?" he recalled. "Either way, it's lose-lose."

None of the doctors I have ever been too have shown any hint of their human side. They go through the process with a perfunctory attitude, and rightfully so. I can see why it'd be even more awkward to chitchat and blithely think out loud for the sake of easing any supposed tension hanging over the room.

Sometimes it was hard for the student not to laugh. Shy and mousy Dr. B, after peering into my eyes and ears, said, "Now I have to look up your nose!" and let out an embarrassed snort.

Playing Doctor

I never offer any awesome insight from these blog posts. My blog is a vacuous show-and-tell. I promise I'll do something about it.

ENRICO FERMI

The Skeptics' Guide to the Universe is a weekly podcast, each episode roughly one-hour long, that focuses on science news and the discussion, dissection, and ultimate ideological destruction of irrational nonsense. It's a fun romp with a handful of intelligent people who talk about things skeptics may find worth thinking about.

What gets me every time is the closing segment of each show is where Jay Novella reads a quote from a thinker of some sort and then pauses and shouts the name of the person being quoted. In #171 he accidentally shouted the name of the person who submitted the quote for consideration. He quickly corrected himself. It's hilarious. It's the little things that make me laugh. Little things happen all the time. I laugh way too much.

COST CORPORATION. COSTAS COMPANY.

What fun. The consumer wins when you buy big. Let them make you believe that!

Costco (via kottke)

The possibilities of the Internet... made possible!

The Internet is great. Computers are great. Connecting with other people is great. MS Paint Adventures takes suggestions from readers to drive the narrative. It simulates old-school text adventures. You are a detective or professional sleuth of some sort and you go on adventures. The first adventure is exploring the wacky office you start in. Warping spacetime and detaching fake windows and safes is all here. It's crayz. I'm sleepy, can't tyep.

MS Paint Adventures (from vgcats)

Random ridiculous thoughts that I think would make the world a better place

Here comes the hyper-meta, self-aware hypocrisy. These thoughts and ideas make me laugh for no good and insidious reasons. FULL FORCE

A liberating, empowering piece of advice to impart to your next girlfriend:
"fuck a lot of men. then let the world know that you fucked a lot of men."
or just tell the world that "you fucked a lot of men."

Christopher Moltisanti--while high--sat on Cossette, his fiancée Adriana's lap dog.The Sopranos.

Later, the gang organizes an intervention and they each go around saying a prepared statement. Christopher gets defensive and starts pointing out the flaws of each and every person in the room. The intervention ends with Christopher getting punched out of his chair and repeatedly kicked on the ground. I think he was beat with the chair he was sitting on, too. This is the worst intervention ever executed.

homo seat - slang for that empty seat left unoccupied between two men to avoid having to be so uncomfortably close to each other

This caught me off-guard; I did not expect this to happen in MOUTHFEEL

Max Bill created a sculpture in the shape of a Mobius strip called "Endless Ribbon"
He thought he created a new shape. But the Mobius strip was already discovered by someone else...
What a disappointment, thinking that you are the first, but really are not.

if a fire extinguisher exploded in a fire, would it put out the fire in that area of the explosion? make it worse? Will try it someday.

Watching films with cool characters to learn how to be cool.

CamelCase / camel caps / medial capitals
When you join separate words (by removing the spaces) and still capitalize all of the words

watching Oz one week and Battlestar the next week. my tendencies wavered between epic space battle / soap operatic drama adrenaline and emotional high and wanting to buttrape a felon

What if brian lehrer interviewed himself on his own show
it'll be confusing because it's radio! YES

TELL ME WHY YOU ARE SMARTER THAN ME

I feel like everything I read is awesome shit.

The Sitcom Digresses

These marketing dudes have got it covered. They pull out their ideas on how they would market overalls or give Katie Couric the relevance she needs. They're adapting to meet the new way consumers think and interact with media. Being crass here, but it's a huge mindfuck, of course. You're giving consumers a chance to invest a brief amount of time and effort in order to have them have a more memorable experience with a brand. When you feel an emotion or try to "send that out to all my friends" that little personal investment claims its place inside your life. Fucking brilliant. The quirky and weird style and humor that ads seem to tend toward nowadays are perfect for grabbing your attention. Confusion and intrigue is a powerful moment of weakness. Something to discuss with friends or inside yourself. What did that ad signify?

