Unleash your Inner Lizard

It should come as no surprise that I’m on a major Stones kick at the moment (get used to it...it’s going to be going on for over a month), so I’ve been posting a Stones song on Facebook once in a while. The other day, I posted “Paint It, Black,” and said that was my second favorite Stones song. My friend Holly said that her favorite is “Shattered” (that is my third favorite Stones song, for the record) and it brings out her “inner lizard.”

That phrase spoke to me. It somehow perfectly describes that sort of down and dirty, raunchy, hip-swivelin’ Stones style. When the Inner Lizard comes out, shit gets real.

You know those ‘would you rather’ questions? Like “Ginger or Mary Ann?” One of the classics is “Beatles or Stones?” Of course I love the Beatles. Who doesn’t? They were my first taste of pop music, when I was maybe 5 or 6, and my Beatlemaniac sister played her records for me. But for me, it was always about the Stones. They always had a darker edge, a more dangerous, bad boy sex appeal. I was listening to their latest greatest hits CD, “Grrr!” while I was working out today, and it struck me just how many of their songs unleash my inner lizard. There is something about Mick’s voice that reaches right into the dark corners of my psyche. It ranges from a deep baritone to a raspy growl to a bedroom whisper that “it’s only rock and roll but I liiiiike it.” He’s really not even subtle about it. What part of “Let’s spend the night together” needs clarification?

Anyway, make all the jokes you want about the Stones being older than dirt, but these songs still totally trip my trigger. Young Mick Jagger was a beautiful, angelic devil (Anne Rice’s phrase for Lestat springs to mind: Brat Prince.), one who could seduce, incite, and inflame. The songs will continue to do that long after he is gone.

Of course, the Stones don’t have the market cornered on rock and roll sexyfuntimes. Remember how John Lithgow told his town that there would be no dancing because it would lead to sexyfuntimes, and Kevin Bacon was all like “Yo, dick move, bro, and I’m bangin’ your daughter” and danced all crazy around a barn and rode a tractor and then everyone made up and wore ugly tuxedos and danced all crazy some more? Anyway, John Lithgow and all those other preachermen who said that rock and roll led to “other things” weren’t so far off the mark.

Because the lyrics make you think about a lot of things. Not just sexyfuntimes, but things like inequality and revolution. Deeper concepts of the human condition. Life outside your small town. “Imagine no religion.” Experimentation, broadening your horizons, walking a mile in someone’s shoes, seeing beyond the narrow borders of your early existence. There are some people who don’t want these questions asked, and they certainly don’t want to have to answer them. How you gonna keep ‘em down on the farm, right?

Rock and roll IS dangerous. Dangerous to the status quo, dangerous to those who have a vested interest in keeping you in line, dangerous to the powers-that-be.

Once that Inner Lizard is unleashed, it’s hard to get it back under control.

It takes a worried man

Or a worried Mom, in this case.

Ken and I went down to visit my Mom today, and found her in good spirits. As always, she needed to feed us first, so we chatted while we had lunch. She admitted that she had a bad night last night and cried a lot, but this time it wasn’t about Dad...it was about my sister Diana flying to China.

Diana and her husband and a couple of friends are going with a large group to spend about a week in China. They found a good deal and just decided to do it. (There’s that grabbing life by the horns thing again...it’s the way to live!) Mom wasn’t upset about them going or anything, but hearing that the flight from New York to China (I forget which city they’re flying into) was going to be 16 hours just wigged her out. Di had texted me that Mom was pretty upset about it, so I said I’d try to talk to her about it today.

She seemed mostly over it, but I hate it that she spent several hours worrying and crying over this. I realize that she has an extreme fear of flying, and I’m certain that we’ll never get her on a plane. It doesn’t matter how many statistics we throw at her about the safety of flying, she just hears “plane” and freaks out. I told her that Ken and I were probably at greater risk of a fatal accident on our Route 66 trip than Di and Tom are on these flights. I try and try to get Mom to not fret so much about these things; she agrees in theory, and realizes that it does no good, but she keeps right on fretting.

