I just wanted to give a shout out to whomever is reading my blog over at the Tulsa World. Keep on reading.
And, I also wanted to say something to the media in general...
Being fair doesn't mean letting both sides dictate their talking points to you and then giving them equal column space.
Fair means that the amount of grief that anyone is given by the media should be directly proportional to the amount of bullshit that person or entity is shoveling.
Think about that for a second.
Anyway, thanks to everyone who takes the time to read this, keep doing what you all can to make a difference.
Peace.
-The Oklahoma Hippy
Several Observations and Critiques:
ReplyDelete1. I hate how the page takes too long to load from hippy.blogspot.com to hippy.com.
~dig deep inside your magic hippy hat, a hat so full of complete answers to this country's problems, and try to fix your own web page.
2. I'm tired of all the pretentious 'liberal love' you people spew. All you do is preach tolerance and openmindedness, but to whom exactly? As far as I can tell you're only tolerant of people on your side of the issue, everyone else lacks your political enlightenment apparantly.
~ My suggesstion is to just drop the act. Despite the many times its mentioned on this web page, you're not tolerant, and you're certainly not openminded.
1. The actual site is hosted at http://www.oklahomahippy.com, and since the blogspot domain is no longer the primary site, I set up a redirect.
ReplyDeleteIf you go directly to oklahomahippy.com, you will not experience this delay.
2. The idea of tolerance is an interesting one. I accept that people have other view than me. I accept that people are free to believe anything they want, no matter how much I disagree or don't like it. I accept that certain beliefs that people hold I will find abhorrent.
So, anyone is free to believe what they want. The problem comes in when people cannot seem to have these beliefs without spilling it on other people.
I am both a small "L" and big "L" liberal.
I believe in liberal democracy as a vibrant, useful, and worthy system of government.
I believe that anyone has the right to decide how to live their own life in any way they choose, as long as it is not harming anyone else.
Gay Marriage? No problem. If Ed and Mike down the street get married, it has no effect on me what so ever.
Guns? Have guns. Hooray for the second amendment. As long as you are not shooting an innocent person, I don't care.
It's when people want to limit the rights of other people based solely on their view of religion, dogma, personal hatred, or out of simple preference that I have a problem.
Then there is the second type of person who cannot keep their views to themselves, and those are the people who use violence as an end.
This would include those idiots over at the Earth Liberation Front, who wants to burn up SUV's and burn down housing developments.
There are the people who feel obligated to kill abortion doctors and blow up gay night clubs.
There are the militia types we have experience with here in Oklahoma City.
Then, most insidious of all, are the international terrorist types. I do not limit my nod to the terrorist to those of the Islamic bent, though they are the evil de jour.
Open-mindedness is not a thing about which I should be ashamed.
Having an open mind means that I can rationalize that I have no preference for a particular opinion, policy, person, idea... I may go so far as to not like it or even hate it.
But, I recognize that other people have the right to believe, act, think, talk, or say anything they want, until it begins to infringe upon my ability to do the same.
A telling example is the insistence on abstinence only education. Beyond being a miserable failure, just because someone doesn’t like that it is being taught, doesn’t mean they should deny the resource to someone who doesn’t not share their uneasiness. If you don’t want your kids to learn about sex in schools, opt them out of that particular curriculum.
To those who want to censor everything that comes on TV removing any hint of sex, violence, or anything else to which they might take offense, I say shut up. Turn off the TV. Throw away your TV. Just because someone chooses to watch or listen to something that is offensive to you on a moral basis, doesn’t mean that it should be censored or banned. It means that you shouldn’t watch it. If enough people agree with you, then it will affect the Television Networks financially, and they will change.
Everyone has a right to live their own life in their own way, as long as it doesn’t hurt anyone else. Pornography? Consenting adults should be allowed to participate in any activity they wish with any other consenting adults. If you find pornography to be evil, then don’t watch it and don’t buy it.
Marijuana? Pot alone has never killed anyone. If it’s not hurting anyone, quit wasting time and resources trying to enforce ridiculous marijuana laws.
Meth on the other hand poses a physical danger not only to those who use it, but those who are around those who use it, as well as anyone within a block of where it’s being cooked.
This list can go on and on. Tolerance means accepting that there are things in the world that I do not like, but accepting that they do not have an effect on me, so another person’s right to indulge themselves in certain things should remain in tact. The moment that it begins to limit my freedom, it then becomes a problem.
