Sunday, August 29, 2010
this is why
Boy meets girl.
I'm so tired of that story line. Boys meeting girls happens all the time, and some of them know what to do with it, and some of them are idiots and fuck it up from day one.
And that's the story we all hear, that is hammered home daily, that boy meets girl and happily ever after flows forthwith.
But I don't want to meet a girl. I'm not made to do it that way. I want to meet a boy and fall in love and be happily-ish ever after.
But the romantic quality of that relationship according to some douchebag that writes for a right wing blog site would find his penis slightly less erect when it came time to bone down with his god fearing love slave if I got to be a little bit happy just once.
And I'm tired of religion fucking everything up for everyone. If you want to worship and believe then fine. I really, really don't care. I might make fun of you when you're not around, but is that any reason to insist on forcing your bronze age myths onto everyone? Really?
h/t Prop 8 Trial Tracker
Wednesday, August 18, 2010
hipster beer
Before we get into this I should admit that I might be a little bit on the drunk side. I'm also feeling a little maudlin, and you'll know this if you're my friend on the almighty Facebook. Yeah, I'm taking my status and making a post out of it. You should also just deal with the fact that I'm going to fuck up with the typing words properly part of being a blog writing sort. I do it often enough anyway, but this time I'm warning you. Feel free to rag on me in the comments.
I'm sitting at home, and by home I mean Momma's house. She's already texted me that she is staying elsewhere tonight. It shouldn't bother me, and on the levels that matter it doesn't. But there's the part of me that is tired of sitting here alone that is a little irritated.
Why am I sitting here at all, much less alone? It's part of the deal she and I made that allowed me to move back into what used to be the playroom. It's part of the deal where i don't earn enough at my job regardless of how many hours I get or how hard i work.
And I actually sort of like my job. I do have to deal with at least one douche on a regular basis, and there's the other day shift guy, a part timer, who has some issues that I try to avoid, and there's the . . .
Really, I kinda hate my job. I hate the hours, and I hate the pay. I hate the kitchen manager that treats everyone like we're idiots when we don't agree with the stupid shit he says and does. I hate that at my age and level of experience I'm still showing up at nine to sweep and mop the dining room and bar, that the owner may well bitch at me because his idea of enough paper towels and my idea didn't happen to agree with each other or because he thinks he smells something that he refers to as a sour mop even though the fucking mop head is as clean as I can get it and that sour smell is probably his own inability to just shut the fuck up and not work so fucking hard to find something to bitch about.
I hate that I drink too much and can't sleep till late which makes my morning shifts a pain in the ass so that I'm running out the door tired and unhappy only to come back home more tired and not wanting to be a reasonable person who cooks a decent meal for his kids and interacts with them because I really just want to lay down for a minute which turns into a nap that I awake from cranky and unreasonable.
I hate that I can't seem to concentrate on anything long enough, that i can't seem to find out what it is I can do that makes me happy. I hate that my only adult interaction is 95% people I don't actually want to see but that I can get along with at work and that my interaction with adults happens solely within the confines of my job.
I hate that I can't do something that benefits me because I can't figure out what that thing would be and that i can't get past the fact that other people might have to take care of their own shit, or so it seems, if i wren't here to cover their ass. I hate that i can't just make a decent living and be happy and reasonable and buy myself something nice once in a while.
I'm sitting at home, and by home I mean Momma's house. She's already texted me that she is staying elsewhere tonight. It shouldn't bother me, and on the levels that matter it doesn't. But there's the part of me that is tired of sitting here alone that is a little irritated.
Why am I sitting here at all, much less alone? It's part of the deal she and I made that allowed me to move back into what used to be the playroom. It's part of the deal where i don't earn enough at my job regardless of how many hours I get or how hard i work.
And I actually sort of like my job. I do have to deal with at least one douche on a regular basis, and there's the other day shift guy, a part timer, who has some issues that I try to avoid, and there's the . . .
