Submissions sent into projectunbreakablesubmissions@gmail.com from Central Michigan University, taken March 19th.
(via upworthy)
after a twitter-conversation tonight, i posted a new blog.
“on internet hatred: please inquire within.”
you can find it at http://bit.ly/blog010513 - but i’d also like for you to comment. please give it a read, and share it wherever you like to share.
love.
I think this blog, and the amazing comments that follow it are real and important and eye-opening. BUT warning: it contains bullying and suicides and very real trigger issues.
The Aokigahara Suicide Forest
The Aokigahara forest has the unfortunate distinction as the world’s second most popular place to take one’s life. The first is the Golden Gate Bridge in San Francisco. Since the 1950s, depressed Japanese citizens have wandered in, and at least 1000 of them haven’t wandered out. In 2002, 78 bodies were found within the forest, exceeding the previous record of 74 in 1998. In 2003, the rate climbed to 100, and in recent years, the local government has stopped publicizing the numbers in an attempt to downplay Aokigahara’s association with suicide. In 2004, 108 people killed themselves in the forest. In 2010, 247 people attempted suicide in the forest, 54 of whom completed the act.
Japanese spiritualists believe that the suicides committed in the forest have permeated Aokigahara’s trees, generating paranormal activity and preventing many who enter from escaping the forest’s depths. Complicating matters further is the common experience of compasses being rendered useless by the rich deposits of magnetic iron in the area’s volcanic soil.
Due to the vastness of the forest, desperate visitors are unlikely to encounter anyone once inside the so-called “Sea of Trees,” so the police have mounted signs reading “Your life is a precious gift from your parents,” and “Please consult the police before you decide to die!” on trees throughout the forest.
The place has long been associated with death. Ubasute, literally translates to ”abandoning an old woman.” Ubasute may have been practiced there into the 19th century, and the forest is reputedly haunted by the Yurei (angry spirits) of those left to die.
(via odditiesoflife)
LINK IS IN THE TITLE
Dear anyone and everyone,
This is the account of one of my closest friends in the whole wide world. We’re trying to spread the word about her story, because this kind of thing happens much, much more often than anyone knows. It’s scary stuff, but please, spread the word. Show your friends, tell you family, especially those who are in college or college-bound. If you feel compelled to do so, then by all means tweet it, facebook-share it, re-blog it, but most especially: read it.
Thank you.
It’s strange: with the UK going through twists and angry self-inspection over the Jimmy Savile case (where a serial abuser appears to have got away with it for over 40 years on an almost unimaginable scale, because the power and fame disparities between himself and his victims meant that they were never taken seriously when they did have the guts to complain,) and after posting something like Neverwear’s account the other day, something like this leaves me fuming, but also puzzled that an institution would want things like this swept under the carpet. When the facts come out they cause more damage to the institution, and in the meantime it just causes more hurt to the victims.
For those of you who missed it. Perhaps this will make more sense of Cat’s poem.
4 am [Trigger Warning]
4 am
he broke in
bitter
with the moonlight.
she woke up, no one else home.
she had never seen him before.
when he kicked the cat across the room
she knew he had come for her.
her shattered leg,
in a cast from
her motorcycle accident
gave him no pause.
he was not ugly to look at
but he held a gun,
threatening,
he told her he was going to kill her anyway.
she said,
no,
with tears in her voice,
but
she did not cry.
she was only 21.
As her raped her,
he told her
he had been watching her, waiting.
waiting until no one else was home.
she could not see him,
he was behind her,
but she
could feel
the cold steel
against her temple.
he was behind her,
hurting her
but she she was gone.
after,
he stood up and
pushed the blond hair out of his eyes.
he said, where is the money.
flat, like that, a statement.
she looked up at him
from far away
and said, what money-
look around you
there is no money here.
but he
found the five dollars
in her little green wallet.
and before he left,
gun still aimed at her head,
he threw that crumpled bill down and said,
you keep this money baby
you need it more than me.
he told her
to count to one hundred
before she moved, that he would be watching her.
she looked at him no more.
after he left
she couldn’t talk or drive,
rocking back and forth.
she was sick over and over again.
sickest she’s ever been.
