Stupidity has a knack of getting its way...
Why can't Dayton (or Ohio in general) make the news for good stuff. I hate when I feel like I get pulled into stupidity and need to vent (I have other stuff I would rather be doing) so, I'm going to do this and go to bed and try not to think about it.
A LONG time ago Fairborn, Ohio was in the news. Why? A girl gave another girl a motrin (or aspirin). Just tonight I saw a news story about something on Facebook. Apparently, as a joke, somebody created a White Students of Wright State user group. There are also other groups based on skin-color/ethnicity (which was apparently the "joke"). Now here comes the anger. Martin Luther King Jr. - civil rights leader - assassinated over desegregation. Malcolm X - civil rights leader - assassinated over desegregation. Rosa Parks - civil rights leader. All these people were working on a goal - desegregation. Now we have it. And, for what? So, we can segregate ourselves within the very institution that was fought so hard to get desegregated. I love walking into the student union and seeing the "diversity" (there's an entire episode of Pen and Teller's Bullshit that comes to mind). I mean we have blacks, whites, handicapped, Indian, you name it. However, it's like looking at one of those cafeteria food trays. You got your mashed potatoes in this little area, your green beans in this other area, corn over here, etc. (I'm glad I eat alone). We're transforming "a cultural melting pot into a fragile glass of filtered water. Bland. Homogenis. And, arrogantly naive" (Artis aka The Spoonman).
For the record, I don't care what "race" you are because, ultimately, we're all the same race - human. Why do we keep trying to subcategorize everything? We don't just have music. We have rap, gangsta rap, rhythm and blues, which is different than just blues, jazz, alternative, country, country-western, hip-hop, trance, house, techno, grundge, pop, hip-hop, funk, punk, rock...why? I mean a person is no longer a person. They are a person who happens to be white. But, that's not good enough. They are a white person who happens to be female. They are a white female person who happens to be lesbian. A white female lesbian person who happens to be parapallegic. You see where this is going. Labels, labels, labels. We have so many labels no wonder we can't communicate - it takes us 20 minutes just to describe who it is we're talking to.
So let me end by introducing myself to you in lyrics from Id I.D. by Artis:
Hi. My name is Fraction
It's just a fraction of my identity
You can call me that, but it's not what I call myself
I don't need a name to separate me from somebody else
I think of my self in thoughts
that only sometimes come in words
I know who I am without the auspices of a name
Why call you by name when it's you I'll remember,
not a word
Your identity, you see
is as abstract to me
as your image would be
for me to paint
on a canvas of air
with a paintbrush of words
using colours you can only hear
Hi. My name is Fraction
It's just a fraction of my identity
You can call me that, but it's not what I call myself
I don't call myself
I'm never that far away.
ADDENDUM: And I turned the news off just to find out that, to curb the creation of meth, our state legislature is trying to pass a law which would prohibit anyone under the age of 18 from purchasing cough medicine. That's right ladies and jellyspoons - cough syrup is now just as dangerous as cigarettes.