I think when Dad was around, he was able to pull her back from such relentless worrying. She’s always been a worrier—in fact, I’d say that it runs in her side of the family—but I hate to see her crying about things like this...things that have an infinitesimal chance of happening. I admit that I have a tendency towards worrying, too, which I obviously get from Mom. But I’ve worked to moderate, negate, and deflate it by doing my best to think logically and rationally, and to work it through in my mind. If I thought about everything that can kill us out in the world, I’d probably never leave the house! I just refuse to live my life in fear, and I refuse to let such fears keep me from living a fun and full life. I wish I could impart a little of my attitude to Mom, just so she wouldn’t make herself miserable with thinking such negative thoughts. But I don’t think there is any changing her at this point, so we just have to try to talk her through it, and sometimes she just has to work through it on her own.

Something else I get from my Mom is a stubborn streak about a mile wide. Oddly enough, that seems to be enough in me to counteract the “worry gene.” As in, screw you, whatever or whoever you are, you are not going to harsh my mellow or fuck up my joy. Some things take a little longer than others, but I always find my joy in the end. (I’m now thinking of the hilarious scene in “Ted” when Mark Wahlberg and Ted sing The Thunder Song. That is very much me.)

I wish I could impart a little of that defiance to my Mom, but I know it doesn’t work that way. All I can do is keep telling her, “Mom, you can’t let these things get to you so much. You can’t let them make you this upset.” But with that stubborn streak of her own, she isn’t going to listen and take it to heart until SHE is ready!

In the meantime, I’ll be over here singing “Fuck you, thunder, you can suck my dick,” and as Devo says, “I may be worried now, but I won’t be worried long.”

What will you regret?

A Facebook friend posted this picture and quote of Lucille Ball today, and I loved it so much I shared it and am writing about it here.

It relates directly to getting the Rolling Stones tickets yesterday, but also to our broader philosophy of life. Ken and I had this conversation when Notre Dame went undefeated in football last season and were playing for the national championship. It was outrageously expensive, but Ken said, “Let’s do it. We will probably never get another chance like this.”

We talked about how we could save every penny towards retirement, but how many people do you know who finally reached retirement and then got sick, or were in poor enough health that they couldn’t travel? We made a conscious decision to do some of these things NOW rather than wait ten years from now, when Ken hopes to retire. Ken took almost a month off of work and we did Route 66; we went to Miami for a three-day weekend to cheer for our Irish; and we decided to go for it and get good seats for the Stones.

Route 66 was the trip of a lifetime for me, something I’d wanted to do for well over a decade. Although the championship game didn’t turn out the way we’d hoped, we still had a fabulous time in Miami and were happy to be there to cheer for our team. I’m sure that the Stones concert is going to be a blast, and I will probably scream and cry and be a hot mess and enjoy the HELL out of it.

We aren’t wealthy, by any means, and we do things like this within reason. But when a good time comes along, we decided to whip it...whip it good. We aren’t extravagant in our daily life, and we save our money for traveling and doing fun things like this. We still have retirement funds, of course, so I don’t think we’ll have to dine on Fancy Feast, but we’re not going to save every penny for ten years from now. I know there are some people out there who make a total career change around this age, or are just entering the workforce due to various reasons. Whatever works for you, I suppose, but I feel very fortunate and grateful that I not only got to enjoy a quarter century of a satisfying and interesting career, I was able to retire five years ago, and I’ve never missed the daily grind once. I still enjoy the subject of Microbiology and read plenty about it, but I was happy to say goodbye to the day-to-day stuff. If you’re my age and you’re just starting your career, well...have fun with that!

If we hadn’t done the 66 trip when we did, we might not have been able to do the walking and climbing we did. If we hadn’t gone to Miami, we would have looked back and said, “Damn, I wish we’d gone to that.” And if we hadn’t gone to see the Stones this time, we will probably never get another chance. Like any human being, I’ve done things in my life that I regret. But like Lucy, I don’t want to regret the things I didn’t do, miss the opportunities I might never get again, and feel that I somehow let life pass me by.

I got what I need

I was doing my Facebook thing this morning, and I’m glad I was on there, because I started seeing frequent updates on the Rolling Stones page. The Hyde Park show sold out in less than five minutes...a second show was added in Toronto...and a second show was added in Chicago. What? Had the first one sold out already? This was the presale through Citibank, so what did this bode for my chances on getting tickets when they go on sale to everyone Monday? Not good, I was thinking, so I thought I’d click through and see if I could get any further information.

Well, I’m glad I did, because it took me right to Ticketmaster and let me go through the ordering process. I don’t know if it was because it was through their Facebook page, or what, but I didn’t have to wait long and had the tickets ordered within just a few minutes. GOT ‘EM!

