However, I do find stereotypical old Jew humor funny. Check out the following webisodes directed by Ben Stiller, featuring his parents and tell me you don’t find yourself laughing pretty hard by the end of each two minute clip.

Of course, I had to save the best for last. Anything involving old people and the internet (provided it’s not someone over age 45 in your family adding you on Facebook) tends to be pretty humorous.

The internet is an amazing and dangerous place, especially if you’re too young to fully understand the repercussions of posting questionable content online. For two days Tumblr has been ablaze with re-postings of a screen cap from a video of a young girl throwing a puppy into a body of water. Along with the photo was this little blurb:

“This is actually one of the most disturbing things I’ve ever seen on the internet, and I’ve really seen it all. I’ve seen suicide videos (mildly disturbing, but usually cartoonish), etc… but this is just fucking awful.

[…]Obviously, if you know who this girl is, report her to law enforcement, even if you’re not a “dog person”.

Here’s why you should report her to law enforcement: She’s a serial killer in the making. There are various reports on the internet [...] that show the direct correlation between animal abuse in childhood, and serial killing sprees as adults. This girl is sick.

This girl, while she appears to still only be a child, needs to be locked up away from people.”

Not that I’m trying to nitpick, but the “she’s a serial killer in the making” comment is a bit of a stretch. In no way am I contesting the fact that this is one very sick little girl — but she’s probably not on her way to serial killer-dom. Just repeated incidences of animal abuse, which isn’t much better.

Once upon a time, I wanted to be an FBI agent. Like everyone else that has had an interest in psychology, I dreamed of working with the profiling unit at Quantico. This led to a lot of reading on the topic of serial killers, which is why I know the information I’m about to regurgitate all over your screen.

The behaviors necessary for this type of loose diagnosis usually manifest themselves in at least two of three areas before anyone takes the leap to saying something regarding characteristics of a serial killer. Yes, she has the whole animal torture thing covered but pyromania and chronic bed wetting are two equally important symptoms in this triad. Plus, she’s female and I’m pretty sure that means there’s a significantly slimmer chance she’d ever make it to multiple murder status.

So she’s got a few screws loose and clearly needs help; that means an assessment from a qualified professional before we leap straight to locking her up forever. She should probably get new friends too, because who the fuck would post something like that on the internet? All of this is assuming the video is real which, as I think we’ve all learned in the past, it could just as easily not be.

I’m not posting a link to the video or the screen-cap because frankly, I need less horror in my life and I figure the rest of you do, too. I can’t even fathom wanting to watch the damn video. If you’re reading this, you’re probably Google-savvy enough to find it yourself anyway. The internet is supposed to allow for research, keeping up with current events and lurking hot girls photos on Facebook. I don’t need one more thing to make my stomach clench, to make me hate humanity with my whole heart. I do that well enough on my own – why else do you think I quit watching the evening news and put a cap on the amount of time I will allow myself to read about sad things in one 24-hour period? Happy news doesn’t sell, and while I’m not trying to argue that it should it would be a nice change of pace for once to see people get up in arms about a cause they can reasonably do something about.

Back to the topic at hand: a link to this girl’s Facebook is now making the rounds as well. For the time being her page is private, but we know that won’t last. I’m curious how long it will take for her account to be removed by Facebook admins (unlikely), deleted by the girl/her family (slightly more likely) or hacked by someone with ill intentions (most likely). Only so much attention can be put on this before someone pulls some crazy stunt to try to “teach her a lesson.” I’m talking 4chan levels of too far, because we all know someone will go there. Will someone call her friends, her school… her parents? Have they already?

If the person whose account has been fingered is actually the culprit, their full name is now forever linked to this video. Assuming it’s real, and that she gets help, this will never stop popping up alongside her name in search engines. The internet, as I’ve said before, is not a forgiving place. Forgetting is not an option either–the internet really does mean forever.

Maybe I’m off base here, but there’s something equally (if not more) wrong with people–most of which are adults–posting this link while encouraging others to try to contact her. Reporting her to the authorities is one thing; behaving like some kind of citizens brigade towards what we all seem sure is just a child strikes me as dangerous. An internet mob mentality running full steam does not equal a happy or productive ending to incidents like this, ever.

If you think reposting things like this for all to see, harassment and otherwise alienating this (and I cannot stress this word enough) KID is going to help her change her ways, you probably need just as much therapy as she does. To be clear, we all love cute furry creatures and hurting them is wrong. But cute furry creatures aren’t the ones that are going to need protection as a result of these posts: that girl is. From the innumerable messages she’s probably received, news media agents, stalkers… at this rate, she may need to be concerned about masked agents of the ALF showing up on her doorstep.

I understand the internet is trying to do right but man… y’all are going about this in entirely the wrong way.

