Manic Monday - Death By Social Media

Ah, weekends. Around here they are known as "catch  up on sleep days" or "have an actual conversation with your husband... two days in a row" days or, my personal favorite "let's make a list of all the shit we aren't going to get done in two days." This past weekend was a lovely mixture of all these things. I was feeling under the weather last week, so this weekend was gonna be my first few times out of the house (other than Friday's workout with momma HBB), plus we hadn't really started the garden yet, we needed groceries... you know, all that jazz. So here I was, checking Facebook on Saturday morning because... yeah, I wanted to. A bajillion things to do-- AFTER a Facebook check, right?

It was during that "quick check" on Saturday that I learned of the happenings of the night before. Picture this, a hot and muggy night in Georgia, a high school graduation and a chick off her rocker. I am sure that we all know by now that Nancy Gordeuk lost her damn mind in front of graduating seniors and their family members, calling people goobers, cowards and trying to call out Black people for leaving the graduation ceremony. After social media (primarily #BlackTwitter) completely lambasted her, she sent out a half-assed apology and appeared on her local news station. She says that the "Devil was in the house" on Friday night and "he came out of her mouth" in front of family members of the graduating seniors. That was her take in the pseudo apology. On the news she said she is NOT racist and it wasn't like she called those Black people the n-word. Ma'am. I NEED YOU TO TAKE A SEAT. IMMEDIATELY. The devil made you do it? Oh, ok.

She wasn't the only fool that died by social media in the last 72 hours. Her knucklehead son put his address on Facebook and invited people over to fight if they disagreed with his mama. He also used the n word in a subsequent post. Those posts have now been taken down. (Surprise, surprise... oh, I can guess what kind of backwoods upbringing that... youngster had.)

In addition to these shenanigans, some douchebag running for the mayor of Gahanna (a little suburb of Columbus) was taken to task about his previous social media posts. Joseph Gergley, a 26 year old special case, essentially showed his homophobic, racist side on his twitter account-- as recently as last year. When the sinister tweets were discovered, Gergley blamed it on youthful indiscretions.  Sir, what exactly did you think was going to happen when you ran for public office? Did you think that those tweets could just stay out there and never be questioned? Did you think it was funny to compare a central Ohio Walmart to Ferguson, Missouri? And you thought the voting public would be okay with that? Why exactly? Oh my, Monday, you do me so wrong. Annnnnnnd to round off the list of the top three most pathetic people of the last 72 hours, George Zimmerman was in the news today for being shot at in a road rage incident.

Listen folks, let me tell you what you should know already: if you are a horrible person in your every day life, you will get caught being a horrible person. Whether it is on twitter or in front of people who send their children to your school and in fact, pay your salary, YOU WILL BE FOUND OUT. I will never understand why people insist on being jerks AND doing it in writing or on video. Nancy yelled at a guy who was taping her. That is how this whole situation got started. So she HAD to know, before she made her super racist and unnecessary comment, that someone would see it. Gergley (who has since deleted his Twitter account) had a public page. Dude, what? I mean, I know that people are forgiving and you will (unfortunately) always have someone who will be willing to take your apology but why give them ammunition? Why put yourself in a position where you HAVE to apologize? Why not just be a stand up kind of person all the time? Too much like right? Oh, I see.

Listen: I know that not everyone agrees with my stances, political or personal. I get it. Not everyone agrees with being a liberal, the death penalty, interracial marriage, reproductive rights, feminism, civil rights, equal rights, equal pay, or pet rescue. There are people that will disagree with everything that I stand for-- and that is fine. But there is a way to say it-- especially if you are, I don't know, a principal or running for public office.  As my mother used to say (ok, she still says it to me because clearly, I need the reminder) "It is not WHAT you say, it is HOW you say it."  Don't put your business in the public forum, for everyone to see, and then complain when your credibility dies on social media, You did that to yourself and just like Nancy, Joseph and George, you deserve whatever the social media gods hit you with. Check yourself. We should ALL be using social media like everyone can see it... because everyone CAN.