Multiscreen Mad Men

You like tomato, I like tomato... Let's call the whole thing off.

I wonder if humans who go to cold places and hipsters who go to cool places could ever meet halfway and bring ridiculously hip outdoor gear to splendid fruition.

How to Layer Clothing vs. Learning to Layer Clothing

What is it with bringing things together that brings a stupid smile to our faces? I remember having a passing thought a long time ago about this new trend of TV/film having a solid ensemble of characters slowly having their plotlines and backstories mix into other characters dark, dark past.

Offhand I can think of the short-lived TV series "The Nine," and "Lost," and the overvalued film "Crash." I once read something about the definition of creativity--probably linked from kottke or fimoculous given their awesomeness--and one person they interviewed, who was a painter, or scientist or something, said that it was the ability to bring several disparate ideas together in new ways. Although I haven't seen many episodes, "Seinfeld" is another big example of mixing ideas together for entertainment.

In longform improv comedy, spotting patterns and merging ideas and actions from previous scenes into current scenes are the most satisfying laughs. The performers are listening and creating together.

Girl Talk, Gregg Gillis's mashup outfit blasts tunes from your childhood, mixing it with jams from your boss's childhood.

An entry about this is obligated to use of the following word at least once: synthesis. I haven't stumbled onto anything profound. I'm sure this has been described by someone or much more qualified to wax sociologic on why we take such pleasure in putting two and two together.

My game is tight

What pisses me off is that there’s this growing sense that somehow Hollywood is the end-all and be-all of everything, EVAR, and that somehow everything good must be purchased and repackaged and buffed and relabeled with the Hollywood stamp. God, Hollywood, YOU DON’T HAVE TO PUT YOUR THUMB IN EVERY SINGLE GODDAMN PIE.

We do love to do that, don't we? It reminds me of a tourist writing about his realization that he wasn't being fucking cool going to foreign countries and venturing in less popular tourist areas. As he trudged through a jungle located on some remote island, he bumped into a small child that smiled and held out his hands. Another child appeared and began acting rather hostile to him. He was confused by the latter child's defensiveness and walked away thinking about the incident. It came to him that he was being a real dick, wandering into someone's property like that. That was probably their land and territory he was entering and the second boy was trying to protect his little bro.

This reminds me of the incident in Atlanta, Georgia of a Fulton County Superior Court judge ordering white lawyers out of the courtroom, hoping that his words would have a greater impact on the homogeneous crowd of black criminals that passed through his docket. Kicking out the white people in the courtroom caused some murmurs among the locals. I feel like it was the right thing to do in terms of increasing that the chance that these young men would take heed of what he was saying, but I can understand the inherent unfairness of what he did. Part of the judge's explanation:

"I didn't want them to think I was talking down to them; trying to embarrass them or insult them; be derogatory towards them and I was just saying 'Please get yourself together,'" he said.

What the fuck? Guilt is a real bitch. I need to be a bully.

Hollywood to Remake Another Korean Film (via Racialicious)

Correction: I wrote about the post on Racialicious from memory. I didn't re-read it and my version of the story is much cooler and much more of a lie than his story. His story is not a lie. I hope.

Copyright International Dialects of English Archive

This Recording should be mandatory reading for everyone.

Whatever You Like. Patron on Ice.

Dear President Obama,

Congratulations on your win to be president of the United States of America. What are you going to change about littering, gas, and wars? Are you going to make hunting stop? Are you going to lower taxes? Are you going to give more money to schools? What are you going to do about stock markets? What are you going to do about parking spaces? What are you going to do about more jail time, book store prices, gas prices, robbers, the laws, houses, and long lines in Pathmark?

