08.01.06

A Frank and Open Statement

Posted in Personal at 9:25 pm by Moody

It is something of a truism, that when confronted by that which challenges convictions — most people turn and flee or attack in classic fight-or-flight syndrome style. Being a bi-sexual male in today’s American culture teaches that. Being pro-abortion rights teaches that. Being against a state controlled institution of marriage teaches that. Being polyamorous teaches that. Being in a bi-racial relationship teaches that. Being (effectively; in the eyes of others) an atheist teaches that. Being a supporter of the fact of evolution and a proponent of Darwin’s theory of evolution teaches that. Being politically and socially on the left teaches that.

Daily, I deal with people for whom the ideas I have come to hold are treated as unacceptable, anathema, skunk-like, odious, perverse, gross, etc., etc., ad nauseam. You’d think that I stood against all that was “good” and “right” in the world, even when that’s what I’m fighting for, as I see it, even when I support others’ right to be in disagreement with me, to argue with me, to state their cases and make their points. People put their hands up, turn their heads, and basically say, “Oh, no. No way I’m getting into this with you! You’re just wrong”. I’ve had people even tell me that they especially don’t want to argue with me because they “know” I’ll trick them, beat them with logic or cleverness! I scratch my head over that one. How can it be that anyone would deny me based on the belief that I’d somehow outperform or deceive them as they stood for what must to them make sense? I mean, how could I beat them, why would I deceive them? Do they really think that I would?

But that’s just it, isn’t it? The truth has to be in their response, right? Do they really feel that they cannot defend their assertions against me? If so — and I remain somewhat doubtful — then what does that say about their assertions? Everywhere I go it’s the same: I say “I think x” and they respond that “Well, x isn’t true!” and run before I can demonstrate why it is I think x. Hrm… eh… uh… er… meh. Maybe I’m too unyielding, too passionate, too headstrong? Maybe I don’t come across as fair? Maybe I’m a black sheep following the evil shepherd of my dark heart, plotting in the infernal shadows of my wickedness? Maybe I’m just a bad seed come to sprout in the fertile ground of American/Western decadence? Maybe I’m simply that unnatural, that uncouth. But, you know, somehow I doubt it.

Thing is, I’ve thought a lot about why I am as I am, and I’ve thought about what it means that I am, and what I think about how I feel about it. I don’t tend to leave any stone unturned. I don’t tend to pass by any nook or cranny of my psyche without examining it. My identity has been hard won. Hell, I’m still winning it one day at a time, year after year. I’m forty years into learning who I am, now, and I know now that I’ll never see an end to the discovery and self-revelation. To which I say, “Great!” and “Hooray!” — because that’s my life and I’m aware of it and it seems good to me… overall. But what’s up with these issues I keep finding snapping at my heels? I mean, what the hell?

I’m the guy who holds the door open for anyone approaching it with me, stranger or not. I’m the guy who always says “please” and “thank you”. I’m the guy who smiles at you and wishes you a good day, whoever you are. If you’re rude, I’m neutral. If you’re kind, I match you. If you’re sad, I attempt to comfort you. If you’re short a bit at the check out, I’ll pay what’s left if I’ve the cash. So what is it about me, that when you learn some personal trait of mine you suddenly decide I’m horrible or unpleasant? What does it matter to you — especially when it’s something that has nothing whatsoever to do with you and harms nobody?

For example, I can (and will gladly, given the proper circumstance) enjoy sex with women, men, and pre-op transsexuals. I’ve no concerns over a person’s skin color, race, ethnicity, class or culture. So what? Who cares? I’m not hurting anyone when I make love with or simply have consensual sex with some adult person. I’m not telling you what to do or how to do it. But you can tell me something. Tell me: since when has enjoying the pleasures of one’s body with another been harmful (assuming safe-sex practices and, again, a consensual desire between adults)? Seems to me that, as a healthy person with a good head on my shoulders, it’s been quite a good thing, that shared enjoyment. I mean, I share my friendship with all kinds of people, and often enough that friendship has been genuinely intimate on every level but a physically sexual one. So, why does the involvement of genitals suddenly ruin the experience in the eyes of this society? Why is it that, as a male, I am supposed to find one woman, marry her, then have sex only with her and raise children with her if possible? What kind of nutty recipe is that for a culture? Last I checked, I’m not a rabbit, a fly, or a salmon. I’m not some “beast of the field”, destined (according to some) to merely act out my life blindly as an organism made only to mate, spawn and die as I serve the powerful leaders of the herd in their undying heirarchical institution within which I remain a pawn to their selfish purposes. I am not going to accept their books that say what they want them to say but through the mask of “God” or whatever.

