I am frankly stunned that there are attorneys who hire people to write their blawgs, manage their Facebook pages, Tweet for them.  I am stunned and I laugh out loud. We pay tens of thousands of dollars for a higher education that is supposed to take our thought process to a higher level and teach us how to write. We then show how little we have learned, thinking we are being smart lawyers because smart lawyers know how to delegate the irrelevant things regardless of how much more relevant we want to be.

While I know I will get irate lawyers writing me about theirs busy practices and millions made in their “Rainmaker” seminars, here it is.  For the record. If  you are an attorney and are paying someone to write your blawg, manage your Twitter account or Facebook page then you know so little about social media and business in general that you could not possibly be having any current success as an attorney.  If you were killing it under the old guard of no one reviewing your bill at 350 an hour, times have changed my friend.  You actually have to put in some real effort using your real time to get clients.

People who might be willing to do business based on a social media contact are no different than the person walking through your office door. They want a personal connection. They want a personal connection and you are sending your P.R. rep to the waiting room to talk to them.  Complete idiocy.

It is a humorous, vicious cycle.  Attorneys who know zilch about social media and have lagging practices hire ghost blawggers and P.R people to do their social media dirty work. No business results and the remedy is to engage in even more social media antics that don’t work.

In the end ghost blawgging is just out and out unethical and indicative of an overall intent to deceive that carries into other areas of your practice.  It’s like taking a case that may get tried and and never telling your client you have never tried a case.

Take my advice.  Fire your ghost blawgger today.  Right now.  This minute.  Now sit down and write something, anything.  Don’t think, just write. Proof-it,  Post it.  You’re on your way…

I don’t heart Hamas but do enjoy the humor of Jennifer Jajeh in her wildly poplar one-person show “I Heart Hamas: And Other Things I am Afraid To Tell You”.

Join me February 9th at 4pm(CT) for the 1st Revolution Rant Broadcast of 2010. Simply point your web-browser to:

http://www.briancuban.com/cuban-live/

Jennifer will be talking about her show and what it really means to “Heart Hamas“.  I took a lot of heat for scheduling Jennifer, being called a “Self-Hating Jew, Hamas sympathizer and a “Bad Jew” That tells me this will be a controversial great show!  Let talk to Jennifer about her show and the line between artistic and political expression.

Here is a little bit about Jennifer and her show, I Heart Hamas”

Jennifer Jajeh is a San Francisco based artist. As an actor, she has appeared in numerous film, television, commercial and theatre productions.  She received her actor’s training at the Lee Strasberg Theatre Conservatory in NYC and the American Conservatory Theatre in SF.

In addition to her work as an actor, she has produced and directed award winning independent film and video projects. Her two short films, “In My Own Skin” and “Fruition”, have screened nationally and internationally in film festivals, museums, art galleries and universities. Jennifer is currently documenting a year in the life of an actor and all the ridiculousness involved in pursuing an acting career in her blog called thefamegame.

With the current ongoing conflicts in the Middle East, the threat of global terrorism, and the never-ending negotiations and hostilities between Israelis and Palestinians, it’s hard not to feel overwhelmed by all of the bad international news.

That’s exactly how Jennifer Jajeh feels. And to make matters worse, Jennifer is Palestinian. Well, Palestinian American. Or more precisely: a single, Christian, first generation, Palestinian American woman who chooses to return to her parents’ hometown of Ramallah at the start of the Second Intifada.

Join her on American and Palestinian soil on auditions, bad dates, and across military checkpoints as she navigates the thorny terrain around Palestinian identity. Weaving together humor, slides, pop culture references and live theater, Jajeh explores how she becomes Palestinian-ized, then politicized and eventually radicalized in a fresh, often funny, searingly honest way.

“I Heart Hamas: And Other Things I’m Afraid To Tell You”, recognized by NYTheatre.com as “a fascinating look into a world we don’t often see or hear about,” made its world premiere in 2008 as a part of New York’s International Fringe Festival. Following strong media praise and audience reception, the play made its San Francisco debut on September 17, 2009 as a co-production with Off-Market Theatres.  Jennifer has recently announced that her show will be taking on the road to Minneapolis, Minnesota.

During a struggle with Officer Park, Grossman got control of  her gun and shot her in the head.

A jury convicted Grossman of first-degree murder and unanimously recommended a death sentence. Taylor, who was 17 at the time, was convicted of third-degree murder and was released in community supervision after serving two years and 10 months of a seven-year prison term.

