Reading the newspapers, I want to cry.
For example:
http://www.nytimes.com/aponline/2010/10/09/us/AP-US-Anti-Gay-Bullying.html?pagewanted=1&_r=1&ref=news
To summarize, this article talks about the controversy of anti-bullying policies in schools, in the wake of four teen suicides this month due to bullying around sexual orientation. The controversy steams from conservative activists objecting that by telling kids it's not ok to bully other kids based on their sexual orientation, it sends a message that being gay is ok. (These conservative groups would prefer an approach which targets all bullying; the article points to studies that show that such a blanket or "neutral" approach creates an environment where bullying around sexual orientation festers and grows).
This all sounds academic and ideological until one considers that this is in the wake of *four children killing themselves this month because they were bullied for being gay* and that *gay teenagers are at uniquely and dangerously high risks for suicide*.
Then it stops being academic, and starts becoming atrocious.
And an atrocious question occurs- is the startlingly high, and, according to studies, preventable deaths of gay teenagers an acceptable price to conservative groups in the attempt to maintain an atmosphere where being gay is an untolerated thing?
And if so, can these same conservative groups be taken seriously in their "right to life" campaigns in other areas?
To come clean here, I believe, firmly, that all the ways we love are a gift from God; love itself, the ability to connect and the willingness to sacrifice for the other, is the highest holy we attain in this love, and an unimaginable gift. But I was raised in an environment that was less accepting of people who weren't heterosexual, and I do understand the Biblical arguments against gay relationships; more importantly, I understand the impetutus to accept those arguments. I understand how scary it is to think that one's personal salvation is dependent on accepting the premises of the Bible, and how difficult and heartbreaking it can be to understand the Bible.
So this post is not an attempt to argue that the only way that Christians (or Muslims or Jews or Atheists or anyone else) can approach the relationships between people of two genders is to be accepting- that's not a possibility for every single person at this moment, just like it's not a possibility that every single person lose their racism, their classism, or any other inate biases.
But this post is calling for putting the sanctity of children's lives above the theological (and theoretical) wrangling over what constitutes appropriate human affection.
Children are dying over this. And we know we can impact this by protecting them, and by letting them know that they are loved and accepted *as is*. And by telling all children that they are accountable in their behavior toward each other, regardless of whether they like or approve of each other.
Just as we, as adults, have an equal responsibility to treat each other with civility, respect, and compassion, regardless of whether we agree with each other.
As adults, we have no excuse to do anything but create that environment of respect. And Christians, who are given such a powerful and forceful guide in the shape of Jesus Christ, have absolutely no excuse in promoting anything other than a culture of acceptance and love.
Regardless of where you are on the political map, and regardless of what you personally believe is appropriate in terms of intimate relationships, as a Christian, your duty is to love the person, and to promote and environment that protects their life.
Shame, shame on any organization or person who seeks to do otherwise.
(For the record, I believe that for people or groups arguing against comprehensive protection for gay students in schools, that their resistance comes from ignorance, not from malice. I think that for people who have not experienced the intense and isolating experience of questioning ones orientation, or knowing that ones orientation is different from and reviled by the norm, combined with some adamant religious teachings on the subject, that there can be a lot of misunderstanding about what it means to be in the shoes of a gay teenager. I think that more outreach from gay people to religious groups is crucial here; I believe that the more people have an opportunity to understand, the more compassionate and sane they will be in their response).
Saturday, October 9, 2010
Saturday, October 2, 2010
Dear Reader,
Unless you are a reader from the future (in which case I am dying of envy, practically, because of all the things you will know that I don't, though also, it encourages me to think there are readers in the future, implying as it does both a future *and* a future of literacy!), you are aware that these are strange, strange days in the United States. If ever there was a time when humans were collectively looking through a glass darkly, now, among my compatriots, it is that time.
It's impossible to get a clear, firm sense of what is going on, because our common narrative has splintered so badly- it's not even a matter of he-said, she-said on national level, it's a matter of completely varying theories about the actual nature of reality. I mean, there are people who believe our president is a Satanic Muslim Foriegn Born Anti-Christ, and there are people who think those things cannot logically cohere together in one person (and who see Satanism and the concept of the Anti-Christ as myths akin to the Easter Bunny in ridiculousness, but vastly more distasteful in aesthetic).
