On the Bandwagon

I know, I'm a little late, but this is too good not to be immemorialized on my pages. They're all so funny, and actually, so right! Plus, I don't know what it is about Maya Rudolph, but she makes me belly-laugh!

See more Jack Black videos at Funny or Die

Thoughts on the afterlife

Been chatting back and forth with one of my UCLA profs, and he commented on my post about Saavik that he holds out hope for an afterlife primarily so that he can imagine his pets are there. It's so funny how true this is for me too.

I have dealt with an inordinate amount of human loss, as many of you know, and while the concept of an afterlife is something I'd probably desperately like to believe in, it just doesn't jive with my concept of what is and what is to be. Generally, I can't cling to it for humans, and maybe part of that is because human life is so complex, the notion that our awareness continues indefinitely is not altogether pleasing.

Yet, imagine for just a moment the notion of Saavik, whose huge and free personality was trapped in a crippled and somewhat immobile little bird body, finally being freed in death and finally becoming able to spread those atrophied little wings and take to the sky. I mean, how can I resist that thought? Who cares if it stands against all of my assumptions about the nature of life and death.... it is a poetic and comforting notion despite the cognitive dissonance it creates.

I'm sure it's odd to think that someone might have an easier time believing in an afterlife for animals than for humans. But I don't believe in a lot of things, like reincarnation in the conventional sense, yet it is easier for me to imagine reincarnation for animals than for humans. For us, it sounds like an overly complicated process, given the differences among human beings. Yet for animals, it kind of makes sense. What if a bird dies, and its little bird soul enters a new hatchling? Neat and tidy.

Eh. I dunno. The point is, I obviously don't believe in all that. But when it comes to the purity and innocence of an animal, it is very hard for me to imagine that just blinking out and going nowhere. I mean, I do believe in a sort of post-mortem reuptake of energy and matter into the energy and matter that make up everything, some would consider that a limited form of reincarnation or an extremely limited form of afterlife. It doesn't seem too weird to me to think that an animal's consciousness, however limited, goes on; so why does it seem so weird that my own consciousness could also continue on?

Perhaps it is because of the difference in consciousness between animals and humans. It's not as if Saavik is analyzing her situation in the afterlife, should that in fact be where she now resides. She's probably just flying back to the jungle from whence her ancestors came, happy as a clam in mud. Now, if I were to die, and still be aware of things.... brr. Don't much care for it. I'm analytical enough now as it is. I guess I could grow to like the idea that I would enter into a euphoric state immediately upon my death, or an all-encompassing state that would have no emergent characteristics at all. But it still doesn't ring true for me.

Perhaps it is because I grew up with the notions of God and heaven and hell, and now believe that I would probably go to hell should such a thing exist and the criteria actually rest upon faith! Ha ha. Although even when I believed in the notion of heaven, and that I was headed in that direction, I rejected it. It was never reason enough for me to stay in service to my God of old once I obliterated my faith with questions, and it never could be now. I mean, I grew up with a lot of other notions too, and one was that the literal heaven and hell were probably mischaracterizations or exaggerations of afterlife states revealed by God that we humans couldn't describe or understand very well. That still makes more sense to me than the literal version.

Well, as usual, I've turned a little blurb into a dissertation. But I'm learning, and what I've learned here is that my desires, what I want life and death to mean, still shape my views on life and death more than I would care to admit. I just don't know if that is a bad thing or not... for example, I have always taken comfort in my mom's faith since her death. There is a part of me that wonders how it could not mean anything at all to believe so strongly in a loving Savior and that you'd be with him, in his arms, in the instant of your death. My mom believed that with all her heart, used to joyously sing songs about it in fact, and if there is any order to the universe it is hard to imagine that her faith amounted to nothing upon her death.

To that end, maybe the afterlife is exactly what you believe in life that it will be? That's a creepy thought too, but one that others have certainly advanced. I mean, our perception completely shapes our understanding and experience of life, so if our consciousness is perpetuated, couldn't it also shape our experience of afterlife? In that case, however, it'd be hard to advocate for an afterlife for animals as it is doubtful they spend much time cogitating on the possibility. For that matter, same thing for babies and children who leave us just as they come in to the world. Doesn't seem right to think that babies just blink out simply because they haven't been around enough to worry about their own mortality yet. Or that crazy religious zealots get to enter into bliss while perfectly decent people who tend to no faith merely disappear. Toss that idea. :)

Well... this has accomplished nothing other than making me feel uncomfortable about the influence my personal desires can have on my existential beliefs. :) I guess I still feel it's improbable that my best feathered friend is now flying free, happily munching on fresh tropical fruit and finding herself a handsome bird boyfriend in the jungle, but I like the idea too much to let go of it just yet. :)

Thought-Provoking (and also hilarious)

I never really gave it much consideration before, but....



