Authors: Brianna Baker
Little White Lies (12 page)
I’m not sure why I’d thought I could offer something more. It’s not like Coretta and I were going to be pals. Or friends. We’d decided as much. Had I thought I could be some kind of mentor to this girl? Why would she want to follow the advice of a forty-one-year-old ghostwriter who sat on a silver yoga ball and trawled the web all day looking for memes?
If Coretta didn’t want to explore serious issues beyond her own comfort zone, that was her prerogative. If she didn’t want to grow and expand her audience, I’m sure she had her reasons. And they were probably good ones. The kid seemed smarter than me for sure—a lot smarter than I was at her age. If she wanted grown-ups telling her what to do, she could do a lot better than the Dark Lord of the Twittersphere. Her parents, for instance. Her dad was like Matthew Knowles, if he traded his God complex for a Harvard Law degree
and a conscience, and her mother was Brooklyn’s answer to Michelle Obama.
So it was just another job. And if I wanted to keep it, I had better schmooze my client.
I knew what I had to do (well, what Alex had commanded me to do), and I wasn’t happy about it. It had been more than two years since I had actually initiated a phone call that wasn’t for tech support or pizza. The last time was after I mistakenly tweeted as Alec Baldwin a photo of his thenfiancée, doing yoga. It was a big misunderstanding, and we later sorted it all out. (Though, come to think of it, I haven’t worked for a Baldwin since.) But that call had to be made, per Alex’s command, and so did this one.
Since it was her first day back at school after the winter break, I waited until the afternoon.
At 3:04
P.M
., I picked up R$$P. Coretta answered right away.
C:
Karl?
K:
Congratulations!
C:
Oh. Um. Thanks.
K:
Oh, come on. Don’t be so nonchalant. Your first TV contract! This is a big deal! I hope you’ve been celebrating.
C:
A little. I drank a glass of champagne with Mike and our parents after we finished up at Pulse on Friday. And Mike took me to an amazing dinner at Per Se on Saturday. So yeah, I guess I’ve celebrated some.
K:
Champagne and dinner at Per Se. I’d say that qualifies. Don’t get me wrong; I would have been celebrating, too, if anyone had bothered to tell me about it. I had to read the deal report in Deadline Hollywood this morning.
C:
Oh, Karl! I’m sorry. I totally should have shared the news with you. But I was so caught up in the weirdness of everything—the bigness, the strangeness of it all—the way everyone was treating me at Pulse. Like I was a cross between their newfound savior and their latest acquisition. Like I was their fancy new toy, and they couldn’t wait to get me out of the package and start playing with me.
K:
Wow. Pretty awesome.
C:
Well, it would be a lot more awesome if I could get in touch with Rachel. I’ve been so rotten to her lately, and now she’s not returning my calls or texts OR my emails, and she wasn’t even at school today—
K:
Coretta, I’m really not the person to talk to about Rachel. But like I said, congratulations. I mean that. And don’t worry about not telling me sooner. I mean, at all.
C:
Are you okay? You sound mad or something.
K:
Not mad in the least.
C:
Really? Because I’m sorry, what more can I say?
Between the insanity of Friday, and spending all weekend being worried sick about my best friend, I’ve been a little distracted, okay?
K:
No, really. It’s fine. This isn’t about me. It’s about YOU.
C:
Thank you. And I’m glad you said that. I still need your help, Karl.
K:
You sure about that?
C:
What do you mean? Of course I still want you to help me. Everyone at Pulse loved your Beyoncé post.
K:
Oh? Well, that’s nice.
C:
I’m serious, Karl. I still need you. But things are on a whole new level now. From today forward, I can’t have you posting anything without getting my approval first. Understand?
K:
We already had this conversation, didn’t we?
C:
Well, yeah … but things are different now. Everything that goes on the blog or on Twitter has to go through the proper channels at Pulse TV first.
K:
Of course. It’s Pulse TV. This is the big time.
C:
Right. Well. Good. I’m glad you understand.
K:
I understand perfectly.
