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 Looks like we need another refresher on Freedom of Speech and what that means

 

Brendan Eich, the now-former CEO of Mozilla has donated a considerable sum of money to a campaign to deny LGBT people equality. He is a homophobic bigot. Mozilla decided being a homophobic bigot is the perfect person to head their company when they appointed him CEO – it was a bigoted decision that proved Mozilla did not value LGBT people.

 

LGBT people and people who aren’t raging bigots and apologists for bigots responded with fierce criticism, blog posts, social media campaigns and, yes, OKCupid joined the campaign (they did not block firefox – they DID have a page that said, basically, “hey we’d prefer you use a browser that doesn’t support raging bigotry” which did have a clickthrough if you really did want to continue with firefox.

 

Brendan Eich stepped down.

 

Would people have been happy with less? Honestly, I wouldn’t have been – and I still look leerily at some of the man’s apologists in Mozilla as well. But Eich didn’t even try. Mozilla threw around policy statements – which addressed nothing. They were so poor that they released several to try and patch the gaping holes – but never addressed the fact they’d chosen a bigot to lead them

 

Eich himself made vague statements – but adamantly refused to address his donation to a hate campaign. More, he wouldn’t rule out doing the same again, even when expressly asked. Eich is a homophobic bigot who has campaigned against the equality of LGBT people – and plans to continue to do so. Yet he expected LGBT people to have faith in him for the future.


This wasn’t even LGBT people refusing to accept an apology (which we wouldn’tbeen obliged to do) or trusting him to learn and do better – because he didn’t make an apology, made no indication that he had learned and adamantly ruled out not doing the same thing all over again.

 

And let us be clear here – LGBT people did not sack Brandon Eich. We do not have that power. We did not ban him under law – we do not have that power. We did not destroy his code or his company or have his website banned – none of these we can do. No-one physically attacked him. No-one put a gun to his head.

 

We spoke.

 

We spoke against a man who would spend money to deny our humanity. We spoke against a man who wished to deny us equality and treat us as lesser citizens. We spoke against a man who refused to even rule out doing the same thing again. We spoke against a company – a company that even prides itself on its principles - that decided such a man was ideal to be their leader and figurehead. We chose not to use the products of that company. We chose not to associate with a man or a company

 

Why is his “freedom of speech” which, by the American interpretation, also includes copious amounts of money to fund denial of our rights – so damn precious that OUR freedom of speech must be silence – or be considered “out of line” or “going too far.”

 

Why is his speech perfectly reasonable but ours is a “lynch mob”?

 

What do you expect us to do? Do you think we have some kind of duty to shop at Chick-fil-a, use Firefox or read Orson Scott Card? Lest our refusal to associate with a bigot somehow “oppress” you? At what point are we ALLOWED to speak up against bigotry? When do we get to defend outselves, oh straight people, do tell?

 

Why are LGBT people – all marginalised people – presented as being vicious, angry and oppressive because we won’t lay down silently and let privileged people oppress us?

 

Brendan Eich is not a victim. Brendan Eich was the man trying to victimise LGBT people – and clearly planning to do so again in the future. LGBT people chose not to lay down and take it, LGBT people fought against being victimised, LGBT people refused to smile in the face of yet another straight, cis person hitting us.

 


All you people squealing about how so-very-mean we’ve been to this bigot? You are like the men who hold some poor guys arms so someone else can punch him. Eich is the one who attacked us – we’re defending ourselves. It’s your choice whether you stand aside, help protect us – or try to hold our arms so we’re defenceless. 

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So, someone has asked me to speak about the FRC shooting.

 To which I would like to invite them to kindly fuck off.

 I don’t think I’ve ever made a point of reporting crime in this space that isn’t related to homophobia and transphobia. That is the only violence I regularly talk about (mainly because the mainstream decidedly doesn’t talk about it).

