Satan's Package

A Facebook friend left the following comment on my wall the other day:

"My girlfriend is an 'ex-miracle'. Her step family used to parade her around to their circle of churches and proclaimed to anyone that would listen that she was "HEALED" of being a lesbian. I have since been called (by these same family members) "SATANS PACKAGE".  

 

I have to wonder at their arrogance - they proclaim an all powerful God, and yet don't trust him enough to create people as He sees fit. They feel that they need to spend their lives trying to 'fix' what He created so that we all fit into perfect Christian-shaped blocks to make THEM feel acceptable. If God wanted robots he would have created robots... a whole world full of happy-clappy, heterosexual, hymn singing, judgmental pharisees."

Very true, very fitting and very well said.

Stirring The Pot

Many feel it is their duty to meddle in others lives. To them it is "helping others right", "doing good" and doing "the Lord's work". They're called missionaries, whether by themselves or their churches or by their comrades. They see others violating what they themselves consider to be the values and ethos of civilization - most typically their personal concept of what is euphemistically called "Christian civilization" (WTF is that, anyway?) - and cannot resist sticking their pointy little noses into the lives and affairs of others. Whether or not the activities of these other people actually affect them directly - or even indirectly - is of course the entire point of this perpetual debate on morality.

I suppose the very first question that pops into my head at this point is "WTF has my morality got to do with you?".

I could also ask these self-appointed crusaders WTF my sexuality, sex-life, choice of a partner, their gender, and who I choose to marry and what I do with them in the privacy of my bedroom has to do with them?

They meddle in the affairs of others, spreading news nobody needs to hear or cares about - and then act all "persecuted" and offended when their noses get knocked out of joint by the all too predictable slamming of a door.

A Summary Of Straight Privilege In Daily Life

The other day I found online a list of observations made by a class of heterosexual university students in the USA, asked to think about advantages held by heterosexual students over their non-heterosexual counterparts. I think they made a very good effort, and I think doing such an exercise helps to broaden the mind.

It certainly helps to show others how fortunate they are - and highlights the clear advantages straight people have over us - and thereby reveals the inequalities in society we face today. Hopefully this will show people why it is we fight for equal rights - and that we really have a few good reasons to gripe after all.

I thought about it and worked through the original posting, making some additions of my own - and this is what I came up with:

Minding Other People's Business

I always thought religion was something personal and one's own choice. Even the tenets of the Christian faith are based upon freedom of choice and free will. In order to be a Christian, apparently, you need to choose to follow Christ.

It is interesting indeed that some people think they are right to force others into believing what they believe.

Herd Instinct

I was invited to join a Facebook group touting a nationalistic Afrikaner line about independence of the "boerevolk". Offhand though, I honestly couldn't think why. I mean, isn't that a bit like being invited to join a fan group set up to adore the most infamous "little corporal" in history?

 

It was very kind of them to think of me, but I simply had to decline - which I did by leaving a short message which would be my first and last post there.

"Come on guys, quit trying to divide SA even more than it is already - the Boer War ended a hundred years ago - catch a wake up!" I typed.

 

Nevertheless, this baffling and outlandish event served to prompt some deeper thought on the subject.

Sex, Drugs And Diversity

"Gay activists are outraged after Xavier High School, a Catholic school in Albury, Australia published an anti-gay piece by a former student in its alumni newsletter. "Writing in a letter to the editor in the newsletter, former Xavier student Matt Price entreated “a world free from homosexuals”, who he said lived lives devoted to drugs and sex.

His letter called for businesses not to employ homosexuals, with Price revealing that he lobbies CEOs with his message." http://queersunited.blogspot.com/2009/07/australian-high-school-publishes-piece.html

Interesting.

Equality - A Goalpost On Wheels For Every Occasion

In December last year, a man was thrown off a moving commuter train in Johannesburg.  

 

His crime? Carrying a woman's handbag and behaving in a feminine manner.

 

The Metro security didn't come to his aid - because the two men who threw him of the train were Metro security guards.

 

Now, supposedly these security guards are there to protect the passengers from just this sort of thing, which is a most bizarre and disturbing turn of events to say the least. To compound this insult to the victim's person and dignity, when he tried to report the incident at a police station, the policemen refused to take his statement or to lay a charge against his assailants - and chased him away.