For those not blessed enough to know, the Superfriends was the DC Comics Saturday Morning Cartoons show from 1973 to 1985:
There are, as it turns out, quite a few of these remakes on YouTube. This one is even kind of close to the animated original:
So why the big deal? 12 years running was probably a record on Saturday morning cartoons. More than that, I had a really crappy childhood. Even my family was a bad influence. The fact that I turned out halfway decent with a sense of right and wrong, can largely be attributed to this show. 🙂
Granted, nowadays I like more sophisticated plots, but this still takes me back to a time when heroes were heroes and villains were not poor misunderstood victims whose violence and cruelty should be excused.
This gave me another idea for a fun topic on the blog. I already have Friday Night 80s started. I’m going to start posting some of the best of Saturday Morning Cartoons on Saturdays.
As I’ve hinted at a few times, things have been going… rough with the new house. I’m finally ready to begin to tell the story here.
So, where to start? We looked at several other houses even after putting in the offer on the cinder block place. Suffice it to say that nothing under $350k here is problem free. We ended up following through on the block house after all. In case you’re wondering, the law here gives you a limited window to back out of a Real Estate purchase on top of the normal contingency windows (inspection, loan approval, etc…) before closing.
I’m still not sure if that was a mistake. It’s been a running battle with the seller and his agent ever since. First it was getting concessions on repairs needed, which needless to say is normal. Then we couldn’t get them out after closing paperwork was signed. It took a $500 a day occupancy fee to get them to clear out. And clear out they did at that point, like greased lightning. After that was where the real fun began.
Of the three repairs we asked for 1 was technically done, 1 was done half-assed and will need to be redone, and the third was not done at all, BUT it did have a work order falsified by a local contractor to say it was done.
Technically done was the side door to the house. The framing at its base was unfinished, and it was allowing water in under the door and along the slab. Did I mention it rains so much here that it makes the tropics look like New Mexico? He put in a sill plate to seal off the door entrance, but didn’t concrete over the area he’d carved out of the slab to install the door. End result; there’s a ditch under the carpet in front of the door.
Half-Assed done was the roof. It’s 8 years old and not in bad shape, but the major swings in seasonal temperatures here have created “nail pops“, where the nails back out of the roof a bit. That in turn can push up shingles partially and cause them to curl. All we asked for was that they drive back down the nails and throw some sealant under the loose singles. Easy job, even if a little time consuming. Well, they did maybe 2/3 of it and used low grade silicone sealant to (sort of) tack down the shingles. End result; it needs to be done all over again to keep the roof intact.
NOT Done was the house electrical system. It was built in 1959, right at the start of “modern” (ie the last version of) two wire systems that are now retired in favor of 3 wire, fully grounded systems. So, no knob and tube or aluminum wiring at least, BUT nothing is grounded, which is horrible for modern electronics of any sort. The seller had already upgraded the circuit breaker box to current standards and had installed 3 prong outlets in the entire house. No ground though; he just hooked the two wire wiring to the three wire outlets and tried to pass them off as properly updated per NEC code. Our home inspector caught that they weren’t, so we said that we wanted those outlets properly grounded as a condition of sale. He agreed, then apparently had a contractor friend forge a work order saying that the work had been done. “Trust but Verify” as Reagan said. After we FINALLY got them out of the house, I went through with an outlet tester and found the only areas properly grounded were the kitchen and bathroom where he’d ran new wiring to for previous remodeling work.
Same general idea with the other two jobs, once checked up on. Partially my fault for allowing closing to go through before they were out of there. I’m going to plead detrimental reliance however, since our own realtor assured us this guy was a well established contractor with a sterling reputation, and a virtual pillar of the community (huge town of 3600 there, lol).
Side Note: Trying to translate from Legalese to English, detrimental reliance in this case means the victim followed the bad advice of an expert professional on a given matter. Such as an electrician telling you it’s OK to stick a fork in an electrical outlet, with wet hands no less. A few other circumstances apply but it’s essentially malpractice for professionals other than doctors and lawyers.