This is a pretty well-known picture of a crucial moment from our 2006 ceremony, which took place on the roof of our apartment building in LA due to some traffic-related technical difficulties. Just below Katie's wrist, among the cranes and buildings of West LA, is the Mormon Temple, where a lot of the hoopla's been going on out there. Isn't that a hoot? I want to email this to the Mormon Church and see what they think about it! LMAO!

Disappointed... but encouraged

I seem to have broken myself this week with my writing insanity and made myself sick. I was waaaaay too low to go and protest in the cold & rain today. It feels like all my organ systems are failing LOL! However needing to stay home disappointed me a very great deal. On the bright side, some were concerned that turnout would be low due to the weather, which made me feel even worse about not going, but that wasn't the case at all....



Rep. Niki Tsongas, speaking at Boston City Hall during today's action.


Regardless.....

I am extremely encouraged by the changing face of "gay-rights" activism. It used to be that no sane straight person would walk the streets with a bunch of 'mos in ActUp t-shirts. Then, for a long time, the PFLAG wing of straightdom (i.e. my mom/son/brother is gay + the supportive straight opinion leaders) would be well-reflected in our public events. Now, it truly does seem that we've built a broader coalition than ever.... straight kids with no personal interest in our cause other than feeling it's the right thing, alongside religious leaders and adherents who believe that faith compels tolerance, alongside people of all colors and backgrounds (contrary to the suggestions of all the recent hoopla, they're out there in the streets with us too!), even grandparents and teachers and union workers, all sorts came out today to show support.

You all know that I believe this battle must be fought and won in the courts, but if THIS ain't progress, call me crazy, I don't know what progress is.

My response to the haters among us.....

Posted in response to the comments on Ta-Nehisi Coates' blog:

As a gay white activist for many different sorts of causes, all I have to say is this: if, in fact, African-Americans voted overwhelmingly to pass Prop 8, as seems to have been the case, then that choice has far, far less to do with the color of anyone's skin than with the potent influence of religion on African-American culture.

We could all sit around for an eternity debating the minutiae of the results, who turned out to vote, how they voted, etc. In the end, we as a community either have to reach out to people of faith (of *all* varieties), or hope that the courts will overturn what seems to be an unconstitutional implementation of religious principle as public policy. Maybe better, both.

It's important to note that people of faith understand the fear of persecution just as powerfully as those who are perhaps more genuinely oppressed in our times. However, they have been taught to believe that we want to take away something that God gave especially to them... That sense of privilege will be difficult to overcome.

If it turns out that the judicial system has not yet evolved enough to fully support the equal recognition of the gay community, then our "target" should be the faith community, and the application should be one of outreach and establishing common ground, not blind rage.

I don't mean to say that the effort will be won on the ground, because like all other equal protection issues, this one will have to be decided in the courts in order to find enforcement. Regardless, we *can* benefit from broader support on the ground, and however amusing it may be to laugh at Mormons' magic underwear, or however easy it may be to target statistics about the African-American vote, directing our collective anger at narrow groups of people can hardly broaden our coalition. We have to channel this passion in productive directions.

Traditional Marriage Perverts the Tradition of Marriage

This was borrowed from a friend of a friend. A bit late, I suppose, and a bit long, but it neatly sums up exactly what it is that "traditional marriage" proponents are trying to protect.

Traditional Marriage Perverts the Tradition of Marriage
By Jeff Goode (Californian)

About a decade ago, as a young playwright, I was hired to write a script for the Renaissance Festival of Kansas City. It was a period piece about knights and jousts and intrigues of the court, building up to a lavish royal wedding between a prince and a princess, restoring peace to the troubled land.

This was one of my first professional writing assignments, so I was really excited about doing all the research and making sure that everything was historically accurate, especially the royal wedding which needed to follow all the traditions exactly.

