The decision which was made on May 26th by the California Supreme Court was in every way a concussion to the hope that I have for my future. The decision to uphold Proposition 8, passed in November of last year by a 5% margin, was extremely divisive. I can remember the intense despair that many of my friends and I felt, not because it hampered our ability to marry, but because it spoke so poorly of the tolerance common to the meagerly rational electorate. My view of that degree of hateful discrimination was, as it is ever more, simply this: I cannot bear the thought that so many people who are so bad at thinking are given so much power.
For me, ethical decisions are almost entirely logical processes which, while frequently stressing because of their ability to produce several rationally supported answers, are at the very least justified, arguable on some basis common to opponents, and amenable to scrutiny and revision. I will revisit this point often in this blog entry, in the debates which will inevitably follow it, and indeed throughout my life, owing to the maddening insistence of a worldview that almost any pain is a better option than intellectual numbness. The first part of my criticism stems from the way that people voted on the initial ballot; it is an issue of predictability. Deplorably, the voter data speaks volumes about the way in which lifestyle, not logic, informs the way that people vote.* I thought that in the supreme court, a body whose title trumpets the gravity of its purpose, there must be a tendency to get it right. In other words, I do not have confidence that any random majority will choose the right thing most of the time, but I do hope that a trained and rigorous council of experts will do just that. Today, that sentiment is proved worthless.
Briefly, for those of you who have not had time to read the public content the 6-1 majority decision, or about any of the defenses for either side, here is an unbiased recapitulation of the reason that the appeal was denied. After Proposition 8 was passed, the opponents to the proposition alleged that the vote amounted to a revision, which necessitates that two-thirds of the legislature rule in favor of its ratification. The corollary of this argument is that the law which would be enacted as a result of passing Proposition 8 is not simply an amendment to the state constitution, and therefore not available to the public to decide based on opinion. It is inaccurate, although understandable given the intense frustration prompted by the CASC decision, to suggest that the court ruled that a ban on same-sex marriages is constitutional. In fact, they have done the opposite of this only last year, whereupon over 18,000 same-sex couples were legally married. Rather, the CASC ruled first, in 2008, that marriage should extend to same-sex couples, and has ruled now, in 2009, that the public does indeed have a right to vote that it wants an amendment to the state constitution which would disallow this sort of union. Attorney General Jerry Brown also asserted in his appeal that the proposition would violate a Californian citizen's right to privacy, and that it rescind an inalienable right. The CASC flatly denied both of these appeals, stating simply: "No authority supports the attorney general's claim."
I say categorically that if you have voted in favor of Proposition 8, if you do favor its sentiment, or if you support the efforts of anti-appeal campaigns in that vein, I have an overwhelming and unmatched disdain for your position. There are many opinion-related matters in a wide variety of fields in which I may oppose a certain view in the argument for which I can see some sort of merit. That is to say, it is absolutely the case that I have disagreements with people, but I can almost always see that my opponent has some reasoning. Gay marriage is one instance which is not governed by this general rule of understanding. In my research of the initial proposition and of the recent court decision, I have encountered dozens of criticisms of gay marriage and of the position supporting gay marriage. Every tiny word of it is nonsense, and wholly unsupportable by any mind with the slightest portion of decency, modesty, or honesty. Not only do I firmly revile the desire to ban gay marriage, but I can see absolutely no evidence to support the assertion that is it either ethically supportable or utilitarian. The anti-gay marriage position is small, it is disgusting, and it embarrasses me every last second that it is allowed to be propagated.
--------------------------------------------------------------
*According to the raw data collected and aggregated by the Sacramento Bee following the poll results, those most keen to vote to restrict the legality of gay marriage were: Republican or conservative (82/85%), black (70%) or Hispanic (53%), Protestant (65%), Catholic (64%), a high school graduate (56%), older than 30 (55% for voters 30-44; 54% for voters 45-64; and 61% for voters 65 and older), gun owners (62%), supportive of the war in Iraq (85%), and supportive of Bush's policies and presidency (86%). According to the same data, those who voted to support the gay right to marriage were: registered Democrats, independents, or liberals (64/54/78%), white or Asian (51%), non-religious (90%), and post-graduate students (60%). Interestingly, 61% of the people who voted YES on Proposition 8 also said that race was a factor for their vote in the Presidential election.
