tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-68115839056744765512024-03-04T22:02:10.130-08:00From Wisconsin, with LoveFeminist, Educator, Activist, You Know the Rest...
Johnhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02994349956675503806noreply@blogger.comBlogger95125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6811583905674476551.post-44242993285246019502019-06-13T21:25:00.000-07:002019-06-13T21:25:11.065-07:00David DismoreDear David -<br />
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Thank you, for making me feel like it was OK, to be a feminist. Thank you, for making me know it was OK, to love women's history. Thank you, for being my friend and mentor. You will be greatly missed! Tell Elizabeth Cady Stanton, Alice Paul, and Susan B. Anthony hello for all of us!<br />
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<iframe allow="encrypted-media" allowtransparency="true" frameborder="0" height="808" scrolling="no" src="https://www.facebook.com/plugins/post.php?href=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.facebook.com%2Fonlinewithzoe%2Fposts%2F10157494074148278&width=500" style="border: none; overflow: hidden;" width="500"></iframe>Johnhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02994349956675503806noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6811583905674476551.post-65218164119146753832018-09-25T00:00:00.000-07:002018-09-25T00:00:09.977-07:00The Cost<br />
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Brett Kavanaugh is a piece of shit.<br />
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There, I said. I know that we are supposed to “use our words” or “take the high road” but I no longer can. I am completely and totally done with the fact that it is Sunday night and I sit here wondering whether or not our Democracy will be around by the end of the week.<br />
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If you are like me, you have found yourself, more times than one I am guessing, watching the news, mouths agape, mind in disbelief, and your heart heavy with grief and sadness. While these great travesties occur, I find myself wondering what is the cost? How many children must be locked in cages? How many women must come forward with accusations of sexual assault and rape? How many more people must accuse the President of harassment and assault? How many more anonymous op-eds and faulty promised must be made before we finally all see that the real cost, is that these great travesties themselves (too many to recall here) are what it really takes to take down <a href="http://www.bellhooksinstitute.com/blog/" rel="noopener" target="_blank">imperialist white supremacist capitalist patriarchy.</a><br />
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Over and over again I overhear the same question, both on the news and in my own individual activist circles, about our current state of affairs: “what else could he [President Trump] do to make it worse or for people to see how truly evil he is? The answer, sadly, is a lot. For a full recount of the things Trump has tried to do since taking office, see <a href="https://twitter.com/Amy_Siskind?ref_src=twsrc%5Egoogle%7Ctwcamp%5Eserp%7Ctwgr%5Eauthor">Amy Siskind’s</a> <em>The List: A Week-By-Week Reckoning of Trump’s First Year</em>.<br />
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<a href="https://feminismandreligion.files.wordpress.com/2018/09/registered-to-vote.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img alt="Registered to Vote" border="0" class=" wp-image-42043 alignright" height="195" src="https://feminismandreligion.files.wordpress.com/2018/09/registered-to-vote.jpg" width="195" /></a>Taking down imperialist white supremacist capitalist patriarchy is not easy. It is complicated. When you think you make progress, another avenue of horrors opens that you have to address before you can go back to the “big bad.” However, while we all can agree that Trump is awful (although people still support him), he is merely a symptom of the real disease that imperialist white supremacist capitalist patriarchy has imparted on both the country, our society, our leaders, and worst of all, ourselves.<br />
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Every action we do must be an effort to destroy imperialist white supremacist capitalist patriarchy. Every march we attend must discuss ways that we can mobilize to destroy imperialist white supremacist capitalist patriarchy. Every tweet, Facebook post, and public gathering must discuss a way to destroy imperialist white supremacist capitalist patriarchy. People have grown weary of having me at parties because my normal talking points are:<br />
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<li>Asking people if they’re registered to vote (and if not, why aren’t they)</li>
<li>Making sure people are discussing difficult issues with their friends and families that may or may not support Trump (even I oftentimes think about how I can reach out to my Trump-loving family members who attacked me online. For more on that, see my past posts).</li>
<li>Just how long do they think it will be until we are actually living in <em>The Handmaid’s Tale </em>universe?</li>
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So, today, I don’t have anything happy and cheery to talk to you all about. I don’t have any more energy to give outside of what I am doing each and every day to destroy imperialist white supremacist capitalist patriarchy.<br />
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The only thing I have for you is this: if you don’t vote on November 6, 2018, you may not have a country anymore the next day.<br />
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What Trump and his cronies are doing is completely awful. Each passing day presents a new set of horrors and pain that we have to deal with. Why we are well aware that the Special Counsel is uncovering a lot of witches in what Trump and the GOP refer to as a “fake witch hunt,” unless we have a Congress and Senate that will hold him accountable, what good is unearthing facts about what really happened in 2016?<br />
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I believe in America. I just hope there is an America to believe in after all of this travesty is said and done.<br />
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Johnhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02994349956675503806noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6811583905674476551.post-48303679193907694872018-06-26T00:00:00.000-07:002018-06-26T00:00:07.310-07:00Don't Look Away<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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Don’t look away. I know how hard it is to say this but don’t look away. All of those images, recordings, and other horrific accounts of the deplorable, sickening, and unconstitutional events at the camps they have set up along the southern border need to be your fuel to take action, get fired up, and take back this country from those that would want to destroy everything we hold dear.<br />
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I’ve written a lot about how the 2016 election has impacted my family. If you want to catch up on any of those posts, you can click here:<br />
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<li><a href="https://www.blogger.com/blogger.g?blogID=6811583905674476551#https://feminismandreligion.com/2016/12/22/a-letter-to-those-ive-lost/">A Letter to Those I’ve Lost</a></li>
<li><a href="https://www.blogger.com/blogger.g?blogID=6811583905674476551#https://www.engagedgaze.com/single-post/2017/11/30/Happy-Anniversary">Happy Anniversary</a></li>
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I didn’t think I’d be writing a series about my family post-2016, but if I learned anything, it is that the personal is political, and sadly, things don’t seem to be getting any better.<br />
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In the third volume of this ongoing series of misfortunate events, we start back at the very beginning except for this time, involving another family member that voted for Trump (I know, I don’t know how or why I have so many members of my family that voted for that Nazi). In what has become a news story and crisis to shock the world, many people have been taking to their personal social media accounts to spread the word of their outrage, distress, and heartache over children being ripped away from their families at the border. For days I did not see one post that was not talking about the humanitarian crisis at the border or calls for action and ways people could get involved to help.<br />
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While I was happy to see so many people trying to find a way to organize and take action, there always seems to be one person who calls on people to look away. Look no further than a member of my family, who voted for Trump, to comment on a status expressing outrage over the recordings of children being ripped away from their families stating: “Why can’t fb just be positive and fun. Why spread the negative?”<br />
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Why can’t social media be fun anymore? Why can’t we spread happy pictures of puppies, babies, and rainbows? While the answer may be simple to many of us, let me state it plainly to my relative: Because the world is on fire and we have a racist in the White House creating edicts that call for babies and children to be placed in ‘tender age’ facilities.<br />
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52% of white women voted for Trump. While that number still continues to shock many of us, my relatives are part of that statistic, and that is something that I have had to grapple with in order to make sense of this new world order we seem to be experiencing. However, what really is behind that statistic is the real monster responsible for both so many actions we have seen lately and ultimately the reason why someone would state: “Why can’t fb just be positive and fun?”<br />
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White privilege is the monster ripping children away from babies. White privilege is the beast that causes white mothers simply look away and find something more pleasing to look at on social media than the horrors going on throughout the world. White privilege is the invisible knapsack that 52% of white women are going to have to unpack if we are to ever get our country back.<br />
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Following the comment on social media, my relative reached out and said she wanted to: “save the welfare of our family” because as many of you have read, there has been a little bit of drama. However, before any action could be taken to “save the welfare of our family” (she literally wanted us to each post a cute photo of a baby or puppy to help make sure HER Facebook timeline was filled with cute photos rather than the news) she blocked my other relatives on social media.<br />
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So, that leaves me with little but nothing else to say than this: If you want to save the welfare of our family, then you start by <em>not</em> voting for and supporting the policy of a known racist. However, most importantly, you do not look away when you see something that upsets you. Question yourself as to <em>why</em> it upsets you.<br />
<a href="https://feminismandreligion.files.wordpress.com/2018/06/grandpa-jim-holocaust-article.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img alt="Grandpa Jim - Holocaust Article" border="0" class=" wp-image-41212 alignright" height="320" src="https://feminismandreligion.files.wordpress.com/2018/06/grandpa-jim-holocaust-article.jpg" width="239" /></a><br />
If we learned anything from history it is that those that looked away were not favorably remembered by history. From people that looked away when women fought for the right to vote, when the Nazis took Jews to concentration camps, to when African Americans were (and still are) beat up, attacked, and killed for wanting civil rights and equality, people that look away are part of the problem.<br />
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I never really talk about my grandfather that much. To be quite honest, he was a very quiet man that I didn’t get to know that much. What I do know is that he did not look away. My grandpa was part of the first U.S. anti-aircraft battalions that arrived at Dachau Concentration Camp the morning after being liberated by the U.S. Army’s 42<sup>nd</sup> and 45<sup>th</sup> infantry division.<br />
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In a time where <a href="https://www.blogger.com/blogger.g?blogID=6811583905674476551#https://www.npr.org/2018/04/15/602666011/survey-holocaust-is-fading-from-american-memory">two-thirds</a> of millennial and 4 out of 10 Americans overall don’t know what Auschwitz was, we need to make sure people do not look away from the tragedy and horrors around us for the sake of seeing something that comforts them. The scene that my grandfather discusses in the article (photo attached) is forever etched in his memory and while I don’t offer to speak for anyone but myself, what I have seen over the past few weeks (let alone the last two years, remember Charlottesville? I do!) will never leave my memory.<br />
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So, to my family member that is craving, albeit pleading, for people to look away, I say this: history will not kindly remember you.Johnhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02994349956675503806noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6811583905674476551.post-55556061702298156372017-11-30T00:00:00.000-08:002017-11-30T00:00:04.966-08:00Happy Anniversary<div>
It has been quite the year. From the Women’s March in January, the Resist March in June, to the #MeToo Survivors’ March in November, we continue to drive the conversation of the “resistance” forward and shed light on important issues and movements that have taken over the American zeitgeist since the early stages of 2016 Presidential election until now. While many of the actions to come out of the Trump administration have forced both myself and many others, to grow as both people and activists, there is still one thing that I cannot get over: my non-existent relationship with my Aunt and Uncle (who are also my godparents).</div>
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Much like I promised on that fateful day where we finally had it out, I swore I would never speak to them again until I received an apology. Now, while you may be assuming that the apology I want is a result of their voting for then-candidate Trump, I must say nothing could be further from the truth. Although I do understand that people have lost and ended numerous relationships with family members, friends, partners, or lovers as a result of a person’s private voting booth decision, I am not in that camp. </div>
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Yes, I’m sure I have retweeted or posted stuff that said: “defriend me if you actually voted for this man,” or something of that nature, I can assure you that the feud I am having with my Aunt and my Uncle is not a result of their decision to vote for President Trump (no matter how much it bothers me). The real reason for our fight stems back to an article I shared on Facebook from the South Florida newspaper the <i>Sun Sentinel</i> titled: <span style="text-decoration-line: underline;"><a dataquery="#txtMedia1yv1" href="https://www.blogger.com/null">“Voter anger over Trump’s election goes deeper than Clinton’s loss.”</a></span> The only addition to the long quote that I pulled from the article was: “This pretty much sums up ALL of my feelings regarding friends/family that voter for Trump.” While the fight would soon consume our family, the facts, much like with the 2016 Election, quickly got away from everyone and were itself a parody that even I couldn’t have made up. </div>
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I was walking back into work at my old job at West Hollywood City Hall when I noticed that my Aunt Mary Lou, who, I had spent most of my time with growing up as most of my mother’s other family lived in Florida, commented on the aid Facebook post. Her comment was as follows:</div>
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I want to mention that I had not spoken to or talked with my Aunt and Uncle (whom I know we're always going to vote for Trump) about the election. I knew we did not see eye-to-eye on it and it would only cause discord. For those of you that know you, know that this almost seems like an anomaly. I am not one to hold back and I have no problem telling people how I feel. However, when it came to my Aunt and Uncle, it wasn’t worth the strife that would come up as a result of me commenting on her posts on her Facebook page (most of which were made up of fake news stories that Russians used to target vulnerable people in swing states like Wisconsin but I digress). I even would tell my sisters, who are much better people than I could ever hope to be, that she has a right to say whatever she wants on her own personal Facebook page and not to worry as I was almost positive, much like everyone else, that Hillary Clinton would win. </div>
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While I do not intend to rehash the devastation the 2016 election had and continues to have over myself (<span style="text-decoration-line: underline;"><a dataquery="#txtMedia8td" href="https://www.blogger.com/null">you can more about that here</a></span>), all I will say is that I continued to not engage with her or her posts because I was hurting. However, it was in that moment when I got the notification that she had commented on the article I shared that all bets were off.</div>
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What followed was a long, drawn-out, nasty fight online (where most fights seem to occur these days). I will be the first to say that I too am guilty of saying mean things; however, they were a direct result of a comment made by my Aunt’s sister Nancy that I said such things:</div>
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What really made me mad wasn’t that they were attacking me online after I had never said a thing to them (don’t get me wrong, this hurt) but the sheer fact that they were equating my sharing the article as me critiquing them on who they voted for. </div>
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I want to be really clear: I never told them who to vote for because I never spoke to them until after the election. I agree with Nancy that as an American citizen she has the freedom to vote for whomever she wants. To make matters worse, my Aunt, and subsequently her sister, much like the fake news that is now part of our daily vernacular, thought that the article that I shared was actually written by me. They were too busy to actually read the article and see that, although I wish I had written it, was a letter to the editor of the Sun Sentinel. </div>
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Now, do not get me wrong, I clapped back to Nancy’s comment. It has since been edited as a result of constant pleas from family members to not make private family business public but I refuse to take down the post or the subsequent comments down. While I thought the post was old news after a few days of no activity, it wasn’t until I was walking around Disneyland, you know, the “happiest place on the planet,” and felt my phone buzzing. Aunt Mary Lou had commented:</div>
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Although I won’t go further into the details of the back-and-forth, all of this sums down to the fact that I no longer speak to my Aunt (and subsequently my Uncle) because I was attacked, online by both her and her sister. Don’t get me wrong; I’m not happy they voted for Trump. However, what makes them different from my other family members that also voted for Trump is, they did not attack me on my personal Facebook page. </div>
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I’m mad. I’m upset. I’m still very hurt. I’m not happy that two people that watched me grow up, supported me, and loved me choose to go this route. However, I am, if anything, a man of my word. When I said, that I would never, ever, speak to them again until I got an apology, I meant it; and I’m still waiting. </div>
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I was recently asked: why don’t you just give up? My answer: because I still believe in them. I still know, that although they voted for the vilest human being, I still love them and hope that one day they will see the light. This past election has destroyed so much, but I refuse to let it destroy the one thing about me that I believe in the most: love. I will continue to “do all the good I can, for all the people I can, in all the ways I can, as long as ever I can” no matter what.</div>
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It’s their move, and it begins with I’m and ends with sorry. </div>
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*<i>This post was originally published on the <a href="http://www.engagedgaze.com/" target="_blank">Engaged Gaze</a></i></div>
Johnhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02994349956675503806noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6811583905674476551.post-62852719399732420612017-06-27T00:00:00.000-07:002017-06-27T00:00:00.213-07:00PrideIf you’re anything like me you not only hate opening up your Twitter feed each morning but also feel compelled to in order to make sure you didn’t miss whatever new atrocity to come out of 1600 Pennsylvania Ave. After the Women’s March, I felt charged. I felt that whatever this administration threw at the proverbial “us,” I knew we could and would overcome it. Although that charge kept me going for a few months, there came a time where I just couldn’t go on anymore and that I was completely drained; then walked in a man named Brian Pendleton.<br />
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After the Women’s March on January 21, I didn’t know what to expect. The event was truly so successful that many of the organizers and coordinators were on an activist high as a result of what was a truly magical and divine moment. A few months came and went and the 45<sup>th</sup> President of the United States continued (much to our surprise) to be as awful as we all knew and expected. However, while I am able to exist in a world, no matter how oppressive, as a cisgendered white male and the full on privilege and power that comes along with that territory, many of the individuals and communities being attacked did not have those same freedoms; and like with the Women’s March and how that all took shape, in walked Brian Pendleton to my life to talk to me about the #ResistMarch.<br />
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Although my involvement during the 120 days or more that led up to the #ResistMarch happened in a flash, one thing is for certain: miracles exist not because of divine intervention but because G-d places people on this Earth to make positive impacts. The beauty of the #ResistMarch was not just the passion of the organizers but the beauty of the rainbow that came out in full force on June 11.<br />
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The strength shown by our community was one that, for all intensive purposes, proves that love does conquer all. RuPaul couldn’t have expressed the common and conquering theme better than when he said: <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6OPbX7mRuxA">“It’s all about love; giving love and being able to receive love. That’s our secret weapon; that’s the one thing they don’t have: our love and our music. That is our activism. That is what we use and what we always use to fight the ugliness.”</a><br />
