| There are probably going to be who disagree with me |
[Jul. 20th, 2009|12:58 am] |
I was reading the comments to this lovely blog on Pam's House Blend about a gay couple that went to a friend's wedding, officiated at it, and opened hearts and minds just by being out and loving.
It startled me that there were a number of comments that responded that they would never go to a heterosexual couple's wedding and/or stop respecting said couple because that couple is entering into a discriminatory institution by getting married.
I just don't understand how someone who would never DREAM of sitting at a segregated lunch counter, crossing a picket line, or any of dozens of other violations of solidarity with the disenfranchised, would participate in a discriminatory institution by choosing to get married at this time. Yesterday a wonderful woman who devotes her life to peace and justice told me she was getting married and wanted my address to invite me to the wedding. I was mute I was so hurt and shocked. She was oblivious to what she was doing.
I never thought of it that way-- marriage isn't like a lunch counter, and you can't put pressure on the owner by boycotting. Refraining from doing something harmful-- like crossing a picket line-- or boycotting a private institution, like a lunch counter is entirely different from refraining from making a public commitment to each other. Civil Marriage is a number of privileges that are conferred upon the couple that are useful and, indeed, in some situations necessary. It's a recognition of commitment, and refraining from making that commitment to each other (and gaining the ability to make medical decisions for each other, among other rights) doesn't get me any closer to being able to make a commitment to (and medical decisions for) my girlfriend.
I don't think in this particular situation that choosing not to get married in solidarity is something nearly as useful as getting married and then continuing to advocate for others to have the same rights. And while I don't doubt that a group like The National Marriage Boycott might send a strong political message, it bothers me on multiple levels. For one thing, a heterosexual couple is still exercising their choice-- they still have the privilege of being able to choose whether or not to marry, and if they don't understand that, the exercise is useless. And for another, I don't want someone to deprive themselves because I do without. I see it as the same sort of situation as someone choosing not to buy themselves necessities because someone else is going without. It's a nice gesture, if and only if combined with giving to or advocating for the other person, but I don't expect a lot of people to do it, and in the end it seems like a mostly self-centered response anyway. It also centers a certain primacy around marriage rights-- which, yes, marriage rights are extremely important in settling family rights laws and setting the precedent that LGBT people are part of ordinary families, but there are lots of gay rights and advocacy that have nothing whatsoever to do with family/marriage rights.
In the end, if a heterosexual couple chooses to refrain from getting married in solidarity with the LGBT community, that's a nice gesture. I appreciate it. But I don't respect someone who doesn't get married because I can't more than I respect someone who gets married because they're in love, want to make that commitment in front of their God, their country and everyone. Not choosing what's best for you as a couple seems like cutting off your nose to spite your face.
If this sounds like a visceral, gut reaction, that's because it is. My friend, ![[info]](http://l-stat.livejournal.com/img/userinfo.gif) jhyanmar, is getting married in a few weeks, and I have every respect for the guy. If, God forbid, he should fall into a coma, I want letiwolf to be able to make those medical decisions for him. If they want to foster a child, I want them to be able to do it together. I don't want them to have to jump through hoops and get dicked around just because I'd get dicked around in those situations. |
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| Two videos on gay marriage |
[Apr. 8th, 2009|02:04 pm] |
| [ | Tags | | | gay, politics | ] |
| [ | If I wasn't apathetic, I'd be |
| |  gay | ] |
The first one is Iowa State Senate Majority Leader Mike Gronstal explaining why he won't support a bill to take away the rights of Iowan gay people to marry. It's two minutes of beautiful smackdown.
BUT! Just so we don't get too cocky, the National Organization for Marriage has put together a rainbow coalition to stop us icky icky gays from getting our gay all over everything.
Via Shakesville |
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| Last thing |
[Nov. 6th, 2008|11:20 am] |
You know, every time I see someone saying that Prop 8 proved people aren't ready yet, and voters should have a say, I want to sit them down and ask whether the Declaration of Independence says "All men are created equal (but only when the voters think they should be)."