So why do you expect me to talk about this? Oh, right, we’re doing the whole “minority collective responsibility” thing, I see. Guess how not impressed I am by that. I have no duty here, I am not responsible for what anyone has done to the FRC and the idea that all GBLT groups somehow have an obligation to speak is nasty and homophobic (they have, anyway, because they’re classier than the hate groups that oppose us – but we have no duty to do so and no responsibility here). Hey, why don’t you get back to me when the FRC and similar hate groups make a point of speaking every time a GBLT person is murdered? I do not condone, accept or agree with what the gun man did – I think it’s bloody foolish as well as immoral – but I passionately reject the ridiculous idea that I – or any other GBLT person, site or org – has a duty to respond and speak on this.

And isn’t it FUNNY (and by funny, I mean nauseating) that in the recent mass shootings in the US people have been bending over backwards to avoid assigning any kind of motive or group to the (straight, white) killers, but suddenly everyone is oh-so-sure that it’s the fault of “the gays” here.

And to everyone wanting the FRC to be delisted as a hate group – I’m sorry, did their policies change? No? Then they’re still a hate group. One of your employees being injured doesn’t change that. You want to talk incitement for exposing their bigotry? You want to blame people objecting to the hatred for this attack? Then you’re homophobe and a supporter of bigotry.


Oh hey, did you know that a gay man was shot to death and another is in hospital in Baltimore, Tuesday?

No?

Huh, funny that. Didn’t hit the news as much did it? Shall we guess why?

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I’ve been trying to avoid the internet lately to try and avoid both the Olympics and the whole Chick-fil-A bullshit. But, alas, the Chick-fil-A bullshit is even more all-encompassing than the Olympics with an inordinate number of clueless straight people rallying round the poor poor oppressed Dan Cathy and his hate chicken. And you’ve got to love how many of them are so desperate to say how much they’re not homophobes, no, really, honest.

Yeah, I don’t believe them either.

In the face of the sheer mass of the bullshit straight folks are flinging here, I feel obliged to say something, to vent if nothing else.

First of all, the most common crap people are slinging is: “He only spoke out against same-sex marriage”.

It’s not actually true – but even if it were, and? Marriage is a human right – one that has been upheld repeatedly on both sides of the Atlantic. Denying human rights to marginalised people, deciding we don’t deserve human rights, is not a defensible position and is more than grounds to avoid this vile bigot and his nasty hate chicken. Of all the pro bono legal services I have provided GBLT people, the most common is my “partner pack” a big sheaf of legal documents that try try try to give same-sex couples the same protections as straight couples – knowing that a) no amount of documents would give them the protection straight couples take for granted (including unmarried ones for that matter) and b) there’s no way the vast majority of them could have afforded this without pro-bono and you know there’s no legal aid for this. They faced no small amount of legal fees for something straight folks can get at registry office – OR not have to do a thing because the straight world gives them status automatically. (Oh and lookie here, Civil Partnerships can cost 12 times more than weddings. I’m shocked, shocked I say)

ZAnd don’t tell me denying the human right of marriage doesn’t have cost. Tell this poor sod whose much loved partner died and his would-be-in-laws put him through hell that it doesn’t cost. Tell these women who are going to be separated against their will after being together for 10 years that denying the human right of marriage doesn’t have a cost. Tell their 2 children who will lose a mother. Or this man who had to leave the US to be with his husband. Or the gay man who was kicked out of the hospital and barred from visiting his partner for kissing him goodbye. It matters.

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Straight man Timothy Kurek was a homophobe from a strong religious upbringing who loathed gay people. Then one of his friends came out as a lesbian and was ostracised. So he decided to learn some empathy for GBLT people…

By fake “coming out” as gay to his family and spending time in the local gay district
around the bars, the clubs, the book stores so he could be around “these people”
learn whether there was any justification behind his homophobia. This immersed
him in the “gay experience.”


What?

WHAT?

WHAT?!

When, thankfully, the anchor challenges his ridiculous claim (I believe the anchor is both gay and not impressed) he backtracks and claims he doesn’t know what it’s like to be gay – but how the “label” of gay impacted him. Seriously. Do I even have to say how clueless this is? How a straight person deciding to use the label gay is appropriative and disgusting – and how there is no way he gets even a SHRED of our experience just because he hangs around in our spaces.

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So, rather predictably, the local elections happened and the Tories were left whimpering and the Lib Dems weeping (the Lib Dems now have less councillors than they’ve ever had since their founding).