Really, I kinda hate my job. I hate the hours, and I hate the pay. I hate the kitchen manager that treats everyone like we're idiots when we don't agree with the stupid shit he says and does. I hate that at my age and level of experience I'm still showing up at nine to sweep and mop the dining room and bar, that the owner may well bitch at me because his idea of enough paper towels and my idea didn't happen to agree with each other or because he thinks he smells something that he refers to as a sour mop even though the fucking mop head is as clean as I can get it and that sour smell is probably his own inability to just shut the fuck up and not work so fucking hard to find something to bitch about.
I hate that I drink too much and can't sleep till late which makes my morning shifts a pain in the ass so that I'm running out the door tired and unhappy only to come back home more tired and not wanting to be a reasonable person who cooks a decent meal for his kids and interacts with them because I really just want to lay down for a minute which turns into a nap that I awake from cranky and unreasonable.
I hate that I can't seem to concentrate on anything long enough, that i can't seem to find out what it is I can do that makes me happy. I hate that my only adult interaction is 95% people I don't actually want to see but that I can get along with at work and that my interaction with adults happens solely within the confines of my job.
I hate that I can't do something that benefits me because I can't figure out what that thing would be and that i can't get past the fact that other people might have to take care of their own shit, or so it seems, if i wren't here to cover their ass. I hate that i can't just make a decent living and be happy and reasonable and buy myself something nice once in a while.
Thursday, August 12, 2010
senseless dadt bullshit
Lt. Col. Victor Fehrenbach should be retiring from the US Air Force in just over a year. Instead, chances are that he'll soon be fired from the job he's apparently done well.
Why would anyone want to fire a soldier with this much experience which includes flying ninety missions in three different wars? You can read about his story at military.com or theadvocate.com.
In the middle of so much strife and war that our country finds itself in, we are still kicking out good soldiers merely for being gay.
It's stupid and sad, and it's a waste. Don't Ask Don't Tell is one of the worst and most shameful atrocities ever forced on the American people and is responsible for too many good soldiers being removed from their jobs.
Why would anyone want to fire a soldier with this much experience which includes flying ninety missions in three different wars? You can read about his story at military.com or theadvocate.com.
In the middle of so much strife and war that our country finds itself in, we are still kicking out good soldiers merely for being gay.
It's stupid and sad, and it's a waste. Don't Ask Don't Tell is one of the worst and most shameful atrocities ever forced on the American people and is responsible for too many good soldiers being removed from their jobs.
Monday, August 09, 2010
red scare ya'll
While I do know that it's likely a mistake, I've started some shit on the ol' Facebook. One of my brothers posted a picture of a bumper sticker suggesting that President Obama is a socialist with a picture of his face as the last in line of several faces, only a couple of which I recognize. Apparently they are the faces of socialists past with Obama being compared to them.
I'm curious as to who the different people are in the picture, and I included that question along with a request as to what exactly makes Obama a socialist. Hopefully, as part of what I expect to be a fun if extremely trying and eventually unrewarding argument with the right wing, I'll at least make one or two valid points while simultaneously changing absolutely no minds whatsoever.
In response to my question as to what makes Obama a socialist an old family friend brought up the health care mandate and pointed out that health care is in fact not in the Constitution. My answer to that was to compare the health care mandate to the idea that we are required to purchase car insurance in order to legally operate our motor vehicles. I'm still waiting for a response to that, and I've had to once more add my request for names of the other socialists in the picture.
Below is the picture in question. Let me know what you think in the comments.
Again, I fully expect to argue with people who don't really know what they are talking about and have no actual idea of what socialism is, but that's what happens when you argue/discuss with the right.
I'm curious as to who the different people are in the picture, and I included that question along with a request as to what exactly makes Obama a socialist. Hopefully, as part of what I expect to be a fun if extremely trying and eventually unrewarding argument with the right wing, I'll at least make one or two valid points while simultaneously changing absolutely no minds whatsoever.
