Letters to the Editor
Tacroy80
Published Letters: 41 Editor's Choice: 3
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Not really news
[Read the article: Old women got the blues]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]Women overall consistently have significantly higher rates of depression than men, and men overall have significantly higher rates of (successful) suicide. Nobody really knows why, though many speculative theories exist. Just as an example, some believe that men are more likely to externalize their suffering, whereas women are more likely to internalize it. With regard to suicide, men are more likely to use "effective" methods such as hanging and guns, whereas women tend to go the pill route.
That this trend should be carried over into old age isn't at all surprising.
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"Settling" = Bad
[Read the article: My shame at being single -- it burns, it buuuurns!]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]Abandoning a superficial list of meaningless achievements in favor of developing true intimacy with a real, live, messy, complicated, endlessly fascinating, actual human being who leads you question your own assumptions about what a "quality" human being is, which in turn allows you to relax and become more comfortable with yourself = Extraordinary!
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Correction
[Read the article: TV Daily]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]We've actually got two weeks left after this coming one :-)
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"Nurturing" and "caring" vs. "confident" and "assertive"
[Read the article: Have a daughter? You wimp]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]Ummmm ... am I the only one wondering these are assumed to be mutually exclusive sets of characteristics?
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I think what most people want above all else is intimacy,
[Read the article: Your girlfriend seems so fake]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]... so I'm not too worried. The vast majority of people want to be loved for who they are - to know that they've been chosen by somebody who could have said no, to have somebody bear witness to their lives. The few out there who prefer the company of robots and dolls ... well, maybe that's what they need, for whatever reason. Maybe, as the article pointed out, they have social, psychosexual, or physical disability-related problems that make it difficult for them to have normal relationships, because of confidence or any number of other issues. The dolls don't even have to be permanent substitutes for sexual relationships - I'd imagine they could be used as a highly valuable adjunct to sexual surrogacy therapy.
It's also likely that a good number of people in the market for the dolls they have Narcissistic Personality Disorder (very likely in the case of somebody who wants to be unconditionally adored without having to deal with the messiness of another human being's wants and desires), in which case it's probably much better that they're out of the dating pool anyway!
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Cary, you rock my world!
[Read the article: I'm really a self-actualized being, but my family is all messed up]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]That is all.
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For what it's worth,
[Read the article: Michael Wolff on sex and the Dems]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]I'd like to second Gams on Glass.
To (most, not all of) the rest of you: you've made my ever-diminishing faith in the basic decency of people shrink even further this morning.
I'm off to do some deep breathing until my nausea passes.
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to the LW
[Read the article: I hit my sister in the head with my purse when I drink]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]In terms of resources, I'd check out Barbara Sher's book "I Could do Anything if I Only Knew What it Was," and read the chapter called "A Rage Against the Ordinary." It's a very insightful, compassionate, and yet extremely practical assessment of problems similar to what you're experiencing.
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again to the LW
[Read the article: I hit my sister in the head with my purse when I drink]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]But stop hitting people first.
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to lonewolfy
[Read the article: I hit my sister in the head with my purse when I drink]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]If there are indeed "Black APs, Desi APs, WASP APs, Italian APs, Hispanic APs, etc etc" (and, when, by the way, was the last time you heard anybody refer to any of the above groups - with the exception of the first - as a commonly accepted stereotypical subset of society?), then the specific designation of the LW as a *Jewish* American Princess would have been wholly unnecessary. But for some reason, she felt it was relevant enough to throw in there anyway.
The problem with jane doe's use of the term "JAP" is that it strongly hints that her whole assessment of the LW was colored by her ethnicity. She referred to Judaism again later in her letter, in a way that made it clear that she was formulating her view of the LW in light of her assumptions about Jews - colored in an inarguably negative way.
If you have a minute, please read this article: http://condor.depaul.edu/~mwilson/multicult/jap.html
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annoying, anal nitpick
[Read the article: I Like to Watch]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]The "motherfrakker" exchange took place on Kobol, not Caprica. :-P
And to put my two cents in, I am loving this season - especially last night's episode. I get a huge kick out of the fact that every time Heather writes about BSG, there's an enormous contingent of letters saying, "oh, the show was good back in Season ___, but now it sucks and I hate it and I'm never going to watch it again. I swear. Really. And I mean it even more now than I will when I come back to complain in six months about how amazing the show was this season and how it'll have all gone down the crapper by then."
To paraphrase master filker The Great Lukeski, I guess I'll just keep on shake-shake-shakin' my fangirl booty.
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Oooh! Oooh!
[Read the article: My boyfriend has an abysmal environmental conscience]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]I haven't even gotten through the entire letter yet, but I have to know: was the pseudonym "Himself" a shout-out to "The Time of the Ghost," by Diana Wynne Jones? If so, way groovy!
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I'd like to add my voice to the anti-ing anti-ers
[Read the article: How Rock Band saved my marriage]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]I thought this was a beautifully written article; definitely the most enjoyable essay to be posted on Salon in quite awhile. Somewhat fluffy, yes (at least on the surface), but it showed genuine skill and craft, and I repeatedly laughed aloud in recognition. You might even say that it hearkened back to Salon's glory days of Anne Lamotte and Ayelet Waldman, before twentysomethings with negligible talent, well-connected parents, and an overinflated sense of their own insightfulness like Lucy Silag (and, for that matter, Emily Gould over at nyt mag) were allowed to run rampant.
Okay, that's not quite fair. I do think Ann Bauer's fantastic. But it's nice to see essays by people who have lived long enough and experienced enough of the world to develop a real voice. Hell, I'm in my twenties myself, and even I can see that many of these young writers just haven't earned the right to tell anyone about life yet.
Okay, bit of a tangent (and I ended up being a bit of an anti myself), but I've been wanting to get that off my chest and had to take the opportunity, even if nobody's going to listen or care :-).
And again, lovely article Rachel. :-)