Over a summer of research, I learned a lot of surprising facts about the history of marriage and weddings, but by far the most shocking discovery of all was that the tradition of marriage-as-we-know-it simply did not exist in those days. Almost everything we have come to associate with marriage and weddings - the white dress, the holy vows, the fancy cake and the birdseed - dates back a mere 50 or 100 years at the most. In many cases less.

And the handful of traditions that do go back farther than that are, frankly, horrifying. The tossing of the garter, for example, evolved from a 14th Century tradition of ripping the clothing off of the bride's body as she left the ceremony in order to "loosen her up" for the wedding night. Wedding guests fought over the choicest bits of undergarment, with the garter being the greatest prize.

Savvy brides got in the habit of carrying extra garters in their bodice to throw to the male guests in hopes of escaping the ceremony with some shred of modesty intact!

It turns out that marriage, in days of old, was a barbaric custom which was little more than a crude exchange of livestock at it's most civilized, and a little less than ritualized abduction at it's worst. That's why you'll find no reference to white weddings in the Bible, or the union of one man and one woman. Because up until fairly recently, there was nothing religious about it.

You will of course find plenty of biblical bigamy, practiced by even the most godly of heroes - Noah, Abraham, David, Solomon - because that's what marriage was in those days. Even in more enlightened New Testament times, the only wedding worth mentioning (the one at Cana) is notable only for the miraculous amount of wine consumed.

In the 21st Century, we've heard a lot about the sanctity of marriage, as if that were something that has been around forever, but in reality the phrase was invented in 2004. Google it for yourself and see if you can find a single reference to the "sanctity of marriage" before the Massachusetts Supreme Court legalized same-sex unions in that state. The proverbial Sanctity of Marriage sprang into being because opponents of gay marriage needed a logical reason to overturn an established legal precedent. And the only thing that trumps the Constitution is God himself.

Unfortunately, God is still pretty new to the whole marriage game (or he might have made an honest woman out of the Virgin Mary, am I right? Try the veal!)

The truth is that marriage has always been more a secular tradition rather than a religious one. Up until the early Renaissance, in fact, couples were traditionally married on the church's front doorstep, because wedding ceremonies were considered too vulgar to be performed inside the building: After all, there was implied sex in the vows and shameless public displays of affection. No clergyman in his right mind would have allowed such an unholy abomination on the premises.

But as times changed, ideas and attitudes about marriage also changed. So when people became religious, matrimony became holy. When people became nudists, clothing became optional. And so on throughout history.

And the wonderful thing about the institution of marriage - the reason it has remained strong and relevant through thousands of years of ever-changing times - is its unique ability to change with those times.

Marriage is, and always has been, a constantly evolving tradition that never fails to incorporate the latest shifts in culture and climate, changing social habits, fashions and even fads. (Because, seriously, that chicken dance is not in the Bible.)

Thus, in the 1800s when the sole purpose of marriage was procreation and housekeeping, marriage between an older man and a hard-working tween girl was considered perfectly normal. Today we call it pedophilia.

For thousands of years marriage was essentially a business transaction
between the parents of the bride and groom. But in the last century or so, we've finally seen the triumph of this new-fangled notion that marriage should be about a loving relationship between two consenting adults.

Followers of the Mormon faith can tell you that the traditions of their forefathers included a devout belief that polygamy was appropriate and sanctified. But modern Mormons generally don't support that vision of happiness for their daughters.

And during the Civil Rights era, when opponents of interracial marriage tried to pass laws making such couples illegal, we came to realize that they, too, were wrong in trying to redefine marriage to prevent those new-found relationships.

Always marriage has triumphed by becoming a timely celebration of our society, rather than a backlash against it. It's strange, then, to see "tradition" used as a weapon against change, when change is the source of all its greatest traditions.

Just ask the white dress:
In 1840, Queen Victoria of England married Prince Albert wearing a beautiful white lace dress - in defiance of tradition - in order to promote the sale of English lace! The image was so powerful that practically overnight the white wedding gown became de rigueur for the well-heeled bride. And then it became de rigueur for every bride.

By the dawn of the 20th Century, the white dress had also inexplicably come to symbolize chastity. (Even though blue was traditionally the color of virginity - "something borrowed, something blue...")

