Unapologetic #BushPig

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Phrase #'d by Brown during his twitter tirade

My twitter stream blew up yesterday with news that Chris Brown deleted his account because of a feud with another user. It's like a fight under the bleachers. You're not involved. You don't really know the actors. But you're still drawn to watch or root or intervene or get mouthy spouty in your own way. Even if it's just to walk away. Or write a blog post.

I was so impressed with this piece (written and published before Chris Brown's twitter meltdown) from Jude Rogers, in which she turns phrases so great they should be bronzed. Phrases like:

• Women in pop are asked to be role models all too often, when they're not preachers or politicians – and this annoys me because men in similar positions aren't asked to do the same. 

• It's easy, of course, to cast judgement on people's private lives. It's also easy to imagine Rihanna's irritation at being tagged, forever, as a victim of domestic violence. What's much tougher to get around is the way in which Chris Brown's assault, before the 2009 Grammys, seems to be publicity fuel. 

• (re: some of Rihanna's song lyrics) – this is sex as disengaged performance, not as a powerful statement.  

• It's not just an image of violence as glamour, inked into the skin. It's the memory of an assault as a fashion accessory. And knowing so many people don't think that there's anything wrong with this – young women, especially – troubles me beyond measure.

It's this last sentence that just guts me. Not because I'm a young woman, but because I'm raising one.

Chris Brown is an immature, unrepentant child, whose response to things he doesn't like is to throw things, or punches, to storm out, and threaten to sh*t, fart, shart, or shove a d**k in the offending person's (usually female) mouth, and who's being sheltered/protected/rehabilitated (aka marketed) by people who care only about the almighty dollar and their own bottom line. It's unacceptable.

I'm done with asking why his (and, by proxy, his team's (and his ilk's)) behavior towards women is tolerated. It's unacceptable, can't be condoned, and must be condemned at every turn. It's not the @JennyJohnsonHi5's of this world who are the problem. It's really not.

Shame on Chris Brown for being so crazy talented, but settling for being an ugly stereotype (atm, anyway. I'm all for redemption and change, but until I see some...wishing don't make it so...). Shame on the idiots who are advising this guy. Shame on an industry that protects and promotes this fool. Shame on a us, a public, that supports such an industry and career.

I don't care about Chris Brown. But I do care about young women, like my daughter and her friends, who live in a world where these statistics* are true:

We know that men can be victims of domestic violence. On average, though, more women than men suffer domestic abuse, and younger women in particular (those between the ages of 20-24) are at highest risk of nonfatal intimate partner violence. In fact, 85% of domestic violence victims are women.

According to the National Coalition Against Domestic Violence:

• One in every four women will experience domestic violence in her lifetime.

• Females are most often victimized by someone they know.

• Nearly 1/3 of female homicide victims are killed by an intimate partner.

• In nearly 80% of intimate partner homicides, no matter which partner is killed, the man physically abused the woman before the murder.

This abuse occurs every day and likely to a woman you know. And it exacts a toll. Monetarily (exceeding $5.8 billion each year (as of 2003)) and in so many other, immeasurable, ways.

Contact information for the National Domestic Violence Hotline is 1-800-799-7233.

Their website is here. 

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* Sad that I just cut and pasted these statistics from a blog post I wrote earlier this year on the same damn topic....

Yo (Excuse Me Chris)

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So you've seen this, right?

Ugh. The interwebz. It gives us such an opportunity to make fools of ourselves, doesn't it? And I do it every day. I shudder at the temptations I know my daughter will face in front of that warm, inviting screen. You know, in 30 years or so when she gets her first computer.

She, who is 7, asked me the other day, "Mom, when can I have a cell phone?"

Me, in that mmmm I'm thinking voice said, "when you're thirty."

"Mom-uh! I'm serious-uh! When did you get your first cell phone?"

"Let's see...I think I'd already graduated from college by the time I got my first cell phone, so maybe 22 or 23?" I said, not adding that cell phones as she knew them hadn't even yet been invented.

"Well, can we at least talk about it again when I turn 18?"

"Sure, honey." Of course we can.

We will have this exact same conversation next week.

I'm a skeptic (and I clearly have too much time on my hands. #onlinepokerisstillonhiatuswhat). At any rate, I pulled up the above-linked list of names because I was curious as to whether these tweeters were real people. The laundry can wait. Please don't judge me.

Here's what I found:

Three of the screencaps were from Facebook and so I didn't bother following that trail.

Out of the twenty-two tweeters captured as having said they'd let Chris Brown beat them, six were no longer active. As in, "Sorry, that page doesn't exist!" Or as in (one can hope), "Sorry, my mom (or dad) saw what I tweeted and took my computer away for life after talking with me about what it actually means to be a victim of domestic violence!"

At least one appeared to regret what she'd tweeted:

A couple did not:

And at least one, er...clarified?

All of the girls seem really young (this last one, for example, is 18) and most appear to still be living at home with their parents. One thing was clear: they got a lot of grief for what they tweeted. And some of it was really vitriolic. That makes absolutely no sense to me. You're going to cyber-ly abuse someone for a tweet they made...about abuse?

M'kay.

I'm trying to tread very carefully here because I'm old and what I think is funny and what you think is funny is often just not going to be the same thing. What we might be able to agree on, though, is that there really just aren't very many brilliant 18 year old comics or hilarious jokes about domestic violence.

I would also wager that none of the screencapped tweeters have had their face smashed in and bloodied at the hands of a boyfriend or their head slammed into the jamb of a door so hard that both it and their head cracks wide open like a watermelon dropped on pavement.

Because that's not funny.

What Chris Brown actually did is not funny. Someone's face looking like this because of domestic violence is not funny.

We know that men can be victims of domestic violence. On average, though, more women than men suffer domestic abuse, and younger women in particular (those between the ages of 20-24) are at highest risk of nonfatal intimate partner violence. In fact, 85% of domestic violence victims are women.

According to the National Coalition Against Domestic Violence

• One in every four women will experience domestic violence in her lifetime.
• Females are most often victimized by someone they know.
• Nearly 1/3 of female homicide victims are killed by an intimate partner.
• In nearly 80% of intimate partner homicides, no matter which partner is killed, the man physically abused the woman before the murder.

This abuse occurs every day and likely to a woman you know. And it exacts a toll. Monetarily (exceeding $5.8 billion each year (as of 2003)) and in so many other, immeasurable, ways. 

I didn't set out writing this post in an effort to jump on the "crucify Chris Brown" train (or any of these young ladies! They're young, cut them some slack?). I recognize we all make mistakes and I believe we can all grow and learn from them (or not, as the case may be). 

But I really don't want to see this guy on my television anymore, and I really don't care to hear his music ever again, and I really, really, really hope my daughter never falls in love with a boy (or girl) who'd physically, mentally, or verbally abuse her in any way. She deserves so much better.

We all do.

Contact information for the National Domestic Violence Hotline is 1-800-799-7233.

Their website is here.

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