In response to my question as to what makes Obama a socialist an old family friend brought up the health care mandate and pointed out that health care is in fact not in the Constitution. My answer to that was to compare the health care mandate to the idea that we are required to purchase car insurance in order to legally operate our motor vehicles. I'm still waiting for a response to that, and I've had to once more add my request for names of the other socialists in the picture.
Below is the picture in question. Let me know what you think in the comments.
Sunday, August 08, 2010
just keep poking us in the eye
Proposition 8 was justifiably overturned last week in a ruling many people have been awaiting for months. National Organization for Marriage has begun what they've decided to call their Summer for Marriage Tour, driving around to preach to people about marriage being one man and one woman.
Perhaps in the majority of US states marriage is confined to one man and one woman, but as time slowly creeps on we find that equality keeps growing more than not. Outside of the US Mexico City is one of the more recent places to find that gay couples should be allowed to marry. Five US states and a growing handful of countries are realizing that equality benefits all families.
And that is one of the most hurtful things to come out of this culture war, this battle that need not even be fought. I am gay and have a family. I have children, and I'm most certainly not the only gay person with children. But to hear NOM talk about family you'd think that children only appear when a loving heterosexual couple marries with the intent to produce children and raise them in a loving home.
Families come about in a variety of ways and for a variety of reasons. Some people do in fact marry and make babies and stay together till death do them part. Sometimes a person's loved one dies leaving them alone with the children. Sometimes children find their birth parents gone and no longer part of their life for any number of reasons. Sometimes people are unable to have their own children and are willing to create a family through adoption to provide a family for children without parents. Sometimes families combine two pre-existing families to create a new family. And to pretend that only the first type of family I mentioned is the only kind of family that is real or that actually exists is to insult every single other type of family, to degrade them as worthless and not of value.
And that is what NOM does every single day and every minute of every day that they exist. They've spent untold millions of dollars fighting this culture war that need not exist, dollars that could do the thing their Bible actually tells them to do, help the weak and downtrodden, the hungry and the hurting.
But instead of doing that they are making a point of making sure more people are weak and downtrodden, increasing the number of hungry and hurting.
If you want to follow their evil trip to spread hurt then visit the Courage Campaign's Prop 8 Trial Tracker blog. They began earlier this year to make sure that anyone interested was able to keep abreast of the Prop 8 trial, and they've continued their work as we've waited for the verdict (great post about that HERE) and are now on the front lines documenting NOM's bus of animus tour.
Perhaps in the majority of US states marriage is confined to one man and one woman, but as time slowly creeps on we find that equality keeps growing more than not. Outside of the US Mexico City is one of the more recent places to find that gay couples should be allowed to marry. Five US states and a growing handful of countries are realizing that equality benefits all families.
And that is one of the most hurtful things to come out of this culture war, this battle that need not even be fought. I am gay and have a family. I have children, and I'm most certainly not the only gay person with children. But to hear NOM talk about family you'd think that children only appear when a loving heterosexual couple marries with the intent to produce children and raise them in a loving home.
Families come about in a variety of ways and for a variety of reasons. Some people do in fact marry and make babies and stay together till death do them part. Sometimes a person's loved one dies leaving them alone with the children. Sometimes children find their birth parents gone and no longer part of their life for any number of reasons. Sometimes people are unable to have their own children and are willing to create a family through adoption to provide a family for children without parents. Sometimes families combine two pre-existing families to create a new family. And to pretend that only the first type of family I mentioned is the only kind of family that is real or that actually exists is to insult every single other type of family, to degrade them as worthless and not of value.
And that is what NOM does every single day and every minute of every day that they exist. They've spent untold millions of dollars fighting this culture war that need not exist, dollars that could do the thing their Bible actually tells them to do, help the weak and downtrodden, the hungry and the hurting.
