Yesterday, my sister and I visited our favorite jewelry shop, Nobel Jewelry in Santa Monica. From the outside it looks like a hole-in-the-wall kind of place, but inside it is a glittering wonderland of beautifully displayed antique jewels. You can get a chain repaired for a few bucks, or you can purchase an Art Deco diamond engagement ring for $20,000. You can also chat with the owners, Ken and Kia, a pair of charming guys who emigrated from Persia with their family when they were boys.

So my sister had some things that needed repairs, and I wanted to argue about rings, and as we prepared to leave, Ken asked if we wanted to see a diamond he’d just acquired. It was a ring he had to get from the window, a spectacular European cut diamond solitaire. He offered up his jeweler’s loupe so we could appreciate its unique properties.

I asked Ken if I could use the loupe to look at the splinter in my thumb, which has been driving me nuts. I got it from an attack by a potted cactus on my front porch, nearly a month ago. My husband  couldn’t extract it and neither could I. I had gone to my doctor to get it out, and she ended up saying, “I think I got it but maybe not all of it.”

She didn’t get “all of it”, as it was getting swollen and now I could barely use my thumb.

So Ken said, “You have a splinter? Let me see!” He seemed concerned. He looked at it and said, “That must hurt.” He looked through his loupe and exclaimed, “That’s been in there a long time!” Then he announced, “I’ll get it out for you.”

He disappeared into a back room and my sister looked at me with fear and wonder. She asked me if I was really going to proceed with this. Ken came back with some alcohol, a needle nose tweezers and a visor thing with goggles. He bent over my thumb and started to work.

It took a while. It hurt but I trusted him implicitly, such was his confident and gentle manner. While he was at it, a guy came to the shop’s locked iron gate and Ken called out, “I’ll be right with you.” I told him he could stop to let the customer in, but he was lost in his efforts. I told my sister, “Go engage that guy to keep him there! Ask him how his day is going!” But the guy was gone.

Finally, Ken got the splinter. He said triumphantly, “No wonder this hurt.” He lay the splinter on my thumb and told my sister to take a picture with her phone. We both said FUCK! appreciatively; it was a long sharp cactus thingy.

Ken got some antibiotic cream and covered the hole in my thumb. I got a band-aid from my purse and he wrapped it around my thumb. Now Ken and I were bonded forever. We were both elated. He revealed that he was all too familiar with splinters, it was part of his work as a jeweler.

We stood in the glow of our shared trust and gratitude, and I tried to remember a fable about a mouse who gets a splinter out of a lion’s paw. I couldn’t remember how it ended. I hoped the lion didn’t eat the mouse for his trouble.

I shook Ken’s hand with my good one, and wandered out of the store, my faith in humanity kindled like never before and knowing that even if I died from a flesh-eating bacteria, it would make a great story.

When did it become a human right to broadcast yourself around the world in real time? If it’s not a right, then let’s admit that humanity is not capable of using this technology responsibly.

You may love the feeling of being a superstar when you go on Facebook Live to talk about your pet peeves or your make-up tips, but the value of that doesn’t come close to the harm generated by live-streamed suicide, torture and murder.

The murder in Cleveland on Sunday was blown up into a huge news story because it was posted on Facebook, whereas brutal, senseless murders take place across America every single day. The most notable thing about the event is that it remained on Facebook for several hours.

I don’ t want to see live murders on Facebook, and I don’t want you to see them either. I don’t want to see torture or rape on Facebook, and I don’t want you to see them either. It is not your right to see these activities. These events are traumatic. It is possible to be traumatized over and over, not just once. Trauma doesn’t work that way.

The fifteen minutes of fame that Andy Warhhol predicted did not refer to live-streaming your stupid life to your cyber-friends. No one could have predicted that it would come to this, that people would mediate every experience and thought through their cellphone. Life is OUT THERE, not in your phone or on Facebook.

But young people who have grown up with the internet are increasingly unable to conduct their lives offline. Everything that matters to them involves their wi-fi connection. And when they are overwhelmed and suicidal, they turn to Facebook Live.

Facebook acknowledges that live-streamed suicide is a problem, but they aren’t willing to give out numbers. There are at least 7 known cases since Facebook went live last year. Mark Zuckerberg pledged to find new ways to tackle this in a recent letter to Facebook users:

“There have been terribly tragic events — like suicides, some live streamed — that perhaps could have been prevented if someone had realized what was happening and reported them sooner.”