Later
her friends made her call the cops
where she was raped all over again,
and they kept that five…
they kept that five dollars for fingerprints.
Later still.
she came up pregnant.
no question in keeping this child.
with heart heavy,
she lied to the “support group”
that she and her “boyfriend” weren’t ready,
were not ready for children.
after all,
she was only 21.
Now, years in the future,
childless still.
haunted still,
by the face
and actions
of a man
who was never caught.
the words of the politicals,
“forcible rape”
makes her (me) sick all over again.
Sickest I have ever been.
-Cat Mihos
I just read this and I cried. Cat’s probably the gentlest, sweetest person I know. I’m proud of her for writing this.
my comic about rape jokes.
i’ll go back to dumb cartoons of ugly people soon i swear
IN MY ROOM
Like she says, Trigger Warning. But astonishing, human, cathartic.
I’ve seen what she’s been doing with things like this during the new show, and it’s so moving.
we’ve been rehearsing a song for tour that usually needs audience participation.
and since we didn’t have an audience during our dry tech run at bard the other day (usually we collect pieces of paper in the lobby), i figured i’d reach out via twitter to just grab a few pieces of text to use instead. it started an avalanche. i don’t usually cut and paste together a whole twitter-storm, but this one was just….too….awesome.
trigger warning for survivors of rape/abuse.
………
so.
it started with this simple prompt:
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quick, I need this for experiment! tell me in one tweet something sad/bad that happened in your bedroom. (no humor, won’t work) GO#InMyRoom
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…..and people starting sending them in. i only needed about 20 to make the stage moment work.
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THESE ARE GREAT. keep em coming
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these aren’t ALL of them….just the ones i retweeted. there were thousands.
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@amandapalmer I spent a night composing a too-late love letter to a boy who had killed himself three hours earlier. #InMyRoom
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@amandapalmer Woke up in the middle of the night, pillow soaked. Thought I had been sleep-crying, but then saw it was a nosebleed.#InMyRoom
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@amandapalmer He rang me 27 times when I fell asleep and left voicemails saying he was crying outside. It was the 5th time that week.
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Matthew MacDonald @MattMacD666:
@amandapalmer mom walked in on me masturbating (more than once) #InMyRoom
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@amandapalmer #InMyRoom I broke a glass ballerina which was the only memento I had of my grandmother
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@amandapalmer Awoke from a nap to be told a man I loved had hanged himself. (Too dark?)
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Hannah Wilks @newwordsplease:
@amandapalmer My dad told me he’d had an affair with a woman not my mother, his wife. I was maybe 10. I went straight to sleep.
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@amandapalmer I realized I didn’t love my best friend. #InMyRoom
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Anthony Ridley @AnthonyRidley:
@amandapalmer when i was 6 i was awoken by my house on fire. I got out, my brother didnt. 25 years ago yesterday #InMyRoom
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Chell Lee Dunphy @Chell_Dunphy:
@amandapalmer I used to cry myself to sleep every night #inmyroom
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@amandapalmer my mother woke me up to tell me my brother was dead. #InMyRoom
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@amandapalmer I tried to kill myself by OD’ing #InMyRoom
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@amandapalmer #InMyRoom nothing ever happens
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Jackie Reuter @JackieMReuter:
@amandapalmer developed paralyzing fear of centipedes after waking up with one 4 inches from my face #inmyroom
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@amandapalmer My room was always my preferred place to cut myself.
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@amandapalmer From childhood through my teenaged years, I cried myself to sleep most nights. #InMyRoom
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Janelle LaMarche @_ModernLover:
@amandapalmer I got punched in the face by my ex-fiancee and had to have surgery on a broken nose, #inmyroom
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@amandapalmer #inmyroom My wife told me we had a miscarriage.
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@amandapalmer realized I wanted out of a potential arranged marriage on the day he was coming to visit. #InMyRoom
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@amandapalmer My girlfriend broke up with me #InMyRoom - and suddenly it wasn’t our bedroom any more, just hers.