Or whether the California state constitution says "All people are by nature free and independent and have inalienable rights. Among these are enjoying and defending life and liberty, acquiring, possessing, and protecting property, and pursuing and obtaining safety, happiness, and privacy. (But only if the voters think they deserve those rights)."
Yes, the courts decided it unilaterally. That's because it's the court system's job the say "oh wait, we promised y'all equality. This shit ain't equal, so we're gonna goddamn fix it now." It doesn't matter what the voters think, because they're supposed to be INALIENABLE RIGHTS, not rights that can be taken away because you think gay people are icky. |
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| (no subject) |
[Nov. 4th, 2008|09:39 pm] |
My router died. Our phone tech was in Utah and was pulling for McCain. He was on the phone when Obama got 286. Felt a little bad for him.
We made patriotic cookies! Congrats, America!
Fuuuuuuuck, Prop 8 is up 10 points with 14 percent reporting. |
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| Someone should make this a meme! |
[Oct. 31st, 2008|09:45 am] |
| [ | Tags | | | meme, politics | ] |
| [ | If I wasn't apathetic, I'd be |
| |  amused | ] |
An undecided voter friend (yeah, no, I'm not sure how she's still undecided either) asked in the ensuing conversation about who to vote for that I "name three negative things about Barack Obama and three positive things about John McCain." Because people who are decided tend to discount the positives of the opponent and the negatives of their chosen candidate. That's fair, I think, so here:
OBAMA:
1. Obama's stance on GLBT issues is luke-warm at best.
2. Obama is inexperienced, relative to Biden and McCain.
3. Obama's health care plan will not cover all Americans-- it's an expansion, but it will still leave several million people uninsured. (yeah, yeah, I'm a socialist, whatev.)
MCCAIN:
1. His stances on torture and immigration *before he ran for president* were commendable.
2. He has spent longer as a member of the US Senate than Obama.
3. He refused to leave the POW camp without the other prisoners, when offered early release.
And since I'm on the topic, I might as well do the VPs.
BIDEN:
1. Anita Hill (mom still hasn't forgiven him)
2. Open mouth, insert foot. Boy has a problem SingTFU.
3. He voted in favor of the Iraq war.
PALIN:
1. She has the courage of her convictions-- on a lot of social issues she walks the walk. (her opinions are all things I find repugnant, but she doesn't back down, at least)
2. She was elected the Governor of Alaska. So she clearly knows how to politick.
3. By all accounts she's a very nice individual, if you know her personally.
Your turn! Take this back to your journal-- name three negative things about a political candidate you like (president or otherwise) and three positive things about their opponent.
To be fair, Obama was never my candidate, so finding negatives wasn't that hard. And I liked McCain okay before he ran for president-- the problem was finding things I liked that he hadn't gone back on during the campaign. Palin was the hardest, though. She fills me with rage. :( |
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| (no subject) |
[Oct. 22nd, 2008|12:31 pm] |
There's a lively discussion going on over at one of my Jewish Women's Group mailing lists, about the rights conferred by legal marriage that aren't conferred by "civil unions" or other institutions. This was set off by one list member discussing with a coworker that fact that said coworker's "friends are struggling with the idea that marriage is in the Bible between a man and a woman and that the idea of marriage is one of the few places where religion and the state overlap."
To which another list member responded:
It's interesting that your colleague brought up the definition of
marriage in the Bible. Perhaps she's unaware that according to the
Tanakh (Old Testament), the act of a man marrying a woman is defined
in any one of three ways:
- Shtar - contract
- Bi'a - vaginal heterosexual intercourse
- Kessef - the exchange of a valuable item (I think this refers to
some sort of payment to the woman's father for the "loss" of a
daughter in the home)
[Actually, this might not even appear in the Bible at all, but in the
Oral Law somewhere (hehe, I said "oral"), probably in the Mishna
and/or Talmud.]
So according to the Bible, a hetero man who hooks up with a hetero
woman for a one night stand has effectively married that woman.
