I believe in the brotherhood of man, all men, but I don’t believe in brotherhood with anybody who doesn’t want brotherhood with me. I believe in treating people right, but I’m not going to waste my time trying to treat somebody right who doesn’t know how to return the treatment. —Malcolm X
I’m still working on my words about Baltimore, but this quote comes to mind as informative and deeply applicable. A lot of poor folks haven’t been treated right for a long time, and as Malcolm’s contemporary once said, “a hard rain’s a gonna fall” if things don’t change soon.
Now, only a few days later, similar laws have raced through both the Arizona House and Senate, leaving that state teetering on the edge of a full-blown, retrograde, hate-fueled Jim Crow reality. The question is: who, in present day, twenty-first century America, thinks like this?
Cast members of Duck Dynasty before their Hee Haw make-overs.
I suppose that it is natural and expected that bigots push back against the progress our nation has achieved in the past few years, both in securing equal rights in many states, and defending those gains, but I have a hard time taking it. For most of my life, I was largely ambivalent to the political aspects of sexuality, accepting but not particularly invested, but the older I become the more angry I become, the more annoyed by the inanity of it all. What is more small and petty than targeting an individual for social and political exclusion on the basis of who they happen to love? Why can’t people keep their hate to themselves, mind their own business, and get on with their own lives?
The justification is ridiculous–it would be laugh-out-loud hilarious if it weren’t so awful. According to the fiends responsible for these attempts to undermine the constitution, requiring Christians–or anyone who adopts a religion or belief that hates homosexuality–to treat gays as actual human beings and citizens, is tantamount to religious persecution. So, in essence, the vast Christian majority of the USA is supposedly being discriminated by the small percentage of people who are gay. I’d honestly had no idea that the faith was perched on such tenuous ground.
On the plus side, these backwards-assed redneck regional political assaults on liberty won’t go unnoticed on a national scale, and while they’ll undoubtably find support in aging, rural fundamentalists the Republican party–which just can’t seem to catch a break despite a train wreck of recent Presidential missteps–is going find itself guilty by association with young voters, most of whom don’t see what the big deal is, but will definitely wonder why so much time and effort is being devoted to the persecution of a tiny segment of the population, when young people are facing some of the worst economic realities in recent history.
I love to tell stories with words and images, often with a darkly magical twist. While speculative fiction & dissecting pop culture are my primary passions, I also work with clients & brands by assisting with content creation, editing, marketing & design.