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That is the one experience that I took most out of the #ResistMarch: the power of love and friendship; the beauty in the unexpected conversation that leads to changing the world, again. Thank you, Brian. Thank you, for bringing us all together to resist, recharge, and love.<br />
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When we come together, we are the Divine. I didn't think I could experience that twice in one year; clearly, I was wrong.<br />
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Johnhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02994349956675503806noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6811583905674476551.post-49455656092298536242017-02-14T00:00:00.000-08:002017-02-14T00:00:28.336-08:00Welcome to the Resistance <div style="font-family: Merriweather, Georgia, "Times New Roman", Times, serif; font-size: 15px; margin-bottom: 24px;">
There comes a time in everyone’s life when you have to make important decisions. What do I believe in? Who do I want to be? What and who will I stand up for? There has been a lot going on in the world lately and a lot of it, sadly, is pretty awful. While people are learning pretty quickly that elections have very real and long-lasting consequences, what is critical to overcome the next 4-years of this fascist regime isn’t just that we are taking to the streets to make our voices heard but we are willing to disrupt society at every turn to make sure that people on the other side of the proverbial political coin know we will not go gently into that good night.</div>
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I’ve been questioning G-d a lot lately; wondering what has happened to that shining “City on a hill” that John Winthrop called for in his 1630 sermon “A Model of Christian Charity.” The idea that the United States of America is “G-d’s country” due to the American exceptionalism present but not only the rich bounty of land and resources many would soon land upon but also the potentiality that America represented in a world full of monarchs.</div>
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Many Presidents have often recited the very same idea to the American populous. From John F. Kennedy to Ronald Reagan, America, although diverse and full of various communities from all walks of life, always presented a rich idea that we would be a beacon for prosperity, freedom, and dreamers. For myself (and many others I’m sure), that idea was called into question on November 8, 2016. We had come so far in the struggle for and the potential achievement of the “American Experiment” to fall before we got to the top and, as we have all felt since then, hit every jagged rock on our journey back down to the bottom. However, what we need to remember is that we’re not anywhere close to the bottom yet; all the symbolic bruises and scars we each have will only continue to grow as we keep tumbling down the rabbit hole.</div>
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Although the hits keep coming I refuse to let them get me down. I refuse to sit back and watch the country and communities I love be attacked by a tyrant and his cronies looking to cash in on people’s lives.</div>
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On January 21, 2017, I saw the resistance rise. For me, the Women’s March was more than just 750,000 people from all walks of life taking part in a communal action across the world, it was an accumulation of what is not only possible but also the hope and dream of what is still to come.</div>
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What a lot of people do not know is that while I too, was a part of the crowd, I was also behind the scenes working on the march here in Los Angeles. I was fortunate enough to be 1 of the 13 co-organizers of the march which consisted of a group of women I now call my heroes. Although I do not think that I’ll ever be able to put into words what the march or being part of its organization means to me, the one thing I do know for sure, now, more than ever, is that we are always stronger together.</div>
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At the march, we went from “I” to “We.” We became part of something that we will never be able to understand. If that isn’t G-d, I do not know what else it would be. While November 8 had me questioning my faith, January 21 brought it back full force.</div>
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The night before the march, I was with three of my closest friends. We laughed, we cried, we shared in the love that we have for this country and most importantly, the love we have for each other. Falling asleep that night, the following quote kept me awake at night and I didn’t understand why until I got home after the march. The quote is:</div>
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The Devil whispered in my ear,<br />“You’re not strong enough to withstand the storm.”<br />Today I whispered in the Devil’s ear,<br />“I am the storm.”</div>
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While I believe the quote is perfect as it is, the only thing that I’d change is that on January 21, “I” didn’t just whisper in the Devil’s ear, “We” did.</div>
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Welcome to the resistance, my friends. The march happened. We all went home changed and more awake than ever before. Now, the only remaining question I have for you is: what’s next?</div>
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<img alt="john-womens-march" class=" wp-image-30458 aligncenter" data-mce-src="https://feminismandreligion.files.wordpress.com/2017/02/john-womens-march.jpg" height="293" src="https://feminismandreligion.files.wordpress.com/2017/02/john-womens-march.jpg" style="display: block; height: auto; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; max-width: 100%;" width="293" /></div>
<div style="font-family: Merriweather, Georgia, "Times New Roman", Times, serif; font-size: 15px; margin-bottom: 24px;">
<em>John is a</em> Ph.D<em>. Candidate in American Religious History at Claremont Graduate University and holds an MA in Women’s Studies in Religion; an MA in Applied Women’s Studies; and a BA in English and Women’s Studies. His areas of focus are women’s, gender, and sexuality studies, LGBT history, American religious history, and 20th and 19th-century American women’s history. John is currently the Community Events Technician for the City of West Hollywood where he works on community events related to women, gender, sexuality, and human rights issues. </em></div>
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Johnhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02994349956675503806noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6811583905674476551.post-68575598001515390032016-12-27T00:00:00.000-08:002016-12-27T00:00:01.105-08:00A Letter to those I’ve Lost <div style="color: #3d596d; font-family: Merriweather, Georgia, "Times New Roman", Times, serif; font-size: 15px; margin-bottom: 24px;">
Dear [Insert Name Here],</div>
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Something died on November 8, 2016, and I do not think I’ll ever be able to get it back. I sat there, walking back to my house, in disbelief and utter shock and scared for the next 4-years of my life.</div>
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For weeks leading up to the election, I had found myself praying in the copy room at my work almost daily. I would sit there, silent and alone, having just read some misleading article or alt-right post from a family member that called Hillary Clinton the devil, and wonder: when did everything go so off the rails?</div>
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Although we’ll spend years trying to figure the answer to my above question out, for me, it is a question I have been asking myself ever since election night and specifically knowing how certain members of my family would, and ultimately did, vote. </div>
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I’ve always known that I had Republican family members (don’t we all?). However, what made this so troubling is that the election of Donald Trump was not just a normal Republican that they were voting for. This was the election of a man who would not only go after my rights as a citizen but also the rights of my female family members, friends, and a large-majority of people in my life that have always and were certain to become the main targets for further bigotry, hatred, and violence. I thought, at least for a second, that when they entered the voting booth, this would be in the back of their mind. They’d sit there, before selecting their nominee, and think about how Donald Trump would ultimately hurt a member of their family, directly and indirectly; boy, was I wrong.</div>
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I expressed my concern to my sisters; having told them I was deeply troubled by certain members of my family having voted for Donald Trump having known and supported me as an openly gay man my whole life. How could someone that proclaims to love me, vote for a Presidential ticket where the Vice-President had advocated for electrocution of LGBT people to “correct” them and cure their homosexuality?</div>
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From that simple conversation, life in my family only got more complicated and much more contentious. If you know me, I’m not one to not directly engage with those that disagree with me. However, in this case, I never directly engaged any of my Republican family members out of the respect and sheer ability to see what would (and did) happen if I did. The situation only seemed to get worse. I shared an op-ed that I did not write stating that it “pretty much summed up how I felt about family and friends that voted for Trump.” The article stated that although I respect your choice to vote for whoever you wish, if you think for a second that I’ll forget that you voted for a racist, sexist, homophobic, xenophobic demagogue hell-bent on destroying the very fabric of America, then you have another thing coming. Upon sharing this article, my Republican family members confirmed that “we will not be coming together ever again” while members of their extended family proceeded to also viciously attack me.</div>
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In the sense of full disclosure, I did fight back and engage with these family and extended family members in a not so cordial way after their bombardment of attacks made it almost impossible for me not to while also casting doubt if I could ever look them in the eyes, let alone ever speak/see them, again. Having fully known what was occurring, I demand and still to this day await an apology for my family members attacking me without provocation. I refuse to speak or see them ever again until they own up to attacking me for my political beliefs, something that I never did to them.</div>
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The worst part of this election is that it has completely destroyed my wiliness to further engage with “those people.” I no longer care to make it a top priority of mine to reach out beyond the proverbial political aisle to hear about what they have to say; especially after they shared fake news articles about <a data-mce-href="http://www.cbsnews.com/news/police-man-with-assault-rifle-dc-comet-pizza-victim-of-fake-sex-trafficking-story/" href="http://www.cbsnews.com/news/police-man-with-assault-rifle-dc-comet-pizza-victim-of-fake-sex-trafficking-story/" style="color: #00aadc;" target="_blank">Hillary Clinton running a child sex-trafficking ring out of a pizza place</a> or the countless other horribly vicious things they said. </div>
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Maybe, our country is doomed after all. Maybe, our country deserves a ruthless dictator who will lie, cheat, and steal his way into the White House and destroy the very lives of those people that ended up putting him there in the process. Maybe, this is the type of President my Republican family members, who all benefit from the Social Security and Medicare programs likely to be on the chopping block in the next 4-years, deserve.</div>
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Out of all of these things, the one thing that has kept coming to my mind is G-d. What is he (or she) thinking? I feel like I’m back in one of my Old Testament classes discussing the harsh and cruel G-d that thrust so many horrible things onto their believers. Maybe, the worst part about the election isn’t Donald Trump, but it is the realization that G-d may be dead after all.</div>
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<span style="background-color: white; font-family: Merriweather, Georgia, "Times New Roman", Times, serif;">Whatever happens, the only thing that I know for sure is that I will never stop fighting. I will never stop fighting the bigotry, the hatred, and lies, the slander, and most importantly the fear that is going to be washing over the communities I care most about throughout these next four (and G-d forbid) or eight years of a Trump Presidency. I will never forget the lies and attacks thrust upon me by family members that I once took pleasure seeing and interacting with. I will never forget the hatred you endorsed with your vote and I will make sure that countless others like myself hold their family members that voted in similar fashions accountable as well.</span></div>
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I vow to never stop fighting and believing that we are stronger together both now and more so in the future. I vow to do all the good I can, for all the people I can, in all the ways I can, as long as I can.</div>
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Sincerely,<br />
John Erickson<br />
#AlwaysWithHer</div>
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<em>John is a</em> Ph.D<em>. Candidate in American Religious History at Claremont Graduate University and holds an MA in Women’s Studies in Religion; an MA in Applied Women’s Studies; and a BA in English and Women’s Studies. His areas of focus are women's, gender, and sexuality studies, LGBT history, American religious history, and 20th and 19th-century American women's history. John is currently the Community Events Technician for the City of West Hollywood where he works on community events related to women, gender, sexuality, and human rights issues. He is, and will not be over, the outcome of the 2016 Presidential election for a very long time. </em></div>
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Johnhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02994349956675503806noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6811583905674476551.post-19419043130559729332016-09-27T00:00:00.000-07:002016-09-27T00:00:18.953-07:00The End is Nigh<div style="color: #3d596d; font-family: Merriweather, Georgia, "Times New Roman", Times, serif; font-size: 15px; margin-bottom: 24px;">
When I was a little boy I was terrified that I would live to experience the end of the world. Whether it was by an asteroid, Y2K, or a zombie plague, I would make myself sick by picturing these horrible things that could befall me and my family. Although I was a precocious child, the crippling fear that would lurch its way up my stomach and into my head would sometimes make it impossible to sleep at night. While I like to think I grew out of that phase, I now sit here feeling that way again. I’m crippled with fear that the end of the world is at hand and there may be nothing we can do to stop it. How will the world end? No, it isn’t Lucifer himself coming from hell to bring in the end times, it is someone far worse, and his name is Donald Trump.</div>
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By the time you’re reading this post, the first Presidential debate between Hillary Clinton and Donald Trump will have occurred and, no matter where you look, the aftermath will haunt us for weeks to come. We will either be sitting here, coaxing in the sunlight that Clinton has, in proper fashion, just goaded Trump into revealing to the 100 or so million viewers that will have chimed in to viewing how completely dangerous he truly is, or will we be scurrying to uncover decade old bunkers that were used during the 1950s and the Cold War to take shelter from the fallout to come should, Donald Trump become the next President of the United States.</div>
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However, as I sit here and write this, I wonder what levels of prognosticating can I accurately do? I predict Trump will make sexist remarks, act totally unhinged when fact-checked by either Clinton or the (Republican) moderator Lester Holt and, most likely, use the phrase “believe me” more than a Second Great Awakening circuit preacher. Or, will he be muzzled, refrained, and attempt to, in his own particular fashion, act Presidential. To be honest, I do not know which version of Trump scares me more; the unhinged or the hinged Trump.</div>
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I’ve written about Clinton on this blog <a data-mce-href="https://feminismandreligion.wordpress.com/2016/03/22/hillyes/?iframe=true&theme_preview=true" href="https://feminismandreligion.wordpress.com/2016/03/22/hillyes/?iframe=true&theme_preview=true" style="color: #00aadc;" target="_blank">before</a>, during her primary battle with Senator Bernie Sanders. I have never seen so many comments, masked with faint hints at sexism, coming from people that I not only respect but also thought would see the ultimate test that she (or Bernie) would have to face: Donald Trump. Comment after comment called into question many of her policies that, should she had been born a man, would have made her qualified, tough or a skilled General not afraid to make the difficult decisions. </div>
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Having read her book, <em>Hard Choices</em>, I can honestly say that I do not think I have ever studied or investigated a candidate that was more qualified to serve as President; and when the current President <a data-mce-href="http://www.aljazeera.com/news/2016/07/obama-clinton-qualified-president-160727233030311.html" href="http://www.aljazeera.com/news/2016/07/obama-clinton-qualified-president-160727233030311.html" style="color: #00aadc;" target="_blank">backs that up</a>, you have to begin to question what your real motives are for not voting for Clinton, and potentially giving your vote (which equates an endorsement) to a third party candidate or worse, simply not voting at all. Countless times I have had to discuss that this election, although it really comes down to good versus evil, is the most important election that you or myself will vote in (yes, I know, some of you reading this see no difference between Trump and Clinton) for the next twenty or so years. Ask yourself: do you really know what you’ll be losing if Trump is elected? </div>
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For me, this all boils down to one thing: my nieces and nephews. I worry about them constantly. I worry about what they watch on TV, what they’ll read for the next 8 years, or whom they will look up to or what horrible things bullies may one day say to them. While I was home in Wisconsin this past weekend, I sat down to have a quick bite to eat at one of my favorite establishments. I opened my book and began reading to only overhear a man and a woman talking about Clinton and Trump and how they were completely torn. I turned around, apologized for intruding into their conversation and began to speak to them about why they felt they couldn’t vote for Clinton and what it was about Trump that put them on the edge as well. Their answers were about character and what they really wanted their grandchildren to go up experiencing. I quickly went over the list of the things Trump had said not only about women but also about people with disabilities and, people in general and asked: Is that the person you want your grandchildren growing up and seeing as the President? A man that calls women bimbos, mocks a person with a disability in front of thousands of people, and frequently calls for violence against non-white individuals? I shared with them that, for me, it was about my two nieces (and my two nephews) but more so my nieces, growing up during their formative years and seeing a woman holding the highest office in the land. Yes, she isn’t just any woman but, a woman in my opinion who is more qualified that anyone ever to hold the office of the Presidency. This race is about the future that they grow up in and one where I hope people will begin to more readily recognize the inherent sexism, racism, homophobia, etc. rather than encourage it from the oval office. </div>
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Before you cast your vote, please make sure you think about the future; please make sure you think about the boys and girls that will grow up in a world with President Trump versus President Clinton. Think about that little boy, petrified, standing here now as a grown man worried about the end of the world not because his candidate could lose, but because the person that could win, has a very good chance and ushering in the end times as we know it and ending any type of progress that has occurred in the past 8-years. </div>
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Whatever you do, make sure you vote. Make sure you sit there and think not only about yourself but also the U.S. Supreme Court, women’s rights, LGBT rights, communities of color, education, or the countless other topics that will be greatly impacted by the outcome of the November 8<sup>th</sup> election. If you do anything, think about the world we have now and the world you want to be in 4 to 8 years from now and ask yourself: is a protest or no vote really worth the bleak world we may get as a result of it?</div>
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If you’re on the fence, please reach out to me; let me know what your issues are and we can speak about it in the hopes of coming to an understanding of what the future could hold for all of us. I can be reached via email at - <a data-mce-href="mailto:ericksonjohn1985@gmail.com" href="mailto:ericksonjohn1985@gmail.com" style="color: #00aadc;">ericksonjohn1985@gmail.com</a> or on Twitter <a data-mce-href="http://www.twitter.com/jerickson85" href="http://www.twitter.com/jerickson85" style="color: #00aadc;" target="_blank">@JErickson85</a>.</div>
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No matter what you do, make sure you vote on November 8. It will be the most important thing you do not only on that day but also for years to come. </div>
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<em>John Erickson is a Ph.D. Candidate in American Religious History at Claremont Graduate University. He holds an MA in Women’s Studies in Religion; an MA in Applied Women’s Studies; and a BA in Women’s Literature and Women’s Studies. He is a Permanent Contributor to the blog Feminism and Religion, a Non-Fiction Reviewer for Lambda Literary, the leader in LGBT reviews, author interviews, opinions and news since 1989 and the Co-Chair of the Queer Studies in Religion section of the American Academy of Religion's Western Region, the only regional section of the American Academy of Religion that is dedicated to the exploration of queer studies in religion and other relevant fields in the nation. He is currently the President of the University of Wisconsin Oshkosh's LGBTQA+ Alumni Association, the Vice- Chair of Public Relation and Social Media for the Stonewall Democratic Club, and the Non-Profit and Governmental Liaison for the Hollywood Chapter of NOW (National Organization for Women). When he is not working on his dissertation, he can be found at West Hollywood City Hall where he is the Community Events Technician and works on policies and special events relating to women, gender, sexuality, and human rights issues that are sponsored or co-sponsored by the City of West Hollywood. He is the author of the blog From Wisconsin, with Love and can be followed on Twitter@JErickson85</em></div>
Johnhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02994349956675503806noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6811583905674476551.post-30688453424570184322016-06-28T00:00:00.000-07:002016-06-28T00:00:20.730-07:00I'm Failing<div style="color: #333333; font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", "Bitstream Charter", Times, serif; font-size: 16px; line-height: 24px;">
“How is your dissertation going?”</div>
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Never before has a simple question packed such a punch. Five little words strike fear into my heart as I remember I have a countless number of things to do before I get that title after my name: Ph.D.</div>
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There are so many reasons as to why I feel like I’m failing at my dissertation and school, something I used to love. The first reason is I never have any time to write. Yes, I find time to write on sites such as Feminism and Religion and others when I should be writing my dissertation but they each serve a different purpose; mainly, this site acts as salvation to my long wrought out mingling with my source materials to where my dissertation acts as a catalyst for the growing number of gray hairs I seem to have.</div>
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Two, although I can picture the text in my head and see where I need to go in the sequence of my yet-to-be-written prose, the daunting and oftentimes perilous act of sitting down and writing has been keeping me from putting figurative pen to actual paper (or fingers to keyboard).</div>
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Three, I’m way too involved. I’ve always prided myself with being able to “do it all,” but maybe the thing I’ve needed to realize these last few months is that one person cannot do it all. Being imperfect is a strength I’ve yet to fully embrace because as a gay person growing up in a small town, I taught myself that I needed to be perfect after everything so I could deflect any type of bigotry or hatred that would come my way and this is a crutch I still carry with me as I no longer run, but limp, towards the ultimate finish line.</div>
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Four, what’s the point? With the dwindling job market and tightening of the university purse strings, why I am running towards graduation if there is nothing to graduate into? Do I really want to leave my current job, where I get to do so much, for the current state of the university system? Sure, it’s great to finish but if there is nothing there at the finish line, why am I figuratively running so hard to get there?</div>
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Five, I’m being stupid. Sure, I know I could just sit down and write my dissertation. I could scratch the surface of my topic without fully investing any more than “what is needed” but that is not how I operate and even though I’ve known many people who have done such things (can you blame them? I mean, the system beats you down), I care about my topic and more importantly, the people that shared things with me they’ve never told anyone.</div>
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So, here I sit, writing this post and yet reliving all of these failing over again. I need to make a change and I need to stop focusing on failing and start focusing on (Trump trigger warning) winning again. I need to rediscover my passion for my research, sit down and outline where I need to go and finally start writing knowing that I will get there. Yes, it may have taken me 6-months extra but in the end, all that matters is that I did get there, and I got there on my own terms.</div>
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Here is my promise not only to myself but also to all of you: I will finish my Ph.D., and finish it soon. I’m going to start prioritizing my schoolwork and start making more tangible steps towards the finish line so I no longer feel like I’m failing but instead, accomplishing my dream of achieving my Ph.D. in American Religious History. It was fun being ABD and making excuses as to why I wasn’t writing that much and working on my dissertation every day but no more.</div>
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For once, I’m starting to feel like me again, and it feels great!</div>
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<em>This blog is dedicated to all that have participated in this struggle, both in the past, present, and future!</em></div>
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<em><strong>J</strong></em></div>
Johnhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02994349956675503806noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6811583905674476551.post-57786765351311724712016-06-13T22:27:00.000-07:002016-06-14T12:25:26.010-07:00Remember<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: left;">
<span style="color: #333333; font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif; line-height: 18pt;">I want to tell you a short story about the small town of Ripon, WI. On May 19, the local newspaper,</span><span class="apple-converted-space" style="color: #333333; font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif; line-height: 18pt;"> </span><em style="color: #333333; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; line-height: 18pt;">The Ripon Commonwealth</em><span style="color: #333333; font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif; line-height: 18pt;">, which has served as the town’s paper since 1864, published a</span><span class="apple-converted-space" style="color: #333333; font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif; line-height: 18pt;"> </span><a data-mce-href="http://www.riponpress.com/Content/Views/Editorials/Article/Editorial-Bathroom-decree-puts-local-control-in-toilet-/11/44/9977" href="http://www.riponpress.com/Content/Views/Editorials/Article/Editorial-Bathroom-decree-puts-local-control-in-toilet-/11/44/9977" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; line-height: 18pt;">story</a><span class="apple-converted-space" style="color: #333333; font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif; line-height: 18pt;"> </span><span style="color: #333333; font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif; line-height: 18pt;">regarding the political right’s uproar of President Barack Obama’s executive order that all public schools must allow transgender individuals to use the bathroom which matches that of their gender identity. Angry and upset, the paper’s education reporter wrote an article expressing his clear disdain for not only the President but also a clear lack of empathy, understanding and sheer bigotry towards the transgender community.</span></div>
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<span style="color: #333333;"><span style="font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">Growing up in Ripon, I always read the paper when it came out on Wednesday evenings. Those of you, who grew up in a small town, can attest to the luxury of seeing friends, family members, and even the smallest ongoings in one’s town in print for the entire town to see and talk about. However, one thing I never saw in the paper was the clear hate I read upon finishing Mr. Becker’s (the author of said piece) article. Enraged, I immediately asked myself: what can I do? Having connections back in Wisconsin, I immediately turned to friends who owned businesses, a friend who is the Director of a vocal and important group in the town, and community organizations and friends to begin to write letters.<o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
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<span style="background-color: white; color: #333333; font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", "Bitstream Charter", Times, serif; font-size: 16px;">After the threat of a boycott of the paper by local businesses, both LGBT and not, which could become very real and financially damaging for a local paper which relies heavily on ad revenue, the publisher of the paper, whom I’ve always respected, met with a local business owner and friend of mine. During this meeting, they had an educational and empowering conversation regarding the multitude of issues and life threatening challenges that transgender individuals face (as well as gay, bisexual, lesbian, and queer people) and the publisher of the paper agreed that the article was wrong and that there would be an in-person interview with my friend about the importance of education regarding transgender issues. The follow-up </span><a data-mce-href="http://www.riponpress.com/Content/Views/Editorials/Article/Editorial-Accept-another-human-being-on-their-terms-/11/44/10045" href="http://www.riponpress.com/Content/Views/Editorials/Article/Editorial-Accept-another-human-being-on-their-terms-/11/44/10045" style="background-color: white; font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", "Bitstream Charter", Times, serif; font-size: 16px;">article</a><span style="background-color: white; color: #333333; font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", "Bitstream Charter", Times, serif; font-size: 16px;"> was published a few weeks later in the paper. Needless to say, it was wonderful to see not only the submissions from local townspeople to the “Letters to the Editor” section calling the original article what it was - bigotry - but more importantly, the empowering responses from the local community that proved Ripon would not let this type of hatred and intolerance go unanswered.</span></div>
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<span style="color: #333333;"><span style="font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">We had won! It was a small victory, but the ability to have a full spread article talking about the importance of not only transgender but also LGBQIA rights was a significant step for those who still are in the proverbial closet and for those that are out and proud.<o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
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<span style="color: #333333;"><span style="font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">However, then Orlando happened…<o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
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<span style="color: #333333;"><span style="font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">I’ve been thinking about the story regarding the anti-transgender piece in my local newspaper a lot since Saturday when at least 50 people were killed and another 53 individuals were critically injured after a gunmen opened fire at Pulse, a local gay club in Orlando, FL. I’ve tried to cry, I’ve tried to get mad, I’ve tried to pray, I’ve tried to mourn the fact that we lost so many people on Saturday because of one individual’s hatred both of himself and those that he never could bring himself to understand or accept.<o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
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<span style="color: #333333;"><span style="font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">While out walking, I asked myself: I wonder what how this level of hate was created in him that made him believe that he was right to hate the people who were dancing in Pulse on Saturday night? Was it a religious text? Was it something online? Or, was it an article in a paper that made him feel correct and righteous in his discontent for the LGBT community that he felt justified taking an AR-15 into a club and leaving a wake of destruction in his path? That’s how hate begins: with people seeing hate in the world and thinking it’s ok to hate people that are not like them, or, having one’s hate validated by the pundits, letters to the editor, political and religious demagogues, and other figures that symbolize it’s ok to hate.<o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
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<span style="color: #333333;"><span style="font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">If you do anything in the wake of Orlando, make sure that every time you smile, every time you laugh, and every time you cry, you remember the names of those that we lost. Remember their ages, their stories, and their smiles. Remember the loss, because we’re going to need it for the tomorrows to come and for those that need our protection the most: the next generation.<o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
<div style="-webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; line-height: 18.0pt; orphans: auto; text-align: start; widows: 1; word-spacing: 0px;">
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<span style="color: #333333;"><span style="font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">Remember, we are Orlando; now, tomorrow, and always.<o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
<div style="-webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; line-height: 18.0pt; orphans: auto; text-align: start; widows: 1; word-spacing: 0px;">
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<span style="font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;"><em><span style="color: #333333;">Dedicated to: Edward Sotomayor Jr., 34 years old; Stanley Almodovar III, 23 years old; Luis Omar Ocasio-Capo, 20 years old; Juan Ramon Guerrero, 22 years old; Eric Ivan Ortiz-Rivera, 36 years old; Peter O. Gonzalez-Cruz, 22 years old; Luis S. Vielma, 22 years old; Kimberly Morris, 37 years old; Eddie Jamoldroy Justice, 30 years old; Darryl Roman Burt II, 29 years old; Deonka Deidra Drayton, 32 years old; Alejandro Barrios Martinez, 21 years old; Anthony Luis Laureanodisla, 25 years old; Jean Carlos Mendez Perez, 35 years old; Franky Jimmy Dejesus Velazquez, 50 years old; Amanda Alvear, 25 years old; Martin</span></em><span class="apple-converted-space"><i><span style="color: #333333;"> </span></i></span><span style="color: #333333;">Benitez Torres<em></em><em>, 33 years old; Luis Daniel Wilson-Leon, 37 years old; Mercedez Marisol Flores, 26 years old; Xavier Emmanuel Serrano Rosado, 35 years old; Gilberto Ramon Silva Menendez, 25 years old; Simon Adrian Carrillo Fernandez, 31 years old; Oscar A Aracena-Montero, 26 years old; Enrique L. Rios, Jr., 25 years old; Miguel Angel Honorato, 30 years old; Javier Jorge-Reyes, 40 years old; Joel Rayon Paniagua, 32 years old; Jason Benjamin Josaphat, 19 years old; Cory James Connell, 21 years old; Juan P.</em></span><span class="apple-converted-space"><i> </i></span>Rivera Velazquez<em></em><em>, 37 years old; Luis Daniel Conde, 39 years old; Shane Evan Tomlinson, 33 years old; Juan Chevez-Martinez, 25 years old; Jerald Arthur Wright, 31 years old; Leroy Valentin Fernandez, 25 years old; Tevin Eugene Crosby, 25 years old; Jonathan Antonio Camuy Vega, 24 years old; Jean C. Nives Rodriguez, 27 years old; Rodolfo Ayala-Ayala, 33 years old; Brenda Lee Marquez McCool, 49 years old;</em><span class="apple-converted-space"><i> </i></span>Yilmary<em></em><em> Rodriguez Solivan, 24 years old; Christopher Andrew Leinonen, 32 years old; Angel L. Candelario-Padro, 28 years old; Frank Hernandez, 27 years old.</em><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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Johnhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02994349956675503806noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6811583905674476551.post-32540301789149916182016-03-22T00:00:00.000-07:002016-03-22T00:00:17.275-07:00#HillYes<div style="color: #333333; font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', 'Bitstream Charter', Times, serif; font-size: 16px; line-height: 24px;">
I’m going to do something I’d never thought I’d do: fill your newsfeed with yet another article pertaining to the 2016 United States Presidential election and yes, I’m going to talk about former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton (hint: I’m emphatically supporting her and I’m unapologetic about it.)</div>
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Let me start off with my central point: a vote for Hillary is a vote to change history and the world. No, not because she’ll hail in some type of new economic stimulus (although I’m sure she’ll do just fine with our economy #ThanksObama) or because she’ll save us all from the evils of the GOP (looking at you Trump/Cruz/and the <a data-mce-href="http://www.msnbc.com/msnbc/john-kasich-no-moderate" href="http://www.msnbc.com/msnbc/john-kasich-no-moderate">“moderate” </a>Kasich) but because she’ll do one thing that’s never been done before: become the first female President of the United States, <em>ever.</em></div>
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While I have tried not to get into “it” (read: online trysts with my friends on social networks who are #FeelingtheBern) the question I beg to ask is: what’s so wrong with wanting the right woman to be the President? This is one, but not my only reason, I will cast my vote for her both in the Democratic Primary in California in June as well as in November (and, if you haven’t guessed, I do not believe or promulgate the reasoning or rhetoric that Bernie Sanders will come from behind and win the Democratic Party’s nomination because I passed 5th grade level Math.)</div>
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Although my support for Hillary has never waivered <a data-mce-href="http://www.twitter.com/jerickson85" href="http://www.twitter.com/jerickson85" target="_blank">(check my Twitter feed) </a>I do have to say that if my support for her was ever in question, it was solidified last week on what pundits were calling “Super Super Tuesday” not because she won all five primary states in question: Florida, Ohio, Illinois, North Carolina and Missouri but because I was there, with my friend, mentor and academic mother: <a data-mce-href="http://feminismandreligion.com/author/ezmerelda27/" href="http://feminismandreligion.com/author/ezmerelda27/" target="_blank">Marie Cartier</a> and as we watched the results pour in, she began to cry not because she too, like myself, is an ardent Hillary supporter but because of these few words: “Finally, for once, it seems like it’s possible that a woman can be President.”</div>
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I’m not a religious man; I’ve often written about my struggle with religion but I’ve never doubted my spirituality and/or faith in signs. To me, that moment was a sign that I was in the right place, at the right time and experiencing something I’ll never forget. G-d may or may not exist (FYI - if G-d does exist, G-d is most certainly female); what does exist is my faith in other people who have lived lives, seen and lived through experiences I haven’t or could never even image, and in those special moments learning from the emotions and passions they’re exhibiting and passing onto me.</div>
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As a gay, white, privileged, cisgendered man, being President is always something that I could possibly aspire too. However, being a woman, getting the right to even vote only 96 years ago, as well as having major disparagements and vilifications facing you not because you’re not qualified but solely based on your gender, being President is something that not only could and did seem impossible but also was and still is, even though we live in the “greatest country in the world.”</div>
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I agree with Dr. Tiller’s famous statement: “Trust women.” It’s always been my motto and more importantly, I believe and trust in Hillary Clinton not because she’s just a woman but because her qualifications and record will make me proud when my nieces look at their iPhones or televisions or read in history books that we had a female President while they were growing up.</div>
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I think the biggest reason I want Hillary for President is because she makes me believe that there are higher purposes, greater hopes, and even a hints of possibilities that this country, while embroiled in rallies, fear-mongering, and hatred on the other side of the political aisle, has the possibility to ride through this storm of insanity and come outside on the other end better, stronger, and changed for the better.</div>
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So, when I’m asked why I support Hillary for President, my response isn’t her litany of qualifications or the recounting of her esteemed career, but rather the explanation of that feeling I got while holding my friend Marie’s hand and toasting not to Hillary’s wins but to the possibility that I will be alive when history is written and our country changes for the better; while some may call that feeling, a moment of grace, or being in the right place at the right time, I simply now refer to it as the moment I felt as if I experienced the some aspect of the divine.</div>
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So #HillYes? You betcha.</div>
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<em>John Erickson is a Ph.D. Candidate in American Religious History at Claremont Graduate University. He holds an MA in Women’s Studies in Religion; an MA in Applied Women’s Studies; and a BA in Women’s Literature and Women’s Studies. He is a Permanent Contributor to the blog Feminism and Religion, a Non-Fiction Reviewer for Lambda Literary, the leader in LGBT reviews, author interviews, opinions and news since 1989 and the Co-Chair of the Queer Studies in Religion section of the American Academy of Religion's Western Region, the only regional section of the American Academy of Religion that is dedicated to the exploration of queer studies in religion and other relevant fields in the nation. He is currently the President of the University of Wisconsin Oshkosh's LGBTQA+ Alumni Association, the Vice- Chair of Public Relation and Social Media for the Stonewall Democratic Club, and the Non-Profit and Governmental Liaison for the Hollywood Chapter of NOW (National Organization for Women). When he is not working on his dissertation, he can be found at West Hollywood City Hall where he is the Community Events Technician and works on policies and special events relating to women, gender, sexuality, and human rights issues that are sponsored or co-sponsored by the City of West Hollywood. He is the author of the blog From Wisconsin, with Love and can be followed on Twitter@JErickson85</em></div>
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<br />Johnhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02994349956675503806noreply@blogger.comWest Hollywood, CA, USA34.0900091 -118.361744334.063708100000007 -118.4020848 34.1163101 -118.3214038tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6811583905674476551.post-16915807945387599382015-12-22T00:00:00.000-08:002015-12-22T00:00:01.480-08:00Remembering to be Thankful<div style="color: #333333; font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', 'Bitstream Charter', Times, serif; font-size: 16px; line-height: 24px;">
With the holidays just around the corner and the frazzled, crisp ping of anxiety, rush, and panic take over the air around us, it is easy to forget to stop and “smell the roses.” In times where teaching positions continue to shrink and more universities switch to adjunct labor, fees and class costs continue to rise, or just simply life, becomes a little more complicated, due to the nature of balancing life, activism, work, friendships, or relationships, remembering to remind myself to be thankful is another task, I find adding to the never-ending list of stuff I always seem I have to do.</div>
