The good old days- they were terrible!

Some of the opposition to gay marriage seems to boil down to "well, that's not the America I know."  So?  "One man and one woman is the way things are supposed to be, because that's how I (or my parents) lived."  That's not America, though.  Those feelings aren't American or patriotic.  They're false nostalgia.  They're ridiculously self-centered and ignorant.  And they show a deep lack of understanding of history.

Racial intermarriage used to be illegal.  (I'll probably do a post on that someday.)  When I started dating a black woman, a few people said to me "that's not the way I was brought up."  I don't care if you were brought up by wolves; I was brought up to respect people, whatever their color, or whether they had a disability or a strange name, whatever.  I was brought up to respect the principles of America.  Not just the traditions, because some of those aren't that great.  Hatred, discrimination, exclusion... Good old American values, right? We're not perfect, and we never have been.  But do we uphold those "traditions?"  Or do we honor the principles we were founded on?

What does America stand for?  Imposing your ideas on others?  Denying people their rights to begin with?  Maybe you think that, but there's a group of people who would disagree with you, called the Founders.  They might never have imagined gay marriage, but there are lots of things they couldn't have imagined, which we take for granted: the internet, cars, planes, a black president.  Some things we do now might have shocked them, but they were good enough and smart enough that they would have come to terms with things.  I bet Thomas Jefferson would sit down and think about it, and decide that it was fair.

I think many conservatives have a shallow view of history, of tradition, of the Constitution. They want them to mean what they want, but they don't think hard about them, and don't put them in context.  I'm going to go ahead and say it: What it comes down to is, they don't like America.  Don't like freedom (well, they love it for themselves, but don't want to share it.)  They wish for something that never was.  They want to return to that false past, and don't like the present.

Maybe they're dreaming of the '50s, which I guess was a paradise for them or their parents.  Don't expect me to live in your rose-colored version of the past.  If you want to, then by all means do.  Just know that it's not real and never was.  The '50s, if that's what you're remembering, weren't idyllic.  100 or 200 years ago, things weren't perfect either.  Your vision of the past isn't always what it was actually like.  And even if it's accurate, that doesn't mean we should go back there.

I have a theory: most people think their childhood era was ideal.  Well, it wasn't always.  And even if it was, it's a very small slice of the real world, and can't be applied to everything and everybody.  Open your eyes.  Tradition is what you grew up with.  What was true in the '50s is not true now, and might not have been true 100 years ago.  Get over it.  You have a selective memory; you're wearing rose-colored glasses.  Or purposely whitewashing the past.

I'm a history buff, and sometimes I'm asked what era I would like to live in.  Certainly there have been interesting times in the past, and it'd be cool to go back for a bit and see things, experience things.  But there were uncomfortable, unpleasant, and just horrible things about every era too.  I'm happy in the present, and looking forward to the future.  I hope we remember the past, and learn from it, and move forward into the future, with liberty and justice for all.


-----This entry's title is stolen from a book------

Musical Memories

I think the first music I ever bought was a Pat Benatar 8-track.  Yeah.  And even though that might be a stereotypical teen boy crush, I liked her music then and still do.  She is an amazing singer, writes many of her songs, and is still out there touring.


You Better Run- huge when it came out. I didn't know till recently that it was a cover of a Rascals tune. I like her version better.  Also, it was the 2nd video shown on MTV (after "Video Killed The Radio Star" which I also remember...)


Hit Me With Your Best Shot


I'm Gonna Follow You


Heartbreaker


Precious Time


Crying- another cover, and a damn good one, though I like the original better in this case.


My Clone Sleeps Alone- a weird one, but I kinda like it...

Down to earth

I'm an airplane nut.  And I've noticed something odd lately.  With the sequester starting to take effect, and cuts all over the place, I'm seeing cuts to aviation.  Cuts to things I love, and sometimes in ways that scare me, etc.  But what I've really noticed is the reaction, in the media and from people I know.  Aaaah- they're cutting back on airshows!  Geez, Obama might actually charge us to go to museums!  (Of course they phrase it that way...)  My local air traffic control tower is closing!  (Okay, this one is a legitimate safety issue, but still.)  I love aviation, I love planes.  I love going to airshows and museums.  I will miss the Blue Angels and Thunderbirds (hopefully it's just one season, or some compromise is slapped together.)  But I understand the cuts.  We- and our representatives- got us into this mess.  Cuts have to be made somewhere, ideally in nonessential areas; but the sequester is all about cuts so painful Congress theoretically wouldn't let them happen.  Unless they were uncompromising idiots...

Aviation people tend to be conservative; maybe I'll talk about why some other time.  And when they hear about, or think about, cuts to aviation they get upset.  Too upset.  Ironically upset.  Because conservatives, as a rule, are against government spending.  But when you cut spending on things they like, they howl.  Anhd they agreed to these cuts.  So, I guess the takeaway is an obvious one:  conservatives are hypocrites.