So, how you came to believe that my view of the world is some how an act, I have no idea. You have every right to think so, and it doesn’t affect me in the least. Congrats.
That to me is what open-mindedness and tolerance are really about.
Well said my friend.
ReplyDeleteSure, "well said". Listen. You have no idea what it is like for me being not only a black woman and a lesbian, but also a Republican. I believe in reasonable taxes, a smaller more involved local government, a strong military, and morality. Is that so wrong? Is the fact that I'm a black lesbian mean that I have to be a Democrat?
ReplyDeleteWhatever, you dont know me.
I'll admit that my first reaction to finding out you're a black woman and a lesbian yet still a Republican is a a slight confusion, but that's not in any way meant as a judgment on you're choice, but rather a discordant mix in the way I associate to each of those demographic traits.
ReplyDeleteIt's a rare combination. That I feel confusion has to do with triggering a response based on my experience in the world emotionally and not how I view the world in a moral and philosophical sense.
I feel it is necessary to find a place in this world for my values and beliefs, to find a symbiosis based on my life experience.
The other half of this country, the ones I so disagree with, are the people who feel not only entitled but compelled to alter the world to adapt to their views and values leaving no place for disagreement.
That's the main difference I seen in the left and the right in this country.
Does that mean I'm not for sensible budgeting and taxation? Of course not, but if anyone's looked at the government's books lately, the Republican Party is not one to lecture anyone about fiscal responsibility at this time.
Does my being a Democrat somehow mean that I am soft on national security? Of course not.
Should people like me be derided by the right for wanting to treat terrorism as a law enforcement issue? Is that weak on security?
The problem with that argument, like so many other arguments that the Republican Leadership makes, is that we don't live in world where options are mutually exclusive.
Treating terrorism as a law enforcement issue does not mean that we can't or should also take it own as a military issue. It doesn't mean that the clandestine services in our Intelligence Services can't take it on as well. But, alas there is no room for complexity or nuance in George and Karl's world.
It's the same story with Guantanamo Bay. As a liberal I feel that those held at Guantanimo Bat should not be tortured and should be afforded some form of due process.
People who take that position as treated as "terrorist abettors" who want to let these people loose on the streets of America.
Is that really the choice? Torture or Terrorists running around? The people who say these things think people are stupid.
As I liberal what I actually think is that torturing people is no way to demonstrate the liberal democracy that you claim to be spreading around the world. And giving the prisoners some form of due process simple allows us to separate the real bad guys from an unfortunate Afghan goat farmer who happened to be in the wrong place when the marines ran by.
We spend unbelievable sums of money on a war which is looking more and more like one of the greater cases of fraud in the history of this country, yet we are told that we cannot afford universal health insurance.
Individuals like me insist that we can afford it.
Socialism is the cry. That of is like all of the rest of it, nonsense. We already pay for the health care of the uninsured. People who cannot afford to go to the doctor don't go and wait and wait and wait until they have no choice but to go seek emergency care which is ten times the cost and they need 4 times they care.
Does anyone believe for a second that hospitals or insurance companies take on any of that cost? No! They pass it on to every one of the people who do have health insurance.
If we were to give every American a voucher which they could use with any insurance company they wanted with the option to buy above and beyond that coverage at their own costs, imagine what that would do. Allow people to use it to cover the employee's share of a group plan through their employer.
If everyone was covered, using private insurance companies, cost controls would come just through competition. Who offers the best service? Who covers the most care?
Everyone gets basic coverage.
The government owns none of it.
As a democrat, I want people to be treated like people. I want the world to be acknowledged by our leaders for what it is and not just what they want it to be.
I want to have national debates about our political, moral, ethical, and economic situations.
There is no room left in this world for complexity. That everything that we are dealing with in the world can be explained in 30 second sound bites is preposterous.
I would be so much more supportive towards my president if every answer to every question and every new speech was just a long string of meaningless platitudes.
"They hate us for our freedom" is quite possibly fundamentally true, but it's a completely useless and meaningless observation.
"Stay the course" is another of the things that drives me crazy. Just once I would LOVE to have the President come out and acknowledge that what's been going on so far hasn't been working and we're going to try a new way, or even that this isn't working as well as we like and there are things that could be better, but there isn't much more we could do...