I got one of the ticket packages that included seats on the floor, and they were not cheap. We weren’t expecting them to be, but still...ouch! I’m happy to report that Ken is not upset with me. He understood that we were going no matter what, so he might have expected some expensive tickets! But you know, it probably really is the last time the Stones will tour. Like I told him, I hope these once-in-a-lifetime things stop happening soon, because between the Orange Bowl game and these Stones tickets, we’ve just about tapped out the vacation fund!

Anyway, the red dot in Section 3 is about where our seats should be. We’re in the twelfth row, just outside the Tongue Pit. It would have been fun to be in the Tongue Pit, but they were even more expensive, and I had to draw the line somewhere. They should still be cool seats, because the stage extends out...the guys will walk out on the rim of the tongue, so they won’t be too far away at times.

It should go without saying that I am super excited. I had an adrenaline rush going for about three hours, and finally managed to calm down. At least I don’t have to wait all summer...only till the end of May! I suspect they might add a few more shows here and there. I was surprised at the scarcity of dates originally announced, but it didn’t take them long to add two shows, and there are rumors that there will be a few more. I think the Chicago show will be the only one for us, though. We couldn’t afford another one!

You can expect plenty of pictures. I hope I can take some during the concert!

Catch-up time!

Whoops, time got away from me again, but that seems to happen frequently now. We had a funeral to go to in there, but I’m going to focus on happier things. I’ll just say that I am very grateful for a loving family.

I tweeted my previous entry, about Parental Alienation Syndrome, to Alec Baldwin, as well as a tweet thanking him for writing his book. I guess I just wanted him to know that it helped me...it helped to realize that others have experienced the same thing. It’s kind of amazing to me that someone like him, with millions of dollars at his disposal, and people like us, who don’t have those kinds of resources, could go through almost the exact same thing. His ordeal was much more public, and was fought more in the courts, but it was still amazingly similar. He actually tweeted back to me! He said thank you, and also said that if you spend millions, you can usually get rulings in your favor...but that there is no enforcement of the rulings.

Anyway, it was pretty cool that he tweeted me back. I hope that hearing that his book helped us also helped him a bit, knowing that he did a good service to all those people who have had to deal with vindictive exes who can’t set aside their anger and bitterness for the sake of their own children’s emotional well-being.

The next two things are music-related, so not so heavy! If you are interested in rock music at all, you’ll know that David Bowie recently released his first album in ten years, “The Next Day.” I liked Bowie a lot back in the day, and got to see him twice, once in Winnipeg and once in Indianapolis. I still enjoy listening to his stuff once in a while, so I was pretty excited about this new album. I pre-ordered it and got it the day it came out...and proceeded to listen to almost nothing else for the next couple of weeks.

It is FANTASTIC. Critics are saying it is his best album in thirty years. I can’t really speak to that, but I can tell you that I love it. There are pensive tracks like “Where Are We Now?” and “You Feel So Lonely You Could Die.” There are danceable tracks like “Dancing Out In Space” and “I’ll Take You There” (which is a bonus track on the deeeeluxe version). I love these lines in the title track: “Here I am, not quite dying, a body left to rot in a hollow tree.” Not quite dying, indeed, Mr. Bowie! I love the song “I’d Rather Be High,” which seems to be about young people fighting stupid wars:

I’d rather be high

I’d rather be flying

I’d rather be dead

Or out of my head

Than training these guns on those men in the sand

I’m seventeen my looks can prove it

I’m so afraid that I will lose it

I’d rather smoke and phone my ex

Pleading for some teenage sex

Yeah

But my absolute favorite is “(You Will) Set the World on Fire,” a rock anthem that showcases Bowie’s still-impressive voice. When he belts out,

You will set the world babe

You will set the world on fi-yah

I can work the scene babe

I can see the magazines

I can hear the nation

I can hear the nation cry

You will set the world babe

You will set the world on fire

You will set it on fire

...his voice just soars on the high notes, and no matter how many times I hear it, he has me punching my fists in the air at the chorus. This song gives me chills! You can hear the entire album on this video (and I recommend it highly), but I’ve tried to embed it so that it starts at the song I just mentioned. If the video starts at the beginning, the song starts at around 40:30. Turn it up!

