Who’s obsessed with sex?
A man has been arrested in Massachusetts for failing to vacate school property.
He was apparently upset about a book about families that included a family headed by a gay couple. "It is not that I don't want my child to ever learn it, it is I want to control the timing and manner." Learn what exactly? It is a fact that there are children with gay parents attending that school. Should children of gay parents also be slapped with a gag order preventing them from talking about their life at home so that Mr. Parker can "control the timing and manner" that his child learns about the existance of gay couples? That hardly seems equitable. Perhaps we should forbid all children from speaking about their home life so that no one ever hears anything their parents don't want them to hear, so that no one ever feels left out or unwelcome.
I hope that sounds as blindingly stupid to everyone else as it does to me. I've written on this subject before. This country is turning into a bunch of cowardly lions. They roar all day long about how strong they are and must be in withstanding [their definition of] the evils of this world, but should they actually have to confront any of said evils, they put their tail between their legs and run, afraid their valor will desert them in the face of temptation. Are we really so insecure that we cannot face opinions contrary to our own? Are we really such fragile flowers that any negative opinon expressed is devestating? Kids can be mean. I'm sure many a child has come home from school crying over some hateful barb flung in their face. Isn't it part of raising children that we instill in them the strength of character that allows them to withstand such attacks with aplomb? Apparently we don't want our children strong. We want them sheltered and weak.
But wait! It gets even better. Governor "Bonehead" Romney weighed in on the matter.
We have in Massachusetts a parental notification statute specifically in matters related to human sexuality. If a parent wants to be informed of what is being taught in a classroom and wants to have their child withdrawn from the classroom for that portion of the class dealing with human sexuality, that parent has the right.
So the book in question was a sex manual? Are Governor "Bonehead" Romney and Mr. Parker trying to tell us that they have sat down with their grade school children and discussed the "facts of life?" They have explained that inserting a penis into a vagina—over and over, usually accompanied by grunting or moaning with the occasional scream of ecstacy—is where babies come from? They have explained that parents do this on a regluar basis, even when the addition of a new baby brother or sister is not specifically on the agenda? I didn't think so.
Romney, do yourself a favor. Shut up.
Ralphinator Update
I've been chatting with Ralphinator, and I guess his relationship with his boyfriend has always been open to some degree. I must have read something to what he was typing that wasn't there, since I didn't really see him as the type to be in an open relationship. Shows you what I know. At least that part of the puzzle has been resolved for me, but it does raise a lot more questions.
I was right, though. There is more going on than first met my eye, but that's not my story to tell. Gotta love intuition. Thank goodness I'm finally learning to listen.
Seen on a bumper sticker
I don't have a problem with God. It's his fan club I can't stand.
Personal Revelations
There is something that has been on my mind for several days now. I've decided to go ahead and write about it. If any of the more genteel members of my family have found this blog, I'll warn you right now you might want to skip this post as it may reveal things about me you'd really rather not know.
A few years ago I spent some time with a certain guy. I had just started dating again after breaking up with my boyfriend of over a year. I liked this new guy, but about the time I actually started developing feelings for him, he stopped returning my calls. I don't know that I ever found out why that was, but we see each other on-line from time to time and will chat and "catch up," so to speak. Last week, he invited me over to his place to have a little fun. The conversation went something like this:
| ralphinator: | So do you want to come over? |
| s007767: | Sure. |
| ralphinator: | You want it to be just me or should I invite my boyfriend to join us? |
| s007767: | You have a boyfriend? |
| ralphinator: | Yeah. |
| s007767: | Weren't you totally brokenhearted just a couple weeks ago? |
| ralphinator: | Yeah. Same guy. |
| s007767: | So you're back together now? |
| ralphinator: | Yeah. We have an open relationship. |
| s007767: | And you're okay with that? |
| ralphinator: | Yeah. If we can, why shouldn't we? |
I've been trying to get my head around that for days now, and I still don't think I've managed it. I wonder how someone goes from being devastated that his boyfriend has been cheating on him to seeming so cavalier about opening up the relationship...in the space of about two weeks. Something about that just doesn't compute for me. I can't help but think he could have been with someone who would have treated him much better than that.
Still, if they really do love each other, have been able to work through the problem and this is an acceptable solution for him, who am I to judge? I know of as many open relationships as monogamous ones. Just from my casual observation open or not doesn't seem to have much impact on the durability of the relationship. Expectations and communication seem to have much more of an effect. Still, I can't shake the feeling that I ended up in the middle of some sort of pissing contest.
So, yes, I did go to his place for some fun. I knew he would be good in bed and I was not disappointed. We had a great time—the two of us. It was some of the best "fun" I've had recently. And yet when all was said and done, as I lay there in the dark, unable to get to sleep (for a variety of reasons, some quite mundane), all I could think about was, "So, I'm good enough for a romp, but not good enough for love?" It wasn't so much about the events of the evening as it was about the frustration I've felt with dating the last couple of years that just seemed epitomized by the evening.
What really burns my shorts is that I always put the negative on me. Why is my first thought that I am the one not good enough? Why am I not thinking that he is the one who isn't boyfriend material? And I'm not talking specifically about Ralphinator, here. It doesn't matter what the situation is. If something isn't going well, my first assumption is it is something I have done wrong.
I'll tell you why. It's habit. I spent so many years believing something was wrong with me, that I was broken, or maladjusted or just plain freakish that it is still my first impulse, my first train of thought. It really bugs that it is so engrained in my psyche that after years of therapy and years of knowing better, it's a rut my mind still slips into so easily.
Wow. This is good.
