Those of you used to chatting with me on AIM may have noticed that I haven't been around too much lately. That is because I'd kind of gotten used to using the laptop as my primary computing device, and then I discovered... a stuck/dead pixel. Actually, there may be several of them in the same vicinity, but one is darker than the others and really really bugs me. Could it always have been there? I don't know, but now that I've noticed it I can't take my bloody eyes off of it. Hell, it's basically rendered the rightmost 150 pixels of my monitor useless, since I'm running all of my program windows dragged that much to the left to avoid making it show up on white backgrounds. I hate it. But as far as I've been able to discern, there's nothing that can be done about it. So I haven't been using the laptop much and have only been using the desktop for work (not much these days) and to check e-mail. It kinda sucks -- this thing cost $4K and I can hardly stand to use it now. What a waste.

Anyway, since my laptop looks almost exactly like Foamy's laptop and is (also) a Dell, I found the latest Ill Will Press cartoon (Tech-Support III) to be especially relevant (and fairly humorous, especially given that I have had similarly infuriating experiences with outsourced Dell tech support since getting the laptop). Unfortunately, the creator isn't taking e-mails so I can't ask him if Dell actually gave him a working solution.

Don't buy a Dell.

Couldn't let the month go by without commenting at length on the subject, could we? Actually, I'd very much intended to, but then I happened to catch the latter half of this "That's So Raven" episode. If you get around to reading it, lemme know what you think of the article. Later!

Been a while since I wrote something of a more substantial nature.

I'd heard that people were anticipating LA riots following the execution of Stanley "Tookie" Williams III, and in thinking about some of the folks I know in California, it popped into my head to see if anything had happened. Upon finding an article that addressed my concern -- it was all quiet on the Western front -- I went on to read the numerous comments that readers had posted regarding this turn of events. And I haven't been this disgusted in a long time. Which is saying something, since I find myself thoroughly disgusted on a daily basis.

Now, I don't go in for the death penalty. Even if a person has done unspeakable things, once that person is caught and incarcerated, that person can do no further damage. Killing the convict neither serves to protect society -- if they're that worried about the person doing further damage, they should probably beef up the prison security -- and numerous studies have shown that the death penalty is not a deterrent for violent crime. In the thread attached to that article, posters gloated over the execution, condemning the deceased as a "merderous thug" (so either they can't spell or were referring to the French word for crap) and asserting that now young would-be gang members will look at the fatal consequences and be frightened away from that path. But look: if the threat of being beaten, stabbed, or shot to death by rival gang members isn't enough to dissuade them, why should the death of an apparently repentant man, 25 years later, by lethal injection, have any effect on their mindsets whatsoever?

Yes, I do think it was a glaring flaw on Tookie's part to claim innocence for the murders -- unless he actually didn't commit them. I think he probably did. However, when the state executed him, it didn't kill a violent, 28-year-old multiple murderer. It killed a harmless 51-year-old author of children's books that spoke out against gangs. Tookie never claimed that he didn't co-found the Crips, and during his time in prison he renounced his former activities and wrote books to dissuade others from following in his footsteps. I'm not saying that's tantamount to achieving "redemption" or atoning for murdering four people and starting a gang that's been responsible for the deaths of thousands. But the impact that he might have had in the future does constitute a compelling reason to spare his life.

Was Tookie genuinely sorry? There's no way to know. However, one in his position only needs to appear sincere to make an impact. Had Tookie been spared, the media buzz surrounding the case might have helped to spread his anti-gang message to a number of different people who wouldn't otherwise have been reached. Maybe that'll still happen. Maybe it never would have, given the fickle nature of the media. Maybe Jesse Jackson and Al Sharpton should realize that they do their causes no favors by getting involved.

Maybe people who claim to have such respect for life shouldn't derive such satisfaction from the deaths of others.

"When dealing with other people, one should temper everything one says and does so as not to risk making them even the slightest bit angry -- because if one does, those others may be moved to retaliate by contacting the authorities and tell unbelievably vicious lies in order to ruin one's life and damage one's reputation beyond repair."

This is not a belief that anyone should hold, nor should an individual's experiences consistently force this thought into one's consciousness. Yet because I have been blamed for every instance in which I have been made to suffer these attacks, it is a code by which I am obviously expected to live.

And the very same people who condemn me criticize me for being "antisocial" -- as if, knowing what I know and having experienced what I have experienced -- entering into healthy relationships with other people is even a remote possibility.

To the women out there (or men who feel inclined to reply in a similar capacity, though I suspect that women the recipients of the more injurious and limiting stereotypes) -- I imagine you must deal with some similar issues, given the more or less inherent assumptions that people make about you on the basis of your sex. How do you endure it? And do you think that, in spite of these perhaps inevitable presumptions, it is possible for anyone to judge you as an individual, without considering it -- or is "being a woman" so integral to your self-perception that such appreciation of your (independent) individuality is unnecessary? At any rate, I am deeply saddened by the fact that a few physical features -- here, breasts and genitalia -- seem to make all the difference regarding how people treat one another.

I have been reading about suicide and methods and came across this article as a "disorder" associated with suicidal thought. I found the latter sections of the piece to be especially interesting.