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However, remembering to be thankful, scheduling it into one’s daily schedule are vital to our success as new and emerging faculty or activists or just in general because being thankful reminds us that we have aspects of our lives that are worth being thankful for. Remembering to be thankful proves that we are in some way, connected to a larger sense of life that, at times, grants our wishes, wants, or desires, brings us despair and then allows us to get through it, or even makes us feel alive.</div>
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As I sit back and look at the personal and professional landscape around me I understand that I have a lot to be thankful for both consciously and unconsciously. Most recently at AAR, I participated on a panel in response to Bernadette Barton’s <em><a data-mce-href="http://www.amazon.com/Pray-Gay-Away-Extraordinary-Lives/dp/0814786375" href="http://www.amazon.com/Pray-Gay-Away-Extraordinary-Lives/dp/0814786375" target="_blank">Pray the Gay Away</a></em>. During the course of our panel, the conversation of chosen vs. biological families came up. Most recently, my mentor and panel moderator, Dr. Marie Cartier, talked about it <a data-mce-href="http://feminismandreligion.com/2015/11/27/creating-families-and-traditions-of-choice-and-saving-your-life-by-marie-cartier/" href="http://feminismandreligion.com/2015/11/27/creating-families-and-traditions-of-choice-and-saving-your-life-by-marie-cartier/">here</a> on FAR and the difficulties many of us experienced in regards to our chosen families vs. our biological families. With the holiday season all around us, and regardless of what or if, you celebrate it or not, it is quite hard to get away from it all without realizing <em>who</em> your “family” is and whether or not you’re close or connected with them can be traumatizing during these times where we’re taught or expected to be with them. </div>
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After our discussion on the panel and then at the hotel bar, people discussed the pains and traumas in relation to not having a biological family to go home to during the holidays. Sitting there and listening to the conversations, I realized that, for once in my life, I had nothing to say. </div>
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Much of my Ph.D. work has been discussing and researching the ways that an individual or group’s spirituality can be in conflict with their sexual or gender identities. Not matching what “normative” values their respective religious dogmas present, are tools that have not only ripped multiple families apart throughout the years but also it have created the chosen families that many of us take solace in during times where we’re told to go home.</div>
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That act of be able to go home is a liberating action and there is nothing like it in the world; wherever home is for you, it is the place where your family, whether biological, chosen, or animal, meet you at the social location your most vulnerable and most receptive to the love that home can represent. </div>
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I was able to go ‘home’ each month this fall starting in August and ending this coming December for various reasons. Wisconsin to me still represents a place where both my biological and chosen families live and it is a place I always love to go to. However, I wouldn’t have been able to go home if it weren’t for the security that my job gives me.</div>
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In the act of reminding myself to be thankful, I have to step back and realize that for many of my friends or colleagues, this option is not doable. Many of my colleagues teach at 4 different universities, teach a course load that is beyond abusive to their professional or personal growth, and live off of an income/debt ratio that proves that academia <em>is</em> in for a rude awakening. This is becoming the new normal in academia, students and teachers who are overworked, overrun with debt, or unable to finish or vocalize their own academic/activist interests without selling out once they get those desired tenure jobs that demand their silence for servitude based off of university approved guidelines. Being able to even be thankful seems, from afar, like a paradox. </div>
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Remembering to be thankful may just be a privileged illusion that individuals in positions of power get to write about in the December of each year to self-congratulate themselves about being actually able to <em>be able</em> to be thankful. It may just seem like people who write about being thankful are complaining or pontificating that being thankful is in itself a chore. However, while all this may be true, I wanted to write this blog because I am mad that although I come from a position of privilege, I too wonder, at times, what I need to be thankful for or, more importantly, that other individuals who may or may not have drawn the same metaphorical straw that I did, are forced to live in situations where they are outcast from their religious or family circle because they refuse to be silent anymore about <em>who</em> they really are or that individuals are forced into university servitude just to get by. </div>
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In remembering to be thankful, I realize now, that although I <em>am</em> thankful, I am thankful for more than just my biological or chosen families or my job security, I am thankful that I am able to be mad and that that madness gives me the drive to continue doing that work that needs to be done to create a world where others too, a simple as it sounds, will be able to write posts about remembering to be thankful because everything else has been achieved. </div>
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Remembering to be thankful, remembering to remain fervently queer, and finally remembering the importance of ‘home’ are vital in our overall fight not against ourselves but in the daily struggle we all face in remembering that we do have things to be thankful for, whether chosen or not. </div>
Johnhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02994349956675503806noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6811583905674476551.post-3370695443079712672015-09-22T00:00:00.000-07:002015-09-22T00:00:04.147-07:00#LoveWins<div data-mce-style="text-align: right;" style="background-color: white; color: #333333; font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', 'Bitstream Charter', Times, serif; font-size: 16px; line-height: 24px; text-align: right;">
Don’t urge me to leave you or turn back from you.<br />Where you go, I will go, and where you stay, I will stay.<br />Your people will be my people and your God my God.<br />Where you die, I will die, and there I will be buried.<br />May the God deal with me, be it ever so severely, if even death separates you and me.<br />-<em>Book of Ruth</em> 1:16-17</div>
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On Saturday, September 19, 2015 I married two of my best friends Andr<img alt="unnamed" class="wp-image-20846 alignright" data-mce-src="https://feminismandreligion.files.wordpress.com/2015/09/unnamed.jpg?w=400" height="246" src="https://feminismandreligion.files.wordpress.com/2015/09/unnamed.jpg?w=400" style="float: right; height: auto; margin: 0.5em 0px 0.5em 1em; max-width: 100%;" width="246" />ea and Cindy in holy matrimony in Appleton, WI. Having been ordained since 2009, I truly never thought I'd ever get the chance to use these credentials until they asked me a few months back. Although my answer was an automatic yes, I sought out to make sure that my homily and the imparting words of advice I gave them on their special day was something unique and not always heard at wedding ceremonies. </div>
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When they had their commitment ceremony years ago, they asked me to write a poem and recite it during the ceremony. I subsequently sought out to discover and write about a truth I hold very close to my heart: love. I did the same when I began writing my homily but this time instead of trying to define love like I did with my poem I decided to write a short story about love. </div>
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I'm happy to share it with you here today because at the end of the day, no matter what political pundits are saying on the campaign trail or what new horrible thing is befaling the LGBTQ community, love truly did win on June 26, 2015 and nothing can nor will stop LGBTQ people from committing themselves to each other in legal wedded bliss.</div>
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<strong><span data-mce-style="text-decoration: underline;" style="text-decoration: underline;">A Short Story About Love</span></strong></div>
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<em>Now it is my turn to impart a piece of monumental wisdom upon two individuals that have impacted my life and whom I consider not only friends but also family.</em></div>
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<em>It isn’t everyday two of your best friends ask you to say something at their wedding but then it also isn’t everyday they then also ask you to marry them too. So, true to form and like with all good things that are supposed to have a meaning behind the meaning, I’m going to start with a story of two married fish.</em></div>
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<em>You see, there were once these two married fish swimming along and they happen to meet an older fish swimming the other way. The older fish nods at them and says: “Morning! How’s the water?” And the two married fish swim on for a bit, and then eventually one of them looks over and says to the other: “What the hell is water?”*</em></div>
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<em>A few years back, I wrote a poem about love; like with all poetry and creative forms of expression, it stemmed from a real place, a memory, and feeling. The one problem with that poem though was that I tried to define, pinpoint, and label what love was supposed to be.</em></div>
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<em>We often forget that we don’t live in a vacuum. The real world has a stark and sometimes-cruel way of reminding us of what’s around us and sometimes the world that we thought we knew isn’t the one that we see. However, the one thing that becomes blatantly clear here is the choice we are all given and have to seek out and change the world we see.</em></div>
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<em>As gay people sometimes we’re lucky enough to have a family that is open and accepting and then sometimes we’re not. If the result is the latter, we each then have a choice to seek out and see a world that feels unaccepting and make it into something that is filled with love, laughter, and of course a dance partner that we both choose to love and build a family and life with. </em></div>
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<em>Upon finding your other half, you begin to build a life, create a family, build a home, have children, and a career; perhaps that career changes but you begin to move and mold not only yourself but now also your partner and family that you’ve built as a result and you work on defining what love means to you and your family. You begin to go through the motions each day: waking up, going to work, coming home and doing the countless other tasks that often take up a majority of our time but in the end aren’t really the things in life that end up defining us or the families we've built. </em></div>
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<em>When I asked you two to describe one another Andrea said Cindy is her protector and Cindy said Andrea is the strength that holds their family together. I first met Andrea at the University of Wisconsin Whitewater when she was my assistant hall director and I subsequently met Cindy while she was a police officer for the university. Andrea represented strength from day one, being a Wells West Hall Director will do that you and Cindy, being a police officer, well need I say more about her penchant for protectiveness. As the years went on I saw two individuals who both represented what they saw and wanted in a partner but also two people who became models for the way in which I, and many others, started to define how we wanted to live our lives and therefore define our own versions of love.</em></div>
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<em>That’s the funny thing about love: you never know where you’re going to find it, how you’ll define it, or where it’s going to take you. Love truly is fleeting and at times, as the years go on, it is easy to forget that in your marriage, in the bond you have both here today and for years to come, that you have to remind yourself of the love you felt when you first saw each other through the mass exodus of Whitewater students as they crowded out of the residence hall at 3:00 am thanks to that ever constant fire alarm that rang in the middle of the night. Then ten, twenty, and thirty years down the road when Cal and Cooper are older and out of the house and you two are left, swimming along together again as partners in life and love. </em></div>
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<em>It’s easy to get bogged down; to forget that a marriage is living bond that grows and expands each day as you two grow together. It’s easy to forget that the world we exist in and fashion is full of love and that it is present within the person and family you’ve created around you, even if you forget or become complacent with the world around you. Staying aware of the real value of marriage is the bond of love that you create here today and that it will always surround you and that you will have to remind yourself each day to immerse yourself in it or you'll run the risk of forgetting why you chose each other other in the first place. </em></div>
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<em>Remind yourselves about how you define love is the real value of a real marriage, which is why it almost never has nothing to do with a contract or religious dogmatism. Awareness of what love is in a marriage is the key to success, remembering what is so hidden in plain sight all around us, all the time, that we have to keep reminding ourselves over and over again, much like the two married fish swimming along together, who have grown unaware of the world around them, that the water in which they are swimming in, is the world, the love, and the lives they once created but perhaps had forgotten along their journey. When we’re married we have to remind ourselves that the vows we take is the love we want to see both in the world and in the eyes of the other individual you are vowing to love until your last day: If we forget this, we too run the risk of becoming the two married fish unaware of their surroundings.</em></div>
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<em>It is unimaginably hard to this, to stay conscious and alive in the adult world day in and day out. Which means yet again that the grand cliché turns out to be true: your marriage really IS the job of a lifetime and it commences now.* Start reminding yourself today that this, what we have here right now, is love; say it to yourself, in your head, or carry it in your heart each day so you know that no matter where you may travel or what may happen in the future that the greatest gift in life is to be loved and love in return.</em></div>
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<em>Andrea and Cindy, I wish you way more than luck: I wish you love.</em></div>
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<span style="font-size: xx-small;">*Foster Wallace, David. "This is Water." <i>Metastatic</i>. Web. 21 Sept. 2015. <http: ater.pdf="" his="" is="" text="" www.metastatic.org="">.<br />*Foster Wallace, David. "Transcription of the 2005 Kenyon Commenc." Kenyon College. May 2005. Web. 21 Sept. 2015. <http: drkelly="" enyonaddress2005.pdf="" web.ics.purdue.edu="">.</http:></http:></span></h6>
Johnhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02994349956675503806noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6811583905674476551.post-1295223290654790702015-09-05T00:00:00.000-07:002015-09-05T00:00:11.483-07:00Two Wrongs Don't Make a Right<div style="background-color: white; color: #333333; font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', 'Bitstream Charter', Times, serif; font-size: 16px; line-height: 24px;">
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Everywhere I turn on both social media or in person people are talking about Ms. Davis, her actions, personal history and for some weird reason her hair and looks. I’m all for individuals taking a virulent stand against an individual who chooses to not upload the law of the land as well as continually acting in an unjust discriminatory way but bringing her looks or anything else about her physical appearance into the narrative is not only just plain wrong it is sexism in its worst form.</div>
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<span style="color: #0000ee;"><u><br /></u></span><span style="color: #333333;">The old saying goes: “two wrongs don’t make a right.” As a community, we must come together now more than ever to correct the wrongs we see occurring in the world disguised as religious freedom and make sure that we are both holding to the strictest of standards and the morality that many in the religious right claim we lack.</span></div>
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Although conservative religious individuals and political pundits are claiming the current American zeitgeist is being monopolized by liberal, left-wing policies that demoralize and destroy the current state of American society, it is in the narrative of sexism and body shaming where the lines of who is standing on the right and wrong sides of history gets blurred.</div>
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Since Davis is arguing her case on moral grounds it is completely valid to bring in her past personal indiscretions into account. Her lack of respect or follow through for what she believes to be the holy and sanctimonious institutions exemplifies the hypocrisy of the religious right and those now claiming that they have the <em>right</em> to refuse service or other items to LGBT individuals.</div>
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What is wrong is the way in which we as a community, (although completely just and right), haven’t learned that the same hateful and poisonous language so often thrown our way by individuals, groups, and now Presidential hopefuls, only keeps us on their same bigoted and ignorant levels. No one is telling Kim Davis that she cannot have her religious beliefs but what she is being told is that she cannot hold an office where she takes an oath to uphold the law only to pick and choose what laws she wishes to uphold. Kim Davis is a bigot but she still deserves the same right to believe whatever she wants to believe, no matter how wrong it may seem, just as much as we are now, finally, after such a long, arduous fight, have the right to marry.</div>
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I always wondered why my favorite U.S. Supreme Court decision was<a data-mce-href="http://billofrightsinstitute.org/educate/educator-resources/lessons-plans/landmark-supreme-court-cases-elessons/reynolds-v-united-states-1878/" href="http://billofrightsinstitute.org/educate/educator-resources/lessons-plans/landmark-supreme-court-cases-elessons/reynolds-v-united-states-1878/" target="_blank"> <em>Reynolds v. United States</em>.</a> Looking back upon it, I see how it applies to so many decisions that have both adversely and advantageously effected the struggles both the LGBT and feminist communities experienced when trying to achieve full equality under the law. An individual can believe whatever they want to believe but when those actions inflict undue harm onto others, they are breaking the law, taking away another person’s rights and creating a world where government exists in name only and where people can pick and choose which laws to follow or not.</div>
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<a data-mce-href="https://feminismandreligion.files.wordpress.com/2015/09/screen-shot-2015-09-02-at-2-45-41-pm-360x360.png" href="https://feminismandreligion.files.wordpress.com/2015/09/screen-shot-2015-09-02-at-2-45-41-pm-360x360.png"><img alt="Screen-shot-2015-09-02-at-2.45.41-PM-360x360" class="aligncenter wp-image-20681" data-mce-src="https://feminismandreligion.files.wordpress.com/2015/09/screen-shot-2015-09-02-at-2-45-41-pm-360x360.png" height="257" src="https://feminismandreligion.files.wordpress.com/2015/09/screen-shot-2015-09-02-at-2-45-41-pm-360x360.png" style="display: block; height: auto; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; max-width: 100%;" width="257" /></a>Kim Davis does need a lot of things but saying of suggesting that she needs a haircut, a makeover, or even to lose weight, makes you and those that continue to repeat it no better than she is; to state such statements doesn’t purport the ideal that #LoveWins, which took over social media just mere months ago, but changes the whole narrative to symbolize that sexism and hate are more important than love and equality.</div>
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<br />Johnhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02994349956675503806noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6811583905674476551.post-41624475478248330472015-06-23T00:00:00.000-07:002015-07-20T15:41:48.169-07:00Caitlyn Jenner is a Friend of Mine<div style="background-color: white; color: #333333; font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', 'Bitstream Charter', Times, serif; font-size: 16px; line-height: 24px;">
<a data-mce-href="https://feminismandreligion.files.wordpress.com/2015/06/caitlyn-jenner-transformation-high-cost-surgery-clothes-house-5.jpg" href="https://feminismandreligion.files.wordpress.com/2015/06/caitlyn-jenner-transformation-high-cost-surgery-clothes-house-5.jpg"><img alt="caitlyn-jenner-transformation-high-cost-surgery-clothes-house-5" class="alignleft wp-image-19712" data-mce-src="https://feminismandreligion.files.wordpress.com/2015/06/caitlyn-jenner-transformation-high-cost-surgery-clothes-house-5.jpg?w=321" height="320" src="https://feminismandreligion.files.wordpress.com/2015/06/caitlyn-jenner-transformation-high-cost-surgery-clothes-house-5.jpg?w=321" style="float: left;" width="228" /></a>I’m deeply troubled by some of the <a data-mce-href="http://feminismandreligion.com/2015/06/14/religious-identity-as-performance/" href="http://feminismandreligion.com/2015/06/14/religious-identity-as-performance/" target="_blank">anti-trans</a> and <a data-mce-href="http://feminismandreligion.com/2015/03/02/what-is-gender-queer-by-carol-p-christ/" href="http://feminismandreligion.com/2015/03/02/what-is-gender-queer-by-carol-p-christ/" target="_blank">anti-queer</a> commentary that has been taking place on the blog <a href="http://www.feminismandreligion.com/" rel="nofollow" target="_blank">Feminism and Religion</a> in recent months. I’ll never forget when the project first began—talking with the founders about its original purpose: to bring the “F” word back into the mainstream religious discourse and more importantly, to be a place where scholars, young and old, senior or junior, could write, collaborate and eventually converse with across cyberspace.</div>
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However, in recent months, I’ve found myself being more of a watchdog rather than a frequent commentator on issues pertaining to feminist religious discourse. I’ve found myself reading comments about issues I may not frankly identify or agree with just to make sure that the cisgendering or anti-trans narratives do not become symbolic of what this blog is <em>now</em> rather than what was <em>supposed</em> to be at the beginning.</div>