Something, but this insistence on having this everything-is-just fine answer about Iraq, and the economy, and the environment, and our security situation.
I don't understand why anyone bought into President Bush's "flypaper" theory?
What is it about the war in Iraq that precludes terrorism from happening ANYWHERE else in the world?
Because we are fighting an insurgency in Falluhja or Basra or Baghdad that a dozen guys won't be able to pull of a terrorist attack in the United States?
That was never true. It didn't even make sense. People in London know that know.
Ultimately, I just have lost trust in the motives of our President. My first reaction to any official statement from the White House is just distrust. And it's not just me, it's half the country.
In this time of war, and with the unity that this country experienced after September 11th, just how did that happen?
Is it a mass hallucination by 53 million people? Or could it be, that there have been enough lies, deception, and mis-truths coming from this administration, that we've been forced to suspend the familial like trust that we had in the President of the United States after the worst national tragedy we've ever seen?
It makes a difference that so many of their "facts" and assumptions continue to demonstrate themselves to be demonstrably not true?
When do the meaningless sayings and criminal oversimplifications become too much to accept?
For me it was the run up the war. Some were still willing to believe. More and more people are losing faith in this President's leadership everyday.
It's not the Republican Party I have a problem with. It's not individual republicans in this nation. I have no problems with my friends, coworkers, neighbors, or strangers.
I do have a problem with the small cadre of men and women who are in charge of our nation at this time. This means most members of Republican Party in Congress as well as quite a few of their Democratic colleagues. It also means pretty much everyone in the White House.
That also includes the cesspool that is the lobbying cesspool that is K Street.
It's corrupt and it's too much.
These people are trying to manipulate reality to conform to them, and it's devastating this country.
That's why I am not a Republican. I need to deal with the world the way it really is.
I hope that you see my point of view. I believe in it passionately. But I can also accept it if you don't. I've made clear how I feel. There is room for both points of view in this country.
That's what tolerance and open-mindedness is for me. I want to scream from the rooftop how I feel about all of these issues and so many more. And I think anyone should be able to scream where they stand on an issue.
But when someone insinuates that I am less of an American, that my love for my country is somehow inferior to theirs, or that I some how give aid and comfort to the enemy because I don't agree with their methods or policies is offensive.
The things I believe and the love I have for my country is as strong and vital as it is for anyone else here.
I am an American too, and I am tired of being told I'm not.
Now, as a black woman and a lesbian, I respectfully and graciously assume that this is a feeling which is not unfamiliar to you.
My honest question is this: So many things that come from the White House have been proven to be simply not true. How do you hold on to the faith in the truth that you're being told about anything by these people?
Sorry for the rant, and I guess I should stop typing before my wrists wear out, so I bid you a good night, and if you made it this far, thanks for taking the time to read.
Peace.
Good night.
-The Oklahoma Hippy
Rockem, I'm sorry to say that I am dubious about who you claim you are. A black lesbian Republican? Sounds like a bad episode of "The Jerry Springer Show." The combination is so incongruous that I hope you understand my doubts.
ReplyDeleteAnd if it's true, you must be a very lonely person. I know of a black Republican, and he's an outcast enough. But a black lesbian Republican? It must be hell.
First off dont you dare claim to know me or judge me. I am an idependant woman of convictions and thought who has DEEPLY searched her own heart. I dont need you, or the 'Howard Dean Spin Machine' telling me how I have to feel or vote based soley on my sexuality and race.
ReplyDelete"Sounds like a bad episode of the Jerry Springer Show"
My gut reaction to that racist statment would be a decisive 'piss off', but I dont see the need to degenerate myself to that point. If you think that for no other reason than the fact I am black and a lesbian that I therefore must automatically agree with every rediculous edict the left proffers then you are a small minded individual indeed. I've fought long and hard to be my own person and I dont need some bored young Democrat to tell me how to think. If I cared what society thought I would have been shuved into a different life style long ago, but I'm me. Dammit I'm me. You may think you know me but you dont. You've never had a beer can thrown at you when you walk down the street holding hands with your lover. You've never been stared at or had someone insult your intelligence by taking one look at you and saying 'Oh hear, you must be automatically feel this way because of your race and sexuality'.
Again I reiterate, you dont know me. And if all your small mind can do is to coral me in a freak show because you simply 'dont get it' then have at it.