C:
From now on, every new blog will take the format of the TV show until we launch the actual show in March. After that, the show and the blog will be fully integrated. We will start with an issue that I select—with the help of the Pulse people, naturally.
K:
Naturally.
C:
Then we’ll come up with a new Lie to fit the issue. I do my social commentary, inspired by the Lie of the Week. And finally, we bring on a kid who has a problem that’s related to the issue. And I give them sort of one-on-one counseling.
K:
Which you’re qualified to do, based on the advice columns you’ve written for your blog.
C:
Exactly.
K:
Well. That sounds perfectly … perfect.
C:
Yeah. I think it’s going to be great. The people at Pulse were really into the stuff I did on bullying back in October. They’ve got a big anti-bullying initiative. So they’re anxious for LWL to do a lot more with that subject.
K:
It sounds like you’re on the right track.
C:
Thanks, Karl. I’m glad you think so. I’m really happy that you want to be on board for this. This is going to be so amazing! My own TV show.
K:
Yep, your own TV show. Amazing.
C:
I know, right?
K:
Right. Anyway, I just wanted to wish you well and make sure everything is copacetic. Please let me know what I can do to help.
C:
Thank you, Karl. I will. Let’s talk soon, okay?
K:
Yes, soon!
C:
Okay, bye!
K:
Bye!
Ahem. Not exactly a successful schmooze session. Coretta had failed to pick up on my very obvious sarcasm, but that wasn’t the most annoying part. She sounded dangerously out of touch with who she was. Like she was trying to convince herself that she had done the right thing.
Maybe she really believed that. The old Coretta wouldn’t have, but what did I know about the old Coretta, really?
It seemed to me that the best days of
Little White Lies
were already behind us. Still, I was contractually obliged to assist her via my conduit at AllYou™, one Alex Melrose. I was a professional. I was THE HELP. If Coretta White was
happy to have her web platform hijacked by a creepy set of twins holding a giant sack of money, I was still going to be there for her. And if she and Pulse TV wanted more ammunition to wage their War on Bullying, then that was exactly what I’d give them.
Exactly.
Coretta (January 8–10, 2014)
I woke up from a bad dream. I couldn’t quite remember what it was or why it was bad. It was about … someone or something was coming to get me. I only remembered that I was running for what seemed like forever and didn’t think I could run anymore. I woke up just when I was about to find out.
I had been having more nightmares as of late, but I guess that’s what happens when you’re hustlin’ each and e’ery day.
That’s a joke. Ha. Ha.
I was glad to be awake. I was glad to listen to the comforting, mundane, albeit odd sounds of my parents discussing whether they should finally redo the bathroom in the hall. Why is this a conversation one needs to have at 7
A.M
.? We can’t know.
I grabbed my phone to see what the world of social media had for me that morning. Another shooting in the news, Miley Cyrus did something else inappropriate, and then …
I saw, and barf rose up my throat.
tumblr
.
LITTLE WHITE LIES
January 7, 2014
The Beauty of Cyber-Bullying
“Progress is impossible without change, and those who cannot change their minds cannot change anything.”
—George Bernard Shaw
Today, instead of a Little White Lie, I’m going to start with the Truth.
A few months ago, I wrote my first-ever response to a reader seeking advice. The subject was bullying, and naturally my response came from an anti-bullying stance. Naturally. But I was so young then. Now that I am older, I am compelled to report that on the matter of bullying, I have decided to switch positions from
Con
to
Pro
.
Just for the record, I remain adamantly pro-choice (but still a virgin, Mom and Dad! Don’t worry!), I still support legalization of marijuana (even though I’ve never tried it), and I continue to oppose the death penalty (haven’t committed any violent crimes yet; fingers crossed!).
Some of you may be thinking, “
Pro-Bullying?!
WTF?” Please hear me out. And don’t worry, I’m not going to waste our time together arguing all the most salient points my pro-bullying sistren and brethren have already well established, e.g.:
• Bullying serves an essential social function. It toughens kids up for the hard knocks they’ll suffer for the rest of their grueling lives.
