Burn the Heretic, Slay the Weak

Don't read the story, just read the headline, then read the rest.

Conservatism in this country has agitated me for a while now, but lately it's had me flying off the handle at every random opportunity.

I'm fairly progressive and equal rights and recognition has always been an itch for me, so, logically this would extend to homosexuals too. So the whole, "homosexuality is bad... M'kay. Uh, if you do it, then you are bad... M'kay," infuriates me. This isn't really anything new, but today I hit it hard and fast. I'm reading the campus newspaper, which I've been tending less to do, but you know how it is: you're bored, you left your reading at home, the only thing around is the campus paper, so you pick it up and read it. Anyway, in the back they have a section where people can randomly send in emails and get made fun of. It's like Strongbad, but less funny and mostly less animated, which increases the less funny. So I'm reading through it and it's pretty much standard fair until I hit this conservative guy talking about how he's not homophobic, but - his words not mine- that he's, "...sick of them... homo-nauseas." After shouting a, "what the fuck," in my usual unrestrained volume on the bus and much blinking I come even further to grips with just how weird this whole thing is. Hate speach can be trumpeted around like it's no big deal and we're so used to it, we don't even register it as weird anymore; we are surprised if these folks don't unleash statements about the evils of homosexuality.

What gets me the most is that these people adamantly state that they aren't prejudiced in anyway. I love that; at least racists are up front about it. I guess I can't see how you can take what they say and interpret it as anything but discriminatory. Ridiculous, thank goodness I live in a bastion of progressiveness. Except for that Pawlenty bullshit, but let's not talk about that right now.

-Thomas