Your Biggest Fan,
Rafi

Why does everything Obama-related make me feel cozy and hopeful? Let's hope America gives him and a Democratically-controlled Congress time to change things. Be patient, folks.

Letters to President Obama from Fourth Graders in Harlem

Razor sharp!

As the returns became known, and Mr. Obama passed milestone after milestone —Ohio, Florida, Virginia, Pennsylvania, New Hampshire, Iowa and New Mexico — people rolled spontaneously into the streets to celebrate what many described, with perhaps overstated if understandable exhilaration, a new era in a country where just 143 years ago, Mr. Obama, as a black man, could have been owned as a slave.

http://www.nytimes.com/2008/11/06/us/politics/06elect.html

Cutting-edge journalism.

Boobs

Interesting discussion led by Harvard Professor Sendhil Mullainathan on the irony of poverty.

The whole idea of the poor requiring more resources to educate themselves on making better decisions in order to get them out of the loop of making bad decisions that keep them in poverty. Yeah, I could phrase that better. Basically, you need resources that you often don't have access to to pull yourself out of doing things that keep you in your status of being "in poverty." You are trying to get out but you need resources to educate you and help you along the way. These are resources that are not there.

Okay, so this was what I was trying to tell Bob a few days ago and this discussion pretty much discusses the big idea behind my justification for Obama's tax plan. The "spread the wealth" plan sounds heinous when you describe it as taking money from someone and giving it to someone else. I'm not adept at tracking the historical shifts of how welfare has been implemented, so I cannot comment on how this resembles welfare, if at all. Painting Obama's comment as a negative thing often includes the comparison of his tax plan to socialism and a welfare state where the sedentary poor feed off the hard-working. The people drawing these comparisons are the ones who feel entitled to all of their income, or at least to all of the benefits of their money, whether it be in the form of government services funded by taxes or personal, private spending or investment. I would not call them delusional, but they certainly cling on to the idea that they have worked hard for every dollar (that's fine) and every dollar should directly be spent on something that benefits them (that I have a problem with).

On the one hand I don't want to denigrate the actual effort and time that got the middle- to extreme upper-class where they are. Ideally, everything should be considered on a case-by-case basis: cultural, biological, genetic, and every specific detail scrutinized and placed in context to create a frame of either YES YOU ARE WORTHY or NO YOU ARE NOT WORTHY, those two labels exactly.

Going back to the taking money from one person and giving it to another person. This is not exactly the case because the extra percentage of gross income going to the IRS is often quite immaterial to the high-income taxpayer. What exactly is another $30,000 to a person who has been consistently making $1 million for the past 10 years? You're bumping the marginal tax rate for top income earners by around 3%. Chances are that no matter what sort of wild lifestyle these top dogs have been living, they can still maintain their routine and still have enough leftover to buy whatever they want to buy before: umbrella racks, statues, photos of rare people... I don't know what rich people buy.

The logic behind the comparison is really ridiculous when you look at it. The critics grow incenses when you boil it down to a tableaux of taking money from someone and giving it to someone else. The unfairness is amplified or even pulled out of thin air and the direct effect is created from summarizing what is actually happening, eliding the details for rhetoric.

In the long run, I think taxing the wealthy at a slightly higher rate makes so much sense. Why do you take from those who don't have much? The cleavage ever-widening is a testament to the rich keep getting richer. You can do more with more.

The psychology experiments discussed in the Edge discussion is great. Mischel's marshmallow test, the implicit association, and the exhaustion of resistance to giving into temptation are ripe for the picking. They show how the poor are fucked the way things are now.

So much to type about. This paragraph is barely coherent. It's like smoking and being afraid of a plane crash. You're more like to get cancer than dying because of a horrific jet engine malfunction x 4. But you're looking short term and I guess for some short term is all they can consider since they won't have many years left. The old vote. Look long-term and helping the people at the bottom will benefit society as a whole when they are educated and even more productive members of our daily grind.

http://www.edge.org/3rd_culture/thaler_sendhil08/class5.html
(from kottke)

Also, upon writing the word "cleavage" I searched for cleavage in Wikipedia expecting photos and it delivered one wonderful photo.