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When I sat down to write my very <a data-mce-href="http://feminismandreligion.com/2011/07/21/283/" href="http://feminismandreligion.com/2011/07/21/283/" target="_blank">first post</a> I was scared. I was terrified that feminists from all communities would see me only as I appeared and not for whom I actually was. I was afraid that all I had worked for throughout my life would be moot with the first bad comment on one of my posts. While all of those fears were real and valid they quickly faded away as I was embraced by this community and many others for my passion rather than my gender; my life’s work rather than my privilege; and more importantly, the personal mission to make the world a safer and better place for women and girls everywhere.</div>
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To speak ones truth is oftentimes a difficult and nearly impossible act. However, to live one’s truth, on a day-to-day basis, is an aspect of life that has become so foreign to individuals who have become so comfortable in their own skin that I fear the activist and social justice roots that we all claim to hail from have fallen at the wayside and been replaced by complacency and reductionism.</div>
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Caitlyn Jenner’s story is one that many individuals, often not highlighted on this blog, know all too well. Caitlyn Jenner’s story and personal experiences are valid and for members of the feminist community to refer to her as not “feminist” or merely as a man “masquerading” as a woman while still utilizing his privilege from being biologically born as a man is troubling and the root of the problem facing many trans individuals today when they’re negotiating coming out as their true selves.</div>
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Trans individuals face a cadre of other horrible social, physical and mental <a data-mce-href="http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/wonkblog/wp/2015/01/22/the-state-of-transgender-america-massive-discrimination-little-data/" href="http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/wonkblog/wp/2015/01/22/the-state-of-transgender-america-massive-discrimination-little-data/" target="_blank">statistics</a> that oftentimes lead them to be more likely to self-harm. However, as feminists, isn’t it our job to make sure that all groups have access to the same freedoms rather than working towards denying it for certain groups while trolling the comments sections of posts?</div>
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Shakespeare said: “To thine own self be true” and for those of us who identify with the Golden Rule, if we no longer treat others as we would like to treat ourselves, then we really have failed as feminists; and if the comments on recent blogs are any indication, we still have a long way to go before all voices can feel welcomed not only on FAR but also in the world at-large.</div>
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<em><span style="font-size: x-small;">John Erickson is a Ph.D. Candidate in American Religious History at Claremont Graduate University. He holds a MA in Women’s Studies in Religion; an MA in Applied Women’s Studies; and a BA in Women’s Literature and Women’s Studies. He is a Permanent Contributor to the blog <a data-mce-href="http://www.feminismandreligion.com/" href="http://www.feminismandreligion.com/">Feminism and Religion</a>, a Non-Fiction Reviewer for <a data-mce-href="http://www.lambdaliterary.org/author/jerickson85/" href="http://www.lambdaliterary.org/author/jerickson85/" target="_blank">Lambda Literary</a>, the leader in LGBT reviews, author interviews, opinions and news since 1989 and the <a data-mce-href="http://www.aarwr.com/queer-caucus.html" href="http://www.aarwr.com/queer-caucus.html" target="_blank">Co-Chair of the Queer Studies in Religion </a>section of the American Academy of Religion's Western Region, the only regional section of the American Academy of Religion that is dedicated to the exploration of queer studies in religion and other relevant fields in the nation and the President of the <a data-mce-href="http://www.uwosh.edu/alumni/alumni-chapters/lgbtq-chapter" href="http://www.uwosh.edu/alumni/alumni-chapters/lgbtq-chapter" target="_blank">University of Wisconsin Oshkosh's LGBTQA+ Alumni Association</a>. When he is not working on his dissertation, he can be found at <a data-mce-href="http://www.weho.org" href="http://www.weho.org/" target="_blank">West Hollywood City Hall</a> where he is the Community Events Technician and works on policies and special events relating to women, gender, sexuality, and human rights issues that are sponsored or co-sponsored by the City of West Hollywood. He is the author of the blog <a data-mce-href="http://www.wisconsinwithlove.blogspot.com" href="http://www.wisconsinwithlove.blogspot.com/" target="_blank">From Wisconsin, with Love</a> and can be followed on Twitter <a data-mce-href="http://www.twitter.com/JErickson85" href="http://www.twitter.com/JErickson85" target="_blank">@JErickson85</a></span></em></div>
<br />Johnhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02994349956675503806noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6811583905674476551.post-1774705687121090932015-06-02T00:00:00.000-07:002015-06-02T00:00:02.110-07:00The Religiosity of Silence <div style="background-color: white; color: #333333; font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', 'Bitstream Charter', Times, serif; font-size: 16px; line-height: 24px;">
In 2013, I wrote an <a data-mce-href="http://feminismandreligion.com/2013/12/24/yes-youre-a-homophobe/" href="http://feminismandreligion.com/2013/12/24/yes-youre-a-homophobe/" target="_blank">article</a> about the then latest reality TV scandal featuring A&E’s <em>Duck Dynasty’s </em>Phil Robertson and his rampant foot-in-mouth disease that caused him to express his true distaste for the LGBT community and mainly the sexual proclivities of gay men in the pages of <em>GQ</em>.</div>
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Starting in the 1980s, “Quiverfull,” the religion that the Duggar family <a data-mce-href="https://feminismandreligion.files.wordpress.com/2015/05/image0012.jpg" href="https://feminismandreligion.files.wordpress.com/2015/05/image0012.jpg"><img alt="image0012" class="alignright wp-image-19598" data-mce-src="https://feminismandreligion.files.wordpress.com/2015/05/image0012.jpg?w=400" height="179" src="https://feminismandreligion.files.wordpress.com/2015/05/image0012.jpg?w=400" style="float: right;" width="248" /></a>adhere to, spread through various evangelical circles with principles focused around biblical literalism such as: traditional gender roles, emphasis on family values, and a scorn and fear of the secular (read: modern) world. Furthermore, while having lots of kids in the Quiverfull religion isn’t just about building up one’s quiver but rather reemphasizing the way in which the world should be run: with women as subservient child producers who are taught to be silent no matter what hardships they face. Josh Duggar and the rest of his Quiverfull family exist in and perpetuate a culture of silence that emphasizes the male struggle while demeaning a woman’s pain as being a result of her having a sinful heart. It should be no shock then to find out that in a world of silence those who are affected the most by silence find it the most difficult to not only speak out but also be heard when men rule the roost.</div>
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While the facts surrounding the culture of silence in regards to assault and molestation are shocking, some other facts emphasize why the case against Josh Duggar is all too real: acquaintance perpetrators are the most common abusers making up almost 70-90% of all perpetrators with 89% of child sexual assault cases involving persons known to the child, with 29% of child sexual abuse offenders being relatives and 60% being acquaintances.</div>
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In a repetitive culture of abuse and silence, is it really shocking to find out that an individual who preached such hate and discontent for others actually perpetuated other forms of heinous abuse against others?</div>
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To say that I was shocked by the revelation about Josh Duggar’s past would be a misnomer; however, to say that I don’t care would be an outright lie. I do care about what happened because I care about the 5 girls he molested and I care about what happens to them now and in the future when they are no longer silenced and are allowed to be free and feel the pain and hurt he inflicted upon them all those years ago in a new light.<br />
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We need to hear their voices, we need to hear their stories and more importantly, we need to stop giving the headline to the name “Josh Duggar” and start giving it back to the young girls, not only in Arkansas but also around the world who are forced to live their lives in silence and fear and without the hope that their assailants, regardless of whether or not they were the son to a multi-million corporate television reality cash cow or just a regular person walking down the street.</div>
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Sexual assault and violence know no gender and in the case of Josh Duggar, the main thing we need to remember that although he got caught, he probably never stopped and even more terrifying is: who will stop him now that he is the head of his household with four young kids in his quiver?</div>
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<em>John Erickson is a Ph.D. Candidate in American Religious History at Claremont Graduate University. He holds a MA in Women’s Studies in Religion; an MA in Applied Women’s Studies; and a BA in Women’s Literature and Women’s Studies. He is a Permanent Contributor to the blog <a data-mce-href="http://www.feminismandreligion.com/" href="http://www.feminismandreligion.com/">Feminism and Religion</a>, a Non-Fiction Reviewer for <a data-mce-href="http://www.lambdaliterary.org/author/jerickson85/" href="http://www.lambdaliterary.org/author/jerickson85/" target="_blank">Lambda Literary</a>, the leader in LGBT reviews, author interviews, opinions and news since 1989 and the <a data-mce-href="http://www.aarwr.com/queer-caucus.html" href="http://www.aarwr.com/queer-caucus.html" target="_blank">Co-Chair of the Queer Studies in Religion </a>section of the American Academy of Religion's Western Region, the only regional section of the American Academy of Religion that is dedicated to the exploration of queer studies in religion and other relevant fields in the nation and the President of the <a data-mce-href="http://www.uwosh.edu/alumni/alumni-chapters/lgbtq-chapter" href="http://www.uwosh.edu/alumni/alumni-chapters/lgbtq-chapter" target="_blank">University of Wisconsin Oshkosh's LGBTQA+ Alumni Association</a>. When he is not working on his dissertation, he can be found at <a data-mce-href="http://www.weho.org" href="http://www.weho.org/" target="_blank">West Hollywood City Hall</a> where he is the Community Events Technician and works on policies and special events relating to women, gender, sexuality, and human rights issues that are sponsored or co-sponsored by the City of West Hollywood. He is the author of the blog <a data-mce-href="http://www.wisconsinwithlove.blogspot.com" href="http://www.wisconsinwithlove.blogspot.com/" target="_blank">From Wisconsin, with Love</a> and can be followed on Twitter <a data-mce-href="http://www.twitter.com/JErickson85" href="http://www.twitter.com/JErickson85" target="_blank">@JErickson85</a></em></div>
Johnhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02994349956675503806noreply@blogger.comNorth America54.5259614 -105.25511870000003-18.8897046 89.510506299999975 90 59.979256299999975tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6811583905674476551.post-65687866138780540752015-03-24T00:00:00.000-07:002015-03-24T12:02:05.084-07:00Genderqueering<div data-mce-style="text-align: center;" style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: 'Open Sans', 'Helvetica Neue', Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 14px; line-height: 23px; margin-bottom: 0.825em; text-align: center;">
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<em style="line-height: 1.7;">This post is a response to a recent blog entry on <a href="http://www.feminismandreligion.com/" rel="nofollow" target="_blank">Feminism and Religion </a>titled "Who is Gender Queer?" on from scholar Carol Christ. The post can be read by <a data-mce-href="http://feminismandreligion.com/2015/03/02/what-is-gender-queer-by-carol-p-christ/" href="http://feminismandreligion.com/2015/03/02/what-is-gender-queer-by-carol-p-christ/" style="color: #1b8be0; font-style: inherit; line-height: 1.7; text-decoration: none;">clicking here.</a> </em><em style="line-height: 1.7;">I want to thank my friend, advocate, and upcoming scholar Martha Ovadia for reasons only she knows! </em><em style="line-height: 1.7;">Stay brave, speak up, be heard! </em></div>
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It is terrifying to know that something is wrong but not be able to speak truth to power.</div>
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It is even more terrifying to know something is wrong, be able to speak to it, and then silence those voices that do not have that same privilege, power, or position as you.</div>
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The struggle that many of us in positions of privilege and power aren’t just the ostracizing and essentializing forces that we, as allies, members of communities, or even those dedicated to a cause, can participate in the oppression we are fighting against and do harm.</div>
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It’s taken me a long time to not only be comfortable with who I identify as but also how I go about fighting and defining my life based on said identity and experience. However, the one thing that I have the ability to do is <em style="line-height: 1.7;">choose</em> that identity, more freely than others. Unlike Leelah Alcorn, Ash Haffner, Aniya Knee Parker, or Yaz’min Shancez, I did not have to face the types of oppressions that they did and sadly lost their lives to as a result because we exist in a society that can’t deal with the inability to leave things undefined or to allow people to define who they are on their own terms. It is vital that although my lived experiences could never meet nor match the same types of oppression that these brave individuals had to face, I, as a white, cisgendered gay male do not, through my own position and privilege become part of their oppression. </div>
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As a man who exists in the world of feminism and within various women’s communities, I walk a daily tightrope of privilege and power to insure that I do not silence those that I consider allies, friends, mentors, or colleagues. As a man who exists in the world of the LGBTQ community, I walk an additional tightrope to additionally take away or diminish from the experiences of those members of <em style="line-height: 1.7;">our </em>community that do not have the same type of lived experiences as myself. Even within minority communities, positions of hierarchy exist and within these hierarchies of knowledge, identity, or power, comes a responsibility to insure that the oppressed do not become the oppressors.</div>
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We find our versions of home in these communities and it is within these spaces where our home not only begins to define who we are but we, as a reflection of that space, begin to outwardly redefine the spaces we exist in. If we slowly begin, through our experiences to shape our homes based on privilege and power without self-reflection and acknowledgment of others, then we are no better than those oppressive forces we say we’re against.</div>
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I can’t speak for what identity feels like –I can only speak for what essentializing does and what it does is reflected in the deaths of Lelah, Ash and many others who die nameless. It is our responsibility, as allies, members of communities, and those fighting to end sexist, patriarchal and even now homonormative oppression to make sure that no more deaths occur on our watch or that truth is spoken to power even when power is masquerading around as truth.</div>
Johnhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02994349956675503806noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6811583905674476551.post-39080268951821357352014-09-23T00:00:00.000-07:002014-09-23T00:00:09.515-07:00Are You Ready for Some Football?<div style="color: #333333; font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', 'Bitstream Charter', Times, serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 19px;">
There is never a reason for physical violence. There is never a reason to hit your partner or child to the point where they are unconscious or bruised. There is never a reason to inflict violence against someone else but apparently there are exceptions to these rules if you’re a NFL football player.</div>
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<a data-mce-href="http://feminismandreligion.com/2014/09/23/are-you-ready-for-some-football/jesus-football/" href="http://feminismandreligion.com/2014/09/23/are-you-ready-for-some-football/jesus-football/" rel="attachment wp-att-16101"><img alt="Football Jesus" class="alignleft wp-image-16101" data-mce-src="https://feminismandreligion.files.wordpress.com/2014/09/jesus-football.jpg" height="216" src="https://feminismandreligion.files.wordpress.com/2014/09/jesus-football.jpg" style="float: left;" width="199" /></a>In my native state of Wisconsin, watching football on Sunday is synonymous with attending church prior to the game. Watching football on Sunday is a cultural norm in many, if not all, different regions of the country where individuals, whether you like it or not, gather each Sunday to both praise and pray that your team ends up on top.</div>
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In Wisconsin, you attend church with your family and head to your desired destination where you gather with friends and family to eat, talk about your life, and of course watch your local football team battle their weekly rival. Although I am not much of a football fan these days, I have very fond memories of attending football games, watching them with my family and talking about the Green Bay Packers’ Super Bowl chances. It was my time to both bond with the men of my family as well as catch up on the gossip the women would whisper back and forth to each other at the dinner table while the men were in the other room screaming at the TV.</div>
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Although I’m sure I will watch more games in my future, lately, all I do is cringe when I think about the growing violence that women and children face and have faced in the large shadow of an organization worth north of $9 billion dollars.</div>
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The biggest scandal to hit the news waves lately is that of Baltimore Ravens running back Ray Rice’s assault of his wife in an Atlantic City <a data-mce-href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VbwTMJroTbI" href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VbwTMJroTbI">elevator</a>. Although Rice and the various other incidents regarding NFL players and violence is disturbing, the biggest problem facing the NFL isn’t just its treatment of women but its continual commodification of them as a disposable resource emblematic with the culture of violence that it has created.</div>
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If you didn’t know, women make up an estimated 45% of the NFL‘s more than 150 million American fans and have, in recent weeks, become their most valuable resource and source of criticism. However, after a long string of incidents stemming back from <a data-mce-href="http://www.takepart.com/article/2014/09/05/cheerleaders-lawsuit" href="http://www.takepart.com/article/2014/09/05/cheerleaders-lawsuit">NFL teams underpaying cheerleaders</a> to the Ray Rice incident, one needs to ask what the roles of women, if any, are outside of the disturbing images of the abused wife, hypersexualized cheerleader? Is being dragged out of an elevator by your abusive husband the only way to get women’s issues addressed in the NFL by fans, league owners, and the NFL commission?</div>
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<a data-mce-href="http://feminismandreligion.com/2014/09/23/are-you-ready-for-some-football/bilde-2/" href="http://feminismandreligion.com/2014/09/23/are-you-ready-for-some-football/bilde-2/" rel="attachment wp-att-16099"><img alt="bilde" class="alignleft wp-image-16099" data-mce-src="http://feminismandreligion.files.wordpress.com/2014/09/bilde.jpeg?w=345&h=210&crop=1" src="http://feminismandreligion.files.wordpress.com/2014/09/bilde.jpeg?w=345&h=210&crop=1" height="240" style="float: left;" width="395" /></a>The roles of women in the NFL and religion have many similarities. Aside from end zone celebrations where players praise God for his apparent direct role in helping them score a winning touchdown or certain players edifications as gods on Earth, women make up the crux of both NFL fandom and attendance but are responsible for the gatherings similar to the ones I, and many others, grew up with.</div>
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Although putting women in charge of drafting new policies that address the “woman problem” currently facing the NFL, it too reeks of the similar dismissive and patronizing actions women face when trying to obtain leadership roles in their religious traditions. Supercilious progress for the sake of progress isn’t progress and progress under the guise of silence is still misogyny. We need women in positions of leadership in both the NFL as well as in religious traditions. The culture of violence and silence will only continue, albeit with a Band-Aid firmly in place, holding the painful experiences and histories of women, long forgotten and often overlooked, until society values their rights just as much as the men leading the prayers and those that are being prayed for on Sundays across America.</div>
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Ann Braude said it best in her foundational text <em>Sisters and Saints</em> that “if we want to understand the history of American women, we need to examine the religious beliefs and activities that so many have found so meaningful.” Without women, we wouldn’t have many, if not all, of the religions that are present throughout the world today and in case we forget, without women, we too wouldn't have the millions of little boys who grow up being taken to and from practice by their mothers with the hope that they too could one day become the professional football players that fans scream and pray for.</div>
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Without women, there is no NFL and without women, there is no religion. Kelly Brown Douglas said it best on this very <a data-mce-href="http://feminismandreligion.com/2014/09/16/domestic-violence-the-sin-that-sin-created-by-kelly-brown-douglas/" href="http://feminismandreligion.com/2014/09/16/domestic-violence-the-sin-that-sin-created-by-kelly-brown-douglas/">blog</a> when she stated, “It is the violence that violence creates.” Although I agree with her, I would only add that while violence does indeed create violence, the real sin isn’t the violence itself but rather the silence that follows.</div>
