John Jacob Jingleheimer Schmidt

[cinema_babe]

When I was kid my mother used to tell us, "Your name is not just your name; it's not yours to do whatever you want. It was clean when you got it from your father and you are responsible for keeping it clean for your husband and children. And when you get married, you're responsible for your husband's name too".

As much as that annoyed me as a child, I realize she had a good point.

When people go rogue, for whatever reason, their friends and families end up as victims as well. Their names and faces are shown by the media and you know their neighbors look at them and wonder about them too. Who wants to be known as the parent or sibling of a terrorist? Who wants people pointing are you and saying, "hey, wan't that the guy who was at your wedding?"

Even if some of their family supports them, you know there are those who don't. I just saw this man's aunt on TV holding up a picture saying how she wants to know what proof they have. Their father is apparently saying the young men were framed. So now they run the risk of either being terribly humiliated by the mens' actions or looking crazy for defending a couple of terrorists. The one who was killed apparently has a child so now there's an innocent kid who will have to live with what Daddy did.

Mom was right, your name really isn't just your name is it?

John Jacob Jingleheimer Schmidt,
His name is my name too.

Whenever we go out,
The people always shout,
There goes John Jacob Jingleheimer Schmidt.

Comments

[emmabovary.livejournal.com]

I was recently thinking along these same lines, but not sparked at all by anything so horrific:

In our small town in Normandy, this older (65-ish) woman and her husband + a teenage male made an amateur porn put up a well-known French site. It was the talk of the village (which is how I knew about it).

The woman works for a building supply company who is now affected by her acts (people coming in and out of the place all the time, just to have a look at her, not to buy). The owner is quite embarassed but can't take legal action, obviously.

The couple's daughter is a hairdresser on the town square; the son also works in the community. They are completely mortified by what their parents did, and put up on the internet, the world's largest agora.

I never really thought about it, but of course porn participants have kids, parents, family, employers (sometimes), etc. All these people deal with the consequences of the porn participants, amplified if it takes place in a small village. It really is their name that gets sullied by association, yes.