Category Archives: Outrages

Cure the Cure

I am on a few listservs related to various topics. I just recently received an email via one of them regarding a story that I had not previously heard about. The basic gist is this: A young gay kid in Memphis, TN, came out to his family and was subsequently shipped off to a Christian fundamentalist re-education center. Now I imagine that this thing has happened before, but this specific case has generated quite a buzz within certain internet circles. One reason in particular is that he was able to do a few updates on his blog while this was going on. The sad thing is that his last update talks about suicide and there has not been a new one since the 3rd of June. Some people are questioning whether this entire blog is a hoax, and though of course I can’t be sure, I imagine it is for real.

First, check out the website for the place where he was sent:
“Love In Action – International Inc.”

The gist of the program he is in is to help people with addictions. Being homosexual is considered by these people as one such addiction. I can’t imagine what the day to day of the program is, but I can’t imagine it is pretty.

Here is the link to his blog:
Zach’s Blog

These Love In Action people seem to be cozy with the group “Focus on the Family.” The people in this organization are basically super-right wing Jesus freak nuts. Idiots such as these people are pushing for the Federal Marriage Amendment. Read their dossier on homosexuality by clicking here.

These people may seem stupid, but they are politically savvy. For instance, they have basically cloned Focus and created “Focus on the Family ACTION.” The crucial difference is that this 2nd organization is not a non-profit and is thus able to more fully engage in political lobbying.

Check out their website: Focus on the Family ACTION

Notice that the News section of this website links directly to the Focus website.

And if this stuff is interesting to you, be sure to check out: Exodus International a flat out anti-gay super Chrustian crusading organization. Check out their FAQ section for some really enlightening reading.

Man, it sucks to read about my country this way. But this is an important time for the USA. We must not allow ourselves to be scared into submission by constant threats of terrorism and we can not continue to pursue a policy of perpetual war. We must focus on extremely pressing domestic issues, which means renewing the fight for civil liberties across the board. I don’t want to go down in history as the generation that allowed the gains of the 1960’s to be lost to crooked neocons and religious fundamentalists. I know America is great, but we’ve got to fight dirty – our future depends on it.

Dangerous Media

Today we have a disturbing entry. Let me introduce you to the United Church of Christ. The UCC is really a grouping of churches, ranging from the very liberal to the modestly conservative. The idea of the the UCC is to articulate church, and Christ, as a place welcoming to all people. What “all people” really means is, gays, minorities, women, etc. So, since churches can tend to be rather stick in the mud places regarding social trends, the UCC seeks to embrace the results of the civil rights movements while keeping space for faith. The church ordained the first openly gay Christian minister back in 1972.

I find that the UCC is a brilliant example of a “uniting, not dividing” institution. And of course, this goal, uniting a deeply divided country has been all the talk of all the politicians – even W himself. Therefore one would assume that the UCC’s mission would be welcome on the public airwaves in the form of a commercial.

Not so.
Continue reading →

Annoying Euphemism of the Day – Plus Free Rant!!

If someone came up to me and said, “I have a conflict about something,” I would not assume he meant, “I have a war [going on] about something.” This brings me to the second installment of annoying euphemism of the day. Though by the dictionary, the term conflict can be used to mean battle, it is a usage that I find insincere. A conflict arises when one has very little money, and must chose to pay either his cable bill or his high speed internet bill. The conflict arises because one can not do both, and thus has to chose one at the sacrifice of the other.

WHEN THE GLOBE’S LARGEST SUPERPOWER IS FIGHTING POOR PEOPLE WHO BELIEVE THEY ARE FREEDOM FIGHTERS IN THE 3RD WORLD, IT IS NOT A CONFLICT. IT IS A WAR.

Although I would like to say this euphemism is just a right wing trick, to keep us buying our hummers and shopping at Wal*Mart, the left is using it as well. Evidence today on the Ed Shultz show when he referred to the Iraqi war as a conflict. Let’s make no beans about it, boys and girls. With over 1,000 of our soldiers, and roughly 10x as many as their soldiers dead, what we have is a war, albeit a lopsided one.

That we can refer to the situation in Iraq as anything less than a war is simply unthinkable. Furthermore, we are told constantly, that in order to fight the WAR on terrorism, we must become more paranoid, distrustful of others, and open to the government than ever. If our WAR on terror is a war that is fought in unconventional terms, than surely poor young men and women riding in tanks and toting machine guns would qualify under the old definitions.

I believe this major euphemism is employed to cover our guilt. That is, now, we can fight war abroad and not have to sacrifice materially at home. Sure that other, vaguer war is forcing us to sacrifice what is perhaps most dear to this country, but even with our troops dying daily in foreign and hostile lands, we cry out when gas prices go up 10 cents to the gallon. Simply, those of us lucky (wealthy) enough to chose not to join the armed forces face absolutely no hardships in daily American life. We have all the exotic fruit we could possibly imagine at the local grocery store (oops, I mean Super Wal*Mart,) and plentiful supplies of sweatshop clothing from countries we couldn’t point out on maps.

