February

The two most active threads yesterday were both threads included in yesterday's blog post. So, I'll skip to the third most active thread to start this post. That thread was titled, "Jessa Duggar had an abortion" and was posted in the "Political Discussion" forum. As a topic, the revelation that Jessa Duggar — a rabidly anti-abortion reality TV star — had undergone a dilation and curettage (D&C) procedure following a miscarriage, probably was the most active because there was a second thread about it in the "Entertainment and Pop Culture" forum which I locked. Pro-choice posters in this thread were quick to describe the procedure as an "abortion" and criticize Duggar and her supporters as hypocrites. Duggar backers, on the other hand, argued that the miscarriage caused the death of the fetus and therefore, no abortion had occurred. I haven't read all 14 pages of this thread, but from what I have read, most of it consists of variations of these two arguments. What the thread highlights is the unclear legal environment in which the overturning of Roe vs Wade has left much of the country. Duggar is a resident of Arkansas which prohibits abortion and has strict limitations on D&C procedures. Because so much of the law surrounding abortion relies on individuals' interpretation and judgement, making absolute determinations in cases such as this is difficult. Duggar's supporters were quick to interpret things in her favor while those viewing her as a hypocrite did exactly the opposite. What is clear is that other women in exactly Duggar's condition have been denied the same procedure. Moreover, this highlights another complaint by the pro-choice movement: the wealthy and connected will generally find a way to access such procedures either by favorable interpretations by their doctors or through travel to another state, or even country. The rest, however, won't be so fortunate as we are already learning.

Because I didn't write blog posts for a couple of days, today I'll cover the top threads for the past three days. The most active thread during that period was titled, "Man killed in Tyson’s Corner shooting" and posted in the "Off-Topic" forum. Crime in general has been getting a lot of publicity lately and violent incidents in or near the Typson's Corner mall have been popular, if heated at times, topics of discussion on DCUM. As such, this thread fits perfectly with this trend. The thread was first started on March 22 with a post linking to a WTOP article about the police shooting a suspected shoplifter. Very few details beyond that were available and, apparently bereft of anything more important to debate, posters immediately engaged in an argument about whether a strand of trees where the incident occurred could properly be described as "woods", Beyond that, some posters, despite not knowing any important details of the shooting, immediately weighed in to claim that the police had acted correctly. Others questioned why shoplifting, especially if it is only suspected, should result in the use of deadly force. As more information came out, many of the pro-police posters held firm in their conviction that the shooting was completely proper and that, hopefully in their view, it would act as a deterrent to future crimes. Other posters, however, insisted that they support the police but were still uneasy about an unarmed shoplifter being shot while running away. Those who thought the shooting was unjustified presented a variety of arguments to support their case, but most vocally argued that those who thought death was the proper punishment for a property crime should move to Saudi Arabia. Some posters justified the shooting after the fact by pointing to the victim's criminal history, suggesting that he presented a violent threat. Of course, the police officers would not have known that at the time.

The most active thread yesterday was titled, "My wife is going to lose me" and posted in the "Relationship Discussion (non-explicit)" forum. The original poster says that he is very close to leaving his wife because of a lack sex in their relationship. He says that he does his share of parenting and work around the house, is a supportive husband, and is in reasonably good shape, but doesn't feel like they are a real couple. Posts of this nature are pretty common in this forum and the men rarely get much sympathy. But, responses to this poster seemed especially unsupportive. Many posters told him to just leave and get it over with. Others suggested talking to his wife about it, even if that was just to give a warning that he was considering divorce. The thread is 13 pages long and I don't have time to read it all, but from looking through a few posts one thing I noticed is that responses are sort of all over the place. Some posters have suggestions for fixing things but many feel that there is no repairing the relationship. Some posters accuse him of having the wrong priorities and blame him for any problems. These topics always attract both posters who believe that sex is an obligation in a marriage and those who do not think it is something that should be expected. Posters representing both views makes appearances in this thread, but there is a big variety of opinions between these extremes.

Starting off today I would like to thank everyone who posted condolence messages in response to yesterday's post about my brother Doug. That meant a lot to me and I greatly appreciate it.

Since I didn't cover Thursday's most active threads yesterday, today I'll look at the most active topics over the past two days. The most active thread during that period was titled, "My wife is furious with me for not standing up for her when my brother told her off" and posted in the "Relationship Discussion (non-explicit)" forum. The original poster goes to some length to describe a conflict between him and his wife. This is the second marriage for each of them and the original poster has one daughter from his previous marriage and his wife has three daughters. The original poster's brother has no kids, but has repeatedly taken the original poster's daughter on exotic trips around the world. His wife's children are jealous of the trips and would like to be included, an idea that the original poster knows is a non-starter with his brother and he warned his wife not to bring up. Nevertheless, the original poster's wife went behind his back to ask his brother to include her daughters in an upcoming trip. The brother responded very rudely and the original poster's wife now wants the original poster to stand up for her. He doesn't want to do that because he feels his wife was wrong, but he is now sleeping in the guest bedroom and wants advice about what to do. Many posters suspected this was a troll thread or copied from Reddit. I have no evidence to support either allegation. However, the original poster only seems to have replied once, which is sort of strange in a 17 page discussion. Most of those responding side with the brother, though some believe that he was unnecessarily rude. A few posters believe that the original poster's relationship with his wife is more important than his relationship with his brother and, therefore, all of the children should go on the trip or none of them. Of course, this being the relationship forum, several posters immediately told the original poster to get a divorce — advice that could be expected regardless of the circumstances.

