I'm still watching you...

I know y'all been busy little bloggists lately. But it's also been sunny outside, and I'm afraid that in the rock-paper-scissors equation of time allocation, swimming in the lake defeats sitting inside writing.

Don't worry, though: I've been watching your mad scrambles for extra blog posts to push up your grades before the end of the month with considerable amusement. Speaking of voyeurism, A Rebel Yell has been telling us about Facebook stalking. Apparently, "clues are: wall posts replying to every status update, viewing every posted picture of the stalked, etc..."

Now, I'm not going to argue that this is extremely bad behaviour (although I would question how it could be considered attractive, or something any healthy individual would 'indulge' in...), but I would like to qualify your list of symptoms by pointing out that they're not always indicative of obsessive stalking, per se. Sometimes, they're merely evidence of terminal boredom. I have a couple of work colleagues, for example, who seem compelled to post headachingly inane responses almost every public post I make on Facebook. But I'm pretty much convinced that they do the same thing to everyone on their 'Friends' lists, because I know for a fact that they have literally no lives and nothing better to do. I don't believe for a moment that their continual, incomprehensibly tedious Facebook-keeping demonstrates an obsession with me. It just proves that some people are really, really sad.

I have a question for Chris, who asks in his post Tattoos and Body Modification that you "please don’t expect to get a full facial tattoos and ear lobes down to your crotch and still expect to get a good job in a popular store, or for that matter a job where you see and interact with other people." And my question is: why not? Why is it okay to judge and dismiss someone based on certain aspects of their appearance and not others?

For example, when interviewing someone for a part-time position last week, I wasn't allowed to tell them, "Sorry, I don't want you working here; you drive a big fat-ass SUV everywhere and you're wearing not one, but two St George's Cross lapel-pins. You are quite clearly a colossal wanker, and I need you to please get out of my sight before I reflexively slap your stupid fat face." However, I've seen my manager deny a crappy register job to a kid with tribal tats all over his face and neck, give it instead to an interviewee who was far less articulate and intelligent, and later justify his decision to me with the assertion that the kid's tattoos would "upset customers." So what's the difference? I'm personally prejudiced against toffee-nosed twats who drive oversized gas-guzzling cars; my employers (and probably most others) are institutionally prejudiced against anyone with specific, visible body modifications. Why is their bigotry permissible?

Just something worth considering in the context of why--and especially how--body modification is seen as 'being bad'...

Claire (Skin Deep) makes the important distinction between having numerous tattoos and having shit tattoos, and correctly points out that the former will always be more attractive than the latter irrespective of the amount of ink involved. Not sure I agree with her assessment of Megan Fox and Angelina Jolie as "the most beautiful women in the world", though...

Another interesting point touched upon in Claire's post is the issue of pain. This is one of the objections to body art that I've never really understood, because I can't say that I've ever had a tattoo that I'd describe as painful. Sure, the process is uncomfortable, and it's often pretty sore for a couple days afterwards... but pain is, like, pulling your hamstring or slamming your finger in a car door (or stabbing a red-hot tack needle through your earlobe--twice). It's something that, by definition, really makes your nervous system drop whatever it's doing and pay attention. It's debilitating. For me, the discomfort of the inking process hasn't (yet...) approached the level of intensity or urgency that would qualify it as "pain."

Also yeah: if we last until 60 we're all gonna look a mess anyways. 'Cos, you know: old people do. Diffused tattoos will be the least of our worries.

Niccy (Pornography): Seriously, how does porn 'devastate lives'? Maybe I'm just super dense and have totally missed your point, but unless you're actually referring to shit like, say, 'child porn' or snuff films (which are categorically not forms of erotica, for several important psychological reasons), I can't see how pornographic material can be considered dangerous or destructive in itself. You mention sexual crimes, but I'm not aware of any evidence to implicate porn as a causative agent. People commit sex crimes for all sorts of fucked-up reasons, but I've never heard or read of a case in which an offender watched some kinky videos and inexplicably decided to go out and rape someone just in case somebody else was standing around with a camera, or something.

Not following the logic here...