Thanks GQ!

Reflecting on the things I learn on a monthly basis by reading GQ Magazine . . .

(April 2009 Edition)

1.  (cover) The guy who played the vampire guy on Twilight is the SAME guy who played Cedric Diggery in Harry Potter?!?  No way!  Hmmm . . . somehow Cedric Diggery just got a little bit hotter . . . 

2.  (page 44)  "Because after all, it's a man's world." Really?  And then you wonder why your girlfriends beat y'all over the head with feminist theory.  

*see image*

3. (page 60) Apparently galoshes are back.  With a vengeance.  In bright traffic cone orange.

4.  (page 79) I have to say it warms my heart a little when I see that a primarily "straight" man's magazine (although that can be debated . . . as I subscribe to it and I am sure I am not the only gay to do so) takes one for the team on tasteless gay humor.  The blurb about Andy Samberg's Gay Humor is both funny and thoughtful and most importantly, accurate.  

5.  (page 90)  Lenny Dykstra is a pompous asshole.  He doesn't really do much for the current image of rich people in the bailout/AIG/wallstreet-induced-recession era.

Then just when I think that I've had all I can take as far as witty takes on exercising male privilege, GQ always manages to end their issues with well written and touching articles.  Here are examples:

6. (pgs 99-101) Examples of men being (woefully sterotypical) men.

*interrupted by pgs 116-121 where I must ask myself yet again whether or not Neil Patrick Harris actually is cute or not.  The jury is still out.  

7.  The article starting on page 126 by John Rico on John Walker Lindh is very interesting.  On one hand, I don't really buy totally that he was just over in Afghanistan chillin' with the Taliban not really sure about what he had gotten himself into.  The man made a video condemning America for Christ's sake.  I mean, c'mon.  However, on the other hand, the McBushyism witch hunt that followed 9/11, where anyone and everyone with any kind of unpatriotic zeal was deemed a traitor to the US, it isn't really that hard to believe that the Bush Administration both wanted to make an example out of him and feed him to the angry lions that was the American Public at the time.  Do I think that he is totally innocent? Obviously  not.  I mean c'mon, it says on US passports that if you decide to engage in foreign military that you are forgoing your American rights and citizenship.  This is a guy who was in pursuit of extensive education - he wasn't dumb.  Yet at the same time, some of the comments printed in the article about how him and his family should be "butt fucked by the severed dick of a dead Muslim before being hanged and tossed into a sewer" doesn't really say much about the rational American public, both then and now.  

Nor does it say much about racism and homophobia.  But that, my friends, is an entirely different story.

All in all, it again just makes on think about the great PR machine that is the American Government and both the truths and the lies that get told to sell an image.

8.  The other interesting (and heart breaking) story starts on page 154 by Wil S. Hylton entitled "The Unspeakable Choice."  It follows the choice of a mother who must relinquish her mentally ill pre-teen son during the Nebraska Safe Haven outbreak because she has no other choices to turn to.  Hers is just one example of injustice and inequality in a system that can forget about those who are unfortunate.  And before you think I am being too soft on a mother who abandoned her child, I will leave you with the last paragraph of the essay:

"To save Skyler, she tried something new.  To save him, she gave up more than custody; she gave up the most fundamental thing of all: her pride.  Her pride as a mother, as a provider; her joy in those precious moments, however scarce, when the family was one, and it worked.  Gone now, gone forever.  And the irony is, if you wanted one signal of a parent's intentions, one clue of a mother whose commitment was total, it would be her willingness to sacrifice everything for her child - not only the child, but the essence of herself.  It would be the mother willing to die for her children, to die inside.  And Lavennia Coover is dying." (page 162)

From GQ Magazine, April 2009

Why I'm Against Gay Marriage

Yes, I said it. I am against it. And I am against it to the point in which I think you should be too. It’s bad. Don’t get me wrong, I think that the recent rulings in Iowa, Vermont and even here in DC are all good things as far as finally recognizing individual rights, and rights for those who are in a minority. Yet at the same time, we as a gay community are walking the balance of a very thin line when it comes to all of this.

Here’s the thing I want to get out of the way right off the bat: I am not saying that there should not be equal rights for gay couples. I think there should be. I think gay couples should demand and be entitled to the same legal benefits as heterosexual couples. However, within the term “heterosexual” lies the problem with gay marriage. Not only is marriage itself a religious institution that is legally recognized in a country that has both freedom of religion and separation of church and state, but marriage is also a heteronormative institution in which the gay community is assimilating itself into in order to fit standards that people have fought and died for so that the community does not, in fact, have to conform to those standards. Yes that’s a long sentence, but bear with me.

