In Woonsocket, it's girls gone wild.

What the hell is going on with women in Woonsocket lately?

Let's start with Ana Rivera and Maribel Santiago. Last month, Ana Rivera's daughter Amanda was suspended from Woonsocket Middle School for what appears to be a variety of misdeeds (apparently making threatening remarks and inappropriate dress), but that didn't stop her from pursing a grudge against her sworn enemy (middle schoolers with sworn enemies?) Grechel Santiago.

After vowing to take Grechel down on her MySpace page, Amanda convinced her mother Ana to drive her to school so she could get gully with her rival, Grechel. What Amanda and her mother didn't know is that Grechel's mother, Maribel Santiago, was with her at school. Before long, the girls started fighting, and anyone could yell "catfight!', their mothers went after each other. A vice principal who attempted to break up the brawl got socked in the eye by Maribel Santiago, and by this time, a large crowd had gathered to soak it all in. Someone finally called The Man, after which, six people (the girls, their mothers, and two other students who threatened the cops) were hauled off to jail.

This made nationwide news, embarrassing the city of Woonsocket to no end, but hey, it was an isolated incident right? No way.

One mother later, Woonsocket mother Robin Sevigny drove to a school bus stop and waited for her 14 year old daughter, and her 14 year old niece, to get off the bus. Sevigny's daughter walked over to her mother's car, said something to her, and before you could say "Jesus, not again!", Robin Sevigny walked up to her own niece, slapped her, and held her down to the ground. She called her daughter over to start hitting her while she held the girl down on the ground. Apparently, the girl and her cousin had been arguing over a boy, and escalated after threats were made on one of the girls' MySpace pages.

But now comes the weirdest, and dumbest, story of them all. Woonsocket mother Rebecca Arnold can more or less forget about seeing her 11 year old daughter ever again after being arrested for child neglect charges. Child neglect in itself isn't so weird, but the circumstances here are just bizarre.

Arnold's daughter had returned to live with her father in North Adams, MA when she told one of her teachers that her mother and her mother's boyfriend, one David Prata, engaged in lewd acts with each other in front of the then 8 year old girl "for educational purposes". The teacher contacted the Rhode Island Department of Children, Youth and Families to investigate the complaint. Investigator Vanessa Ciesla probably wasn't prepared for how easy the investigation would be. Both of them freely admitted performing a dazzling array of explicit acts in front of their daughter, and didn't, like, see the big deal, man. The report noted in a dazzling mastery of understatement:

"Mr. Prata said that he and [the girl’s] mother believe in a free and open relationship and don’t want to hide anything from [the girl]."

And what was the mother's rationale for her overeager readiness to get it on with her boyfriend, on numerous occasions, in front of her own 8 year old daughter?

“When I was married to my first husband, my mother-in-law and husband would make fun of me” because, Arnold said, she didn’t know a slang term for oral sex. “I didn’t want anyone to make fun of [her daughter]."

Gah. If anyone can think of a stupider reason to go to jail and alienate their children, by all means, share it with me. And for Woonsocket's sake? I hope Woonsocket women find a more suitable outlet for their aggression and lust. Like politics.