At First You Think I Need A Segue, But Then You Remember The Bit About Mike Tyson

This weekend was Cody's birthday.  Everyone: Yay, happy birthday, Cody!  Anyway, it was a wonderful weekend.  Full of nothing, nothing, and more nothing.

Actually, that's not quite true, although doing nothing is what stands out as the best part (surprising? not really).  Friday night we rented a couple of movies and went out to dinner, and Saturday I went in to work for a bit and then we spent the rest of the day at my parent's abandoned (for the weekend) house, swimming with Lydah (read: coaxing and pleading with her to come near the edge of the pool, which resulted in frantic barking and terrified pacing - RANDOM LITTLE GIRL WHO THREW MY DOG INTO THE POOL, I BLAME YOU), and downloading (then subsequently playing) old NES games on the Wii. 

Now this, the NES downloading, is a post-worthy subject.   First and foremost, do you have a Wii?  If you said no, well, I still love you, but you probably should go on and get one here pretty quickly.  If you said yes?  Well, you know I loved you before, but now I'll probably not be able to contain myself.  Because playing Super Mario Brothers on a big screen with nothing more than a simple point and click?  IS AWESOME.  No jerry-rigging the old NES console by propping the gigantic power supply up with a book so that it doesn't burn a hole in the wood floor.  No ejecting and re-inserting the game cartridge, all while intermittently blowing the "dust" out of the innards of the cartridge and praying that the game might actually work.  No reset button carousel.  Just point and click, baby, point and click.  We downloaded Punch Out!!, formerly known as Mike Tyson's Punch Out!! but apparently changed to protect either the profit margins of the boxer or the reputation of the game.  Probably the latter.  You can only bite off so many ears before people start pretending their alliances with you never really existed.  But it does seem rather cold, removing Tyson's name in 2007 from a game that originated sometime in the mid 1980's.   Plus, the new Tyson, the fighter you're trying to get to the entire game?  Is named Mr. Dream.  I think they surely could have come up with something more impressive than that.

We also got Excitebike and Mario Kart 64, which is possibly the Best Game Ever, and certainly the only game I Could Definitely Beat You At.  No, REALLY.  I can.  Yes, you too.  Yes, even if you played every single day of your college career for 8 hours per day.  No, it doesn't matter if you won some online tournament.  I CAN BEAT YOU.  It is my one true talent, Mario Kart 64.  We also got Ninja Gaiden, a game which I have never played and have no interest in whatsoever.  Stupid Cody, filling up his Wii memory with games I don't even like.  And on his birthday, too.  Geez.

After all that strenuous downloading (can you imagine that it only takes, like, 8 SECONDS to download the entire Super Mario Brothers game??  Seriously?), we went to eat dinner with some friends, then to our house for some drinks and cake, and then to see Ocean's Thirteen.  Which, at the risk of sounding like every single other person who has seen and offered some review of the move, was better than Ocean's Twelve and worse than Ocean's Eleven.  So there you go!  Some continuity in your movie reviews.  It is hard to care about the technical merits of a movie, however, when every Ocean's is completely full of exceptionally handsome and suave men who are scripted to be so confident and cool in their every line that they absolutely ooze sex appeal.  I wish someone would write me a script like that to go by, just for a day.  And then someone else could follow me around with a camera, just to catch all my interactee's looks of awe and amazement.

After that was over, we adjourned to the movie theater parking lot, discussing various aspects of the movie (yes, that Brody nose DID play!), and encountered a man who seemed to be drunkenly stumbling around.  He fell down, and since we were still a ways off, we couldn't tell if a drunken friend had jokingly pushed him, if he had just tripped over his own feet, or something else.  It turns out it was definitely Something Else.  As we drew nearer to Drunk, we noticed that he had definitely been pushed, and not at all jokingly, by a drunk female who was sitting in a parked car.  He rushed back at her (as quickly as a drunk can rush) and PUNCHED HER IN THE FACE.  What? 

Here is where I sound like a sheltered, privileged little snot: while I have, in the past, lived in places where this sort of behavior, while NEVER condoned, would at least not come as a total shock, the place I live right now is not one of them.  Like, at all.  The place I live right now is one of those horribly annoying places where the only decision you'll make while car shopping is which BMW is the right size for your lifestyle RIGHT NOW.  You can always trade up later!  Where people send you nasty notes if your lawn is not pristine within a month of your moving in.  Where high-end boutiques flourish and thrive (ummm.....yeah).

Not that I harbor any idealistic views that the types of people who live in Upper Middle Class America are any more happy or less dysfunctional than anyone else.  Hardly.   However, around here, you usually see these dysfunctions manifest themselves in the form of spending as much of your soon to be ex-husband's money as fast as you can, or cheating on your wife, getting caught, and then buying her a lakehouse complete with a $200,000 budget specifically designated for her "decorating needs".  It's just not that common to see a really drunk guy beating the absolute hell out of his girl in the parking lot.

