Hello, everyone who still reads this ridiculous blog. I’m
going to be doing one of those “rant” posts because a lot of things have just
been really grinding my gears lately. Also, this post is more than likely going
to go off in several different directions. You’ll either follow it or give up.
This first issue doesn’t make me mad but the enemies of the
FANTABULOUS news given by the Supreme Court ruling do. There are still people
in the year 2015 that think gay people are subhuman, that they don’t deserve
the same rights as everyone else. Guess what? THEY DO! These people also came
from their mother’s womb, just like you. Just because they have a different
sexual preference than you doesn’t mean jack.
Now, I was raised in a pretty churchy household in WV. Mom
was raised Protestant, dad was raised southern Baptist. Of course I grew up
reading my bible. I was in church every Sunday and Wednesday. I went to church
camp every year up until I was 15 then I started counseling there. Am I proud
of that? Absolutely not. I had a lot of hate in my heart. I don’t know whether
that was at god or if that was because I knew there was no god at that point.
One thing I do know is that in the past, I was very mean to others who were
different than me because that’s how I was raised. I was taught not to like gay
people because it was bad and that those people were going to go to hell. This
didn’t necessarily come from my mother. While she did have a few gay friends
growing up, she didn’t condone the lifestyle but she didn’t hate those people
either. Unfortunately, I think she’s grown out of the former and into the
latter.
My best friend is gay. I remember hearing the news that the
Supreme Court ruled in favor of marriage equality. I cried and texted him with
all caps and seventy different emojis “CONGRATULATIONS, YOU CAN GET MARRIED
NOW! I CAN’T WAIT!!!” I kept crying. What a freaking relief. This should never
have been an issue but I understand why it was. People are really hateful and I
am so sad that I was one of them even if I didn’t understand what “being gay”
meant besides “one does not lie with a man as one lies with a woman; that is
detestable.” I understand why some people don’t like the decision from SCOTUS.
It’s upsetting, of course, to know that 98% of my family is those people. I can
only imagine what would happen should someone if my family find out that I am
someone, in terms of a relationship, who doesn’t care what gender someone is or
isn’t.
Many of you know the story about my decision to leave the
church. It certainly wasn’t easy to do and honestly, I struggle with it
sometimes. Do my parents still love me even though they know I’m not a believer
anymore? Of course they do. Do they wish I still believed? Absolutely. They
think they’ve failed me somehow but it’s quite the opposite. Growing up the way
I did taught me to learn to think for myself. I never did that until I was 15.
There were so many questions left unanswered and still cannot be answered to
this day. I am content with this for the most part. I have learned that all I
really need to do is to just live my life. If I happen to learn awesome shit on
the way (like when I watch Bill Nye or hear Neil deGrasse Tyson talk), that’s just
a bonus.
So now that I’ve gone COMPLETELY off topic, let’s get back to
things that make me angry.
People who believe women do not have the right to govern
their own bodies: what is wrong with you? There are a million things
Republicans could be doing to try and fix things and yet the only thing that
bothers them is Planned Parenthood and the fact that sometimes women decide
that they don’t want a parasite living inside them. Old, straight, white men
just LOVE to try and govern other people’s lives and bodies, especially
women’s. It’s kind of gross, really. These men will never ever be able to have
a child. They’ll never know the pain a woman has to go through. They think that
women just WANT to have abortions. I wouldn’t be surprised if they tried to pass
a bill to make every woman who has a miscarriage to be classified as a
murderer.
Also: bills to make abortions illegal past 20 weeks even in
the case of rape/incest…really? Trying to tell a woman who will either 1) give
birth to a dead child or 2) die giving birth to a child that they cannot abort?
The Republican Party is nothing but human garbage. Most women do not just
decide “hey, I’m totally gonna have unprotected sex and then if I get pregnant,
I’m gonna spend all this money to kill a POTENTIAL child.” It just doesn’t work
that way. Now before anyone jumps down my throat: yes, some women have had more
than one abortion; some women do not care, etc. but that’s not MOST women. Most
women struggle with the idea of making a decision to abort a potential child.