Beyond people coming from different places, there is a pervasive, underlying distrust of the media (which is almost always defined as "a news outlet saying things I don't like to hear!"), an underlying distrust of the government (ours and everyone else's), an underlying distrust of the various multi-national corporations (which no longer even seem to be run by humans, but something vastly more powerful and less sympathetic), of schools, of unions, of religions- basically, there is no safe place, no sanctuary where one can go, even for a minute, and not feel surrounded and nipped at on all sides by unease, distrust.
In such an environment, it's increasingly difficult to find common ground. Tea Partiers look insane to non-tea partiers, who are themselves viewed as elitist and/or mind controlled liberal idiots. Liberals look like traitors to Conservatives. Rural people look like hickish buffoons to the urbanites from the Coastal Cities. Incredibly, at a time when we are able to travel more than we ever have, and to communicate instantly with the widest range of people possible in humanity, we seem to be backing off, shirking back into our enclaves, and limiting our meartfelt communication with people who are like us, who will hear what we hear, see what we see.
I'm not innocent of this. You'll note, dear reader, either of the now who has opinions on this already, or reader of the future who knows how this will all shake out and is judging me accordingly, that I'm pretty much disdainful of the tea party movement and ideas, which seem to me stunningly ignorant of both history and the human need for interdependance. Sarah Palin does, in fact, God forgive me, make me want to claw out my eyeballs everytime I hear or read her. Ayn Rand is someone I am fascinated with, and read out of a guilty pleasure, but when I find someone who takes her ideas seriously I feel hysterical laughter rising in me that I have to surpress- the experience is akin to how I imagine it would be if I woke up and everyone all the sudden had elephant noses coming out of their foreheads, and didn't see it as a problem. Utter absurdity. Utter, sanity challenging absurdity.
So I'm not innocent in this, and I don't really know how to be innocent in this. You live in the world. You come to an understanding of things. You chose sides. I get that. I get that to perpetually dilly dally in the maybes and well, on the other hands of existence is to stay, perpetually, in one place. I don't want that for myself, and beyond that, my brain doesn't really let me go that way.
But I am scared- terrified, actually, does not do the experience justice- and heartbroken at the way this polarization becomes personal. I don't think that people who attend tea party rallies are lunatics, and I don't want to start seeing them that way. I don't think that wealthy people who vote for tax breaks for themselves at the expense of social programs for the many are evil monsters who eat their babies, and I don't want to start thinking that way. Likewise, I don't think that Christians who vote for anti-gay legislature are hateful trolls, and etc. I don't want to let my frustration over the outcomes of tea party rallies, tax breaks, homophobic legislature, etc, to spill into dismissing the people who pushed for those outcomes as less than me somehow.
What is universal, it seems, in this country, at this time, is the idea that our social fabric is unraveling. Our sense of the future is coming apart at the seams. In this, we share a commonality. It does not feel like a good thing to share.
A blog post isn't going to solve this, obviously, but one of the reasons I'm writing is to try to get a sense of how to come together, how we as a community can come together, how I as an invidivual can make bridges. I can't imagine his is a winner takes all game- I see it the opposite: there is no winning unless we are all involved. And I can't imagine how we can all get involved without there being some willingness to bend, to be empathetic. And, ok, honestly, I feel pretty dwarfed as an individual, and have no idea how to go from here (pretty distrustful and angry) to there (?).
But the work is clearly crucial and urgent.
S
Unless you are a reader from the future (in which case I am dying of envy, practically, because of all the things you will know that I don't, though also, it encourages me to think there are readers in the future, implying as it does both a future *and* a future of literacy!), you are aware that these are strange, strange days in the United States. If ever there was a time when humans were collectively looking through a glass darkly, now, among my compatriots, it is that time.
It's impossible to get a clear, firm sense of what is going on, because our common narrative has splintered so badly- it's not even a matter of he-said, she-said on national level, it's a matter of completely varying theories about the actual nature of reality. I mean, there are people who believe our president is a Satanic Muslim Foriegn Born Anti-Christ, and there are people who think those things cannot logically cohere together in one person (and who see Satanism and the concept of the Anti-Christ as myths akin to the Easter Bunny in ridiculousness, but vastly more distasteful in aesthetic).
Beyond people coming from different places, there is a pervasive, underlying distrust of the media (which is almost always defined as "a news outlet saying things I don't like to hear!"), an underlying distrust of the government (ours and everyone else's), an underlying distrust of the various multi-national corporations (which no longer even seem to be run by humans, but something vastly more powerful and less sympathetic), of schools, of unions, of religions- basically, there is no safe place, no sanctuary where one can go, even for a minute, and not feel surrounded and nipped at on all sides by unease, distrust.
