Archive for July, 2008
A List Apart: The Survey, 2008
Wednesday, July 30th, 2008Hey web designers, developers, producers! It’s that time again.
Fairy Tale Ending
Wednesday, July 30th, 2008
I have found greater compassion outside of the pews, greater peace through science, and greater urgency to make my life matter by letting go of god.
I have a confession to make. I grew up in a Christian home. I led a Christian club in high school. I taught Sunday School to third graders. I worked at a Christian radio station for five years. I accepted that I was *not* a Christian shortly after I published my coming out post three years ago.
(The last statement isn’t a joke or a trick. I’m not going redefine myself as a person of faith who believes in the teachings of Jesus and just rejects the church by the end of this post. This post will explain my journey to atheism.)
Six years ago, the college group leader at my church in San Diego held a series on the science within Genesis. The series did not discuss “intelligent design”, but rather how Genesis could be a metaphor for evolution. This contradicted the teaching of my church in Virginia that Genesis was literal. The discussions prompted me to start validating the faith that I was told to not question if I really wanted to understand it (that’s “faith”).
Two years later at Emerson, I took two classes on evolution as part of the honors program. Professor Alan Hankin taught Biological Evolution and changed my life is so many ways. My internal struggle of faith became quite an external debate in his class. Alan, a proud atheist, often reminded the class that science is “the study of” everything around us. He lovingly asserted to me in our many conversations that truth wasn’t a destination.
I kept reading and learning. I applied critical thinking to everything I believed to be true, validating and invalidating along the way. The more that I read about biology, evolution, and sociology, the more I tried to reconcile my Christian faith with the observations by hundreds of studies in so many fields. After awhile, I could no longer defend Christianity with logic. I was defending Christianity with a desire to believe rather than its own merit. I wanted so desperately to believe my faith was worth believing.
I didn’t stop believing in god because of tele-evangalists, gay bashers, the Crusades, the church’s many institutional hypocrisies, or President Bush (though these are all valid reasons). I stopped believing in god because I finally recognized the Bible for what it really was.
Humans are narrative creatures. Mythology is useful as a point of reference along a long timeline of existence. The narrative of Christianity is comprised of metaphors to relate the human things we deeply understand, like pain and pleasure, to the things we don’t understand, like suffering and death. It can be useful for emotionally healing and morally guiding. I respect religion for this reason. However, metaphors and narrative still separate experience from reality. When the stories replace actuality and critical thinking, it’s intellectually dishonest.
My place in this world is no more important than an ant’s. I am just a living being, made of stardust, fortunate enough to live in a time when I don’t have to mythologize how I got here. I stand on the shoulders of giants, the knowledge accumulated by all humans over hundreds of thousands of years, and get to peak at what’s over the wall of not knowing.
Facebook F8 ’08
Wednesday, July 23rd, 2008I’m here! Will post more later.
Thoughts on “The ‘N’ Word” from a White Fag
Sunday, July 20th, 2008This past week, a video was leaked to FOX News that showed Jesse Jackson using “the n word”. The newsworthiness of this story, seemingly, is the hypocrisy of a black leader. Jesse Jackson previously criticized rap musicians for using “the n word” and called for a boycott of Seinfeld after one of the show’s characters used “the n word” in a comedy routine. The hypocrisy reported this past week was not that Jesse Jackson varies the level of punishment he feels necessary depending on whether you’re black or not, but his own use of “the n word” in a side comment.
I think it’s stupid for the major news media to dedicate time to discussing a word when we’re at war/occupation. I think it’s even more stupid that we can’t use the word being debated when discussing its use. This is the type of conversation that should be reserved for The View and my blog.
(ABC is stuck in the 20th century and won’t let me embed a video from its website. To see the clip referenced, go here and search for “Hot Topics 7/17: The N Word”.)