Finally, the big announcement came today, one that was considered to be the worst-kept secret in the music world: the Rolling Stones are touring! I had originally heard that they were going to do 18 US dates, and I was hoping for a Cleveland show so we could make three days of it and see the new Stones exhibit at the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame, but they aren’t doing that many (so far) and our closest show is, of course, Chicago. After their limited five-show tour in 2012, word was that they are still sounding great and playing tight, and they made it pretty obvious that they were having fun (not to mention making some big bucks!).

We’re going, but the question is whether I’ll be able to get tickets when they go on sale, and if not, how much will we have to pay through a broker? It looks like tickets are going to range from $185 to upwards of $600, and I’m guessing they’ll go incredibly fast. I’ll do my best to get them when they go on sale Monday morning! I’ve said for some time that I want to see the Stones one more time before I die (I saw them in ‘89 in Indianapolis), and this will probably be my last chance. I’m not getting any younger, and Mick and Keith and the boys sure as hell aren’t!

It’s looking to be a fun summer...if it ever gets here!

It happened to us

Ken and I both recently read Alec Baldwin’s book A Promise to Ourselves, after I got it for him for Christmas. Baldwin describes his messy divorce with Kim Basinger, and his struggles when it came to maintaining a relationship with their daughter. Undoubtedly, he bore some culpability in things going wrong, and he does not deny that. However, what struck us both was his description of Parental Alienation Syndrome.

Many of you know that Ken and I went through something similar with his kids from his previous marriage. I have described at length some of the things that occurred as the alienation progressed. Ken has also written about Parental Alienation, but I felt the need to write about it as well. Like Baldwin, we both realize that there were some things we should have done differently, and would change if we could. For example, we felt that we were removing the stress from the kids by stepping out of the picture and letting them enjoy their high school years by not adding to conflict (which was occurring constantly with their mother); instead, it was portrayed as us not caring about them and “writing them off.” Simply untrue, but we had no idea that our actions would be portrayed as such. We also made it clear that we were not cutting off contact...numerous phone calls and messages left were unanswered, and email addresses were changed. We had no way of contacting them short of knocking on their door, and we were threatened by their mother that she would call the police if we did that. But I’m getting ahead of myself.

There is quite a bit of controversy surrounding Parental Alienation Syndrome. Some feel that it is not a legitimate syndrome, and it has not been included in the DSM, the diagnostic manual for psychological disorders. Some feel that it should be classified as a disorder rather than a syndrome, which if I understand correctly is a matter of one physical or mental abnormality versus a collection of associated abnormalities. I am not qualified to weigh in on which it is, but I can tell you that of the eight symptoms listed, we experienced every single one. Whether it is ultimately dubbed a disorder or syndrome, I would argue that it is very real. I will list them here, and give a brief description as to how it applied to our case. Some of these things we experienced via emails and phone calls. Others we gleaned through reading their mother’s blog, which was publicly available, both to us and to the children.

1. Campaign of Denigration

The custodial parent targets the noncustodial parent, often portraying the target as dangerous, angry, and mentally unstable. The target is blamed for the divorce, often labeled as “walking away” from the marriage and from the children. Phone calls are often refused and messages are not delivered, and the children are then told that the other parent never calls, or doesn’t care enough about them to call. Key events are not mentioned to the target parent until after the fact, as in, “He doesn’t care enough about you to show up,” although no notice of the event was ever mentioned. The target parent is often portrayed as not supporting them financially; in our case, although Ken never missed what was a substantial child support payment, it was written that many of the kids’ toys had to be sold in order to put food on the table.

2. Weak, Frivolous, and Absurd Rationalizations for the Deprecation

When asked about why they do not want to be around the target parent, the kids will often use nonexistent and exaggerated reasons. For us, it was that we were forcing them to do hours of yard work, or that the “lazy step-parent” (that would be me, I guess) was making them do all the housework. Ken was portrayed as some sort of angry monster, with one child expressing fear that he would hit them. That couldn’t be further from the truth, and further from Ken’s personality. For such thinking to have become entrenched, there could be only one source.