But instead of doing that they are making a point of making sure more people are weak and downtrodden, increasing the number of hungry and hurting.
If you want to follow their evil trip to spread hurt then visit the Courage Campaign's Prop 8 Trial Tracker blog. They began earlier this year to make sure that anyone interested was able to keep abreast of the Prop 8 trial, and they've continued their work as we've waited for the verdict (great post about that HERE) and are now on the front lines documenting NOM's bus of animus tour.
Wednesday, August 04, 2010
oh your poor feelings
After months of waiting for the verdict, people across the country who believe in equality and fairness were delighted today when Judge Vaughn Walker overturned California's Proposition 8 which made marriage inequality in California the law of the land. Prior to prop 8, for a very short time, gay couples in California were allowed to be equal citizens in terms of marriage rights, and a few thousand couples married the person they love. Prop 8 closed that like a closet door slamming shut.
A very few states in the US allow same sex couples to marry, and a very few allow same sex couples to attain something not entirely unlike marriage, often known as a domestic partnership. Like school segregation before Brown vs. Board of Education, gay people were, and in too many states still are, separate but not equal.
Some people who oppose marriage equality will self righteously and infuriatingly pretend that marriage is something a man and a woman do in order to then begin bearing children so that they can have a family. They see marriage as a holy and sacred thing that is the only way in which children are brought into the world, and they insist that the only good way for children to be conceived, born and raised is through this myth that they so want to be true.
Possibly the most infuriating argument now that prop 8 has been overturned is their decrying the "activist judge" who invalidated the votes of seven million Californians who wanted to maintain the charade that all children are born into loving families with parents of opposing genders and are raised in a quaint fifties style sort of perfection that never really ever existed.
And this argument is one that angers me so much because they conveniently ignore reality. Okay, so they consistently ignore reality. They ignore that children are in fact now and have been being raised by gay parents, by single parents and even are adopted and raised by parents with whom they share no actual genetic heritage beyond mere humanity.
So, back to that seven million now disenfranchised voters in California who have to deal with the idea, solely in their slow bigoted minds, that their democracy has failed them. What these anti equality people fail to realize, or what they so easily ignore because the light burns, is that the vote wasn't seven million to zero. The vote, according to this page at Wikipedia was more like 7,001,084 for taking away the right to marry the person you love to 6,401,482 who believe that marriage is a fundamental right that should be available to all.
Somehow the right to equality and the votes of 6.5 million people just don't happen to matter as much as fear mongering, deception and animus. And honestly, if you just don't like gay people have the fucking balls to say so. Quit hiding behind your Bible or your church or your platitudes. Own your bigotry. Quit pretending that you're going to be in any way effected. Quit shitting on all those kids who don't have the fortune to be married into a family that involves a couple lucky enough to have found "the one" the first time around. Quit fucking with other people's lives. Quit forcing us to fight you over and over again. Just fuck off!
A very few states in the US allow same sex couples to marry, and a very few allow same sex couples to attain something not entirely unlike marriage, often known as a domestic partnership. Like school segregation before Brown vs. Board of Education, gay people were, and in too many states still are, separate but not equal.
Some people who oppose marriage equality will self righteously and infuriatingly pretend that marriage is something a man and a woman do in order to then begin bearing children so that they can have a family. They see marriage as a holy and sacred thing that is the only way in which children are brought into the world, and they insist that the only good way for children to be conceived, born and raised is through this myth that they so want to be true.
Possibly the most infuriating argument now that prop 8 has been overturned is their decrying the "activist judge" who invalidated the votes of seven million Californians who wanted to maintain the charade that all children are born into loving families with parents of opposing genders and are raised in a quaint fifties style sort of perfection that never really ever existed.
And this argument is one that angers me so much because they conveniently ignore reality. Okay, so they consistently ignore reality. They ignore that children are in fact now and have been being raised by gay parents, by single parents and even are adopted and raised by parents with whom they share no actual genetic heritage beyond mere humanity.