Wednesday, May 27, 2009
Sunday, May 24, 2009
Someone Should Be Studying These Things
I bet that it would make a good book to collect the bizarre stuff that people think about, and to just have someone clean up the grammar and structure a little bit. I should think that it would be rather nice to wake up on a Sunday, say, around 2pm (as is my custom on Sunday mornings, Saturday mornings, and other mornings when the Giants do not play an afternoon game) and to eat a turkey sandwich, lazily thumbing in and out of some guy's pointless thoughts. It must be at least half-interesting to some of you: after all, you're reading this. And it would obviously be better if you had that turkey sandwich.
Spying on Whales
I begin with the premise that for all the advances that we have made in our study of the myriad species on our strange planet, sometimes our technology is too powerful to be useful. On several occasions, I have seen marine biologists on television, zipping their UltraWhite Smile boats through the Pacific. They drop down their scanners and dials, their cone-shaped sonar dishes and their cooing sonic mechanisms, and they start pulsating coded messages to all the whales in proximity. They're talking, and hoping to hear back. I'm not sure what sort of research is being done by these trials. I do not consider myself an expert on whale conversation, but I thought that we knew pretty much all we really needed to about whale habits. They swim up and down the coast depending on the weather, they eat krill, and they have heroic battles with giant squid the size of space shuttles. Case closed, I figured, but damned if you can't find some guy with a patchy beard and a whole bunch of pockets who wants to sail for a living. Onwards with the funding, then, to invent all these fancy gadgets that let us chirp to whales.
The weird part is, they answer back, these lumbering giants with their bathtub faucet heads. A couple flirtatious, mechanical blips, and these whales quip back with as much undersea gossip as the scientists can haul in and--get this--interpret. Because, you may ask, what good is doing the work if you cannot figure out what the things are saying? I have no idea how this sort of translation is done. I suspect, and now with even more evidence, that we have found an aquatic Rosetta Stone, and those swarthy marine biologists are just keeping it a secret. I have suspected this for years, in fact, and I suppose that it is the exact reason that Porter Ricks was able to understand Flipper; how else, after all, are we to believe this was possible? And good, I say. Otherwise, both Coral Key Park and Marine Preserve and mid-1960s television programming would have been all the worse for it.
How strange it is that we spy on whales? It is probably no weirder than the fact that I am into a third paragraph of writing about it. But there are two particular things in this whole matter that stick out to me. First, I cannot think of any other animal, with the obvious exception of other human beings, that spy on one another, across species or within a species. So, it seems to be that we are the only animals that have a system for recording and interpreting the conversations that other animals have with each other and with our own computers. When you think about it, it is probably a good thing that other animals really do not concern themselves with these sort of trivialities. Only the species that has NASCAR commemorative KFC buckets could invest in whale translation as a profession. Second, I am not sure that I can say, with confidence, that I could never imagine myself in the topsiders of that sailor. There are only a few things left that are a total mystery to us, but have the prospect of being comforting anyway. I can imagine being that lonely scientists, floating askance on a choppy emerald ocean, dropping six-hundred foot of steel cable into the deep, and waiting. Maybe you get a booming sigh back, and you have company somewhere under the unimaginable blueness. Talking to whales may be the intersect of a Venn diagram which addresses things that are magical and things that are scientific.
Real Trust
Actually, when you look at how we generally act towards one another, we probably should not trust airline pilots half as much as we do. Here are the facts. I have probably taken 100 plane flights in my life, and likely more than that, the majority of those having come in the past four years. Each time, my routine is the same: I guard against boredom and people with the cunning use of an iPod, I bring with me several books which I never read, I buy a tremendous wealth of candy for the flight, and I board a several-ton flying bus to be guided in a parabola across the planet by a man I will never meet. This man now has the ability to kill me. But I get on the plane, I clickwheel over to Wilco or Belle and Sebastian or Sufjan Stevens, and I rack out with my face pressed against the plexiglass, nary a thought for the 'morrow. There is no other time in life when we are required to trust so much, given so little. Why do we do it, and without paying this relationship any attention? I think it has to be basically the same mindset which governs our collective respect for Zorro.