Then when we got a chance to thoroughly look the place over, the exterior windows (all but two of them were unsealed on the outside. One of them even had ivy growing into the gap. Personally, I can’t believe I missed all of that either. I saw new windows, and new looking bricks with clean, well formed mortar though. I didn’t think I had to worry about if he’d finished the job and fully sealed the exterior of the windows:
He also left two holes in the exterior walls where the old, in-kitchen hook up for the washer and dryer used to be:
Fortunately, I have many talents:
It’s actually amazing what one can do with a YouTube video or two and simply RTFM 😉
Yes, that’s patched with actual concrete for a proper, similar materials patch. Same with the smaller nearby hole that I patched. There are other, smaller holes that I still need to patch though. These two holes were hidden behind furniture and boxes to deliberately conceal them.
OH, I forgot to mention that the sellers failed to inform us of a roach infestation as well. When they finally got out, and we went to look at the place, the house reeked of cheap carpet shampoo and roach spray. There were dead roaches all over the carpet also. Unfortunately, this area only requires disclosure of wood destroying pests. Ergo there’s not much we can do on that specific one. Despite apparently cleaning the carpets, they also managed to leave the house filthy. Even the aforementioned carpets don’t feel anywhere near clean.
What really set me off regarding the entire situation is that when the violations of the closing contract came to light, EVERYONE involved with the transaction (including our own agent) just threw up their hands and said “oh well”. They got their money, so they don’t care. Take advantage of my good nature and risk my possible wrath. Rub it in my face that you did so, and guaranteed it’s going to get ugly. So, I’ve spent the last two weeks going through real estate laws and building codes online at night after working on the house all day. What have I found, you ask?
Well, first the renovated bathroom, all the exterior windows, the new side door, the new electrical panel (circuit breaker box), and hell maybe even the new-ish A/C system were all done without the required building permits. The holes in the wall, the unfinished windows, the improperly wired / switched out electrical outlets (along with several other things) are all building code violations. Digging into some of the outlets to check the wiring turned up things like this:
That’s the hired electrician sitting there, staring in disbelief
Yes, that’s gravel pouring out of the outlet. I wasn’t sure what to make of that at first, but a little research turned up that cinder block walls sometimes use “aggregate” (pebble) material as insulation in the hollow center portion of the block. This jabroni doesn’t even know how to keep the crap out of the ‘gang box’ for the electrical outlets though. I found jury-rigged, mismatched and spliced together wire in other outlet boxes and wood chips from the wood paneling in others. The electrician that looked over the house recommended a whole house rewire. The previous owner also left uncapped gas lines where he had his grill tied into the house gas system, where there was a gas powered space heater that he removed and where the dryer was.
Sooooo… long story short, we went from something that could have been settled easily with a “My bad, we ran out of time. Take care of it and send me the bill”, to escalating this up to the point where I’m out for blood. We’re going to sue the previous owner for breach of contract, fraud and misrepresentation. I’m also going to do everything I can to get his contracting license, and that of his electrician friend, pulled for the building code violations and fraudulent work order as well. Oh yes, and go after his realtor for the same reasons as well as acting in bad faith. Somebody’s losing their real estate license or is at least going to end up with one hell of a fine to the state department of real estate and Realtor’s Association.
SICK Cat Too…
And if all that wasn’t enough… One of our two cats got really sick and turns out to have a massive internal cyst in her abdomen area which will require surgery. The HIGHLY reputable vet hospital (extreme sarcasm noted, I hope)only took $1500 dollars to make the diagnosis of a cyst. We haven’t even gotten to treatment yet.
