Comment on Mr. Tomlinson' s Death

http://mitchthepunk.blogspot.com/2009/04/john-tomlinsons-death-parkinsons.html

Well what would you expect? Show me any goverment that actually does care about people they govern and i will gladly relocate to that country. I can understand your anger though - in my country it is sadly just the same, the police does what it wants and no one ever gets arrested.

Comment on Infidelity

http://mitchthepunk.blogspot.com/2009/02/infidelity.html

I can understand your point as well as your bitterness - and to a big extent you are right. On the other hand life can be very various and what you said isn' t universal - things happen, doing stupidity is easier than one thinks. There are lots of other reasons for infidelity, not just lust or greed - though selfishness might take a big part in many of them, I'm with you there.

Comment on Smoking

http://mitchthepunk.blogspot.com/2009/04/smoking.html

PLEASE continue being the uncool kid! That is one of the funniest and most beautiful paths in life one could choose. Do you know why? Because it leads to yourself. Also - like in my case - because of all the high brows you see along the way. When it comes to your NO smoking opinion, I'm definitely with you - I understand the smokers feeling persecuted lately, but it' s not we non smokers who are threatening for health of others, is it?

Comment on Lying with Integrity

http://mitchthepunk.blogspot.com/2009/04/lying-with-integrity.html

What you wrote is nice and honest and to a big extent I agree with you. However, have you ever considered that there are situations in which people are forced to tell lies and maintain them to the rest of their lives, or rest of the lives of the people they lie to? It is sad, but it' s a truth - I grew up in atmosphere like that.

Comment on True Story about me and Girls

http://mitchthepunk.blogspot.com/2009/04/true-story-about-me-and-girls.html

I'm with you, guy - the discovery had to be a truly horrible experience. It sort of reminds me of my own experience with a lesbian woman - like yours it' s not totally positive. Just to make it clear, when it comes to lesbians, I'm all for their rights and relationships - the thing that happened to me was just a natural result of a friendship between a heterosexual and a lonely lesbian who had to hide her orientation almost all her life. And I happened to be the only person she was able to talk about it freely with - and I guess you can imagine what happened next.

Questionnaire

Age? 20
Sex? Female
What is your degree subject (both if joint)? Creative and Professional Writinag AND English
Does ‘Being Bad’ relate well to the other modules you are taking? Sort of does
If so, how? And if not, why not? As I'm going to be a writer, it is useful to have insight into little human deviations
Have you found ‘Being Bad’ too demanding, too easy, or at an appropriate level? Aproppriate
Do you think the list of topics covered on the module was appropriate? Yes
Are there any topics not included in the module that you would like to see included? Alternative Fashion, Intollerance
Do you think that the format for classes has worked well? Yes, I do
What did you think of the module team? I loved the module leader! The other staff was great too, especially the Infidelity tutor
Do you think it would have been better to have had more:
Small group discussions? No
Discussion and debate among the class as a whole? Yes
Information and talk from lecturers? No, the topics seemed well-covered; however, there is never enough of information
The approach taken in the module is interdisciplinary (drawing on perspectives from English Literature, Film Studies, Creative Writing, Philosophy, Media Studies and Politics): do you think this a useful way of approaching the topics covered in the module? Yes, definitely
Do you think that interdisciplinary modules are a good idea? Yes
Do you think you have benefited from the interdisciplinary approach taken in the module? Yes
Would you like to see more modules that cover this kind of subject matter? Yes
Are you planning to take the follow-up module PH2004 ‘It Shouldn’t Be Allowed’ at level 2? Yes, I'm thinking about that
Would you recommend ‘Being Bad’ to a friend? yes
Do you think that the blogs (web logs) were a good idea? Not sure
What did you think of the other assessments (e.g. would it be better to have one longer assessment rather than two shorter ones?)? Yes, I think it would be better to have one longer work - especially as long as it would create more space for the creative piece
What have you learned from the module? That even University modules can teach you something without boring you to death - I had great fun on each session I attended
What parts of the module have you found most useful and why? When the tutors first explained us the topic and then asked us questions - it made us think, which is always good
What parts do you think were a waste of time and why? None
Are there any other comments you wish to make regarding ‘Being Bad’? Thanks for all, I really enjyed this module

