One Less Voice

Life is something that I must admit I often take for granted. I won't
lie to you, and I will assume this is more information than the average person might want to know; but I have had my moments of uncertainty. I think most people have those moments. When life seems to weigh you down, and you think you've tried all the options but there are so many. Perhaps it's the fact that there are so many options, which sends some people over the edge. And in those moments, every individual has their own uncertainties and their own internal melodrama. They feel there is nowhere to go but out. And they are wrong. Suicide is a permanent solution to a temporary problem, no matter how you slice it. And it's also for many, a cry for help. Unfortunately some don't hear the cry, and sometimes the cry goes unanswered. I've fought that demon before. Perhaps more times than worth mentioning. Don't worry. I'm not going without a fight. I beat that particular demon in my own little internal melodrama. Some people are not quite as lucky. I never thought about it before, or rather I can't recall ever thinking about her before. I'd seen the television series several times. Despite its irreverence and blatant disregard for anything socially acceptable, I personally see a hidden agenda and an intelligence perhaps disregarded by those who prefer to criticize the program and take it on its surface. They feel it does not offer anything to the social consciousness, that it is pointless.

They are very wrong. South Park is a cartoon that is not for children. Some find that alone an abomination. Cartoons should be for children or not at all. South Park is for adults. More specifically, I believe it's for parents. There is a growing series of misconceptions and ironic catch-22s when it comes to raising children nowadays. If you watch South Park objectively, you may hear a message. You may not. I do; and I'm not even a parent. The irreverent program is originated from the minds of Trey Parker and Matt Stone. However, they would probably be the first to tell you they are not alone in its execution. They instigated this Frankenstein monster, but they are not the only two people keeping it alive. There was perhaps an unsung hero of South Park which few people paid attention to. However, whenever you heard the voice of a female character in South Park, be it Stan's crush Wendy Testaburger or Cartman's mom, you were probably hearing the voice of Mary Kay Bergman.

I know. I thought it was more than one person too. I mean the voices
are so differentiated. How could those two voices be the same person? How? Mary Kay Bergman was quite a talented woman. To give full credit, Mary Kay Bergman was until this week the woman responsible for a host of characters in South Park, including:

1. Ms. Cartman
2. Wendy Testaburger
3. Stan's Mom
4. Kenny's Mom
5. Mayor McDaniels
6. Ms. Crabtree
7. Principal Victoria
8. Shelly Marsh
9. Nurse Gollem
10. Aunt Flo
11. Alexandra

And most probably others but that's the most extensive list I could find. Mary Kay Bergman's home page has been shut down. Last I went there, I saw a 404 error and a message from those close to her and her husband. It appears some people were going a bit too far. Not respecting the dead. Not respecting the accomplishments of this particular soul while she lived. What actually happened escapes me, because I was not there. However, those who have survived asked the person operating the site if he would please shut it down, and the request was acknowledged and followed out of a sense of respect; if not for Mrs. Bergman, then for those who have survived her. Perhaps this is a bit too far? A tribute and tip of the hat to someone who I didn't know to appreciate until after she was gone? How short-sighted of me to have not noticed her contribution before, but then it would have made little difference. Maybe. What if there were a few people who noticed and were favorable to her contribution, not just to South Park but her larger body of work? What if there were a few hundred or thousand more who somehow let her know she was appreciated? Would that have made a difference? We have no comprehension just how many lives we touch in our day to day lives, and we so take it for granted.

Mary Kay Bergman was admittedly no one special, except to those who truly knew her personally. I mean, she wasn't a star by any stretch. She didn't own her own private mansion. She was a successful and accomplished vocal talent, but she wasn't famous or powerful. She was a working girl and the men behind South Park noticed her talent and paid for it. She did so much more as well. Have you heard her? She did voices for animated television programs and CD-ROM games. Quite a diverse and trained vocal palette, as well as a professionalism that I've heard no one question. The animated films Beauty and the Beast, Hercules, Mulan, The Iron Giant, the cartoon network's Cow and Chicken, and the voice of Daphne for some recent revisits to the Scooby Doo Mystery franchise, and so much more. If you watch (and listen) to contemporary cartoons, chances are you have heard her. Did you note her name? Usually it scrolled by quickly at the end of the programs to which she lent her voice. When most people are leaving the theater for her films, or are getting ready to rewind the tape for the videos in which she participated, her name was there. Some may have even read the words but with all the other animators and vocal talents and producers... It's possible that for most of us her name did not stand out in the crowd.

How many others are like that? Tens of millions perhaps? Billions? I was once talking with some friends about parenting. How in today's society due to time constraints and financial pressures, most parents work overtime or hold two jobs and some of them are single parents. They don't necessarily spend as much time with their children as perhaps they should, or need to. And the children tend to respond to this by performing acts in which they are blatantly seeking attention. Now, I'm not saying every suicidal attempt is a cry for attention. I'm probably wrong in even surmising that might have had something to do with it, but it is food for thought. It has been said that suicide is the ultimate cry for help; from a mind that has gone so far to extremes that it no longer rationally seeks ways to protect itself from itself. It's a catch-22. If I fail at this, people will be upset with me and I will be upset with myself not for trying it but because I failed and perhaps there is nothing more pathetic to a mind in that state to have attempted suicide and not succeeded: the ultimate embarrassment. However, at least if the person tries and fails, people might pay attention to them for awhile, so they will feel less alone. To attempt and succeed at suicide. What does that mean? It means in the end nothing. If it was a cry for attention, it only works in the post-mortem, and is therefore an irrational act.

