In the mail came two issues of a gay-lifestyle magazine its founder is hoping I might contribute to. It’s not my kind of thing, but I got a kick out of the letters to the editor, which are startling when you substitute the word white for gay.
Dear Hero,
I am a white man living in Kansas and your hot magazine came as such a relief. Finally a publication for people who are proud to be white, and want to know what other white people are up to. It’s nice to know that I am not alone. White people have come a long way, but we’ve got a lot farther to go. There’s no white pride parade in my town, but in the meantime I’ll keep my fingers crossed, and continue reading your great white magazine!
June 5, 2017
"I got a kick out of the letters to the editor, which are startling when you substitute the word white for gay."
From the January 8, 2000 entry in David Sedaris's diary ("Theft by Finding: Diaries (1977-2002)"):
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With the substitution, it sounds like he is commenting to a hypothetical "KKK Today" magazine.
A nation of laws, not of men.
Equality under the law.
Noble, dead concepts. Illuminated by humor.
The stilted feel of this reminded me of the following: I Love My Dead Gay Son.
I am Laslo.
I think these "sovereigns" will come around. Doesn't Zuck already support the minimum income?
After all, what else can be done for us useless eaters in flyover.
I'd laugh so I don't despair... But thats the essence of David's writing.
Substituting "Jewish" for "White" in all discussions of White Privilege can be equally revealing. Hitler was a Social Justice Warrior avant la lettre.
It's far more interesting to substitute the word "homosexual" (or "gay", if you've fallen for the propaganda) for "white":
"Let's hope the Boston Marathon bomber is a homosexual American
Homosexual men must be stopped: The very future of mankind depends on it.
Homosexuals guys are killing us: Toxic, cowardly masculinity, our unhealable national illness."
robother said...
Hitler was a Social Justice Warrior avant la lettre.
The Nazis invented affirmative action.
Subsitute he or she for he.
If you substitute "sales" for "gay" you just have a run-of-the-mill trade magazine.
If claiming to be Homosexual can be a religion, then so can being an Albino. You are born with both, right.
JAORE said...
A nation of laws, not of men.
Equality under the law.
Yes, "Equal justice under the law" and "We are a nation of laws, not of men" are pretty lies we were told in school. They've always been lies but damn it, they sure sound nice.
If you substitute "Irish" for "gay" you have Boston in 1900.
I don't recall ever having heard of this David Sedaris character until about a week ago. I heard him on NPR and thought e was a woman. Then I figured out he was gay. I then heard about him again here and everywhere.
I guess he's supposed to be funny and deep. I found him neither.
David's kid sister Amy has been in some really bizarre stuff. Check out Strangers With Candy.
I prefer 'Caucasian' meself.
I should take it as a compliment that everybody but me is allowed to openly display pride and gratitude for my inherent qualities. I must be really powerful to warrant collective guilt.
I must be really powerful to warrant collective guilt.
You've figured it out!
robother wrote: Hitler was a Social Justice Warrior avant la lettre.
Hillary is gearing up for 2020, doncha know? This time around her keynote issue will be the White Question.
I didn't find it startling at all. I found it contrived.
What is the point xe's trying to make?
I actually feel bad for gay people and this month, do enough people know about the background of the stonewall riots, while important it is so cheery. This month has turned into Saint Patty's Day and Cinco De Mayo. oh well
Hilarious? Sounds pretty reasonable and sensible to me. But then again, I am apparently a vicious, hateful, racist white supremacist (whatever that means).
@Renee:
I actually feel bad for gay people and this month, do enough people know about the background of the stonewall riots, while important it is so cheery. This month has turned into Saint Patty's Day and Cinco De Mayo. oh well
Victims of their own success.
Substitute "White" for "Black" in something like Ebony and really get disturbed, or realize that affinity for those like yourself is pretty normal, unless you are white, which then makes it pure evil.
@ J Farmer
The gay lobby doesn't at times doesn't seem to act on the best interest of average gay folk. Pope Francis said wisely...