In the aftermath everyone is, of course, asking whyyyy this happened! Why oh whyyyy did the Tories and the Lib Dems get so pummelled? Well, the answer’s simple – it was THE GAYS!!!!!

Wait, what?

Yes, us gay folks. Now, personally I’d be ecstatic if I had the power to decimate the Tories and their mini-mes but, if I did have such power they’d be even more damaged than they are now so I’m personally a little doubtful. But according to Nadine Dorries, Tory MP, Cameron hater (and it depresses me that I also hate Cameron because while he deserves to be hated, it puts me in the deeply unpleasant position of agreeing with Nadine Dorries) because of the weak Tory “consultation” about marriage equality, the electorate abandoned the Tories! Yes, it’s all about us gay folks – and Lords reform! So say David Davis (who believes that marriage equality is London politics – see, gay people only live in London, y’know)

So the electorate, outraged over gay people getting equality and the House of Lords getting democracy, decided to stop voting for the Tories and vote for… Labour? A party that also supports equal marriage? And they left the Lib Dems despite them always supporting equal marriage?

No, they say, Osbourne should focus more on the economy! More Tory economy! That will please the voters – more Tory budgets, more Tory economic policy, more focus on what matters. And Osbourne seems to be buying it – promising 100% focus on the economy!


To which I wonder what they think they have been focused on? Because marriage equality and Lords reform? Have just been words. They’ve done nothing, it’s been words and window dressing


But the economy? Well there’s the last budget – with the granny tax and the pasty tax and, of course, a great big tax cut to the richest in the country. There have been brutal benefits cuts across the country that have left so many worse off. Local councils are being strangled which, in turn, means more cuts to essential services. We have the tuition fees debacle. We have VAT being raised, the most regressive tax, ensuring the biggest burden falls on the poorest (and despite supposed opposition from the Lib Dems). We have bankers – of government owned banks – being offered nearly million pound bonuses.

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For the upper rate of tax to be cut. The tax on people earning over £150,000 a year. We really need to cut this, apparently, according to the government. And look, the Lib Dems are melting on the point.

So we're all in this together?

So while VAT rises, benefits are cut, legal aid is gutted, local services are gutted, the NHS is gutted, the police are privatising and the poorest in society continually suffe rmore and more.

In the meantime the government is also looking at the richest in society and... asking nicely for the bankers not to take the huge bonuses they're getting from tax payer owned banks? Now we're scrapping the top tax for people earning over £150,000 a year.

These poor poor rich people, it must be so hard for them. Now let's cut some more child benefit and make disabled people face even more of a struggle to get any kind of help at all.

These are thesacrifices the rich are expected to make, it seems. Typical Tories and their mini-mes. Ye gods how I regret ever voting for the Lib Dems. Never again
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*deep breaths* my temper is frayed on this one. I’ve just come across a blog post by a straight person who is most displeased that the GBLT community is not more up in arms and outraged by the group beating of Brandon White in Atlanta. She wanted to see more outpouring of… I don’t even know what. Outrage, grief, anger, shock? She judges us for not reacting more forcefully to the gay bashing and not paying more attention to it.

And I wish it was just another failed ally pulling this privileged shit, but sadly, she’s not alone.

What did you expect? It was a brutal gay bashing? Yeah then and every other day of the week. You don’t get it. blinkered straight folks, this isn’t unusual or freaky or weird or shocking. This is a normal day. This shit happens every day. Every bloody day – and yes as bad and much much worse.

I have yet to publish a bad news list that didn’t contain shocking violence. Mob attacks, stitches, beating, broken bones, concussion, rape, rape with objects, burning people with hot water, setting them on fire and, of course, murder. Beatings, stabbings, shootings, burnings, arson. Over and over again.

Look. Look at the list. Read them. It happens over and over and over again

And in my list of links for the next round up which I’ll get to once I have the strength for it I have at murders, mob attacks, mass arrests and a 16 year old kid with a broken jaw. And that’s just a brief scan of the links in the folder.

