Chicks Rule

Saw the video for the Dixie Chicks new single "Not Ready to Make Nice" for the first time this morning. The song itself didn't blow me away, but the integrity behind the statement really struck me. Politicians (of both parties) triangulate for political gain so regularly these days, one never knows whether they really believe most of what they say. Yet here are three musicians, who have been vilified, threatened and boycotted by angry mobs, standing up for their principles, even at great risk to their careers and finances. A refreshing dose of authenticity in an otherwise poll-tested world. My favorite verse, and the chorus:

I made my bed and I sleep like a baby
With no regrets and I don’t mind sayin’
It’s a sad sad story when a mother will teach her
Daughter that she ought to hate a perfect stranger
And how in the world can the words that I said
Send somebody so over the edge
That they’d write me a letter
Sayin’ that I better shut up and sing
Or my life will be over

I’m not ready to make nice
I’m not ready to back down
I’m still mad as hell and
I don’t have time to go round and round and round
It’s too late to make it right
I probably wouldn’t if I could
‘Cause I’m mad as hell
Can’t bring myself to do what it is you think I should

Agree with their politics or not. But admire their backbone.

Daily Wisdom

Extremists run the country, because moderates have shit to do.

- Jon Stewart, The Daily Show (June 20, 2006)

Father's Day Reflections

Father's Day is a funny day for me. Growing up without a dad (mine was your standard-issue drunken, absent, white trash loser), I barely paid attention to the holiday. It was so irrelevant to me that I remember showing up for church one Sunday as a teen and being totally caught off guard by the "dads rule" sermon. I bailed out in tears.

It was during those tumultuous teen years that I finally came to grips with not having a dad, or rather, having a chickenshit deadbeat as a chromosomal contributor. I raged, cried and once grabbed for a gun in my desire to get back at him. It finally took my youth minister's wife bluntly reminding me that "you're only hurting yourself, not him," to snap me out of it. Since then, I've been at peace with my past and even more grateful for the miracle that my mom held things together on her own all those years.

So, Father's Day no longer bothers me, but I still haven't managed to incorporate an appreciation for it. My mom's husband has been a good stepfather to my younger brother and the adopted father of my little sister for 12 years, yet I forgot to even send him a card this year. Ditto for my brother, who has my two-year-old nephew, whom I adore. Not being a dad myself, it still just doesn't register.

At any rate, big ups to all you dads who are present, involved, and loving with your kids. It will mean a lot to them down the road.

You'll watch "7th Heaven" reruns and you'll like it!

Der Pres signed legislation today increasing ten-fold the maximum fines for indecency on broadcast television or radio.

Proving once again that Republicans are best at putting other people's money where their mouths are, a House subcommittee voted last week to drastically slash funding for the Corporation for Public Broadcasting -- the folks who bring you PBS, NPR, and the wealth of family-friendly content that those organizations provide. The subcommittee's move would eliminate all funding for CPB in two years.

Thinking back, I realized today that the GOP has been targeting public broadcasting -- one of the most cost-effective public goods in existence -- since I was a studying telecommunications in college some 10 years ago. Just like gay marriage and flag burning, attacks on public broadcasting are one of those perennials that has bloomed every election year since 1994. Contact your Reps and Senators and tell them to let it die on the vine once again.

"The Decider" Goes AWOL

After calling his senior advisors together to discuss stategery in Iraq, the Shrub goes AWOL after ONE DAY to fly to Baghdad for a grip-and-grin with the new PM. WTF?! Bush reportedly "slipped out" without telling anyone but his closest advisors of the trip.

Wow, that must have been some power-decidering on Monday. Glad to hear he's engaged in figuring out how to fix the mess his fucked-up policies have spent the last 3+ years creating. No doubt he'll need a few weeks clearing brush and bike riding in Crawford after this marathon of statesmanship.

Last Gasp of the Dinosaurs

The Senate will likely vote this week on the Federal Marriage Amendment, and it will most certainly fail. Both sides will spin the margin of defeat as a victory, and the country will move on to its next issue of vital non-importance -- flag burning.

The FMA, and the state versions that actually have passed, are the "last gasp of the dinosaurs." Those who would keep gay Americans closeted, oppressed and out of sight are losing in the culture at large, plain and simple. My generation is far more tolerant that those before, and signs are good that Generation Y may consider sexual orientation to be nearly irrelevant. The day will come when gay Americans are permitted to live freely, marry and raise families, just like everyone else. I can't say when it will happen, but it will.

In the meantime, those whose religious, moral or cynical political views demand that marriage remain a strictly heterosexual union are fighting with all of their might; a cornered animal lashing out in a vain attempt at survival. Their tactics are divisive, hurtful, and so lacking in Christian spirit as to be blasphemous. But they will not prevail in the long run.

I say all this not to encourage a false patience or discourage brave efforts to advance the equality of all Americans. My message is simple: do not dispair. History will be picking over the fossils of this flawed ideology soon enough.

The Pain of Faith Lost

An article in today's Washington Post reports that a number of people wearing rainbow-colored sashes were denied Communion at a Mass in St. Paul, Minn. The ostensible reason -- Mass is an inappropriate place to protest. The gay parishioners denied the sacrament argue that they are merely celebrating their identity, not protesting.

Incidents like these break my heart, because they reinforce my growing conviction that my church has nothing more to say to me. I grew up mostly outside of church, enthusiastically participated in an evangelical Protestant congregation as a teen, and converted to Roman Catholicism as an adult. I have internalized the teachings of the Gospels and attempted to emulate the spirit of Christ (with questionable success). But I can no longer feel that spirit being exercised by my church, or rather, it is exercised so selectively as to reek of insincerity.

I have seen marvelous acts of love and beauty carried out in the name of Christianity, but incidents like that in St. Paul remind me that this love is conditional, with the primary condition being obedience to the laws of a man-made institution. One sentence in the Post article drove this home:

None [people wearing rainbow sashes] were reported yesterday in the Archdiocese of Washington, which has a policy of denying Communion to anyone wearing a visible sign of protest.

The denial of Communion is an accusation of sin. If protest or dissent is sin enough to deny someone the most important of sacraments, well, I am already damned.

Hat tip: Tyler and Lisa at Habakkuk's Watchpost.