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This Planet Earth (You'all may never speak to me again)

 
  

Page: 12(3)456

 
 
gornorft
11:59 / 05.07.04
So, out of interest, JAMM, have you had any thoughts about the largely disgusted responses to your opinions on queer issues?

Nup, not a lot. I still don't see why I should accept that everything they taught me about human biology in school is suddenly politically incorrect, or rather that why it's being "politically incorrect" should preclude it from still being true. I still don't understand the need for female gay people to receive double billing in gay AND lesbian parades. I still don't get how "queers" (as others have referred to them in this thread, not me), whom I distinctly said I was quite happy to have carry on doing whatever they choose to do, should consider me a bad person simply because I stated my preference to NOT want to treat them differently to anyone else due to my not considering sexual preference an important enough thing to base my opinions of any person upon. I still want to know why acceptance, friendship, personal support and indifference to stereotypes isn't enough, why I am expected to actively care about things like sexual preference when I don't think sexual preference is the slightest bit important in determining the worth of a person. If you wondered what the connecting thread to the initial rant was, btw, it's something GWB said in the leadup to the war in Iraq, something along the lines of "you can't sit on the sidelines, it's not enough to support us with well wishes. You are either with us or you are part of the problem". I thought that was a crap thing to say at the time and I could see how many groups in society might grab a thought like that and adopt it to their own causes.

I'm sorry if I made a shouty thread in Conversation. Yes there was a hangover involved the next day. No I won't be doing it again. Knee jerk PC wankers give me the shits and it's it's not worth the hassle.
 
 
Regrettable Juvenilia
12:09 / 05.07.04
What does "politically incorrect" mean?
 
 
_Boboss
12:11 / 05.07.04
yeh yeh whateva

thing is i learnt the language of Southern from Claremont, same as everyone else, and it's not 'you'all' it's y'all' or just 'you all'

okay hippy?
 
 
Less searchable M0rd4nt
12:21 / 05.07.04
I still don't see why I should accept that everything they taught me about human biology in school is suddenly politically incorrect

When I was kid, we had this set of those old Arthur Mee Children's Encyclopedias knocking about the house. Really old; I think they must have belonged to my grandmother. I remeber reading a bit of human biology in there which stuck with me: line drawings in profile of an ape's head, an African man's head, and a white man's head, along with an explanation that these images "proved" that the white man was more advanced along the evolutionary path than the African.

Are you telling me I have to reject something I read in an encyclopedia just because it's not PC?

Also, I'm hard put to belive that your school biology lessons covered the ins and outs of transexuality and gender reassignment.
 
 
w1rebaby
12:30 / 05.07.04
Knee jerk PC wankers give me the shits and it's it's not worth the hassle.

Get a Mac.
 
 
Regrettable Juvenilia
12:35 / 05.07.04
Wait - does this apply to history lessons too? Omigod, please don't say it applies to gym and RE!
 
 
ONLY NICE THINGS
12:38 / 05.07.04
So, you haven't read any of the lenghty threads linked to, you haven't learned anything, and you are unlikely to do so in the future.

That's a shame, but we can't really be blamed for you being simple and incurious. Would you like us to go over the arugments again more slowly? Since I imagine that you very rarely meet LGBT people, or indeed people, I daresay the queer masses (queer is used as an adjective, not a noun, generally. Like gay or black) will just about get by without your support, but your ignorance may at some point embarrass your friends or relatives in polite company.
 
 
Hattie's Kitchen
12:38 / 05.07.04
Yay, I was sooo waiting for the "Politically Correct" phrase to come up. You have thus proved yourself to be a complete cock. I'm a lesbo/dyke/queer and I use words like "queer", "twat", "cunt" and "cock", so less of the political correctness gone mad garbage, if you please.

You have also failed to address why you cannot accept that transsexuals or anyone else for that matter can identify as whatever they like.

And the reason we have separate lesbian and gay labels is simply to differentiate which category of porn we wish to purchase. Sooo much easier...
 
 
We're The Great Old Ones Now
12:41 / 05.07.04
Ah, fercrissakes. You guys do recall that the only person JAMM really hates is JAMM, right?