So yeah… It’s been a hell of a month. And there’s no resolution in sight for ANY of it yet…
A friend recently posted in her blog about “letting it go”. Normally good advice but…
OK, it’s been a long while since I’ve write anything here. As usual, reports of my demise are greatly exaggerated though. 😀
I’ve had a TON going on at a personal level. Most of it I’m still debating if or how much to tell. On a bigger front, the house sale went through two days ago now, and I have been up to my armpits in projects. The previous owner left the place utterly filthy and we even found roaches. They took past closing to get out also. We were nice and gave them an extra day but they made zero progress packing. At that point we hit them with a $500 a day fee to stay and miraculously they were out of there like greased lightning.
Aside, from the dirt, grease and roaches, they also hid an old dryer vent hole in an exterior wall behind a bunch of crap. We have to patch that…
They also lied about claiming to have several bad electrical outlets in the house repaired. The outlets work, but the ground side of the outlets tests bad. The seller *apparently* had a contractor friend forge a work order saying the work was done, and apparently didn’t think we’d come behind and test them ourselves.
Well… As a wise president once said:
We’ve got the home inspector returning for a reinspection later today. Once it’s in writing that nothing was done, there’s going to be hell to pay. We’ve got a contractor that willfully and deliberately committed fraud to aid the seller in fraudulent representation of the condition of the house, and they both lied on legal documents. Fraud in the inducement.
So, to paraphrase Patrick Swayze… It was time to be nice, NOW it’s time to NOT be nice. It’s not like we redheads are evil though…
Beyond that, there’s a bajillion projects to do. I’ll document the progress as time allows. 😉
OK, trigger warning here: I’m going to be getting “political” here, and discussing racial and police issues. If that’s not your thing, I understand. It’s why I’m putting up the warning.
So what sparked this? We’ve been catching up on TV lately. We missed quite a bit of shows during our moving prep, the actual move, and the time our furniture was MIA. We got into the most recent Season of CBS’s S.W.A.T. reboot.
Overall, it’s a really good show; a rarity among reboots. They went off the deep end trying to show support for Black Lives Matters at the start of this last season though.
The episode involved trying to break up a chain of terrorist attacks that were designed to hit South Central and stir up racial tensions to the point of actual violent conflict. All this while the neighborhood is planning an annual remembrance event of the Rodney King beating.
LONG story short, the episode spins the riots following the King verdict as the fault of the police because they didn’t step in and restore order. They even have the Commander of the SWAT Division of LAPD get up in front of the community and apologize to them for not disobeying orders and trying to help (he was a patrol officer at the time).
The thing is, I was in San Diego at the time the riots broke out. I was staying with my dad the cop AND (his idea) I was also working as a private security guard in the Miramar area of North San Diego at the time. Believe me, I was paying CLOSE attention to everything that was happening.
Still can’t believe I went to work the nights of the riots completely unarmed, but otherwise looking for all the world like a cop. Pinkerton had dark blue uniforms.
ANYWAY… The truth is people in the neighborhoods where the rioting was taking place were actively shooting at any police that came into the area. Not only that, they were shooting at fire trucks and ambulances trying to help as well. The police pulled back and focused on containment because the alternative was to turn South Central into a full blown war zone, and be accused of a race massacre.
Back in those days, the police were also outgunned. The military weapons and transports that we see police using nowadays came about after the riots.
That’s a big part of why the national guard was mobilized to deal with the riots.
What’s My Point?
First, let me say that NONE of the above facts justify what happened to Rodney King, or others like George Floyd. The idea that Rodney King’s 1986 Hyundai could even do 120 MPH as police claimed is laughable. Even my dad called BS on that one. Early Hyundais were complete crap. You couldn’t get them going 120 if you dropped them out of the space shuttle.
Black Lives DO Matter.
If we’re ever going to get to a solution for all of this though, things have to be dealt with honestly. Both sides are going to have to see each other as human beings. Policing needs to change, no doubt about that. You can’t drive the police out of neighborhoods or try to eliminate them completely (as a few cities have tried) and then complain when they’re not where they were chased out of though.
It’s racist if they’re in black neighborhoods, and it’s racist if they don’t respond (fast enough) to calls in black neighborhoods. Is it any wonder cops are quitting in record numbers and cities can’t find replacements for them?
