(I don't normally post twice in one day, but considering it's been how many weeks now...? Double posting. Coming right up!)
"Hey! You're male!" "Hey! You're female!" "Hey...! You're... Gay! And you're... Lesbian! (Insert remark of disgust here.)" "Hey! You're straight!" "You asshole!" "Fucker!" "Ew, an Athiest!" (Think I've noted enough?)
All fracking day. Every fracking day. We just enjoy labelling each other, don't we? It's like we need these labels for everyday life, like we depend on them. Even I have noticed myself over these past few months using labels more than I'd like. I've never been one for calling somebody gay - not in my nature. Always been opposed to using said label. But calling someone an asshole? Ohhh yeah. All the time.
The problem is, we really have become reliant on these labels. They are our descriptors. Sometimes, it's not such a bad thing that they are used ("She's smart!"), but then there are times when they become dangerous - times like when a person uses a racial slur, or a homophobic term. That gets to people. It's called bullying, and it's why we have such a high suicide rate (especially amongst LGBTQ teens).
If you've walked the halls of a high school in the past ten years (I wouldn't recommend it, but hey, some of us have had to - or currently have to), you'd notice the sheer amount of language being thrown around - and I'm not talking Shakespeare being quoted either. I'm talking phrases like "What up, nigga?" and "That's so gay!" ... What the hell, gang? "Nigger" was a racial slur used to refer to African Americans some years ago, and is still an ugly term, yet I used to hear it being thrown around, all the time. A phrase I've always fought strongly was "That's so gay!" No. Is it happy? No? Then no, it's not 'gay'! Shut up.
As usual, the threat of labels does depend on the people involved. If it happens to be somebody who doesn't care, or knows how to brush them off, it's not going to matter... But if it's somebody who has heard it one too many times or is just tired of it, the offender might find their nose bent in ways it shouldn't be, or a couple of ribs misshapen.
I always feel a little sense of.... vengeful happiness when somebody who has hurt somebody else gets the hurt repaid to them more times over. I am not one to do much damage - I try my best not to - and I certainly don't like seeing somebody get hurt, but sometimes it's just too much and it feels like somebody needs to pay. It's those people, the ones that like to insult others with these ugly, painful labels, that need to get that repayment.
I'm getting off subject.
We need to watch our labels, in whatever walks of life. Maybe I'm biased, but it especially needs to be taken care of in the LGBT sections of reality. I've known - at least indirectly - two teenagers who have taken their own lives thanks to torment like this. What kind of shit is that? How is that... right? It isn't.
In the end though, what does it matter who you are, much less what others label you? A label is a generality placed on somebody because other people can't fathom the depths of the labeled person. It doesn't matter though what they're called. They are a PERSON. They are who they are. Nothing more, nothing less. It is not up to us to judge who that person is - there is nobody on this brown Earth that has the right to judge another person, much less state it.
Leave other people to be, and be yourself. If everybody were to do that, peace would actually be achievable...
(By the way, did you notice my minor Battlestar Galactica kick there earlier? I'm watching the series again... Be warned! Muahahahaha!)
Until next time.
Peace.
2012/01/24
Few Weeks and Insanity
Been a few weeks since I last threw something up on here. Last day of December.... Hey everyone.
So it's been a quiet past few weeks. Job hunting, mainly. Unfortunately, nothing yet - three weeks, and several applications later, no calls. Sucks, but welcome to reality.
There is an Aikido class at a library near my house, so I'm going to start going to that. It's fun. The warm up exercises are much more of an aerobic version, and then we do similar wrist exercises to what I'm used to. The style of teaching is different, plus so far, there have only been a couple terms used that I'm actually used to. Overall, it's almost like learning a completely new art, which I have no issues with. The Sensei is one that I trained under for several years while the old club was still completely together, and I have a friend already in the class, so it should be good. Two weeks down so far with this class, and it's turning out well. Except for an almost sprained wrist....
Couple weeks ago, while I was at a shop getting dinner for my family, I was out and about in my flats like normal, and for the first time, somebody spoke against me. A man a few places in line behind me looked at me and said, "Nice shoes" all manly like. I snorted and continued my ordering, but was cautious for the rest of the time in there, until I was out the door, in my car, and gone. For the first time in a long time, I was actually afraid I might have to use my kubatans - and was glad that I carried them. It was a relief to get out of the parking lot and be able to confirm I wasn't being followed.
Few days ago - the 12th - was the first time it has really snowed here. It was Thursday night, and I had to take my sister to work. We ate at a shop, took our time, then left to get her to work. It was snowing hard, and my windshield had already frozen. At this point, my windshield wipers almost completely failed, and I had to wait for the defrost to take care of the better part of it. At that point, the car already had a couple issues - she needed a new battery and new tires across the board - and then we had to add another issue to the list. I got my sister to work, dropped her off, then headed back home. Between the snow, the road already getting slick, bad tires, and wind, it was a very interesting trip. The kind of trip that a driver doesn't break forty miles an hour for fear of being blown off course - and this was on main roads. The weekend later, after this happened, we went in and took care of the battery and tires. Let's just say that the car now has pretty damned good traction. (I tested it. Hehehe.)