And as for you, JAMM, you're a class act. Does this seem in any way familiar to you? Self-immolation as a way to get noticed? The online aspect is a twist, I'll grant you. Slightly better than the IRL version, I suppose.

I take it you haven't followed my suggestion that, if you're life's worth so little to you, you make it into something which is worth something to others? That's fine. It's up to you. I doubt much of Barbelith will be talking to you for a while, but I imagine when the smoke clears and you look at this thread and feel like a total ass, a bit of heartfelt apologising will at least get you in through the door.

And JAMM, as ever, if you reallly believe any of this, you need to do some reading. Find a library.
 
 
illmatic
12:45 / 05.07.04
JAMM, I must say that the main thing I get off your posts is that you are remarkably thin skinned. To regard being stopped once in the street once by Greenpeace, and simply the actual existence of events like Pride as some kind of erosion of your civil liberties and invasion of your personal space strikes me as hugely intolerant. (Unless Pride organised a parade through your front room as an affront to your hetrenormative self, but I find that unlikely). You might want to have a look at the Pride thread which has bounced back up to the top of Convo to actually comprehend why people find things like their
sexuality (y'know, your sexuality - that cornerstone of personal identity) worthwhile celebrating.

You say things "why I am expected to actively care about things like sexual preference" preceded by nonsense like this:"I still don't understand the need for female gay people to receive double billing in gay AND lesbian parades". Newsflash: No one is expecting you to care, particpate or actively give a shit - what people in this thread would like you to do is stop making narrow minded value judgements like latter statement. I mean, can you not get in the head why someone who is a lesbian might wish to particpate in both events? Can't you show one shred of empathy or thinking outside your own narrow box? What gives you the fucking right - as someone who self-professedly doesn't care - to make fucking judgements about what these people do or don't do? Next, you'll be deciding who's a "real" lesbian and who isn't - oh wait, you've already started to do this re. transexuality, privleging your defintions of sexuality over transexual people's actual defintions for themselves.
 
 
Ex
12:47 / 05.07.04
Why do we have to care?

Well, you don't, do you? Nobody's forcing you to.

Yes, you're getting poked here. But I see nothing to to suggest that this thread is an example of a fiendish array of technologies of pressure that are being applied to you by society at large is a shit argument. If you'd just kept it to yourself and not thrust it in our faces, what would have happened to you?

Because you're talking as though you were rung at midnight and told you'd been drafted to be the Pride Steward next to the double-helping gayLesbian float, and were forced to grin and distribute hermaphrodite flyers all day while singing yourself hoarse ("He and She/ And Hir and Sie/Live together in perfect harmony..."). In the rain.
 
 
Ex
12:55 / 05.07.04
Blimey! Sorry, Illmatic, I wasn't ignoring or rehashing your pertinent post. While I was drafting, the hive mind evidently decided you'd get to the point quicker...
 
 
ONLY NICE THINGS
12:58 / 05.07.04
Nup, not a lot. I still don't see why I should accept that everything they taught me about human biology in school is suddenly politically incorrect


Yes, ladies and gentlemen, "political correctness". The last refuge of the halfwit. Unless you are able to provide a history of the Political Correctness movement, featuring its major thinkers, publications and commentators, you are using this phrase to advertise the paucity of your argument.

Let's run through, shall we? Blood types - that was part of "everything they taught you about human biology at school", yes? Has that been affected by this political correctness? How about the number of bones in the human body? No? So, you are wrong to begin with.

Funnily enough, what you were told about gender in school is also unaffected by political correctness. Dimwit. Peple with XY chromosomes are still generally born in male bodies, and people with XX chromosomes in female bodies. Even after gender realignment surgery, these people can still be said to be "chromosomally male" or "chromosonally female". Does that mean they are a man or a woman? A "he" or a "she"? That's not a biological question. It's a grammatical and social question. Fortunately, it's one the many ramifications of which have been discussed here quite extensively. You may, if you don't get a chance to hit the library, learn some interesting things from this thread and this thread. A quick quote:

Male and female - these are references to the physiological composition of an animal. Humans can be male or female. So can pigs, cats, Siamese fighting fish.

Man and woman - social constructs associated with and built from physiological gender and the relationship to it. Cats cannot be men or women. Nor can pigs. Nor can siamese fighting fish.