Bulimia nervosa

It is interesting to point out person can suffer from anorexia and bulimia at the same time, with one of the ilnesses being temporarily dominant. My wish-to-be model friend is a classical example of that - she suffered from anorexia for approximately six years, during each of the years her anorexic symptoms were always replaced by bulimic ones for up to 4 months. Why was it so, we were never sure, however there was a certain pattern - she always started to eat more and then of course vomited it all or burnt all the calories immediatelly by insane, hours and hours lasting exercise whenever a boy turned her down or was made profoundly unhappy by any other sad event. After that however, despite all the vomiting and exercise madness she only kept gaining more and more weight (which was the self-preservation instinct of her body, to build up supplies of energy for the future torture) which made her even more unhappy and guilty - and she turned back to her "best friend" with granted losing weight effect, anorexia. Which, together with her absolute resistance against any plea to go visit a specialist, made her situation a merry-go-round without any exit possible. Bulimia nervosa is curable - but, as any mental illness, needs first a will to admit there is a problem and then to solve it to recover.

More info:

http://www.womenshealth.gov/faq/bulimia-nervosa.cfm#b

Intollerance

What is so bad about not fitting in when it doesn't harm anyone? That is the question I have been asking myself since my very early years and I came up with several theories about such fear of something different; and yet, the definite reason I still don't know.

Perhaps it is just in human nature to be scared of something different, as it equals something unknown and therefore without manual how to cope with that? I think most of people carry a trace of this quality in them - and there is nothing bad about it, no one is just black or white. It is the amount of wisdom, life experiences and good or bad manners that make it either flourish or diminish over time - and wisdom and good manners are, sadly, the qualities less and less people seem to posses. Black or white, alternative or conversative, Christian or a Muslim - we are all people and we have to live on one planet, so we might as well do it peacefully and with respect to differences. Can we?

Loads of info:

http://www.stm.unipi.it/Clioh/tabs/libri/book9.htm

Anorexia

"I love my anorexia. It is my best friend." said my 18 years old friend. And in her eyes indeed it was; it was one of the factors that kept giving her promising prospects in her dream modelling career. When the models shown to teenage girls and in demand by fashion companies are no bigger than hat hangers, what else would you expect?

Anorexia is actually all about distorted body image as it is seen by self, by common public and by fashion designers that probably doesn´t really want their models to be attractive at all, to they didn´t overshine their absolutely godlike creations. May God save us all from them.

Anorexia is by no means a healthy helper for losing weight (as it seems to my friend); it is a killer. No matter how thin anorexic girl may get, she always sees herself as disgustingly fat, which is the difference between how she sees herself and how the others see her - whoever meets her most probably goes through a huge shock and thinks about people in concetration camps. As the illness goes further and the girl gets thinner and thinner, she takes people´s shocked expressions as encouragements for further losing weight and compliments to her slim beauty.

Anorexia, in contrast with bulimic overeating and later throwing up, is characteristic with its gradual lessening of portions of food girl swallows - one my other anorexic friend lessened her portions to the point of eating only three cucumbers a day. She continued like that for a month, then she collapsed and ended up in a hospital. She never mentally recovered from that.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anorexia_nervosa

Alternative Fashion

Cosmopolitan as England might be, followers of alternative fashions can still have a really hard time here. Especially if they belong to a smaller, not so widely known group or not as threatening as for example Punks or Goths. Have you ever met anyone mocking a Goth into his face? I doubt about it, as they have the aura of possible threat so much needed sometimes to other people let someone be in peace. Lolitas for example, especially the Sweet Lolitas, lack this aura. Sometimes this disadvantage can get even life-threatening for them.

But who are actually the Lolitas? No, despite you think you know clearly who they are, if you aren' t into Japan or anime, you probably have no clue. Lolita as a fashion has nothing in common with the famous Nabokov' s novel - and Lolitas certainly aren' t girls dying for finding sugar daddys. Ironical as it might sound, it is one of the most innocent, purest and least sexual fashions in this world inspired by Victorian and Rococo children clothing and rather than sexy aims to be cute and sweet and above all, fun to wear. Think about old porcelain dolls or dollfies and maybe you will get closer to what I mean. Modern fashion is full of uniformity and stereotypes - and its accent on sexuality makes many of the girls including me sick. C'mon guys, do you seriously automatically see in any woman a sex object? Does anyone of you realize how hugely limitating such attitude is?