While I love what the Internet has done to extend my ability to communicate with my friends, I’m realizing it’s hard not to hate it for exactly the same reason. I don’t know when the ability to judge what is (and more importantly, isn’t) appropriate to be posting in public forums became so difficult, but apparently it is and I’m really over it. Anyone who’s experienced this themselves, meaning probably anyone who’s reading this, probably agrees with me.

It’s not that I don’t see the humor in the foot-in-mouth effect FB has on its users. There’s comical diagrams and varying meme’s poking fun at the use–and abuse–of social networking websites everywhere I look, and I laugh at all of them. There’s more than enough humorous screen caps to populate whole websites with embarrassing content. Does failbook.com ring a bell with anyone?

Sometimes I worry about the fact that a not-so-private internet life could easily spill over and having a damaging effect on my real life. Read “The Web Means the End of Forgetting” if you feel like giving yourself one more thing to worry about when counting the number of questionable photos you’ve been tagged in.

The internet is supposed to be merely a tool, one we utilize when needed and then put away. I feel like Facebook has become more of a tool for forcing me into realizing how many people I know that I wish I didn’t. This goes beyond the friends that won’t stop inviting me to their resident DJ nights/shitty shows/protest marches/Farmville support groups, beyond people I didn’t like when I was in their presence regularly now feeling the urge to “reconnect” with me. As far as I can tell, all that really means upping your friend count with people from the past you probably still don’t like. Amazing, these same people that didn’t have much interest in hanging out with me ten years ago still don’t. The really problem is how FB has become the ultimate lurking tool for ‘friends’ I’m trying to get rid of.

In this case, it’s a person I’ve known since high school. We were close, then she dropped out & went off to make babies with loser dudes. Don’t get me wrong, I went off to make my own bad decisions–but mine were fixable. After I moved away and made new friends, it seemed I had successfully managed to cut this person out of my life. Until the last year or so, anyway. To give you an idea about how dedicated she is to forcing this friendship, she has started to call my mother if I ignored her for more than a week at a time. Which is amazing to me, given how this same person can’t get back to me about the money I’ve been owed for six months. Over the last month the internet has been used multiple times in attempts to e-pressure me into attending her birthday party. A birthday party I already knew would be full of drama, a fiance that technically isn’t divorced yet and who knows what other shit show elements. While it sounds like fun to watch, I’ve had my fill; I’m over it, done. I don’t want to talk or pretend we’re going to hang out when I’m not so busy; I just want us both to grow up and grow apart–a totally normal thing to do, in my mind. She just won’t let it happen, and I’ve been feeling unsure of how to handle the situation without being a prick for months.

The straw that broke this camel’s back was despite saying I probably wouldn’t make it to her birthday, she left a wall post with too many exclamation points. The persistent messaging and texts didn’t push me over the edge, but invading my e-space did. That probably says certain things about me, and I don’t care. There’s no cause for a conversation when I know it’s just going to be really dramatic and encourage further attempts to rekindle a friendship that’s been dead for years.

See what just happened right there? Maybe Facebook’s real threat to modern society isn’t that it forces us to be accountable for every little thing we say, post and reply to. It’s the ability to depersonalize each other when we act like jerks online. It’s easier to say some things in a text box than it is to look that same person in the eye while giving them a piece of your mind. That aspect I’m not too concerned about, as I have spent the past few years perfecting my sense of tact. Not like you see it much around here, but hey… “it’s just the internet.”

Print above is an original by Justine at Compai.

See?

It’s Thursday/April Fools/the last day you have to suffer through before consoling yourself with “well, at least it’s Friday.” You need a pick-me-up, so assuming you like R&B or at least have a good sense of humor you’ll appreciate this Reinvented Sex track from Richard Benjamin.

Download it here, and get freaky with your girlfriend when you get home. Or on your lunch break, whatever works.

There’s two things I love in life: John Mayer and senseless Japanese cat videos on YouTube. They are consistently dubbed over with the weirdest music choices, too. If my cat did more than sleep, eat, and stare at me with a mild level of contempt I would force her into this YouTube-based brand of humiliation.

For some context: this list of 90 types of bitches was found on the floor of a third grade classroom in DC. While some folks are expressing concern about the state of America, I think any of us that were even a little bit “bad” as kids can appreciate this for what it is: absolutely hilarious.

I don’t have to bother thinking of some way to justify how much I adore “Jersey Shore” because someone else has already explained it perfectly:

I feel about Jersey Shore how I feel about Gucci Mane. Like, “if you only like this in an ironic way, you’re a fag. This is actually sick.”

Fuck you and your sweet Interpol video, I didn’t want to share it with the world anyway. (Fine, here’s the link.)

Oh wait, this chick has a video lurking around somewhere of her fingering herself? That’s laughable as-is, but let’s not forget how she protests people calling it a sex tape because “it’s just me, I’m not having sex.” I hope this girl doesn’t believe in the pull-out method, too.