Hi! There is this major dooshball that I know. All of these guys try to be like him. It is so majorly aggervating. He is always making fun of people and really hurting there feelings. He thinks he is so all that. I wish he would just get a life. What should I do about this? (I don't want to become the mean person who nobody wants to say anything around.)

*~Scarlett~*

-- Anonymous, April 18, 2000

Answers

Depends on who this person is, I suppose. If you've got no particular ties with him, then cut him out. And if you do have ties, well, consider cutting them anyway. Doesn't sound like someone particularly worth hanging around

-- Anonymous, April 18, 2000

Take him out, get him drunk, steal his wallet, go to his house and destroy all his belongings, drive him out into a deserted area and leave him tied to a tree, dressed in womens' undergarments. Then, when when he comes to and hunts you down, deny ever having seen him before in your life. This would take a degree of cunning and determination on your part, but if you've got nothing planned for the weekend it could be worth a try.

Or, just don't hang out with him, or be polite but no more than that, and ask your friends why they spend their time with such a dickhead.

-- Anonymous, April 19, 2000

I believe the term you're looking for is "douchebag".

Other than that, no comment.

-- Anonymous, April 19, 2000

Maybe the key is self-empowerment. Take some kickboxing classes, and the next time he says something you don't approve of, knock him flat on his ass. There's no attitude problem a few good roundhouse kicks can't cure. (grin)

No, seriously, I'd give him a piece of your mind and be the strong one, not the "mean person who nobody wants to say anything around," as you put it. Why put up with something that you know is wrong just to fit in with the group?

I mean, really, if you want to fit in so badly, why not just go down on him behind the bleachers like all the other girls?

Forlaetan

Vain Travails

-- Anonymous, April 26, 2000

Jackie Collins's idea is brilliant. I couldn't improve on it with a week's work, and I just want to say that if anyone ever really, really p*sses me off, I am going to ask Jackie to fly over here and settle your hash.

I also want to say how much admiration and goodwill I have toward Ms. Collins, and how important her good opinion has always been to me. If I have ever done anything to offend her, I hope she will understand that my action was inadvertent and well-intended.

-- Anonymous, April 26, 2000

We've been running around calling each other dooshballs all week. LMAO.

-- Anonymous, April 27, 2000

Doosh! That's the sound kids make when they shadow box each other, like they were the six Million Dollar Man. "Doosh!" "Doosh!" "Doosh!" "Doosh!"

And then you're like, "Oh, yeah? I got a laser gun! Tchew Tchew Tchew Tchew Tchew!"

-- Anonymous, April 28, 2000

Major Dooshball? Isn't he the one in Beetle Bailey always cheating on his wife with Miss Buxley? Oh, that Beetle's found him hiding in the trash can with the banana peel on his head again! Do'h!

This broadcast may not be aired whole or in part without written consent by Major League Dooshball.

-- Anonymous, April 28, 2000

Dooshball, n. Those things you find under the refrigerator you have to keep little kids from, or they shove them up their nostrils, and you feel like the dumbest person who ever lived for taking him to the Emergency Room. The doctor had to pinch Junior's nose, so he could blow the dooshballs out. See also COCOA PUFFS

-- Anonymous, April 28, 2000

C'mon, people. To Scarlett this is possibly a big deal to have to deal with this guy every day. She's taking an personal issue to the right place and asking for help...some advice from people who may have 'been there, done that'. Let's help her figure this out. It's "dooshballs" like the one she speaks of that can make a normal school situation get out of hand with built-up resentment and anger. (Can you spell C-o-l-u-m-b-i-n-e?) Isn't it about time we all take the issues of cliques and good/bad behavior just a leeetle bit more seriously? Laughing off another's problem with problem classmates hasn't exactly worked so well lately, now has it? Besides, it's just downright rude. You can't just say "Don't hang out with him." There's more to it than that, obviously, or she would have done that already! Every school or group that hangs together has one of these "dooshballs". Every dooshball will get older and someday look back and regret being one. You may actually help this guy be a better person, Scarlett, and there *are* people here who want to help you with this, and not just treat you like your problem doesn't matter. Having said all that, so have you already solved it by now? I'm a little late getting into this discussion, sorry. Here's a thought: Try discreetly observing and writing down everything he does that's obnoxious and how it affected the person he aimed it at. When you get a full page, fold it up and put it in his locker or anonymously mail it to him. It would be like holding a "mirror" up to him so that he can see his own horrible behavior in action. It really could help. 'Course, you need to be VERY careful that he doesn't know it's you. What do you think, would this do the trick in a way that won't get anyone shot or beaten up? Scarlett, if you want to email me instead of talking about it on a forum, please feel free.

-- Anonymous, April 28, 2000

Discreetly observe and write down everything he does that's obnoxious, fold it up and put it in his locker or anonymously mail it to him? I think working so hard to try to reengineer someone's behavior is giving a lot of authority to someone you refer to as a dooshball. I think it's much less work to raise your own botulism culture (peas and chicken in a jar under your sink for a couple of weeks), and slip a contaminated Dorito into his locker instead. Plus there's no messy police investigation.

-- Anonymous, April 28, 2000

Are we talking horrible pranks?

Get lots of keys. Write the phone number and/or address of the person in question, with $50 reward tagged to each key and spread them all over town.

-- Anonymous, April 29, 2000

Pranks? Hmmm. I know a guy that put a fresh fish into his obnoxious neighbor's rooftop swamp cooler while the neighbor was away on vacation...for three weeks! The neighbor came home to a mysterious rank odor in the house that he couldn't figure out. My friend took great amusement in watching the poor man looking around under and outside his house for the source of the mysterious and atrocious rotting fish odor. Heheheheheh Not very nice, definitely bad karma, and probably wouldn't work in a boy's locker. If I remember correctly, they usually smell like dead fish already, so it'd be like putting an air freshener in there.

-- Anonymous, April 29, 2000

(1) When the dooshball makes fun of you, act bored. If you show anger at him or try to insult him back, you merely reinforce his popularity, because you show that he's Someone Worth Paying Attention To, and folks like this look for attention as a substitute for having a life.

(2) Make friends with the people who are not trying to be friends with the dooshball.

(3) If you're in middle school or high school (the most common habitat of the wild dooshball), try to get into a college in a medium-sized or large city. This will make it easier to find more non-dooshballs and non-dooshball-syncophants.

(4) Do not enter a Ph.D. program. The modern Ph.D. program is a sort of indentured servitude, where students are subject to the whims of their graduate-school advisor. If you shoot for a Ph.D., and your advisor turns out to be a dooshball, or a person that your advisor makes you work with turns out to be a dooshball, you will suffer years of middle-school-style torment.

-- Anonymous, May 01, 2000