danielle-dowd
Elle.Belle
danielle-dowd

The first time I had edamame in a sushi restaurant years ago, I totes ate the pods. And then I was really confused about what that extra bowl was for. Whoops. Embarrassing.

I mean, as a white cis-hetero dude in the military that culture benefits my husband but he still speaks out against it every time he sees/hears it too. I guess I am just hopeful that there are a few cops like that too out there somewhere.

I don't think all cops are bad...I think the culture within police departments is unhealthy, and that there are a lot of bad cops. But I dont think all cops are bad. But heres what I dont get:

I dont understand the defensiveness from cops about all this shit lately. I really dont.

My contacts in Ferguson say this is actually a third autopsy.

It kind of reminds of me "ironic sexism" in marketing, where its like *wink wink* We are all in on the joke. Jezebel has spoken out against that type of marketing. Its a similar sort of thing.

In my opinion a pretty good radar for satire is to see who feels hurt and who feels empowered by the attempted satire.

In this case, if someone from West Africa were to read this, would they feel empowered and supported? Or would they feel that they are the butt of the joke?

I'm not from West Africa. But I do have

Right. I get that. And Twitter is a mess right now with people saying stupid things.

My issue is with the execution of this article and its jokes . They are not well crafted. Many of them dont take into account things relevant to the history and culture of West Africa.

I get that it was intended to make fun of those people (like omg, the stuff on Twitter right now is awful) but some of the jokes fell really flat. Like the cannibalism one. And the general flippant tone.

I would love to see well crafted jokes making fun of people like Donald Trump (and others) who have said awful

I responded before saying that since I dont comment on Kinja often I didnt realize that everyone can read every response. I thought that people could only see if you responded directly to them.

Anyways if you read my other responses you'd see that I'm upset because people I love live in Sierra Leone, some of them in

Thank you. Theres a lot of rumors and distrust going around. People are really afraid.

Agreed. It sounds really cliche (and it is...but its still true...) we take things like access to clean water for granted.

Yeah this article was also awful and terribly insensitive. I'm just so frustrated that even though this outbreak has been going on for MONTHS that it seems like US media hasnt taken notice until very recently when a couple of Americans were affected. The idea that we cant care about things unless they directly affect

Thank you.

You're right, the level of hysteria from people who are freaking out about allowing patients to come home is ridiculous. They are taking all of the necessary precautions.

Thank you so much for saying that. I really appreciated your comments on the situation. Things dont have to directly affect us for them to be important.

Thank you.

So far the children I work with are on lock-down at their compound and have stock piled supplies. My family in the village seem to be ok so far...communication is hard with them. They have a phone (that I purchased for them) but dont always have money to buy units to call and they arent literate so getting

I agree. The information is relevant and appropriate. Its the tone I take issue with.

One of the first things I talked with my loved ones about when this first broke (even when it was still just unconfirmed cases) was to avoid funerals. It's pretty culturally normal to touch the body at funerals there. Funerals have

Yeah...I didnt really understand how Kinja commenting works. I thought more or less you only see the comments that respond to yours? But now I am seeing thats not the case.

Also feeling pretty emotional about this since I have loved ones living there.

Yup. During Sierra Leones recent civil war, there is documentation of civilians who were forced by soldiers to murder their loved ones and cannibalize their remains. At gun point. So yeah. Its not funny.

PREACH. This is so not ok.

You know that forced cannibalism was part of Sierra Leones recent and horrific Civil War. right? So yeah. That shits not funny.