In such an environment, it's increasingly difficult to find common ground. Tea Partiers look insane to non-tea partiers, who are themselves viewed as elitist and/or mind controlled liberal idiots. Liberals look like traitors to Conservatives. Rural people look like hickish buffoons to the urbanites from the Coastal Cities. Incredibly, at a time when we are able to travel more than we ever have, and to communicate instantly with the widest range of people possible in humanity, we seem to be backing off, shirking back into our enclaves, and limiting our meartfelt communication with people who are like us, who will hear what we hear, see what we see.
I'm not innocent of this. You'll note, dear reader, either of the now who has opinions on this already, or reader of the future who knows how this will all shake out and is judging me accordingly, that I'm pretty much disdainful of the tea party movement and ideas, which seem to me stunningly ignorant of both history and the human need for interdependance. Sarah Palin does, in fact, God forgive me, make me want to claw out my eyeballs everytime I hear or read her. Ayn Rand is someone I am fascinated with, and read out of a guilty pleasure, but when I find someone who takes her ideas seriously I feel hysterical laughter rising in me that I have to surpress- the experience is akin to how I imagine it would be if I woke up and everyone all the sudden had elephant noses coming out of their foreheads, and didn't see it as a problem. Utter absurdity. Utter, sanity challenging absurdity.
So I'm not innocent in this, and I don't really know how to be innocent in this. You live in the world. You come to an understanding of things. You chose sides. I get that. I get that to perpetually dilly dally in the maybes and well, on the other hands of existence is to stay, perpetually, in one place. I don't want that for myself, and beyond that, my brain doesn't really let me go that way.
But I am scared- terrified, actually, does not do the experience justice- and heartbroken at the way this polarization becomes personal. I don't think that people who attend tea party rallies are lunatics, and I don't want to start seeing them that way. I don't think that wealthy people who vote for tax breaks for themselves at the expense of social programs for the many are evil monsters who eat their babies, and I don't want to start thinking that way. Likewise, I don't think that Christians who vote for anti-gay legislature are hateful trolls, and etc. I don't want to let my frustration over the outcomes of tea party rallies, tax breaks, homophobic legislature, etc, to spill into dismissing the people who pushed for those outcomes as less than me somehow.
What is universal, it seems, in this country, at this time, is the idea that our social fabric is unraveling. Our sense of the future is coming apart at the seams. In this, we share a commonality. It does not feel like a good thing to share.
A blog post isn't going to solve this, obviously, but one of the reasons I'm writing is to try to get a sense of how to come together, how we as a community can come together, how I as an invidivual can make bridges. I can't imagine his is a winner takes all game- I see it the opposite: there is no winning unless we are all involved. And I can't imagine how we can all get involved without there being some willingness to bend, to be empathetic. And, ok, honestly, I feel pretty dwarfed as an individual, and have no idea how to go from here (pretty distrustful and angry) to there (?).
But the work is clearly crucial and urgent.
S
Jump right in, get your feet wet!
Good Morning, Dear Reader!
Do you ever, just before you wake up in the morning, have the sensation of wondering, before you open your eyes, at what point of your life you'll wake up in? This is not an infrequent experience for me, particularly on a Saturday when I don't have some mad scramble of Shower!Brush Hair! Apply Deodorant! Eat English Muffin! Crap, Feed the Cat! Shoes, Work Clothes, Where are My Keys and Bus Pass, Out the Door to Work going on. On a Saturday, when I don't have any particular need to be in any particular place, I often have the general sensation that it is possible that I could just wake up- anywhere, at any point of my life. This is geographical (my tiny tiny little yellow house in a college town in Ohio? the south facing room in the farmhouse I grew up in in WNY? the orange and turquoise room I helped paint and shared with my then girlfriend in the first insane, decadent, beautiful, painful year of living in Seattle?) but also it's an issue of time travel- I have the sense that I'm not sure where I am in my timeline, which self (25 year old Self? 9 year old self?) I'm inhabiting these days. It's a sensation both exhilarating and dreadful, and when I wake up to find myself, consistently moving forward (I think!) in typical linear fashion, I'm both disappointed and relieved.
I don't know what this experience means, or where it comes from. I don't know if this is a restlessness of the soul or of the brains inability to to properly absorb, catalogue, and incorporate the vast and disparate bits of data I am always asking it to absorb. Maybe I've read too many science fiction novels, or suffer from that ironically common desire among Americans of my age and younger to be somehow unique and destined for greatness. Or maybe this is a common experience in and of itself- maybe the very act of waking up is a disorienting experience for everyone, a pulling us out of one existence and thrusting into another that is by its very nature a confusing, sense-scrambling thing.