See, what I think is important is that we ought to act intelligently enough to do well by one another. There’s no reason not to, and plenty of reasons to do so. Even crazed killers should be dealt with as humanely as possible. We’re too intelligent to behave so stupidly as to build prisons all over the planet that do no more than incarcerate and punish people for all manner of offense, from little to large, nearly equally (nearly equally, save for the rich white guys who robbed the poor or other rich people in order to feed their gluttonous desires and now cool their heels at Club Fed while their already minimal sentences are reduced for “good behavior”). I’m not saying you have to like, let alone love, the truy bad people, but how about a little reform, — please?

We’re smart enough to realize that just because someone is not like us (ethnically, religiously, racially, sexually, politically, culturally, etc.) we’ve no reason, ipso facto, to ostracize, incarcerate, or otherwise punish them. I know we are smart enough to see that. Did we learn nothing from World War II? (Don’t answer that.) I’m all too aware that, as I write this, war is ravaging several countries even before the blood dries in others. Those who fight have their reasons, their justifications, their motivations, though these may all be reduced, ultimately, to religio-political and/or economic roots, ancient or modern as they may be. What are we doing? To speak only of America’s war(s), I ask, What are we supporting, we citizens? Do we even know? We think we do, or a lot of us do, but it seems clear to me that even those who think we are justified are wondering about it all.

Do we wonder about those other, little wars? The war against understanding, the war against compassion, the war against humaneness, the war against caring? We want to believe we’re not like that. We want to think that “taking care of our own” means we’re good people. But how can it, when “our own” is defended irrationally against that which seems foreign to us? How can that be anything less than a willful blindness set against that “other” whose life is just as precious, just as fleeting? How is it that we can tolerate ourselves, when we are so miserably intolerant of others who are not like us?

So again, I ask, what are we doing? — pointing at that line in that verse of that chapter of that book and saying, “Well, it says here that I’m right and you’re wrong and so I can hate you!”, as if that means something less than the fact that we’re messed up in our heads and hearts pretty damn seriously. And meanwhile — speaking of America’s teeming masses — we’ve got this pretty great Constitution and Bill of Rights combo sitting right there, along with the Decalration of Independence, languishing under the ugly and seemingly endless dog days of corporate hawks and pious egomaniacs. Tsk, tsk. What are we doing? — denying the valid, self-defined values and worth of those for whom life is just as precious, just as important, casting around their necks the weight of their difference from us so that they sink from our view and disturb us nevermore. And how, pray tell, do we benefit from that? Our fears are not exposed? Our unwillingness to deal with the larger world is not confronted? Our desire to be bounded within a nutshell, counting ourselves kings of infinite space, is not troubled by bad dreams?

How damnably cruel! How utterly pointless! How… dehumanizing. I just don’t understand it, us, we Americans, we humans, this life we tolerate and accept and promote. We can do better. We ought to do better, and, in the end, we must — or we shall certainly kill ourselves.

We must stand up and face the attack on our convictions, the trial by fire that could free us. We need to face the facts, heed the evidence, and, in the end, realize that we still have more to learn from each other and our differences. There shall ever be more to learn. And in learning, there will be more to live for, more to love in ourselves and in others and in the world itself. Is that not a worthy goal, a quality goal. Don’t you want that? Don’t you? Do you know what it is you want from this life you have? Does it include making room for others?

We don’t have to be friends, per se. But we don’t have to be enemies, either. And here’s the thing, regardless, I’ll do my best for you… because that’s the best thing to do. But I won’t let you put me down or shut me out. That set of documents we ostensibly treasure and revere here in the U.S.? — those documents are mine, too, as much as they’re yours, and as an American — theirs are the only words that matter, all else is a matter of personal opinion and preference, sacred in your own house if nowhere else. In public, we all need to get along.

What better way to pursue happiness?

As a member of this human race, the only thing that matters is having an open mind and a generous heart. Those are universal qualities that translate across all languages. That’s what I have to offer. That’s what I’ll give, for as long as I can, to anyone willing to meet me in the middle ground and be an upright human being with a little courage.

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