New Jersey Build-A-Bear Store Manager Considers Quitting In Order To Avoid Middle Schoolers Filming TikToks In Store

-
News In Brief

WOODBRIDGE, NJ-- Overwhelmed and exhausted, 42 year old Build-A-Bear Workshop store manager Karla Donnell quickly rushes out of the Woodbridge Center Shopping Mall employee entrance to take a smoke break after having to ask several pre-teen aged girls to stop filming TikTok videos in her store. After arguing with the middle schoolers back and forth, while they actively ignored her in favor of practicing their "Renegade" dance remix for the camera of an iPhone 11 Pro Max, she finally got them to leave once she threatened to have them banned from the mall for breaking the no filming policy. Taking a drag from her cigarette, Karla dazedly explains the issue. "This is the 3rd time this week I've had to threaten these kids to get them to stop filming TikToks here.. and it's only Tuesday. Do these kids even have school? Or parents?" This isn't a Build-A-Bear central problem as well, almost every store in the Woodbridge Center has reported being overrun with eleven-year-old boys and girls disrupting store environments for the perfect shot of their pretty messily executed "TikTok dances". Many schools across the country are starting to ban the usage of the app from their internet servers as well as classrooms. "If I have to see another lil' kid try to 'throw it back' in this mall, I might as well quit," Donnell sighs. "Kids don't even come in here to buy the damn bears anymore. They just want a place to set their phones up on the shelves.. and most of the time they cant even reach the shelves." She drops her cigarette stub to the concrete floor of the parking lot, her corporate-given five minute smoke break now over. Walking under the exit sign, Karla visibly shudders, and pushes herself through the doors. "This is why I don't want kids," she mumbles.

Comments

  1. Kayla TompkinsMarch 8, 2020 at 1:55 PM

    I really liked how you did your own version of an Onion article. I especially liked how you did it on TikTok. I thought that was very creative.

    ReplyDelete
  2. Sejal PatilMarch 8, 2020 at 6:15 PM

    Yes Luna, I love this! It is Onion by Luna and I am here for it. I love how you incorporate satirical elements to show how this is in fact humorous and it highlights the current controversy between millenials/Gen Z against Gen X/Boomers. Especially incorporating Tik-Tok which is an otherwise foreign topic to older generations, really helps show the underlying message in your piece. Also, it is a perfect representation of how Onion is able to talk normal news and twist it almost entirely to create a facade or illusion to their readers.

    ReplyDelete

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Some ponderings on freedom

-
Image
This week I noticed a continuous theme throughout our readings: all of the pieces we read largely referenced freedom and the author's perspective on the concept, and all of those authors were Americans. Despite this, the writings of Douglass, Vowell, and Wallace all defined freedom in a different way.. Douglass' definition was physical freedom. The ability to be your own person, not the property of another person. At first glance, I thought that this concept was irrelevant to the modern American, because we're all here and free anyway, right? Then I thought deeper about the undocumented immigrants in overcrowded "accommodations", and the people who have to suffer through the deeply flawed U.S. prison system. You can probably think of even more examples of this here in our country.  Vowell defined freedom as the ability to have an expression of self and opinion. As long as you're not doing anything illegal or inherently wrong/harmful-- yolo, right?
Read more

has your child been subjected to halloween hallucinations?

-
Image
watch out, parents! with halloween just two days ago, countless children will fall victim to illegal-substances-or-items-hidden-in-candy-by-evil-people-related-illnesses. this may be found in, but is not limited to: candies such as twix, starbursts, fun dips, organic/non-gmo gummy bears, snickers, skittles, m&ms (peanut excluded), old bags of chips that old people throw in the bowl after they run out of candy, and anything purchased from target. an anonymous mother submitted these horrifying images saturday night after her children returned from trick-or-treating. a dangerous substance was maliciously hidden in her daughter's rolo.  the mother in question had smartly trained her children on how to thoroughly examine all of their halloween candy to prevent this when the time came-- and her three-year-old daughter put those skills to the test when she discovered this and presented it to her parents. "my husband and i never would've been able to catch that if she hadn'
Read more

judgments

-
we all inherently judge people by their appearances. even if you consider yourself to be a kind and welcoming person, you still make judgments of people based off the way they look. it's true that first impressions drive someones perspective of your character, and presentation is the first thing someone can observe about you before you open your mouth. when we make immediate judgments of a person, we size them up; compare them to past experiences, types of people we've interacted with, and then consider how to go about communicating with that person in an acceptable manner. the way we judge people depends on personal expectations. for me, my natural mindset was realized after i read deborah tannen's piece, there is no unmarked woman . i noticed that i tend to read more into women than i do with men. sometimes the voice in my head becomes too nasty, and i feel shame for thinking mean things about women i don't even know personally, just from the way they look. on the o
Read more