3. Lack of Ambivalence Toward Both the Alienating and Targeted Parents

Rather than the reality that everyone has both good and bad characteristics, the kids see the alienating parent as completely good and the targeted parent as completely bad. How could anyone love a monster that is completely bad? Even when evidence showing “good times” is presented, it is brushed off as the child putting on an act, or behaving in a happy way only because they were afraid of what the target parent would do to them if they didn’t act happy. For us, it seemed that all fun times—and there were plenty—were completely obliterated and forgotten in the shroud of anger at Ken and me. Fun vacations, being around loving family, Christmas and birthday celebrations, funny ghost stories told around a bonfire...all good things were negated and ignored.

4. The “Independent-Thinker” Phenomenon

Even when one parent is accused of alienating the child from the other parent, this is denied by the alienating parent. They say that they have always encouraged the kids to come for visitation, even when they didn’t want to come. The children pick up on this, and deny that the alienating parent is engaging in any sort of campaign of alienation. We heard this one verbatim, as in “My mom always encouraged us to come and see you, even when we didn’t want to.”

5. Reflexive Support of the Alienating Parent in the Parental Conflict

This often happens when parents make children feel as though they have to make a choice between the two parents. Ken never did this, but was accused of doing so. At one point, he told one of the kids that if they wanted to come and stay with us, they were welcome to. There was no, “If you don’t come stay with us, you don’t love me,” or any sort of coercion whatsoever. It was simply stating a fact that it was an option they could think about. Ken’s statement was portrayed as “putting pressure” on the children to move. This was undoubtedly framed to the children in such a manner, and Ken’s comment was portrayed as coercion and seen as a bad thing, while the alienating parent was portrayed as the victim. The alienating parent was sided with completely, and Ken’s remarks were seen as wrong and mean.

6. Absence of Guilt over Cruelty to and/or Exploitation of the Alienated Parent

There were many instances of the kids ignoring or forgetting Ken’s birthday or Father’s Day, even when we were seeing them on a regular basis. When he would try to contact the kids, his efforts were labeled as ‘harassment’ by the alienating parent. Ken got very few responses to emails, but would get requests for extra money for a new MP3 player, or for school trips, etc. In other words, contact was initiated only when something was desired. Even when these requests were granted, there was an attitude of entitlement. As the book states, quoting the psychiatrist Richard Gardner, who first wrote about Parental Alienation Syndrome:

Commonly they will say that they never want to see the hated parent again, or not until their late teens or early twenties. To such a child I might say: “So you want your father to continue paying for all your food, clothing, rent, and education—even private high school and college—and yet you still don’t want to see him at all, ever again. Is that right?” Such a child might respond: “That’s right. He doesn’t deserve to see me. He’s mean and paying all that money is a good punishment for him.”

Even after Ken received letters from both children saying that they did not want him in their lives (one of the letters addressed him as “Ken,” not as “Dad”), he was denigrated for removing one child from health insurance when they graduated from high school. I believe it was something like, “Fuck you, asshole. I’m sorry I have your last name.” In their mother’s blog, Ken was portrayed as loving money so much he didn’t want to pay for their health insurance or college costs (although we were willing to do that if we’d had any contact with them). Our feeling was that once they were legal adults, if they wanted nothing to do with either of us, why would we continue to voluntarily give them money?

7. Presence of Borrowed Scenarios

In this case the children will often describe situations with the target parent that they would have no way of experiencing, e.g., an argument that occurred between the alienating parent and the target parent with no one else around, or describing the circumstances of the divorce without knowing all the details (“You abandoned me.”). False accusations might also be leveled against the target parent, especially accusations of abuse, including sexual abuse. In our case, the accusations were made not against us (although for all I know, they may very well think that now), but someone we had befriended who previously had a place in the children’s lives. Because we had befriended this person, we were said to be horrible people, because that person had “abused them.” This was the first we had ever heard of it. If such abuse was going on, why wasn’t Ken informed before, either by the children or by their mother? Ken would have taken immediate action to remove them from the situation and from the abuse. If such abuse was going on, why did their mother keep them in such a situation? These are legitimate questions, and we never received any answers. We remain unconvinced that any “abuse” took place.

