Grimey
4/17/2006, 11:41 AM
The Left, Online and Outraged (http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/04/14/AR2006041401648_5.html)
For those of you not signed up with the Wash Post, here is the Bugmenot (http://www.bugmenot.com/view.php?url=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.washingtonpost.com%2 Fwp-dyn%2Fcontent%2Farticle%2F2006%2F04%2F14%2FAR20060 41401648.html%3Fsub%3DAR) info
very interesting look at a leftwing blogger. It almost makes me feel sorry for her, because I think she is seriously suffering from some kind of mental disorder. But I really feel sorry for her kiddo.
http://media3.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/photo/2006/04/14/PH2006041401759.jpg
some lowlights...
In the angry life of Maryscott O'Connor, the rage begins as soon as she opens her eyes and realizes that her president is still George W. Bush. The sun has yet to rise and her family is asleep, but no matter; as soon as the realization kicks in, O'Connor, 37, is out of bed and heading toward her computer.
Out there, awaiting her building fury: the Angry Left, where O'Connor's reputation is as one of the angriest of all. "One long, sustained scream" is how she describes the writing she does for various Web logs, as she wonders what she should scream about this day.
Before:
She signed petitions. She boycotted veal. She canvassed for Greenpeace. She donated to Planned Parenthood. She read the Nation, the New Yorker, the Utne Reader and Mother Jones. She agonized over low wages for overseas workers every time she bought a $40 leather purse.
Then George W. Bush was elected. Then came 9/11, Afghanistan, Iraq, Guantanamo Bay, Abu Ghraib, the Patriot Act, secret prisons, domestic eavesdropping, the revamping of the Supreme Court, and the thought "It has come to the point where the worst people on Earth are running the Earth." And now, "I have become one of those people with all the bumper stickers on their car," she says. "I am this close to being one of those muttering people pushing a cart.
"I'm insane with rage and grief.
"But I also feel more connected than I ever have."
The cigarettes are because of a personality that she describes as compulsive.
The nonalcoholic beer is because for several years she drank to excess.
The note that says "Why am I/you here?" is because she is in constant search of an answer.
And the photo album is because of a 25-year-old Marine who died fighting in Vietnam three months before she was born, which she thinks helps explain the note, the alcohol, the cigarettes and the very first piece of writing she ever published online, a rant against the war in Iraq that began, "Every single millisecond of my life was directly affected by the nightmare that was Vietnam."
As for the keyboard, it is where O'Connor finished her evolution from lost soul to angry soul, beginning with that very first rant, which concluded with a wish that Bush, "after contracting incurable cancer and suffering for protracted periods of time without benefit of medication," go to hell.
The front door opens and in comes her 6-year-old son, Terry, home from school, who starts batting around a blue balloon at the other end of the living room, batting it closer to her, closer, closer. She searches through her iTunes library until she finds one of her favorite downloads -- not music, but a speech by a character named Howard Beale in the movie "Network." She presses "play" and turns up the volume. "I want you to get mad!" Beale shouts at one point. "I want you to get mad!" she shouts along, startling Terry. "What?" he says, backing away with his balloon.
For those of you not signed up with the Wash Post, here is the Bugmenot (http://www.bugmenot.com/view.php?url=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.washingtonpost.com%2 Fwp-dyn%2Fcontent%2Farticle%2F2006%2F04%2F14%2FAR20060 41401648.html%3Fsub%3DAR) info
very interesting look at a leftwing blogger. It almost makes me feel sorry for her, because I think she is seriously suffering from some kind of mental disorder. But I really feel sorry for her kiddo.
http://media3.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/photo/2006/04/14/PH2006041401759.jpg
some lowlights...
In the angry life of Maryscott O'Connor, the rage begins as soon as she opens her eyes and realizes that her president is still George W. Bush. The sun has yet to rise and her family is asleep, but no matter; as soon as the realization kicks in, O'Connor, 37, is out of bed and heading toward her computer.
Out there, awaiting her building fury: the Angry Left, where O'Connor's reputation is as one of the angriest of all. "One long, sustained scream" is how she describes the writing she does for various Web logs, as she wonders what she should scream about this day.
Before:
She signed petitions. She boycotted veal. She canvassed for Greenpeace. She donated to Planned Parenthood. She read the Nation, the New Yorker, the Utne Reader and Mother Jones. She agonized over low wages for overseas workers every time she bought a $40 leather purse.
Then George W. Bush was elected. Then came 9/11, Afghanistan, Iraq, Guantanamo Bay, Abu Ghraib, the Patriot Act, secret prisons, domestic eavesdropping, the revamping of the Supreme Court, and the thought "It has come to the point where the worst people on Earth are running the Earth." And now, "I have become one of those people with all the bumper stickers on their car," she says. "I am this close to being one of those muttering people pushing a cart.
"I'm insane with rage and grief.
"But I also feel more connected than I ever have."
The cigarettes are because of a personality that she describes as compulsive.
The nonalcoholic beer is because for several years she drank to excess.
The note that says "Why am I/you here?" is because she is in constant search of an answer.
And the photo album is because of a 25-year-old Marine who died fighting in Vietnam three months before she was born, which she thinks helps explain the note, the alcohol, the cigarettes and the very first piece of writing she ever published online, a rant against the war in Iraq that began, "Every single millisecond of my life was directly affected by the nightmare that was Vietnam."
As for the keyboard, it is where O'Connor finished her evolution from lost soul to angry soul, beginning with that very first rant, which concluded with a wish that Bush, "after contracting incurable cancer and suffering for protracted periods of time without benefit of medication," go to hell.
The front door opens and in comes her 6-year-old son, Terry, home from school, who starts batting around a blue balloon at the other end of the living room, batting it closer to her, closer, closer. She searches through her iTunes library until she finds one of her favorite downloads -- not music, but a speech by a character named Howard Beale in the movie "Network." She presses "play" and turns up the volume. "I want you to get mad!" Beale shouts at one point. "I want you to get mad!" she shouts along, startling Terry. "What?" he says, backing away with his balloon.