However the laws pertaining to marriage in the Bible relate only to
Jews, so the point is really moot for Christians. However, your
colleague might be interested to know that in the old days, some
people did get married by simply having sex. Yet I don't see any
Fundamentalist Christians running around demanding that people who
hook up at discotheques file for divorce the next morning.
For me, the biblical argument about the "sacred" nature of marriage is
a flimsy one, given the above info. Even the marriage contract which
is still used today in Orthodox Jewish hetero weddings basically
stipulates that the groom needs to provide for the bride (with a home,
income, and sexual satisfaction--note, he must satisfy *her*). It's
basically an ancient legal document that was intended to protect the
rights of women within marriage (because otherwise they'd have been
completely powerless).
If you can get married by fucking someone, and if marriage is a legal
contract that protects the rights of women in a partnership, why can't
the definition of marriage be extended to protect the rights of all
people involved in a partnership? And what is so sacred about fucking
as a symbol of partnership that needs to be protected?
Furthermore, these Christians who look to the Bible to define marriage
need to rethink their definition of marriage. Again, the description
in the Old Testament applies to Jews, whereas the Catholic definition
of marriage as a sacrament does not necessarily apply to
Fundamentalist Christians who reject the authority of the Catholic
Church. Which begs the question, by what religious authority do
Fundamentalist Christians define *their* idea of marriage? I've only
read small sections of the New Testament, so I honestly have no idea.
But I think it sort of removes fuel from that particular fire.
Take this post with a grain of salt-- since this was posted on an informal mailing list, it may not be entirely accurate-- but I think it's interesting to discuss the biblical definition of marriage in this situation, since that's what it seems a lot of people are basing their beliefs on the awful unholiness of gay marriage on. |
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| Thingie of the day |
[Oct. 14th, 2008|09:56 am] |
Every time a pundit makes a comment about how the country doesn't need government meddling to fix things, or the public hates having the government meddle or
Rank and file Americans know that more government meddling ultimately equals more problems. It always has and always will because government is not the social or cultural engine that drives America -- capitalism is.
I just want to stop and laugh.
Because really, the New Deal? It did nothing for our economy. Nothing at all. |
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| (no subject) |
[Oct. 10th, 2008|09:35 am] |
| [ | Tags | | | gay, politics | ] |
| [ | If I wasn't apathetic, I'd be |
| |  pleased | ] |
Congrats to all the gay couples in Connecticut! They can now marry.
Article here. |
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| (no subject) |
[Oct. 3rd, 2008|09:21 am] |
| [ | Tags | | | politics | ] |
| [ | If I wasn't apathetic, I'd be |
| |  cynical | ] |
Random political comment of the day:
Does anyone else think it's entirely and irritatingly classist to assume that blue collar workers care more about how "folksy" and "down-home" Palin is than anyone else? It seems a little weird to me that all the commentators keeps talking about how her "folksy charm" plays in "small towns" in "the Midwest". I can't bring myself to think that this is anything but hype-- and extraordinarily classist hype too. It feels very "Those poor working class folks! They don't understand the realities and politics, so they'll only vote for someone who sounds like them."
I'm trying very hard not to make comment on her accent-- It probably wouldn't sound so grating if Palin could put together a coherent point, though. |
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| Well, that was a thing to wake up to. |
[Aug. 29th, 2008|08:01 am] |
| [ | Tags | | | politics | ] |
| [ | If I wasn't apathetic, I'd be |
| | amused | ] |
So how about McCain's new running mate, then? Anyone think women are going to defect because he tapped Sarah Palin?
Wait, no?
Oh, McCain, stop trying to pander. All you're doing is pissing off Republicans. |
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| LEAVE HILLARY ALOOOOOOONE. >:( |
[Aug. 27th, 2008|09:08 am] |
This just in: Hillary Clinton is not the anti-Christ.
So, I watched a bit of the convention with mom and dad last night, and mom was raving about Clinton (I'm pretty sure she's got a girl-crush). And everyone at the convention was amazingly happy, and all the pundits were grudgingly like "well, I suppose she did a good job even though we really hoped she wouldn't."