And the new equation of white with virginity eventually achieved such a rigid orthodoxy that older readers may remember a time when wedding guests who happened to know that the bride was not perfectly pure would have felt a moral obligation to demand that she change into something off-white before walking down the aisle.

Fortunately, as cultural norms eased during the Sexual Revolution, a sort of "don't ask, don't tell" policy took hold where all brides were required to wear white regardless of their virtue and the less said about it the better.

In recent years, as a generation of divorcees have remarried and a generation of young people have entered wedlock with some degree of "experience", the pretense of a connection between literal virginity and the bridal gown has become entirely obsolete. A colorful journey for a custom which has always seemed iron clad, even as it was evolving over time.

And not all traditions have to do with changing sexual standards. The long-time custom of pelting the newlyweds with birdseed did not exist before the 1970s when animal-lovers realized that songbirds were bloating on dried rice that they found on the ground after the former custom.

Economic times have caused families to rethink the age-old convention of the bride's father paying for the entire ceremony - a last vestige of the days of dowries when a young man had to be bribed to take a free-loading daughter off her parents' hands - that well-established custom has gradually given way to a more humane approach to sharing the financial burden.

Even religious traditions of marriage have experienced constant metamorphosis over the years. As more interfaith couples have wed, we have seen the emergence of multi-disciplinary ceremonies where couples have chosen not to follow the out-dated tradition of rejecting one or both of their faiths as a prerequisite of holy matrimony.

One of the most beautiful weddings I ever attended was between a young Jewish fellow and his Catholic fiancé, whose mother was born in France. The ceremony was performed by both a rabbi and a priest with intertwining vows in English, Latin, Hebrew and French. A perfect expression of the union of their two families, yet one which would have been unthinkable just a generation before.

But, again, marriage has such a long history of changing with the ever-changing times, that the last thing we should expect from it is to stop growing and changing. We know today that marriage is not a rote ritual handed down by God to Adam & Eve and preserved verbatim for thousands of years. It is, rather, an expression of how each community, each culture, and each faith, chooses to celebrate the joining of loved ones who have decided to make a life together.

Christians do not expect Jesus to be central to a Buddhist wedding, nor do Jews refuse to acknowledge Lutheran unions because they didn't include a reading from the Torah. Marriage is what we each make of it. And that's the way it always should be.

Perhaps the greatest irony of the traditional marriage argument is that it seeks to preserve a singular tradition that has, in fact, never existed at any point in history.

Because, honestly, which traditional definition of marriage do we want our Constitution to protect?

... The one from Book of Genesis when family values meant multiple wives and concubines?
... Or the marriages of the Middle Ages when women were traded like cattle and weddings were too bawdy for church?
... Since this is America, should we preserve marriage as it existed in 1776 when arranged marriages were still commonplace?
... Or the traditions of 1850 when California became a state and marriage was customarily between one man and one woman-or-girl of age 11 and up?
... Or are we really seeking to protect a more modern vision of traditional marriage, say from the 1950s when it was illegal for whites to wed blacks or hispanics?
... Or the traditional marriage of the late 1960s when couples were routinely excommunicated for marrying outside their faith?

No, the truth of the matter is, that we're trying to preserve traditional marriage the way it "was and always has been" during a very narrow period in the late 70s / early 80s - just before most of us found out that gays even existed: Between one man and one woman of legal age and willing consent. Regardless of race or religion (within reason). ...Plus the chicken dance and the birdseed. Those are okay.

But there's something profoundly disturbing about amending the Constitution to define anything about the 1970s as "the way God intended it".

Whirlwind!

Wellll....
After staying up for 26 hours and sleeping for 5, I have to pack and clean my apartment in anticipation of my trip home. The good news is I have one of my statements completely done, I am still satisifed with it hours later so I think it will stick this time. One more to go and then the fun of attaching everything electronically and double-and triple-checking everything before it goes out will begin! The bad news is, my body seems unsure what day it is and I keep having tiny panic attacks that I've missed my flight, which is at 6pm tomorrow. :/

My poor friend is really taking it from all sides right now as a Christian and seminary student who supports the right of equal marriage. I am so grateful for his support, and the support of some of my other friends of faith who are crawling out of the woodwork to oppose the cruel CA Prop 8. I'm not so much the praying type but if you are and you read this, pray for my friend. His is obviously a minority viewpoint where he's standing and he seems to be taking a whole lot of flak for it and becoming quite the target. Which is, funnily enough, the perfect example of why majority opinion shoud not automatically be canonized as law.