"So much is written of the gay lobby. I still have not met one who will give me the identity card with “gay” . They say that they exist. I think that when one meets a person like this, one must distinguish the fact of being a gay person from the fact of doing a lobby, because not all lobbies are good. That’s bad. If a person is gay and seeks the Lord and has good will, who am I to judge him? The Catechism of the Catholic Church explains this in such a beautiful way, it says, Wait a bit, as is said and says: “these persons must not be marginalized because of this; they must be integrated in society.” The problem isn’t having this tendency, no. We must be brothers, because this is one, but there are others, others. The problem is the lobbying of this tendency: lobby of the avaricious, lobby of politicians, lobby of Masons, so many lobbies. This, for me, is the more serious problem. And I thank you."
Because no one was going to bother with the actual transcript or context. All we got was 'who am I to judge', because the gay lobby wouldn't want you to know in context.
https://zenit.org/articles/francis-press-conference-on-return-flight-from-brazil-part-2/
Most of identity politics is nationalism. The bad kind of nationalism, where you believe that your identity as x (Black, Hispanic, female, gay) is your core identity, your x identity fundamentally separates you from the non-x's, the non-x's fear you because you are superior to them, and so they work together to oppress you, and keep you from your natural role as a human being. This unnatural state of affairs is unjust and is unstable. It causes the x people to react, justly, with resistance, including violence. Because the non-x's have oppressed the x's and co-opted what is rightfully theirs, anything the x's get must be taken from the non-x's. The x's can only prosper (as is their right) by diminishing the non-x's.
This is standard Nazi race war ideology. It hasn't changed for a hundred years, but the (arbitrary) group identity of the x's has.
Damn Mrs. Althouse, you are goring some Oxen this morning.
If you put ...in bed at the end of reading your fortune cookie fortune it's really funny!
Unreconciled moral, natural, and personal imperatives.
Pro-Choice, selective, unprincipled, and opportunistic, is a religious/moral and legal solution with an immediate return and long-term dysfunction.
@Renee:
I honestly have no idea how anything you wrote is in response to what I wrote. I am aware of the notion that there is a "gay lobby" that wields power in the Vatican. I am agnostic; I don't know if there is and I don't know if there isn't. And frankly, I don't care. I am not Catholic, and the Catholic Church has relatively little power int he US.
Sorry, I was trying to figure out your comment as well. Sorry I misread it.
The gay lobby was definitely a 'success'. but when I think gay lobby I think of the Kathy Griffins of this world and other celebrities who aren't even gay.
I think it is great that gay people can be open, but the fascist nature of the gay lobby that acceptance and love is never enough it seems.
OT Althouse is there going to be another Wonder Woman thread?
@Renee:
The gay lobby was definitely a 'success'. but when I think gay lobby I think of the Kathy Griffins of this world and other celebrities who aren't even gay.
I think it is great that gay people can be open, but the fascist nature of the gay lobby that acceptance and love is never enough it seems.
I think you are conflating two things. The "gay lobby" that Francis was referring to was a reference to a notion described in former Pope Benedict's memoir about a "gay lobby" among cardinals within the Vatican. You are describing,I think, the politically-organized movement towards so called gay rights beginning in the late 1960s and picking up steam throughout the 70s, 80s, and 90s culminating in what I would say is more or less total victory by the early oughts. The gay marriage gambit was really the result of this victory more than its culmination. It's really little surprise that with this total victory, the focus has switched so swiftly and so intently on transgenderism (which has always been a distinct phenomenon from sexual orientation). The changes, though, actually have little to do with either gays (perhaps two or three percent of the population) or transgedered (perhaps a third of one percent). It's really the notion and preferences of heterosexuals that matters.
"OT Althouse is there going to be another Wonder Woman thread?"
If you think there's new material worth talking about, put it in the open thread.
I'm not seeing anything... especially not seeing the movie. Not interested in whether it's successful.
Substitute "elite" instead to see why the intended point falls short.
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