8. The Spread of the Animosity to the Extended Family and Friends of the Alienated Parent

Both Ken’s small family and my larger one were subjected to this aspect. Ken’s family was portrayed in writings as “dysfunctional,” and I’m sure that was said in front of the kids. My parents were called “pseudo grandparents” and it was written that they should stop calling the house (my Mom would call to wish the kids a happy birthday) and “disrupting” their family. The kids’ godparents, our friends Kim and Steve, were personae non gratae (I believe the actual quote was, “They are dead to me now.”), and the kids’ mother wanted them to have no contact with the kids. My sisters were also left out. These were all people who would be positive influences in any child’s life: a WWII veteran, a woman who grew up in the Depression, a former police officer, a woman who had lived through life-threatening illnesses, a science teacher, a community college teacher, a museum director, a nurse...all good people who could have provided positive feedback and support for the kids, and possibly career advice and help. Ken and I aren’t chopped liver, either...an engineer/project manager and a medical technologist/microbiologist could have helped with science classes or careers. The systematic dismantling of our relationship with the kids extended to these good people, too, and I can honestly say that it is a loss to the children. The more positive influences in a child’s life, the better!

Those are the eight points, and as I said at the beginning, we experienced them all. As I was reading through that chapter, my responses were something like, “Wow. WOW.” I told Ken, “All of these happened. Some of this stuff we heard verbatim!” It was quite an eye-opener for me. Although I know it has happened to others, including some in my own family, I had never seen all the symptoms laid out like that, and to have them apply so perfectly to our own situation was astonishing. It made me feel like someone really understood what we went through, and at a level of detail that was amazing. I actually tweeted to Alec Baldwin to thank him for writing this book!

We bear no animosity towards the kids. We understand that they were manipulated to a degree that even they don’t realize. Our hope is that one day, the anger will fade, and their eyes will be opened the way mine were when I read this book. It is so tempting to send it to them, but I doubt that they would receive it...or be receptive to it, for that matter. But as long as I live, I will never understand any person who is so lacking in self-awareness and so unable to put their own feelings of hurt, anger, and bitterness aside that they would systematically destroy a relationship between their own children and their father, someone with a strong work ethic, a sense of compassion and generosity, and an all-around decent human being.

THAT is unforgivable.

Getting it horribly wrong

Yesterday, we got a piece of good news out of Ohio, when the judge found the two high school football players in Steubenville guilty of rape. It was a horrible incident, with a 16-year-old girl drunk, passed out, and violated by two young men. Some of the super geniuses involved decided to take pictures and video, and you know the rest.

The fact that they were guilty was the good part, but CNN and other news outlets had to go mess it up by talking about how these boys got good grades and now their lives are ruined and they have to register as sex offenders and blah di fucking blah.

Seriously? As if they had no culpability in this matter? As if they were good kids who just...got caught being rapists? What the hell was the point of this bizarre defense of these two rapists? If they didn’t want their lives messed up, perhaps they shouldn’t have, you know...RAPED A GIRL.

This is nothing new. We’ve heard it all before. “She shouldn’t have gotten so drunk.” “She shouldn’t have been out that late.” And that extra-special one, “She shouldn’t have dressed like a slut.” It’s called blaming the victim, and I’m sick of it. How about we start blaming the rapist instead of the woman? Let’s understand, once and for all, that rape is a crime of violence, not one of sex.

This is offensive enough to women, but men should find it equally as insulting. It implies that they are idiot creatures who have no control over their testosterone, and are driven simply mad by the sight of a woman in a short skirt. If I were a guy, I don’t think I’d appreciate being thought of as that stupid and out of control.

It’s a dumb argument on both sides, and it’s time to alter the discussion. Instead of slut-shaming or portraying men as a bunch of dumbasses who can’t control themselves, let’s start sending the message that rape is rape, and it is always wrong. It’s not wrong only if you get caught, it’s not wrong only if the woman is aware enough to fight back, it is wrong. From the time I was a young woman, I was taught to stay out of dark alleys, not walk anywhere by myself, and to not dress provocatively. This is the wrong conversation and the wrong audience. Start teaching young men at an early age that it is. Wrong, wrong, wrong. What is so difficult about this concept?

If we have failed these young men, it is a failure of our society and culture. The message needs to be sent early and often: not to young women about dressing appropriately, but to young men about respecting boundaries and understanding that an assault is always wrong, no matter the circumstances. The blame is not on a woman for being in the wrong place at the wrong time. It is squarely on the shoulders of those who assault her. That includes those two young men, sobbing so pitifully in court. Their lives are ruined? I would imagine that it would be more than a little disturbing and ruinous to see the video of your sexual assault all over YouTube.

Shame on the media for driving this false perception and feeding the “oh, those poor boys” paradigm. Time to change the conversation.