Those of you who know me also know I have a couple of kids -- a teenager in high school, and a tweenager about to enter middle school.Both of my kids have met the infamous blogger who used, you know, THAT word on MSNBC this afternoon. In fact, they were watching the video of the infamous blogger.
Neither batted an eye about the use of THAT word.
And I am so proud of them.
Because even my kids know the real obscenity isn't a euphemism for oral sex, or even that it happened on a cable show in the middle of the afternoon. My kids know that the real obscenities are these:
* Our country went to war based on lies told by elected and appointed officials;
* Their brother and the sons/daughters/brothers/sisters of many other families like ours served for this war, came back damaged or dead, for nothing but lies;
* Their president and vice president lied repeatedly about all manner of things while refusing to accept responsibility for any failures which happened on their watch;
* Their government was either obstructed during investigations into these lies or simply failed to make any effort to investigate these lies;
* Their government spent billions of dollars to make these lies, to support these lies, to pass these lies on, while killing hundreds of thousands of people in other countries, while making plans to kill more on a targeted basis in the form of assassinations;
* Their government tortured people, innocents among them, including children, to further their lies;
* Their fellow citizens are not better off for all of this, but are far worse off in terms of security, health and finances than before all the lies started;
* The corporate-owned media in their country makes money off ghoulishly beating a tattoo every day about dead entertainers and missing white girls while avoiding the work required of investigative journalism important to real democracy.
Even kids understand when adults are being stupid and unethical, and they know the truth when they see it.
As a mother I'm absolutely offended, but not about the word "blowjob."
I'm deeply offended that the corporate-owned mainstream media can turn a blind eye to the really offensive obscenities, thereby becoming complicit in the criminality -- and they've done this in front of my kids for more than eight years.
What am I supposed to tell these children?
[Cross-posted at The Seminal.]
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