The morning after
It's the morning after. I can finally shed a bit of the stress and anxiety I'd been feeling the last couple days leading up to and including election day, and watching those counts roll in. Indeed, history was made yesterday by a solid majority of US citizens wanting and hoping for a new direction for our country. This path of change and reconciliation is a long, slow uphill one, thanks not only to the failed policies of the last eight years, but going back into the Reagan years.
I wake today with the giddiness gone, replaced with some cold facts of reality not entirely unlike the day after a drunken Vegas-style wedding facing the cold truth of the consequences of one's actions. Prop 8, along with other ballot initiatives passed nationwide nullifying and prohibiting same-sex marriage have rewritten state constitutions, targeting a class of citizens with discrimination and the inability to live equally among the rest of the populace. It's like a roundhouse kick in the gut, delivered by smiling, self-righteous bible-toting Neanderthals who insist they know best and proclaimed themselves some sort of authority on such matters. Well, it's time that changed. By publicly involving yourselves in the political workings of America and it's diverse citizenry, it's now time to bring the machinations of organized religion out into the light and into widespread public scrutiny. The separation of church and state benefits both. Those that seek to meld their religious tendencies into the realm of government for their own gain don't stop to think that it's a two-way street. We've seen the inherent nastiness of political investigations. I feel it's time to focus that glaring spotlight into the realm of the church, this time making public the inner workings of various religious organizations who seek to intertwine themselves into the body politic. Nothing will put the brakes on religious meddling than the greater public eye.
For every effort that seeks to shove prayer into public schools or hang the Ten Commandments in some courthouse there needs to be an equal and opposing push. And by opposing, I dont necessarily mean the so-called godless approach. You want "God" in school? Fine. In order to do so, however, you have to include them all. So Jesus will simply be leading a big, long parade that will include Vishnu, Jehovah, The Flying Spaghetti Monster, L. Ron Hubbard, Satan, Zeus, witches, crones, Eric Clapton, Yngwie Fucking Malmsteen and every other person or entity considered as or worshiped as a 'god' or otherwise a basis for a religion. It's all or nothing. And we all know what the reactions would be.
I'm sick to death reading stories or watching how some backwater church full of small-minded people have their sheep huddled together praying and crying that a President Obama or gay marriage will bring about the end of the world according to some lunatic beliefs they share. You want a Rapture? Great. May I suggest you start with lots of nice, cold Kool-Aid. Not a single one of these people subscribing to their nutty beliefs has a closet so free of skeletons that they have any right to dictate how others can live their lives. No more sacred institutions. If you are trying to make policy, then you live in a glass house. Not only can we see inside at everything you do, you cannot throw stones. It's often been proven that those who seek to undermine or eliminate something are hiding the same (or worse) in themselves. Not any more.
It's been said over and over again to the point of vomitus that 'marriage is a sacred institution'. Bullshit. Those who keep proclaiming this nonsense not so ironically tend to live in areas of like-minded people and surrounded by the highest rates of divorce, spousal abuse and dysfunctional families. Way to go, keep up the good work of changing the party from within. Maybe y'all can take a page from the Log Cabin Republicans. Or far better yet, not. Marriage is nothing but a contract. You can get one practically anywhere, and no church need get involved. It's an industry in Las Vegas, only minus the smokestacks. Marriage can indeed be sacred, however, once it is treated with respect and available to every dedicated loving couple who seeks it.
I cried as I saw the results from the Prop. 8 passage. Over the past several months I witnessed the legal marriages of quite a few people on my list, along with wonderful photos and stories behind them. I got to hear and read about so many who finally had a chance to tie the knot, even as one of the last things they had done in their life. To have that right once again snatched away by a simple majority, and not even an overwhelming one, fills me with a rage that I am not sure how to contain. I just hope that no one I know makes some sort of passing nasty remarks about how fags should not be able to marry. I will most likely punch their teeth out.
To all my married, wanting-to-be-married and otherwise hopeful gay and lesbian friends in California, and everywhere, I am truly, deeply sorry.
I wake today with the giddiness gone, replaced with some cold facts of reality not entirely unlike the day after a drunken Vegas-style wedding facing the cold truth of the consequences of one's actions. Prop 8, along with other ballot initiatives passed nationwide nullifying and prohibiting same-sex marriage have rewritten state constitutions, targeting a class of citizens with discrimination and the inability to live equally among the rest of the populace. It's like a roundhouse kick in the gut, delivered by smiling, self-righteous bible-toting Neanderthals who insist they know best and proclaimed themselves some sort of authority on such matters. Well, it's time that changed. By publicly involving yourselves in the political workings of America and it's diverse citizenry, it's now time to bring the machinations of organized religion out into the light and into widespread public scrutiny. The separation of church and state benefits both. Those that seek to meld their religious tendencies into the realm of government for their own gain don't stop to think that it's a two-way street. We've seen the inherent nastiness of political investigations. I feel it's time to focus that glaring spotlight into the realm of the church, this time making public the inner workings of various religious organizations who seek to intertwine themselves into the body politic. Nothing will put the brakes on religious meddling than the greater public eye.
For every effort that seeks to shove prayer into public schools or hang the Ten Commandments in some courthouse there needs to be an equal and opposing push. And by opposing, I dont necessarily mean the so-called godless approach. You want "God" in school? Fine. In order to do so, however, you have to include them all. So Jesus will simply be leading a big, long parade that will include Vishnu, Jehovah, The Flying Spaghetti Monster, L. Ron Hubbard, Satan, Zeus, witches, crones, Eric Clapton, Yngwie Fucking Malmsteen and every other person or entity considered as or worshiped as a 'god' or otherwise a basis for a religion. It's all or nothing. And we all know what the reactions would be.
I'm sick to death reading stories or watching how some backwater church full of small-minded people have their sheep huddled together praying and crying that a President Obama or gay marriage will bring about the end of the world according to some lunatic beliefs they share. You want a Rapture? Great. May I suggest you start with lots of nice, cold Kool-Aid. Not a single one of these people subscribing to their nutty beliefs has a closet so free of skeletons that they have any right to dictate how others can live their lives. No more sacred institutions. If you are trying to make policy, then you live in a glass house. Not only can we see inside at everything you do, you cannot throw stones. It's often been proven that those who seek to undermine or eliminate something are hiding the same (or worse) in themselves. Not any more.
It's been said over and over again to the point of vomitus that 'marriage is a sacred institution'. Bullshit. Those who keep proclaiming this nonsense not so ironically tend to live in areas of like-minded people and surrounded by the highest rates of divorce, spousal abuse and dysfunctional families. Way to go, keep up the good work of changing the party from within. Maybe y'all can take a page from the Log Cabin Republicans. Or far better yet, not. Marriage is nothing but a contract. You can get one practically anywhere, and no church need get involved. It's an industry in Las Vegas, only minus the smokestacks. Marriage can indeed be sacred, however, once it is treated with respect and available to every dedicated loving couple who seeks it.
I cried as I saw the results from the Prop. 8 passage. Over the past several months I witnessed the legal marriages of quite a few people on my list, along with wonderful photos and stories behind them. I got to hear and read about so many who finally had a chance to tie the knot, even as one of the last things they had done in their life. To have that right once again snatched away by a simple majority, and not even an overwhelming one, fills me with a rage that I am not sure how to contain. I just hope that no one I know makes some sort of passing nasty remarks about how fags should not be able to marry. I will most likely punch their teeth out.
To all my married, wanting-to-be-married and otherwise hopeful gay and lesbian friends in California, and everywhere, I am truly, deeply sorry.