Sherri Shepherd exploded at the notion that the word should not be used by anyone in any circumstance. “Don’t tell me I can’t use that word!” she said before proceeding to explain why black people can tell non black people they cannot use the word. Apparently, Sherri can use it as a “term of endearment”, but Barbara Walters cannot because she is be incapable of using it in such a way. I maintain that the only people who get to make rules about language are members of the MLA.
Whoopi made an insightful comment: words gain meaning when we give them meaning. Unfortunately, the rest of her thought was bleeped by ABC. The network claimed that the opinions presented on The View were not those of the network, yet the network took a position in this debate. By bleeping Whoopi, ABC endorsed the opinion that the word cannot be used, even when its use is being debated intellectually (or not so intellectually in Sherri’s case).
Moments after bleeping Whoopi for 10 seconds, ABC allowed Elisabeth Hasselbeck to say, “You’re a dumb polack.” So… one racial slur is okay, but not the other? Does ABC not like Poland?
Words are just references to definitions and definitions are defined by culture — a culture that everyone gets to participate in regardless of ethnicity. If we focus on a word instead of its intended meaning, we won’t get anywhere. I can say “the f word” — fag — as a term of endearment to Arthur and feel special in our little clique. Or a female friend could burst into a party and say, “Hello my darling fags!” Or it could be yelled at us from a dumpy car full of Mexicans while we cross the street and feel insulted (it happened). I know what definition is being referenced in each scenario.
The words we use are indicative of the power relationship we feel to those we talk. I can use a paragraph or a single word to make you feel intimidated. However, it is your decision what to feel. Unlike physical offenses, being verbally offended is always a choice to be made. I can choose whether or not to be offended and accept the power dominance suggested by a word’s use.
All of which brings me to the idea of redefining words. Dan Savage, famous gay American sex advice columnist, wrote:
When I started writing this column in 1991, there was a debate raging in hellish homosexual circles about words like faggot. The idea was that if we used these words ourselves–Queer Nation, Dyke March, “Hey, Faggot” — straights couldn’t use them as hate words anymore. I chose “Hey, Faggot” as my salutation in joking reference to this lively debate about reclaiming hate words.
Dan did not say, “straights couldn’t use the word ever again.” I agree with Dan and this is how I feel about “the n word”. If those who were oppressed by a word want to reclaim the word, they should, but then they have to give the new definition back to the culture. Otherwise, they need to bury the word forever. If they reclaim and harbor the word, it’s maintaining a segregation, a power relationship of “us and them”, and it will always be divisive regardless who uses it.
Jesse Jackson used “the n word” as a black man speaking about some black people he felt were being ignored by a half black man more powerful than himself. That was the real story. I regret that the major news media missed a productive conversation about economics, opportunity, and the long term effects of discrimination.
Executive Power Documentary — HD Sneak Peek
Tuesday, July 15th, 2008Some of you may know that Arthur & I have been working on a new documentary for the last six months. I’m pleased to share this high definition sneak peek of Executive Power (working title) on Vimeo.
We’ll still in production and will be posting more on the Grey Matters Media site. To support this project with a tax deductible donation, visit ReelChanges.
More Evidence Local News Isn’t News: iPhone Line
Monday, July 14th, 2008Person in line for iPhone to KTLA reporter: “This isn’t smart. This isn’t journalism.”
A Declaration by the Representatives of United States of America, in General Congress Assembled
Friday, July 4th, 2008One of my favorite part of The Declaration of Independence:
We hold these truths to be [sacred and undeniable] selfevident, that all men are created equal and independent; that from that equal creation they derive in rights inherent and inalienables, among which are the preservation of life, and liberty and the pursuit of happiness; that to secure these ends, governments are instituted among men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed; that whenever any form of government shall become destructive of these ends, it is the right of the people to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new government, laying its foundation on such principles and organizing it’s powers in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their safety and happiness.
When our government spies, tortures, and preaches fear over freedom, it’s no longer “the greatest, best, freest nation on the face of the earth”. It’s unfortunate that the people who believe it still is are those whose ideologies have ruined the claim.
