The local paper

[dancerjodi]

Its not the best written rag, but it allows me to keep up with things going on in my area politically, socially and economically.

Two interesting articles from yesterday:
http://www.metrowestdailynews.com/localRegional/view.bg?articleid=125340

Now, the dress code forbids kids from wearing clothes with logos that could be deemed "offensive", so a followup article stated this girl shouldn't have been wearing the earing at all. Do you think the counselor should have sketched the earing? Do you think this Mom is being a bit silly? Here's a great example of what Dita mentions in her book with things being fetishized because they are forbidden. I'm wondering how many of these elementary school kids even knew what Playboy was before this fiasco. Interestingly enough, this is the school in our old Framingham neighborhood that I used to drive by on the way to and from work each day (the one near the women's prison).

The other one was on a house listing a couple of blocks from where we live (Robbins Street). The article reads "Sun Drenched on the South Side" and the house looks fairly small. Its got 3 bedrooms and 2 baths and a basement in-law with 1 bedroom and 1 bath. The asking price? $595k. Damn! Here's the listing!

Comments

[developer.livejournal.com]

At first I was thinking "lots of bad judgement", but then I was wondering if this woman gets bent when kids wear the t-shirts that may be related to alcohol? Certainly the counselor showed poor judgement reproducing the bunny, assuming they knew what the bunny was. Hard to imagine, but I suppose that cultural icon might've slipped by them. They do spend all day with 10 year olds!

I do think that playboy is playing with fire when overtly marketing to the under 18 set - which I think in recent years they have been.

On the other note -- looks like housing values are going up -- plus I think a n inlaw tends to push the value of a house up considerably.

[threadofscarlet.livejournal.com]

I'd say very few of them had any clue. The kid who was wearing the earing probably didn't even know. Very likely she saw what she thought were cute bunny earings that she wanted to wear, nothing more.

I find that stuff so ridiculous. Not only is it silly to get all bent out of shape about sexual imagery that is NOT sexual imagery when the kids don't know what it represents, it seems to me that teaching your kids to freak out at anything that even remotely symbolizes sex is setting a bad precedant.

Way to teach your kids that anything even slightly sexual should be hidden like the dark, dirty little secret is is!

[bratling.livejournal.com]

wow. that house is about four hundred thousand dollars out of my price range. i wonder what they'll get? the real estate market has "softened", which as far as i can tell means, "selling conditions have returned to what they were a decade ago, and it can take a month or two to sell instead of a day or two, and you may not get your asking price."

(we're in the market, btw -- probably for a small condo or very small house well outside the 128 loop!)

[bratling.livejournal.com]

another comment:

last night, a friend of mine told me about seeing a *busty* eight year old girl with her mother in a store getting fitted for a new bra (having outgrown the previous ones). the idea of someone with the mental development of a child but with an adult's sex drive scares me.

[tk7602.livejournal.com]

600k to live in our old hood? dang!

[roaming.livejournal.com]

The Playboy logo teaches people to view young girls as sexual objects? Hell, our entire culture views girls and women, emphasis on youth, as sexual objects.

Marketing the logo to anyone under 18 is crass commercial exploitation. Making a big deal about it is making something out of nothing: there are far worse "bag guys" to spend time protecting children from.