Blogaround

Graffiti on Focus on the Family HQ says "Their blood is on your hands. Five lives taken." Image source.

1. How Asexuality Is the Quiet Queer Revolution (November 11) "What if we start decentering sex? This is the radical question we are forced to confront once we start recognising asexuality as a real identity deserving of space in this world – one that makes it queer for how it subverts normative sexuality, and dares to imagine a world where we free ourselves of its baggage entirely."

2. Rearranging deck chairs on the Titanic: Southern Baptists still arguing over women pastors (November 6) Kind of shocking to me, reading this, how openly these men just hate women pastors. I know I used to be in that culture, and I used to believe there was something to the concept of men being leaders more so than women, but now it just seems incomprehensible to me. And these men believe in a "this doesn't make sense but God wants us to do it anyway, and obedience to God is the most important thing" God, whereas I believe in a "you're gonna stand before Jesus someday and She's going to be like, 'what the hell were you thinking???'" God.

3. How the pandemic took the toxic out of my Turkey Day (November 23) "Thanksgiving was the one day of the year that I knew was going to suck. Not just for me, but for my son and husband too, the two most important people in my life. They rode out that horrible day with me every year."

4. The few, the loud: How ‘very online atheists’ differ from other atheists (November 21) "Most atheists are pretty quiet about it, but a few people drive most of the online discussion of atheism. This creates a potential mismatch between typical atheists and the most visible atheists, to the extent that there are predictable differences between the two groups."

5. Do the rich pay their fair share? (November 15) "Billionaires in the US pay a smaller tax rate than most teachers and retail workers. Thanks to a tax code that favors income from wealth over income from work—and a slew of tax-avoidance strategies—the richest among us end up paying a smaller percentage of their income to the federal government than most working families."

6. Stochastic terrorism and the Colorado Springs Club Q shooting (November 21) "In the US this weekend, Club Q in Colorado Springs joined a long list of places struck by concrete violence informed by a broader cultivation of hate. The term for this terrible outcome is 'stochastic terrorism': when an act of public violence is individually unpredictable (i.e. in terms of exact date, target, perpetrator), but also statistically predictable, based on a series of preceding factors, such as sustained hate-mongering from prominent media sources."

7. Catholic hospitals are wrecking reproductive health care (October 11) "But doctors at a Catholic hospital won’t do that. They will perform the C-section, sure, but that’s it. They are forbidden from tying a woman’s tubes thanks to Directive 53."

8. San Francisco launches new guaranteed income program for trans community (November 16) This seems very weird to me. A government chooses one specific marginalized group and picks some people in that group and gives them money. Yes, it's great for the people who receive the money- but it feels weird to me that a government would be doing that. Seems like the sort of thing a charity should do? A government is supposed to do things that benefit society as a whole.

I don't know, perhaps there are other examples where local governments have done this sort of thing, just focused on one specific disadvantaged group, and the result benefitted society overall, and now San Francisco is kind of modeling their plan on something like that?

And, please note, when I say a government is supposed to do things that "benefit society as a whole", I don't mean like, everyone should directly benefit from every government program, or some nonsense like that. If, for example, the government gives money to low-income people to lift them out of poverty, I do count that as "benefitting society as a whole" because a society which helps people get out of poverty is a better society than one that doesn't. But I'm not sure about just focusing on trans people, because there must be a lot of low-income cis people who are in need too. And this program is just giving them money, rather than addressing specific trans issues. (Addressing specific trans issues would also be an example of "benefitting society as a whole"! A society which helps people get transgender-related health care, for example, is a better society than one that doesn't.) This seems more like "here's a good thing that happened one time to a few specific trans people" but it doesn't go any farther than that.

But anyway, the important thing is to see the results of this program. It will definitely be a great thing for those people who receive the money, but my question is, does it make sense from the government's perspective to focus on them specifically?

9. "Anti-science" is a meaningless phrase (2021) "People honestly SHOULD be skeptical of any human-related science."

10. Here’s why vandals sprayed graffiti at Focus on the Family headquarters (November 27) When I heard that the Focus on the Family sign had been vandalized, I was like, "GOOD." I grew up reading and believing their propaganda, all their books that take the Lord's name in vain and bear false witness against their neighbors. I read "The Homosexual Agenda" and "Marriage Under Fire"- books about how "homosexuals" are trying to destroy marriage and destroy society and must be stopped. It was all lies. And now I'm queer, and I'm mad.