NONE of these cases get vast amounts of attention from the GBLT blogosphere or GBLT news sources. They’re reported on once, maybe twice and then we move on. If developments happen – like suspects caught or a court case develops, it is reported on – that’s about it. Even murders rarely get massive outpourings of shock and horror from us any more. There’s too many of them for more and we’re too inured to violence for a greater response.

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So Janet W. Hardy is writing a book that she has a kickstarter page to announce. And the book is called Girlf@g. (I am not linking to it, the last thing I won’t is for even one link from me to add so much as a penny into having this homophobic book put on the shelves)

Yes Girlf@g. Though Hardy, of course, doesn’t remotely have the respect to disemvowel the slur –if she did she wouldn’t have used the slur in the first place. And this book is about? Women who are sexually attracted to gay men. No, let's not even be that respectful. A book for women who fetishise f@gs, since that's the term this woman uses. Oh yay there’s a book about the fetishists now.

How to count the many things wrong with this?

Let’s begin with the slur shall we? Even if you wanted to write a book about women who were creepily obsessed in gay men, the very least you could so is not slap a gay slur on the freaking cover. I suppose I should be happy for honesty in advertising since it very clearly says "this woman doesn't give a fuck about you as people." A slur is utterly disrespectful and dehumanising. Using this slur already shows the extreme contempt Ms Hardy has for gay men. There are no doubt a dozen ways she could have titled this book

Her excuses so far are that she didn’t coin the phrase – what, so a slur is only offensive now if you invent it? Most slurs out there are older than I am, the fact I didn’t invent them doesn’t make them not offensive if I use them. That it isn’t meant to be hurtful (yay magical intent, that many gay fetishists absolutely love that word (got that, it may offend us, but the people doing the offending love it, so what’s the problem? Ye gods what is with that logic?!) and that it’s a reclaimed word.

Do we have to revisit reclaiming again? This is getting tiresome. You cannot reclaim a word that cannot be used against you. F@g is a word used against gay men. Ms. Hardy is not a gay man, she cannot reclaim this word. Ye gods can we stop having this conversation already?!

It is not ok to use a slur. Slurs are violence in spoken form. Slurs dehumanise, reduce us to things, reviled things at that. A slur carries the full history of violence and oppression and persecution. Slurs carry the full weight of societal prejudice and loathing. Slurs are so often trigger words that cause so much harm to so many trauma victims. Slurs are not acceptable and not excusable.

Now let's tackle the idea of women being sexually attracted to gay men. Note only gay men. Not men. Because we’re different from other men, apparently. We’re weird, odd non-men and a totally different being from straight men. That’s right, we’re so different from straight men that there’s a whole new attraction just to us that in no way encompasses the straight men. Let me reiterate – it’s not attraction to men or men of a certain body type, hobbies, interest or whatever – not, it’s gay men who are so very different from straight men. As is further revealed when I tried to email her to explain how offensive she was being (it didn’t work, she doesn’t care) she described her partner as “gay-seeming”. Yes, gay seeming. Whatever the hell that means. Born with a rainbow tattoo on his forehead?

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Or give me a new set of haddocks.

So what do we have to annoy me to day everybody? Oh look, more advice! YAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAY! WHAT FUN!

Oh wait, *opens window* *let’s the sarcasm out*

Damiano Tommasi, head of the Italian Football association would advise gay footballers against coming out.

*le sigh* Look, just like we don’t need people advising us to come out, we don’t need people telling us not to come out either. Is there homophobia in professional sports? Gods yes – and no-one knows that better than GBLT people! And most certainly no-one knows that better than GBLT football players – and if they want to be damned brave and come out anyway, kudos to them. If they want safety and security and not to risk everything then they can stay closeted – also their choice and perfectly reasonable. But I cannot imagine any GBLT football player – or any GBLT person period – thinking “oh, I was going to come out but this straight guy says HOMOPHOBIA EXISTS which I like, totally didn’t know, so now I’m changing my mind!”

But wait! It gets worse! See, Mr. Tommasi here isn’t worried about gay footballers being victims of homophobia – no no, he thinks we should be closeted to preserve a “civil space” because footballers are so close together, and change in the same changing rooms that there could be embrassment!