My sister needed my help this past weekend with a psych project, so I went over there all day Monday to help (she had the day off). Well, of course, being the techie I am, I figured it'd be easy. Nope. Camera was a pain in my ass. Trying to capture didn't work. Couldn't make the camera and my computer play nicely, or even really play at all. It just didn't work out. This coming Sunday, we're scrapping the original idea and working on a new idea to finish quickly... Ugh. Stupid cameras.
Within the past few weeks, my second-most-recent-ex and I have been spending time together, and we figured out that we never really got over each other. Tried, but we didn't. I'm hopefully going to get back together with her... She wants me to be romantic about it, so it should be... fun.
Now here's to hoping that I can get a job so I can use the car when it's time to actually go ask her out... Also... Need to find potatoes. Which means telling Mom I need her to buy a bag and we can make potato soup. Or something.
Anyways. Those were the past few weeks. Now, to the fun parts...
If you live anywhere with 'net access, you've probably heard about SOPA and PIPA. They're shitty pieces of legislation that would have destroyed what the very internet stands on - free speech and DNS. If we'd destroyed those two things - which is exactly what those two bills would have done - there would have been a LOT of issues. More than just a lot, actually. Google said a few days back that if they passed, Youtube was going dark, immediately. Facebook could have easily been taken down, what with everything on it that could be considered "pirated". Ebay. Wikipedia. Craigslist. The list goes on as to what would have been hit. It was bullshit. Wednesday, the 18th, the Internet responded.
Its message? "Don't fuck with our tubes."
English Wikipedia went dark for twenty four hours. Google blacked out its logo. More sites than can be kept track of did various things. People changed their facebook profile pictures to a mark saying their picture had been removed by SOPA. (I participated in that one.) People called their senators and representatives, flooded them with emails, and just in general told them to shut their bullshit spillers and get RID of these stupid, shitty pieces of legislation.
It worked - for now. Both bills have been pulled, temporarily, if not permanently. But the problem is, even though the immediate danger is in the past, sometime soon, probably in a year or two, somebody is going to shove something like this through on the backs of another bill - appropriations, or a "save the children's education" bill, something like that. At which point, if we're not careful... our tubes could be blasted.
The public woke up, if briefly, and fought these things, and even defeated them. But we're asleep again. Didn't take much time, unfortunately. We're like that - we like our sleep. Lazy, that's us. I read on another blog where somebody hoped that SOPA or PIPA would pass, because it might actually wake us up and force us to realize just how much is wrong with this country.
Personally? I say we fire the entire lot of politicians. Every. Single. One of them. (Except Obama - and maybe even him!) And then, we rewrite ALL of it. Politicians don't get paid except a stipend for when they're in office and can't spend the time at a real job, and then once their term is up, they get paid absolutely no more. Also - they can't be allowed to vote to raise their own stipends. Companies and lobbyist groups won't be allowed to fill the campaign coffers with huge amounts of money to make sure the wrong people get re-elected. Limit the number of terms a senator or representative can run consecutively. Place a limit on how much a campaign can spend so that everyone will have an equal shot. Who will run for office then?
Those who actually want to make a DIFFERENCE in this country. Those who see what this place could be and want to make it as such. Those who aren't just about the power.
I've been rolling around an idea for how to rebuild the government from the ground up, starting with a world government, but I'll outline that at a later point.
My Dad and I got to discussing government a bit back and as he pointed out, our government does things slowly because if it could do things quickly, things could go too quickly to one end or the other. In the end, everything mostly balances out. At this point though, it's time to rework everything, because that's what we need in a big way.
Anyway. Enough politics. I'm going to drive myself nuts if I don't stop there.
Pretty sure that's basically it for now... So I'm going to shut my ranter and get outta here.
Until next time.
Peace.
So it's been a quiet past few weeks. Job hunting, mainly. Unfortunately, nothing yet - three weeks, and several applications later, no calls. Sucks, but welcome to reality.
There is an Aikido class at a library near my house, so I'm going to start going to that. It's fun. The warm up exercises are much more of an aerobic version, and then we do similar wrist exercises to what I'm used to. The style of teaching is different, plus so far, there have only been a couple terms used that I'm actually used to. Overall, it's almost like learning a completely new art, which I have no issues with. The Sensei is one that I trained under for several years while the old club was still completely together, and I have a friend already in the class, so it should be good. Two weeks down so far with this class, and it's turning out well. Except for an almost sprained wrist....