• Trying to rid the world of bullies is just another lame attempt at inclusion and equality along the lines of “everybody wins a trophy.”
• Labeling bullies as “bullies” and victims of bullying as “victims” does more long-term psychological damage than the bullying itself.
• The best way to deal with a bully is to punch him in the nose; i.e., Stop Snitching and Join the Fight.
Now that we’ve made it through Pro-Bullying 101 (any converts yet?), I will proceed to the more subtle points of my reversal. Mine is
not
an ANTI-Anti-Bullying stance, but
PRO
-BULLYING. Specifically, I would like to concentrate on promoting dynamic new bullying possibilities thanks to a platform that I know a little something about: the Internet.
Let’s no longer think in terms of Bullies and Victims; on the Internet, we are all potential bullies and victims. If you only take one thing away from this post, it’s this: if we all work together, We Can Change the World with CYBER-BULLYING.
For starters, let’s get rid of the noun and stick with the verb. (Technically a gerund, but gerund is not a word you want to throw around in conversation.) Let’s stick with the all-purpose description of an action. Like “friending.” If “bully” can become a word like “friend,” CYBER-BULLYING can be the great new equalizer. CYBER-BULLYING takes the word away from the strong and puts it at the fingertips of the weak, the average, the powerless.
Like “friending,” bullying used to require some form of real or perceived power. The classic playground bully uses his size and strength to intimidate and abuse. But plenty of other bullies wield more insidious sources of power: social status, socioeconomic advantage, sex appeal … much like “friends.”
See what we did there? No more “labels.”
Sure, CYBER-BULLYING may come easier and be more damaging if the aggressor has a large Twitter following. (Welcome to my Bully Pulpit!) But any one of my schoolmates can wreak plenty of emotional havoc with just 15 minutes and an anonymous email address. And just as power is no longer a prerequisite, weakness is no longer required of the bully’s intended Victim. Or Target, if you will. With CYBER-BULLYING, you can target the strong as well as the weak. In fact, TARGET™ just got cyber-bullied a few weeks ago!
Don’t like a corporation? Get online!
Don’t like an entertainer? Get online!
Don’t like a blogger like me? Get online!
Get online and start
BULLYING
.
If EVERYONE would just begin Cyber-Bullying IMMEDIATELY, with RECKLESS ABANDON, then before we know it, our entire online presence—both individual and collective—will be awash in a sea of senseless negativity. Dare I say we have already become awash in a sea of senseless positivity with “friending” and “liking”? Oh, yes; I have already said it.
As for those few voices—the lonely and truly sadistic cyber-bullies (lower-case), lurking in the shadows of their dark little rooms, eager to sling their sticks and stones—we will no longer give a damn about them. Only when WE ARE ALL CYBER-BULLIES will the slut-shaming blubberheads and self-righteous comments section hate patrol cease to exist.
A final thought: I was pleased to see a recent item on Pulse TV about their nonprofit NGO SKOOLS 4 ALL. Or #S4A, as you might know them on the Twitternets. They are launching an initiative to provide children in Africa between the ages of 12 and 18 with their own laptop computers. They are currently distributing brightly colored “portable schoolhouses” (a
euphemism for backpacks) through an ambitious “nationwide pilot program” in the Central African Republic.
According to the #S4A website, each backpack will include a rugged solar-powered laptop outfitted with a direct satellite Wi-Fi connection, promising that “Soon, every student in every village in Africa will be truly connected.”
And seriously, folks, just imagine if every one of those millions of lucky African children could use that shiny new laptop for CYBER-BULLYING. We would all be that much closer to becoming a World United as One.
While it is imperative to Think Globally, we also must Act Locally. Which is why I urge each and every one of my readers—yes, I’m talking to YOU!—to please START CYBER-BULLYING TODAY!
What in the hell did “I” just write? Had Karl lost his mind? I’d
just
told him that he couldn’t write something without
my
approval, which would then require the Skool twins’ approval. And of all things, he writes something in favor of bullying? And promotes their nonprofit as a mechanism for the spread of bullying?!