What I mean to say is, it seems that we can reasonably infer that if someone is wearing a mask, he's either a hero or a madman. The allure of what is not seen--and therefore, what could potentially be--is enough to inspire confidence in a masked avenger, and is likewise sufficient to bolster our terror of a sheathed lunatic. I think the mask somehow convinces us that our initial opinion is right. And if in cinema, then why not in person? We get a great deal of what we imagine life to be like from the print we read or the films we see, so this bit of transposition is not too big of a stretch. Every girl I have ever dated seems to want, from me, some version of John Cusackitude: so this mask idea might as well have some merit. Someone has entrusted a man with the responsibility to fly a jumbo-sized tuna can through the troposphere--he even gets little uniform accessories, if he's good enough--and if he is mostly an unknown to his passengers, that may actually be calming. The pilot even has the benefit of that speaker system, by which he can, through his trademark drone and slogans, reassure everyone in the cabin that he knows what he's doing and that everyone can go ahead and relax. If I knew that Spiderman was really that spazzy little chemistry student from Empire State University, there's no way I would let him dive off a roof to try to catch me (and by me, I mean whatever chick is playing MJ). But because I don't know who he is, I just trust the mask. I listen to his voice. And I go about my day.
Spying on Whales
I begin with the premise that for all the advances that we have made in our study of the myriad species on our strange planet, sometimes our technology is too powerful to be useful. On several occasions, I have seen marine biologists on television, zipping their UltraWhite Smile boats through the Pacific. They drop down their scanners and dials, their cone-shaped sonar dishes and their cooing sonic mechanisms, and they start pulsating coded messages to all the whales in proximity. They're talking, and hoping to hear back. I'm not sure what sort of research is being done by these trials. I do not consider myself an expert on whale conversation, but I thought that we knew pretty much all we really needed to about whale habits. They swim up and down the coast depending on the weather, they eat krill, and they have heroic battles with giant squid the size of space shuttles. Case closed, I figured, but damned if you can't find some guy with a patchy beard and a whole bunch of pockets who wants to sail for a living. Onwards with the funding, then, to invent all these fancy gadgets that let us chirp to whales.
The weird part is, they answer back, these lumbering giants with their bathtub faucet heads. A couple flirtatious, mechanical blips, and these whales quip back with as much undersea gossip as the scientists can haul in and--get this--interpret. Because, you may ask, what good is doing the work if you cannot figure out what the things are saying? I have no idea how this sort of translation is done. I suspect, and now with even more evidence, that we have found an aquatic Rosetta Stone, and those swarthy marine biologists are just keeping it a secret. I have suspected this for years, in fact, and I suppose that it is the exact reason that Porter Ricks was able to understand Flipper; how else, after all, are we to believe this was possible? And good, I say. Otherwise, both Coral Key Park and Marine Preserve and mid-1960s television programming would have been all the worse for it.
How strange it is that we spy on whales? It is probably no weirder than the fact that I am into a third paragraph of writing about it. But there are two particular things in this whole matter that stick out to me. First, I cannot think of any other animal, with the obvious exception of other human beings, that spy on one another, across species or within a species. So, it seems to be that we are the only animals that have a system for recording and interpreting the conversations that other animals have with each other and with our own computers. When you think about it, it is probably a good thing that other animals really do not concern themselves with these sort of trivialities. Only the species that has NASCAR commemorative KFC buckets could invest in whale translation as a profession. Second, I am not sure that I can say, with confidence, that I could never imagine myself in the topsiders of that sailor. There are only a few things left that are a total mystery to us, but have the prospect of being comforting anyway. I can imagine being that lonely scientists, floating askance on a choppy emerald ocean, dropping six-hundred foot of steel cable into the deep, and waiting. Maybe you get a booming sigh back, and you have company somewhere under the unimaginable blueness. Talking to whales may be the intersect of a Venn diagram which addresses things that are magical and things that are scientific.