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Let us pray that we will continue to not be silent and that we will <a data-mce-href="http://flavorwire.com/476219/whyileft-and-whyistayed-are-hashtag-activism-at-its-best" href="http://flavorwire.com/476219/whyileft-and-whyistayed-are-hashtag-activism-at-its-best">rise up</a> and fight for the millions of women (and men) each day who do not live in fear that their significant other’s multimillion dollar contract will not be reinstated but rather that they and their children may not see another day on this Earth.</div>
Johnhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02994349956675503806noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6811583905674476551.post-55135003001838634752014-06-24T00:00:00.000-07:002014-06-24T11:25:17.734-07:00#YesAllWomen, the Darwin Debate, and the God Complex<div style="color: #333333; font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', 'Bitstream Charter', Times, serif; font-size: 13.333333969116211px; line-height: 19px;">
The one thing I typically will always choose to do on the rare occasion that I’m able to sit down and relax is watch a documentary. While some people may go to the gym, read a book, or hang with friends, I typically choose to stay in, nestle up on my couch, and learn. While on my last bout of relaxation, I chose to watch the HBO documentary <em><a data-mce-href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7jrOdDEB0MU&feature=kp" href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7jrOdDEB0MU&feature=kp">Questioning Darwin. </a></em>Although it offers very little new insight into the evolution vs. creationism debate, it does offer an interesting new way to look at the recent social media hashtag war feminists, allies, and supporters found themselves in over the <a data-mce-href="https://twitter.com/hashtag/yesallwomen" href="https://twitter.com/hashtag/yesallwomen">#YesAllWomen</a> movement that took the world by storm.<br />
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<a data-mce-href="https://feminismandreligion.files.wordpress.com/2014/06/yesallwomen.png" href="https://feminismandreligion.files.wordpress.com/2014/06/yesallwomen.png"><img alt="yesallwomen" class="aligncenter wp-image-14960" data-mce-src="http://feminismandreligion.files.wordpress.com/2014/06/yesallwomen.png" src="http://feminismandreligion.files.wordpress.com/2014/06/yesallwomen.png" height="149" style="display: block; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;" width="217" /></a></div>
Now, before I discuss #YesAllWomen I have to admit that I did not enter into the safe space women created for themselves to tell tales of the horrible things they have and have had to face on a daily basis. I firmly believe that men should not have entered into the digital space that women created to “voice” their opinions on a subject that women, specifically two women (writer Annie Cardi (<a data-mce-href="https://twitter.com/anniecardi" href="https://twitter.com/anniecardi">@anniecardi</a>) and one other, who has since made her profile private to protect herself and her identity), created. Although I did see men chiming in as allies from time to time, the #YesAllWomen space proved more than ever that <em>some </em>men really can't just shut up and let women have a space all to themselves. The #YesAllWomen movement has become a tome of lived experiences where women were and are able to share the pain that they have, currently, or fear they will one day experience. The troubling aspect of the hashtag activism that took place wasn't that women were openly talking about these horrible experiences but rather that the men, who openly engaged, accused, harassed, and ridiculed women (and some men) felt they had to do in order to defend themselves from stories that had nothing to do with them personally, but rather indirectly put their divinely sanctioned manhood under duress.<br />
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<a data-mce-href="https://feminismandreligion.files.wordpress.com/2014/06/manhood.jpg" href="https://feminismandreligion.files.wordpress.com/2014/06/manhood.jpg"><img alt="manhood" class="aligncenter wp-image-14961" data-mce-src="http://feminismandreligion.files.wordpress.com/2014/06/manhood.jpg" src="http://feminismandreligion.files.wordpress.com/2014/06/manhood.jpg" height="139" style="display: block; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;" width="316" /></a></div>
This leads us back to the main question – what does all of #YesAllWomen dialogue have to do with the HBO documentary <em>Questioning Darwin</em>? Simply, 1 Timothy 2:13, that states: “For Adam was formed first, then Eve” and Genesis 2:18: “The LORD God said, ‘It is not good for the man to be alone. I will make a helper [read: woman] suitable for him’” have led many men and women to become victims of a God complex that appears to have divinely ordained men to rule over women. While many of us have written about and refuted these biblical passages and norms, the sad and oftentimes painful aspect of the debate is that many communities and people, both young and old, believe these passages to be the literal word and wishes of God. While the arguments in <em>Questioning Darwin</em> between creationists and evolutionists did not diverge from the same ones we have heard over time, the one argument that rose above the rest was that the men, who touted and blew their horns for the sake of creationism's significance, often stated that they (read: men) could never have evolved from a primate because they were not only to rule over them, as dictated in Genesis 1:28, but also because they, as men, were made in the image of God and therefore bestowed with certain divine rights and privileges that primates and those created as helpers (read:women) did not have. This ultimately lead men to feel as if they were the oath keepers of some divine truth, both within and outside of scripture, that places them atop of the proverbial totem pole of life.<br />
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<a data-mce-href="https://feminismandreligion.files.wordpress.com/2014/06/sistine-chapel-creation-of-adam.jpg" href="https://feminismandreligion.files.wordpress.com/2014/06/sistine-chapel-creation-of-adam.jpg"><img alt="sistine-chapel-creation-of-adam" class="aligncenter wp-image-14962" data-mce-src="http://feminismandreligion.files.wordpress.com/2014/06/sistine-chapel-creation-of-adam.jpg" src="http://feminismandreligion.files.wordpress.com/2014/06/sistine-chapel-creation-of-adam.jpg" height="235" style="display: block; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;" width="354" /></a></div>
22-year-old Elliot Rodger, the author of <a data-mce-href="http://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2014/05/25/us/shooting-document.html?_r=1" href="http://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2014/05/25/us/shooting-document.html?_r=1">“My Twisted World,”</a> a 141-page manifesto that he created prior to going out on a shooting rampage in Isla Vista, California near the University of California Santa Barbara killing seven people and a major proponent for why the #YesAllWomen debate started, stated: “I would have an enormous tower built just for myself, where I can oversee the entire concentration camp and gleefully watch [women] all die…If I can’t have them, no one will…Women represent everything that is unfair in this world, and in order to make this world a fair place, women must be eradicated.” Rodger and his <a data-mce-href="http://time.com/134152/the-toxic-appeal-of-the-mens-rights-movement/" href="http://time.com/134152/the-toxic-appeal-of-the-mens-rights-movement/">MRA (Men’s Rights Activist)</a> elk all prove the point that men like him think and feel that women are not only objects that they <em>can</em> control but also can do away with at any given moment because they, like God, can do whatever they want. They are the leaders of the world and therefore everyone else should just fall in line.<br />
<br />
The success of the #YesAllWomen movement isn’t that it openly allowed women the spaces to talk about their painful lived experiences and fears but that it helped them to prove the point that their safe spaces are oftentimes eradicated by the likes of <a data-mce-href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7KP62TE1prs" href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7KP62TE1prs">Elliot Roger</a>, <a data-mce-href="http://www.avoiceformen.com/paul-elam/" href="http://www.avoiceformen.com/paul-elam/">Paul Elam</a>, <a data-mce-href="http://publicintelligence.net/anders-behring-breiviks-complete-manifesto-2083-a-european-declaration-of-independence/" href="http://publicintelligence.net/anders-behring-breiviks-complete-manifesto-2083-a-european-declaration-of-independence/">Anders Breivik</a>, and many other individuals who feel it is their place to tell women what to do and inflict verbal, mental, and physical violence upon them if they don't listen. #YesAllWomen proved that although <em>not all men</em> commit horrible crimes against women, the men that often get the headlines and create the most controversy are the ones that need to be watched out for. If you can or have the ability to stomach their various manifestos or read their tweets and blog posts, the one thing that will ring true above all else is that these men feel threatened by strong and empowered women and girls, who they truly believe to be both beneath them and ruining the world that they are to rule over with their feminist agendas. Although a lot of these MRA and religious men like to think they are Gods, they in reality, after watching <em>Questioning Darwin</em> or reading tweets like the one below, are sometimes nothing more than a bunch of baboon’s asses contained in 140 characters. Although they like to admit that they did not descend from apes, they oftentimes can be found acting like a bunch of babbling baboons.<br />
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<a data-mce-href="https://feminismandreligion.files.wordpress.com/2014/06/photo.jpg" href="https://feminismandreligion.files.wordpress.com/2014/06/photo.jpg"><img alt="Photo" class="aligncenter wp-image-14965" data-mce-src="http://feminismandreligion.files.wordpress.com/2014/06/photo.jpg" src="http://feminismandreligion.files.wordpress.com/2014/06/photo.jpg" height="247" style="display: block; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;" width="544" /></a></div>
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Johnhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02994349956675503806noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6811583905674476551.post-45568316868867983392014-03-25T00:00:00.000-07:002014-03-25T10:28:38.540-07:00In Memoriam - God Hates Fags<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi3zMDmLZ4X4YeAufVr61lOsERPmx5Uw6Gkp8CcyTpViJ9x96-4sFJh6ssKysviJdkIzxIJk5JxATuwYDi8X0loHlmOkrK6r3QEZnI-ziAWHrHBbD1vexCw8Bo0XoLbYzPkI03HHIh8DFQ-/s1600/Fred.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi3zMDmLZ4X4YeAufVr61lOsERPmx5Uw6Gkp8CcyTpViJ9x96-4sFJh6ssKysviJdkIzxIJk5JxATuwYDi8X0loHlmOkrK6r3QEZnI-ziAWHrHBbD1vexCw8Bo0XoLbYzPkI03HHIh8DFQ-/s1600/Fred.jpg" height="193" width="200" /></a></div>
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Fred Phelps, an American Pastor who headed the
Westboro Baptist Church in Topeka, Kansas died at the age of 84 on March 19,
2014.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>While some individuals leave
behind legacies of their good deeds and loving memories, the only thing Phelps
left behind was a family and church founded on the principle of hate. <o:p></o:p></div>
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A frequent eyesore at various events ranging
from military funerals and gay pride gatherings to mainstream events that
captured the attention of our pop-culture obsessed society, Fred Phelps and his
clan believed it was their sacred duty to warn others of God’s anger over the
growing acceptance of not only modernity in general but also issues like gay
rights and abortion.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>From slogans and
signs such as ‘God Hates Fags’ to ‘Thank God for IEDs,’ Phelps has caused many
controversies both during his lifetime and after his death. <o:p></o:p></div>
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The first response many individuals had when
hearing that Phelps was close to death or that he had actually died was: “Are
people going to picket his funereal?”<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>or
“Should members of the <b>[Insert Varying Communities the Westboro Baptist Church
Pissed<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Off Here]</b> show him the same
amount of respect as he did in life to us and the multitude of funerals he and
his family were frequent at?” While many individuals are stating
that they should forgive and forget his hate, the matter that not only the
church he founded but also the rhetoric and legacy of hate he created still
exists is troubling. While there is still room for debate about the symbolic
power <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">rising above it all</i> it is worrisome that he’ll exist even more so now in death than he ever did in
life.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span><o:p></o:p></div>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgZnN0JjBacJ05AcKQh2JRKgiQq6M-O_AyuA1Fo0IopIzYZqJ_aWf6Hks9sFfSMArc17iO8FjgBqFi34ukhd76Ud5zHSutcT2czP3rq5nYNx75-b83dJTnLaveihJ3HKBB-R2ZVaIoEZZUq/s1600/fred-phelps.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgZnN0JjBacJ05AcKQh2JRKgiQq6M-O_AyuA1Fo0IopIzYZqJ_aWf6Hks9sFfSMArc17iO8FjgBqFi34ukhd76Ud5zHSutcT2czP3rq5nYNx75-b83dJTnLaveihJ3HKBB-R2ZVaIoEZZUq/s1600/fred-phelps.jpg" height="216" width="320" /></a>While any such protest at Phelps’ funeral is
impossible because the Westboro Baptist Church is not having one for Phelps (coincidence?), the problem still remains that it is far too easy to reduce that Phelps was most
likely a homosexual and his repressed sexuality caused him to utilize religion
as a force of hate to embody the worst parts of humanity in public forums. More importantly, it is too easy to dismiss Phelps and his independent church as a bunch of loons. However, it is not easy but rather very difficult to clean up the mess that Phelps has caused
since he famously picketed Matthew Shepard, the gay student who at 21 years old
was tortured, murdered and strung up on a Wyoming field fence in 1998. </div>
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The complex legal, religious, and social mess that
the Westboro Baptist Church has created goes all the way from their tiny,
secluded area in Topeka, Kansas all the way up to the United States Supreme Court.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>In the case <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Synder v. Phelps</i>, the Court held that even speech deemed <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">outrageous</i> could not be liable for a
tort of emotional distress (a.k.a. the plaintiff was forced to return a
settlement won in a previous court case where the Westboro Baptist Church was
held liable for causing emotional distress towards their family after their son
was killed in Iraq). </div>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjZS-PK1M18vsLDqea7tbgIGp8EneNdtQczZVZxI5WFT0_CUh9Q_tHahlE5sT0CpYzrKgatp8h7tOS4YSj8YtrC6X-kbs3hBk2ahKCoNLkeAQbHuv0Ly1ToGIVM3aTJvUVUVrjr1T6Ulf-E/s1600/Snyder+v.+Phelps.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjZS-PK1M18vsLDqea7tbgIGp8EneNdtQczZVZxI5WFT0_CUh9Q_tHahlE5sT0CpYzrKgatp8h7tOS4YSj8YtrC6X-kbs3hBk2ahKCoNLkeAQbHuv0Ly1ToGIVM3aTJvUVUVrjr1T6Ulf-E/s1600/Snyder+v.+Phelps.jpg" height="270" width="400" /></a></div>
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While I do not know many individuals who are
willing to marry into the Phelps family (they're famous for not marrying people with beliefs that do not match their own, their utter demise seems to be
imminent not because of Phelps’ death but because the legacy of hate that he
created being slowly beaten back by the tide of modernity that greets the
remaining Phelps family members each time they unpack their signs to protest
yet another event.<br />
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<o:p></o:p></div>
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Should we rise above his death and not
protest?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Did Phelps awaken a new, more
radical class of LGBT activists who have dedicated their lives to turning back
the hateful tide he has caused? Or did Phelps help further the divide between
the LGBT and religious community by embodying everything that hurt and
grief-stricken closeted and open LGBT members dislike about religion as a
whole?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span><a href="http://www.thedailybeast.com/articles/2014/03/20/fred-phelps-friend-of-the-gays.html">If
Fred Phelps never existed, would some other nameless figure have taken his
place?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></a><span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span><o:p></o:p></div>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjaNvcOBOTUCVbhkX7pw-_53q_0fkiyuorxLCqti5St6ldW1_XzgllyfCHgCL80M6zfC-i29xyxnYxI_7gXDgjDxsCNoosYwDHkxzeWEwOXGn1qCARPZUM3Z8mITFOhR92HXDesvDj1MF84/s1600/Fred+Phelps.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjaNvcOBOTUCVbhkX7pw-_53q_0fkiyuorxLCqti5St6ldW1_XzgllyfCHgCL80M6zfC-i29xyxnYxI_7gXDgjDxsCNoosYwDHkxzeWEwOXGn1qCARPZUM3Z8mITFOhR92HXDesvDj1MF84/s1600/Fred+Phelps.jpg" height="218" width="320" /></a></div>
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While I do not think we’ll ever know the answers
to the multitude of questions behind Phelps’ existence, I say if people want to
dance on his proverbial grave we should let them polish their tap shoes.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>However, the problem is that although Phelps
may be gone to whatever version of heaven or hell one believes in, his family
and his church live on and will be at the next funeral or event with their
signs higher than ever.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span><o:p></o:p></div>
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Phelps didn't just live a life filled with hate
but he also embodied the very reasoning why so many communities cannot cross
that proverbial bridge to work together to see past their differences and maybe
never will. In the case of Phelps, sticks and stones may break our bones, but words really <i>do </i>hurt.<br />
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_________________________________________________________________ <o:p></o:p></div>
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Although this video may be doctored, I think it is the perfect ending to a violent and conflict ridden recent history of anti-gay crimes both in Russia, abroad, and here at home in the United States. Often painted as the enemy of gay-rights, Russian LGBT activists have been sacrificing their lives to further the cause of gay rights in a country where people who, like Phelps, can do more than just hold up signs stating that you are going to hell but rather pass laws that make it nearly impossible for you to exist in the first place. While were here in the United States often paint Russian individuals with a broad stroke of anti-gay sentiments, especially prior to and after the Sochi Winter Olympics, I find it comical that a "Russian News Caster" reporting on the death of Phelps, an American who at his very core hated LGBT individuals, is incapable to not only read the news story but also the various types of signs that Phelps created without laughing. Homophobia is a traded commodity and it knows no boundaries and it is time that we start realizing the the outsourcing of homophobia doesn't begin abroad but rather right here at home. </div>
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Johnhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02994349956675503806noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6811583905674476551.post-31945638811468854002013-12-24T00:00:00.000-08:002013-12-24T00:00:02.163-08:00Yes, You're a Homophobe<div style="text-align: center;">
This post is dedicated to my fearless friend Michelle - an individual who stands up for what she believes in and those she loves no matter what. Special thanks to <a href="http://www.feminismandreligion.com/" target="_blank">Feminism and Religion</a> for always being a space where my voice and the voices of others are welcome!</div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
__________________________________________________</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 15.75pt; margin-bottom: 15.6pt; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<span style="color: #333333; font-family: Georgia; font-size: 11.0pt; mso-fareast-language: EN-US;">A line has been drawn in the sand
between those who support gay rights and those who do not. While some
call it being on the “right side of history,” I simply now refer to it as not
sounding and looking like a bigot in the halls of history and in the various
books, Facebook posts, and Tweets that our children will one day read.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 15.75pt; margin-bottom: 15.6pt; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<span style="color: #333333; font-family: Georgia; font-size: 11.0pt; mso-fareast-language: EN-US;">I’ve spent a lot of my activist life
attempting to educate or <i>save</i> for lack of a better term, <o:p></o:p></span><span style="color: #333333; font-family: Georgia; font-size: 11pt; line-height: 15.75pt; text-align: center;">individuals who say hateful things similar to </span><a href="http://www.aetv.com/duck-dynasty" style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: 11pt; line-height: 15.75pt; text-align: center;"><i><span style="color: blue;">Duck
Dynasty’s </span></i></a><span style="color: #333333; font-family: Georgia; font-size: 11pt; line-height: 15.75pt; text-align: center;">Phil Robertson.In a recent</span><a href="http://www.gq.com/entertainment/television/201401/duck-dynasty-phil-robertson" style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: 11pt; line-height: 15.75pt; text-align: center;"><span style="color: blue;"> <i>GQ </i>profile</span></a><span style="color: #333333; font-family: Georgia; font-size: 11pt; line-height: 15.75pt; text-align: center;">, the patriarch of
the</span><i style="color: #333333; font-family: Georgia; font-size: 11pt; line-height: 15.75pt; text-align: center;"> </i><span style="color: #333333; font-family: Georgia; font-size: 11pt; line-height: 15.75pt; text-align: center;">A&E series called being gay a “sin” and compared the sexual
action between same sex individuals to bestiality. Robertson said:</span></div>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiqo2dR4ykkVrkSklE17CqBatnMoAr9kTMX8Tqq47aVlDR6QbHzeilVxErWHCbnwovrKWu9mznwC5dpqHowa6-rKDz2_HrlaW8Ias5dFRkxzgCWwwZ_VdAEyNgSoLtAY0mOP5GpOPioHrca/s1600/phil+robertson.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiqo2dR4ykkVrkSklE17CqBatnMoAr9kTMX8Tqq47aVlDR6QbHzeilVxErWHCbnwovrKWu9mznwC5dpqHowa6-rKDz2_HrlaW8Ias5dFRkxzgCWwwZ_VdAEyNgSoLtAY0mOP5GpOPioHrca/s320/phil+robertson.jpg" width="237" /></a><span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: 11.0pt; mso-fareast-language: EN-US;"><span style="color: blue;">“It seems like,
to me, a vagina </span><span style="color: #6aa84f;">– as a man –would be more desirable than a man’s anus. </span><span style="color: blue;">
</span><span style="color: #674ea7;">That’s just me. I’m just thinking: There’s more there! </span><span style="color: red;">She’s got
more to offer…But hey, sin: It’s not logical, my man.</span><span style="color: blue;"> </span><span style="color: #bf9000;">It’s just not
logical…Start with homosexual behavior</span><span style="color: #ffd966;"> </span><span style="color: magenta;">and just morph out from there.
