Am I growing up or being a self righteous asshole?

I had to tell someone today that I have been friends with for less than a year that I couldn't be his friend anymore. That is the first time I have ever actually done that to another person.

What happened?

I'll tell you. One of my married friends cheated on her husband with him.

I know, there will be debate on this. "It was their business and not mine", or "Why are you friends with either one of them?", etc.

Well, I've known her almost my whole life. Right now, we are on shaky ground, but we are friends. Sorta. I'm still sorting this out.

He. Well, I tried with him. I couldn't do it.

After four months of being in the middle between her, him, and her soon to be ex-husband, I was exhausted. I have encouraged him towards healthy AVAILABLE women. He wants none of that. He wants to take the easy route with my married friend.

I've lost all respect for either of them, really. I want to try with her because we have history.

Him, well, he's a snake with changeable morals. Our friendship would never be the same.

People are often surprised with how open I am that I despise adultery.

I am open when it comes to honesty. Cheating is about nothin' but selfishness, deceit, and manipulation. I hate that shit. You entered into an agreement to be faithful to someone. You be faithful or leave. I am not and have never been married, yet I have never cheated on any of my partners.

I myself am often surprised at how many married people don't seem to adhere to that same belief system when it comes to adultery.

I hope that I don't sound like a self righteous asshole, but I couldn't live with myself if I went along with something I thought was wrong.

Skirting parental responsibilities

I've been gone forever. No one reads this. Oh well.

I've had two experiences in the last week that have tested my patience in regards to parenting. Firstly, I went to a FPSE community meeting in which some woman *whom I've never seen before and I go every meeting* claimed to be speaking on behalf of the neighborhood. This woman criticized the FPSE Safety Meeting because it was not offering up suggestions for bettering the lives of teens in the community. She felt that the point of the meeting was to punish teenagers by having a "bait" car in the neighborhood to catch those thieves that have been stealing cars.

Sigh............

I was a social worker for a few years. I liked the kids; I hated the parents. Would you like to know why? I'll tell you anyway. After the parents had drank, or did drugs, or preferred to fuck someone instead of paying attention to their kid, or abused/neglected their child in some fashion for fourteen years of the kid's life and the kid finally acted up because of the shitty parenting, it was the kid's fault. I needed to wave my magic social worker wand and fix the kid. There, of course, was to be no discussion of the parental example that was being set. How could little Johnny or Suzie be doing drugs, (even though I, their parent, do drugs and don't plan on quitting)?

Sigh....................................

This meeting was the same shit. Do I think that children need things to do? Yes. How about attending school? How does that sound? Does that sound like a good start? Good. Well, how about being involved with positive friends and in positive after school activities (deal drugs/doing drugs is not a positive after school activity)? You like that? Good. Oh, I almost forgot...........how about having at least one positive parental figure that gives a shit about that kid by praising them, supporting them, taking care of their necessities, AND SUPERVISING THEM?

No, that's silly. Instead let's focus all of our energy by complaining about the fact that there is no social programs (This is laughable. There are plenty) such as the community center being open(This being open was a good thing. I also hear that after the drug dealers had their lunch break, they went back to drug dealing after the community center closed.)

So, should the poor mothers and fathers who only have one car and are doing their best to work, provide, and be good parents for their children be punished because someone else didn't do their job as a parent and now their car is stolen?

How many people who don't have a propensity to steal do you think are going to try to steal that bait car? My guess is zero.

How many kids are going to social programs because they want to? Most. The programs are there. You can't MAKE youth attend. I'm sorry to say it. I wish it weren't true. How is one hour a day or week going to fix a fourteen year old's life when they still have to go home to their crappy home environment?

That is one of the reasons I will never go back to social work. I could work forever and ever with the kids, but most parents don't want to hear how the job that they are doing sux. The parents, my friend, are key.

Finally, an elderly woman (Isn't that who usually does it?) yelled that it starts at home with parenting. Amen.

The second incident almost popped my top.

A "friend" of mine mentioned that he had told another "friend" that she should not move into an apartment complex as they are the worse places to raise children.

HUH?

This "friend" lives in the suburban bliss of St. Charles. In his experience, he has noticed that there were alot more unsupervised children.

So, other people's lack of parenting would force you to not supervise your children?

People in suburbia ALWAYS supervise their children?

Someone explain to me how the structure in which one lives dictates the molding of the child.

It couldn't be that most people who live in apartments are probably one parent families and that it is hard to supervise your child alone. Or that people in apartments have left their spouse and the change has affected the kids through change and instability. It couldn't be that impoverished people suffer more when alcoholism or drug addiction takes over their lives and their children are neglected.

Of course, he meant lower income apartments because suburban people are so blinded that they only think of lower income apartments when they say apartments.

I bet all those kids in NYC are out of control with that apartment living.

I'm never going to have children now. I'm so afraid that the idiots with children will be around my child and sabotage everything.