The Movie, "Pride" and Other Lofty Thoughts

Okay, so I am a fair-weather Giants Fan.  So sue me.  This was taken at a game in September with the Padres that I attended with my brother, Don, just as they were sliding in to win the pennant and go on to the World Series. I love ATT park. It is a beautiful thing in a lovely location. But on to other matters:

So in the 90's some time, I was a member of the Idaho Society for Clinical Social Work.  The national organization with which the local group was affiliated had decided to venture into an experiment by aligning itself with Unions.  The idea was to become a professional guild and throw our lot in with unions in the hopes of expanding our influence and, in the bargain, gain some benefits for members.  Well, the experiment didn't work out, mostly because the benefit part didn't pan out as well as expected.  It was a big disappointment to me when the national group broke ties with the union.  Back then I thought of it as having the potential for great things, as it could have consolidated the profession of social work's influence nationally on issues of social justice. I went to a lot of local union meetings and attended a national meeting.  Anyway the film, "Pride" brought all that back for me.  The movie is the true story of an organization of gays and lesbians  in England who decided to support a Welsh group of striking miners in the mid 1980's.  The story showed how these disparate groups of people with seemingly nothing in common joined together for a common cause.  It's a beautiful story and I highly recommend that you see the movie.  Because it depicts how people didn't miss their chance to join together to get something done.  I don't see that happening today very often. But I dream of a world in which gay rights groups join together with women's groups who join together with people of color and unions and spiritual progressives and groups dedicated to ending hunger and on and on and on.  We have so much more in common than what our differences might be. We could truly change the planet.  Or at least greatly increase our collective compassion and caring for one another, which maybe means the same thing.

Wow!

Okay.  I just read something on Facebook that I must comment on.  I tried to comment but then it looked like it didn't take.  The posting was supposed to be a long diatribe by Bill Cosby about "being tired" everything,  from the government trying to take away his money and give it to people with "no work ethic" to how terrible Muslims are.  And a bunch of other nonsense in between. My comment was "I'll tell you what I'm tired of.  I'm tired of rich people who have had every benefit available from capitalism tell me how tired they are of everything. If Bill Cosby is so damn tired, why doesn't he go take a nap." I guess we have come a long way when rich black folk can talk out of their asses right along side of rich white folk.  This is what people suffered for during the civil rights era I guess.

My question is: When did we become a nation of people who like to blame everybody else for what is wrong with everything.  It's the people with "no work ethic", as if there is a whole class of people out there livin' off the government doing nothing.  In case you weren't looking Bill Cosby and others who think like him, welfare as we know it was pretty much eliminated during the Clinton era.  In Idaho you can get "welfare" but it's something like $250 per month and you have to practically kill yourself for the privilege of receiving it.  It's awful and degrading and anyone who is desperate enough to need it ought to damn well be able to get it without the likes the Bill Cosby's of the world ragging on them about it.  I know this because I made my living knowing it. If Bill or others are talking about people on disability having "no work ethic" then I invite them to live in some country where there is none and then write me a letter about it.  Another object of blame for Mr. Cosby was those nasty Muslims who are doing everything from being responsible for female genital mutilation to somehow making it so that Cosby doesn't have enough to live on in retirement, for chrissake.  If you are dumb enough to think that it is somehow written in the Quaran that females should undergo genital mutilation then I have a bridge I want to sell to you, too.  Genital mutilation has to do with culture, not religion. If we are going to blame Islam for every damn thing wrong in the world then we better not forget about Christianity which has not exactly been the bearer of all things Christlike over the many centuries, in case anyone is wondering.  Case in point: Pat Robertson telling the world  recently that we should not buy towels from Kenya because they carry AIDS.  This is the type of wisdom we have come to expect from so called Christian leadership.  (this was on Facebook, too.  Could be that my source is a little limited and crazy and if so, like Emily Littela, "Well, never mind".)

In summary, for God's Sake, get a grip and get to work making this a better world and quit blaming everybody else for every damn thing that is wrong.(unless, of course it is the stuff I agree with that needs to be blamed)  I have attempted to attach the link here to Cosby's statement.  If you are able to get to it, you will see that Bill is posing for his photo with a nasty looking beard.  I say, get a razor, Bill and quit embarrassing your wife.  

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Living in a Backward, Backwoods State for All My Adult Life!

With the exception of 2 years (1980-1982), I have lived in Idaho my whole adult life.  I have witnessed this state going politically from tolerable to bad to worse. From the days when Cecil Andrus was governor (a centrist almost left leaning Democrat) in the 70's to today's embarrassment of a governor, Butch Otter.  From the great Frank Church to the embarrassment of Jim Risch.  From Richard Stallings to Raul Labrador.  Help me, Jesus.  One could liken spending my adult years in Idaho to the frog in the boiling water, just didn't quite notice the changing political climate until it was too late. When I first came to Idaho in 1972, there was a man named Willie Ludlow who ran for Congress.  He was a lefty of the extreme kind.  Just my kind of political person.  I voted for Shirley Chishom in the '72 caucus right there in Pocatello, Idaho.  Anyway, it's a sad state of affairs when Idaho is kind of the barometer of the political climate of the rest of the country.  We have fallen just that low. 

 Anyway,  all that being said, today marks the first day when LBGT people can get married just like everyone else right here in River City.  And it is because of the courage and perseverance of a group of women who wanted the right to marry and went to court to make it happen.  It certainly didn't happen because the state suddenly found it's heart and it's misplaced sense of justice and good sense. Otter would have fought to the end of time if it wasn't for the fact that he needed to get busy on his millionth run for his office and being the stalwart defender of "traditional marriage" didn't turn out to be the political lynchpin he had hoped it to be.  No, it happened because four same sex couples made it happen. And because it is right.  So what that confirms for me is that when people band together, wondrous things can occur, even in the worst of political climates.  Those women inspire me. Although I do wish that making what is right happen didn't always take such courage and stamina and guts and fight.  We really will overcome someday.