Happy-Making and Angry-Making, all at once.

Rep. Bachmann's Seat in Jeopardy Following McCarthy-ite Allegations The Nation
I, personally, HATE this woman.
I hate her as no good humanist should ever hate another human being.

It's not just that she stands in direct opposition to EVERY thing that I stand for. That, I'm okay with.


It is that she is a foul, putrescent, spewing, hateful, soulless example of a human being, who proudly calls herself a Christian. If the God I once believed in really does exist, she will rot in the lowest of hells.

I mean, ugh, just try watching her on the cable news shows. Give her a chance to make you hate her too. Flippin' Larry King has her on all the time. Seeing them side by side is horrifying: one side of the screen is the most horrifying vision to every part of me which is shallow, and the other side of the screen is the most horrifying vision to every single part of me that isn't.

And now...

She done gone 'n done it.
She was flapping her jaw like usual, probably thought nobody was paying attention, and basically accused all Congressional liberals of being involved in "anti-American" activities and had the gall to suggest that there should be an investigation.

Dumbass. What a throwback to the 50s!

Now she's also started lying about it and claiming she never said such s thing. Hi, there's tape. And some of us losers were watching live as it happened on MSNBC. Sputter, sputter, all you like. The upshot is... her Congressional opponent in MN, a relatively unknown Dem by the name of Elwyn Tinklenberg (you'll remember him now) has received close to a million dollars in new campaign donations since she went on her tirade! Go ahead, Bachmann, get kee-razy. Then you can leave the "secular" public service, and continue giving sermons about being HOT FOR JESUS, fo real do. Can I get an amen?

What I want to know is this.... which part of our national history leads these mental giants to believe that it is conformity that is American and democratic? Or that it is dissent and plurality which are dangerous and anti-American?

Morons. These are our LEADERS!!!!!!!!! Argh!

UPDATE: Even if you want to take my advice and give the estimable Rep. Bachmann an opportunity to make you despise her crazy behind by watching her night after night on cable news, you'll have a bit of difficulty these days. She has quite suddenly lost her prodigious love of appearing before the cameras every dang day and is now in hiding, issuing fevered statements about how she did not say those horrible things that they have video record of her saying live to Americans on the national news... Grand!

Thoughts on the "born gay" debate

My posted response on another blog from earlier today:

As a student of biochemistry and neurophysiology, I feel compelled to comment on the "born gay" controversy. Some people say that homosexuals were simply born that way. Others contend that it is a matter of environment only. Both of these views are inaccurate, incomplete. Genetic heritability is much more complex than people realize, and what is accurate is to say that, like most other biological traits, an INTERACTION of genetic expression and environmental influence is the source of our orientation. For example, you may have the genetic material of a tall person, but environmental factors can lead to you being short. You may be genetically predisposed to being fair-skinned, but if you remain in the sun long enough, you may get dark. On the contrary, if you are fair, and your parents notice this, they may teach you to wear sunblock. Or, if you are genetically predisposed to be tall, and nothing stands in the way, your genes will be fully expressed, and you will be tall.

In my personal experience, the influence of one aspect over the other also varies from person to person, just like any other biological trait... Many feel they were born that way, that they can remember these inclinations and a sense of feeling different since very early childhood. Others are empowered by the sense that their genetics may have triggered their orientation, but that their identities, experiences, and choices are their own. Homosexuals do sometimes have a history of being victims of abuse, but then so do heterosexuals, and much more frequently, so this doesn't prove much. Regardless, if one believes that the touch of an all-powerful Creator resides in our DNA, then it makes perfect sense to believe that we are as God intended us. I accept that logic, and, for the record, I am gay.

Incidentally, it is worth noting that no admonishment of homosexuality ever crossed the lips of the Savior. The Old Covenant was washed away with the blood of Christ; that's why Jews are kosher and Christians aren't, folks. In the New Testament, all admonishments against homosexuality are either in the writings of Paul or the writings of his followers, and many scholars who are not literalists agree that Paul's time in Greece may have infused his philosophy with a "cultural conservatism" never intended by Christ. For example, Christ never suggests that women should go unadorned and be silent in church, but, uh, Paul goes there.
All right, let me have it. I asked for it. :)