Bestiality,</span><span style="color: #e69138;"> sleeping around with this woman and</span><span style="color: #c27ba0;"> that woman and that woman and
those men.”</span></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: 11.0pt; mso-fareast-language: EN-US;"> (Note: The rainbow colors were added by me)</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 15.75pt; margin-bottom: 15.6pt; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<span style="color: #333333; font-family: Georgia; font-size: 11.0pt; mso-fareast-language: EN-US;">While this may seem like a run of the
mill statement coming from someone with this man’s views and beliefs, his
statement has created quite the controversy as he has been placed on permanent
suspension from the show, his family refuses to film without him (something
that is economically harmful to A&E since the show has broken many
broadcast ratings records pertaining to reality shows and is a proverbial cash
cow for the network and their investors) and, the craziest point of all, the
people defending him are stating that his statement isn’t homophobic but rather
an expression of his deeply held religious beliefs.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 15.75pt; margin-bottom: 15.6pt; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<span style="color: #333333; font-family: Georgia; font-size: 11.0pt; mso-fareast-language: EN-US;">While I would usually just brush off
the man’s statements as the actions of another delusional homophobe, I can no
longer sit idly by when statements like his not only influence my personal life
but also the way in which my human rights are restricted by a man who
influences millions of people who tune into watch him on a weekly basis and buy
his family’s countless products.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiCm0DcbwFHmBZE6MR_DU2irUib79hQPkR79JpUvJuZfQdUSMVSWxm2aycXQVfSSoy0cVJbfOK8NpBq_sYPIebatWL3MWVBK1PWAgsgRRYy6DYPBs7Dmn0yujgMzyKc1QQoR_9FgZWgfUjG/s1600/homophobia-gay-homophobia-equality-demotivational-poster-1228353290.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="276" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiCm0DcbwFHmBZE6MR_DU2irUib79hQPkR79JpUvJuZfQdUSMVSWxm2aycXQVfSSoy0cVJbfOK8NpBq_sYPIebatWL3MWVBK1PWAgsgRRYy6DYPBs7Dmn0yujgMzyKc1QQoR_9FgZWgfUjG/s320/homophobia-gay-homophobia-equality-demotivational-poster-1228353290.jpg" width="320" /></a><span style="color: #333333; font-family: Georgia; font-size: 11.0pt; mso-fareast-language: EN-US;">Does being against gay people make
you a homophobe? Yes. Does being against gay marriage make someone
anti-gay? Yes. It is that simple. We live in a country and exist in
an academy where we can’t make value statements against those individuals
standing on the wrong side of history and totally taking advantage and
profiting from the homophobia they produce and I have a problem with that.</span></div>
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<span style="color: #333333; font-family: Georgia; font-size: 11.0pt; mso-fareast-language: EN-US;">People are forming a metaphorical
human shield around Robertson and the rest of his <i>Duck Dynasty </i>clan
and I’m here to say that those individuals, defending him and toting the
declaration that homosexuality is a sin are on the wrong side of history and
people will not forget who stood on what side of that proverbial line in the
sand when this is all over.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 15.75pt; margin-bottom: 15.6pt; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<span style="color: #333333; font-family: Georgia; font-size: 11.0pt; mso-fareast-language: EN-US;">I no longer feel the need to save
people who feel the same way as Robertson. I no longer feel the need to
educate them about how I am just like them but I just happen to like
boys. I no longer feel the need to explain, over and over again, that
although Pope Francis stated: “<a href="http://www.catholicherald.co.uk/news/2013/07/29/if-a-gay-person-seeks-god-who-am-i-to-judge-him-says-pope/"><span style="color: blue;">If someone is gay and seeks the Lord with good will, who am
I to judge?”</span></a> it doesn’t make the Catholic church or any other
similar fundamentalist or conservative faith-based tradition any less
homophobic than they have been or erase the violent and hateful history to
those groups who didn't fit their definition of <i>normal</i>. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 15.75pt; margin-bottom: 15.6pt; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<span style="color: #333333; font-family: Georgia; font-size: 11.0pt; mso-fareast-language: EN-US;">Is Pope Francis’ statement
groundbreaking? Yes. Has Pope Francis, being the leader of the
Catholic church and major social, political, and cultural influencer changed
any type of church dogma pertaining to homosexuality? No – and that’s the
problem. People and groups in power need to create the change that we all
need to see in the world and until they and their cohorts are willing to do
that, I will not sit idly by and feel bad for calling someone or something a
homophobe and leaving it at that. The time has come for activists from
all walks of life, who no longer are willing to sit by and watch as their
rights are taken away from them, to take up the reins and finish the hard work
that our brother and sisters and not only fought but also died for. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 15.75pt; margin-bottom: 15.6pt; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEigxNYLuD8ghUwYteq_9RSYON_D6mTBfWQcqrjAVEQkbp3QTYHHyNIlJl-ESmEmtXvbtEJDpJylsarIXIvYG03PTuajt_qA5_GYHAcgcW6jXsoj0xuZnSPHmZfoFNdmcUTRJ_W_ROVRh3ON/s1600/god+hates+fags.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="213" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEigxNYLuD8ghUwYteq_9RSYON_D6mTBfWQcqrjAVEQkbp3QTYHHyNIlJl-ESmEmtXvbtEJDpJylsarIXIvYG03PTuajt_qA5_GYHAcgcW6jXsoj0xuZnSPHmZfoFNdmcUTRJ_W_ROVRh3ON/s320/god+hates+fags.jpg" width="320" /></a><span style="color: #333333; font-family: Georgia; font-size: 11.0pt; mso-fareast-language: EN-US;">Lately, this problem has become all
too personal. From Facebook status’ that declare Robertson and his clan
have the right to say whatever they want because the Bible told them so, to
individuals who are openly upset (as they should be) about his statements, I know
now that we no longer can live in a society where people can walk the line of
the homosexuality argument, examine both sides, and come to the conclusion that
it is wrong based on scripture – when you’re against homosexuality and you base
your reasoning on your <i>faith</i> that God condemns it or that
you’re simply following the teaching of Jesus, you’re <b>wrong</b>.
Jesus never said anything about homosexuality and Jesus, a man who hung out
with the poor and downtrodden, wouldn’t be hanging out with Robertson and his
homophobic brood who openly preach hate. Jesus loved sinners and Jesus
would rather be dancing with me in West Hollywood on a Friday night than
lugging through a swamp luring ducks into a trap with a duck caller made by a
clan who think that my sexual actions are similar to that of an individual
having sex with an animal.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 15.75pt; margin-bottom: 15.6pt; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<span style="color: #333333; font-family: Georgia; font-size: 10.5pt; mso-fareast-language: EN-US;">Call me simplistic or call me a
reductionist, but whether or not you call someone a faggot to their face or
behind their back </span><span style="color: #333333; font-family: Georgia; font-size: 11.0pt; mso-fareast-language: EN-US;">doesn't</span><span style="color: #333333; font-family: Georgia; font-size: 10.5pt; mso-fareast-language: EN-US;"> make
you any less homophobic. Using hegemonic biblical texts that no
longer define or reflect the views of many individuals from all walks of life
fighting for gay and lesbian rights and emphasizing the correct usage of
genitalia that deduce a minority class of citizens down to nothing more than
whom they decide to love is homophobia plain and simple. </span><span style="color: #333333; font-family: Georgia; font-size: 11.0pt; mso-fareast-language: EN-US;"><o:p></o:p></span><br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhfaAOgRm5R5rRXn8EB7EKyuRivTOHIQyeI1yPt9jsHIghAdkouWOfMx7bgQ43wdEBYZVx4_rThKwjolhqMCHG4QT0xG7o7T9dJC-lQhSIRGuOXDs2lT3dQfI5523Kg0A2ymqPiTITNUCKQ/s1600/dynasty.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="180" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhfaAOgRm5R5rRXn8EB7EKyuRivTOHIQyeI1yPt9jsHIghAdkouWOfMx7bgQ43wdEBYZVx4_rThKwjolhqMCHG4QT0xG7o7T9dJC-lQhSIRGuOXDs2lT3dQfI5523Kg0A2ymqPiTITNUCKQ/s320/dynasty.jpg" width="320" /></a></div>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<span style="color: #333333; font-family: Georgia; font-size: 11pt; line-height: 15.75pt;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">
<span style="color: #333333; font-family: Georgia; font-size: 11pt; line-height: 15.75pt;">Just like radical feminists in the
1970s who no longer stood by as patriarchal forces took away their personal,
political, bodily, and social autonomy to the ways that African American
refused to be silent about how they had (and have continued to be treated) by
racists, homosexual, lesbian, bisexual, transgender, queer, intersex, and
asexual men and women can no longer remain still in the face of targeted
hateful attacks upon our communities. Until religion, politics, and society
treat LGBTQIA people as equals no one is safe and until people are held
accountable, both publicly and privately, for their actions and statements,
this world will never change.</span></div>
</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 15.75pt; margin-bottom: 15.6pt; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<span style="color: #333333; font-family: Georgia; font-size: 11.0pt; mso-fareast-language: EN-US;">I recently tweeted that: “If it walks
like a duck and quacks like a duck, it’s most likely a duck; and in this case,
its most likely a family full of homophobes hiding behind a statement that lies
near the condemnation of shellfish.” I stand behind this statement and I
stand behind the millions of LGBTQIA people who know more about G-d’s love than
a man and family who claim to be <span style="color: blue;"><a href="http://insidetv.ew.com/2013/12/19/duck-dynasty-family-phil/">deeply religious.</a></span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 15.75pt; margin-bottom: 15.6pt; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhuruHGhwcMuuUM0cN8tsWrEZ7u-GAWyoCIu-jubtog39WHHMu4qcgCoEjVVNPMfdRjgcbyVRvYTx8yL7m9cBdBnJGB2kvM_nEUvkB2xdVrm3DAFp7l1bNzWkSOyc3ri0wtR49Bja70vaE4/s1600/We're+Sorry.jpeg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" height="313" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhuruHGhwcMuuUM0cN8tsWrEZ7u-GAWyoCIu-jubtog39WHHMu4qcgCoEjVVNPMfdRjgcbyVRvYTx8yL7m9cBdBnJGB2kvM_nEUvkB2xdVrm3DAFp7l1bNzWkSOyc3ri0wtR49Bja70vaE4/s320/We're+Sorry.jpeg" width="320" /></a><span style="color: #333333; font-family: Georgia; font-size: 11.0pt; mso-fareast-language: EN-US;">Although I find it difficult to
understand at times, I respect the position of those individuals and groups
that frequently contribute to this blog who choose to remain in these types of
traditions and fix the various problems equal rights activists must overcome
from the inside. I am clearly not from this camp and although I claim no
religious identity, I do respect their call to action to make a difference in
many of the conservative religious and faith-based communities I may and may
not have mentioned above. From the fight for women’s rights to the
inclusion of LGBTQIA people in religious communities, the fight for equality,
in my opinion, needs a flare of the radical. Historically, I would call
this the Alice Paul vs. Carrie Chapman Catt debacle – while some individuals
choose to cozy up to those individuals in power and work for change from the
inside out there are those who will literally starve themselves to death just
for the ability to taste freedom. Both are valid and worthy of respect
but what one, at the end of the day, will achieve the equality we all so crave? </span><br />
<span style="color: #333333; font-family: Georgia; font-size: 11.0pt; mso-fareast-language: EN-US;"><br />
If the <i>Duck Dynasty</i> debacle has taught us anything, it isn’t
that we live in a country where people like Phil Robertson (and many others)
have the ability to say whatever they want by hiding behind the Bible but
rather the fact that there are millions of people who only wish to have the
same inalienable rights as he does and solely takes for granted. To be
able to walk down the street holding the hand of the one you love is a great
feeling and an action that some of us aren't able to perform without fear.
