Wet blanket

Some Skypeland rooms are completely dead. Sometimes this is because of problems with Skype itself, and sometimes it is because of the management by the host. Sometimes some of the residents of the room contribute to the general blandness and ennui.

One host loves to brag about how wonderful his rooms are, and even goes to the extremes of trying to recruit people from other casts for his rooms. This host will even criticize the room management skills of other hosts while they are trying to host a Skypecast. This host will take up time in other rooms by bragging about how superior his rooms are and how much better his room-hosting skills are. However, this host's rooms often collapse into insipid, vapid, boring discussions, often due to his own management of the room.

One man entered this host's room, and complained that his 17 year old daughter was planning to get married to a man in his 20s that she had been involved with 2 years previously. I tried to use this opportunity to broaden the discussion and talk about the general topic, and some related issues. I attempted to give some perspective about how these standards had changed over time, and were different in different places. However, the host took me to task for this and said he was only interested in the laws for marriage here and now, not in other times and in other cultures. Someone else, M, suggested that if one does not know the mistakes of the past, that one is condemned to repeat these errors, and this irritated the host. (I investigated this question a bit. It turns out that under Roman Catholic Canon Law even currently, people who are 14 years old are judged ready for marriage:
http://socialissues.wiseto.com/Articles/EJ3010052212/
In 1371 in Europe, the average male was 24 when he was married and the average female was 16. By 1427 the average male married in his mid-30s and the average female was about half as old, and therefore still a teenager: http://marriage.about.com/cs/teenmarriage/a/teenmarriage.htm This change was apparently associated with the onset of the plague, although I am not sure why and how, exactly.)

I was asked what I would do by B, the man with the daughter, and I said I would try to convince the daughter not to get married by giving her a list of about 20 reasons or so. B, the man with the daughter, was shocked that 20 reasons even existed, and attacked me and ridiculed me for saying so. B asked me to give him 3 reasons that his daughter should not get married at 17. I tried to give a few reasons, and was frequently cut off by B and others in the room. They were quite angry and did not want to hear a thing I had to say.

For my first reason, I suggested that most young marriages failed, but I was interrupted and told that this was not a young marriage. (Oh brother...When I encounter this sort of comment, it makes me really wonder.) I said that one could get statistics to show that marriages of very young people often fail, and people were dismissive of this idea. (A little investigation showed that the Archdiocese of San Diego's marriage handbook states that marriages of people where both parties are teenagers are twice as likely to fail as those of people where both are in their twenties:
http://www.diocese-sdiego.org/Handbook/Handbook_PDFs/Marriage1.pdf)

For my second reason, I tried to talk about the complications of the modern world, and that one needed a lot of education and training to succeed in today's world, but I was repeatedly cut off when I tried to describe this reason for not getting married too young. It was clear to me that B only wanted to fight, and did not want to hear anything from me (or anyone else really). I declined to say any more, partly because B was becoming increasingly abusive and combative. (Interestingly, I found these same reasons from some marriage counsellors that give courses and write articles about the same issues: http://marriage.about.com/cs/teenmarriage/a/teenmarriage.htm It strikes me that in all of these discussions, the conversation could be steered in a more serious vein and the issues explored in a deeper and more responsible manner, to uncover facts and enable everyone to learn things. However, quite often I notice that many would prefer to shut down all dialogue and just engage in angry rhetoric and mindless spewing. Ah well...It says a lot about people. The entire question of how to estimate marriage failure rates and societal attitudes and their evolution are fascinating, but something that people like this cannot address. They would rather yell and scream like buffoons and ignoramuses, and then bemoan their situation.)

It was as if I was the 25 year old trying to marry B's daughter. Frankly, although I did not say this in the room, I started to get the impression that the reason the daughter wanted to get married was to get away from her father, and possibly her mother as well, based on his behavior in the room. Sometimes people communicate far more than they intend in conversation. In my discussions with people who were married young, it is revealed that this is often one of the main reasons people decide to get married when they are still children; their lives at home are a living hell. And from my interactions with B, this time and previously, it would not take too much to convince me that B is hellish to live with. He is often angry, abusive, obnoxious and crude, and not just stupid, but aggressively stupid, and even proud to be stupid. Who would not want to get away from that?

I stopped talking. Then someone entered the room with a high-pitched whine being emitted from their equipment and the host dropped everyone to listening, abusing many of his listeners in the process. After finding the offending microphone, some of the people were allowed back into the talking area. However, the room descended into complete silence, punctuated by the host and others trying to encourage someone, anyone, to talk. No one said a thing. Who would want to talk, just to be cut off and abused? I decided to not ask to ask to talk and to just stay in the listening area, and just listen. As the host says in his advertising for his room, "When in listening, listen". So I decided to do just that.

My friend M from Philadelphia tried to start up a conversation, and said that he had a truckload of wood to split. He was asked how much wood that is. M said it was enough to fill a truck bed to the rim. B said it was about 4 feet by 4 feet by 8 feet of wood. At this, M had his microphone shut off. M asked to be able to speak again, and the host declined, and started to berate him for some purportedly inappropriate behavior. I asked several people in text what M had done, and I did not receive any satisfactory answers. Perhaps M had sent some nasty message to the host, E, in private, but I certainly did not hear it or see it. Sometimes, there are obvious reasons that rooms are boring...

I exchanged some text messages with M and T, trying to ascertain what was going on:

[10:10:07 AM] A says: What did YOU do?

[10:10:15 AM] A says: What the heck?

[10:10:34 AM] A says: You were annoying people?

[10:10:41 AM] A says: by talking about the pickup truck?

[10:10:43 AM] M says: apparently

[10:10:44 AM] A says: huh?

[10:10:48 AM] A says: That is annoying?

[10:10:53 AM] A says: I missed something

[10:11:00 AM] A says: Do you understand?

[10:12:46 AM] A says: He even dropped you? what the heck?

[10:13:42 AM] M says: i sent a message to T asking him to give E a message for me lol

(E is the host of the room)

[10:13:52 AM] A says: oh i see

[10:13:55 AM] A says: something nasty?

M sent me this exchange he had with T:

[10:14:16 AM] M says: [10:10:23 AM] M says: do me a favor and tell E that I will not bother his cast anymore with my sensless ramblings and apologize for intruding upon your delicate sensibilities...

[10:10:27 AM] M says: good day sir

[10:10:59 AM] T says: (y) See you next time (handshake)

I did try to come up and talk a few times, but was accused of being M secretly, and was berated for wanting to speak. Finally, after abusing M repeatedly for a few minutes, B asked the host E to let me up, thinking I was M, and wanting to pick a fight with B. When my microphone was turned on, Skype did not function properly and whatever I said did not get transmitted by Skype. This caused the host E and B to engage in more derogatory and derisive comments about M. And my non functioning microphone was shut off again...

I sent M a few final text messages, but he had probably logged off already:

[10:15:30 AM] A says: hmmm

[10:32:56 AM] A says: What the heck did you say?

[10:33:04 AM] A says: Wow they are angry at you

Addendum: I am slowly learning more about B. Today I heard him say that his philosophy of raising children is to use physical means to address problems. As he said "bigger children, bigger hammer". He also said that his family situation is the reason he is a "wino". I recall several instances in the past where he has been severely inebriated and offensive, cursing and insulting others in casts. It all starts to make more sense...