The trouble with Lolita fashion is it is not yet widely known - and despite its original innocent purpose due to the reminiscence of children clothing it seems to most of the people (overfilled with sex from every side to the point of connecting it with everything) perverted. The thing that boils my blood most about that is that girls with cleavages to their nipples and skirts long approximately 2 inches are considered normal - and girl who are covered with layers and layers of non see-trough garments from their necks to their knees and do nothing to attract (anyway unwanted in the most of the cases - who would want you, you pigs) the sexual attention of men are called prostitutes. I can' t make sense of this.

Though I must give England this: whenever I go out in my pink and frilly Lolita dress, the older ladies are usually absolute darlings. Older ladies with your memories of the times when fashion was cute, impractical and feminine, WE LOVE YOU ALL!

More info:

http://www.lolitafashion.org/styles_list.php

Sexism

I found myself having terribly sexistic thought seeing one guy with absolutely ripped trousers:

"Don't you have a mother to repair them for you?!" Like if he couldn't do it himself if he wasn' t lazy. It sounds hilarious, but it showed me how much I still have to work on my thinking. So I'm writing in my notepad: No desire to offer any however miserable looking man to repair him any piece of his clothes is allowed!

Besides it was probably some sort of mainstream kidney-killing fashion anyway and the trousers with all their holes in them probably cost more than I can afford to spend on groceries for month.

http://www.feminet.sk/show.stm?x=13473

Masturbation

Our first president Tomáš Garrigue Masaryk, otherwise great and wise philosopher, warns very severely in his books about education against what he calls "an evil young boys in highschools seem to have got addicted to lately". The same, even more severe tone is used in August Stringberg´s autobiography, where the young man narrates about his fear of rotting and untimely death due to the contemporary belief that a man committing masturbation would die in few years in a very disgusting way. I wonder where did they find proof for such statements, as if they were true, I think at least one half of population would vanish from Earth just in one year.

I believe the former common distate against masturbation is actually biblical - as in Bible Onan, a husband of his deceased brother´s wife Tamar, indulges in such practics rather than conceiving Tamar with a child which would be according to law considered his brother´s, and for the killing of his potential children and unwillingness to do his dead brother a favour he is punished by God and dies. A Christian that used his energy to pleasure himself/herself instead of spending it on producing new generation was a sinner according to Church, almost as big sinner as someone who went through artificial abortion. Incredible as it might sound in 21st century, such opinions are still prevailing in certain groups of people, particularly above 50 years of age or very religious. Let´s just hope they didn´t do to their children what their parents did to them - crippled them with their narrow-minded belief.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Masturbation

Two Thoughts on Taking Drugs

Thought one:

Artists during the centuries have been taking drugs to get to know another forms of consciousness and call inspiration upon themselves, or for example to shake off all the pressure they are under; perhaps it´s one of the reasons why so many of the artists end up in asylums or commit suicide in the end?

Thought two:

One of the signs Western society outran the Eastern one in progress is teenagers at schools in Western countries no longer start to just smoke at very early age to look cool - to get on the top ten of popularity is nowadays needed to take drugs or at least pretend to do so - which makes me grateful for relative poorness of my country which makes this kind of progress in the short or long term impossible.

http://www.sirc.org/publik/talking_not_taking.shtml

Shoplifting

Why do people actually shoplift? The reasons are many and truly various and to some extent can depend on person´s age. Let´s have a look at some of them.

When you are a child, the way you want things is usually very badly and it seems like if all the stars should fall down and the whole world tear apart if you don´t get what you want. Obviously if such a passionate wish is turned down by evil unsympathetic adult, the stars stay where they are and the world is not more ripped into pieces than it already is; but what happens is such a child in his longing can say goodbye to all morals the very evil unsympatethic adult has taught him/her and according to the law of jungle just take it him/herself. As long as it stays in realm of candies however and child is caught once (trust me, that can be a very good lesson), it means no actual harm to his/her character and it is not probable s/he would continue with that afterwards.