Therefore, a *female* human being will generally be expected to identify as a *woman*. But a female human being who identifies neither as man or woman will, although female, not therefore necessarily be a *woman*.

So a hermaphrodite, who possesses physiological elements of both *male* and *female*, might decide to identify as a man, a woman, or neither. Sex is hardwired, gender performative.


I can only assume that "everything they taught me in school about human biology" was not very much. Probably because they were too busy wasting the class' time teaching them about about the life cycle of whichever thickly-muscled, purple-skinned, betailed species you belong to. PC fools.
 
 
ONLY NICE THINGS
13:00 / 05.07.04
(Unless Pride organised a parade through your front room as an affront to your hetrenormative self, but I find that unlikely)

And then did you. Right up the cock.
 
 
illmatic
13:10 / 05.07.04
And another thing – I notice that no one has decided to upbraid you for your oh-so-witty statements re. Greenpeace, environmentalism and the future of the human race. Well, I find it particularly irksome when this sort of misanthropy is presented as if some sort of radical gesture. “I hate everything, humanity is a virus - look at what an iconoclast I am!” It is not in any sense a radical, original or even interesting position. I consider it to be adolescent, narcissistic and an abnegation of any responsibilities that you might have. It’s a very easy stance to take if you don’t have children or dependents to think about, for instance. I think it’s a far more interesting and challenging position to look at the parlous situation we’re in and the problems we face collectively, and to try and consider if you can in any way contribute to their resolution. But, dangerously, this involves stopping sulking, thinking, picking up your toys and putting them back in your pram, so you probably won’t be doing it any time soon...
 
 
Goodness Gracious Meme
13:15 / 05.07.04
Pride organised a parade through your front room as an affront to your hetrenormative self

Oh c'moooon, give me a bit of time, willya?
 
 
Cat Chant
13:17 / 05.07.04
You know, JAMM's fine grasp of the finer points of human biology reminds me of Chris Morris's equally fine and scientifically justifiable distinction between "good AIDS" and "bad AIDS". (For those who didn't see the episode of Brass Eye in question, "good AIDS" is contracted from blood transfusions; "bad AIDS" is contracted through sexual activity or drug-taking.)

So presumably, for JAMM, a person whose anatomical/ perceived gender is at odds with their chromosomal gender from birth and through no fault of their own - or, indeed, any one of the one-in-a-thousand people who are intersex in some way - are "good" intersex, whereas people whose anatomical/owned gender is at odds with their chromosomal gender through their own choice or action are "bad" transsex? That's the only way I can reconcile his statement that "it's biological fact that gender is determined by chromosomes" with, um, the biological fact that, um, it isn't. Good to know he's being value-free there, though.

Further, just to add my voice to others' about the "being expected to care about Pride": JAMM, please reread BiP's post on the first page. In fact, please stay behind after school until you have memorized it and are able to paraphrase it.

As others, including Ex, have said: you are not expected to care about Pride. You are, instead, expected to get your heteronormativity the fuck off the streets for one day. I tell you, every day is a Straight Pride parade on the streets of my city - straight people are able to snog in public, take up a disproportionate amount of space on the public highways, and consider it their right not to be abused for this! It's a FUCKING DISGRACE, why do they need a group hug from queers just for being straight, etc, etc, etc oh God I'm so tired.
 
 
Cat Chant
13:22 / 05.07.04
Illmatic:

I notice that no one has decided to upbraid you for your oh-so-witty statements re. Greenpeace, environmentalism and the future of the human race.

I keep meaning to, but I just keep coming back to:

Greenpeace and almost everyone else takes this incredibly narrow view of things that says that what we have is worth saving

Because... yeah, out of all the viewpoints quoted or espoused in that first post, that's the one that stands out as "incredibly narrow". The idea that humans should take any action to try and ensure that the planet remains capable of sustaining animal life.
 
 
Regrettable Juvenilia
13:37 / 05.07.04
Ah, fercrissakes. You guys do recall that the only person JAMM really hates is JAMM, right?

