Politically moral or morally political?

I have a terrible habit: I am political on social media. Mostly Facebook, where I am likely to encounter folks with whom I went to high school. I grew up in a suburb of Kansas City, in an area with an unfortunate confluence of new money and small-minded Kansas semi-rural folks. When I was in high school, it was a moderate Republican area. In that way that Kansas politics have gotten more and more crazy over the last fifteen years or so, it's a hard line conservative area, now.

So I still have a few acquaintances from high school who are in the area, or in Kansas generally, whose politics have mirrored the shift that's taken place in the area.

When these two facts align just so, they can result in some unpleasant conversations.

Recently, after a long conversation about the FDA's reversal on Plan B, a man I knew in high school weighed in that the decision was to be mourned because it would lead to an increase in murder, an increase in fornication (yeah, he really talks like that: he's a minister in a fundamentalist sect) and would take children away from the moral guidance of their parents.  We talked a bit about some of the underlying false assumptions in some of the above--Plan B is not commonly regarded as inducing abortion--without much progress--and then he said something that I have had stuck in my craw ever since:

I hardly ever write about strictly political issues. that is not to say that i am without opinions, but they are not my prime concern. You assume politics because it is the forum is which your discern truth.

See what he did there? He's got God and religion, and that informs his politics. I've just got politics, like some kind of modern day Lucrezia Borgia, who is political...and amoral, because of the imperfect forum I use to 'discern truth.' He doesn't say it outright here, but he has implied before that my politics are at best "humanist" and at worst...utterly divorced from moral considerations. Nevermind how clearly untrue that is: I'm not HIS kind of religious (and very few people are!) but the assumption that I am therefore immoral/solely political makes me want to hand him a box of genital punches.

I guess I don't have a conclusion about why this bothered me so much, except that it's so emblematic of the cultural script that people of fundamentalist faith impose on people who are different from them. I encounter it so rarely, but this was really subtle, and it's left me cruising for a fight that probably isn't merited by how it was presented, and talking about it would require resurrected an old thread in an off-topic way.

That's why you all get the rant here, I guess.

What would you have said in my shoes?

Hrm.

If an anti-gay bigot spells it "biggot," is that telling? It just seems perilously close to another double-G word that's likely part of his vocabulary....

"American Savage" by Dan Savage

American Savage: Insights, Slights, and Fights on Faith, Sex, Love, and Politics by Dan Savage
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

Worth the read just for Bigot Christmas, though that's not the only good essay in this collection. Dan Savage is not without his flaws, but being boring certainly isn't one of them.


View all my reviews

 One of the most amazing things about Savage as a writer is that he can be as crude as can be in one essay, then leave you wondering where you left the damn tissues in the next one. Savage brought me to tears several times in the essay about his mother, and as a long-time reader of his column and podcast subscriber, I knew most of these stories already. The love and grief when he writes about her death are real, and I think it's unlikely that most people could keep a dry eye. I've read most of his books, and they are alternately inspiring, educational, filthy, and hilarious. Not bad at all, for your time.

Constant rebooting

I set up a new domain and imported my blog over here, doing just a little clean up to keep the new setup looking nice. I went ahead and linked this blog to Google+ with the notion that I would maintain a more active presence there, going forward. Facebook, it is wearying and a time suck like none other.

I could use a little more introspection, a lot more personal writing and goal reaching, and a lot less of Zuckerberg's infernal creation.

Lots more to come! I hope to see you around.

Thanks, Cheryl Strayed. I'm ready to get to work.

"We get the work done on the ground level. And the kindest thing I can do for you is to tell you to get your ass on the floor. I know it’s hard to write, darling. But it’s harder not to. The only way you’ll find out if you 'have it in you' is to get to work and see if you do. The only way to override your 'limitations, insecurities, jealousies, and ineptitude' is to produce. You have limitations. You are in some ways inept. This is true of every writer, and it’s especially true of writers who are 26. You will feel insecure and jealous. How much power you give those feelings is entirely up to you."

--From Dear Sugar #48, which isn't precisely written for me, but close enough.

I saw Cheryl Strayed, who IS Sugar, at the Unity Temple on the Plaza last night. There aren't many authors I would be so simultaneously pleased and flummoxed to meet, but she is on a very short list. She was as warm, as funny, as generous with her time and wisdom as I might have hoped. I am once again reminded that  at the end of the day, no one cares if I write but me, so I have to be the one to make it happen.

Watch this space. I'll be accountable here.

Fuck, yes.

I got Cliniqued

So a little over a week ago, my mom gives me this flier for some weapons-grade beauty cream that Clinique is giving away. You know, one of those the-first-one-is-free sorts of deals where after you're hooked on the tiny little bottle of complexion magic, they let you know that the full-sized bottle's going to be 80 bucks a month now that you can't live without it. So the you bring the flier in, and they give you a tiny bottle and make an appointment for two weeks in the future where you get another tiny bottle.

What the heck, I think.

I have good genes on my side so my skin's actually still nice for a 36-year old person. But free is free, and I am curious. I haven't used Clinique skincare for a while: these days, I use Philosophy, and I'm quite happy with the results.

But I'll give anything a try if it's free. And I need new blush anyway.

So I go to the Clinique counter and I show the nice lady in the almost-medical white coat the flier, and tell her I was in the market for some blush. I tell her two things I use regularly--Black Honey lip color and Teddy Bear eyeshadow--and that I am looking for a color of blush that is harmonious with those two products. She asks if I have time for her to try a couple things out, and I end up in the chair with her applying foundation and red-neutralizing base cover-up to my makeup-less face. (Hey, don't judge: it was my weekend, and I was tired.)

The end results of this pampering is that I walked out of Macy's with three products and my "free" miracle anti-aging serum. I'd feel worse about it, if the end result hadn't been so unequivocally BETTER than I have ever been able to for myself. I have yet to try to recreate what she did with these products...but the free serum is pretty damn great.

That's how they get you, I suppose...and I was no exception.