When you are in your teens, such thing can make you look cool - and that is the most desirable thing for most of the regular teenagers, isn´t it? To be cool, to be accepted. To fit in.

Another factor is shoplifting is exciting - for someone it is as adrenaline sport as bungee-jumping for example. Plus if you don´t get caught, it´s free. Some of the people who are addicted to it know no greater excitement than the quick, frenzied bagging of practically unworthy, yet highly surveilled item: "Will I get caught this time? Has anyone seen me? Oh, God, now I´m walking through the detectors at the door; what will happen now? Great, magnificent, I´m out! Ugh, it was close this time - but I was so clever haha!" And perhaps we are at the very point of the shoplifting addiction - proving yourself you are smarter than the other people. Once, twice, then again and again, the feeling of one´s own wit is fantastic and overwhelming.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/magazine/4477596.stm

Pathological Jealousy

Most of the people are jealous or have experienced feeling of jealousy during their lives. I believe a seed of it is in everyone of us and that such feeling is natural - as long as it stays within healthy boundaries and it´s not an excessive jealousy of insecure or mentally ill person. But when does it stop to be just a feeling that stems from uncertainity and low self-confidence and starts to be an illness? There are several possibilities.

• When person starts to think s/he has exclusive right to own someone, rather than be simply his partner and believes his/her ownership and leadership is the only way how to maintain a successful relationship



• When the uncertainity and low-self esteem, as well as problems with trust, make the jealous scenes arise repeatedly in every relationship the ill person had

Pathological jealousy is a very serious and very dangerous disorder that often leads to violence, emotional blackmailing, life-threatening situations and not unfrequently to a murder, of which are mostly women victims. Which is natural, when you think about it; guys are usually more capable in breaking up with women that stalk them and make a hell out of their lives. Sadly to women it usually takes too long to wake up and jump out of the lethal train till it´s too late.

More info:

http://www.mental-health-today.com/ptsd/ptsdther/16.htm

Cutting

Cutting, or self-harm, is a deliberate self-infliction of injury usually done with a razor or other very sharp object without intention to kill oneself, most common among young people. Usually it´s a sign of a mental disorder, the reasons however can be quite various:

• It can be something that tells you you are actually still alive - the pain of it reassures you of it.


• Cutting can be a manifestation of self-hate, or unrecognized needs (like it was in case of the young lady in Secretary, who was actually a masochist)


• Often it is a result of a previous trauma, such as emotional or sexual abuse or cold and restrictive atmosphere at home


• It can accompany eating disorders like anorexia or bulimia


• Sometimes, as in case of one my acquaintance, it can be used as a protest against authority misusing its power - in her case it was an insane mother that tried to persuade her it´s actually her who is insane by forcing her to attend sessions with a psychiatrist on a daily basis


• Cutting serves as an outlet for emotions which are too strong and have to be otherwise repressed

More info:

