Withdrawing the sanction of the victim

I've long said that if you show a political party that it can take you for granted, it will do exactly that. The "My party, right or wrong" queers have given their party carte blanche to be wrong, and my word, has it ever been.

Now, this group has withdrawn the sanction of the victim from those who think that they own us just because of their party affiliation. This site is doing the same with regard to religion.

The club scene: NY vs DC

It appears that the over-the top eighties club scene in New York is coming back. Back in the eighties, while New Yorkers were indulging in every imaginable flight of fancy, Washingtonians (or at least the ones whom I knew) were achingly politically correct and simply sat around disapproving of everything.

So we were spared the horrors that everyone knew would come from the club scene, right? As it turns out, Washington got an extra helping of those horrors. Keep up the good work, puritans.

A suggestion

If you want to be seen as the person who does all of the work in your organization, I suggest that you start doing some of the work in your organization. You know who you are.

Debating same-sex marriage with theists (2)

While I have not the slightest intention of becoming a Mormon or a Jehovah's Witness, I will say this much for those religions: They actually expect their followers to know something about the Bible. By contrast, most mainstream Christians appear to have a knowledge of their own holy book derived solely from Peanuts specials.

Nonetheless, knowing some proof texts is not the same thing as being able to think through one's faith. In my experience, if you ask adherents of those religions enough probing questions or even just let the them talk enough, they will reveal a contradiction in their belief systems. They truly do not appreciate having that contradiction pointed out to them.

Yet another reason why I am not a gay conservative

Some people are surprised to learn that I do not self-identify as a gay conservative. For one thing, when conservatives have to choose between including LGBT people and maintaining a worldview based solidly on thirteenth-century philosophy, all too many choose the latter. I'll stick with what has followed the Middle Ages, if that's okay by gay conservatives.

You might be a conservative if ...

• You know when to say that we must defend democracy and when to say that America is a republic, not a democracy.
• You are worried about "pollution" of the airwaves by naughtiness, but not about pollution of the air by actual pollutants.
• The institution of the family is so sacred to you that you will gladly sacrifice your own family on its altar.
• You accuse liberals of regarding the Ten Commandments as the Ten Suggestions, when that's exactly how you regard the Bill of Rights.
• You do not think that the government should regulate businesses until they try to grant domestic-partner benefits or broadcast Howard Stern.
• You think that the First Amendment protects anti-gay bigotry and nothing else.
• You regard equality as a special privilege, and you think that the way to achieve equal rights, not special rights, is to mandate special rights and to forbid equal rights.
• You think that The Bell Curve is Divinely inspired and inerrant, but you are sure that sexual orientation is a conscious choice.
• You think that modern science cannot be trusted, but that a book of just-so stories that cannot go for the first two chapters without contradicting itself can be.
• You think that anti-gay laws, the Patriot Act, government ownership of liquor stores, and the ballooning of government under Ronald Reagan and George W. Bush are entirely consistent with smaller government.
• You are horrified by the thought that courts could act as super-legislatures, but it's fine by you when legislatures act as super-juries.
• You demand lower taxes, but you live in the sort of low-density, entirely residential outer suburb that is ridiculously expensive for state and local governments to serve.
• You are sure that the United States Constitution was based closely on the Book of Deuteronomy.
• You can believe this since it has never occurred to you to read either.
• You deride liberals for their "tax and spend" mentality, since your "spend and pray for an economic deus ex machina" outlook obviously makes far more sense.
• You are sure that your cherry-picked anecdotal evidence proves far more than does the other side's statistically valid sample.
• You are convinced that equality for people who aren't exactly like you will invariably lead to affirmative action and quotas.
• You don't notice, or pretend not to notice, how often the status quo provides an affirmative-action quota for people like you.
• You excoriate liberals for moral relativism, when you are a factual relativist.
• You believe that we should faithfully follow Scripture on science and on homosexuality, but you believe that the parts about charity must have been "meant for the church back then" or meant to be "interpreted correctly."
• You attack politically correct people, but you don't notice, or pretend not to notice, how much like them you are.

Falling in love again

Queer political activists have an alarming tendency to speak of having fallen in love with politicians. As a predictable (to everyone except them) result, their one-sided love affair clouds their judgment and blinds them to those politicians' flaws.

Also, this is yet another example of the sort of anti-rationalism that our enemies can easily turn against us. Which president won reelection because voters saw him as the sort of person with whom they'd have a beer, and how much of a friend to us was he?

Finally, how often does anyone complain that American political culture is too rationalist?

Monogamy

Monogamy (or supposed lack thereof) among gay men is a hot topic. This is a perfect example of the politically correct crowd's ability to turn its immutable dogmas on a dime, depending on what it wants to prove and to whom.

People in our community used to see monogamy as patriarchal and heteronormative, and consequently as very bad. Then, the politically correct Pat Robertson clones saw it as a convenient stick with which to beat gay men. The latter group did not cite any new information that required a shift in position; instead, the perceived enemy had changed.

Another issue is that commenters on the subject have tried to extrapolate from a subset of gay men in San Francisco to the LGBT community elsewhere. As I have said before, it doesn't work that way.

Don't ask, don't tell, don't do anything.

On "Don't ask, don't tell," politicians are emphasizing the supposed need to review, study, reexamine, and look at the issue, which has already been reviewed, studied, reexamined, and looked at to death. Those terms have long been politician-speak for "I don't want to do anything; I just want it to look as though I were." Perhaps when they ask for our time or money for their campaigns, we should tell them that we are reviewing, studying, reexamining, and looking at the issue.