Yesterday was a day on which people around the world gathered around their televisions for one of the most watched events of the year: the broadcast of Super Bowl commercials. So naturally, the most active thread on DCUM was titled, "Super Bowl commercials". Posted in the "Entertainment and Pop Culture" forum, the thread managed to rack up 13 pages in just over 12 hours. Pretty amazing considering that most of our users were asleep during much of that time. Started with a prompt by the original poster to discuss the commercials, the thread is mostly a collection of opinions about the ads that appeared during the football game. Many users expressed dissatisfaction with all of the ads, opining that none of them were very good. Others found favorites, with the Dunkin' commercial being praised by several posters. Probably the most controversial ads of the evening were the "He Gets Us" ads promoting Jesus. Many posters pointed to the right-wing, evangelical Christian groups behind the ads, especially the family that owns Hobby Lobby. This provoked criticism from both liberal-leaning and anti-religious posters. However, posters who supported the message of the ads spoke up to defend them. Two commercials that featured dogs, one by the Farmer's Dog and the other from Amazon, were lauded by multiple posters. The Remy Martin ad featuring Serena Williams provoked some debate over the appropriateness of an athlete promoting an alcoholic beverage. At some point the thread was temporarily hijacked by discussion of the half time show and Rihanna's apparent pregnancy, though there was an entire separate thread devoted to that topic. One or two posters even posted about the game that periodically interrupted the commercials.

The most active thread yesterday was the thread about The Satanic Temple offering abortion services. I've already covered that thread so I'll move on to the next most active thread which was titled, "Uninvited from Super Bowl party" and posted in the "Off-Topic" forum. The original poster explains that her husband commands a military unit that has an annual Super Bowl party. The original poster, who has been feeling lonely and isolated, was looking forward to attending the party. The host of the party was scheduled to be on duty during the game, so the original poster's husband volunteered to take his shift. Subsequently, someone else — it's not exactly clear who — emailed the original poster's husband, copying the original poster, to say that due to capacity reasons the original poster and her children could not be hosted this year. Many posters found this behavior by whomever sent the email to be appalling and shockingly rude. Some of those went so far as to propose retaliatory ideas such her husband withdrawing his offer to cover the host's shift. While the original poster and her family had attended the party in previous years, this was the first year that her husband held the command position. Some posters suggested that those attending the party were planning to relax and maybe engage in gossip and didn't want the boss's wife around. As such, they argued, the original poster should not take this as a personal slight. It was just something that went with the job. They further hypothesized that the previous commander's family did not attend and that the original poster should not have expected to have been invited this year. Beyond that, multiple posters urged the original poster to focus on why she was feeling isolated and lonely and to work on fixing that rather than worrying about the Super Bowl party.

Yesterday's most active thread was titled, "How do you stay married to an ASD HFA Aspergers husband?" and posted in the "Relationship Discussion (non-explicit)" forum. The original poster writes that her husband was recently diagnosed with Autism Spectrum Disorder (ASD), something that she says explains the problems they have had in their marriage. She wants to stay married but doesn't know how she can do it given the difficulties that she attributes to his condition. She asks if others have made such a relationship work and, if so, how? This is a controversial topic that has come up repeatedly in the last several months. The controversy begins with the name of the condition, something the original poster demonstrates by using three different terms to describe her husband's diagnosis. Traditionally referred to as Asperger's Syndrome, this condition was later referred to as High Functioning Autism, but is now called Autism Spectrum Disorder Level 1. Regardless of what it is called, several posters attribute problems in their marriages to the diagnosis. An immediate point of dispute concerns why these women didn't notice the symptoms in their husbands earlier. This leads to a debate about whether those with ASD are able to "mask" or hide their symptoms. This highlights a paradox. Those with ASD are prone to difficulties in social communication and trouble reading social cues. Yet, these same individuals are allegedly capable of faking a persona for for long enough to get married. Some posters don't buy this scenario. Moreover, one poster strongly believes — and "strongly" cannot be emphasized enough — that "ASD" is being wrongly used to describe behaviors that have nothing to do with the condition. In this poster's view, the men being described are not on the spectrum, they are just jerks. Intermixed within these various debates are some helpful suggestions and advice for those involved in such relationships. But, of course, even the lessons posters have learned from their own experience are disputed.