http://kidshealth.org/teen/your_mind/mental_health/cutting.html

Bullying

Although statistically bullying is commited more often by boys than girls, the interesting fact from my own experience is that girls are the ones who mastered its techniques to perfection. Despite the guys at my school kept kicking me and beating me, it was nothing in comparison with such a slow, refined and maddening torture the 6 girls from my class kept practising on me for 4 years, till I eventually literally lost my sanity for some time.
What is the reason of bullying? Perhaps it is more often a lack of self-confidence and inner strength than cruelty one was born with or was taught it during his life.
Bullies are like hyenas - they never dare to attack creatures taller and stronger than themselves, unless perhaps they are sure the victim is outnumbered. They are cowards in nature and mostly feel great need to be accepted by the herd - and to gain this they draw all attention to a chosen scapegoat, knowing as long as s/he continues to mock and hurt him/her, no one will notice the attacker´s own flaws and weak points.
The surprising thing for many people is that many bullies (especially their leaders) are clever children with good marks and otherwise unproblematic (at least it seems so) behaviour. But clever doesn´t equal mature, having a character and by no means self-confident and crueltiless. To use a bit of hyperbole to illustrate the situation, let me please quote one my former professor: "The greatest murderers were clever and educated people."
Intelligence can make self-confidence issues a lot worse, plus if you have ambitious parents knowing your potential and pushing you to your very limits all the time... and mocking, insulting or beating you for a small failure... what do you do? Well if you have a character or forming character with some strong basics of sense for good and wrong, you go on and try to withstand it, try to fight at least a bit for what you are. If you lack these basics, you go and let the steam out on another kid´s head. Inner insecurities, pain, anger, lack of self-esteem, selfishness, need to fit in and be admired, ambitions, skillfulness at sports and intelligence create the best bullies´ leaders. And if they have a let´s say natural talent for cruelty, the combination is murderous - in the sense it can easily lead the victim to attempt to commit a suicide. My Bully No.1 was like that.
How are the typical victims like? Surprisingly the ones I met have some things in common with the best bullies´ leaders- they are mostly clever children with good marks, have overly ambitious parents whose expectations they must meet, otherwise they are punished, and they are therefore greatly stressed both at school and at home. The difference between them is the victim kids are usually "strange" or "different" and generally don´t fit in - and some of them don´t even want to anyway. They have more adult interests and live mainly among adults, they are more mature, perhaps overly wise for their age - and generally they are physically weak or handicapped in some other way, like not being able to defend themselves. They are not easily understandable and their physics, interrupted nerve system and lack of strong close friends make them an easy prey. In society led by intolerance and lack of compassion they are sort of doomed to be victims. I don´t know about England, but in my country it was the case of most of the schools I attended.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bullying

Smoking

Have you ever considered, that cigarettes are one of the few lethal weapons which are legally accessible for anyone above the age of consent without necessity of having gun licence?

Reasons of smoking:

• Smoking can increase somebody´s feeling of maturity - as it was in one Czech novel where a very young hero during World War II meets a Jewish girl that escaped from concentration camp transport and he both scared to death and filled with compassion reassures himself of his adulthood and braveness by taking in several deep inhales from a cheap cigarette.


• It can also serve as a tool for improving a difficult social situation - in an awkward moment just put a cigarette to your mouth and take some poisonous air in and you get some precious seconds to think what to do next.


• Smoking can mean the same for smokers as going out to a park with their dogs to dog people - an opportunity to meet at least in one respect likeminded partner. You know the situation when you are asked by some attractive woman to light up her cigarette?


• Smoking calms down, therefore it´s a friend of overly nervous people


• Many people, especially girls, smoke to stay slim. I wonder if they know it is as much at cost of their health in longer term as anorexia?


• Rebellion and risk taking


• It seems sexy to some people

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tobacco_smoking

Telling Lies

In some ways, telling lies virtuously is a sort of an art a human being can´t exist peacefully without. Can you imagine telling your 130 kg weighting boss straight how frightfully she looks in her new leather mini skirt? If you are a mentally sane person, probably not. Even if you want to help her, you need a portion of lies, that is called diplomacy, first. As we Czechs say, tell the truth, but be sure to know how to escape afterwards.

I find the worst of lies the lies that are meant to harm somebody. I understand merciful lies, though they can cause more harm than good, lies used to shield somebody we like, despite we often get hurt instead of that person, or even lies to gain an advantage or save our own neck - those are the things everyone can do and still remains relatively good. The milestone between let's say OK lies and bad lies like the malicious ones is in cruelty. And that is, as I hope we'll all agree, most of the times bad.

http://74.125.77.132/search?q=cache:kBblPZHPhN8J:www.cyh.com/HealthTopics/HealthTopicDetailsKids.aspx%3Fp%3D335%26np%3D287%26id%3D1485+telling+lies&cd=1&hl=en&ct=clnk&gl=uk

Prostitution

Though definitely not the oldest profession, prostitution has a long history. As a mean of forcing old Judah to acknowledge Tamar´s rights it was even mentioned in Bible - and long before that in Ancient Egyptian papyruses, in documents of Ancient Sumer or Mesopotamia...

Historically prostitution was often connected with a cult of some god as well as cult of fertility - and at the same time with poverty, desire to live better/easier life, lust for luxury, misery and oppression. I wonder how many of men visiting a brothel give a thought to the possibility the woman they are about to have sex with might not be doing this on her own free will? That she might be actually a nice girl from Ukraine or Russia who was kidnapped on her way home from work, raped, beaten and imprisoned afterwards in foreign country to be raped anytime a client chooses her?