It is as absurd as starving oneself in order to lose weight. Sure, you'll weigh less but you'll be malnourished and may die. That'll sure solve the weight problem immediately, won't it? I didn't notice her before now. Now it's too late. Suicide is a permanent solution to a temporary problem, and it's never the right solution. Did her presence on this planet touch you? Her life crossed most of our lives in some indirect way. We may never be able to measure just how far one person's voice can truly reach another. Not considering it though would be a mistake. A mistake I personally wish I could remedy. The actual details are not fully disclosed. There are assumptions, and perhaps partial truths. I've read reports that she committed suicide. She even left a note. The contents of that note have not been detailed to the public. Some close to the situation have reported that the note indicates she may have not been in the right frame of mind when she made this decision. One even phrased it as temporary insanity, but doesn't one have to be temporarily insane in order to take one's own life, especially when (though perhaps they can't see it at the time) they had so much to live for?

The family in question deserves a distance as they mourn, so
speculation is again perhaps disrespectful, but it's a distance they're not being offered. In today's society, with such a technological explosion coupled with the average human's almost macabre curiosity and need to know we find out a lot about others, sometimes by pure chance. Perhaps the Information
Superhighway is making this Global Village a bit too intimate in some
respects, while retaining an impersonal tone in others. It's a strange
and sometimes sickening combination. In fact, the reason why I know about this is because I was looking for cheats and hints about this South Park CD-ROM game I just picked up. I discovered what just recently happened to the female voices of a program dear to my heart by pure accident. To say I am stunned, or even shocked, is an understatement, but I'm not sure how I'm supposed to feel, or if it's even right for me to feel anything at all. Is it even my place? How could such a beautiful and talented soul come to a point in her life where she felt the need to kill herself? Perhaps I can answer that question better than some people can, but not as well as others. However, for each person who approaches that crossroads and meets up with that demon, the answer would be different. No two people approach this issue in exactly the same way or for the same reasons. And what is there to do now but look on in grief? Like someone rubbernecking at a totaled car on the side of the road. Can I help? No, of course not. I can do nothing but gawk and try to make some sense of it from my own perspective. As can you.

Or perhaps such an event happening to a complete stranger doesn't even
affect you, and already you're reaching for your mouse and ready to
click somewhere else. Some place less disturbing than my page has become today. I beat this demon before, this voice in the back of the mind that speaks of futility and solitude in a sea of strangers. Admittedly, I assume a time will come when I face it again. I intend to win. I know its weaknesses but it knows mine. I am... close to this issue. As I assume are some of you. Back when I was in college, I recall asking around a table at the Student Union one morning when I was in a particularly morbid and macabre mood. I believe someone close to some of us had been contemplating it, and I admitted I had contemplated it a few years before. I began gauging the commonalities in this topic. The result was disturbing: at one time or another most people at that table, and I was later to discover most people I knew, had at one time or another contemplated suicide. It has perhaps become a natural stepping stone in modern life: yet more hurdles to overcome. Perhaps yet another trial through which to persevere: a baptism of fire. I know it can be beaten. I've seen it happen. I've done it. When I learn of someone so full of potential and life who I never met, who has given joy to so many, when I see such a life needlessly wasted, though I am not at a loss for words I find I am at a loss for meaning. She deemed it necessary to end her journey on this spinning rock in space. It was her decision. So why do I feel like I'm the one who has been robbed? Why do I feel violated? Why is it that I feel this futile waste affects me somehow?

Because it does.

Every person on this planet is important to the lives of every other.
Oh, you may not notice the significance now to your own life, or how
someone on the other side of this planet has in some way affected your own, but people are like pebbles tossed into a pond. Their ripples may not always be seen to a casual passerby not paying attention: that does not mean they are not there. What does South Park say to me? What is the message that I think it conveys below the surface of its belligerence and gut-busting tomfoolery? It's that what we teach our children by action and deed affects them so much more than the dirty words and pictures which we strive to protect them from. And every action we make, affects others in ways we can't hope to comprehend. That's what South Park preaches. That four eight year old boys are affecting the world around them, and it in turn affects them, and there are ramifications of that which ripple out in unorthodox and unpredictable ways. And you know? That's life. It's not something that should be bridled and tamed, or coerced into submission. It just happens, and it's each individual's responsibility to consider their own actions. It is not each person's responsibility to force others to a single will. We each are responsible for our own destiny. We are not responsible for everyone else's destiny or decisions. We can however seek to help one another along when it's warranted.

If you have fought that demon in the past, or perhaps you're fighting that sense of hopelessness and uncertainty now, or perhaps you will in the future, we learn from the lives of those around us. Perhaps a time has/is/will come when you will sit there with that bottle of pills in your hand and perhaps you've already written the note, perhaps not. Perhaps it's not a bottle of pills. Perhaps it's a gun, or a tall ledge. It doesn't matter. Perhaps a point in your life will come when you'll think oh its alright. No one will notice. I can just end this now and not worry about the consequences. My life doesn't matter. No one will miss me when I'm gone. You are so very, very wrong. You are so wrong that I wish I could reach you at that moment in your life and slap the s**t out of you. Slap some sense into you. Ultimately however, the decision would be yours. This is something I wish I could have said to her. It's something I learned long ago. I'll say it to you now because I can. You can choose to take it or leave it. You have no comprehension just how many lives you touch by your actions and by your words in ways that you so take for granted. You can't possibly try to imagine it. It would drive you mad. Just stop. Remember these words. You do matter, in ways you can't see now but hopefully someday you will. However, you would never see how if you end it now. If that time comes and you remember this, then you will have learned from the life of Mary Kay Bergman, and the lives of all those who, like her, choose the other path, will not have died in vain.