We're going backwards, not forwards

Doesn't this just make your blood boil? Doesn't it make you want to punch and scream and yell at how unfair the world is? Doesn't it just make you want to raise up as a collective consciousness and completely reinvent the way the world is run?

Because it does for me. Am I doing anything about it? No. In this particular instance I can't think of anything I can do. I don't live in California so I can't vote, I don't know anyone in California so I can't tell them to vote, I do remember being three years old and experiencing an earthquake in California but I don't think that's got much to do with this issue and nor does it allow me any voting powers. What I can do is write and let these words escape into the atmosphere. It won't change nuthin' but at least they'll be there nonetheless. (For those that didn't get the memo; words are very powerful).

Why do I even care? Well, let's see. Firstly, does it not scare you shitless that they ushered in this progressive act and the 'powers that be' are now threatening to take it away? It scares me SHITLESS. If it can happen in California then it can happen A-N-Y-W-H-E-R-E. I don't want to wake up one day and find I'm a character in a Margaret Atwood novel whose only purpose is to provide offspring to the upper classes with no rights over my own body and only having one choice about the way I live my life; be this person and nothing else. I don't want that, neither should you, neither should any free-thinking, right-minded person. But if this Prop 8 goes through then that takes a step along a path where that dystopian future lays. All these rights that women and minorities and homosexuals have now, have had to be fought for in the past. People have died to make sure we have more choices on offer. If this goes, what's to say everything else won't follow? These 'rights' we have now, and the laws that protect those rights, are not immovable objects. They are formed within and around the societies that created them in the first place. They reflect the state of mind of everyone that lives within the reality we all inhabit. They can be changed and they will be changed if everyone doesn't make a conscious decision here-and-now to keep chipping away at inequality and restrictions of freedom.

Allowing a step backwards, allowing a past equality to be overwritten TERRIFIES me. Even more than Amy Winehouse's crackface terrifies me (which is a lot).

Secondly, I don't understand homophobia and I mean I genuinely don't understand it. There are some concepts in this world that completely pass me by and other people seem to 'get' implicitly and this is one of them. I think maybe this can be filed under the kind of thing that makes me awesome and sucky at the same time. I simply DO NOT CARE what other people do as long as it doesn't affect me. Even if you are my bestest best friend in the world, unless you are stood in front of me crying or bleeding or begging for my help then... I don't care. I'm far too wrapped up thinking about me. I have a shitload of introspection and over-analysis on myself to perform. This is not to say I don't love my friends or family and I don't want them to be happy - because I do - but, I'm far to bothered about me to waste time bothering about you (so, you know, see above as to why this riles me so... It could, one day, affect me!) I mean, I'm being kind of glib and you shouldn't take this too literally but, there is a kernel of truth there; I just don't give a fuck a lot of the time. For instance, I am the LAST person in the world that the silent treatment works on because I just keep on living my life whilst you are quietly harbouring a grudge and tending to it and making it grow. I might wonder why someone hasn't been in contact if something reminds me of them but, other than that, out of sight; out of mind. I think a lot of the world's problems could be solved by that mindset. Why can't everyone just wish for everything to be awesome all of the time? Like, I want you all to happy and I will help you achieve that if you ask or if you are in front of my face crying or bleeding but, other than that, you worry about you and I'll worry about me. You go off and find your happy and I'll go off and I'll find mine and we'll have adventures and overcome adversity and all that shit and as long as getting to that happy doesn't negatively impact other humans then... just do it. Don't worry that this person whom you don't know is fucking this other person whom you don't know, they're consenting adults both off finding their own happy. You're finding your happy remember? It doesn't (shouldn't) matter to you what these guys over here are doing. And yeah, I know, they've fucked each other sufficiently to decide that they want to spend the rest of their lives dedicated to fucking each other and arguing about who is hotter in Gossip Girl and whose turn it is to wash up. And yes, I see they've stood up in front of all their friends and signed bits of paper making the fucking and Gossip Girl and washing up arguments official but that's got nothing to do with you or your happy. They've gone off and found their own happy by themselves. You were too busy observing all this from the safe distance of your judgy deck through the lenses of your accusatorial binoculars and forgot that YOU had your OWN happy to find. Jeez, that's super lame and I feel kind of bad for you but WHY ARE YOU STILL STOOD THERE JUDGING AND CARING ABOUT SOMETHING THAT DOESN'T REALLY AFFECT YOU?!

For seriousballs (this is my new favourite, very irritating, catchphrase) y'all... Explain it to me.

