Tuesday, May 10, 2005

Not a Mr. Nice Guy post

When I was a little girl, we played outside all the time. We rode our bikes down a seldom used dirt road next to our house. We were never frightened of someone stealing us. We were scared of an abandoned old house we had to ride by. We always stopped before the housImage hosted by Photobucket.come and played a few hands of one potato, two potato.....to see who had to ride by it first. We played kick the can, went ice skating, played hide-n-seek and tag. We built forts and treehouses from scraps of wood (my dad was a carpenter) and were allowed to use hammers and nails. We rode in the back of a pick-up truck, never wore seat belts and our parents smoked cigarettes around us. What changed the world as I knew it? The story in the news about the two girls from Illinois just sickens me. Absolutely makes me want to puke. Why, why would someone do that to those girls? Two innocent little girls, best friends, riding their bikes, on their way home. It totally boggles my mind. In this world we live in, I hear so many horrible things happening everyday that it almost hardens me against emotion. However, this story made me weep. What's even sadder to me is if it is true and turns out to be the father of one of them and that a parent could even do that. What made me think about this was last night I was watching the show Medium . I normally enjoy this show because I find the supernatural fascinating. However, last night's show was too gruesome for me to really watch. I know the show is based on real life cases but some of them, I don't think need to be retold. This story was of a doctor who heard voices telling him to murder and disembowel young girls while they were in his care at the doctor's office. Of course, they had to show this scene and also show the parent at the doctor's with the child, in a dimension of panic and grief that no human should ever have to withstand. I couldn't watch. But at the same time....I didn't feel anything. I actually had to think about how I should feel. Is this from being exposed to this type of thing too often? Or am I just strange?

7 comments:

Sandi said...

Personally I believe that the more the media shows and dwells on these crimes, the more there will be committed. Yes, I think it is desentization due to excessive media attention to such horrible events.

Melody said...

I agree with Sandi, I think that we all become desencitized from over exposure to things like this, if we didn't develope a "thick skin" we'd be crying all the time. I have a hard time watching some things now...a child in a car accident...a person being shocked with paddles...autopsies, these things are just too close to home. I used to love ER, never missed an episode - I can't watch it any more. I remember things that we did as kids, teens mostly, that scare the shit out of me. Have things really changed that much since then or were we just very VERY lucky that we never got hurt?

Tammy said...

I posted my sadness about this tragic event. Lost more of my small town innocence...not much left...

Sue said...

It's so sad.

Willow said...

We are so incredibly desensitized, but I think there are far too many who cannot make the leap from "it's just on TV" to "That really happened."

There are those who don't see the made up shows for what they are (such as Texas Chainsaw which was NOT based on true events, as stated in the beginning of the movie- that was all a publicity tactic), and those that are real but shown on shows that aren't the news (The real "based on" things). I think seeing them in TV format tends to lessen their impact to some extent. (Sort of like some people tell themselves, "It's only on tv. It'll never happen to me.)

I hope I made sense here.

Kim said...

The whole thing is even sicker when you factor in that it was the little girl's own father! What the hell is going on?

Anonymous said...

I wish we can not only turn off the news, but turn off all the violence that is happening next door, near by town, country...