Climb Ev'ry Mountain, Ford Every Stream

"I will call any interrogator that tortured me, a gook. I can't believe that anybody doesn't believe these interrogators and prison guards were cruel and sadistic people who deserve the worst appellations possible. Gook is the kindest appellation I can give."
-John McCain, February 17, 2000

What the fuck? Why would Senator McCain want to go around giving people mountains?

THIS HAS NOTHING AT ALL TO DO WITH NEBRASKA

Whether all those views reflect people watching until the end is hard to know, but some of their reactions are collected in comments on the site, ranging from thoughtful analyses to “THIS HAS NOTHING AT ALL TO DO WITH NEBRASKA.”

http://movies.nytimes.com/2008/10/20/movies/20wang.html

"The Princess of Nebraska" is a feature-length film released on YouTube by director Wayne Wang ("The Joy Luck Club," "Maid in Manhattan," and "Anywhere but Here").

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rKgbIz6CM_E

Everybody shakin'

Chest compressions for CPR are best performed at the same rhythm as the beats in The Bee Gees' "Stayin' Alive."

http://ap.google.com/article/ALeqM5hwFew2vQ69x6-RFPFXQPyPFCceGgD93RQIM81

Dexter

if i accept that life is life and nothing is a big deal. shit happens and whatnot. not that i'm some sort of nihilist, but it's nothing but wasting time to dote over things.

so if i pass these values onto my child, is that irresponsible? would a child be better served if i passed on a different set of ideas.

for example, if my child accidentally killed her dog--an absolutely clear accident; there will be no serial killers in my household!--and i told her not worry about it. you're not in trouble. things like this happen.

that sounds cold. i would definitely emphasize that life is precious and should be preserved when you can, but no need to blame yourself or be down. i guess there is a risk of being misunderstood. the child may misinterpret this as an ok for anything. i don't know. fuck this.

Meeting your needs

Upside Down Dogs!

http://upsidedowndogs.com/

Pun fun

"

I.M.F. Says It’s Ready to Assist Hungary

"

http://www.nytimes.com/2008/10/14/business/worldbusiness/14hungary.html

Oh, you.

The United States of today and Britain of 1905 are certainly more different than they are similar.

http://www.nytimes.com/2008/10/12/weekinreview/12leonhardt.html

Disappointment

“I wanted to make art that questioned our relationship with animals and the ethics and sustainability of factory farming,” Banksy said in a statement distributed by a publicist, “but it ended up as chicken nuggets singing.”

http://www.nytimes.com/2008/10/09/arts/design/09publ.html

I'll waaaaait a yeeeeear or two

That door will come open again next May, during breeding season, and the two old turtles will try once again.

http://www.nytimes.com/2008/10/08/world/asia/08turtle.html

Turtles fucking. Yes!

Gender!

Although homosexuality is not allowed--to put it lightly--transgender individuals are recognized and are encouraged to undergo transformative surgery to find the true self. They even have programs that may pay half of your operation costs!

http://www.wnyc.org/shows/lopate/episodes/2008/09/30/segments/110942

Their official gender is the primary concern, it seems. As long as the person makes it clear what he wants to be and maintains a consistent lifestyle and keeps a low-profile about the whole change-up, the government is content.

Why does gender identity throw people off if there is any sort of ambiguity?

You heard it here first, folks

Simon Baker of "The Mentalist" looks like a young Michael Caine.

Shut down all the garbage mashers on the detention level

Oh boy, am I the only one who finds shoulder blades ridiculously sexy? Just enough to show those two plates of beauty. Not so skinny as to show the spine or the oppression.

Dealing with issues that matter

Oh man, my blog is so far away from being quality. I'm linking to other blogs!

http://goldenfiddle.com/node/13127

It's a picture of SNL's Kenan Thompson and G4TV's Olivia Munn thumbs-up, thumbs-pointing to a club dancer.