And I comment to my father about how badly Maureen Dowd's been treating Clinton and her supporters this entire time. Any person who bitches unironically about "Hillary's gals" needs a good curbstomping, I'm just saying. My father LOL NO-ed me when I said that Dowd would find a way to spin the convention so that it would look bad for Clinton. Yeah, so what did I see when I checked my daily NY-Times email?
High Anxiety in the Mile High City
By MAUREEN DOWD
I’ve never actually seen a convention where the energy was so absorbed by people who had lost the nomination, rather than the one who had won.
Because god forbid the convention spend some time dealing with unifying the party by utilizing all of the popular, charismatic and groundbreaking people who were a part of the primaries. Apparently by speaking, Hillary is proving that's anti-Obama. Or her supporters are still anti-Obama. Or something. I mean, if Clinton hadn't spoken, Dowd probably would still have blamed her for the bad feelings felt by the last of her die-hard supporters. She can't win.
Other pundits I wanted to punch? Well, there was the one on MSNBC last night who said, during a discussion of whether Clinton's speech would unite the democrats who felt disenfranchised by her not getting the nomination, "no, because Hillary Clinton doesn't have supporters, she has followers." (He was sitting next to Rachel Maddow, who I do not want to punch because she's awesome and hot like a thousand suns.)
Uhm, hi? Clinton? Seriously not the candidate with the cult of personality, y'all. I mean, I'm cool with Obama. He's not a bad candidate. But he's the one with the magic gift of tongues and the terrifying league of supporters who kind of made me want to hide during the primaries.
Seriously, people, she can't control the thoughts of every person who supported her. If some of them are still pissed at Obama, that's Obama's goddamn problem, not hers. While she's made some missteps here at the end, as far as I can tell, Clinton's done pretty much her damndest to throw her support behind Obama. Now go away.
Someone curbstomp Maureen Dowd. Please? For me?
Vote Lex 2008. Saving the world from itself. |
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| (no subject) |
[Mar. 20th, 2008|12:00 pm] |
I'm having a good time. I've been at the PCA/ACA conference, and listening to papers on the use of Chinese in Firefly (that was terrible fanwank, BTW), the social construction of the obesity epidemic, and the use of folklore in Supernatural. I missed an entire panel on Doctor Who because I didn't want to get up at 6:30am today, though... and ended up missing all the panels I could go to today because I overslept. I'm meeting roseganymede and shay_reynolds at the Exploratorium in a few hours and don't have time to get downtown and listen to some papers before then. Woe.
Last night was awesome, though. At the Fat Studies panel I went to, Marilyn Wann (fat activist, writer of Fat!So?, and all around awesome person) was handing out little stickers inviting everyone to open houses at her place all weekend. Since it wasn't that far, I went to hang out at like, nine. She was gracious and sweet and dealt with my having a migraine, being a spaz, and one of those halves of a couple who never shuts up about their girlfriend. Who, by the way, didn't find out whose place I was at until I'd left, and promptly proceeded to spaz and fangirl a bit. Marilyn was brilliant, and we had a lovely conversation about activism, internet memes (I explained Anonymous and RickRolling), adipositivity, music and whole host of other things. She sent me an email afterwards, so... go me! :D
SPEAKING OF!
BOSTON FRIENDS, YES YOU! LISTEN UP!
H. 1844: the height/weight anti-discrimination law
People of all sizes face discrimination based on height or weight. It's real. It's not okay. Without a law, we have no protection. Only a few places have this law: San Francisco, Santa Cruz, Washington DC, Madison, Wisconsin, and Michigan.
You want to make history?
1. Call your Massachusetts Representative: 617-722-2000 (Ask to be directed based on your zip code.)
- Ask: How will my Rep. vote on H. 1844, the height/weight law?
2. Come to the crucial hearing! Tell your story!
Tuesday, March 25, 2pm
State House, room A-2, in Boston
If you know other people living in Massachusetts, please forward this info to anyone you think would be interested!
