Conform or Die

Freaky looking riot police in Miami who have
been turned into Teenage Mutant Ninja
Turtles with your tax money.

Believe, obey, do not question!

Let's milk terrorism so we can have an excuse to turn our nation into a Police State. Let's humble those little demonstrators with our clubs, tear gas, dogs, fire hoses, rubber bullets, armored tanks, and any other weapon we can find to humiliate those who question us. Let's throw them in jail; maybe even kill them. For we are the Think Police, and we know the One Right Way, and if you open your mouth in protest, you'd better find a good dentist.

So, allow me to digress...

I would like to take a break from my usual idealism to give a more personal example of why I'm so screwed up and why this world is so screwed up.

Today, my mom insinuated that I'm a bad parent, and that really hurt. I spent this morning cleaning the house and eating a bowel of rice, I really can't figure out where this is coming from. I can't really understand why my own mother has to continually remind me what a rotten scum bag I am.

Yesterday, I spent the afternoon getting my oldest daughter's car worked on and washed, and I spent 45-minutes at her college getting her financial aid paperwork completed. I stopped by the state patrol and picked up a driver's handbook for my youngest daughter and later took her to dinner. I love and idolize my daughters more than anything in the world — they are everything to me.

But I am a bad parent? Why? Because my youngest daughter left a video at my mother's house that contained "really horrible stuff." My mom is a religious fundamentalist, and she says it's MY FAULT for my irregular church attendance, and for not "making" my 14-year-old daughter attend church. My mom says if she doesn't "attend church" she will get in trouble, and fall into the ways of the world.

Okay, let's talk about the video. I'm not sure what the hell my mother is talking about. She says my daughter downloaded stuff from the Internet. Now, I have NO IDEA how to download a video from the Internet onto a VCR tape, and I don't think my daughter does either.

Secondly, I am suspecting the incriminating video contains some Good Charlotte videos. Now, these kids are covered with body piercings, body art, they wear black leather, one of them has colored hair, they are really freaky looking, and I love them. This is a band that has clean songs, who sing about the pain of growing up. They talk about when their dad left them, or what it's like to be a geek in school. They are helping my daughter and her friends get through growing up. But since they do not look like Eddie Haskell, then they are immediately deemed as evil and satanic. Okay, let's take a look at wonderful Eddie Haskell.

This is taken from a Leave it to Beaver fan website:


Eddie’s two trademarks are his unctuous politeness to adults and his weasly, sharp-tongued meanness to everybody else. He is a model white-collar delinquent, a creep who goads people into trouble rather than perpetrating the crime himself. He was a born shirker, not worker, and a strain on any parent, especially his own long-suffering mother and father, Agnes and George.

Now, let's talk about those freaky looking people. This comes from today's Atlanta Journal-Constitution, Letters Section:

To the guy with the rainbow-colored mohawk, tattoos, and earring who picked up the lunch tab for Lt. Col. Steven Butler, Capt. Ed Ray and me at Harold's last Tuesday, and then slipped out before we could acknowledge your generosity: Thanks.

—Lt. Col. Kelly S. Jennings

So, in conclusion...

To my mother and others, I ask that you please not judge people by their appearance. Only judge another human by what's in their heart.

As for Christian fundamentalists having a monopoly on morality, I fully expect everyone on this Planet to be moral. While I support gay marriage, I expect these couples to live a moral life. It is the moral duty of a gay couple to have a divorce that's just as ugly and drawn out as a heterosexual divorce. After all, 53 percent of marriages end in divorce, and then I hear people mumbling something about the "sanctity of marriage." I'm tired of hearing about the Conservative Right's definition of morality: Hate, self-righteousness, prejudice, and intolerance all ring hollow with me.

Yes, I am...

...a rotten person. I am rotten because I cannot support big religious institutions who tell me that God will judge me, and then their members judge my every move. There is no need to send my daughter to church every Sunday — I'm sure there are plenty of other places where she can learn to be a hypocrite.

"He's a bad one, that Yellow Canary, he is a truly lowly, sorry, no good, loser."

"Yes, you're right Ms. Whipple. He is pond scum. Now get back to knitting those socks."