Monday, September 10, 2018

The Limitations of the Tiny Little Mother Mind™ and #SeezJahBoy



It's a big world.

That's what I tell myself when I read about or hear about things that are otherwise incomprehensible. It's a big world, I thought when I read about plushies in a Vanity Fair magazine in the last millennium. It's a big world, I thought when I actually ran into a plushy convention at a resort hotel in Orlando where I was attending a children's healthcare convention. It's a big world, I thought, when people started talking about reality shows and women being famous for being famous,  It's a big world, I thought when Arnold Schwarzenegger was governor of California, and it's a big world, I thought, when certain celebrities insured their famous asses, literally. It's a big world, I think, when people get all geared up for the season of bashing brains into dementia, otherwise known as football. It's a big world, I thought when people -- some of whom I actually know and love -- voted for and continued to support Donald Trump, even after he imitated and mocked a disabled man and bragged about his prowess grabbing women's pussies. That one was a stretch, to tell you the truth.

A lot of people are excited about last night's Miss America pageant -- how Miss Michigan, a blonde Barbie doll, made a comment about the bad water in her home state and appears "woke" in the newest sense of the word, and Miss New York, a black Barbie doll, won the prize. It's a big world, I'm thinking, wondering how in 2018 we still have beauty pageants (although I've read they're no longer "beauty" pageants, and there's no more bathing suit competition). What's that expression? Whatever floats your boat?

Anywho.*

My tiny little mother mind™ was seriously taxed today when I learned that Netflix released some movie called The After Party that's getting all the raves. Evidently, the main character has a seizure (after smoking marijuana) while rapping on stage, projectile vomits and falls to the ground writhing. The moment is captured on video, it goes viral, he's called "Seizure Boy," and soon everyone is doing the #SeezJahBoy dance.

This is comedy.

Sigh.

Where do we start? The young man who plays the character is an up and coming rapper and has a bazillion followers on Instagram. He sees himself, ironically, as a bullying advocate. People with epilepsy are commonly bullied. This is a fact. I know countless people whose children have been bullied, have been mocked and derided when they've had a seizure in school. The stigma of epilepsy is still so strong that adults with epilepsy often don't tell their employers that they have it. Teenagers with epilepsy are often at higher risk for anxiety and depression, and much of that can be attributed to our culture's ignorance of the disease.

So, yeah, back to #SeezJahBoy. Despite condemnation from different news sources and epilepsy and seizure awareness foundations, the hashtag is viral at this point. I have heard from good friends in the epilepsy community that when people go in to these conversations on Twitter and Facebook, in an attempt to counter the ignorance, they are being called trolls or "racists" (because the movie is predominantly by black people). How many people did this show have to go through to get put on the air? Are we overly sensitive as parents of children with epilepsy or individuals with epilepsy? Do I think the show should be pulled? To tell you the truth, this sort of thing so taxes my tiny little mother mind that I think nothing at all. I don't have the energy to think about some stupid movie that makes a mockery of people with epilepsy. I don't give a fuck about the writers, the editors, the sound people, the young actors and wannabes that made this movie. There is no big world that holds such shit. The big world shrinks in to a dot, and that dot is a portal to my house where my epileptic daughter sits in her wheelchair, the little vein in her forearm penetrated by a needle that brings an infusion of antibodies to her brain, so many antibodies that they literally flood her brain and dilute out the bad antibodies that have been wreaking havoc, causing her to seize, near constantly, in her sleep and subsequently destroying her ability to walk and eat and move in the world.

Dance on, #SeezJahBoy people.

The world is ugly,
And the people are sad.

Wallace Stevens, Gubbinal


















*New Readers should know that I hate this expression and only use it facetiously.

11 comments:

  1. Ugh. Ugh. Ugh. That is ugly. And I am sad.

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  2. Oh Jesus. Weep for us now.
    This is just too much.

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  3. It never ends, does it? I didn't understand how bad Sophie had become, didn't realize she was losing function. Fucking hell. I hope the IVIG helps and that she improves.

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    Replies
    1. Apparently not. The loss of function has been going on for months. Not a lot of seizures, though, except for ESES. That causes global problems in day.

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  4. I don't know what to say. I never even heard of that movie, but the premise is awful. I am glad Sophie is being infused, and that you fight to keep the ugly sad world outside her door.

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  5. People's stupidity continues to astound me.

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  6. Unbelievable. I'm amazed anyone at Netflix gave that movie the green light!

    And for the record, I read that story about Plushies in Vanity Fair and I have NEVER forgotten it.

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  7. On behalf of a handful of semi-intelligent, good-hearted males on this great green jewel, I'd like to formally apologize for loving football.

    I'm even more sorry to hear about how Sophie is doing.

    As for the Netflix film...I don't know...to be frank this is the first I heard of it, but I keep my head up my ass a lot. By that I mean I tend to hyper-focus these days on trying to fix my life and I pay less attention to goings on outside that parameter. It sucks, and my reaction to it is just that it does not shock me anymore. In what is now 9 years of experience (sigh, remember when I was a rookie?) I have seen a decent amount of mockery, from my son's own family to friends to professionals to strangers to celebrities to organizations...and historically it doesn't seem to have changed all that much.

    You can tweak a word here, make a policy there, but at the core a lot of humanity is so...mired in thought processes that don't show evolution or progression. How else do you explain how a life form like DT gets elected president, a man who mocks disability (not his worst offenses as we all know) and cuts off funding for a family member's medical insurance (whose kid has IS and several other disabilities and was receiving 24-hour in home Nursing Assistance) because that family member challenged DTs father's Will & Testament? This COULD change, if the negatively charged parts of these ways of thinking were not constantly fueled to benefit those in power.

    I disagree only with one thing when I read your blog today. I don't think the world is ugly. I think the world is beautiful, with lots of beautiful Moms and Dads, Daughters and Sons...and a lot of shitty sub-humans trying to get or holding on to too much power by fostering negativity, bullshit agenda, hatred, etc., creating an environment that makes it very difficult for a global community to connect through education and modern technology and build a better overall planet.

    I just had two huge cups of coffee. Sorry for the ginormous comment. :O

    FYI...Mindhunter on Netflix is great. Highly recommend it. Just binged The Sinner Season 1 also. Great show, amazing performance by Jessica Biehl. These are old I know...like I said, I'm super behind the times. If you are gonna blop Netflix totally because of the shit show, Amazon has some great stuff. Or you could just say Fuck TV! and stick to movies and theatre and books.

    I need a drink of water...:P

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  8. Once again I read your words and feel emptied out. I search for my own words to make you feel even the tiniest bit better. I come up empty. The whole world is on tilt and almost nothing makes sense anymore.

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  9. Mockery of anyone is indeed ugly.

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