I’ve seen the impact firsthand there. We left Sacramento and California completely because it LITERALLY took 7 hours for police to respond to any call that didn’t involve gunfire. That’s IF they responded at all!
I won’t fault Shemar Moore (lead actor and producer) or CBS for trying to shine the spotlight on race issues as relates to police. They’ve done it before and up till this point had done a very balanced job of showing both sides of the issue.
I’m REALLY disappointed at the spin they put on the whole situation in this episode however. It was blatantly and unabashedly anti-police, dishonest, and only served to deepen mistrust of law enforcement, especially in minority communities. Nothing in that episode was going to promote communication or healing.
Maybe I’m expecting too much in hoping for Shemar Moore’s character to instead say “We have every right to be pissed about what happened that day and still happens too often. We can’t blame the police when some of us burn down and loot our own neighborhood, and shoot at the people who come to help us though.”
I’m only going to add one other point here: I am NOT saying that the entire neighborhood was involved in shooting at police, etc… I’ve said time and again that the vast majority of Black people, like ALL races, are good people. Like all races, there’s a small percentage of bad apples though. That small percentage did ALOT of damage though, and to their own neighborhoods.
Anybody comes in here with a racist reply about that’s how “all of those people are”, it’ll be an insta-ban from this blog. I don’t have the time or patience for ignorance and hate.
They called it the “Block 19” and that is a VERY real firearm. They were quite proud of the fact that they glued the Legos onto it, and got the gun to keep them in place for over 1500 rounds fired.
Oddly enough, they also don’t understand the outrage this has generated with people.
Stats on how many children are killed with guns are sadly twisted and politicized. Regardless of the actual numbers, children getting ahold of guns and accidentally shooting themselves, a sibling, or shooting people at school are too common, and IMO one is too many because a responsible gun owner keeps their guns properly secured.
I’ve already called for the gun owners to be tried as co-conspirators in such cases unless they can show that they did have their guns locked up. Kids are tempted by the mystique surrounding guns, and if you make it look like a harmless toy, whatever respect they may have for the weapon is going to be lost. This was just completely irresponsible on Culper’s part.
Before any of the Pro-Second Amendment crowd jumps on me here, I *am* a gun owner. I own a CZ-75 Compact 9mm pistol:
Image courtesy of CZ-USA.com
Not only do I own it, I practice regularly and I’m pretty damned good with it:
Image courtesy of me; 20 rounds at a distance of 40 feet or 12.19 meters
Point being that I’m not some extremist activist who has never held a gun nor understands how they work. I’m a responsible gun owner who keeps my gun secured, practices to be accurate so I don’t unnecessarily endanger somebody IF I’m ever forced to defend myself, AND I hope to never, ever have to point it at another human being.
Culper made a gun that looks like a child’s toy, and then defended it by saying they were doing it to protect the second amendment (I can’t make this stuff up):
What’s all the more scary is that Instagram post got 2900+ likes.
Then, when they started getting TONS of hate, they doubled down on stupid, saying the reason people didn’t like it was because they gave their children unlimited access to guns or were a bunch of ignorant anti-second amendment nuts. See the story I linked above. I’m paraphrasing but NOT exaggerating.
THIS is the kind of irresponsible idiocy that makes others question the mindset of gun owners.
FINAL THOUGHTS:
My OPINION on this; Why does it matter? First of all, as previously stated, it LOOKS like a toy. That’s going to give a child a false sense of safety with it. Ideally, children in a gun owning household are taught to respect guns, that they’re extremely dangerous, and not a toy. Even such children would likely be tempted by this however. It only has to be put down for a moment for a kid to snatch it up too.
Second, and equally important, it shows that the ADULTS are viewing guns in an irresponsible manner.
A gun can be used as sporting equipment; for competitive target shooting or hunting, as well as for lethal self defense. Regardless of use however, it is a DEADLY WEAPON and should ALWAYS be treated with the respect and caution that comes with that.