Perhaps my problem is not necessarily with gay marriage per se, but marriage itself. Why? Why do we need this? More importantly, why does the gay community need it? We fought for years, and are still currently fighting, for the opportunity to remain outside of the sexual “norm,” to be able to allow ourselves to spill over the levees of the binary so that what, we can then conform to it? So that we can allow our rights to be dictated to us by those very people who have done the oppressing for so long? So that we can appear to be a little bit more “normal” in the eyes of those who would rather not allow themselves to come down to our level of culture, so that instead we have to “raise” ourselves up to theirs? So that conservatives can have a little bit more reason to be more comfortable around us? So that now we really can’t go to hell if even some form of god views our union as holy? I mean really, what is the reason?

The problem with all of this is that we are making ourselves more relatable to them. And perhaps this is the little angry teenager inside me saying this, but why do we have to? The problem with majorities in general is that they are rarely forced to experience anything other than what they consider acceptable, so instead of embracing new ideas they expect everyone else who is not in the said majority to conform to theirs. And here are us gays, pride flags and all, sashaying our way right into heteronormative culture, calling it “groundbreaking.” It’s not groundbreaking, it’s assimilation.

Also, let me be very clear: I am not at all opposed to being in a long term relationship with one person. If that’s what makes you happy, you should be allowed to do so and to celebrate that commitment with those you hold most dear to you. But what about those people who don’t want that? What about those people who are in committed relationships, but who have extra partners, both when their significant others know about it and not? What about those who operate outside traditional relationship standards? Should their commitments on whatever level not be recognized also? Are their relationships not also valid? Just because they might not be dressed in white and throwing rice doesn’t mean that the commitment to their “other” isn’t just as strong as the one dressed up in fluff and flowers. And for those who are in non-traditional relationships, y’all need to speak up and stop being afraid to be seen. Part of the stigma that is associated with the idea of non-traditional relationships is because those in them still feel the internal social shame that comes along with it. I mean, if y’all are gay, you are already dealing with a lot of internal social shame, so you might as well just get it all out on the table.

Ok, but so then what? What happens when gay marriage is totally accepted across the country? What do we have left to fight for? We as a community have pushed all of our effort into having our relationships be able to be seen just like everyone else. Is that really the end of discrimination for the gays? Teens are still committing suicide, people are still being killed for sucking cock in a bathroom in Nebraska, trannies are still denied employment in most of the country, I don’t really see how gay marriage is Mr. Clean’s Magic Eraser to all of this. The only thing it solves is the gay communities’ ability to differentiate themselves from the standard, when in fact it is the standard itself that needs to be taken into question. It is the standard of heteronormativity that needs to be broken. It is the standard of the gender binary that needs to be broken. It is the standard of “male” and “female” roles that needs to be broken. It is the standard of what is viewed as “right” and “wrong” from a morally religious and puritanical background that needs to be broken. We in the gay community pride (no pun intended) ourselves on being diverse and accepting to those who are misfits and outlaws in the normative society. Yet we strive to be apart of that. Perhaps it is the plight of any minority to want what the majority has, but when what the majority does have does not fit our standards of what we stand for, the majority has to be rejected and something new has to take its place. It is our job as the minority to be ambassadors to our own cause, to not allow the dictatorship of rule overcome who and what we stand for, but through diplomacy (and perhaps sometimes a little civil disobedience) to extend ourselves to those who don’t understand to make them see that the way we chose to live is not wrong, it is just different. And that they need to accept that.

Hey, if you want to get married that is by all means your individual choice, and I personally have no problem with that. If you need your relationship to be validated by those whom you elect to represent you, or if you need a celebration with the people whom you love or if you even just want an excuse to get trashed with the person you’ve chosen to spend a significant part of your life with, I really do totally understand (especially the last part). And I might even be persuaded to believe that if you should so chose that for yourself, that you should have that right to do so. But let’s just say that when that very institution that we so long to be apart of decides to ban us from participating, what do we do? Instead of fighting for recognition of individual rights we instead fight for the right to be part of that institution. We as a community lose the very rights we have fought so long to attain: to be sexually free from that institution. Instead it is the institution’s constraints that we are now striving to be apart of.

