I was surfing the web this morning and came across an article about Stephen Collins allegedly abusing underaged girls several years ago. I am stunned by these accusations. I remember watching Seventh Heaven when I was in Ohio, loving every moment of the syrupy, yet wholesome family drama. Yet there it is... on all the news sites. It is a sad and tragic situation. I feel terrible for his victims. However, there is something very fishy about his ex-wife. There are several questions that have been left unanswered:

1. Why was Stephen Collins' wife recording him in therapy? If he really did do this, it was the therapist's ethical responsibility to report him to the authorities. According to the ethics of Psychologist and Counselors, confidentiality will be broken if the client reveals that he plans to harm himself or someone else. 

2. How did TMZ get a hold of this recording? It was very thoughtful of them to censor the girls' names but how did they get it? If the police had it, did they leak it because their investigation was going nowhere?

3. Did the wife record the session so that she could blackmail him and get more alimony? Her divorce lawyer adviced her to record the session. Why? Why? WHy?

4.The timing of the leak is very suspicious. They have been going through a bitter divorce. she wants more money because she "gave up her career to bring up their only child and is now unemployable." I guess what that means is she can't get those 'young, sexy romantic roles only matronly ones' now. Their daughter was 23 years  old in 2012. She could've gone back to work several years ago if she wanted to. 

5. Her reaction to hearing the information seems strange, like she was acting and pretending. Why were they in therapy? To repair their marriage or to end it? In 2012, when asked about the divorce she said she had been blindsided by the fact the Stephen Collins had left her; the she was "surprised" and "devastated." Faye Grant, the ex-wife, also wished " him the very best in whatever path he chooses to take. Twenty-seven years of marriage in Hollywood is the equivalent of 189 dog years. I was exhausted." That's a bit glib for someone who, "you have to understand", was shocked by the revelations in therapy. When she found out, why didn't she file for divorce? Was she planning to stay with him? She found out on January 19th 2012 and HE filed in April of the same year. Of course in her response she has wiped her hands off the whole thing, claiming she had nothing to do with the leak of this "extremely private recording." Come on, lady! And she "believes he has a narcissistic personality disorder with sociopathic tendencies." Do you really, Faye Grant? What qualifies you to make this diagnosis? She really does seem like a good actress. I'm surprised she couldn't find work.

It hasn't sunk in yet. The question going through my mind is "How did this happen?" This is not going to end well. Is he going to be another hollywood statistic on the suicide watch? If he did do this he needs to be incarcerated and pay for his crime. Is it ironic that he played a priest on TV and several molesters have been priests in real life? I suppose, we will just have to wait and see how it all unravels.

 


The piece below was written by Marina Keegan '12 for a special edition of the News distributed at the class of 2012's commencement exercises last week. Keegan died in a car accident on Saturday. She was 22.

We don’t have a word for the opposite of loneliness, but if we did, I could say that’s what I want in life. What I’m grateful and thankful to have found at Yale, and what I’m scared of losing when we wake up tomorrow and leave this place.

It’s not quite love and it’s not quite community; it’s just this feeling that there are people, an abundance of people, who are in this together. Who are on your team. When the check is paid and you stay at the table. When it’s four a.m. and no one goes to bed. That night with the guitar. That night we can’t remember. That time we did, we went, we saw, we laughed, we felt. The hats.

Yale is full of tiny circles we pull around ourselves. A cappella groups, sports teams, houses, societies, clubs. These tiny groups that make us feel loved and safe and part of something even on our loneliest nights when we stumble home to our computers — partner-less, tired, awake. We won’t have those next year. We won’t live on the same block as all our friends. We won’t have a bunch of group-texts.

This scares me. More than finding the right job or city or spouse – I’m scared of losing this web we’re in. This elusive, indefinable, opposite of loneliness. This feeling I feel right now.

But let us get one thing straight: the best years of our lives are not behind us. They’re part of us and they are set for repetition as we grow up and move to New York and away from New York and wish we did or didn’t live in New York. I plan on having parties when I’m 30. I plan on having fun when I’m old. Any notion of THE BEST years comes from clichéd “should haves...” “if I’d...” “wish I’d...”

Of course, there are things we wished we did: our readings, that boy across the hall. We’re our own hardest critics and it’s easy to let ourselves down. Sleeping too late. Procrastinating. Cutting corners. More than once I’ve looked back on my High School self and thought: how did I do that? How did I work so hard? Our private insecurities follow us and will always follow us.

But the thing is, we’re all like that. Nobody wakes up when they want to. Nobody did all of their reading (except maybe the crazy people who win the prizes…) We have these impossibly high standards and we’ll probably never live up to our perfect fantasies of our future selves. But I feel like that’s okay.

We’re so young. We’re so young. We’re twenty-two years old. We have so much time. There’s this sentiment I sometimes sense, creeping in our collective conscious as we lay alone after a party, or pack up our books when we give in and go out – that it is somehow too late. That others are somehow ahead. More accomplished, more specialized. More on the path to somehow saving the world, somehow creating or inventing or improving. That it’s too late now to BEGIN a beginning and we must settle for continuance, for commencement.

When we came to Yale, there was this sense of possibility. This immense and indefinable potential energy – and it’s easy to feel like that’s slipped away. We never had to choose and suddenly we’ve had to. Some of us have focused ourselves. Some of us know exactly what we want and are on the path to get it; already going to med school, working at the perfect NGO, doing research. To you I say both congratulations and you suck.

For most of us, however, we’re somewhat lost in this sea of liberal arts. Not quite sure what road we’re on and whether we should have taken it. If only I had majored in biology…if only I’d gotten involved in journalism as a freshman…if only I’d thought to apply for this or for that…

What we have to remember is that we can still do anything. We can change our minds. We can start over. Get a post-bac or try writing for the first time. The notion that it’s too late to do anything is comical. It’s hilarious. We’re graduating college. We’re so young. We can’t, we MUST not lose this sense of possibility because in the end, it’s all we have.