From AndrewSullivan.com
I can understand your sense that you cannot leave the church. But I know from experience that it is just that--a sense. You have felt the presence of God at Mass? I have too. You can feel it elsewhere but you cannot know that until you look. The gospels speak to you? I know you don't seriously think they speak only though the Catholic Church. As for the family/mother analogy, it simply isn't a good one. There is no biology here no matter how like that it may feel. Still, it can be valid in this way: If the church is your mother you have been, still are, and if the events of today are any indication, will increasingly be abused by her. Mentally, spiritually, and perhaps even physically abused. I feel for the pain I see in your writing. I have felt it too. But you have to take the advice you would give to anyone in an abusive relationship: get out.
It may be difficult, seem almost impossible, but that is the bottom line. I got out myself. I can assure you there is a rich and rewarding spiritual life to be had elsewhere. Religion is a choice. Please, for your own sake, choose a non-abusive one.
God made me do it.
The environment is a values issue. There are significant and compelling theological reasons why it should be a banner issue for the Christian right.
Rev. Ted Haggard, President, National Association of Evangelicals
This precisely my chief complaint against religion of almost any kind these days. Why do there have to be "significant and compelling theological reasons" for doing anything and everything? Why can't you just do them because they are smart and practical? Why do you need to have theological arguments to compel you to act? Are you really that weak of character? Is religion full of people who don't have the intestinal fortitude to act on their own and thus need God to compel them to righteousness?
Caring for the environment is a no brainer. Taking care of God's creation should be self-evident. How come it's taken you so long to figure out it's something you should be concerned about?
ANWR
Suddenly it is a matter of national security that we drill for oil in Alaska. That's rich. I wonder how many more miles Repulicans will get out of that excuse. We already have an oil reserve. I was informed today that there is enough oil in eastern Utah to supply the US for 10 years, but we don't use it. So either this is part of the "emergency oil reserve" we keep for war time (when else would an emergency be declared?) or it is like every other industry that is dying in eastern Utah: we buy oil from Saudi Arabia because it's cheaper than producing it at home. Either way, I see little point in drilling in Alaska, never mind the environmental concerns and the eyesore a huge oil pipeline would be in the Alaskan wilderness.
"We need to reduce our dependence on foreign oil!" is the battle cry. Wrong. We need to reduce our dependence on oil, period. As more nations around the globe industrialize, we will be competing for a piece of an increasingly smaller pie. China is the new oil consumer. How long do you think it will take India to catch up?
Something stinks and it's not the dead skunk on the highway.
Satan’s Secrets Exposed!
| s007767: | Well, I have crossed over to the Dark Side, you know. I am trying to corrupt your immortal soul. |
| bobster: | lol |
| bobster: | you are? |
| s007767: | Sure. Homosexuals are the new Axis of Evil. |
| s007767: | Saddam Hussien is so last year. |
| bobster: | lol |
| bobster: | you crack me up |
| bobster: | If you're trying to corrupt me you're not trying very hard |
| bobster: | I've given you plenty of opportunities to invite me over and seduce me but you've flatly turned me down |
| s007767: | Ah, but you see, that would be too direct. As one of Satan's minions, I am required to be subtle such that I corrupt you w/o you knowing it. |
It's a long story.
I love this man.
I was pleased to see John Paul II's papacy come to an end. On one of his other visits to the United States the pope condemned an "[American] culture that seeks to declare entire groups of human beings . . . to be outside the boundaries of legal protection." That's rich coming from the man who ordered bishops here to oppose civil rights laws that protect gays and lesbians (including hate-crime laws), leaving us "outside the boundaries of legal protection." In 2003 a Vatican screed condemned not only gay marriage but also adoptions by gays and lesbians. Allowing us to adopt children, the Vatican said, "would actually mean doing violence to these children." (Hmm. Violence against children . . . perhaps we should defer to the Catholic Church's expertise on that subject?) And two days before my boyfriend and I celebrated our 10th anniversary in February, the pope rose from his deathbed just long enough to describe gay marriage as part of an "ideology of evil." Gee, J.P., you shouldn't have.
What's maddening about this pope's signature gay bashing is this: When the pope—the dead one, the next one, the one after that—says something stupid about homosexuality, straight folks take it to heart. The church's efforts have helped defeat gay rights bills, led to the omission of gays and lesbians from hate-crime statutes, and helped to pass anti-gay-marriage amendments. But when a pope says something stupid about heterosexuality, straight Americans go deaf. And this pope had plenty to say about heterosexual sex—no contraceptives, no premarital sex, no blowjobs, no jerkin' off, no divorce, no remarriage, no artificial insemination, no blowjobs, no three-ways, no swinging, no blowjobs, no anal. Did I mention no blowjobs? John Paul II had more "no's" for straight people than he did for gays. But when he tried to meddle in the private lives of straights, the same people who deferred to his delicate sensibilities where my rights were concerned suddenly blew the old asshole off. Gay blowjobs are expendable, it seems; straight ones are sacred.
So I can't get behind this orgy of cheap and easy piety. Watching the talking twats on CNN pay their respects to this "universally beloved man of God" (how many of them have had premarital sex, I wonder?), to say nothing of the suddenly reverent assholes on Fox News (Bill O'Reilly didn't have many nice things to say about J.P. II when he opposed the invasion of Iraq), makes me want to throw a bottle of lube through a stained-glass window.
Awwww…
If you don't know Chris and Michael, they are boy's briefs and nochd respectively. If you don't know them, then you also don't know that they are two guys in love who afford the world a peek at their romance in their blogs. Check it out.
Thanks, guys.