Lady Gaga's Life, White Men Acting Asian, And More!

Things occupying my mind as of right now:

1. Lady Gaga's cancelled DC shows.

How much uproar have I heard about this?  Or rather the question should be, how much do I really need to hear.  Yes, the Christ of glam/indie/electro god seekers cancelled her sold out DC shows to be on American Idol.  Since the canceling, people have been going into Gaga hysterics, calling for a boycotting of Lady Gaga and all her music.  

My, aren't we fickle lovers.  

The gays are especially bad.  An email from a popular "indie" gay party (i.e. those who claim not to serve Satan and her minions aka Britney Spears (et al) . . . even though they still probably really like "Slave 4 U" and have it hidden in the corners of their iPods even though Mac products are "douchey") called her act of American Commercialism blasphemous in the eyes of all that is "cool" i.e. non-main stream.  They grabbed their pitch forks and torches and stormed up to 18th street to root out all the evil that is Gaga from D.C. and search for a new lightning bolt clad goddess.  And to them I say god speed.  

And I also say get over it.  Lady Gaga has a life outside you and of DC.  Yes, it is disappointing.  Yes, American Idol is not exactly the standard when it comes to producing pop sensations or even talented artists. Yes, it is all about money.  But then again that is the whole Recording Industry.  If Lady Gaga was truly a maverick in that area she wouldn't have signed with a major record label and she wouldn't be producing glitzy videos and she wouldn't be doing  . . . well . . . anything except sitting outside of Penn Station in spandex holding out an upside down wig begging for some change.  

But hey, we all gotta make a living.  

And yes, I heard "Just Dance" last summer, almost a year before it became mainstream, mostly because I was in San Francisco, where everything cool materializes as if it was being beamed down from Planet Out. However, I don't really see how "grassroots" played any part in her success.  I see it mostly as how most artists get famous: some people like them, who turn them onto other people who like them, who turn them onto other people who like them and so on.  I didn't see a Lady Gaga non-profit spring up or a Lady Gaga petition being handed out so that she can serve her fans with disco-clad music.  No, I only saw a talented young woman trying to make it big.  And make it big she has.  So for those who were giving her the big "f*ck you," I hope you made one big gesture.  I'm sure I'll see you at the concert when she reschedules it and sing along at the top of my lungs by your side.  

2. White Men Playing Asians

Yes, I hear the cries of the blacks saying they are both under and misrepresented in movies.  But hey, when you think y'all have got it bad, just think of the Asians.  I mean, y'all haven't had white guys pretend to be black in movies for at least, what, a good 50 years?  Maybe more?  And yet today, as I watched the Dragon Ball Z trailer (hey, I was bored) I see some white kid being cast in the main role of a JAPANESE anime turned live action movie.  Really?  Are we short on Asians recently?  Because last I checked, in the JAPANESE anime, Goku was, well . . . JAPANESE.  

Yes I know that I know his name, you don't have to remind me.  

And then the only Asians in the entire movie were the old "kung fu mentors" who spoke in accents or the fetishized "hot asian female who can kick your ass."  The other main female character in the movie was white also.  

Now, even if this was your run of the mill Hollywood movie who cast all white people, I would say "hey, you know what?  I know Hollywood is racist.  I know the race relations in this country.  I know that people in Nebraska and Oklahoma are much more comfortable seeing someone in a movie named Jim or Bobby than Zhang Wei or Jamil Okunyka."  

But this is a movie, based on Anime from an Asian country, where the majority of the people are Asian.  Is it too much to ask that they at least be represented by their own racial identity?  

And just when I thought I hated Clint Eastwood movies, at least he had the balls to make Letters From Iwo Jima with actual Japanese actors.

3. Upcoming Movie Season

And speaking of movies, aside from Dragon Ball Z or excuse me, Dragon Ball Evolution, I was perusing the Apple (douchey) movie trailers (instead of doing the massive amounts of work I have to do) and there are a lot of movies coming out the next few months that look really really good.  A lot of indie and foreign films are now getting the chance to be seen thanks to that of Slumdog Millionaire et al and I think the world will be a better place for it.  You know, learning about other people's cultures and ideas is always a good thing, despite what Rush Limbaugh might tell you.  

April Blog Extravaganza and UN Human Rights.

So, in an effort to expand ideas, knowledge and discourse (as well as in conjunction with a class) I have decided that I am dedicating myself to my blog this month as a form of apology for neglecting it recently. For the month of April, I am dedicating myself to writing at least one post per day.

