Words Jerry DeMarco
Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg says the cartoon-character profile pics that this weekend became the newest online craze truly were part of an effort to raise awareness of child exploitation and weren't, as some conspiracy theorists suspected, an evil way for pedophiles to make young friends.
Yeah, it seems dopey. But people will do ANYTHING when the cause is right. In this case it was replacing profile pics with cartoon characters as a way of saying: That's right. I am totally against anybody hurting a kid.
Jerry DeMarco Publisher/Editor
What's really insidious is Facebook's ability to pull off such a stunt and make it instantly viral. Who ISN'T against child exploitation? Why does it seem such a cool idea to so many to step in line? Are people that much into the sheep mentality?
Here's the bigger question: What exactly is the point?
How did my changing my profile pic to Yogi Bear or George Jetson or Bluto this weekend fight child exploitation? What non-profit group benefitted from the meme?
And what's next? Are we going to post pics of Pam Grier and Fred "The Hammer" Williamson to protest black-sploitation? What about the exploitation of immigrant labor? Where does it end?
Or is that the point: There is no end. Simon says do this. Simon says do that. Facebook is Simon. We are sheep.
Some would buy the line that pedophiles are behind the mindless campaign -- the same way they believed that the guy who bought $20,000 worth of candy at the Costco in Hackensack the week before Halloween a few years ago intended to poison our kids. He actually was a flea market vendor doing his usual business: stocking up for the flood of folks who wanted to get their hands on cheap candy to give the trick-or-treaters.
Here's the latest joke: The only thing that's spreading faster than the Facebook post-a-cartoon profile pic are the warnings that pedophiles have orchestrated this grand scheme.
It apparently began as a joke -- in Greece, in fact, at least a month ago. Now it's merely the latest form of Internet idiocy, wrapped in a nostalgiac desire to show our cleverness and display OUR favorite cartoon heroes.... Narcissism masked as altruism.
What would Aristotle do? He'd dismiss it for what it is -- a waste of thought, time and trouble.
Jerky, actually.
Yet, in a single day, nearly 100,000 Facebook users changed their pics.
The result?
Um.... this story.... and .... well.... honestly.... uh.... beats the shit out of me....
We've seen this before, including the time women were asked to post the color of their bras to raise awareness of breast cancer. Then came the "I like it on..." campaign, another breast cancer offshoot, for women to wave the banner by saying where they preferred to stash their purses or pocketbooks.
Come on. Do you truly think Facebook gives a shit about any of these "causes"? Or is it another slick way of mining your data?
Not for anything, but if you have enough time on your hands to go find a pic, shop it, and post it, then you could be better spending that time being a foster mom or dad, brother or sister, or volunteering at a shelter, or tending to battered women, or being a big brother or sister to a kid who needs one.
I'd rather go down to the shelter and hand someone a bill than sit there and play Internet games that make me look so clever. Who the hell am I helping by sitting home in front of a monitor? No one but Facebook, whose purpose is to help advertisers profile YOU.
A cartoon doesn't explore unexplained injuries, or changes in a child's behavior -- including eating disorders, sleep troubles and plummeting grades at school, not to mention personal hygiene and major risk-taking. It doesn't explain how the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services found 772,000 children deemed victims of abuse or negelct -- with 7 of 10 suffering at the hands of their own parents.
A cartoon doesn't say that physical abuse is but one of a group of horrific behaviors toward innocent children. Some are sexually abused, neglected or emotionally mistreated.
P.T. Barnum could've never fathomed the breadth of gullibility when he said a sucker was born every minute. If he'd lived to see the latest Facebook gimmick, Barnum -- the original huckster himself -- would have never stopped throwing up.
I've got it: How about we all go an entire day without Facebook -- yes, make Facebook go dark -- to show our support for a less commercialized society? It could work, y'know, if only so many weren't so weak.
Pick a day. Any day. Let's do it in April: Child Abuse Awareness Month. Give me 1,000 emailed confirmations and we're in business.
Like you've got the balls.
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