There is now an outpouring of support in the Jewish community asking the Governor of Florida to commute his sentence to life in prison.  In reviewing the “fact sheet of Amnesty International who opposes the death penatly in general, the main points seem to be as follows:

1.   Ineffective Assistance Of Counsel at Sentencing-The Appeals Court rejected this claim.

2.   A forensic psychologist hired years after conviction called Grossman’s mental state into question as to whether he could act in a pre-mediated fashion or whether his conduct should be mitigated.   Grossman had a “a high level of fear and depression, and parental neglect, abandonment and mistreatment.”

3.   The jury was not presented with evidence that Grossman was high on mind-altering drugs that negated the state of mind needed for a 1st degree murder conviction.

4.   The length of time Grossman has been on death row-24 years.

5.    He has become a devoutly religious Jew and has been a model prisoner.

The U.S. Supreme Court denied an appeal in 2007. The Florida Supreme Court rejected has latest one 11 months ago.

There is no reason for the governor to spare this guy’s life.

His ineffective assistance  of counsel claim has been considered on appeal and rejected.  It is not a proper purview of a Governor for commutation.

A judge has rejected a motion to consider the fact that the jury never heard about  Grossman being on mind-altering drugs at the time of the crime. This decision was proper.  Voluntary ingestion of illegal drugs generally does not negate the element of intent.

If there was evidence that despite the appeals court ruling, the 1st degree conviction was so out-of-whack with the facts I might be on board with looking at that.  That however is not the case here  Mr. Grossman killed a law enforcement officer in the course of her duties.  He knew she was an officer when he killed her.  In my mind, that is 1st degree murder.

His claim of “finding religion” fails as well. He has become a devout Jew gaining the support of Rabbis and Jewish organizations claiming he is a “changed person”.   I am Jewish.  I am glad Mr. Grossman has found his god in our religion.  That does not get him off the needle.  Theological considerations are not a proper criteria is making a commutation decision.  Are we going to commute the sentence of  every prisoner who claims he/she has “found god”?  I hope Mr. Grossman’s god absolves and blesses him in the after-life.  He however has been judged by his peers with due process on earth.

The fact that he has been a model prisoner carries no weight.  That gets him extra commissary and television privileges, not a  pass on the judgment of a jury.

Matthew Grossman, absent new evidence relating to his innocence or guilt or that the sentence is compleltely out of whack with the facts(which they do not appear to be) should be denied commutation and  executed as scheduled on February 16th.

Mark:

On this, the 65th anniversary of the liberation of the Auschwitz Nazi Concentration Camp, I felt this would be a good time to renew my plea to reconsider your decision to allow content which promotes the Anti-Semitic revisionist theory of Holocuast Denial.

This is not a 1st Amendment issue. Facebook has rules. These Rules prohibit hate speech. Holocaust Denial is Anti-Semitic speech. Anti-Semitic Speech is hate speech.  Hate speech leads to hate crimes against not only Jews but Muslims, Gays, African-Americans, and other protected classes. The ghosts of Martin Luther King, Matthew Shepard and Stephen Tyrone Johns can speak all to well to that.

While I agree that Facebook would never tolerate speech as we recently saw on Twitter threatening to go on a “Jew Killing Spree“  history and today’s remembrance teaches us that such sprees have occurred, can occur again and are directly fueled by hate speech.  Let there be no doubt.  Holocaust Denial is hate speech.

There is no dispute that Facebook’s Statement Of Rights And Responsibilities prohibit the uploading of hateful content. It is in black and white. Below is my original letter. I hope you will read it again and think about what hate speech is really all about and what Facebook’s social responsibilities are in providing a platform for and monetizing such such rhetoric.

Below is the letter I wrote to you back in May. Please take another look and think about hate content that leads to horrific hate crimes and what Facebook’s responsibility is in that regard.

May 10, 2009

Mark:

The last 7 days have seen much debate on the issue of Holocaust Denial Groups on Facebook.  There has been a lot of focus on the issues of free speech, open discussion of controversial issues and Facebook Terms Of Service(TOS).

While I have made it clear that I would like to see these groups removed, I have done a poor job in articulating why. I attempted to take a short-sighted, back door “lawyer’s approach” with Facebook by alleging that Holocaust Denial was illegal in other countries and, therefore, a violation of Facebook TOS.  While at the time, these were legitimate issues, I should have focused on the real issue.  The issue of the proliferation of Facebook groups that promote hatred of religious and ethnics groups and the hate speech those groups perpetrate. While you may have your doubts, I submit that this includes those who promote the fringe revisionist theory of Holocaust Denial.