When the case is a woman chose to do this, alright, I´m not saying anything - the thing I truly dislike is actually the demand of such services that creates atmosphere for committing crimes on those who cannot defend themselves. There were already too many Eastern and other women kidnapped and forced to do such a job - women who were as good and as deserving of happiness as the others- like your mothers, daughters, sisters or wives. Seriously guys, are you really such losers you cannot persuade a woman to have sex with you in normal way?

http://www.portal.cz/scripts/detail.php?id=2076

Adultery - Part II

Reasons of Infidelity

• trying to improve one´s self-confidence and self-esteem - I find it to some extent understandable, especially when I imagine living years and years with someone who doesn´t notice any effort in looking beautiful except musing over the bills for clothes and perfume he can´t understand the importance of, and who brings me flowers or is especially nice to me just when he has done some mischief and needs my pardon. On the other hand, this is just not the way - first it leads nowhere and second most of men are like that in the end. So after some months with the new guy you are where you were before and what then? Though dumping him and finding another one for some months and then repeat it on and on might be a solution... it is a well observed fact people who do that spend the winter of their lives alone and die alone. I think either looking for that male exception or improving the one one has now is better, what do you think? And vice versa, of course.
  



• looking for what we miss in relationship elsewhere - oftentimes it is not sex, but other needs that are not met by the current partner. Need for emotional fullfilment that is turned down at home for instance; need to share important parts of one´s life which are not possible to share with the partner because of his different interests; maltreatment and so forth



• sexual disharmony - partners come into relationship with different sorts and amounts of experience, which is something that usually settles down after some time - if it doesn´t or if the wishes of the partners are too different, an infidelity may occur in time; it depends on the characters, temperaments and attitudes of each party concerned

• fear of commitment - Autumn in New York is a classical example of movie about a man who has terrible problems with commitment, however doesn´t have at least the guts to end the relationship that is getting too serious - therefore all his adulteries are not about sex, but actually just provide his partner with reason to send him to hell

• revenge - one of the saddest reasons, I think. Though in the end it might teach the one who cheated like first a lesson, if adultery is committed with a sole purpose to harm, the one you harm most by such act is yourself

http://www.infidelity-etc.com/index.php/8

Drinking

Personally, there is not much I hate more than alcohol or other people encouraging me to drink. If you ever had to live with an alcoholic and defend your mother against him when you were only 3 years old, I guess you understand why. If not, let me please explain it to you a bit: When you are a child of an alcoholic, safety is not something you ever experience as long as he is present. Your childhood is stolen away, as you have to mature quickly to support your mum that spends her evenings crying in your arms scared to death he will kill you all. And as his alcoholism grows worse, you have to watch one of the persons you love most turning into a monster.

Such used to be the situation of my dad. He kept drinking since my earliest memories, turning our life into hell. And be it not he opened once to me, I would probably never understand any person that turns to drinking... and never accept them as people that actually (though not all of them) just need help.

Long before he met my mum, his first wife stole his children and escaped with them to Canada; he has never seen them again. He lost his prominent job due to her act and didn´t end up in jail just thanks to help of his friends. (It was a communistic Czechoslovakia, remember. To attempt to escape to Western countries or have any close relative who does so equaled many years of hard imprisonment) He found a new woman, had a new son - and lost them again. After the change of the regime he founded a company which went into bankruptcy and left him with a Mount Everest of debts. Whenever he tried anything to help himself get out of his misery, life kicked him in the face and he sank even lower.

After he once told me all these things, I was not wondering anymore why he spent approximately 10 years almost constantly drunk as a skunk.

http://alcoholism.about.com/cs/heal/a/aa082097.htm

Emotional Blackmailing - The Invisible Domestic Violence

News stuff you daily with wars and crimes commited all around the world; but what most of them say not is the simple and ugly truth that the worst violence can be found at home. And, beside the obvious physical attacking which is of course criminal offence, it´s often not the sort of violence you can charge your parents for; unless you really long for ending up in Children´s House, your hands are tied. This is the most a social worker can do for you, I suppose.