It’s not an easy thing to do. “How will I support it?” “Will it be healthy?”
“Will *I* be healthy?”
There are a ton of arguments for and against abortion (which
is maybe an entire other post I’ll do soon) but the main thing is this: a
woman’s body is her own. Until a fetus is viable, until it is able to live
outside the mother’s womb on its own…it is NOT a child. Republicans want to ban
abortions and force women to carry children to term and then what happens? Are
the mother and child homeless? Does she put yet another child into the system?
See, Republicans only care about “human life” when it’s not actually a human
life. Once a child is born, they don’t have to worry about it anymore. It’s
disgusting.
It is 2015; Roe v Wade passed in 1973. It has been forty-two
damn years since the Supreme Court ruled that the due process clause extends to
a woman being able to have an abortion by the third trimester of pregnancy. Why
are people STILL caught up on this? Stop it. Just stop it.
Donald Trump is stupid and guns are still an issue.
Okay, next: Tyler, the Creator is some kind of rapper or
something that writes really misogynistic lyrics and raps about raping women
and also killing women and assaulting/mutilating their corpses. Pretty serial
killer-esque right? Apparently he had shows to do in Melbourne, Australia but a
feminist group protested this and so his shows were cancelled. He said some
really awful things about the woman who is a member of said group. Anyway, I
happened to be browsing facebook when I came across a friend who lives in
Australia talking about how he can’t wait
for this woman to “get raped and beaten senseless” getting the shows
cancelled, trying to be funny about it. I wish I’d taken a screenshot of it but
I was so goddamn disgusted that I immediately unfriended him which makes me sad
because I’ve known him a long time and he’s been a good friend to me.
Now don’t get me wrong: I’m ALL about free speech. I might
not like what you have to say but I’ll always fight for you to be able to say
it. However, I personally don’t feel like rape/sexual assault/domestic violence
is ever funny. Again, most of you reading this know my story and know how I
feel about it so I am not afraid to 1) speak my mind on the subject and 2) tell
you to fuck off and never talk to you again. I am not someone who needs trigger
warnings for anything but I do realize that some people are not as advanced in
their recovery as I am (and even then, I’m hardly what you call “advanced”).
Some things still get to me, like depictions of violence/rape in books, movies,
or TV shows. I wouldn’t wish the things that have happened to me on my worst
enemy. No one should have had to go through that.
Seeing things like that Facebook post though? I felt so many
emotions as I read it. I was angry, sad, disappointed in my friend. I didn’t
offer an explanation to him before I hit the unfriend button. This is the
second time I’ve done that but now I’ve learned my lesson. He says a lot of
controversial things. He fat-shames people, hates women who label themselves as
feminists, is vehemently anti-theist, and makes a mockery of those who have been
hurt before. He was a genuinely good friend to me; always listening to me rant,
giving me advice about my relationships, making me laugh. But at some point, I
can only see so much of that and that was the last straw. Wishing for a woman
to get raped and beaten within an inch of her life? What kind of human being
are you when you say those things? I know he isn’t the only one either.
While I’m on the subject, I’ve been looking for a therapist
here in Chicago. Before now, I was never really ready to face what happened to
me. I was going into a lot of depressive states and I would take my anger out
on my loved ones. I was lashing out. It wasn’t anything that they’d done; it
was what is hiding underneath. It was then that I realized that I needed to
face this head on. I’ve been hurt in more ways than anyone can imagine. I’m not
looking for sympathy; I’m just looking to move on. My fiancé recently purchased
a book that we are going to be reading together, “Allies in Healing.” It’s an
advice book for people whose partners have witnessed sexual trauma. David
purchased this book by himself to read and I’ve been so lucky that he is so
incredibly supportive.
Anyway…wow. This isn’t even the way I wanted this post to go
but oh well. That’s just how I am.