I'll be sipping cocoa with the bearded lady.
Now, now ... you can apply some of the same advice to yourself. I'm hardly young, and I don't vote straight Democrat. You made rasher assumptions of me than I did of you.
ReplyDeleteBut being a black lesbian Republican does sound self-contradictory on one particular issue: If you and your partner plan to eventually get married, why are you in support of a political party that's so vehemently opposed to same-sex marriage? It sounds like you're in support of a party that goes against your own self-interests.
Or do you hope to eventually change the GOP back into a "small government, stay out of our private lives" party? That was a Republican Party that I supported until it threw away its principles with both hands.
RSR,
ReplyDeleteI respect that you are who you are despite social norms. I think it's healthy and I think it's good to challenge nominally accepted social constructs.
More power to you my dear lady. Don't take shit from anyone, and keep being yourself.
Just because I'm confused by it doesn't make it wrong. Just because my experience doesn't seem to allow for all of those things to co-exist doesn't mean that yours doesn't.
You aren't from Oklahoma. Your experience gives you a completely different emotional association to the Republican Party.
The same goes for me. I can't know what it's like to have lived your life, and I accept the choices you made as being right for you.
And that, to me, is tolerance.
-The Oklahoma Hippy
Rockem, here's another reason I have doubt that you're a black lesbian Republican.
ReplyDeleteThere are 38.7 million black people in the United States, according to the census.
Half of those are women. That knocks it down to 19 million or so.
Only 11 percent of black people voted Republican in the last election. That knocks it down to about 2 million people.
Although there's some disagreement about the average, let's say that 5 to 10 percent of people are gay. That knocks down the total to 100,000 to 200,000 people.
That, along with a Zogby poll in 2002 that showed that gay, lesbian and transgender people were only 8.4 percent Republican, shows why I'm dubious that a needle in a haystack like yourself would end up on Oklahoma Hippy's blog.
I'm not saying that it's impossible that a black lesbian Republican would be here. But it's unlikely.
I also like your "morals" reason for being associated with the Republicans. Aren't you aware that the GOP considers homosexuality immoral? I don't know why you'd want to be in a club where nobody wants you as a member.
Dude, welcome to the blog, and feel free to partake in any discussion at anytime, but really. Ease up off the lady.
ReplyDeleteShe knows how I feel about issues, and that's all that needs to be done.
Laying out the common sense of the issue is what needs to be done here.
Addressing in RSR in the way that you are only feeds into her point, though I do feel there is a bit of a glass house problem there.
I say how I feel. People can read how I feel. If people wish to agree or disagree with me, that's fine. I may very well reply and retort and even get a bit snarky at times, and that's ok.
It's when people begin to try and push the idea that someone should not be permitted to say certain things, or do certain things, or imply that certain beliefs or positions make one less of a person or less of a patriot that lines are crossed.
What you offered as a way of questioning the identity of RSM is math that doesn't prove or disprove anything. You seem to feel that it is statistically improbable that such a rare group of identifications would find it self in a person who ends up on my blog?
Why? She shares common interests. She's concerned about the state of her country and the things that are going on in it.
I write about those very things. She happens to Google a topic that interest her and I have written about it. She follows the link.
She reads other things I have written, and like it or hate it she decides to return.
This isn't sheer randomness in action.
So, ease up off the lady. If she is who she says she is, and I don't have any reason to believe she's not, then she is one of the more interesting people that I have encountered lately.
If she's not, then that doesn't affect me in any negative way at all.
She's not preaching hate or violence against anyone else. She just has different ideas, and that's ok.
So, let's chat. Let's argue, let's get passionate and rowdy.
Let's just not spend our time trying to convince someone they don't really exist.
It's uncouth.
To anonomous: many improbable things happen in life and the fact that I am a black lesbian and a republican may be one of them, but it does NOT make my being a person or make my identity suspect. What gives you the right based on math alone to tell me that someone like me cannot exist? I am very much here in the flesh sweetheart.
ReplyDeleteTo Hippy: I can take care of my own arguments, but I thank you for your comments on my behalf. Kisses.
No intentions on impugning your ability to speak for yourself, but as a southern hippy, anything less would have been polite since your essentially a guest in my electronic home.
ReplyDeleteNot saying something would have been impolite.