For questions, contact Marilyn Wann: marilyn @ fatso.com |
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| Also, political blogging |
[Feb. 7th, 2008|02:54 pm] |
| [ | Tags | | | politics | ] |
| [ | If I wasn't apathetic, I'd be |
| | political | ] |
I meant to post on Tuesday with a big fat Yeah, I voted for Hillary. Wanna make something of it?
I never got around to it for the same reason I don't get around to blogging most things I intend to talk about.
But then I saw a post on Shakespeare's Sister about voting for Hillary (and the attendant shaming, bashing, and fear), and I just have to say: "Co-signed, man. Fucking co-signed."
I Am Not Ashamed |
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| (no subject) |
[Apr. 20th, 2007|01:50 pm] |
You know how I was planning to model the Superhuman Registration Act on the Patriot Act?
... The Patriot Act is 131 pages long. (Yeah, I'm a terrible liberal, I haven't read it yet.) The goddamn summary is 18 pages. I'm gonna hafta do some editing for my Registration Act, because like hell I have the patience and fortitude to write something that's 131 pages. Or even a quarter of that.
If anyone wants to help, all the info, including the text of the Patriot Act can be found [here]. If you have a better model for the Superhuman Registration act I'd be delighted to hear it. |
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| (no subject) |
[Jan. 31st, 2007|02:03 pm] |
Racewank always makes me want to write a tl;dr post about my fandom habits and kinks, and analyze them in light of current gender norms and racial prejudices.
And then I try to work it all out and it leaves a bad taste in my mouth.
Because, yes, I am well aware that I do, on occasion, fetishize Black and Asian men. I have a kink for androgyny. Tattoos and piercings turn me on. I like fantisizing about what, in most literature, would be termed "Other."
After all, I'm a short, well-educated, middle-class Caucasian girl.
And then I start trying to fit in my religion, and something in the back of my brain points out that to some people being Jewish means I'm not White. Granted, I can pass, but my Whiteness is certainly questionable by some lights.
I mean, Jews have areally weird history when it comes to dealing with ethnic minorities-- nannies, for instance, are common, and what with the whole civil rights movement, and the huge fights over whether jews are White or not... There's the whole "epidemic" of Jewish women adopting Chinese babies that's been going on for a few years now. And this is a total tangent, but it gets wrapped up in my race issues.
And I want to focus on simple appreciation, because why is it inappropriate for me to appreciate a certain cant to features, or a certain body type, or skin tone? Is the fact that I think the facial features of a certain set of Asian men attractive any more or less appropriate than someone who likes, say, redheads?
Not to mention the subset to my Black guy thing: which is that I find the stereotypical thug unappealing,and the black men that I like are the ones who look and act intelligent-- is this simply filed under my appreciation for intelligence along with my pretty? Or can it be read as a back-handed complimentwhere the rest of my subconcious has issues with the "dangerous, unintelligent animal" stereotype of a Black guy?
Am I allowed to say that there are certain black men whose abs I find quite lickable? And there are some nice Asian men that I wouldn't mind touching in naughty places?
... ... And that there's a certain chubby white chick that really should be in my bed right now because she's hotter than all the Black guys in the world?
Fuck this shit. I don't need to analyze my kinks because they ARE my kinks. If it's racist to like what I like, that's not going to stop me from being attracted to it-- all it does is make me feel guilty for fantasies (well, the white girl one isn't a fantasy, but she's not in my bed right now, and should be.) So, here. Have visual aids. Go ahead. Tell me it's wrong.
( Visual Aids ahead. By which I mean half-naked men. ) |
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| (no subject) |
[Dec. 2nd, 2006|08:30 am] |
I was going through my CDs and I found out that I apparently own "Oooh... On the TLC Tip"-- the first CD by TLC. It's interesting to remember that the group was very political originally.
TLC's final track ("Conclusion") includes a bit about words cannot express to you how important safe sex is to us-- what some of us toy around with can easily become a deadly weapon. Actually, my favorite song on TLC's first CD is called "His Story", dedicated to Tawana Brawley, a young Black woman who spoke out about being raped six White men. This is a story of a male/female threat to society/ why you wanna go and tell a lie on me? His story, over mine/ his story will be his story and/ my story is a waste of time...