Imagine your mother crying everyday due to your unwillingness to do what she thinks is best for you, everyday showing you the most colourful scale of suffering, sometimes changing it for threatening and speeches about ungratitude. What would you do? Indeed you love your mother. Indeed you don´t want her to suffer. And if you have just slightly soft heart, you are trapped. The problem with emotional blackmailing is that when you give in to it, you choose to suffer yourself instead of the blackmailer. The essence of emotional blackmail is selfishness; no matter how honourable may somebody´s motives sound, in the core s/he just wants to get her/his way, no matter the other´s cost.

Why are the people who usually blackmail us the people we care for and trust? The reason is simple, they know us. They know our weaknesses, they know our secrets, fears, they are familiar with our dreams. What would be a problem for a relative stranger, is no problem for them - by trusting them and confiding in them we actually give them a powerful supply of lethal weapons they can use against us.

How to resist emotional blackmail? The best way is probably to know exactly what you want and be sure of yourself enough to know that even if you don´t do what the blackmailer wants, it won´t be the end of the world. Do resist. It is hard, but it is worth it. As nothing encourages the blackmailer more to repeat his behaviour as giving into his demands.

More info:

http://peterfox.com.au/family_blackmail.htm

Adultery - Part I

Motto:

"Life is amazing, life is odd. Life is not what you expected it to be. Things happen... growing up takes longer than you think."

Lauren Bacall

A Definition of Infidelity

Is it just a betrayal of trust or is it a solution of an impasse? Some people can commit adultery just to make their partner end their relationship, which is for them no longer bearable, however they are too weak to end it themselves, without visible reason. Others do it for their marriage has died years and years ago and they found someone who understands them - but is it still infidelity?

To what extent is infidelity harmful? That depends on individual conditions of each couple. In some cases it can save a relationship, as it is in human nature to not to value things till we are losing them - and both partners realize they have to work on what is between them. Also adultery can bring new opportunities - let´s imagine you are an all the time humiliated housewife, that can hear from her husband just sentences like: "Where is my dinner, you stupid old bat?". And suddenly there is a guy or lady elsewhere, that finds you interesting, open-minded, funny and attractive and does incredibly risky things to draw your attention - doesn´t that make you open your eyes and see your own power and possibilities? It´s a bit sad if someone realizes it only after an affair and thanks to help of someone else - but still, if the change is lasting, it is worth it.

On the other hand if it happens to otherwise harmonic and loving couple, the harm can be immense. In the beginning of a relationship people usually set their do´s and don´ts basing it on trust they both will respect them - and in most of the cases adultery is clearly a most violent abuse of these rules, and more importantly of the trust behind them. It can happen the cheated one will be never again able to trust any potential partner and maybe as a result of that either mistreat him/her or stay completely alone. You can forgive, you can forget - but the harm stays and hurts like a salt in open injury and complete trust is either never again possible, or needs thousand proofs to be reborn.

Although it´s true that in general, everyone can do a stupidity, during our lives we do so many of them we lose count. The important thing is how we face the consequences.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Infidelity

Body Modification - Part III

Plastic Operation

To me the increasing number of teenage girls undergoing even multiple plastic surgeries seems highly alarming - in their 14-19, how many of them do actually know what they are doing? From school to media young girls are bombarded with so called perfect looks of present idols, photoshopped and and painted beyond recognition (I assume it would be a great shock if the girls met those idols in reality and found out they are just humans like anyone other). But when you think about that, how many supposedly adult women know what they are doing while doing the same thing? What is the scale of maturity? I´m twenty now - and still feel being as much a kid as I was twelve years ago.

But let´s leave the question of mental adulthood aside now and think about the morality of plastic operation itself. I find it interesting that a very similar philosophy, when it comes to Christianity and suicide (God gave you life and you have no right to take it), applies to such a permanent and drastic change of one´s looks - God gave you one body according to his consideration and you aren´t allowed to alter it. But what if you feel on the day you were created God was either asleep, or had very wicked sense of humour?