Things like this, and the stupid gun tricks videos on YouTube reflect poorly on ALL gun owners. It does NOT protect the Second Amendment. It instead shows that it’s followers are too stupid to respect that rights come with equal amounts of responsibility.
As a responsible gun owner who values the ability to defend my home as a LAST resort, I’m extremely offended here, both by the infantalizing of guns, and the gaslighting of people who had the common sense to object to this stupidity.
If you need your gun to look like a toy, or be a pretty color (ie it’s pink);
then, to be blunt, you don’t have the right mindset to own a firearm.
I debated writing this days ago when I read that 76 year old Harrison Ford trashed his shoulder during the filming of Indiana Jones 5, and that filming will be delayed for 3 months because of it. He was just rehearsing a fight scene also.
Picture via digitaltrends.com
We also have 59 year old Tom Cruise reprising the role of Maverick in Top Gun 2. Never mind that it’s almost unheard of for anyone older than 45 to be flying fighters for the military. In fact, the world record for oldest fighter pilot is an Isreali F-16 pilot at 60 years old.
67 Year old Bruce Willis is still knocking out action movies at a pace to outdo Steven Seagal’s string of late life B movies as well.
And as it turns out, Arnold (who was born in 1947 and is 74 years old) is also doing more action movies also, including Expendables 4 and a new Conan movie.
*Raises walker over head and snarls* “By the bones of Crom, you kids get off my damned lawn… err sand!!!”
OK, being a little more serious, most of these guys, Stallone included (since he keeps doing Rocky and Expendables movies) are in really good shape for their ages. They still look nowhere like they did in the 80s though, and are really stretching the bounds of suspension of disbelief by continuing to try to relive their movie glory days. Poor Bruce Willis looks particularly haggard anymore.
I LOVED these guys in the 80s and 90s. I thought the idea of the original expendables was awesome also; grizzled veterans showing they’ve still got the moves. After a while though it starts to remind me of Ric Flair (the wrestler). This is the guy as I remember first seeing him when I was a YOUNG kid in the 70s:
Nowadays, 40+ years later, he still trying to make himself relevant within the WWE, and it’s just sad to be honest:
Getting old sucks, I get it. I’m getting there far faster than I’d like to admit, and my spinal issue are only highlighting it. I don’t like to be told I can’t do things, and I’m sure these guys don’t either.
At some point you have to set your pride aside and retire with dignity though. Harrison Ford is a great example here. At the end of Indiana Jones, they had probably the best scene in a otherwise horrible movie when the hat blew off Indy’s head and his son picked it up. Perfect symbolic passing of the torch and Indy could still be back in the role of the wise old master, mentoring his son. NOPE, he has to take the spotlight again though.
The Expendables started to go that way with 3; Barney training the new kids. It didn’t last though as the old guard had to come bail them out. They made it clear they were sticking around at the end also.
The 20 somethings can bad mouth the WW2 generation all they want, at least the actors of that generation knew to pass the torch and move on to more mature roles.
I saw a picture 5 days ago online that was part of a story how the sexist Ukranian army was making female soldiers march in high heels. MUCH outcry over it also, with the world denouncing the barbaric practices.
BUT, are we REALLY seeing what we are told we’re seeing? These are cadets practicing for a parade supposedly. HOWEVER… The picture immediately raised several questions for me.
First, why are they all wearing numbers like they’re entering a marathon? Hardly military.
There are also several other inconsistencies with their “uniforms”:
Their stockings are all different. No Uniformity.
Their T Shirts are different colors and worn differently also, with sleeves folded or rolled at the wearer’s whim.
There’s no rank or any other military insignia anywhere on the uniforms
Their pants are too tight, with many of the girls looking like they’re wearing stretch pants almost. Military combat uniforms are loose to allow freedom of movement.
Hats are pulled down with their bills creased to varying degrees as well.
