Stupid America

So in Massachusetts, one of our only places of sanity in the world of treatment towards homosexuals, seems to not exactly have a total consensus on the idea. 2 parents are sewing a school in Mass for having a story read to their children depicting two princes falling in love.
The state has a law/statute/something or other that says if a school is to teach about homosexuality and same sex marriage in a sex education/sex health class, the school must inform the parents so that the parent has the option of removing the student/child from the class. The school is claiming that this would not fall in that type of class and feels they did nothing wrong. I tend to agree, but again, the problem is not the correctness of under what setting the information is provided, it's the fact that parents are so frightened by homosexuality and that little monster 'Different," that they have the option to take kids out of class. What if i didn't believe that physics existed. If I didn't believe that gravity was a real thing. What if I believed that there were little invisible midgets that sat on people's shoulders all the time and that's how people stayed connect to the ground. So, do I then get to take my kids out of science classes anytime the concept of gravity comes up(teeheehee). I should think not. what if I'm a communist. Do i take my kids out of class when democracy is discussed. or so that we go with the majority view point since that seems to be more accurately the case with the sexuality issue. As someone who likes to think that democracy can work (when it's not run by a bunch of businesses who change the shape of our society through lobbying), do i then take the student out of class when communism is taught. I don't understand what is wrong with us. If a parent doesn't like something, then why is it not then their responsibility to educate the child. Why are we so afraid of allowing people to hear concepts that exist outside our view system. We have a government acting like big brother over parents acting like big brother over children who are our future. This Big Brother cycle will continue and worsen if it is allowed to continue. The concepts and structure of our society should be focused and centered around the fact that we are all different. Acceptance of other view points is not only something that should happen, it NEEDS to happen. For the survival of our country and the world, it is necessary for people to be able to relate to and understand other people. Otherwise our differences will grow and swell. People will begin to break down all concepts as being 'Not their own' and everything will be censored. All things will be closed off from discussion. And then what do we have. A Big fucking world of Ignorant Nothingness.

Super Size Me

With the growing number of grossly overweight people in this country and the CDC claiming that the obesity of our youth is a national crisis, we aim to thin those ever-expanding waist lines. Schools are removing vending machines and junk food. Some schools are making PE mandatory for children everyday(I thought that was how it was when I was a kid, but whatever). People are focusing on the dietary needs and healthiness of foods. McDonalds, Wendy's and other fast food places are now offering salads. But though these efforts and changes are important and in some ways necessary, will it really make much of a difference. We still have a society of people who are becoming less and less active. I like the idea of forcing children to take the PE class, but honestly how much will standing around in a class that's called PE make a difference. If you are 12 years old and you weigh 180 pounds. It's not like you are going to be doing a lot of running. The schools and restaraunts chaning their menus will only go so far. But again, it comes back to the irresponisble parents placing blame everywhere else. Perhaps if parents were around and encouraged their children to play a sport or do something active around the house. Or if instead of giving them junk and crap all the time, it might be better to keep the snack food out or at least make the snack food healthy. Why not take some parenting classes or something, learn to say no. Decide that perhaps the 64 oz slurpie is not exactly the best thing for your child. Otherwise, just give them a 1 lb bag of sugar and say enjoy. It's about the same thing.
I can understand how, once you get into the work world as an adult, you may begin to lose that trim figure you once had. or shit, even when you get into college, those high school sports are no more and your best friend is beer. i can understand a few pounds coming on. But how in the world can a 12 year old get to be close to 200 pounds. It can't all be glandular issues. At some point, the parents can't just say, oh, my child is just a little big. or it's baby fat. or whatever excuses they want to make for themselves and their negligent parenting. It is your responsibility to take care of your children, and part of that is not letting themselves eat themselves to death.
Come on people, think about it. Be aware, be intelligent, be fucking parents.

Where do we go from here?