So, back to that seven million now disenfranchised voters in California who have to deal with the idea, solely in their slow bigoted minds, that their democracy has failed them. What these anti equality people fail to realize, or what they so easily ignore because the light burns, is that the vote wasn't seven million to zero. The vote, according to this page at Wikipedia was more like 7,001,084 for taking away the right to marry the person you love to 6,401,482 who believe that marriage is a fundamental right that should be available to all.
Somehow the right to equality and the votes of 6.5 million people just don't happen to matter as much as fear mongering, deception and animus. And honestly, if you just don't like gay people have the fucking balls to say so. Quit hiding behind your Bible or your church or your platitudes. Own your bigotry. Quit pretending that you're going to be in any way effected. Quit shitting on all those kids who don't have the fortune to be married into a family that involves a couple lucky enough to have found "the one" the first time around. Quit fucking with other people's lives. Quit forcing us to fight you over and over again. Just fuck off!
from whence come I
Thanks to Christine for this one. I played with what it asked for as I suspect most people do. I didn't mean for it to be as negative seeming as it seems to seem, but maybe I'm just looking at it the way I tend. At the same time, if does come across as negative I have to remind myself that I didn't want to spend too much time with each line. I wanted this thing to come out of me in a way that I felt was being honest.
And then I remember and must accept that I over analyze everything, that I edit a lot, that I want to present things in a way that I'm at least okay, if not happy, with. I'm never altogether happy about it. But it's done, and that's all I can say for now.
And all that being said, I give you the thing below. It's called Where I'm From and is basically a set of writing prompts. It wasn't really fun, but if you want to play along go HERE.
I am from old toys from older brothers and out of style clothes.
I am from the white ranch style house where in the summer, if you would just lie still in bed you wouldn't be so hot and could get to sleep.
I am from the dogwood, the red clay, the pines and kudzu.
I am from setting the table and sitting down as a family for sandwiches and listening to Larry Munson on the radio while watching the game on tv with the sound turned down, from being one of many brothers so that we're all always and forever a Hullboy.
I am from the not really talking or being heard.
From because I said to.
I am from the same pew every single service, Sunday morning and night and Wednesday night, and missions conference and revival, men's prayer meeting.
I'm from South Dekalb and iced tea being the first thing I ever learned to make in the kitchen.
From only ever really knowing as family my parents and brothers, a couple of cousins and their parents, from a grandmother I never really remember liking as much as I liked that a night spent at her house meant a certain freedom.
I am from a random assortment of pictures at my parent's house as well as the new collections on the internet as the family I have moves into the twenty first century.
And then I remember and must accept that I over analyze everything, that I edit a lot, that I want to present things in a way that I'm at least okay, if not happy, with. I'm never altogether happy about it. But it's done, and that's all I can say for now.
And all that being said, I give you the thing below. It's called Where I'm From and is basically a set of writing prompts. It wasn't really fun, but if you want to play along go HERE.
I am from old toys from older brothers and out of style clothes.
I am from the white ranch style house where in the summer, if you would just lie still in bed you wouldn't be so hot and could get to sleep.
I am from the dogwood, the red clay, the pines and kudzu.
I am from setting the table and sitting down as a family for sandwiches and listening to Larry Munson on the radio while watching the game on tv with the sound turned down, from being one of many brothers so that we're all always and forever a Hullboy.
I am from the not really talking or being heard.
From because I said to.
I am from the same pew every single service, Sunday morning and night and Wednesday night, and missions conference and revival, men's prayer meeting.
I'm from South Dekalb and iced tea being the first thing I ever learned to make in the kitchen.
From only ever really knowing as family my parents and brothers, a couple of cousins and their parents, from a grandmother I never really remember liking as much as I liked that a night spent at her house meant a certain freedom.
I am from a random assortment of pictures at my parent's house as well as the new collections on the internet as the family I have moves into the twenty first century.
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