I feel like they lost some of that edge-- Salt n' Pepa faded out of the limelight quickly, but TLC didn't. While, TLC's second, and breakthrough, CD was political, it didn't wear its politics on its sleeve the way their first album did. "Waterfalls" was a powerful song, but it was a little quieter, a little bit less agressive. This is not to say it was bad, but I do remember being surprised the first tiem I heard "Oooh... On the TLC Tip" at how much more pointed it was. The songs have more hard edges-- their sound, as well as their music was more polished in their second album.
Their third CD was... well, disappointing, as a recall. I vaguely remember "Unpretty"-- a song about female self image, but the focus was gone. Might have something to do with all the infighting and lawsuits, but still.
There's no real point to this post except that I think I'll listen to Salt-N-Pepa and TLC tomorrow. Whatever happened to my copy of CrazySexyCool? |
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| JESUS CHRIST |
[Oct. 19th, 2006|01:30 am] |
| [ | Tags | | | politics | ] |
| [ | If I wasn't apathetic, I'd be |
| |  annoyed | ] |
That's the third person in an HOUR to call and want to ask how I'm going to vote.
Okay, well, technically, it's the first person for ME. But the first person wanted to talk to my mother and thought that she was a he (her name isn't popular or well-known, but it IS a gender-specific female name). The second person just hung up when I told them mum wasn't home. And now another one. Fucking go away people.
Who I intend to vote for is none of your damn business. I don't like being a statistic. I don't vote along party lines-- I vote what I think. And while that does tend to fall into the Democratic range, if there's a proposition that I want to vote for that the Democratic party doesn't, screw off. I don't want you to add me to your number of people that you can wave in the face of doners. There's no reason for you to keep bloody BOTHERING me. |
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| Another damn 9/11 post? |
[Sep. 11th, 2006|01:17 pm] |
| [ | Tags | | | politics | ] |
| [ | If I wasn't apathetic, I'd be |
| |  restless | ] |
| [ | Play it for me |
| | library, yo | ] |
Everyone seems to be doing the reminisce thing.
It's one of those events where everybody remembers exactly where they were and what they were doing at the time-- it's memorable to me, not for what I was doing when ithappened, but for the fact that I was unreachable from almost exactly the moment the first plane hit to the minute the towers finished falling. 9am to 10:30am. I was in Asian Art History-- I don't remember what we were studying that day. Early Japanese art, probably, since it was one of the first classes. But the lights were off, the doors were closed, the teacher had the projector on and was lecturing in the little, out of the way art history building where there's only one classroom that's really used on a regular basis. There was no one to come in and spring the news.
Nothing seemed off to me when I walked back to my room. I don't remember people talking more, there weren't more people than usual out and about or off in their rooms. I flopped into my chair and went to go poke around online, as was my wont after classes.
My first hint that something was wrong was that kyofujimiya, my girlfriend at the time, displaying her wonderful grasp of geography, asked me if I was alright. (I lived in Boston). After assuring her that I was fine, because New York was four hours away, I finally managed to get some sort of coherent story. About planes and the Twin Towers and devastation. I have to admit, I remember not taking much of it seriously at all. I knew there was chaos, and knew people were dead, but I remember my two major thoughts being "either Bush's administration organized this, or they're going to use it" and "I hope Dee's family is okay." Dee was my roommate-- her family lives in Queens. I wasn't worried about my family. My grandmother had no reason to be anywhere near the Twin Towers, she's an old lady and doesn't really leave Brooklyn much. My uncle is in Long Island, but he too had no real reason to be downtown on that particular day. I left it to my parents to try and get through to the rest of my family.
It wasn't until later in the day, when I watched Dee freaking out, and the death tolls started rising that the seriousness of the situation hit me.
Confession: I have never seen the footage of the planes hitting the Twin Towers. |
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thoughtful
worried
tired
awake
accomplished
shocked
guilty