Everything's a story. That isn't really the case, but we make it so, look for the drama, the heroes, the villains. The gray areas are just too hard to deal with. i catch myself doing it all the time. They broke up? He was a jerk. She got fired? She was incompetent. Is it just me? No - you do it too. That's why the really poignant news stories always take off. I remember reading about how the guy who wrote "Rent" died of AIDS a few days before it opened to rave reviews.. It's touching, ironic (don't ya think?)�it sticks with us. Princess Di is a prime example. Fairy tale wedding turns sour, but the Princess picks herself up and goes on to save the world. I'm not putting down her accomplishments� but Mother Theresa died the same month, and who talks about her anymore? who wants to talk about a nun?
It's like that woman - Canadians will remember this, i'll look for a link for the rest of you. In 1996, Donna Mercier went to the police and told them that her purse had been snatched. She was destitute and hiding from an abused husband; the purse contained painkillers to help her cope with her terminal cancer, the last of her money, and a bus ticket to send her son to live with relatives after she died. People were touched. It was such a sad story.... the media plastered it all over the country. Canadians donated $114 000 to help. Just regular citizens who read the paper and wanted to do something.
then�
i hate this part of the story, because� it's just awful�.
but. then.... (does there ALWAYS have to be a "but then�"?)
- it turned out it was a scam. Her purse hadn't been snatched, she didn't have cancer, she didn't have an abusive husband. She was sick, but she wasn't dying. It was awful. They charged her with public mischief, put $20 000 in trust for her son, and donated the rest to various charities.
But that is not the point. the point is: it was a STORY� like a fairy tale - She was innocent, her son was innocent. Her husband was a bastard, they were poor, she was dying. People understood it, they reacted, and it was beautiful. So neatly lined up: good vs bad. Like a movie.
Real life is not like that.. there are no neat heroines, there is no poor little match girl, there are no evil stepmothers or beautiful, innocent, tormented girls like Snow White. Instead� instead we have angry, suicidal, depressed teenagers. We have junkies who get AIDS from sharing needles. We have bullied teenagers going on shooting sprees. We have crack whores who sleep with 100 men a month to support their addictions. We have in-your-face squeegie kids. We have mothers on welfare with three children.
All those things mean different things to different people.
They are complicated, they make us uncomfortable: issues that are so complicated, we could not begin to understand.. They do not fit our fairy tale schemas.. So we judge them.
And we do not help.
07:11 p.m. - 2001-03-23
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