Real Trust
Actually, when you look at how we generally act towards one another, we probably should not trust airline pilots half as much as we do. Here are the facts. I have probably taken 100 plane flights in my life, and likely more than that, the majority of those having come in the past four years. Each time, my routine is the same: I guard against boredom and people with the cunning use of an iPod, I bring with me several books which I never read, I buy a tremendous wealth of candy for the flight, and I board a several-ton flying bus to be guided in a parabola across the planet by a man I will never meet. This man now has the ability to kill me. But I get on the plane, I clickwheel over to Wilco or Belle and Sebastian or Sufjan Stevens, and I rack out with my face pressed against the plexiglass, nary a thought for the 'morrow. There is no other time in life when we are required to trust so much, given so little. Why do we do it, and without paying this relationship any attention? I think it has to be basically the same mindset which governs our collective respect for Zorro.
What I mean to say is, it seems that we can reasonably infer that if someone is wearing a mask, he's either a hero or a madman. The allure of what is not seen--and therefore, what could potentially be--is enough to inspire confidence in a masked avenger, and is likewise sufficient to bolster our terror of a sheathed lunatic. I think the mask somehow convinces us that our initial opinion is right. And if in cinema, then why not in person? We get a great deal of what we imagine life to be like from the print we read or the films we see, so this bit of transposition is not too big of a stretch. Every girl I have ever dated seems to want, from me, some version of John Cusackitude: so this mask idea might as well have some merit. Someone has entrusted a man with the responsibility to fly a jumbo-sized tuna can through the troposphere--he even gets little uniform accessories, if he's good enough--and if he is mostly an unknown to his passengers, that may actually be calming. The pilot even has the benefit of that speaker system, by which he can, through his trademark drone and slogans, reassure everyone in the cabin that he knows what he's doing and that everyone can go ahead and relax. If I knew that Spiderman was really that spazzy little chemistry student from Empire State University, there's no way I would let him dive off a roof to try to catch me (and by me, I mean whatever chick is playing MJ). But because I don't know who he is, I just trust the mask. I listen to his voice. And I go about my day.
Monday, May 4, 2009
Broken Wheel
"Our Great War is a spiritual war. Our Great Depression is our lives."
Chuck Palahniuk
Chuck Palahniuk
About two weeks ago, my knee betrayed me. I have no job, and I have no dependable schedule, so I am clothed in the evils of idleness. I do nothing all day which acts as evidence that I have existed that day. I make sandwiches, I ride my bike, I watch and listen to podcast debates, and I do one-legged pushups on the floor of a cramped bedroom. In the case that I had entered a time machine and I was concerned about irreversibly altering the future by polluting the past, this is the sort of life I would have to life in order to make sure that I affect nothing. Twelve days whipped by like the leaves of a flipbook, and I have made nothing with them. I hope that I do not have to experience this fate, but if it happens that I am one day lain in bed and around me are gathered the people I love, it is possible that I will look back on days like these have been and think to myself, there is no limit to what I would give to have those days back for the doing. I should crumple up the time I waste and shoot it at the wire basket next to my desk, like so much paper that is issued from the hands of writers who are obsessed with--and constantly motivated by--attempting to produce things of merit. I am often one of these; I have not been, recently, and my mood has soured noteably as a consequence.
For the emotional price I have paid by way of this lassitude, I have accrued quite a bit intellectually. I have watched or listened to something north of 20 debates and lectures, mostly revolving around the topics of religion, international human rights policy, or freedom of speech and press. I wish I could record the massive amount of thinking that I've done about these topics as a result of the impressive discourse, but sometimes the density of the material, combined with my poor organizational skills when I'm so furious with ideas, makes it impossible to summon order, especially among the interlacing topics. Here is a very brief list of the blogs which could come as a result of my only best use of time during my convalesence. My hope is that I will be able to turn this attrocious negative into something of a positive and productive experience, although my mood tonight, which is typical of how it has been most of the week, usually fosters either vitriol which I am sad to have thought or slop which I am embarrassed to have written. Intellectually and emotionally, then, it is obvious that I have good reason to resolve both my attitude and my body, but both of them are slow-going and neither mechanism cares much about my preference for not being ill.
