Unremarked miracles

I was chatting with a friend tonight, who relayed a moment from the Oscars on Sunday night. I was otherwise occupied on Sunday night trying to put my brain back together and even if I hadn't been so engaged, I wouldn't be watching Oscar and his tribe of devotees. One more demerit on my Gay Scorecard. I fear my gay days are numbered.

Anyway, Jon Stewart apparent made a wisecrack --pretty well all he ever does-- about the last time a woman and a black man were running for president. Something about asteroids. Everyone felt very superior, I am sure.

But it was only forty-some years ago that the push for an end to the old racial regime started in earnest, followed years later by the revolution in women's status. In less than one lifetime, now we have two people whose race or gender would once have limited their ambitions severely, running for President of what's left of the Republic. As people with policies, I abhor them both, but as a sign of race and gender change...

And this is the miracle of America, which many Americans are the last to notice, much less praise. Such vast social change in such a short span of time. As I have said more than once: compared to the Kingdom of God, America is a shame and tragedy. Compared to the rest of the planet, it is a daily continuing miracle.

Year of the Rat

Since I live in a city with a longstanding, large and influential Chinese population, I not only know that this is now the Year of the Rat, but that it is supposedly MY year. I was born, in the Chinese horoscope, a Rat, an Earth Rat, to be precise. As if being a Pisces and a homo wasn't enough! :-)

I am a lover of grand explanatory schemes. Very unPoMo. Illusory or not, they fascinate me and, if I choose to take them seriously, they sometimes make me feel more at ease in a world that often baffles me. The Jungian-inspired MBTI or the God-Knows-By-Whom inspired Enneagram. Astrology, not much.

Nevertheless, as Elinor Roosevelt said.

Here's the layout for Rats Like Me. I wish I were indeed more rat-like than I really am. Especially when it comes to money.

The Rat in the picture above, now him I can identify with. I have no idea what the Chinese says. But the guy is clearly not happy. A great crime, I know, but there you have it. Seems to be stuck in something. And he's both angry...maybe frustrated is better...and crying. Rats are supposed to be clever. Maybe he wasn't.

Who's to blame for this state of affairs? Is he mad at someone else? Or maybe himself.

Poor dude.

Me an ex-gay?

There are times when people in the gay tribe irritate me...well, no, that's not strong enough...make me crazy. I feel like resigning.

Me, a Kinsey 10, becoming an ex-gay? Was Mom right after all??

Two lesbians are hauling a photographer before the New Mexico Human Rights Commission because she refused to take a job to make pix of their commitment ceremony. The photog is a conservative Christian.*

This kind of stuff has been going on in Canada for quite some time.

My jaw drops when I read these stories.

What started out as a movement to be left in peace to live our lives without legal or social fear has morphed into one more victim entitlement program with a nasty, illiberal and vengeful attitude, one that now has legal teeth. Liberal fascism, anyone?

This past year I got to know a really wonderful guy who clearly had his fair share of homoerotics --boy, did he :-) -- but did not identify as gay. And more, he was not socialized as gay. A guy who likes, and in some cases loves, men but who lacked the whole gay baggage. God, what a breath of fresh air for yours truly.

One of the things which separates conservatives from libertarians is that libertarians make liberty the highest value. Conservatives dislike making any one value the highest; life is too organically messy and complex for that. But progressives make justice the highest value, and in consequence will ride roughshod over liberty to enforce it. For me, liberty has got to be more important than justice or stuff like this multiplies. Progressives like to paint conservatives as nothing more than fascists. Physician, heal thyself.

I am ashamed of being part of a group that promotes this kind of behavior.

I really do consider resigning. Really.

*And I speculate that if the photog had turned out to be a Muslim, the two dykes would have backed off and genuflected before her "cultural diversity".

And more thoughts....if the situation were reversed: a fundamentalist Christian bride-to-be contacted a photographer who was, unknown to her, a lesbian and when the photog found out the venue, said she would not be comfortable there because of the conflict between sexuality and religion, and declined the job, should the Christian woman be able to take the lesbian to the Human Rights Commission? Why not? Both discrimination on religion and on sexual orientation are illegal. These laws are nuts.

Why VDH is The Man

A very long interview with Victor Davis Hanson.

The "all cultures are equal" file

New Guinea woman gives birth
while being hanged for sorcery by her neighbors.

I mean, like, how can WE judge? It's, like, their CULture.

Tuesday afternoons remembered

MaleSoul 17

MaleSoul 16

Washington

Lazy critter that I be, on Washington's Birthday I have the nerve to link to my post from last year on this day. And this one, from someone else who thinks as I do. And if you can handle it, this one.

For Imad Mughniyeh

Welcome to Paradise, MF.