Of course Cody and his brother and friend all ran over to the guy and asked him if he wouldn't mind, to maybe please stop slamming his wife/girlfriend's legs in the door, over and over.  They asked just like that, too.  I promise.   The guy immediately stopped with the leg-mangling, but didn't stop with his verbal abuse at all.  Minutes later, the police pulled up, summoned by a concerned passerby before we even saw the scene, and they stepped in and separated the two drunks.  The girl, with a quickly-swelling black eye and a pretty obvious limp, stepped to the side with one officer, while a few others attended to the original Drunk.  Since the officer with the girl happened to be standing relatively near me, I could hear bits and pieces of their conversation.

Officer:  So, these witnesses are telling me he was hitting you.  And I see your black eye there.  Was he hitting you?

Girl:  No, he was NOT.  I don't know why they told you that, either.  He wasn't hitting me at all.

Officer:  Well, how did you get that swollen eye, then?  I can see it swelling, right now.

Girl:  I fell, or something, I guess.  But he didn't hit me.  He's just too drunk to drive, that's all.  I don't know why they keep telling you he hit me.

Officer:  Are you sure?  There are about 10 witnesses there, and they all said that.  Also we heard that he slammed your legs in your car door.  That's assault.  Let's think about pressing charges, ok?

Girl:  I already told you, he didn't do anything!  He's just too drunk to drive.  Let me drive him home.  He didn't touch me.

I stood, in awe and disappointment, as the girl lied in the most obvious and transparent way about the fact that her boyfriend/husband IS an abuser.  And the police, they can't do anything about it if she won't press charges.  We stood there, all 10 of us or so, and watched in amazement as the girl continued to deny him even touching her at all.  We watched in horror as Drunk continued to yell at his girl, screaming at her to tell the police to let him go, mouthing threats and curses to her every time she turned around to see him in handcuffs.  And she defended him.

We eventually left, after telling the cops again that YES, he was most certainly hitting her, and that YES, we would be happy to cooperate in any way whatsoever if any charges were filed.  And after, of course, we were painfully certain that no charges WOULD be filed, and that all the guy was going to have to deal with was one night in jail for public intoxication.

As I sat in the car, trying to reconcile my thoughts on the altercation, I was faced once again with my lack of compassion.  Who do you feel sorry for in a situation like that?  Certainly not the guy, although it's easy to assume that both he and the girl must have had some pretty awful upbringings to end up dealing with problems in such a way.  I really couldn't feel sorry for the girl, either.  I felt incredible sympathy, and more than that, a righteous anger for her when I thought she was an unwilling victim.  But to defend a man like that?  To insist, to the contrary of every other person out there and obvious physical signs, that he DID NOT TOUCH HER?  She is not a victim.  She is an enabler, and for whatever reason, she is content to allow herself to be treated like the most mistreated of dogs.  She is kicked by her man, and instead of fighting back or even turning tail and running, she puts her tail between her legs and comes crawling back for more, swatting away any helpful hand extended to her in her misery. 

How do you feel sorry for someone like that?

Obviously I don't see both sides of the issue.  I was brought up in the most ideal of circumstances, with two parents who loved me and taught me self-respect and how to live in moderation and all sorts of other helpful things.  Obviously I am missing something.  I don't WANT to have no compassion towards women who are battered and beaten and broken.  But when they allow it?  When they turn away, hatefully, from all help to extricate themselves from the poisonous grip of an abuser?  How can you possibly help someone who doesn't want to be helped? 

Comments

[Moose]

The first time I ever got called in for jury duty I ended up on a domestic abuse case where the girlfriend staunchly defended her boyfriend. There's really nothing you can do in that case. I didn't know what to think of that either.

[tana]

Dispite their crappy image, the nice thing about the LAPD is that they now take it in their own hands to arrest the abuser even if the abusee doesn't want to press charges.

[Helen]

I think, very often it is that before this particular act, the man has beaten the very life out of the woman, she no longer believes she has any chance without his abusive self, she believes that as rotten as HE is, she is worse, useless, doomed to a life of worthlessness without him. If she dares to 'tell' she will have nothing, will not be able to cope. Anyway...he will get out and come back and THEN she will be sorry. Also....financially how will she cope? Maybe ( probably) he has had complete control of all the money,because you know, she is stupid and not trustworthy and can't do anything...she NEEDS him, fists and all because she is nothing.
Give him long enough, a man who is as abusive as this one sounds....he will make his woman believe all his lies, by now she is completely ruined.I saw my sister beaten this low by her husband. One day though the worm may turn. Hopefully she will see that she CAN do it on her own, hopefully one day she will feel a spark of righteous indignation and FIGHT THE SCUMBAG back.
I do sympathise although I always feel such rage that women can be made to feel so worthless that a physical beating becomes nothing more than a daily chore to be endured. Maybe someone will slam that drunks head in a car door one day soon, we can but hope.