1. Something comprehensive about my view on the role of religion in the world. This will easily be several essays, both perscriptive and descriptive. Specific topics needs to include dogmatism of any kind, the role and import of conversation, and the stricture that religion places around the neck of the global struggle to establish and ensure human rights. In each of these instances, I'm not sure that I can manage to reduce away the terrible fear I have about the way in which history will judge the time in which I lived.
2. Something about the terrible legacy of quarreling and antagonism beset upon us by the last administration, and the events that took place in its duration. I cannot listen to a single news telecast or talking heads show anymore without wondering what percentage of the truth I'm hearing. I very regularly hear two people say opposite things about the same event or person, so I believe there is one of two things happening. Either one or both of the people is wrong, or one or both of the people is lying. In either case, the quality and quantity of information to which I have access is depressing; the horrid clumsiness of intellectual pursuit confounds me every single day of my too short life. Should I have to constantly figure out whether or not I am receiving the truth, and how much of it? How can there be partisan news? Why can I not rely on something to just relate one small set of facts in a row? Nothing could be goddamned easier than this, and none of you will do it: you must taint everything. Well this is the world we have, because of it.
3. A short story I am working on about a man whose birth date had been confused.
4. A social contract theory for backpackers.
5. There is a Tennessee Williams quote that goes like this: "Why do I write? Because I found life to be unsatisfactory." So, something about that.
6. One of my primary historical interests, and political interests for that matter, is revolution. I have begun working on a short essay, informed by the ideology present in the entry about Dublin, that revolution must be non-violent in order to be successful.
Oh, to be able to travel again.
For the emotional price I have paid by way of this lassitude, I have accrued quite a bit intellectually. I have watched or listened to something north of 20 debates and lectures, mostly revolving around the topics of religion, international human rights policy, or freedom of speech and press. I wish I could record the massive amount of thinking that I've done about these topics as a result of the impressive discourse, but sometimes the density of the material, combined with my poor organizational skills when I'm so furious with ideas, makes it impossible to summon order, especially among the interlacing topics. Here is a very brief list of the blogs which could come as a result of my only best use of time during my convalesence. My hope is that I will be able to turn this attrocious negative into something of a positive and productive experience, although my mood tonight, which is typical of how it has been most of the week, usually fosters either vitriol which I am sad to have thought or slop which I am embarrassed to have written. Intellectually and emotionally, then, it is obvious that I have good reason to resolve both my attitude and my body, but both of them are slow-going and neither mechanism cares much about my preference for not being ill.
1. Something comprehensive about my view on the role of religion in the world. This will easily be several essays, both perscriptive and descriptive. Specific topics needs to include dogmatism of any kind, the role and import of conversation, and the stricture that religion places around the neck of the global struggle to establish and ensure human rights. In each of these instances, I'm not sure that I can manage to reduce away the terrible fear I have about the way in which history will judge the time in which I lived.
2. Something about the terrible legacy of quarreling and antagonism beset upon us by the last administration, and the events that took place in its duration. I cannot listen to a single news telecast or talking heads show anymore without wondering what percentage of the truth I'm hearing. I very regularly hear two people say opposite things about the same event or person, so I believe there is one of two things happening. Either one or both of the people is wrong, or one or both of the people is lying. In either case, the quality and quantity of information to which I have access is depressing; the horrid clumsiness of intellectual pursuit confounds me every single day of my too short life. Should I have to constantly figure out whether or not I am receiving the truth, and how much of it? How can there be partisan news? Why can I not rely on something to just relate one small set of facts in a row? Nothing could be goddamned easier than this, and none of you will do it: you must taint everything. Well this is the world we have, because of it.
3. A short story I am working on about a man whose birth date had been confused.
4. A social contract theory for backpackers.
5. There is a Tennessee Williams quote that goes like this: "Why do I write? Because I found life to be unsatisfactory." So, something about that.
6. One of my primary historical interests, and political interests for that matter, is revolution. I have begun working on a short essay, informed by the ideology present in the entry about Dublin, that revolution must be non-violent in order to be successful.
Oh, to be able to travel again.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
Posts
