BLESS YOUR LITTLE TENTACLES

Hello Friends,

How’s everyone doing? Are we keeping our heads on despite how violently they might be spinning? It’s

the cognitive equivalent of the Gravitron out there and I hope we’re not all covered in vertiginous puke.

I don’t contribute much to the political cacophony because I don’t have much to add to what everyone else is already spewing. I know that means I’m a privileged white person* who “doesn’t have to care.” Wrong. I care. I have called (state & federal) officials and left them messages which I only hope they got. Now that my foot is healed I am going to volunteer at a place that’s being hard hit by reform, and which means a lot to me personally, and where I feel I can actually do some good. I do what I can without constantly bitching about it. 

I still have a lovely personal life which is as important to me as what’s going on in the world. Sorry for that. Sorry for being an individual in these times of collective outrage. But it’s the only way for me to stay sane and remember what the outrage is all about.

What I’m really waiting for is for the impeachment police to come knocking on the White House door. I’m waiting for our wonderful system of checks & balances to accuse our lunatic-in-chief of Treason. Most of all I’m waiting for a team of medical experts attended by international law enforcement to come and kindly Baker Act this motherfucker (and his loverboy Putin) for much longer than 72 hours.

I’m waiting for a do over of the whole thing. I’m waiting for New Rules—if an election and its results turn out to be so fraudulent it threatens the very fabric of our Constitution, we can do it all over again. And maybe that threatens the very fabric of the Constitution too, but we’re at a place where so many threads have been pulled, loosened from the loom, soon there may be no fabric left at all.

I’m tired of all the noise over each & every misstep. There are too many, every day, every hour; every tweet a talking point for days. Let’s get this over with. 

I’m sick of “While YOU were distracted by THIS, here’s what was really going on (big rape-y Trump administration move)” memes. We’re ALL being distracted by everything he does, it’s a multi-ring circus, and I’m a complex human who CAN pay attention to all of it. 

I’m not such a simpleton that I’m only concerned with trans bathroom issues, or the repeal of the ACA, or the death of the EPA, or how many hits this blog gets from Russia. I can see it all and still have time to care what the Kardashians are wearing and still have time to make more refrigerator art for you. Now that’s privilege.

*I was a poor white girl who grew up to be a middle class trans man, so I do qualify for the special snowflake Olympics, I just don’t get a medal.

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One thing that does scare me to death and makes my skin crawl like maggots is this Religious Freedom Order. Not so much the Order itself (which only concerns the fining of churches that align themselves with specific political issues), but the religious groups that are clamoring for MORE religious freedom than the Constitution already grants so they can use it to discriminate against a) women and their inconvenient childbearing bodies and b) the LGBT community. These extreme right conservatives who see Xtians as a persecuted group right here in America and want the Trump administration to Help Us! Help Us! Save us from these married queers and men in dresses! Save the precious little white babies because humans are such an endangered species!

If you know me, or read my last blog, you know I have very little patience for religion. Any religion really, especially the most orthodox & extreme versions of those religions. Nothing creeps me out more than indoctrination of thought-conformity, and the moralistic restrictions that thought conformity makes on the individual.

I would rather watch a roomful of gays & lesbians enjoying themselves in orgiastic bliss than see a bunch of people praying—whether they be a mass of Xtians in a church or a swarm of Muslims responding to their timed loudspeaker ululation. 

I would rather have some creepy slimeball make trans-phobic remarks to me than have some churchlady say I’ll pray for you.

Why? I’m not sure. In the first instance I would feel able to defend myself, and I would feel justified in defending myself against the slimeball’s ignorance. In the second instance, I would feel that someone was trying to manipulate me with their (perceived) moral superiority.

It’s been many years since I’ve felt the encroachment of religious extremists. I felt them loud & clear in the 1980s when I first became aware of them. In the 90s they were still there, just not as loud. Then in the early 00s, the evil Muslim extremist v. the good Xtian people of America dynamic rose up like so much phoenix-shit from the twin towers.

It was a different sort of religious conversation, but the “moral superiority” of white Xtian Americans was still the underlying message.

Under the Obama administration, one thing I appreciated was that religion was put in its place, ie it was not invoked as a political talking point at every opportunity. Religion and state were kept separate, as they are intended to be.

I started to believe that the American people had grown up, come to their senses & realized what religion and/or spirituality were. That those were acceptable tools for personal growth, and for comforting one’s self in dark times, but they weren’t to be used as the basis for legislation. 

Of course, I was wrong to assume that. I made an ass of myself assuming that. For here we are, back in what looks like The Dark Ages to me.

I mentioned in my last blog that I have family members who take moral issue with my identification as a trans guy. They don’t want their precious children to be tormented by the sight of their “aunt” becoming their “uncle.”

[What they really don’t want is to have to answer difficult questions about gender or God’s will or Mommy, why can’t I dress up like a girl?  They don’t want their children to be aware of any options except the ones they present to them. Because it’s easier that way. Or so they think.]

[And some of you are probably shocked to know that after 11 years of estrangement, I am reunited with (most of) my family. That’s another story altogether…]

BUT, what I do want to do, in this Era of Seriousness, is explore my attitudes about religion. WHY do I hate it so? What life experiences led me SO far away from embracing conservative values?

In the past few months I’ve had to acknowledge and try to empathize with people who are as uncomfortable with who I am as I am uncomfortable with who they are. I really get it now that some people do see me as an abomination in the eyes of their god.

BUT—another big BUT here!—I want to refer back to this story that gendermom posted on her blog:

A southern Baptist mother whose child came out to her as trans at the age of 3, how she handled it, how she was treated by her “church family”, and what a wise therapist? pastor? said to shed light on who she was really trying to please—God or the congregation of sheeple who were judging her?

It also shed light on my own reason for disliking religious groups so passionately. Listen here

So…what I’m going to do in the coming weeks is write candidly about all my forays into different kinds of religion/spirituality.

I’ll bet lots of you will be surprised that I have tried to embrace Xtianity in my life. A few different times. I never did take to it, but next time in The Octopus Diary I give you

ADVENTURES IN SPIRITUALITY PART ONE: XTIANITY !!!!!

Keep your submissions coming. I still have only two. I’ll post the guidelines again soon.