Wednesday, March 27, 2013

Adam and Steve

Every once in a while I get my face rubbed in something that reminds me why I can't be what I probably should be; a crusty old conservative white guy.

Because I just don't get it. Who the hell gains anything from telling two other perfectly innocent people that they can't get married? I mean, goddamn it, we let freaking Michael Jackson get married.

In Mississippi we let cousins get married. Fourteen? Hell, Arkansas'll let you get married. Frankly, assuming that everyone involved is a consenting adult I can't see a reason to object (sorry, Arkansas, but I don't got yer back on this one...) Christ, we let everybody and his or her 86-year-old granny get married. All it seems to lead to is bad white-people-dancing, adultery, sexual ennui, missed parent-teacher meetings, and the sort of scenes you see in Viagra commercials. Sheesh. "Sacred"? Marriage? Like the Slurpee counter at a goddamn 7-Eleven it's "sacred". Ask friggin' Newt Gingrich how "sacred" marriage is.

Yeah.

But for some bizarre reason being a modern U.S. "conservative" means that you have to go into a whirling-twizzler hissy-fit if two guys or two gals want to marry each other. And for the life of me I don't get it.

I thought that "conservatives" were supposed to be all about tradition. And what the hell is the whole idea of "marriage" other than tradition? I mean, the damn thing was pretty much invented as a property deal. Until about two or three hundred years ago it was about "love" in the same way that going to a prostitute is about "love"; it was a ready-money transaction, only in this case between the families involved. And what's more Republican that that?

You'd think that U.S. conservatives would be all pants-peeing excited about all those lesbians and gays wanting to get married and buy a ranch house in the 'burbs and get a lawn mower and a Brittany spaniel and adopt a couple of kids and join the Rotary Club or the Lady Elks and get all honked off about their property taxes and how the City of Portland is building bike paths instead of another lane on Interstate Avenue.

But they don't.

The sad thing is that the "conservative" Supremes have a chance to look their "conservative" brethern in the eye this week and advise them to put their big-boy pants on, dry their widdle eyes, and get the fuck over it and there's not a chance in hell they will.

And that's a goddamn shame.

Because there's an old white guy over here that should be prime "conservative" material but can't get past the Himalayan-size mountain of bone-stupid that this sort of thing says about what being a "conservative" in this country stands for.

5 comments:

Syrbal/Labrys said...

I was once horrified (as a 19 year old) to have a dream about Barry Goldwater... that I met him and liked him. OY! Looking back now? Holy catcrap....compared to the current crop of alleged conservatives? Well, wait...the cook in me points out that yes, they ARE conservatives. Conserves, unlike other jammish products DO contain lots of NUTS.

FDChief said...

Well, the thing about the Goldwater years was that you had the Birchers in the mix; they were outright nutjobs. And the Taft Republicans were no treat, either. The Ike/Rocky variety at least accepted the then-current social contract in a way that would horrify the Teabaggers, but who the hell admits to being a Rockefeller Republican now?

And hatin' on Teh Gays is just a part of the looney. The "no taxes not EVAH" thing, the "More rubble less trouble" thing, the "Wimmens is baby-baking machines", the...

Shit, it's hard to think of anything that the current GOP stands for that IS relatively sane.

Leon said...

Well if they want to defend the institution of marriage so badly then lets take the next logical step and ban divorce. Hell lets apply it retroactively - you've remarried, sorry pal back to your original wife.

Think of the amusement we'd get from Gingrich alone...

FDChief said...

And let's not even get into the whole issue about how a "real" or "legitimate" marriage is defined by reproduction.

Yep. What gets me isn't the bigotry; everybody has something they're irrational about - who puts what where in who just doesn't happen to be one of mine - but that, one hopes, if one isn't to be taken for a total fucking idiot, that one has a smidgen better bad-arguments to support their bigotry than this. So it's the Stupid on display here.

I should really do a post on something like "Why I'm NOT a conservative", because that's the real problem I have - as I said in my reply to Labrys; the GOP just has so damn many positions that are utterly moronic. Every time I try to find a way to rationalize something some Republican says or does that seems halfway sensible I keep bumping into some of this goofy booger-eating-moron-grade Stupid.

Liberals have some dumb shit they believe, but there just doesn't seem to be anything as concentrated and toxic as this stuff...

Syrbal/Labrys said...

Yeah, Chief, the GOP is channeling the crazy. But as you say, now and again some Liberal says something that reeks of wtf-ness; but usually it isn't MEAN and off the wall nuts. Mostly tho' for me....pretty much a lifelong Democrat? They are FUCKING SPINELESS of late, and Obama keeps eroding the bits of the Constitution that I happen to like best. ...the parts that do enable all kinds of legal "mean" for instance.

All in all, I'd say if we are going to act like a copy of 1930s Germany, we need a damn sight more Cabaret sorts of clubs with hot music and cold booze. None of that cheap ass 3.0 beer, either.