So uh yeah I ended up having to take a break from doing the blog and the crackfest. So allow me a moment for excuses. I got handed a big video editing job that needed to be done pronto. Then got sick. The sort of sick that makes all creative thought either impossible or so banal that you feel ashamed for having such terribly thought out ideas.
But now I'm back. Hopefully for a bit.
Meanwhile I always run through my mind things to write about up here. Lately my interactions with certain sub sets of people got me to thinking.
It seems to me that there seems to be a societally conditioned notion among some people to look for a group of people they can reflexively look down on. Usually a minority group of some sort, because lets face it's easier to bully people around when you're in a larger group.
Conversations with and observations of the culture around trans people have blown my mind of late, as it strikes me that they can't seem to catch a break from most anyone. As a mostly straight man looking in I find the level of criticism they get from LGB groups and also from corners of the female or male population is kind of mind boggling.
Then we have the case recently of the furry convention that someone pranked (or as I like to say, attacked.) With a device that emitted Chorine fumes, sending 19 people to the hospital. Now to say that furries are by and large seen as on the bottom of the geekdom totem pole would be something of an understatement. Sure the whole thing comes across as a bit silly, but my experiences with the furry community at local cons has always been cool. They are by and large the nicest, easiest going and some of the most fun people there.
It just underlies the notion that, in my humble opinion, we have been taught to view people using the wrong lens. That for far too long we view people with an eye that their differences are things we should view as road blocks to an understanding.
I prefer to take a different view. (What a shock!) That our differences are a thing to be explored and celebrated. Religiously I'm a pagan, but that doesn't mean there isn't wisdom in the Bible, Torah, Or Koran that might do me some good. I might not buy the whole thing but I am always willing to listen. Who knows maybe we'll make our biggest stride when we as people realize that each of us has the key to a larger puzzle and that listening to folks might help you solve a bit more of it.
As to our differences why should it bother me who someone loves as you long as they love? Why should it bother me that you got the physical body of one gender and the identity of another? If you're comfortable in the end with who you are it can only make your life better.
And as to bagging on peoples for their hobbies, fandoms, and other simple pleasures. Seriously what business is it of yours? Geeking out on something actually shows a passion for life that others seem to lack. In the end maybe that's why they get so hung up, you have something that makes your life larger and all they have are sitcoms on TV.
Perhaps in the end that's their own little hell they don't even know they're in.
Comments are always welcome, and if anyone has an idea of something they want to see me write about let me know. It's so nice to have my writing brain back.