In the heart of a winter Friday night my freshman year, I was dazed and confused when I got a call from my friends to meet them at EST EST EST. Dazedly and confusedly, I began trudging to SSS, probably the point on campus farthest away. Remarkably, it wasn’t until I arrived at the door that I questioned how and why exactly my friends were partying in Yale’s administrative building. Of course, they weren’t. But it was cold and my ID somehow worked so I went inside SSS to pull out my phone. It was quiet, the old wood creaking and the snow barely visible outside the stained glass. And I sat down. And I looked up. At this giant room I was in. At this place where thousands of people had sat before me. And alone, at night, in the middle of a New Haven storm, I felt so remarkably, unbelievably safe.

We don’t have a word for the opposite of loneliness, but if we did, I’d say that’s how I feel at Yale. How I feel right now. Here. With all of you. In love, impressed, humbled, scared. And we don’t have to lose that.

We’re in this together, 2012. Let’s make something happen to this world.

I bought myself a new car a few months ago. It was an exciting day. A new start! My previous car brought me so much bad luck, from day one, when an arrogant auto driver hit me on purpose, to the last day, thanks to a motorcyclist who was driving in the wrong direction of a one - way street and another auto driver. I figured that if I could go through the first one year without a scratch I would be okay. Alas.... that was not meant to be.
The sad part is I had nothing to do with a single scratch. Here's what happened:
SCRATCH #1: School van driver knew he was cutting it close when he tried to squeeze past my PARKED car. He could have waited for me to move the car. The school clerk could have called me and asked me to move the car. But nooooo, that would've been too easy. The jackass went past the car twice.
SCRATCH #2:A motorcyclist pulled out from his parking space without looking. I had no choice but to stop. The motorcyclist behind me has never heard of space between vehicles nor has he heard that the journey is more important than the destination. He also did not know how to use the brakes on his own vehicle either. Luckily, there was no dent on the car but it left a dent in my heart and a bit of scraped paint on the car.
SCRATCH#3: I was parked in school in my usual spot. The car was covered. Someone tried to pull something between my car and the hedge. They left me with a souvenir-a torn car cover and some more scraped paint. Again, why take the easy way out and use your brains,right?
SCRATCH #4: I went to the department store and parked in their regular parking area. You would think that the car would be safe there, after all, it is their space and they do have a parking attendant. Boy, did I learn the hard way. No, it is not safe, even if you tip the guy. It happened to the old car too and this guy pretended he couldn't see anything on the car. I should have learnt by now.
As I write this, I feel another little piece of my heart breaking. I also hate cars that have no scratches on them. Damn them! One thing I can definitely conclude is this: I AM PARKING IN ALL THE WRONG PLACES!!!

It's the end of another school year and as usual I have found myself surrounded by things (paper, pencils,packets etc) that I seem to have collected through the year. Now I need to begin the process of getting rid of them. Instead of spring cleaning, I'm winter cleaning. I haven't started the process and I am already dreading it. Tomorrow is day ONE! One question lingers, however-How did it all get here?

I was skimming through the papers this morning and came across an article about an actress Nikita Thukral who was banned from acting in Telugu movies for 3 years by the KFPA (Kannada Film Producers Association) for her role in the marital dispute between actor Darshan and his wife, Vijayalakshmi. Seriously? My curiosity was piqued. I wanted to know what happened to Darshan? Did he get the proverbial slap on the wrist? Of course, he did!

I did a quick web search and found several articles quite easily. It seems this actor Darshan has quite the roving eye and "his philandering ways angered his wife." She left him, took the children and moved to a friend's house. Unable to convince Vijayalakshmi to come home, he sullied his name further by threatening her at gunpoint and hitting her. Drama, drama! So Darshan was arrested; his wife recuperated in the ICU. Celebrities weighed in about how Darshan played and angry man onscreen but off-screen he was actually amiable and the couple seemed quite happy together. Thats what people say about serial killers too-they are so kind and polite, they don't cause any trouble (until they kill someone of course)

An affair usually takes two people. If this alleged affair took place, he is just as much to blame. If he was seduced by Ms Thukral's charms, maybe he is just easy or is really not committed to his marriage or his wife. Or my favorite-he has a sex addiction! After all this is not his first affair.He fell off his wife's pedestal, maybe it's time he fell off the film industry's pedestal. If the industry can survive without Shiney Ahuja, they can survive without Darshan Whatshisname. Why should Nikita bear any such consequence just because Darshan couldn't keep his pants zipped and cannot control his anger? MCPs!!!!!!

Poor Amy Winehouse! The waif-like, troubled singer should have just gone to rehab. Instead she wrote a song about how she said, "no no no." It became a cult classic, an anthem, amongst addicts, who also said, "no no no." Would rehab have saved her? Maybe. Like many celebrities, however, she had too much money, no one to supervise her, an addiction to several bad habits and made too many bad choices.
Poor Amy Winehouse! May she finally rest in peace...

Dear Tori Spelling,

I am sorry to hear that you crashed into a wall as you reversed in your children's school because you were being chased by paparazzi. That's like a reality show in real time. I'm glad to hear that you and the kids are fine. Unfortunately you are not the first celebrity this has happened to and you won't be the last. You asked whether it would take someone's death for these people to stop. Someone already died trying to get away from them. Her name is Princess Diana. Since you've been in showbiz for so many years and have your own reality show where cameras follow you around 24/7, you are aware that this is one of the hazards of the job. So the question is-should you try to get away from them or keep your children safe and alive?

Concerned