Er...Do you mean this in a cod-psychological way? In which case yes, maybe the only person John Ashcroft REALLY hates is himself, the only person Julie Burchill REALLY hates is herself, but in practice these people say things that we might describe as full of hate - some even call it 'hate speech' - so does it really matter what their deep-seated issues are? Whether someone "really" hates transexuals doesn't matter if they're talking/acting to all intents and purposes as if they do... Especially not to transexuals, I'd imagine.
 
 
Less searchable M0rd4nt
13:42 / 05.07.04
I notice that no one has decided to upbraid you for your oh-so-witty statements re. Greenpeace...ect.

All righty then.

Look, Greenpeace and almost everyone else takes this incredibly narrow view of things that says that what we have is worth saving. I don't.

This is narrow? Not wanting to turn the world into a lifeless radioactive cinder is narrow? Dude, unless you're a big blue guy who wears tiny black pants and sees tacyons, I just don't get you.

You know of the thing where you compress the entire history of the planet into the timescale of a single year? Earth somehow magically appears on the instant of New Years Day, becomes habitable somewhere on Christmas Eve and Human Beings don't show up until a few minutes before midnight on News Years Eve at the end of the year. The entire recorded history as we know it covers only the last few seconds and each of our lifetimes last less than the time it takes to even think about blinking, let alone carry out the action. And Greenpeace seems to think that these last few seconds are all that matters. As I said, I don't agree...

...In a million or so years from now everything will be fine and lovely again with a whole new set of, hopefully, more viable species than the lot we currently have running around killing, eating and flattening everything in sight. THEN the environment will no longer be under threat and the planet, which will have been fine throughout this whole process, can continue to be so without the need of Greenpeace going about telling everyone it's in danger when in fact it never was in the first place.


Why? Why don't you think it matters? Who cares what proportion of time life occupies? Life matters BECAUSE it's small! It matters BECAUSE it's fragile! It matters because for all we know it may never have happened anywhere else and it may never happen again! You don't know what will happen to the planet if humanity doesn't straighten up and fly right. Maybe we'll end up with a planet that's so irredeemably fucked, nothing bigger than your intestinal microflora will ever appear again.

This "oh look at me, I'm all abstracty and long-view taking" pose is a load of bullshit. You are living in human time, not rock time. Brooklyn is not expanding, dude.
 
 
ONLY NICE THINGS
14:01 / 05.07.04
Well, the great thing about this viewpoint is that, while it appears radical and exciting, it also means that, rather than giving your time and money to environmental causes, you can instead give your time and money to eating beef and buying some more, without even feeling bad about it. It allows you to feel iconoclastic while continuing to live precisely the same ideologically lazy, consumption-centred existence of double cheeseburgers and SUVs that all those unenlightened fools are also enjoying. It's like buying clothes produced in sweatshops, while claiming that you are doing it not to save money but because you hate the dependency culture and the nanny state, and you want to see kids earning a bob instead of sitting around on their arses smoking dope.
 
 
Papess
14:12 / 05.07.04
I still don't understand the need for female gay people to receive double billing in gay AND lesbian parades.

I believe it is because of the discrimination that takes place from the percieved establishment and the socio-economics of the gay community. As lesbians are still women, they are often dicriminated against twice. Because of still overwhelming inequity of socio-political power between men and women, it is no wonder that the issues of lesbians are undermined, or unheard by those in power. IOW, gay men have a much louder voice politically than do the gay women. If it takes two parades to make Lesbians heard, then so be it, kudos.

Now, when do us bi-sexuals get a parade?
 
 
ONLY NICE THINGS
14:21 / 05.07.04
It was tried. Half the march refused to leave the cake stand, and the other half stormed the security fence set up by the police, scaled it and then sat on it.
 
 
pointless and uncalled for
14:22 / 05.07.04
You know JAMM, you seem to keep saying "Why can't we just do what we feel like doing without having to interfere with anyone else's life while were at it?" Which on the surface could be considered quite a noble sentiment. But the trouble of it is there are reasons why we can't.

For instance, there are people who read books that they rely on to guide them through life and indicate, or even dictate, what sort of value system they should use to interact with the world. Not only this but they believe that these books carry this guidance and these values from a higher power. Now whether that is true or not is irrelevant because faith can be an overriding principle and frankly I'm not the person to get into an argument about the existence of higher powers. However, some of these books (being the important issue here) require of the faithful to their cause to be evangelical. Now I'm not sure how familiar you are with the concept of evangelism but as a recap it means you go looking for people who believe differently to you and make a lot of effort to try and convert them to your belief system.