ZOMG the gays be staring at your straight junk guys! HORROR! AAAARGH. Can’t you feel our gayze upon your bodies Didn’t we have this conversation already, Jason Akermanis? Really, I don’t think I need to repeat myself since it still applies and I’m not typing it all out again:

I need to break something to you – the chances are a gay person has seen you nekked

If you ever changed for PE at school, if you’ve ever been to the swimming baths, if you’ve ever been to a sports centre, health spa, joined a sports team, if you‘ve been in a communal barracks or tent etc. In short, if you have ever been in any situation where you are naked around members of your own gender, chances are that you have been seen nekked by a gay person.

We r hiding and looking at your nekked bodies! ZOMG AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAARGH! RUN straight people, RUN!!!!

And you know what? There are several things we need to address here.

1) Nudity =/= sex. And y’know what? Chances are GBLT people know this better than most people. Why? Because we’ve been here before! Every time we go to the gym or a join a sports team and most certainly at school – gay men have been around naked straight guys, lesbians have been around naked straight women. We‘ve been there, we know and we know it‘s not sexual. We know the difference between sexual nudity and non-sexual nudity

2) Get over yourselves already. Seriously, to all the straight folks out there – gay people do not spend our lives lusting after your hetness. No, really. Enough with this silly idea that because we’re attracted to our own gender, we’re attracted to ALL of our own gender.

3) Y’know what? Maybe you are hot. Maybe you’re drool-worthy hot. Maybe you are so damn sexy that your mere presence in the changing room will make all of our days. Maybe you are sex on legs. Congratulations, have a cookie. Guess what? Your being a pure avatar of solid sex does not mean that we’re going to leap on you and have our wicked way with you. It doesn’t even mean we’re going to stare at you and make you uncomfortable (and, hey, if someone DOES the skeevy leering thing then say something because that’s rude regardless), our libidos aren’t going to overrule our good sense of the appropriate. Which brings me to…

4) The gay panic defence. Y’know, it has been raised in court over here yet again not that long ago. There are a substantial number of straight people who feel it’s ok to attack gay people because they are seen to be making a come on. A touch, a glance, even how we are dressed can be seen as a reason for a violent attack. You think we’re going to stare at your naked straight arse? You think getting an eyeful is worth that kind of risk?

But, of course, the actual argument presented is NOT that gay people are going to rush at the irresistible straight folks and have our wicked wicked way. No, it’s that our open presence will make the straight folks… uncomfortable.

Ok, seriously? So GBLT people are supposed to closet themselves for their entire lives – because this is what that means – for the sake of straight people’s comfort in the dressing room? So straight people can keep the delusion that there are no gays around? Keep their partners undercover, never mention their families, make sure their families are never noticed? Maybe make up a few lies, a fake girlfriend, a fake history? Edit their entire lives for the sake of straight people’s DISCOMFORT? I would gape at the entitlement in this if it weren’t so damn common.
GBLT people don’t have a duty to censor themselves so straight people can pretend we don’t exist.


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I knew I’d have to do this, because I have to do this every time.

Jerry Sandusky is a paedophile. You’ve probably seen the news, as a coach at Penn State university over there in the US he raped several young boys under his care, most of them marginalised and among the most vulnerable in society. There’s lots more to talk about as it gets increasingly sickening as just about everyone and his dog at the university seemed to know about this and decided to look the other way for years – allowing more boys to be preyed on. There’s a lot of disgust to mention here. A lot of outrage and you could spend endless words and not adequately cover the vileness of this – and in a culture that so often ignores this it’s important to talk about it.

And it certainly more useful to talk about this disgust than saying that Jerry Sandusky is gay.

Yes, of course they did. The minute we have anyone abusing children there’s always someone leaping up to blame the gays. And it’s not just established scum like like Rush Limbaugh declaring that Sandusky is gay (based on… well… based on nothing. But if there’s child abuse you have to blame the gays!) and many many many more of his ilk.

But we even have alleged liberals and “progressives” and even “allies” blaming this abuse on the closet. Yes, the closet – see this is what happen when you oppress us gays and force us into the closet – denied and oppressed we take the only sexual outlet we can apparently – little boys. Oh isn’t it terrible?

