Smackie the Frog

I hate it when I see these religious conservatives talk about “family values” or work at a place with a name like “The American Center for Values and the Family”. Why? Is it because I’m a savage liberal who wants to eat babies and party in the jungle with naked savages? Maybe. Or maybe it is because I have values, too, but the implication of these groups is that because I’m not like them, that I don’t.

What brought this to the front of my mind was Bush’s newest nomination to the Supreme Court. It has also made me think about what other country I’d like to live in. I’ve heard good things about the Philippines. But as I was driving home and stuck in traffic I started a list in my head of my values. Things that I would work to advance if I ever, for some reason, started a group called “Nathan’s Group for Values and Naked Savages”. Here’s what I’ve come up with so far.

Religion is great. You have your God. Let me have my God. But keep your God to yourself. And keep your God completely out of government, and preferably the public eye. It is a private decision, and you have no right telling other people how they should worship. And you have no right to force the government to legislate based on what your God tells you. Maybe my God tells me something else, and that’s just fine.

Gay people are people. Just like everyone else. And gay relationships are relationships, just like all other relationships. And gay people should be allowed to get married and have all the benefits associated with it. Why? Because marriage is a social institution, not a religious one. Why? See previous point. There is no logical reason that gay people shouldn’t be allowed to be married. It is bigoted, the same way that people didn’t used to (and some still don’t) think that people of different races should be allowed to get married. Gay people marrying has no effect on your marriage, or really anything to do with your life.

What people do in their bedrooms with other adults is their business. I don’t care. If they want to fuck each other in the ass while listening to ABBA and eating chocolate covered rats, hey, that’s their deal. I don’t want them in my bedroom telling me what to do, so I’m not going to go into their bedroom and tell them what to do. People who want to legislate things like this are perverts who get off by talking about it in public and by calling it a sin. There might even be statistics to back that up, but I’d doubt it.

If people want to do things to themselves that don’t harm anyone else, I don’t care. Wanna shoot up heroin and sit in your room and stare at the ceiling for 20 hours? More power to you. That doesn’t harm anyone. Alcohol and tobacco are legal, why not other stuff? As long as people don’t harm other people with their actions, what does it matter?

Women get to do with their bodies whatever they want. I don’t have one, so who am I to tell them what to do with it? If I were a woman, I sure as hell wouldn’t want some slimey old pervert who has never met me legislating what I can do with my body. How do I know this? Because as a man I don’t want some slimey old pervert who has never met me telling me what I can do with my body.

Civil rights are one of, if not the most, defining measure of our society. I think that if Martin Luther King, Jr. were still around today he’d be ashamed that in the time since he died, we’ve only come this far. Everyone should be given an equal chance, despite what they look like. But because our society is full of people who won’t give those people an equal chance, we need affirmative action to make sure those people get the chance. Won’t it be great when the day comes that we don’t need it, but today isn’t that day.

Health care should be a right. I hate it when people say that health care isn’t a right. Fuck you and your rich, arrogant ass. How can I feel good about myself when there are people out there who are sick and dying when they shouldn’t be? Now I don’t know what the solution is, but no child should wake up in this country not able to go to the doctor and get better. If my taxes have to go up a little bit to make that happen, that’s fine. I don’t mind if my money goes someplace that helps.

Sending troops to fight unnecessary wars is criminal. When people my age and younger are dying over lies that were told by people in positions of immense power, it makes my blood boil. People should not have to risk their lives over deception. We owe the people who protect us better than that.

The poor in this country deserve our help. Enough of them are there for reasons out of their control that we as a country should step up and make sure that their lives aren’t tormented and miserable. Again, if my taxes have to go up a little bit to make that happen, fine. This is an acceptable use of my money. And rich people, you can step up too. Not only with taxes, but by donating or creating foundations to help out. In many cases you built your wealth on the backs of these people and you don’t have any right to turn your back on them.

Goodness is judged by what you do, not by what you say or look like. I don’t care if you curse like a sailor, listen to rap music, have 30 piercings and 15 tattoos. If you lead a good life then you are a good person, and no one has any right to look down on you for anything else. People that do should work on their own problems.

Basically, I’m a pretty crazy liberal. But as my sister likes to point out, in most of the instances throughout the last 50 or even 100 years, when liberals and conservatives took sides on an issue, the liberals ended up being right in the long run. Civil rights, Vietnam, Pepsi being better than Coke. It is all there, you just have to look.