Brittany Boosh @BrittanyBoosh:
@amandapalmer one of the saddest days in my life was taking all the posters off my wall & packing when my parents got divorced.
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@amandapalmer #InMyRoom fucked all day, to distract from sadness. then he used my computer to FB his ex to tell her how much he missed her.
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Weston Verdegaal @Weston_Verd:
I once accidentally sat on my pet rat and killed him :-(@amandapalmer #InMyRoom
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@amandapalmer #InMyRoom she laid in my arms, and told me that we had no future.
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Justin Di Cristofaro @jdicristofaro:
@amandapalmer a cat I was fostering gave birth under my bed. She ate the babies and only left their heads laying in the floor.
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@amandapalmer I hid in my wardrobe one morning.so I didn’t have to go to school. Didn’t work.
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@amandapalmer Vietnam vet father cleaned his gun during flashbacks and walked patrol in his sleep. I’d lie motionless and silent. #inmyroom
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Starting to cry reading the #InMyRoom tweets @amandapalmerrequested. I am falling in love with every person that responded while #inmyroom.
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@amandapalmer I foolishly dance naked #InMyRoom
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Victoria Acataleptic @VicAcataleptic:
@amandapalmer I was woken by police raiding the house for my mothers trafficking sized stash of smack and weed. #inmyroom
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@amandapalmer My dad told me that he was going to ask for a divorce from my mom a year before he did when I was 14#inmyroom
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@amandapalmer I tried to commit suicide in front of my mom#InMyRoom
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@amandapalmer My rat got caught and broke her toe in the cage bars. Realized, sobbing, that I wasn’t cut out to be a mom#inmyroom
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(me too) RT @glitterboo @amandapalmer I would sit in the dark & listen to The Cure’s Disintegration on repeat #InMyRoom
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@amandapalmer my dad told me he loved me but would never accept me #inmyroom
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i didn’t RT all of #InMyRoom tweets, but I read every one of them. I love you. thank you.
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Emily Griffith @theconfuser69:
@amandapalmer sitting in my room, pianist mother calls upstairs and tells me she cut off the top of her finger (drunk) #InMyRoom
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sorry. art hurts. RT @vinylrabbit I don’t like this experiment.
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@amandapalmer My walls are covered in photos of friends I haven’t spoken to in years, I can’t take them down. #InMyRoom
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@amandapalmer Thanks, everybody, for making me cry at the gym!
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@amandapalmer wow such honesty from people with the#InMyRoom tweets. I’m a coward. Too scared of tweets coming back to haunt me.
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@amandapalmer I saw a face staring in my window at me as a small child while playing #InMyRoom
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something else! @HouseOfManyWays:
@amandapalmer #InMyRoom my dad put up pictures of the red, deceased fetus that would have been my brother & had me sleep in there :S
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April Daisy Lee @AprilDaisyLee:
@amandapalmer Passed out drunk every night for a year after realizing the person I loved, didn’t love me #inmyroom
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@QueenBeebo @amandapalmer i wish twitter had a function to hide tweets from everyone but the person intended. Like a dm for a non follower
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acceptance speech time?? RT @psycninjasteven CONGRATS! You take home the gold for Most Depressed Fans!
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*weeps, takes podium* i’d like to thank god and my family. and most of all…my depressed fans. without you, nothing. with you, nothingness.
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mine too. look for the box in the hall at the show… RT @Stevenbogartthese bedroom confessions are blowing my mind. See you mañana.
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TRUE RT @missmorganwho @psycninjasteven Gotta say, I doubt that’s the case. There’s always Morrissey fans.
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PREACH RT @Stroppy_Girl @psycninjasteven Not depressed anymore! Whole lotta living goes on in my bedroom (and everyone else’s)
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PREACHX2 RT @melanieiscushti @psycninjasteven some of may be depressed, but we’re ALIVE and talking about our shitty experiences.