We have reached the point in the consumer society whereby so long as our choice in goods and services remains at a certain acceptable level, externalities such as wars can be reduced to mere conflicts. I do like my country, for its ideals, but we have come a very long way since the 18th century. Though the easy life is now available to more people than ever, I think we have become masters of delusion. Just like Viagra may allow sex where there is no longer desire, calling war conflict only further thickens the haze that surrounds us in these 50 states.

Quality Construction

I worked once with Habitat for Humanity. Why only once? Two reasons. One, I was too busy, and two, the quality of the housing being built for these people sucked. Now, today I go clicking over to the Globe to find this article on the Big Dig. As it turns out, all the tunnels have major structural flaws and will have to be repaired at what will undoubtedly be tremendous costs. Read the article HERE.

After this disspaointing and, frankly, enraging article, I decided to visit Nate’s website. He had a particularly good editorial linking his personal goings on with the fate of something called the High Line Railroad in Manhattan. I remember hearing about this a while back, but thanks to Nate’s article, I re-discovered the project’s amazing website. Click HERE to check it out.

What’s interesting about these two seemingly unrelated incidents is Quality. The High Line, built from 1929 – 1934, is still standing today, and is in fact strong enough to begin its second life as a unique public park. The Big Dig, which consisted of a construction period of roughly 15 years, is now just being completed (though anyone who actualy drives in Boston would harken to qualify the meaning of “complete.”) Anyway, it has now been discovered that large and critical sections of the project will have to be re-built! And it’s brand new!

So, over 75 years later, though our technical know how has increased, the quality of our work has decreased. Whereas the High Line will soon begin its new life, the new Central Artery Tunnels will already be undergoing major structural repairs. It’s a sad commentary on the nature of worksmanship and the larger ideal of public works projects in this country.

Fashion Police

I was listening briefly to Air America radio today and heard the story of two people being arrested for wearing anti-Bush T-shirts at a Bush speech. What was particularly shocking about this even was that it was held on public property – at the West Virginia Capitol. The T-shirts had Bush’s name crossed out on the front and the words, “Love America, Hate Bush,” and “Regime Change Begins at Home,” on the back.

The couple was led from the event in handcuffs after refusing to remove the shirts.

Although the charges were later dropped, the incident caused one of the protesters to briefly lose her job. The city’s public officials have apologized. The two, however, are bringing a lawsuit against the federal policing agencies involved in the arrest, with the help of the ACLU.

This is a very clear cut case. These individuals, one of whom is a registered Republican, were singled out because the political message on their shirt did not sit well with the authorities. These people were not out there trying to shout the president down or belittle other supporters, instead they were involved in a quiet but visible protest. Protest is not always about disruption, and wearing a shirt with a particular message is a direct way to make yourself heard without speaking.

Take two examples from back at Trinity. For one, a certain sorority during pledge time had shirts made up for pledges. As part of the ritual these pledges had to wear the shirt and a white skirt around campus on certain days. The shirt said, “If I don’t remember it, it didn’t happen.” As you might imagine, some people on campus were furious about these shirts. They found them demeaning to women, and couldn’t understand why some would chose to wear it. Someone mentioned it in a letter to the editor of our newspaper, and the issue was discussed. However, no T-shirts were confiscated, and the girls (I say girls because I mean girls) wearing them were not kicked out – all perfectly correct.

Another instance is when I would wear my famous “San Francisco Physical Education” T-shirt around campus. The message of this shirt was pretty obvious, and I knew that a lot of people did not agree with the message. I’d get stares and sometimes glares, but again, nobody demanded I remove the shirt or leave Trinity.

Obviously what these people were trying to do was bring attention to their viewpoints. Their intention, as far as I can ascertain, was to use the shirts to engage with those who did not agree with the messages on them. Furthermore, they did this all at a public gathering in a public location. Had this been a private place, such as a Bush-Cheney “Town Hall,” then such censorship, though perhaps still odious, would be legal.

But this was a traditional public forum. As such, the arrest of these individuals expressing their viewpoints in a non-disruptive manner, based solely on the fact that the authorities didn’t like the message, is clearly a violation of the 1st Amendment.

I can only hope that this two people, who acted within the law during both their protest and arrest, can get their message out there. There is no doubt in my mind that the treatment these two received has been imposed on countless others, both outside of and within the Bush administration. Incidents such as this are what really turns me away from these Bush type Republicans more than anything else.

Peaceable public protest is the guarantee that makes this country so special and so hated by those who would rather stifle all dissent. If Bush’s platform is going to be a hard line against intolerant regimes, then he must practice what he preaches.

But I don’t see that happening.