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I pity the mental state of working-class urban America. And that means most of us. I overheard a random lady at Herald's Square asking her friend why public transit gets such a bad rap, since it "helps the enviroment", frees up traffic, and streamlines day-to-day living. She was serious too.

I'm earnestly sorry she's so damn complacent, because when she suddenly has to start dealing with unpleasant people on the bus or subway she'll get a coronary. Mass-transit commuters can be total assholes. You get them in two varieties, both of which I had to taste yesterday.

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1) The Crazies: These people are either drunk, high, or just have some genuine diagnosis of dangerous mental illness. This isn't me condescending on the mentally handicapped at all; these diagnoses exist for reasons, to categorize how and in what way people are dangerous. It doesn't make me discount them less as people so much as it makes me observe them more readily for signs of immediate physical danger to myself or others. And as for those under some kind of chemical influence, well fuck them, they may need a way to get home without driving but I can't stand how many inconvenience other people with a lousy attitude in the process.

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2) General Disgruntled Folk*: Normal people. Just angry. Often times it doesn't escalate to anything more than words. But anger can have many sources and erupt in different ways, ranging from the petty to the slanderous to the completely vindicated, with weapons being drawn. Again, I blame the stress of working-class living. It was like this even before our economy went to the shitter. I'm kinda scared, since I think I'm skirting this territory myself, but I've managed to keep things on an even-keel. I haven't slapped someone around on the bus or anywhere in public just yet.

In the first case, I was actually on the way to the city, and I brought a lot of things for a martial arts session with my friends. A lot of times you have to stand on the bus and after squeezing through a bunch of people, I managed to get a seat all the way at the back and put my stuff down. There was a man standing in the back and loudly mumbling when I excused myself past him. I could hear him curse me, his day, everyone the bus had to pick up, and mostly the bus driver, who he complained was driving like a snail. When I sat down behind him, he gave me this stupid look like "don't let me flatten you, bitch" before going back to his completely not subtle rambling.

If the bus driver was so slow, why couldn't he just get the number of the bus and report him before he left? He knew he was just being selfish. Again, people are so fucking petty.

AND THEN on the bus ride home that night, a lady with a child opened up most of the windows when everyone was boarding. A man who came sometime after angrily slammed these windows shut complaining about how cold it was. The resulting argument went something like this:

"Who the fuck told you to close those windows? I didn't know you work for the MTA."
"What was that you fucking cow? Take off your jacket. It ain't summer yet it's fucking cold out."
"It's not me, it's my kid, inconsiderate bitch, you didn't see I had a child? Now you forcin' me to expose my kid to this fucking language?"
"Yeah whatever, take off your fucking jacket."
"What? And that's right, you walk to the back of the bus pussy, you don't wanna say this shit to my face. I'll put my foot so far up your ass and push the stick that's up there even further."

She opened one window and left it at that. They would curse each other out and argue for a few more minutes, and then it stopped. But did it end there? Apparently another woman who came on at a later stop got on her case about how cold the open window made her feel. It degenerated into that woman telling the lady with her kid "bitch, don't play with me, I'm from the ghetto too." And the moment I heard that, I just shut my brain to off. Yeahh, I love how people like to play the entitlement card and argue some such other of "my plight is more valid than yours." Real classy.

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I swear to goodness, Stinkmeaner's ghost must have been on that bus.

*- If you want to get into sociology, there's the argument that a lot of urban America is insane or neurotic to some extent but are too prideful and/or poor to get diagnosis. That's for another time and place though.

I'm irked when people generally take things said by a random somebody on the 'net seriously. Anywhere, be it 4chan, Xanga, or Youtube. You will likely never meet said somebody in person, unless you already do. Even then, they will likely be avoidant if they know you know them. To quote Huey from the second season of Boondocks, a squabble's only worth what you're willing to give up for it.

The last thing you want to do is give a troll attention. They feel flattered when you respond to them. You're the better person for not indulging them. You likely have something more important to do, so go do that. If someone trolls you enough to piss you off, the absolute best thing to do is keep your emotions from leaving your fingers and hitting a keyboard. You'll save yourself a lot of time and humiliation by ignoring them.

And honest to goodness, I mean IGNORING them. Don't let them know you recognize or even acknowledge them. You should only be concerned is if they try to cause harm or damage that can leave them legally responsible. That's the time they've crossed the line from "Hey I'm here! Tee-hee!" to "Hey I'm here! Fine my ass or put it in jail!"

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Trolls come in forms and attitudes varied as the people that drag themselves onto the interwebs, so I'm definitely oversimplifying. Nevertheless, that shouldn't even matter if you don't give them the time of day. The internet gives them the perfect poker face after all, so why can't it do the same for you?

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As I write this post, I'm likely leaving my station as contributing editor at Mancouch. I already hear cries of "yay! You were lame!" and I admit, I wasn't (consistently) well-written as I hoped. Or you're probably just trolling? 0/10. Bad trolls, bad. Troll smarter, not harder kthx? Regardless, I had my fun. But something always nagged at me while I've been here.

Figuring out what kind of post should and shouldn't have been on the 'couch was confusing. Mancouch was probably intended as a general interest site for dudes and bros but it quickly ended up attracting female readership, so we accommodated for that too (misogyny ain't cool after all). And with the death of Scandalish and Hardest Level, we were encouraged to fill in for video games and sex-related stuff simply because they were also "guy" concerns on some level.

That said, I found out the hard way originating from HL myself that the nerdier video game posts just don't resonate the same way with the broader audience of Mancouch. And while the sex posts tend to attract loads of attention, a handful of Xangans think we're piling it a bit too heavy on that topic. Said sex posts also gave way to relationship ones that just as many people would prefer stayed on Datingish.

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I like the idea of Mancouch covering different things since it's supposed to be a general interest site. But as long as a post is interesting or funny to frequenters, does it really matter there's no clear-cut way to distinguish what can and can't be posted?

Here's what I think:
1) Realize that you comment, eProp, and most importantly just view the posts you want to, regardless of whether you end up liking it or not. This all has a bigger effect on our site than you think. And I don't just mean Mancouch, this is the same for all the -ishes. Wonder why Hardest Level really went under?

2) Even if we have a quota for posts every week, there's only so many of us at the editorial staff. And not all of us share the same interests. Contribute what YOU want to read on Mancouch instead of complaining that we don't put up cool or intelligent posts, when you very well have the power to do so yourself.

At least this isn't something we've had to worry about in recent days. Instead of the billion Top 10 Lists of hottest chicks in whatever category the past couple of weeks, now we've got topics varying from BBW's, to why science isn't cool in real life, to cutting off a loved one's life support.

3) If you do send us a post, make sure it's well written, just a little bit. You don't have to be like an Alex Pergo or Neil Prospect (though it sure helps), but if we have to spend 20 minutes or more trying to clean up your post, something is wrong.