The Holocaust Denial movement  is nothing more than a pretext to allow the preaching of hatred against Jews and to recruit other like minded individuals to do the same.  Allowing these groups to flourish on Facebook under the guise of “open discussion”  does nothing more than help spread their  message of hate.  Is this the kind of open discussion that Facebook wants to encourage?  Is this really where you want to draw your line?

It is undisputed that as a collective , Holocaust Deniers are overwhelmingly antisemitic.  One cannot be separated from the other.   They use a fringe, discredited historical theory as a pretext and rallying point to perpetrate and promote their message of hate using Facebook as  recruiting ground.   By allowing these groups whether they number 1 or 1000, Facebook is not promoting open discussion of  a controversial issue.  It is  promoting and encouraging hatred towards ethnic and religious groups, nothing more.

By claiming open discussion as the rationale for allowing these groups to exist, Facebook is playing games with semantics.  Facebook is taking form over substance to protect their imaginary subjective corporate line in the sand they have drawn.

If Facebook is serious about encouraging open discourse on controversial subjects,  let’s start with Facebook itself.  Let’s talk about the controversial decision to allow Holocaust Denial groups.  Let’s talk about transparency.  Sending out canned email answers or spouting canned corporate-speak in an interview is not transparent.  I would like to see transparency on the specifics of how Facebook went about arriving at this controversial decision.  I would like you to address the following questions:

In a CNN interview,   Facebook representative Barry Schnitt stated:

“It’s a difficult decision to make. We have a lot of internal debate and we bring in experts to talk about it,” Schnitt said. “Just being offensive or objectionable doesn’t get it taken off Facebook. We want it [the site] to be a place where people can discuss all kinds of ideas, including controversial ones.”

Mark, I would like to know who at Facebook was involved in the “internal debate”  that resulted in the decision that Holocaust Denial does not constitute hate speech.  Were you involved?  Do you offer any input in these types of discussions?  How does Facebook define “internal debate”? How many people were involved?  What was their expertise to discuss this issue?  Did they bring their personal beliefs to the table?   What safeguards were employed to ensure objectivity in a decision that is innately subjective?  Were attorneys consulted that have experience in such matters or was it general counsel?  Do you agree that something can be legal but still constitute hate speech?  Was the final decision yours?  Did the buck stop with you?

I would also like to know what experts were consulted on this issue.  Were any Holocaust Denial experts consulted?  Were any experts on antisemitism consulted?   Were any hate speech experts in general  consulted?  If so, I would appreciate it if you would identify these experts spoken of by Barry Schnitt in his CNN interview.

Finally, Mark, in an interview for the CNET blog “Technically Incorrect”, Barry Schnitt stated:

“One thing to consider that someone actually mentioned in the thread was the idea that there may be a benefit to having these ideas discussed in the open. Would we rather Holocaust denial was discussed behind closed doors or quietly propagated by anonymous sources? Or would we rather it was discussed in the open on Facebook where people’s real names and their photo is associated with it for their friends, peers, and colleagues to see?”

Is this an official corporate statement from Facebook on how Holocaust Denial should be addressed in society?  What kind of open discussion was Mr. Schnitt talking about?   How was he defining  “open discussion”?  How does Facebook define “open discussion”?  What experts did Facebook consult in coming to the conclusion that “open discussion” was the most appropriate way to deal with this subject?   Are you aware of the Jewish/Holocaust historical significance of such a statement Mark?   I sent an email to Facebook asking for clarification of his statement but received no response other than the canned ,”we received your email”.

Mark, I hope you will take the time to respond to these important questions and issues, not just with regards to the Holocaust Denial issue, but with regards to transparency in how Facebook subjectively comes to these types of decisions in general.

Sincerely

Brian Cuban

©2010 Brian Cuban

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I think this is a great idea.  I am right there with Sam.  I am acutely aware  that Men Do Get Eating Disorders Too.  I know this because for several years I suffered from Bulimia. I experienced the stigma, the unwillingness to tell anyone, the isolation, and the health effects.

I empathize with any male sufferer being too ashamed and embarrassed to seek treatment.  I went through a three year brutal battle with bulimia while a student at Penn State University.   If you think that it is a disease under-reported by men in the 21st century  try being a 21 year old male bulimia sufferer on a college campus of Forty-Thousand in 1981.