Nowadays when it comes to seriously physically handicapped or injured people, perhaps all the humans agree the religious view on the thing is pointless. But what if such operation undergoes for example a woman with no obvious flaw, except a long-term desire to have a C instead of A cup? In United Kingdom 85% of men are against silicon-made bust. But while most of men, women content with their natural size and even many people working in medicine laugh at operated breasts, their owners don´t - as it remains a statistic fact most of the women who had their breasts augmented experience increase of self-confidence and better sexual life. On the other hand there remains the question for how long will this effect on their psyche last - do they learn to love themselves for good after the thing that was a flaw in their eyes was improved?

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A62540-2004Oct25.html

Body Modification Part II - Tattoo

Tattoo

The common negative view on tattoos stems from their rather problematic history. The craddle of this technique is Ancient Egypt, where it was used for marking slaves, captives and criminals. From Egypt it spred through Arabian countries to almost all the asian continent, Pacific and later to Ancient Rome, keeping its original purpose in most of the countries it reached. The exceptions include for example India, where the hinduistic parents marked their children to recognize them in afterlife, or New Zealand where tattoo served as a sign of belonging to a tribe and to religious purposes. Later on thanks to this kind of use tattoo was seen as paganic in Europe, a very inappropriate thing in world ruled by Christian Church. In 787 it was even forbidden as such by Pope Adrian I and thanks to his act it went forgotten in Europe for centuries and centuries, till the tales about "painted creatures" came with great discovery cruises and sailors that besides veneric diseases (from European ports, though) carried pictures on their skins as souvenirs from their journeys.

Tattoos remained a realm of sailors, prostitutes, actors, dog soldiers, criminals and prisoners till later twentieth century, when adorning one´s body with ink became massively popular thanks to music and movie stars; but still its label of a sign of criminal activities remains in many minds till present times. Just a prejudice, one might say - and of course such quotes like my father´s "Every tattooed girl is for sure a prostitute" are exaggerated for sure. On the other hand... do you remember colourful tattoos of Japanese Yakuza?

More information about tattoos and tattoo artists can be found here:

zjimas.blog.cz/0611/tetovani

Body Modification - Part I

Make-up



Changing views on make-up during centuries



While in thousands of years of Ancient Egypt, Greece or Rome enhancing one´s appearance by painting one´s face or cultivating hair were considered a very aristocratic things to do due to high prices of such commodities like make-up or well-keeping oils, with Christianity and particularly Victorian Era all make-up products gain a stigma of something low-class, despicable. A real Victorian lady would never use such things, and even more than that - make-up was considered the sign that contradistinguished a lady from the sisterhood of prostitutes and actresses. Strange as it may seem, considering the revolution in cosmetics that have passed during the 20th Century, such opinions can be still actual in some religious or age groups. Like for example in my family, that is ruled by an 85 years old Grandmother. C´est la vie.


http://www.channel4.com/life/microsites/M/make_up/decades.html

Reasons of wearing make-up:

1. A rebellion - it can be just a trivial revolt of a teenage girl or boy against their narrow-minded parents or teachers, or it can also be a deep-going rebellion of women opressed by prejudices of men - whether it is a suffragette wearing red lipstick or an Afghanistan woman with her face fully done behind her burka, make-up can scream a political message about not being willing to let the others break one´s spirit. The reason of the make-up being a symbol is the traditionally reserved male attitude towards female beautification. In Iran it´s so reserved you can be killed for plain lipstick wearing.
2. Need to look and feel better - the most common reason, I suppose. Make-up, if done skillfully, can truly change a rather plain woman, that would otherwise remain unnoticed, into a goddess of beauty - don´t you think the best examples of this are Hollywood stars? It can also do wonders for woman´s self-confidence, which is of course big part of the charm.
3. Feeling artsy - some experienced make-up painters, such as Doe Deere from Lime Crime Makeup, understand putting on make-up actually as a form of art rather than just an attempt to accentuate one´s assets. Faces serve as instruments of creativity and demonstrating skills; unlike common make-up use, creations of these lipstick and eyeshadow wizards are not possible to overlook (as demonstrated on the picture)- more likely they are about to cause you a shock, either pleasant or unpleasant. Each of these faces put on faces is unique, expressing one´s individual image and guaranteed to stand out, which leads me to point three:
4. Need to shock or attract public attention - can you imagine Kiss or Marilyn Manson make-upless? Or can you imagine remembering them for long without their image?