Author: Brett Fujioka
People often ask themselves, “What would make the world a better place?” Some people say that if a certain political party dominated the scene, then the world would be more peaceful. Others say that if things stay the course, then things are bound to get better. A lot of people believe that if peace magically arises in the Middle East, then the rest of the world would follow in tune. Everyone agrees that if Paris Hilton would close her legs and stop being such an attention-monger, then the world would be less annoying. I, however, say that the world would be more tolerable if people would stop whining. Asking people to stop bitching, whining, complaining, etc. altogether is absurdly impossible. Demanding that people cease these listed methods of whining (and things to whine about) is reasonable.
Nearly everyone in college uses Facebook, but not everyone manages it properly. The purpose of the status update bar is to inform people what you’re doing, where you are, and your current mood. It isn’t meant as a miniature one-lined diary nor is it a means of gaining attention. There are a million “cutters” out there who write whiney updates like: “Cuddles is depressed because his life is just a black abyss, y’know? So dark and stuff—,” only to have their words cut off because the update bar only allows so many characters. It’s one thing to mention your problems on Facebook every once in a while, but a recurrent series of updates dedicated solely to your misery just screams attention-whore. If you’re going to whine about your life, then go cry about it in the dark with the rest of the Goths on Livejournal. I never thought that I’d ever encourage anyone to use Livejournal, but it’s the lesser of two evils in terms of whining. Instead of subjecting an entire network of people to your inane life, you’re only boring a narrow audience. After all, who uses Livejournal anymore?
Facebook is already similar enough to Livejournal and Myspace, so don’t turn it into another complete and pathetic clone by abusing the note application. You can make an announcement on it to state an upcoming event or idea that came to fruition, but again, don’t use it as an outlet of depression. Keep that to yourself, your close friends, or a psychiatrist. I even find the sharing of bad poetry on notes tolerable, but there is other poetry out there that isn’t dark or moody.
iChat (a Mac version of AIM) possesses a similar function to Facebook’s status update. There’s a customizable “available” status option opposite of “away” (I just got a Mac last year, so this is new to me). Don’t abuse this option like others do with the status update on Facebook.
To emphasize how annoying these methods of bitching are, I’ll whip out the E word. Yes, the E word—the one label that nobody wants. Each and every one of these media of bitching and whining are Emo with a capital E. I’ll just leave it at that, because people might start to suspect things from my Emophobia.
This isn’t a method of bitching, so much as it’s a topic—but stop whining about George W. Bush. I hate him with the same passion as the next liberal, but it’s overdone. After all, why should it surprise anyone, even his most ardent supporters, when he’s made another mistake?
Most importantly, the worst medium to bitch and moan in is the newspaper. Not only is that Emo, but it’s professionally Emo.
Brett Fujioka is a senior ECLS major. He can be reached at bfujioka@oxy.edu.
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