Treatment for an eating disorder is for the most part not going to be anything a male 18 year old freshman college student contemplates. I was not about to ask for medical or other help.  I did not even tell my family.   I went through several emotional battles within myself.  There is the overwhelming feeling of shame.  I would have rather told my family I wanted a sex change than I was throwing up after every meal.  You have no context for understanding what you are going through.  You believe that once  you are thin enough to have reached your goal all your social problems will be solved.  Unfortunately the mirror tells you that you are never thin enough.

There is no doubt that in the hot-bod, infinite image explosion,  G-Q generation we live in, men have become more  aggressive in trying to emulate the male model types they see in various types of media.  I never saw it that way.  In the pre-MTV and Directv world of my college days, you were simply not exposed to those types of images to any significant degree.  I equated being thinner with being more accepted and popular.  I was not comparing myself to television and other media images.  I was comparing myself to the people I saw around me on a daily basis.  My perception going through high school was that there were no fat popular kids.  I  was not a model.  I was just your average fat kid trying to fit in and wanting to be popular like the thin kids seemed to be.  I wanted that life.  I wanted any life but mine.  In order to help my weight along I decided to get into long distance running.  I eventually worked my way up to running  10 -20 miles a day, 7 days a week.  I would run 10 in the morning and the same in the evening. I was always training for one marathon or another. When the day was over I scarf down a 2lb bag of peanut M&Ms.  I would then head straight to my next best friend, the toilet, to puke it all up.  This behavior was repeated with pizza, fast food etc. There were days that between not eating, puking after I ate and running long distances I was too dehydrated and weak to even get out of bed.  No matter how much weight I lost or how thin I became I always saw the same person in the mirror.  It was some beastly kid who still needed to drop a few lbs that had no friends.

In the span of one year I went from 230 lbs to 165 lbs at 6′2.  As appealing as that may seem to some, it was a brutal, almost deadly ride that I would not wish on my worst enemy. In my mind being thinner  was the only possible route to social acceptance.  I was not trying to reach some unattainable model goal, I was simply trying to fit in.  The problem is that regardless of why you think you need to either starve yourself or binge and purge the reflection in the mirror never ever changes until you are dead.  About 10 percent of those suffering from Bulimia will ultimately die from the disease.

Fast forward to present day.  Today as I sit here writing this in at 220lbs in 2010.  I still hold the battle scars from my struggles over 25 years ago.  The mirror images fueling the disease also lead to other issues such as alcohol and steroid abuse.  I was able to beat the eating and binging part by replacing it with years of self-exploration and getting comfortable me.  The mental and mirror images will stay with me for life.

Copyright 2010

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YDOP advertises itself as a “Internet marketing firm that provides comprehensive Internet marketing strategies, solutions and tactical implementation to a variety of customers.” I see they represent PA Counseling Services.  Maybe they could work in trade for some counseling on history, maturity, tolerance and good judgment.

As we were chit-chatting and enjoying the visual entertainment, a guy I know entered and walked up to the bar.  He was one of those guys or girls who over the years, you see repeatedly as you and your fixed clique of single, once single and single again acquaintances move through life in a often fluctuating but never really changing mate and date scene.

He was a very good looking guy that always had a very good looking women on his arm.  They however,  always seemed to be the same women.  Not the same in re-hooking up with a previous flame.  The same in that he always seemed to be with a women from the same rotating fixed menu choices that I have seen out on the Dallas scene for the last 10 years.

That night was no exception. In lockstep behind him was  a very attractive women who had also been part of the Dallas “out and about” scene for the last 10 years and had dated nine other guys I know.  I turned to my girlfriend and said:

“That makes perfect sense that they are together”

She inquired as to why.  “Because they are both into group sex”

She was flabbergasted and immediately suspicious.   “How would you know they are into group sex!!”

“Because they run in a group that no matter how many years go by, at one point or another, everyone in the group has dated or slept with everyone else in the group.  Group Sex!!

About three months later I saw the same guy again at a Dallas Mavericks game.  He was with, you guessed it, another group sex girl!

What is it about this “group sex” phenomenon.  Ten or Fifteen years will go by and the dating clique will move right along with it, fluctuating only as people get married, divorced, date and dumped.  Always coming back to the flock like pigeons to a homing beacon.  Keep in mind that this is Dallas, Texas, a large metropolis with plenty of dating options. I suspect it the same in New York City ,Chicago, Miami etc where the dating options are even more expansive.

Any explanations out there?  Is a certain level of insecurity to step outside our comfort zone and into the rejection zone simply part of the human condition?

Copyright 2010

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