I think I annoyed Vivacia with my crazy school reform ideas.

Holy shit! My last entry was # 300 and I forgot! Oh well. Congrats to me, that was my 300th blog post! Wooo!

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Sorry I forgot to write a blog entry last night, Ryter and I hung out after my reall not-fun Chem lab (four hours and I only got 1% yield for one sample) and watched the movie Se7en, all because Ryter is doing a short preliminary-to-a-novel story on a telekinetic serial killer and I said, "You know, I always thought it would be cool to do a story about a killer whose MO is based on the seven deadly sins."

He then said, "You know what? Get in the car. We're going to Blockbuster."

So my idea's been done. I liked the movie, actually, though it was very creepy. Hang on a second....

SPOILERS, IF YOU CARE

Not that you should, it was released over ten years ago. Still, only fair to warn people.

I have to say, my favorite murder by far was the Sloth one. Chaining a guy to a bed and keeping him alive as his body is covered in excruciating sores until he looks like an long-dead corpse and his mind slowly turns to mush, so he can't identify you when he is found? Cutting off his hand to place his fingerprints at the scene of another crime, thus leading the cops to him at the perfect time? And even paying his rent so that his landlord never complained or noticed? That's impressive.

The writers were pretty creative with the murders. Gluttony= force feeding was kind of obvious, but a pound of flesh from the greedy man then bleeding him dry, that was clever. Although the "lust" one, making a john strap on a penis sheath with a blade on the end and stab a prostitute through the uterus, creeped me out because there are actually people who might make that sort of shit for someone. Gah. The model for Pride was interesting because I actually have trouble believing even a model would choose suicide over disfigured survival. I mean, really, you'd think she'd know something about plastic surgery. Someone could build her a new nose to replace the one he cut off.

The only part that really bugged me, though, was the final scene, specifically mailing the young detective's wife's head to him. Creepy and effective, yes. But I have two problems with it. One, Doe SPECIFICALLY said in the car that his victims were not "innocent people." As in, he killed them because they were sinners. He didn't think he was a monster for it, because they were not innocent. And yet... he kills a pregnant woman and her fetus with her, just to get at the guy he wants to peg as Wrath? Maybe he could justify the woman as obviously a sinner because all people are guilty of some sin, but Catholic dogma, which he was following, states that a child can't be accountable for their sins until they are seven years old, and that a newborn has only the original sin. By his own rules he should have been forced to leave her alone as soon as she said she was pregnant.

Also, I thought the detective should have died. All the other representations of sin died. Why not Wrath? I figured he should have killed himself and it should have ended right then.

But anyway.

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Today Vivacia and I had girl time. We talked and I helped her bake a cake for her mom's birthday, which they are celebrating tomorrow. It was fun.

And yet, while I like spending time with her, this is the first weekend since I got back to school that I haven't spent the night at Ryter's. It's actually been a couple months since I went a week without spending the night at Ryter's.

AHHH! Boyfriend withdrawal... No. Must. Kick. Habit...

I'm lonely.

This is what you get for lettin' us womenfolk think

There was an article on the death penalty that I was reading today, and I felt the need to put my 2 cents in on the subject.

I believe in the death penalty.

That said-- Texas is bonkers in how much they use it. Like the guy mentioned in this article, who raped and murdered a woman. One woman, however cruelly and violently. Should he be locked up for life? Yes. I also believe that violent rapists for whom there is DNA evidence proving the rape should be surgically castrated. Not chemically, as you stop taking the pills and the desire comes back-- if someone violently rapes a person and there is definite evidence both that he was the rapist and that the crime was violent in nature, they should have their testicles removed and replaced with prosthetics. Cruel and unusual? If a person kills someone with a car, they lose their license. If they shoot at someone with a gun, they are denied the ability to ever own one again. It's just removing a weapon.

And yet, as for the death penalty-- I am of the mind that the death penalty should only be used for repeat offenders. Serial killers and gang members and the like. No crimes of passion, no single-murders, just people who plotted and acted on their plans to murder a stranger, a passing acquaintance, or a rival.

Also, the insanity defense is way overused-- the only way you should be able to plead not guilty by reason of insanity is if a) you actually have a real mental illness, and one severe enough that your crime is plausible-- situational depression doesn't count; b) you were not undergoing treatment (because you were undiagnosed or were not enough in your right mind to chose to) at the time of the crime (or a proper course of treatment was not found); c) you agree to undergo treatment and NOT STOP for your ENTIRE life; and d) you are expected to be a functioning member of society if treated.

So if a person kills someone and blames it on postpartum depression, they should get the same treatment as a healthy person. If they are an undiagnosed schizophrenic and willing to undergo treatment, they can get off. See where I'm going with this? My point is that if you have another Ed Gein, who was determined not guilty by reason of insanity and sent to a mental hospital for his whole life-- well, honestly. He wasn't going to get better. And if he had been sane he probably would have been put to death. So if you've got someone like that, just put them to death.

But not the electric chair or anything. Nitrogen narcosis-- unconsciousness and painless suffocation, with mild euphoria beforehand. Plus it leaves the body undamaged so the family can chose to donate the organs or the whole body to science, if they so wish, or inter it intact, if their religion requests it.

And as for the people who claim the jails are too crowded from all the people who deserve to die already-- if we legalized and then regulated (most) drugs and saved jail for people who are a threat to others or who genuinely need rehabilitation.

Also, anyone in jail for life should have the option of painless elective suicide whenever they wish. I think it's only fair, honestly.

I wish I was able to do an overhaul on a prison and test some of my theories about rehabilitation, though. Even if I didn't get to set sentences or allow suicide. Things like work detail, trade education, and not allowing people convicted for certain crimes (pedophilia and gang crimes spring to mind) interact with each other (because that's how they learn techniques). That way I would see firsthand if it failed and accept the system we have now.

A gift of my twisted mind

Last night I had a dream that everyone was accusing me of a brutal murder I did not remember doing. They all said they had seen me covered in blood and carrying the severed head of the victim, but while it was true that I had in my possession a hooded sweatshirt covered in blood, I could not remember committing murder and I could not remember ever holding the head. The thing was, I wasn't in jail or anything-- I was at home, but watched like a hawk, and no one trusted anything I said, because they thought I was a criminal.

Meanwhile, I had to try to prove my innocence to people who remembered things differently from me. In the end I figured out when the murder was supposed to have taken place and that I actually did have an alibi at the time, a fact I had forgotten because I honestly did not remember what I had been doing on the precise date (this is a minor annoyance to me on TV shows-- when they ask for an alibi, what if you can't remember what you were doing on a specific date?) I proved my innocence right before I woke up. Like, I had almost proved my innocence when the alarm rang but I hit the snooze to make sure it was all settled.

The interesting thing about this dream is that it felt very real, so much so that I was desperately afraid the whole time that I would discover I actually had murdered this guy and rather panicky about the whole thing. When I woke up it took me a few minutes to remember that none of it had happened.

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I'm going to do a site redesign (the url will be the same-- that's about it). I need to figure out a theme, though. And a title. Any great ideas?