NO! A gay man is not a paedophile. Putting a gay man in the closet doesn’t warp us into paedophiles. Stop stop stop linking gay men and paedophilia. Gay men are not a threat to children. When a paedophile assaults children he is not a gay man in the closet. It is not the same, it is not even remotely the same – this is bigotry, it’s offensive and it is constantly used to demonise us. STOP.

Gods I am sick of this bigoted shit.
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So another bigoted arsehole has decided to open his mouth to defend poor oppressed Christians in the UK Who are being crushed under the “pink jackboot” and he needs to oppose the “Gaystapo”

Yes, Nazi analogies. I'm putting aside the malicious vileness of claiming GBLT people are oppressing Christians when Christianity is pushing so much homophobic and transphobic hatred because it's eclipsed by the sheer nauseating evil of comparing GBLT people to Nazis. And because he most certainly isn't the first Christian homophobe to use this comparison.

Firstly, and least importantly, Godwin's law exists for a reason. When you reach such levels of hyperbole, your point is utterly lost. Unless you are speaking about a fascist and oppressive government that brought war to much of the world while setting out to exterminate millions upon millions of people OR people who emulate and admire these vile people then it is not Nazi-like.

Secondly, and more grossly, GBLT people were targeted by the holocaust. The Nazis committed a ruthless, barbaric and sickeningly cruel genocide against GBLT people. One of many ongoing genocides I might add.

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Another bad news round up - as ever, very upsetting and triggering.

They're hard to read and ye gods they're hard to right - but they're important. Always to remember that it never stops, it hasn't stopped it isn't changing - and remember to make sure the blood is dripping from the right hands - no matter how much they play the victim or pretend they are not part of this hatred.

This is the cost of hate speech and discrimination.

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You've probably seen this on twitter in the news or otherwise in the greater images that remind us what a sewer our politics are. But for those who don't:

Theresa May, our Home Secretary and Equalities Minister gave a speech trying to condemn and scrap the Human Rights Act (yes, our Home Secretary and Equalities Minister wants to scrap the Human Rights act. This should probably tell you a lot about her.) In this speech she said “The illegal immigrant who cannot be deported because – and I am not making this up – he had a pet cat.”

Except of course she did make it up, or someone did, because it's grossly untrue. Utterly utterly untrue. In no way, shape or form can you remain in this country when facing deportation because you have a pet cat. She was talking bullshit.

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It's that time again. There's anotehr sad litany of how homophobia and transphobia is a blight on our world - complete with the haters and the victims.

I think it's important to spread these, not just so we can see that this stuff happens and how damaging it is but I think it makes a point to bring them together - that this crap happens everywhere, literally and the common themes and links between them

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I am not queer. I am a gay man. A click on the About Me tab up there takes you to a post about my labels and identity. It's abundantly clear and starkly clear. I've tried to make this as clear as possible without enraging the folks who demand I identify by their label not mine.

So let me be really bloody clear about this. To me that word is a slur and it's a trigger. Not a “oh that makes me uncomfortable” spork. No, a whole load of mental illness and pain causing trigger that often leads to me opening my handy-dandy pill bottle. It's an instant trip to under-threat land. It is not some minor thing I can just get over, it's not something that can be readily dismissed

And I hate dealing with it, enough that I will just take absences just because there's too much of the word around and it's bringing me down. When you use the word as a generic, I'll skip past it, try not to read it, cringe and push into my mind whatever you're referring to doesn't include me, I've found it's the best way to try and deal with this. It's in common useage which means common pain but that's on me to deal with however I can. If you use it to self-reference, it doesn't apply to me anyway which makes it easier to handle.

There's no difficult, painful get around for when you apply it straight to me. Then it's a slur and it just hurts. And I'm beyond tired of explaining this – and even further tired of people denying this, denying that it can be possible, denying me feeling this way. I cannot make it clearer – do not call me it, it triggers me and if you call me it after having ample chance to know better – and especially after I tell you not to – then you are using a slur against me.

For people within the community – that's unacceptable, you don't get to force your reclamation on me – and don't get to police my identity to suit your idea of who I should be and what I should identify with.