Texas...our national football championship state...our lonestar state...our bastion of liberal thought. Oh wait, oops. Texas and it's challenged cousin, Florida, have made it into the news recently with an onslaught of forward thinking delictables of tolerance and intelligence. Or something like that. Lets start with Texas.
A state known for football, racism, the death penalty, and the pain associated with driving through it's enormity. Did I miss anything? Well, anyway. In the news..."White Teens accused of Brutal Racist Attack." Apparently a 16 year old hispanic boy allegedly tried to kiss a 12 year old white girl at a party. In response, 2 white boys, one 17, the other 18, "forced the boy out of the house party, beat him and sodomized him with a metal pipe, shouting epthets 'associated with being Hispanic.'" Alright now where do we even begin with the problems of this statement. Let's start with the party, because it seems a little more simple. What the hell is a 12 year old doing at a house party being attended by 16, 17 and 18 year olds. Where are parents. Where are authority figures. Where are the people who are supposed to be responsible. Whatever...this is a problem that can be linked to any number of problems facing our children. If all of these right wingers want to focus on a family values issue, how about instead of focusing so much attention on same sex marriages or abortion, how about the whole latch key issue. how about the fact that so many families are forced to be dual income households just to stay afloat. how about the fact that families are placing the blame for bad parenting on any number of things ranging from video games, music, television, schools, the government, but never themselves. how about a little responsibility. everyone points fingers but no one stands up and recognizes that we are essentially the only animal whose parents don't take care of their young. we offer financial support, but don't spend the time, don't provide the attention, the nurture, the necessary care and love needed to develop a healthy and strong youth.
Problem two: this one is a little more obvious. 2 white children beat, and sodomize an hispanic boy. After doing so, I might add, they dumped bleach on him (in an effort to dispose of evidence). All the while calling him vulgar names. What year is it? Did i get jaunted back into some other decade. How is it that the youth of american can still see such disgusting racial boundaries. What ever happened to the concept of America being a melting pot of religion and race. A melting pot would imply that there were some kind of mixing and blending. But thats not the america I see. I see us living in a world where 2 duke boys rape an african american stripper, where 3 south carolina boys lynch a black boy, where two ignorant white boys rape an hispanic in texas. Where people not only focus on the differences of religion when looking at muslims, jews, christians, but even if you are christian you have to be the right kind of christian. we look for reasons to hate people, to keep the concept of us and them as present and prevalent as possible. There's always that word "they." Who they are changes, but it's always used to separate you from 'them.' generally its used to distinguish yourself as superior and 'them' as inferior. But it exists, of course it does, and instead of making efforts as a society to embrace the concept of love shared by nearly all religions, we use our faith to separate and judge, to damn those around us. We are intelligent people, i guess, why is it that we can't see that we are all the same, we come from the same place. If evolution is right, then white people are white because over time they moved to colder climates with less direct sunlight. Therefore, the noses are longer and thinner, in an effort to warm the air going into the body, and the skin is paler. Black people are darker because they located themselves in a region closer to the equator. the nose is shorter and thinner because, obviously, at the equator, there is no need to warm the air. If the Bible is right, and we were all created. wouldn't that make all white people, black people, muslims, arabs, hindus, hippies, democrats, republicans, etc...brothers and sisters. If adam was made in God's image, and Eve created from Adam's rib...would we not all have stemmed from these two people. Does the Bible say, oh and after that, God created a bunch of other people and was like yeah, whatever, Adam came first so he's cool, the rest of ya'll, you know, whatever. i don't remember that in genesis, but hey, what do i know. Either way, we don't want to hear this stuff, we like to think of things as a better than or worse. We are better than them, because they are "they." We need this, we want this. We teach our kids our own ignorance, hoping to keep that concept of fear, hate and ignorance in its own melting pot. And this we brew, and damnit if we don't make this shit better than grape kool-aid. We are fucking pros. if we could sell the drink we'd put coke and pepsi to shame, with how much people seem interested in embracing this particular poison.
I continue...
Florida is now in a row in which they are trying to determine if an inmate feels the pain associated with a lethal injection. here's some news for ya guys, they did this study, in louisiana, and yeah, they feel everything. I believe the phrasing was that it would feel equivalent to your insides turning inside out. But wait, it's peaceful, i mean they don't move or anything so it should be totally okay. But here's the thing smarty pants, they are paralyzed. of course they aren't going to move. but it doesn't mean that they can't feel what is happening. brain activities still functioning, nervous system still doing that whole synapse thing. It's cruel and unusual punishment, anyway you look at it.
I'm done. I could keep going but i'm not.

Super Powers

Do you ever wonder if you have super powers? I do. In fact, I no longer wonder, I know, that I do indeed possess the powers of the super. My particular power is invisibility. I know you're thinking this does not make sense, because if you know me, you have seen me, and you may ask for me to become invisible, but alas, I will likely be unable to. You see the problem is that I have not mastered my powerius superiorus. But I know that it exists, and here's how.
Often while I'm driving around town, whether it be on my way to work, going to a friends house, running an errand, or just tootling around, my super power kicks in unbeknownst to me until...people start to drive into me. I know it's weird. But there it is. People don't see me, so they enter my lane. I'm there, I'm honking, I'm flicking them off, cursing them and their mothers and yet i have been paid no mind. So I have decided that I am invisible at these moments.
Other instances of my uncontrollable super powers. At a bar/club/party I stand there and other people don't seem to notice me. It is cool in this case because one, it's not quite as life threatening as the other example. But also, in this case I get to go around staring at people, saying things to myself or the other invisibles. It's cool, you know. Like a super power club within the club.
Another instance is when I go anywhere in public with my girlfriend. People seem to only look at her. I find this odd. Guys look/stare/gawk and i just raise my hands insisting my existence, yet nothing.