The first comment by zaptor:
I wonder if O.M. is pro-choice

Terrible, but I giggled.

Unoriginal schmuck

So you're climbing Mt. Everest. You're thinking about how great it'll be to be the first to the top. You get to the top. You find a handful of flags already on top. You weep.

Max Bill sculpted "Endless Ribbon." He thought he had stumbled upon a new shape. This new shape wasn't new at all. The Mobius strip had been discovered a few decades back. Imagine the disappointment!

I started watching The Sopranos. It's a pretty good show. I thought it was funny to call Dr. Melfi "Dr. MILFi." I always check to see if my little puns and stupidity have been said before. I searched on Google for "Milfi The Sopranos" and yep, it's been done. The Internet delivers once again.

Score one for nature!

Fully functional, same specs from the start. You are you!

http://www.nytimes.com/2008/09/04/garden/04twins.html

Here's the church, and...

Steeplechase. Track with a puddle.

But who can watch the watchmen?

The American public can, come March 2009!

Killing me won't bring back your fucking honey!

I enjoy a 3.75 oz. bag of Wise's Honey BBQ flavored potato chips every other day at my desk. I won't have that luxury if the honey bee problem continues. The Happening mentions the honey bee mystery massacre. It's pretty important if you think about it.

Transfer

Long-form improv comedy doesn't visually transliterate well into video. It's pretty good with just audio, though. The object work and silly physical moves are lost but everything else stays entertaining.

Go like this

My hands move like this when I talk. Recently, I don't know if it's to compensate for the fact that I'm trying hard to sound more sure of myself by speaking louder and using more brusque statements. But, if it is, it looks fucking hilarious.

One shot

Am I Awesome?

Things I Did Last Night

Enjoyable!

Stop Snitchin'

I will avenge the Asian Longhorned Beetle.

I always thought it would be funny to tag up one of those ads I frequently see on the 7 train, where they are pushing a hotline for reporting sightings of Asian longhorned beetles. A cheeky Stop Snitchin' sticker would have the same effect. I just ordered and batch and will try to paste them on the ads I see. Should be fun.

What It Feels Like to Not Get Into 501

I was advised to repeat 401 at the NY UCB Training Center.

I feel like an outcast! A leper! Woe be those who once associated with me; they may have been exposed to sickly tendencies. The same, tired characters; selfish performances stymied by a lack of supportive moves; and downright stage fright. These are the symptoms of the poor improviser, a hack.

It feels like someone outed me as a racist, a bigot for all societies. What a brazenfaced perpetrator of all that is wrong!

Christ. It feels terrible.

Revealing Acts

This is a work in progress. The tolerant and mature do not dismiss a person after finding out more about them. Their opinion of the person may change, understandably.

The following games will reveal a lot about a person:

Two People Doing Trust Falls

Take Me to McDonald's, Coworker. Right now.

Roll in the Mud for a Distant Friend

Fight Me

Hold Your Eye Contact With Complete Strangers

How Many Pornstars Can You List Off the Top of Your Head?

If All Endeavors Led to Success, Our Language Would Change

Incongruous Generosity Takes Its Toll; Given the Circumstances, What Is the Straight and Narrow When Even Children Are Taught to Become the Twisted Misconception of How an Animal Survives in the Wild: No Room for Sympathy But Little Do They Know That the Capacity to Care For Others Is Innate and Wholly Appropriate in Any Situation

Here we go now, here we go now

I just ate one of those wrapped pound cakes, made by some local bakery--bakery being a large, clanky machine in a warehouse somewhere in the warehouse district, spitting out product like orange seeds.

What an interesting way to sell an item. It poses as fresh product even though it is loaded with preservatives. The gossamer wrapper is the kind you would find on a pack of cigarettes. Or maybe, the plastic that showcases the addressee on a windowed envelope. Transparent packaging evokes the illusion of freshness and just-baked goodness. No expiration date, adding another layer of ambiguity regarding its edibility based on freshness.