<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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Johnhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02994349956675503806noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6811583905674476551.post-87155932372150180612013-09-25T00:00:00.000-07:002014-06-18T12:07:16.533-07:00Truths My Mother Taught Me<div style="text-align: center;">
Today is my mother's birthday and I'm so lucky that I have a space like <a href="http://www.feminismandreligion.com/" rel="nofollow" target="_blank">Feminism and Religion</a> to talk about not only her but also my journey.</div>
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Happy Birthday Mom! I love you!</div>
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The first question I always get asked when I’m in feminist spaces is: “What inspired you to become a feminist?” Although I could go into the various histories revolving around men’s involvement in the early stages of the women’s movement to the similarities between the LGBTQ and women’s movements, my simple answer has always relied on one person: my mother. </div>
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I’ll be the first to admit (as well as many other people who will join me in the same chorus) that my mother deserves Sainthood for having put up with all the shenanigans I put [and still continue to put] her through. From running away from our local Catholic church the moment she dropped me off at Sunday School, to swearing like a sailor on leave at a very early age in front of Father Schmidt (who still fondly remembers me and the list I brought in with me to the confessional booth), I taught my mother a few things I do not believe she would had ever thought she'd know during her lifetime. </div>
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Although I pride myself on my rejection of religion, the best lessons that I’ve learned ultimately deal with and relate to the <i>thing</i> I thought I swore off long ago. I am a feminist because of a Catholic woman who refused to take no for an answer on Sunday mornings because going to church wasn’t about listening to the Priest but rather listening to and learning from the woman who brought me there. I may have hated sitting in the pews every Sunday but it was there, in that space, where I began to learn what I now love so much. Though some people may refer to this as <i>lived religion</i>, I suggest that it is more relatable when we refer to it as <i>experiencing religion</i>. Lived religion, for me, implies past tense, something we’ve studied or done years, days, or even minutes ago. Experiencing religion is an on-going process, one that happens in the <i>now</i> rather than in the future. My mother left me when two other truths I’ll never forget:</div>
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1.) Love is love, whether divine or earthly, love does conquer all.<br />
2.) Trust G-d by trusting in yourself. </div>
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I still remember the day my mother drove away, leaving her baby and only son behind to pursue his dreams of getting a graduate degree in Women’s Studies. I was scared and I didn’t know whether or not I’d come running home to Wisconsin a week later. </div>
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As the white P.T. Cruiser we rented pulled out of the graduate housing complex I lived in, her words: “I’m so lucky to have a son like you,” resonated in my head. For the first time, I felt some semblance of divinity watching over me because I trusted my choice and myself. Trusting in myself led me to find G-d in whatever form he or she chooses to greet me in, I just have to be willing to open the door.</div>
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I’m still reminded of my mother’s parting words and the feeling I got each time I board a plane to go wherever those dreams and choices take me. However, this time, instead of hearing her say that she is the lucky one, I just chuckle, and smile as the plane lifts off the ground, and realize that it is I who is the lucky one. </div>
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<span style="background-color: #fcfcfc;"><span style="color: #333333; font-family: Open Sans, sans-serif;"><span style="line-height: 18.99305534362793px;">I never gave much credence to religion but through my mother, I met G-d, and through her I understood that I’m not a feminist because of the books I’ve read or the degrees I </span><span style="line-height: 18.984375px;">acquire</span><span style="line-height: 18.99305534362793px;"> but rather because of the woman I call mom. </span></span></span></div>
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Happy Birthday Mom! I wish I was there to celebrate with you in Wisconsin.<br />
<a data-mce-href="http://feminismandreligion.files.wordpress.com/2013/09/mom-and-brady.jpg" href="http://feminismandreligion.files.wordpress.com/2013/09/mom-and-brady.jpg" style="color: #3c2bb6;"><img alt="Mom and Brady" class="aligncenter size-medium wp-image-11441" data-mce-src="http://feminismandreligion.files.wordpress.com/2013/09/mom-and-brady.jpg?w=257" src="http://feminismandreligion.files.wordpress.com/2013/09/mom-and-brady.jpg?w=257" height="300" style="border: 0px; cursor: default; display: block; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;" width="257" /></a></div>
Johnhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02994349956675503806noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6811583905674476551.post-21339212341477404702013-08-20T00:00:00.000-07:002013-08-20T10:05:49.575-07:00The Hot Seat<div style="text-align: center;">
I've kept quiet during the whole <a href="https://twitter.com/search?q=hugogate&src=typd" target="_blank">#Hugogate</a> that has taken the feminist blogosphere by storm. Although I wanted to scream at the top of my lungs, I took a moment to step back, examine the situation, and think about the next step not only for myself but also for all of those who identify as feminists and happen to be men just like me. Men are here, doing good work, and making strides towards equality alongside women and yes, we can be angry over what happened, but lets use that as a force for good and overcome this pain and anger and continue to create a world that we all want to live and work in together, rather than further apart. As always, thanks to Feminism and Religion for not only having faith in me since the start of the project but also for continuing to have faith in me and the work I do. </div>
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I've been thinking a lot about what it means to be a male feminist lately. As the only man to be a permanent blogger on this very site until my colleague and friend <a data-mce-href="http://feminismandreligion.com/author/kilejones/" href="http://feminismandreligion.com/author/kilejones/" style="color: #3c2bb6;">Kile Jones</a> came on board, I took my role, as a man in a traditional feminist (online) space very seriously. Although the ongoing struggle to be a male feminist is one continually wrought with dialogues about power and positionality (amongst a host of many other topics), I am often conflicted when I see <a data-mce-href="http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2390917/California-professor-Hugo-Schwyzer-Twitter-meltdown-reveals-affairs-porn-star-23-year-old.html" href="http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2390917/California-professor-Hugo-Schwyzer-Twitter-meltdown-reveals-affairs-porn-star-23-year-old.html" style="color: #3c2bb6;">male feminists </a>take advantage and destroy the hard work that many, specifically on this site and beyond, worked hard to build and defend.</div>
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Not wanting to reopen old wounds or start new <a data-mce-href="https://twitter.com/search?q=Hugo%20Schwyzer&src=tyah" href="https://twitter.com/search?q=Hugo%20Schwyzer&src=tyah" style="color: #3c2bb6;">online battles</a>, men have been involved in feminism for quite some time. From James Mott chairing the first women’s rights convention, to radical feminist Andrea Dworkin’s life partner <a data-mce-href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_Stoltenberg" href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_Stoltenberg" style="color: #3c2bb6;">John Stoltenberg</a>, to <a data-mce-href="http://creativepromotionsagency.com/mk/" href="http://creativepromotionsagency.com/mk/" style="color: #3c2bb6;">Michael Kimmel </a>and <a data-mce-href="http://www.michaelkaufman.com/" href="http://www.michaelkaufman.com/" style="color: #3c2bb6;">Michael Kaufman’</a>s life long work to legitimizing not only men in feminism but also what it means to be a man who works for gender equality, being a man in feminism isn't easy and that’s how it is supposed to be.</div>
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I’ve wrote on this blog that men often have to deal with an <a data-mce-href="http://feminismandreligion.com/2012/11/13/please-excuse-for-having-a-penis-taking-a-back-seat-to-privilege-and-power/" href="http://feminismandreligion.com/2012/11/13/please-excuse-for-having-a-penis-taking-a-back-seat-to-privilege-and-power/" style="color: #3c2bb6;">internalized misogyny</a> that is a born characteristic trait that imparts that idea that men are not only dominant but also more powerful than women so they should, naturally, be atop of the proverbial pecking order. This internalized misogyny leads many men, who already or want to exist in feminist spaces, to speak up more than the women in the room when they should really be listening. However, what is more important than this internalized misogyny is how men, specifically, male feminists, fall victim to their ego by wanting to be <b>the </b>sole <a data-mce-href="https://twitter.com/hugoschwyzer/status/365920835216744449" href="https://twitter.com/hugoschwyzer/status/365920835216744449" style="color: #3c2bb6;">male feminist</a>.</div>
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While I still believe that men are endowed with these characteristics as a result of purposeful and subconscious cultural, societal and religious imagery that shows men as Gods, it is important to realize that while there the image of the one God may be something that many men idealize and aspire to, the idea of the one male feminist doesn't exist and it is not supposed to. Those who strive to be <b>the </b>male feminist are doomed to fail and they hurt those who came along for their ego driven ride and the feminist cause they sought to be a part of.</div>
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When it comes to leading, men are told to get to the front of the line no matter what the cost or who they hurt and women are told to take a backseat However, when it comes to feminism, especially men in feminism, men <em>must</em> to go to the back of the bus<em> first</em> and work their way up to the front fully knowing that although they may never reach that coveted front seat, the work they did to help the cause was just as important because equality doesn't mean anything when there is only one voice screaming from the rafters.</div>
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Hopefully the hurt that has been caused as of late can be healed and as a result more men join the cause to stop all forms of injustice that threaten not only women’s equality but also equality for all, no matter what.</div>
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Johnhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02994349956675503806noreply@blogger.comWest Hollywood, CA, USA34.0900091 -118.361744334.063708100000007 -118.4020848 34.1163101 -118.3214038tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6811583905674476551.post-51996828564233656952013-07-09T00:00:00.000-07:002013-07-09T00:00:02.451-07:00To Have and to Hold: Gay Marriage and the Religion Question<div class="MsoNormalCxSpFirst" style="text-align: center;">
I feel especially honored to have worked for a City that not only prides itself on human rights but also is a constant beacon to the community and the world, specifically during this critical moment in LGBT history. If one boy, from Ripon, WI can hear the equality ringing from the streets of West Hollywood when he was younger, then I can only imagine what's next and how the City will continue to change the world for the better. </div>
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This blog dedicated to both the City that I now call home but also the <a href="http://www.feminismandreligion.com/" rel="nofollow" target="_blank">Feminism and Religion </a>community that I am constantly honored to write for. </div>
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<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"><a data-mce-href="http://feminismandreligion.files.wordpress.com/2013/07/gay_marriage_81102178_620x350.jpg" href="http://feminismandreligion.files.wordpress.com/2013/07/gay_marriage_81102178_620x350.jpg" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img alt="gay_marriage_81102178_620x350" class="wp-image-10527 alignright" data-mce-src="http://feminismandreligion.files.wordpress.com/2013/07/gay_marriage_81102178_620x350.jpg" height="237" src="http://feminismandreligion.files.wordpress.com/2013/07/gay_marriage_81102178_620x350.jpg" width="420" /></a>Outrage. Anger. Fear. Hatred. These are just a few of the words that flashed across my Twitter feed as I woke up on that fateful Wednesday, June 26 morning when the Supreme Court of the United States ruled that the Defense of Marriage Act (or DOMA) was unconstitutional and that supporters of Proposition 8, the hotly contested voter initiative in California that banned same-sex marriage, had no standing. People were mad. However, it wasn’t just the typical kind of mad that is associated with hatred, it was a type of mad that was met with impossible anguish because what I was reading and feeling was a result of one thing: there was nothing more they could do.<br />
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What does all this mean? Questions from friends and family were filling up my inbox and although I wanted to take a moment to just hit “Reply All,” and input the words: Equality, I had to hold back and start to examine the notion that although equality may now be firmly on the proverbial table, there is still a lot of work to be done, specifically for gay marriage and those wanting to marrying inside the traditional church spaces they grew up in and not just the ones that have come out as open and affirming in recent years towards LGBT individuals.<br />
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The ongoing shift of public opinion in support of gay marriage and LGBT rights in recent years is encouraging but it still is only one piece of the puzzle. Working for the <a data-mce-href="www.weho.org" href="http://feminismandreligion.wordpress.com/wp-admin/www.weho.org">City of West Hollywood</a> has granted me the opportunity to see first hand the beauty and the work still left to be done. Although organizations such as <a data-mce-href="http://cafaithforequality.org/" href="http://cafaithforequality.org/">California Faith for Equality</a> or <a data-mce-href="http://www.eqca.org/site/pp.asp?c=kuLRJ9MRKrH&b=5609559" href="http://www.eqca.org/site/pp.asp?c=kuLRJ9MRKrH&b=5609559">Equality California </a>are doing an excellent job in recruiting faith-based communities and other religious organizations to join the fight for LGBT equality within religious communities the work and conversations that need to still occur outside of open and affirming churches is becoming a daunting and often overwhelming force of opposition. The amount of individuals who still do not support gay marriage or LGBT rights in general in conservative and oftentimes hyper patriarchal religious traditions such as Catholicism, Mormonism, Islam, Judaism and other conservative Evangelical traditions still remains a daunting number and it only appears to be growing now that there has been such a public declaration from public policy and legality standpoints that echo Hilary Clinton’s famous words that:<a data-mce-href="http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/post-partisan/post/clintons-geneva-accord-gay-rights-are-human-rights/2011/03/04/gIQAPUipcO_blog.html" href="http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/post-partisan/post/clintons-geneva-accord-gay-rights-are-human-rights/2011/03/04/gIQAPUipcO_blog.html"> “gay rights are human rights.”</a><br />
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The question that remains is not why do these religious groups not support gay marriage or LGBT rights in general but how are individuals, typically on the outside, supposed to convince members of these faith-based traditions to leave or possibly change their opinions if they still remain steadfast and stubborn on other progressive causes that are often discussed on this very blog. Women’s ordination, sexual ethics, women’s rights, and theological and religious equality in general are just a few causes that individuals on the outside believe would be no brainers when compared to tackling the issues of gay marriage and LGBT rights but still we have on-going and often exhaustive conversations about ensuring the full rights of women in faith-based traditions and communities.<br />
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The other question that remains may seem to be the icing on the cake but it is really the tip of the iceberg when we discuss issues like equality within religion: if people refuse to leave their religious traditions and communities when women, who are oftentimes the reason for the very success of not only religion but also faith-based communities in general, then do we really think or expect that they’ll leave when their LGBT brothers and sisters are also denied that same type of recognition but on top of it constantly told they are sinners and are going to hell? If a conservative religious traditions can’t give their mothers or sisters full equality, how can we expect them to give LGBT individuals the time of day?<br />
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<a data-mce-href="http://feminismandreligion.files.wordpress.com/2013/07/gay-marriage.jpg" href="http://feminismandreligion.files.wordpress.com/2013/07/gay-marriage.jpg" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img alt="Gay-Marriage" class="aligncenter wp-image-10525" data-mce-src="http://feminismandreligion.files.wordpress.com/2013/07/gay-marriage.jpg" height="237" src="http://feminismandreligion.files.wordpress.com/2013/07/gay-marriage.jpg" width="320" /></a>The issue of equality doesn’t just stop at gay marriage and LGBT rights but only begins there. Women’s rights, women’s ordination, and even the idea of a woman President are the only a few of the other pieces of the equality puzzle anxiously awaiting to be put together. As we have seen with the fight for equality, groups are banding together now more than ever before and although gay marriage may be on the front page of newspapers today, who knows what tomorrow could bring.<br />
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Johnhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02994349956675503806noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6811583905674476551.post-60263025589567782322013-06-11T00:00:00.000-07:002013-06-11T00:00:13.508-07:00God Doesn’t Live Here Anymore: Gay Bars and the Growing Divide Between Sexuality and Spirituality <div style="color: #333333; font-size: 13.333333969116211px; line-height: 18.99305534362793px; text-align: center;">
<span style="font-family: Courier New, Courier, monospace;">I'm always honored to be able to mix the various lives I lead together during my monthly contribution to the Feminism and Religion Project. I hope you enjoy this month's post and continue to check out the project! </span></div>
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My good friend and fellow <a data-mce-href="http://feminismandreligion.com/author/ezmerelda27/" href="http://feminismandreligion.com/author/ezmerelda27/">Feminism and Religion Contributor Marie Cartier’s</a> forthcoming book, <i><a data-mce-href="http://www.amazon.com/Baby-You-are-Religion-Spirituality/dp/1845531264/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1370918428&sr=8-1&keywords=baby+you+are+my+religion" href="http://www.amazon.com/Baby-You-are-Religion-Spirituality/dp/1845531264/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1370918428&sr=8-1&keywords=baby+you+are+my+religion">Baby You Are My Religion: Women, Gay Bars, and Theology Before Stonewall</a></i> argues<a data-mce-href="http://feminismandreligion.files.wordpress.com/2013/06/marie1.jpg" href="http://feminismandreligion.files.wordpress.com/2013/06/marie1.jpg"><img alt="" class="alignright size-thumbnail wp-image-10178" data-mce-src="http://feminismandreligion.files.wordpress.com/2013/06/marie1.jpg?w=150" height="137" src="http://feminismandreligion.files.wordpress.com/2013/06/marie1.jpg?w=150" style="border: 0px; cursor: default; float: right;" width="150" /></a> that American butch-femme bar culture of the mid-20<sup>th</sup> Century should be interpreted as a sacred space. Specifically, gay bars served as both communal and spiritual gathering spaces where butch-femme women were able to discover and explore not only their sexuality but also their spirituality. An opus of an academic accomplishment based off of the amount of in-depth interviews she conducted, Professor Cartier explores lived religion in an area that has become all too common within the LGBTQ community: the bar</div>
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The Palms, the last local and only lesbian bar to be found in city of West Hollywood, CA is <a data-mce-href="http://www.latimes.com/features/food/dailydish/la-dd-historic-lesbian-bar-the-palms-set-to-close-in-west-hollywood-20130507,0,1676563.story" href="http://www.latimes.com/features/food/dailydish/la-dd-historic-lesbian-bar-the-palms-set-to-close-in-west-hollywood-20130507,0,1676563.story">closing</a> its doors and I can’t help but wonder where its patrons or parishioners will now go?</div>
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With its closing, specifically at the end of <a data-mce-href="http://lapride.org/" href="http://lapride.org/">L.A. Pride weekend</a>, where thousands of LGBTQ individuals flock to West Hollywood to celebrate what makes our community truly unique, one has to begin to wonder where, if Professor Cartier’s thesis holds true, God has gone? </div>
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Does God exist within the LGBTQ community anymore or has the community itself abandoned God for all-night raves, dance clubs, alcohol, and hypersexualized and over commoditized fetishized forms of femininity and masculinity? Oftentimes, I find myself answering yes to the above questions. After surviving hate crime after hate crime and endless batches of newly elected conservative politicians hell bent on ignoring medical and social epidemic plaguing the very country they were elected to serve and protect, why would a community, oftentimes linked to sin itself, believe in a holy entity?</div>
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The overarching question at hand in regards to the closing of the Palms is not whether or not there is a space for God in the LGBTQ community anymore but rather what role does misogyny play within the very community sworn to respect and take pride in the very differences that makes itself truly unique? Scholar <a data-mce-href="http://www.amazon.com/Sisters-Saints-Women-American-Religion/dp/0195333098" href="http://www.amazon.com/Sisters-Saints-Women-American-Religion/dp/0195333098">Ann D. Braude</a> credits the success of religion to <span style="font-size: 13.333333969116211px; line-height: 18.99305534362793px;">the active and oftentimes overwhelming support of women. With 40% of West Hollywood’s 35,000 residents identifying as gay but only 3% identifying as lesbians one can deduce that the closing of the Palms signifies the growing divide between the LGBTQ community and spirituality as more women leave the proverbial "church spaces" that they have created. </span></div>
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T<span style="font-size: 13.333333969116211px; line-height: 18.99305534362793px;">he success of the LGBTQ community cannot be tied exclusively to gay men but also the struggles and successes of the lesbian community. Similar to the various ways in which women helped religious communities boom throughout the 18</span><sup style="line-height: 18.99305534362793px;">th</sup><span style="font-size: 13.333333969116211px; line-height: 18.99305534362793px;">, 19</span><sup style="line-height: 18.99305534362793px;">th</sup><span style="font-size: 13.333333969116211px; line-height: 18.99305534362793px;">, and 20</span><sup style="line-height: 18.99305534362793px;">th</sup><span style="font-size: 13.333333969116211px; line-height: 18.99305534362793px;"> </span><span style="font-size: 13.333333969116211px; line-height: 18.99305534362793px;">centuries in America, the lesbian community, as a whole, is integral to not only the successes of the LGBTQ community and the very cities and spaces they have helped to found. </span></div>
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With the exodus of women, so comes the migration of spirituality itself and one can only wonder, whether or not, there will ever be any room or spaces left for women where more individual are becoming continually transfixed by Adonises and abdominal muscles. <a data-mce-href="http://feminismandreligion.files.wordpress.com/2013/06/hot-man.jpg" href="http://feminismandreligion.files.wordpress.com/2013/06/hot-man.jpg"><img alt="" class="size-thumbnail wp-image-10180 aligncenter" data-mce-src="http://feminismandreligion.files.wordpress.com/2013/06/hot-man.jpg?w=121" height="150" src="http://feminismandreligion.files.wordpress.com/2013/06/hot-man.jpg?w=121" style="border: 0px; cursor: default; display: block; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;" width="121" /></a></div>
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If Professor Cartier’s thesis does hold true, we have to begin to wonder if women are fleeing and God is following them, where might they be looking for a new lease?</div>
Johnhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02994349956675503806noreply@blogger.com