Let it hereby be know that April is official blog month, at least according to my own purposes.

So in my first official act in the blogging extravaganza, I read today that the US has finally jumped on board for a seat in the UN's global Human Rights Council. They have this quote by Hil Clinton saying that Human Rights is back on board as a quality of US foreign policy.

All I have to say is: Really? Did it really take an entire 8 year administration for the American government to again become a supporter of global human rights?

It's also interesting to note that not everyone is on board because of "anti-Israel" connotations that the UN's HRC has. Now, the debacle in the middle east is obviously far greater than anything I can say in a few sentences here, but while I am in support for all people to have a space to call home, to say that "God" has appointed Israel is kind of insane. I mean, let's not forget the W. told the world that "God" told him to invade Iraq and free it's people. And how is that any different than saying that "Allah" is holding that land for the Muslims? It's not. The only main difference is that the Palestinians were there first. I'm not saying that they are right. But neither are the Jews. And the bottom line is all of this is that people need to stop being afraid to talk about the real issues of displacement so that we can start talking about resolutions.

Yes, I'm sure the UN HRC is highly politicized. Why? Because it's politics. Since when is the American public afraid to take on anything that is highly political?

Punjab in lipstick.

Hearing that Bobby Jindal, the GOP's new poster boy for change, ("He's young! He's not white!"), was going to make the Republican "rebuttal" to Obama's State of the Union, signifying Jindal's GOP "coming out," makes my stomach hurt in the same kind of way as when I heard that John McCain picked Sarah Palin to be his V.P. once Hillary was out of the race. Only Jindal can name a newspaper he reads. Which makes my stomach hurt more.

Stimulate This!

I am so sick of hearing about the stimulus package. Really, after resounding debt from the Iraq war, we as a nation choose now to be financially conservative? For all their hootin' and hollerin', the GOP was more than willing to sell the lower class's left kidney in order to find those ever elusive WMD's in the name of patriotism, but now that a democratic administration has chosen to spend that money on our own soil instead of abroad, there is all this turmoil? And really, enough with the flogging of Obama for his lack of "bi-partisainship." It's a little alarming that out of how many house republicans, NOT ONE was in favor. Really? Not one of y'all thought his might be a good idea, even though your GOP governers are foaming at the mouth for potential stimulus money? I find it hard to believe that not one had an orignial thought and wanted to support a democratic legislation, but instead were too busy being afraid of backlash from their own party to do so. Obama tried to get all y'all involved, but you wanted nothing to do with it, so stop bitching. Maybe if y'all could stop pouting for 5 minutes and play nice for once, you'd have more of your ideas heard.

And this isn't to say that house democrats are the saints in this. Jack Cafferty on CNN.com has a scathing commentary on Pelosi and Reid, part of which sounds all too much like them not to be true. However, even though (as I posted before) the meager $50 million for the arts was thrown out quicker than a Planned Parenthood brochere in the Palin household (how goes those wedding plans, Bristol?) as I was reading where the money was actually going, my first thought was, "gee, we as a nation should already be doing all these things as a part of being united under the same borders, why is it taking an economic meltdown to get it done?" Things like, oh, repairing roads and bridges. Or renewable energy. Or modernizing schools. You know, basic stuff that for the past 8 years has been neglected due to shoveling money to the middle east rather than to our own children. Obama is absolutely right to essentially say to all the GOP that y'all got us into this mess, and now you're acting like 5 year olds on how to get out? Yeah sorry, no sympathy.

Then it occurred to me that maybe after 8 years of Wall Street greed, military spending, environmental rape, civil rights abolishing, etc, that the actual cost to try to go back to a semi-normal state can be totalled to roughly 787 billion dollars.

What recession? As long as we've got Rummy, it's all good.

I wonder if the $46,790 that the Department of Defense just spent on their one of a kind Donald Rumsfeld portrait is covered in the stimulus package. But hey, you know what, even though the $50 million allocatted for the arts was the first thing to go once negotiations started (thank you Mr. Coburn, Ms. Feinstein et al) out of a (then) almost 1 trillion dollar package, it's nice to know that the U.S. Government still has some money left to spend on the arts. Here's to eternally watching over things, Mr. Rumsfeld. Now that you're immortalized for the great job you've done, let's hope you won't have to stand more than 8 hours any longer.