There’s a variance in posture, head position and hair styles that don’t speak to being real military cadets as well.
For comparison, I did A LITTLE scouting around the internet and quickly found several pictures to fact check. Something it SEEMS that the Examiner and MSN should have done:
image via Reddit
These are actual Ukrainian soldiers (as opposed to alleged cadets). Note that everything I pointed out as wrong in the above picture is different here.
image from UniformGirls.blogspot.com
Above is a picture of women wearing a Ukrainian army dress uniform.
image via warnewsupdates.blogspot.com
And for comparison, there’s the men’s uniforms above and the women’s’ full combat uniforms below:
MY CONCLUSION:
I’d bet that first picture that the Examiner ran with was a fake created by Russia, and wasn’t even fact checked. Russia has wanted The Ukraine back under it’s thumb for a long time, and propaganda is a favorite tactic. If they can make Ukraine’s government look evil, less people will complain when Russia rolls in to take the rest of the country after already seizing part of it’s coastal area for naval bases.
That said, I do indeed smell a rat here, AND wonder where the fact checking and named sources are. I also wonder how we’re supposed to trust the media when things like this are regularly turning up as “factual” news.
Yes, that’s right, about 2 hours ago (as of the time I post this), the Pennsylvania State Supreme Court overturned Bill Cosby’s sexual assault conviction:
The short version here is that the court ruled that the prosecutor was legally bound by the agreement the former prosecutor had made not to prosecute Cosby. Per the MSN story:
The court said that overturning the conviction, and barring any further prosecution, “is the only remedy that comports with society’s reasonable expectations of its elected prosecutors and our criminal justice system.”
The court was apparently also bothered by the nature of the testimony by other victims:
The trial judge allowed five other accusers to testify at the trial about their experiences with Cosby in the 1980s to establish what prosecutors said was a pattern of behavior on his part.
The Pennsylvania Supreme Court justices voiced concern not just about sex assault cases, but what they saw as the judiciary’s increasing tendency to allow testimony that crosses the line into character attacks. The law allows the testimony only in limited cases, including to show a crime pattern so specific it serves to identify the perpetrator.
MY View / Commentary:
Fair warning: I’m going to largely be playing devil’s advocate here. I don’t believe in Cosby anymore (he admitted he did it, plain and simple), BUT I also still see the problems with the way he was convicted, and the implications for the justice system as a whole.
When the accusations surrounding Cosby first surfaced, I admit that I didn’t believe them. I grew up with Fat Albert and the Cosby Kids on Saturday morning cartoons, and the morals that the show always taught, then “The Cosby Show” later. Cosby was “America’s Dad”, and presented an image of a wholesome ‘Middle America’ Black family and father on the show.
Long story short, doubt grew as time went on, and when he admitted during his trial that he did it all, but didn’t see it as rape, that was the final nail in the coffin for me. To top that, when offered parole, he refused it because a rehab program for sex offenders was a condition of that parole. So there’s no denying he’s not only guilty as hell, but unrepentant as well.
The court decision today raises alot of questions again that have been brought up by Black Lives Matters and other criminal justice reform movements though.
If a prosecutor makes an agreement, and the other party lives up to it, shouldn’t the prosecutor be obliged to also? Let’s take another, easier example here; somebody turns state’s evidence on their criminal organization, gives the District Attorney everything they need to get several convictions and shut the group down, but then turns around and says “Yes, we made an agreement and you lived up to your end, but your involvement was just too serious, I’m prosecuting anyway”.
The question of the other victims’ testimony is something that has to be considered here also. There was, to the best of my knowledge, no evidence or collaborating witnesses to support their accounts. Did their testimony serve to show a pattern so specific it served to identify Cosby? A little debatable as what he did was a sadly all too common date rape tactic. I’d have to say Yes in this specific case however. My concern here however, as it was with the court, is the potential and real abuse of this sort of testimony to gain convictions, particularly where evidence is otherwise flimsy.