Now because we're human and all think differently then different groups believe different interpretations of these books and what is required of them and the lengths you should go to to carry out these requirements. Now in case you haven't quite figured out where this is going, some people feel that they are obliged to go around telling people that what they do is wrong and evil and at a very real level persecute them. Now unfortunately for your views and ideals a lot of these people were charged with governance for a long time and now we live with a massive construct of legacy social systems that by their very methodology treat a fairly sizable segment of the population of the world as second/third rate citizens and seeks to interfere in their lives. So is it really so bad that these people ask to be treated in a fair and reasonable manner by everyone? And should you find that it truly objectionable that they devote a little bit of time, once a year, to coming together to ask for that en masse then perhaps you should refer back to your history books. There are freedoms and rights that you probably take for granted that exist because a lot of people joined together at one time to demand these freedoms and rights.

Of course I'm just scratching the surface here of reasons why we can't just do what we feel like doing without having to interfere with anyone else's life while were at it.

But before I go any further, perhaps you might like to provide a reason why we can.

May - because watching a bunch of people sit on a fence doesn't draw much of a crowd.
 
 
Papess
14:31 / 05.07.04
because watching a bunch of people sit on a fence doesn't draw much of a crowd.

Har, har...fences?...picket signs? There is a joke in there somewhere. Besides, who is sitting?
 
 
Our Lady Has Left the Building
14:42 / 05.07.04
I couldn't stay out any longer...

Justified Ancient Of Mu Mu I still don't see why I should accept that everything they taught me about human biology in school is suddenly politically incorrect

Oh, and I was sooooo hoping you'd be able to back up your position with an intellectual argument rather than posturing. Shucks.

or rather that why it's being "politically incorrect" should preclude it from still being true.

That would probably be the word 'incorrect' there. It's generally used to mean 'wrong'. HTH.

I still don't understand the need for female gay people to receive double billing in gay AND lesbian parades.

Oh that's right. They get to march round Hyde Park twice the lucky cows. Plus when the compere shouts "All the gays in the house stand up!" they do to, but when he shouts "all the lesbians stand up" they... I mean? What the crippling fuck are you going on about? What Pride events have you been to?

I still don't get how "queers"... whom I distinctly said I was quite happy to have carry on doing whatever they choose to do, should consider me a bad person simply because I stated my preference to NOT want to treat them differently to anyone else due to my not considering sexual preference an important enough thing to base my opinions of any person upon.

So you're a liberated moon-child then? Congratulations, now if you'd kindly wait over there while I try and deal with this bunch of shaven-headed football fans who want to kick the shit out of me because I like touching other mens bottoms. Newsflash: Not everyone thinks the same way as you. It may have escaped your attention but there is still a problem with homophobia in the Western World. Gay Pride is for US, it's because of THEM, it's NOTHING TO DO WITH YOU YOU TWART.

why I am expected to actively care about things like sexual preference when I don't think sexual preference is the slightest bit important in determining the worth of a person.

See above. Maybe if you take your Tyler Durden bomber jacket off and try giving a fuck about the shit that people around you have to deal with then maybe you'll find the world a nicer place.

And earlier: I object to Lesbians not allowing themselves to simply fall under the blanket heading of "gay". Lesbians are gay, why do they need a whole separate word?

I dare you to tell anyone from the Indian subcontinent that they should be happy with being called 'black'.

Why don't you all shut the fuck up and just get on with it and stop asking me to sign patitions to allow you to get married to each other?

Heaven forbid that you should be expected to take your head out of your arse...

Why the hell would you even WANT to get married?

Why do you graciously accept that people of the same sex might want to find pleasure with one another and not that they make like to get the legal benefits that a social ceremony available currently only to heterosexuals would give them? Why won't you accept that some people see marriage as the means to affirm in the strongest possible way their commitment to one another?

Why do men who have sex change operations expect to be recognised as women?

You do know gender is a performative act right?