Couple weeks ago, while I was at a shop getting dinner for my family, I was out and about in my flats like normal, and for the first time, somebody spoke against me. A man a few places in line behind me looked at me and said, "Nice shoes" all manly like. I snorted and continued my ordering, but was cautious for the rest of the time in there, until I was out the door, in my car, and gone. For the first time in a long time, I was actually afraid I might have to use my kubatans - and was glad that I carried them. It was a relief to get out of the parking lot and be able to confirm I wasn't being followed.
Few days ago - the 12th - was the first time it has really snowed here. It was Thursday night, and I had to take my sister to work. We ate at a shop, took our time, then left to get her to work. It was snowing hard, and my windshield had already frozen. At this point, my windshield wipers almost completely failed, and I had to wait for the defrost to take care of the better part of it. At that point, the car already had a couple issues - she needed a new battery and new tires across the board - and then we had to add another issue to the list. I got my sister to work, dropped her off, then headed back home. Between the snow, the road already getting slick, bad tires, and wind, it was a very interesting trip. The kind of trip that a driver doesn't break forty miles an hour for fear of being blown off course - and this was on main roads. The weekend later, after this happened, we went in and took care of the battery and tires. Let's just say that the car now has pretty damned good traction. (I tested it. Hehehe.)
My sister needed my help this past weekend with a psych project, so I went over there all day Monday to help (she had the day off). Well, of course, being the techie I am, I figured it'd be easy. Nope. Camera was a pain in my ass. Trying to capture didn't work. Couldn't make the camera and my computer play nicely, or even really play at all. It just didn't work out. This coming Sunday, we're scrapping the original idea and working on a new idea to finish quickly... Ugh. Stupid cameras.
Within the past few weeks, my second-most-recent-ex and I have been spending time together, and we figured out that we never really got over each other. Tried, but we didn't. I'm hopefully going to get back together with her... She wants me to be romantic about it, so it should be... fun.
Now here's to hoping that I can get a job so I can use the car when it's time to actually go ask her out... Also... Need to find potatoes. Which means telling Mom I need her to buy a bag and we can make potato soup. Or something.
Anyways. Those were the past few weeks. Now, to the fun parts...
If you live anywhere with 'net access, you've probably heard about SOPA and PIPA. They're shitty pieces of legislation that would have destroyed what the very internet stands on - free speech and DNS. If we'd destroyed those two things - which is exactly what those two bills would have done - there would have been a LOT of issues. More than just a lot, actually. Google said a few days back that if they passed, Youtube was going dark, immediately. Facebook could have easily been taken down, what with everything on it that could be considered "pirated". Ebay. Wikipedia. Craigslist. The list goes on as to what would have been hit. It was bullshit. Wednesday, the 18th, the Internet responded.
Its message? "Don't fuck with our tubes."
English Wikipedia went dark for twenty four hours. Google blacked out its logo. More sites than can be kept track of did various things. People changed their facebook profile pictures to a mark saying their picture had been removed by SOPA. (I participated in that one.) People called their senators and representatives, flooded them with emails, and just in general told them to shut their bullshit spillers and get RID of these stupid, shitty pieces of legislation.
It worked - for now. Both bills have been pulled, temporarily, if not permanently. But the problem is, even though the immediate danger is in the past, sometime soon, probably in a year or two, somebody is going to shove something like this through on the backs of another bill - appropriations, or a "save the children's education" bill, something like that. At which point, if we're not careful... our tubes could be blasted.
The public woke up, if briefly, and fought these things, and even defeated them. But we're asleep again. Didn't take much time, unfortunately. We're like that - we like our sleep. Lazy, that's us. I read on another blog where somebody hoped that SOPA or PIPA would pass, because it might actually wake us up and force us to realize just how much is wrong with this country.
Personally? I say we fire the entire lot of politicians. Every. Single. One of them. (Except Obama - and maybe even him!) And then, we rewrite ALL of it. Politicians don't get paid except a stipend for when they're in office and can't spend the time at a real job, and then once their term is up, they get paid absolutely no more. Also - they can't be allowed to vote to raise their own stipends. Companies and lobbyist groups won't be allowed to fill the campaign coffers with huge amounts of money to make sure the wrong people get re-elected. Limit the number of terms a senator or representative can run consecutively. Place a limit on how much a campaign can spend so that everyone will have an equal shot. Who will run for office then?
Those who actually want to make a DIFFERENCE in this country. Those who see what this place could be and want to make it as such. Those who aren't just about the power.
I've been rolling around an idea for how to rebuild the government from the ground up, starting with a world government, but I'll outline that at a later point.
My Dad and I got to discussing government a bit back and as he pointed out, our government does things slowly because if it could do things quickly, things could go too quickly to one end or the other. In the end, everything mostly balances out. At this point though, it's time to rework everything, because that's what we need in a big way.
Anyway. Enough politics. I'm going to drive myself nuts if I don't stop there.
Pretty sure that's basically it for now... So I'm going to shut my ranter and get outta here.
Until next time.
Peace.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)