Finally, for me, there’s the issue of Cosby’s trial being driven by media and social media outcry. The prosecutor that did finally charge Cosby wasn’t going to do so at first, citing the difficulty of getting a conviction due to lack of physical evidence, etc… as well as Cosby’s age (which should NOT be a mitigating factor in any prosecution). The social justice outcry forced the trial though.
BUT… He was guilty, so it was the right thing to do!!!
That’s pretty much saying the ends justify the means, and rationalizing witch hunts by saying if they’re accused, they’re guilty. The criminal justice system is supposed to operate on the exact opposite premise; innocent until PROVEN guilty. I can recall more than one famous media lynch mob in my time also. The McMartin Preschool pedophilia accusations, and the Richard Jewel Olympic Park Bombing (prevention) during the 1994 Atlanta Olympic Games for starters.
Both of those cases very clearly illustrate the need to avoid rushes to judgment and allow the system to do it’s job free of undue pressure or influence.
We could also get into the issue of prosecutors inflating charges and then pushing for plea bargains so they can pad their conviction record, or using a case to advance a political career, but that’s another story, even if somewhat related.
Is There A Real Answer Here?
Aside from the media (and by extension now, social media) learning self control, I don’t know if there is an easy answer.
Cosby is, by his own admission, guilty as hell, and unrepentant as hell also. He deserves punishment. In this specific case, the question is, “Is nearly three years of an 83 year old man’s life, the complete destruction of his reputation and career enough?”. Given the lives he damaged, I’d say no.
Perhaps without a rush to get a conviction at any cost, there could have been a later conviction of Cosby that actually stuck. How do we punish him and others though when the legal system is frequently guided by public opinion and political grandstanding vs facts, the law and what’s morally right?
OK, time for a “Things that Make You Go Hmmm” post…
Now for those who don’t speak Italian or can’t guess based on the phrase’s similarity to English, the title means Private Site. I bring it up because there’s a blog I follow that’s in Italy, and the gal who runs it has a bad habit of locking most of her followers out of some of her posts. Since just about all of her posts are romantic poetry, thoughts and songs, I assume she’s younger. I likewise assume that given the rest of her posts are about romance and sensuality that the private posts are also.
Every time I hit that private site screen, I can’t help but wonder what’s being posted that she feels the need to keep it hidden from most people.
With that in mind, I wanted to offer some advice to the young women out there: NOTHING, and I mean ABSOLUTELY NOTHING on the internet is private. No matter what you do, there are people with ways around it. Anything from outright hackers to sites that index (and clone) other sites, to “social engineering” and a dozen other possibilities.
Keeping it simple, the aspect of social engineering that we’re talking about here is that whole thing your parents or friends hopefully warned you about with not sharing racy pictures of yourself with somebody you have a crush on. They’ll share with one friend, no matter what they promise, and then it gets passed around more and more until suddenly everybody in the neighborhood, at school and / or at work knows what your bare boobs look like.
My point is this; if your piece of erotica or sensual poetry is that sexual, or you don’t feel comfortable sharing that pic (nude or not), putting it behind a “private” page or site is really NO protection at all. You have two realistic choices here:
DON’T DO IT. Use discretion and common sense levels of caution and don’t post that written material or picture. You’re very likely saving yourself a good deal of drama later on down the road. Won’t happen to you? That’s what EVERY girl that ended up with nude pictures passed around school, or the star of a revenge porn video on the internet said. None of them set out to be publicly humiliated.
The other option is to accept it’s VERY likely going to happen to you also at some point. Webpage passwords are minimal protection. They might be better than just “owning it” and putting it out on display for everybody but the end result is probably going to be the same. That pic, video or story could resurface at the worst possible time too.
Hypocritical, given that I write erotica? Superficially, BUT I’m only warning you of the likely fallout. I’m also careful to disclose minimal personal information and NO pictures of myself. I’d do follow those last two steps regardless. The world has too many weird people in it.
Silk Chatters 