For straight, cis people – you can't reclaim a slur that can't be used against you, calling me it after I've told you what it means to me is beyond unacceptable – and I refuse to endure it.

Now please stop. Honestly, I'm tired of having to fight over every little basic request.
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One of the things I've been doing lately is keeping a look out for places to fill my already full RSS. Mainly because my RSS is split up into sections. There's the “Come here any time, it's probably going to be ok” at the top (this has a side group: “Site won't hurt, subject matter will”), followed by the “Generally good, but there's going to be regular or semi-regular heterosexism” then the “Good info, but there's a huge chance it's going to hurt” then “No chance about it. This will hurt” and lastly the “HERE BY DRAGONS! Homophobes abound, don't go there!” (And after that there's homophobes without any possibility of redeeming content. But they obviously don't get on the RSS at all).

It's one of my ways of trying to keep out of the line of fire when I'm not feeling especially strong or mentally sound. I can tailor my browsing to my mental strength and chance of collapsing nastily. Anyway, recently I did a big reassess and moved a lot of sites and blogs down (some of them falling off the bottom) because I was giving far too much repeated benefit of the doubt to places that gave me grey hairs but were sure to wave their past laurels around every damn second. So, the top two slots of my RSS have been severely denuded and I was doing a scout for more and I came across a post and comment thread that just epitomised so many ally headaches.


The OP: I was so religious and I totally hated gay people! They were sinners sinners! But then I realised that I was wrong! Gays are ok!
Commenter 1: Oh you are such a wonderful person!
Commeter 2: you're sooo brave uh-huh
Commenter 3: Exactly! It's only Jesus who gets to judge, not us! (*side-eye* no-one judges me for being gay)
Commenter 4: Let he without sin cast the first stone (hey, you too – my being gay isn't a sin and you say it is I'm going to throw the first, second and third rock)
OP: Oh you're all so wonderful
Comment 2: And brave!
Commenter 5: I don't hate gays as well!
Commenter 3: So wonderful!
Commenter 2: And brave!
Commenter 4: Am I wonderful?!
Op: Yes we're all wonderful!
Commenter 2: And brave!
Commenter 5: Why can't everyone be as good allies like we are?

(I'm paraphrasing a little. Suffice to say there follows what could crudely be called an ally circle-jerk about how wonderful and brave everyone is. I managed to keep my dinner down. Just).

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Another depressing round up of bad news.

I think it's important to spread these, not just so we can see that this stuff happens and how damaging it is but I think it makes a point to bring them together - that this crap happens everywhere, literally and the common themes and links between them

As ever, divided by category

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Another depressing round up of bad news. I've been lax oin this and my links have built up so I'm going to have 2 next to each other.

I think it's important to spread these, not just so we can see that this stuff happens and how damaging it is but I think it makes a point to bring them together - that this crap happens everywhere, literally and the common themes and links between them

As ever, divided by vague category


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The Uganda genocide bill is again raising its ugly head. I really do think this vile attempted genocide (and, let me be frank, this is more an escalation of genocide than imposing of a fresh genocide as Uganda's laws and policies are already genocidal) is going to keep raising up until enough people are looking the other way for it to get passed. It also has a chance of being passed soon – by the end of August.

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So the overwhelmingly straight, cis dominated Equality and Human Rights Commission has decided that, following such cases of Christian government employees refusing to provide government services to GBLT people, we need to strike a “balance” between the rights of GBLT people and the rights of Christians.

Particularly, this so-called Equalities Commission thinks that Christians are being badly done to by not being allowed to be gatekeepers of government services and being denied the right to subject GBLT people to homophobic prejudice.

In particular, they are eager to intervene in the case of Lillian Ladele, a Christian registrar who decides that her religion should dictate which state marriages are formalised or not. They want to intervene in favour of more homophobia.

They also wish to intervene in the case of Gary MacFarlane, a “therapist” who is so homophobic he cannot work with GBLT people. On his behalf – of course. They want to encourage the continued prejudice that has caused so many of us to be so wary of the mental health profession


And I side-eye, I do. Because the very nature of the “rights” being fought for here are so different:

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