I do get that there's two general types of homophobics in this world; the first type are people who have this book written, however many years ago, within which it says that homosexuality is unnatural and even evil. They chose to believe the words written in these books as literal truth for a myriad of reasons and ok, that's fine. I've sort of come to an acceptance and peace with the idea of religion - religion and I have never got on but I've been furious with it for far too long. I'm letting it go. I'm even thinking that some of this stuff might be kinda, sorta, useful as a metaphor for the human condition (goooo Gnostics!) but you will never get me to understand why you follow one bit and not other bits. Why you think Roman 1:26-32 is worthy and Leviticus 19:15-17 is arguable I will never know. That's up to you I guess. I'm off finding my own happy. I suggest you do the same.

Then there are those who just find the idea of homosexuality abhorrent and disgusting. These people... I understand even less. Mostly because of, you know, the whole 'I don't give a fuck so why do rest of y'all' thing. This is where I start to fall out again with religion because if it wasn't for that then these people wouldn't have been conditioned to think this way in the first place. Although, having said that, I think that's a bit of a cop-out as I remember having a conversation with my mother when I was around 10 or 11 about this very topic (it just exasperated me that being accused of 'gaydom' on the playground was acceptable) and getting really riled up because she couldn't explain it to me. Why are people homophobic? Seriously? And she finally admitted that she sometimes felt uncomfortable being around this lesbian she worked with so she did kind of understand partly where the prejudice came from. This is a moment that stands out very clearly in my mind - not least because a little of the idolatry that I held for my mum died that day (don't get me wrong, I still think she's awesome and weird and funny and whatnot but this is actually quite an important step in anyone's development so, it's sad and vital all at the same time) but what mostly remains from that story is that I. Do. Not. Get. It. and everyone else seems to. Even brought up in a house where, even if prejudice wasn't championed exactly it was still something that existed, however undercurrent and non-verbalised that existence was - I'm not homophobic. So why are other people?

Equal marriage rights for girls who are boys who like boys to be girls who do boys like they’re girls who do girls like they’re boys just seems logical to me. The whole homophobia thing is just OLD now, I'm so bored of it. It's not logical or useful in any way, shape or form. People have been gay since people existed. Outlawing it didn't stop it from happening, giving marriage rights to all those that want them will NOT ruin the institution of marriage. Surely it only strengthens it? Makes it about love and life as we know it now rather than something that was invented to just strengthen family ties and solidify existing pacts between different families? It makes it relevant. It makes it something that we all have to accept even if some of us don't want to. You know what else? Genuinely, it KILLS me that Gay Boy said, when he first came out, that if he could choose he would be straight because it's easier. He is as perfect a person as you will ever find. Just reconnecting with him over the last year has made me a better person. Everyone falls in love with him wherever he goes (case in point: 15 out of 19 people ticked him on his first foray into speed dating! I mean, come ON!) and the world we live in has made him feel bad for this huge part of his identity! It made him feel so bad he felt required to hide it for 25 years. That shit? Is bananas (side note: 'Hollaback Girl' taught me how to spell 'bananas' at the first attempt which is something I was never able to do before that song. True story.) Identity is an intense interest of mine and I will talk your ear OFF about how 'coming out' is a great metaphor for accepting you as you and, if you load me up on a little vino rouge and ask me nicely, I will probably admit that I was a bit jealous of Gay Boy's coming out because he has this tangible thing that PROVES he's accepted himself and I have to make do with just adding bits and pieces to myself and my identity as I go along. There's no date stamp on me accepting me as me. But, you know, regardless, it all happened at the right time as far as I was concerned anyway because I was dealing with a different boy who was feeding me half-truths and illusions of honesty and I had neared the end of my tether on it all and along comes this person who just sets the truth free right in front of my eyes. Once I saw how it was done I was able to go off and find my own happy which is something I, and he, continue to do. I cannot envision any way in which honesty - the good kind of honesty, the kind of honesty that sets you free - could be bad. For any of us. Life has very few guarantees but I truly believe that the more you allow people to be themselves (and that's all 'coming out' is - and why it works as a metaphor for coming to terms with your own self generally - he's now free to be more of himself than he was before), the better this world is going to be.

So why are they trying to deny the rights of people that want to celebrate honesty and love and being as much of themselves as they can be? How does that ruin anything? These are the tenents we should be teaching our kids to follow. Why go backwards (we've been there! It's well-chartered territory! It DOESN'T WORK!) when you can go forwards?