I was hungry. I should have known better, but it was gut-wrenchingly cheap.

Texture and taste make the experience and both are absent in this cake. It also smells funny, something I discovered almost halfway through the cake. I need to learn to resist buying deceptively fresh items from bodegas. Stick to Cheez Doodles.

Pepsi Points Memo

You feel too embarrassed to redeem this mountain of orange and yellow, "BUY PEPSI 20oz GET 1 FREE" bottle caps. You consider, Maybe this is hurting the margins that these stores depend on. Poor souls. You decide to redeem them at a Rite Aid or some establishment with deeper pockets than your proximal bodega. That is right: stick it to them. Corporate skulduggery put to good use.

I love cola.

Let's be the best

I can't wait! What is accomplishment without hard work? We frown upon those who receive a sudden windfall. Those lucky, undeserving cretins!

I need to keep at it. Nobody made it happen on a consistent basis because of chance. Work until you ache your bones!

I must express my concern over your second use of the word 'japs'

I respect you. I really do. The brazenfaced glibness that you said it with... it was terribly convincing. The presence of an Asian-American male who is not only your generational peer, but a classmate in the very same classroom that this transgression took place, twice, did not deter you from going beyond the pale.

What is going on? I respect you. I really do.

Response to: Why I Let My 9-Year-Old Ride the Subway Alone

This was meant for the Digg comment section but some site error kept me from posting this. I need to spill this out somewhere. But I guess this is the typical mentality of a blogger anyway.

re: Why I Let My 9-Year-Old Ride the Subway Alone
----
Although I appreciate her faith in humanity and agree with her assertion that we are bombarded with negative stories, I find fault with two things: first, the dismissal of crimes as infrequent and thus, able to be ignored with open defiance no less; and second, this idea of over-protectiveness as an actual danger.

She brushes off the Carlie Brucia story with startling levity. She classifies the act as a rare instance of one bad apple. The consequences of allowing a city of kids to run free without guidance becomes an issue of temptation and the sudden appearance of numerous opportunities to snatch up children, who may not all have the capacity to make informed decisions. Nine-year-olds aren't all made equal. One may be able to avoid putting herself in a dangerous situation, while another may have his mind wander and get hit by a car. Similarly, I would like to believe that all adults are informed enough to pass this information to their kids, but unfortunately many parents are oblivious to the possibility of various tricks or ruses, which really tempted, impatient, and particularly insidious criminals would gladly take the time to think of. (And don't dismiss criminals as dumb. That is a sad generalization that is more of a vain, comfort-thought that such horrible people are logically as stupid as they come. There is no way a low-life can be cunning AND a pedophile. Spare me the snobbery.)

This isn't a small town where everyone knows everyone and everyone is identifiable. If you are in a county with a small populace, then you will probably notice your neighbor bringing home a child when you swore he was single and know that he is an eerily disposed recluse. A big city where identities get lost in the fray of the daily bustle, where anonymity is achieved through the logistical impossibility of keeping track of everyone that walks through your store.

She believes that coddling your child to the point of losing ability to function as an adult is a likely outcome of being over-protective. As with most behaviors (or anything at all), going to the extremes is a flimsy basis for an argument.

And for goodness's sake, there are other ways to develop your child's independence or give your child a lesson in self-reliance. Not that this should be an issue anyway. These are your kids. It is genetically etched into your mind to make sure that child grows up safe. Nature entrusts you with this. Why shunt this responsibility for the sake of a lesson that can be learned elsewhere? I do not know how salient this episode may remain for her son when he grows older, but personally, 99% of everything that occurred before puberty has been lost with the years (I am 23). His future would be better served if, when older, he volunteered on a regular basis or takes a trip to study abroad, among other possibilities.

The mother approached this with a smidge of due diligence, offering the child a few options to reach for help. But what bothered me the most was this line: "No, I did not give him a cell phone. Didn’t want to lose it." She may have said this facetiously in the service of irony, but if that was at all blithely written, it was a sad irony that she would value a phone over her child.
----