Do you have super powers.

Freedoms

So I just read an opinions article in the LA Times that was discussing a recent(ish) issue. The article discusses a San Diego public school student who chose to wear a T-shirt that read ""Be Ashamed, Our School Embraced What God Has Condemned" on the front and ""Homosexuality Is Shameful" on the back in response to the schools decision to have a "Day of Silence" in an effort to teach tolerance of homosexuals and lesbians. To keep this moving, the court said the student should not be allowed to wear the shirt, the writer of the editiorial disagreed. The court felt that the wearing of the shirt impinged on the gay and lesbian students' rights to an education, and that the shirt was inciteful.
Though I disagree greatly with what the shirt says I'm not that sure if the shirt should not have been allowed to be worn. I understand the ruling of the court and I understand what their intentions are. But the school is a public school. Therefore, is it not a public forum? I know that at a public university, this issue would not have existed.
So here we have a student, though ignorant, close-minded and probably best kicked swiftly in the balls, who disagrees with a statement that the school is making. The school as a public forum is making a politcal statement by forcing the "Day of Silence." In response, the student wears the shirt. I see no issue here. I think the problem is not the shirt, or that the child is making the statement, it is that the child believes what is on his shirt. This is the issue that we as americans, fuck, as people should really think about addressing. How much undeniable ignorance there is in this world. How close-minded we all are. How much we tend to fear and hate all things different. We are seated at a very scary time on this rollercoaster of time. I think that we are sitting atop the high point, half of us over the edge, the rest getting pulled over the edge by the weight of those already over. We are in a conservative swing in this country. We have the re-introduction of segregation in Omaha, the threatening of Roe v Wade, the loss of personal rights to the government, shit, the loss of personal freedoms in general. How is it that in todays world two people who love each other are incapable of getting married, just because those two people are of the same sex. Do we not as an 'intelligent' race not see the stupidity of this? I can understand why a conservative church would not allow a wedding to be performed between two people of the same sex, but if those same two people can find a church that will marry them, why not give them that right. What reason does the federal government, or state government since that's where the responsibility of deciding was placed, have to not allow this junction? It's change. it's fear. It's that scary beast that we all hide from late at night in our beds, safely tucked into our warm beds, that monster called Different. The things in our life that are 'different' are the things that frighten us most greatly. At one point, and in many places still, it was that fear of the multi-racial relationship. Shit, I remember in high school I was doing yard work for this old man, and his neighbor's daughter was in a relationship with a black man. His response was disgust, hatred. i think his wording was very close to 'dirty nigger lover." It seems scary enough that people like him exist, but that he is closer to the majority than the minority scares the shit out of me. The reason behind much of this political climate shift that is vastly shifting the direction of this country, is...The Bible. I know, it's weird, I know. I know you're saying but hey, what about separation of church and state. Aren't we supposed to not govern based on religious beliefs. I know, I would say back, it's crazy but true.
The Bible, though said to be a book meant to teach love and acceptance, seems to be used most regularly as a reason for condemnation, for hatred, for war, for genocide. All these things I would think a God, if there is one, would look at us as if we were all fools. What happened to Love Thy Neighbor as Thyself. Do unto others as you'd want done to you, or whatever. I mean, isn't that the Golden rule. The thing by which in the very least, all decisions should be based on. Do you think that that same shirt wearing student would want an atheist to wear a shirt to school that read "Jesus is as real as the Easter Bunny." Or a shirt that has Jesus, the Easter Bunny, Santa and the tooth fairy sitting around drinking and playing cards. I'm sure he would be incited by this shirt.(if you read this and make one of these two shirts, I ask only that you send me a copy) I'm sure he would throw a fuss about the shirt being acceptable. But why? Well, because it's Different. It upholds views that are not shared by him, or many other people in the country, and he, like most of those people, would be outraged by a shirt like that.
So what do we do? Where do we go from here? It'd be nice to think that things will change for the better, and at some point, they might, but history repeats itself but it is a downward spiral. That whole tendency for chaos thing kinda blows, huh. But for now do we sit back and watch as our world is destroyed? Do we rise up and overthrow the government, recreate our democracy? Do we write blogs responding passively rather than actively? I don't know, but for me, this sucks.