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@amandapalmer I learned that the light from my stereo was my friend. #inmyroom #highschool
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Christine Johnson @cjohnsonbooks:
@amandapalmer Disagree. Life hurts. Art makes meaning out of hurt.@vinylrabbit
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@amandapalmer It’s 2am, dead silent, no one’s awake and I don’t know what to do with the heartbreak you’ve retweeted.
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@amandapalmer I think even if we feel depressed sometimes it helps to know that there are others who understand.
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@amandapalmer sorry if I disappoint, but I’ve never had anything sad happen in my bedroom. I’ve been w/o one for months though
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really. it happens sometimes. like a spontaneously embarrassing boner. RT @FatDork82 i love you. i adore you. but so many tweets… really?
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these #inmyroom tweets have definitely made me feel less alone. life is insane and @amandapalmer makes it even more so.
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@amandapalmer I love all these tweets. They make me feel less lonely and more brave.
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The @amandapalmer retweet extravaganza is breaking my heart. Yet, i don’t feel so alone in my hurt anymore
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Katrina Galore @katrinagalore:
@amandapalmer woke up to a stranger molesting me. I blinked, hoping I was dreaming & he’d turn into my real boyfriend—he didn’t#InMyRoom
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#inmyroom is the most moving thread I have ever read. Thank you to@amandapalmer and all who shared.
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@amandapalmer Pain and shame thrive in the dark lonely. Bring it in the light shows how small and helpless it really is. U bring the light
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Louise Martins @louiseemartins:
@amandapalmer I want to hug every one of your fans for sharing their #InMyRoom stories. Thank you for bringing us together & loving us all.
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love
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Louise Martins @louiseemartins:
@amandapalmer #InMyRoom I finally lost my virginity at age 29 to the guy I truly loved. He broke up with me the next day.
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@amandapalmer I received an ultrascan picture in an MMS accompanied by the text that my ex was aborting it on my mother’s birthday #InMyRoom
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wayne sanders @sweetestcaliboy
@amandapalmer my dad found out I was gay and never looked at me in the eyes again. #inmyroom
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@amandapalmer #InMyRoom I make a decision every morning not to use heroin. Just for today: 812 days.
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@amandapalmer had miscarriage #inmyroom at in-laws house. For years, smell of that room alone could bring back crushing sorrow.
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@amandapalmer Was beaten and raped by my ex-husband while pregnant, causing a miscarriage. #InMyRoom
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@amandapalmer for some strange, inexplicable reason, I have never felt like my room is my own #InMyRoom.
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@amandapalmer heard my roommate kill himself while I was#inmyroom
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@amandapalmer My siblings and I heard my dad beat my mom.#InMyRoom
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Gut-wrenching stories from @amandapalmer’s TL. This stuff is horrifying. lol I want to hug you all #InMyRoom
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@amandapalmer My stepfather would rape me, every morning, for years #inmyroom Now it is the safest most wonderful space
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Jeanette Williamson @DifferentAuthor:
@amandapalmer i’m truly in aw of the outpouring of honesty and love from this feed. I’m proud to be a fan even more so now#Inmyroom
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calling it a night. I can’t believe what’s technologically possible right now. i’m surprised my iphone doesnt give up & just start weeping.
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Angie Bee Hotz @BarefootAngieB:
@amandapalmer powerful snippets of humanity being transmitted tonight. I feel a part of something bigger than myself. #InMyRoom
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.@amandapalmer and her #inmyroom thread is amazing. Go read & get some perspective for your own life. After all we are all#inmyroomtogether
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good night everybody, in every room. if you’re reading this, you’re not alone. we’re here. tomorrow…who knows. another day, another room.
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…..and that was that.
except i couldn’t resist this final moment:
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RT @MikeyLamps Fuck man! Shits too real tho
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p.s. tour rehearsal is officially finished. we start on the 10th in phildephia…tickets at
http://www.amandapalmer.net/shows/ UK is sold out, germany is sold out, it’s all happening.
we’re all braindead. the record is about to be released….in fact it literally just dropped in australia.
i am losing my mind. about to post a huge blog. watch for it, i’ll cross-post here on tumblr. love. evil.
And a Trigger Warning tag now on, as requested by several people.
(via mizzkatonic)