Suicide has surged to the highest levels in nearly 30 years. Suicide is devastating for the people who witness it, and could encourage others who are struggling to attempt it, too, says Dan Romer, research director of the Annenberg Public Policy Center at the University of Pennsylvania.

But Facebook has its own suicide ‘researcher’, who insists that

“…cutting off the stream too early removes the chance of someone being able to reach out and provide help. In this way, Live becomes a lifeline. It opens up the opportunity for people to reach out for support and for people to give support at this time that’s critically important.”

God, what self-serving fuckers. They will never give an inch, because their stated mission is that everyone will do everything via their platform: chat, shop, argue, order pizza, make friends, kill yourself and maybe each other.

There are reasons why people want to carry out momentous acts in front of a public audience, and none of those reasons are healthy. The urge to watch these acts might be attributed to “human nature” but human nature is changing. Kids didn’t use to make videos of gang rapes for the amusement of their friends. Kids used to feel horrified by things that are horrifying. Desensitization is a real thing.

Facebook is criminal in its practices, as we all know. Selling data, promoting fake news,  discouraging face to face contact, and broadcasting rape, torture and violent death…it is the fucking devil.

The less you participate, the less power it will have to drag humanity down to zero.

Isn’t is weird to see people going on about their business while a disaster devastates  one part of the world and a ruthless massacre takes place somewhere else? If you follow twitter, the incongruous tweets illustrate how most people go right on advancing their agendas and talking about what they’re wearing or what they ate, NO MATTER WHAT.

I know that humans are wired like this, wired for adaptation to nearly any  circumstances. Instead of celebrating this feature of humanity, I’ve always found it incredibly sad. People survive wars, torture, earthquakes,  amputations, every kind of loss. They learn to  absorb  these tragedies and and for the most past, we expect them to return to “normal.”

Even if we can’t go to Japan to help out, should we shrug it off and go right back to slobbering over shoes or worrying about our Klout scores?

I feel guilty, sad, angry, confused, and conflicted.

In my own life, I can’t move on and get back to business. It feels like a sin to even consider it.  Resilience  seems like a cruel joke.   But that’s what  survival is about.

I wish resilience for the  people of  of Japan, but less resilience for the people of twitter and elsewhere, who haven’t even missed a beat in the rhythm of their daily bullshit.

Thoughts or  advice?

Cat Dancers is the name of a documentary now playing on HBO. It’s also the name of a show biz act consisting of Ron and Joy Holiday and their younger partner, Chuck Lizza. The three of them trained and worked with wild tigers in their act, which pre-dated Seigfried and Roy.

It is a mesmerizing documentary that challenges all sorts of assumptions. The director creates a bittersweet, surreal atmosphere as Ron recalls the excitement of his years on stage with his beloved wife and their exotic pets. When they meet Chuck, a lost young man who ran away to join the circus, he becomes their favorite pet, in a sense. Chuck becomes their lover, forming a romantic triangle that lasted harmoniously for 14 years.

In some respects, Cat Dancers recalls Grizzly Man in its portrait of well-meaning humans who refuse to believe in the boundary between them and the wild animals they love so deeply.

It’s a tragic story that lingers with you like a strange and vivid dream. I’m glad I saw it; It felt like a trip to Mars… a hallmark of a great documentary.

Still under the spell of Cat Dancers, I heard from my friend Romeo that he’d been on a wild pig hunt while visiting his family in Texas. I think it’s okay to kill a wild pig, but I’m not sure if the pig thinks so. Probably not, I’m guessing. Romeo’s email message brought forth a bunch of ads for Wild Boar Hunting. I clicked on one, a big mistake if you’re not turned on by images of fat guys grinning next to huge dead boars.

Then, I was intrigued by an ad for “ethical trophy hunting” in Namibia and Mozambique. Here, you can plan your “safari” where you are guaranteed to get the “trophies” (i.e. dead animals) you want, but by “fair chase only!”

Here is some bastard with his Ethical Trophy!

If Romeo wants a dead pig, by god he deserves it. He just got through a stint in the US Military Forces, protecting us from terrorists. That guy in the photo above, though, is not worth fighting for. Fuck that punk. It’s almost, but not quite, enough to put me off wearing fur.