I don't know. But I'm fascinated by it, and curious, and more curious if this is an experience that other people have. And more curious to know, above all things: What Does This Mean? What Does This Say? What does the private, murky interior workings of our brain as it constantly churns out consciousness tell us about ourselves?
Here is another thing you should know about me: I haven't actually travelled all that much. Beyond the US, I've only been to Canada (both coasts!) and within the US, I have spent the vast majority of my time at home, wherever home happens to be at the time. It's not that I'm a homebody exactly; instead, at some point, I picked up the idea that every stone and leaf and crack in the sidewalk (not to mention cat, person, kid, old lady, old house, new street sign, etc) held it's own secret dignity and purpose, and I became fascinated with that, and maybe kind of obsessed, as well. So with such a backlog of things to observe and honor and think about- well, travelling seems a little bit redundant in that light. This is important because I tend to write and think a lot about the minutia, and about the things and people that I see right around me at any given time. I believe, strongly, in paying attention at all times, and the more overlooked and neglected a thing appears to be, the more fascinating it is and more proprietary I get towards it. You've been warned.
A final thing you should know about me: I read, a lot, anything I can get my hands on, and then there are all these fascinating ideas that have been practically downloaded into my head, and all I want to do is talk about them, ad infinitum, forever. I like ideas. I like learning how other people navigate life. I like arguing and figuring it out.
OK. So, like I said, good morning!
Next Post!
S.
Do you ever, just before you wake up in the morning, have the sensation of wondering, before you open your eyes, at what point of your life you'll wake up in? This is not an infrequent experience for me, particularly on a Saturday when I don't have some mad scramble of Shower!Brush Hair! Apply Deodorant! Eat English Muffin! Crap, Feed the Cat! Shoes, Work Clothes, Where are My Keys and Bus Pass, Out the Door to Work going on. On a Saturday, when I don't have any particular need to be in any particular place, I often have the general sensation that it is possible that I could just wake up- anywhere, at any point of my life. This is geographical (my tiny tiny little yellow house in a college town in Ohio? the south facing room in the farmhouse I grew up in in WNY? the orange and turquoise room I helped paint and shared with my then girlfriend in the first insane, decadent, beautiful, painful year of living in Seattle?) but also it's an issue of time travel- I have the sense that I'm not sure where I am in my timeline, which self (25 year old Self? 9 year old self?) I'm inhabiting these days. It's a sensation both exhilarating and dreadful, and when I wake up to find myself, consistently moving forward (I think!) in typical linear fashion, I'm both disappointed and relieved.
I don't know what this experience means, or where it comes from. I don't know if this is a restlessness of the soul or of the brains inability to to properly absorb, catalogue, and incorporate the vast and disparate bits of data I am always asking it to absorb. Maybe I've read too many science fiction novels, or suffer from that ironically common desire among Americans of my age and younger to be somehow unique and destined for greatness. Or maybe this is a common experience in and of itself- maybe the very act of waking up is a disorienting experience for everyone, a pulling us out of one existence and thrusting into another that is by its very nature a confusing, sense-scrambling thing.
I don't know. But I'm fascinated by it, and curious, and more curious if this is an experience that other people have. And more curious to know, above all things: What Does This Mean? What Does This Say? What does the private, murky interior workings of our brain as it constantly churns out consciousness tell us about ourselves?
Here is another thing you should know about me: I haven't actually travelled all that much. Beyond the US, I've only been to Canada (both coasts!) and within the US, I have spent the vast majority of my time at home, wherever home happens to be at the time. It's not that I'm a homebody exactly; instead, at some point, I picked up the idea that every stone and leaf and crack in the sidewalk (not to mention cat, person, kid, old lady, old house, new street sign, etc) held it's own secret dignity and purpose, and I became fascinated with that, and maybe kind of obsessed, as well. So with such a backlog of things to observe and honor and think about- well, travelling seems a little bit redundant in that light. This is important because I tend to write and think a lot about the minutia, and about the things and people that I see right around me at any given time. I believe, strongly, in paying attention at all times, and the more overlooked and neglected a thing appears to be, the more fascinating it is and more proprietary I get towards it. You've been warned.
A final thing you should know about me: I read, a lot, anything I can get my hands on, and then there are all these fascinating ideas that have been practically downloaded into my head, and all I want to do is talk about them, ad infinitum, forever. I like ideas. I like learning how other people navigate life. I like arguing and figuring it out.
OK. So, like I said, good morning!
Next Post!
S.
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