I'm unsure how wanting more realism contradicts being concerned that female characters are depicted unrealistically.

Right? That response is blowing my mind:

I don't understand why people are asking for help about how to read an article. This is very confusing to me. This is not an opinion piece, clearly, or some type of argument. I feel like maybe a lot of people here don't read much literary nonfiction, or hell, even fiction, because this might be a surprise, but most…

I don't think there is supposed to be a "moral": I take it as a slice of life thing. A moment when this kid finally does something in response to this shitty person being in her life and being powerless to do much about it. Having grown up in similarly dangerous situations with people who were pretty sketchy and not…

Yeah, the naked adult male is totally a victim of the abused 12 year old. We don't get much context for the story, but based on what we have just here, it seems like Charles is incredibly abusive and vindictive and not a safe person for a 12 year old to be around. It's hard for me to have much sympathy for him.

God, I love J Law, but that haircut is like straight from a 1998 episode of Dharma and Greg. But she's adorable anyways.

Choirgirl is totally one of my favs. I pretty much love everything from LE through Venus, and then it gets dicey IMO.

OMG, Twister! That one was big in Oklahoma, where I grew up, because it was filmed there. I do love that version of Talulah, even better than the album version (I'm revealing my levels of Tori knowledge here).

LITTLE EARTHQUAKES.

Ah, I see. Not a troll then, just kind of a jerk.

I'd say that making a personified monkey including stereotypical African American accessories such as gold chains and a gold tooth might indicate that at the very least, he probably has some internalized racism that he has not examined, like all of us, though he has the money and time to actually do so. And I hope he…

"I happen to be white but some of my best friends are black so that's just as good."

Your opinions are hurtful to people who are suffering. I am not interested in taking a step in any direction toward advocating them as mere "opinions", because this is the kind of thing that makes people suffering from mental illness despair: the idea that they aren't doing it right, that if they just tried harder…

I can disagree with both you and the article. You seem to have some model mentally ill people in mind who did things "the right way". I think that's fucked up for reasons related to my experience with working with people suffering from mental illness, my education, and my own experience. I'm not interested in only…

You said "we should never idolize anyone who has committed suicide". I personally don't "idolize" anybody, but if one chooses to do so, I don't think that a person who has committed suicide is automatically less of a good candidate because they suffered from mental illness and did not recover, for whatever reason.…

I think the idea of 'role models' is flawed to begin with, but there are definitely people I consider vibrant and amazing, no matter how their mental health ultimately affected their deaths. Plath is definitely one of those people for me. I think the point of this whole post was that the idea of "role models" is…

I have no idea who you think hasn't tried to get help and is a cautionary tale. Right now, you are talking about imaginary people. And even the ability to get help is sometimes beyond the scope of what the illness itself, access to services, and money allow. Having "bad examples" of mentally ill people does nobody any…

No, she's a cautionary tale. Not much better. I'm not trying to jump down your throat here, but I think you are not thinking through this very well. You can idolize Plath without killing yourself, because how she died isn't everything about her. Like all complicated people, there is good and bad. And the idea that…

Wow, so killing yourself if you are seriously and deeply depressed means you are somehow less valuable than people who have found help and been able to stay alive? I think that comments like this really make people who have attempted suicide and who live daily with this issue feel like shit. I know that's not your…

And Jason just literally checked his watch while somebody I've never heard of talked. This is such a mess.