[Helen]

Opps, should have said that one day....now 18 years ago...my sister literally woke up and had a WTF? moment. She left, with 4 children. She is now married to a man who personifies patience and oozes gentleness. Stil, there are remnants of that battered girl left, her husband now just waits and patiently accepts that he gets the legacy from the first one. He pays for the meanness of the first one, I'm not sure she will ever trust this new man, who is integrity itself, who is loyal and kind. She is convinced, still, all these years later that she is worthless and so why would any man, especially a good one stick around? These men do more than beat the body, they scar the soul.

[Erin]

On a scale of lightheartedness (with "1" being Easy, Breezy, Beautiful Covergirl and "10" being the Republican National Convention), this post went from a solid 1 1/2 to a 12 in like two sentences. That's some skill right there.

Not prepared to jump into the abuse discussion before I've had a shower, I'll simply say that I was disappointed to see your parents' house was only temporarily abandoned. For a minute there I was really excited to hear that story.

[elise]

I just told Erin that my new plan is to just throw some post-resembling words up here and wait for her to comment.

I think we can all get on board with that, right?

[Chantay]

My husband wants a Wii very badly but I'm not convinced. Afterall, the tiny amount of video game skill I acquired as a child is now defunct. I fail spectacularly in all games, save tetris...I rule at tetris. Plus if Colin gets a Wii who will play the nintendo DS and hours of poker online? I think he needs to think of his responsibility to our current entertainment outlets. (I have a feeling it's only a matter of time before the Wii joins our family. I hope a point-and-click system works better for me than the standard.)

Pertaining to the abused female, I think some people think they deserve to be misrable for whatever reason.. I can't understand that way of thinking because there's no way in hell I would put up with that behavior in my life. I've known of women who go from one abuser to the next, trading bad for worse, throughout their lives. It's a bit pathetic. Hopefully they wake up before it's too late. I feel the worst for children in those situations. You can't force a person to change but it still sucks that the perfect opportunity came along and that woman refused to teach her ass of a "man" a lesson. I think being a cop would make me lose a lot of faith in people in general.

[Heather]

having seen women, very personally, who are involved in the abuse cycle, i know it's heartbreaking. that's what's so hard about the abuse cycle - it's a cycle. people get out, and the women that do are my personal heroes. but most women don't. they don't when they're kids, they don't when they're dad is beating the sh*t out of their mom, and they don't when they are with a man that beats the sh*t out of them.

it's a really hard thing to witness.

[Chaos Control]

Some women have heard their abusers tell them so many times that they will kill them and/or their children if they report the abuse that they believe them. Who knows ... this woman could have feared for her life and/or that of any kids she might have. Very, very sad.

[EDW]

Wow. Just, wow. I would have been stunned, too, to see that where I live.

When I was a kid, my mom stopped a couple having a violent argument at an ice-cream place, and asked the girl if she needed a ride. Years later, as a college student, some friends and I saw a woman running down the road in her nightgown. We stopped. She called the cops, we waited at the house with her. She called her parents across the country, we waited. Finally, we took her to the bus station, ticket in hand. Her family sent us a note to thank us, and I still wonder if she made it all the way there, if she made it at all.

[thethinker]

Holy crap, I'm jealous. I've been begging my parents for a Wii. I LOVE Super Mario Brothers.

[regan]

there's so much about our culture that is about "enabling" and being weak. it's about time people just stand up and take responsibility for their lives. i find it hard to feel sorry for anyone not willing to do that and it seems they get what they deserve.

sounds sick, but there's no other way to rationalize it. crappy life? tough shit; very little of our choices are out of our control.

[Teacher A]

1. The Wii is awesome!

2. I don't get it either. I mean, I know the reasons people give, but they just don't like enough (but that is probably a good sign, as it means that I wouldn't put up with that sort of situation).

[wordgirl]

Fear makes women lie for the men they hope will love them. Either that or the fact that we're so used to men treating women like crap that we figure we've got it coming. Not me, of course. Forty years ago a man who beat his wife at home might get the police called on him, but once he informed them that he was simply having trouble teaching the "little woman" a lesson about obedience, the police would chalk it up to a DOMESTIC DISTURBANCE and leave. it's no suprise that when a wife/mother goes missing, the husband/boyfriend is always the first suspsect. It's also no surprise that homicide is the most common form of death (in this country) for pregnant women or new mothers. I'm not trying to come off as a man basher, but truth is truth...even when it's an inconvenient one (thanks, Al Gore!). How did we get here and when is it going to change?

[Scott-san]

Yeah, I'm with Erin. I was all prepared to make a pithy comment about how fun it is (er, was) to get high and play Mario Kart, and then the BEATING started. Jesus.

I served on a jury for a trial that never happened that seemed to be a similar case. The wife/girlfriend was the only witness for the prosecution, and she fled rather than testify. No case.

[tiff]

Everyone who mentioned how they break the will to live of the wife/girlfriend is right. They start to believe that's what they deserve, and the beating is actually love, and why not defend this person who is so adamantly loving you? Why this happens is a mystery.

Now... how do you download games onto your Wii? If it's hooked up to the Intraweb? I need to be playing some Mario Kart. Stat.