Yes, there is "Something About Miriam", he makes a not very attractive man trying to pass as a woman. He still HAS a dick. Why should I care? Why am I expected to go "OOOOOHHHHHH!" and "AAAAHHHHHH" and "EEEEWWWWWW" when he tricks other guys into thinking he's a she and still, not surprisingly, fails to find true love in the process.

What, you mean that transsexualism is an invalid condition because Fox made a tacky TV show about it? I hate to think what 'Seriously Dude I'm Gay' would do for your opinion of the gay community if it ever got shown. Would you kill yourself if they made a show about Aussie Bearded Misanthropes?
 
 
Ganesh
16:04 / 05.07.04
Well, I would engage with this thread, but I'm too busy demanding the approval of pigshit-ignorant "straights" elsewhere to bother with this particular cunt.

(And how come he gets double billing as "straight" and "cunt"? And why can't he observe basic biology by being a cock instead? And why's he bothering writing this stuff anyway? It's almost like he's pathetically soliciting my opinion or something...)
 
 
Less searchable M0rd4nt
17:21 / 05.07.04
This whole sorry pile of shite would piss me off less if JAMM was the 17 he sounds instead of the 40something he's admitted to elsewhere.
 
 
Wombat
17:30 / 05.07.04
I feel the same way as JAMM if I watch more than 30 seconds of `Will and Grace` (or Graham Norton...or big brother).
(I`m sure there are threads here about counter-productive media representations of humanity...anything that makes you want to wipe out a species within 30 seconds can`t be good)
The only cure is to watch Shrek 2. (overheard on the way out...`it`s much gayer than the first one`...which brought a smile to my face even though my lack of understanding is legendary)
(sorry about the brackets...still thinking in C++)
 
 
Less searchable M0rd4nt
17:58 / 05.07.04
So your opinion of everyone whose sexual orientation happens to be towards people with the same set of crotchular gubbins is informed by a couple of TV shows? TV shows, moreover, that are deliberatly designed to wind people up so they'll keep watching? But it's all okay, because watching a cartoon with a few cross-dressing references made you feel much yummier?

Do you ever go outside?
 
 
Char Aina
18:01 / 05.07.04
dude, i approve of you...
does that help?

i feel that what i lack in straight i make up for in knowing absolutely *nothing* about pigshit.
 
 
Wombat
18:24 / 05.07.04
Mordant C. I try to minimise outside time. Scary scary place. My opinion is based on TV, meeting (minimal) and wading thru lith threads that refer to theory I`m never ever going to read. Outside as mentioned in threads above is full of straight people holding hands and showing affection. Only a few days a year do I even notice anything different.

Toksic. Pigshit is really interesting. Pigs can live on land that isn`t suitable for growing food crops. BUT their shit can be degraded into methane by bacteria. We can produce cheap, clean electricity using this shit. (most types of organic waste can be used in this way). I`m sure you are aware that sustainable power is very important. I suggest you read several hefty and difficult tomes to increase your knowledge.
 
 
Goodness Gracious Meme
18:45 / 05.07.04
So, JAMM posts a 'provocative'/aggressive "rant".

And people respond. Some of them in kind, like me(except I'm not excusing mine as provocative). Some of them attempt to engage. Lots of people, in fact, take time to respond to his points.

JAMM cheerfully admits that the slew of responses has provoked 'not alot' of thought.

For fucks' sake. What was the point then?

Was it just to pollute my environment with your noxious straightness*, prejudice and moronic pronouncements as to 'the way of the world'. Opinions, not facts.

Thanks soooo much.

What did you want to happen, JAMM? People to agree with your viewpoint and tell you that you're right and this mystery queer domination brigade are wrong? (Where do I make contact, btw, sounds handy?)

Or people to engage with your questions, point out the assumptions inherent therein and offer their differing opinions?

Hmmmm. I wonder.



*specifically yours, no-one else's, mind.

But thank you for relieving my mind that my original suggestion was probably the correct one.

Fuck off, you bigoted, moronic, blinkered excuse...
 
 
Char Aina
18:49 / 05.07.04
man, you know how to talk shit...
 
 
Goodness Gracious Meme
18:49 / 05.07.04
Oh, and spong, I'm now humbled by your pigshit-expertise so will go away and try and inform myself on this fascinating and vital subject.

Thanks for pointing up my ignorance.

*sulks*
 
  

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