Ridiculousness

So I've recently become aware of a growing trend in our lovely country. It has to do with every single one of the people on this site, whether you write blogs to express your opinions on pop culture, politics, life, or whatever floats your boat. It is an attack at our right to express ourselves. This recent trend is that in addition to running a background check prior to employment, companies are now running MySpace checks. Trying to find out your interests, personality traits, social life activities. If you write blogs on that site, and I'm sure, on ones such as this, they are being read and reviewed by some employers. Am I the only one appalled by this. I understand that we are on the internet but this is still private life. It has nothing to do with your employment, or your ability to do work under someone's employment. So I don't understand the purpose of it. I've had people try to explain it to me and as of yet, it's just not clicking.
Say for instance you are a defense attorney. You write a blog about the way you hate murderers. I was told that the prosecutor(s) or judge(s) could use this information against you and as a result, the firm should either not hire the person, or if they are already employed, fire them. This makes no sense to me. Wouldn't you want a lawyer to dislike murderers, and if they do, and they are a defense attorney, is it really going to keep them from being able to do their job? And if anyone would be against the posting of this information, wouldn't it be the client, and therefore under the client's discretion to give a shit.
I think we are in scary time where all things private and personal are no longer that. Where a networking site like MySpace is run by a conservative based company that just so happens to be the largest media corporation in the world. So even outside of the employers/employee relationship, how much of our life is being 'watched.' is this a step one to the world of Big Brother. Perhaps, but whatever, that's a different time. So I understand that by writing a blog on the internet you are writing for a public forum, and that in doing so, there is that irrefutable loss of privacy, but I think that when people write these things, they are often rants. Expressions of how you feel at a time. If I say I hate my job on a blog, whether I write the blog or not, I still hate the job. Am I right? I don't understand why expressing it on a blog that it seems nobody reads anyway should make any kind of difference.
I can understand an employer deciding against a hire if the person talks about wanting to kill people and their disrespect for authority, etc. But what if the employer is a republican and discovers that the potential hire is a democrat and just decides they don't want them around. What if someone doesn't want to hire me because I think our country is fucked up, that our president sucks, that I like stephen king books. What if, what if, what if. The growing potential for discrimination now has the possibility to extend across an ubelievable amount of concepts. Do we lose our rights to use this site as entertainment and expression, and have to begin to watch our backs when we post, wondering who might think what. What information is getting out and to whom. Do we have to stress about whether we should change our privacy settings so only certain people read this stuff. And even with that, how private is private. Where can we express ourselves without the fear that our words will harm us. should we go back to journals we write while laying in bed, late at night. what if that were to get shown to an employer. Would it still be okay for them to fire you.
I think this is just ridiculous.

What's the point

So I am just trying to figure out what the point of 'The Blog' is. Is it a forum used to explain your day to day life? Is it supposed to be used to rant and rave (which is most likely what I would use it for)? Or is there supposed to be some other purpose? Is it just a journal you can put pictures to so that the world can see? Or is it everything all in one. Used to express yourself to the world about all things great and small?
If someone knows what I'm supposed to be writing about, then I'd probably do a better job of making use of this crazy thing called a blog.

Chillin

Perhaps My New Hero

"I'm the Decider"
by Roddy McCorley

Tue Apr 18, 2006 at 03:50:16 PM PDT

Well, it took me awhile, but I finally realized what "I'm the decider" reminds me of. It sounds like something a character in a Dr. Seuss book might say.

So with apologies to the late Mr. Geisel, here is some idle speculation as to what else such a character might say:

I'm the decider.
I pick and I choose.
I pick among whats.
And choose among whos.

And as I decide
Each particular day
The things I decide on
All turn out that way.

(You can decide if you want to continue below...)

Roddy McCorley's diary :: ::
I decided on Freedom
For all of Iraq.
And now that we have it,
I'm not looking back.

I decided on tax cuts
That just help the wealthy.
And Medicare changes
That aren't really healthy.

And parklands and wetlands
Who needs all that stuff?
I decided that none
Would be more than enough!

I decided that schools
All in all are the best
The less that they teach
And the more that they test.

I decided those wages
You need to get by
Are much better spent
On some CEO guy.

I decided your Wade
Which was versing your Roe
Is terribly awful
And just has to go.

I decided that levees
Are not really needed.
Now when hurricanes come
They can come unimpeded.

That old Constitution?
Well, I have decided
As"just goddam paper"
It should be derided.

I've decided gay marriage
Is icky and weird.
Above all other things,
It's the one to be feared.

And Cheney and Rummy
And Condi all know
That I'm the Decider -
They tell me it's so.

I'm the Decider
So watch what you say
Or I may decide
To have you whisked away.

Or I'll tap your phones.
Your e-mail I'll read.
`cause I'm the Decider -
Like Jesus decreed.

Yes, I'm the Decider
The finest alive
And I'm nuking Iran.
Now watch this drive!

my first

was on a bed in the basement of my old house