Valentines day rant!

I nearly forgot my annual valentines day rant! This is a good thing, it means I haven’t been assaulted by saccharine pink banners and cutesy heart and cherubs and all the rest of the eye abuse that assaults me this time of year.

Still, rant I shall! I hate Valentines – let me count the ways!

Firstly, even Hallowe’en has more actual sincerity of a holiday than this one. I think it’s on par with Mother’s/Father’s day in the running for “holiday most blatantly created by the greetings card industry to make you spend money.” Sure it had a history – but it’s a Hallmark Holiday. And florists and chocolatiers hike their prices to ridiculous degrees to take advantage of that

Secondly, it’s heteronormative as hell. The straightness oozes from this holiday and its depictions. For far too damn long it has been another big flagship of proper straight relationships that I am not part of. It’s only recently that gays, bis and lesbians have been given the nod – and even then that’s due to there being gold in them thar gays more than anything else.

Thirdly, the tubby baby with aerodynamically challenged wings has to be the WORST depiction of a love/sex/fertility deity in the history of the world. Seriously – I say yet again, if you’re going to use Eros/Cupid like this it’d be 100 times better for him to be some fine piece of prime man meat. Because Psyche didn’t wander round the world for no damn baby (and yes, Greeks and Romans portrayed him as a YOUTH but that WAS the depiction of gorgeous male beauty for many back then).

Fourthly – it’s meaningless. For the 10 thousandth time – there is absolutely NOTHING romantic about a mandatory gesture demanded by society. Giving gifts at this time isn’t a sign that you care or have remembered something important or great romance – it’s a sign that you are performing a societal obligation. It has no meaning because it’s demanded. Romance comes from doing something for someone because you care about them, because they matter to you. Not because society demands an overpriced card, some straggly garage flowers and some dramatically named chocolates in early February. Obligation is not romantic.

Of course we can all look forward to the real holiday – CHEAP CHOCOLATE DAY!!!!!!!!!

Further on foolish demonisation- DADT

And while we’re on the subject of stupid crap homophobes spout to demonise us – when discussing DADT can we move ON from the terrible scary idea that ZOMG gays are going to be showering with straight men! They’re going to be in the same barracks! SUBMARINES! WILL NO-ONE THINK OF THE SUBMARINES!!!!

Look, as far as I can see DADT has not miraculously removed all gays from the military, no, no it didn’t. It made gay and lesbian and bisexual soldiers HIDE and LIE. There are already gays in the military – and in the showers and, yes, in the submarines. (Submarines? I mean, really. Sure you have to live in very close confines in a submarine, but I shouldn’t think such circumstances are ideal for clandestine sexual encounters unless you want the whole crew to participate. Hey, quick, call me up a porn studio, I have a great idea for a plot!)

And this idea that the enforced closet is the only thing making all these gays behave themselves? First of all, that’s a gross insult to us that we cannot be professional. Are you saying that straight men and women must be segregated at all times unless there is an outbreak of mad sexoring? No? Then why do you think GBL people will fall on the straights with uncontrollable lust?

And there’s another point that is, of course, offensively ignored. When a straight person makes unwanted sexual advances on someone what is the likely response? A firm no. Maybe some mockery? Maybe a slap in the face or a even a drink flung on them?

We get attacked. We get beaten. We get killed. We can get attacked for looking too long, for making too much eye contact, for flirting, for suggesting that ZOMG we are gay and maybe interested. You think, in close confines with dozens if not hundreds of straight people, straight people who are at the peak of physical fitness and trained to kill, I might add, that GBL people are going to be a sexual nuisance?  Yeah, that shows a depressing ignorance of homophobia and its effects right there.

Even if you don’t trust our professionalism – trust our damn survival instincts