Problem, Reaction, Solution

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Originally uploaded by tattooindiana.

I know I promised to talk about Nazi UFO's, but a Jahova's Witness just came to my door and handed me a pamphlet about False Religion and I have to go with that. I read it just to see how they were gonna trip themselves up - it was a short journey.

I was down with the 1st paragraph decrying preachers openly warmongering when they should love their fellow man. Then, in the next entry, the pamphlet starts bashing this Jesus character that it had just quoted for supporting material in the previous entry. Clearly, this is a confused piece of paper.

To the pith of my quandary: the next statement leaps from war (#2 was about death, so not much straying) to same-sex relations. This was something I thought only our current president could do. This brings me to the title of this post:

Problem-Reaction-Solution

A long time ago, in a place where people screwed everything that moved, there was a Roman Emperor named Diocletian. He didn't like his citizens very much, but did enjoy playing with them on the battle field.

But he was sad because Romans were so good at killing things that there were no more enemies. So he has his palace burnt down (twice) and blames it on the Christians so he can turn the war machine inward and keep it chugging. The public accepted this lie and the Empire provided a solution to the problem it had (covertly) created itself.

Meanwhile, Back at the Ranch

Just when people were starting to get together on this whole terrorism kick in which the country had been engourged, the president throws the golden apple of Same-sex union into the ring. Even if you aren't a fan of history, it isn't hard to see this for what it is.

Then all of the zealots come marching out. Like the pamphlet I received, Christianity preaches love yet many that call themselves Christians love to hate the minorities. At the time of Diocletian, Christians were the minority and the followers of the state religion thoroughly enjoyed seeing them get hacked and chomped.

Did Rome ever really change management or just the sign on the edifice? When are humans going to recognize that freedom for all can't have an asterisk. When will people stop being so goddamn dumb?

I know this is running long, but please bare with me...

In answer to the last question, I decided to research this biblical passage the fanatics like to trot out (the pamphlet was no exception). It's Corinthians 6:9, 10. What many quoters do is ellipsis-out the non-sexual offenses of living to make the subject entirely about sex. This heats up the brain pan and makes all logical thought impossible (apparently).

Another problem with this passage is that it has as many mis-translations as there are versions of the bible. One can not literally follow a text if the meanings of words have been altered to fit political agendas. The original sentence fragments homophobes keep pointing to are minutia compared to the overall message and had nothing to do with homosexuality as a whole.

The Good that can Come out of This

On a personal note, I was talking with a friend who is very hurt by our free & enlightened society's relegation of him as a non-person. He was inconsolable. Even though he may have been preaching to the choir, so to speak, as those of us involved in the dialectic were on his side, at least a dialogue has developed.

The don't ask - don't tell doctrine of the military was an outward representation of how we deal with this issue as a people. Straights that consider themselves evolved enough to have a couple of gay friends can still be squeamish about talking on the subject. It's treated as understood, an elephant in the living room that people try not to notice but nod toward occasionally.

If we examine ourselves and speak out when bigotry rears its ugly head, then real change can occur. You don't have to be a jerk about it. That just turns people off to the resolution of the issue and creates polarity. Rather, if channels are opened and we can work through this, we may realize that consensual sex is not evil, no matter the proclivity.

Grow up America and throw away those concepts that made our ancestors' escape from religious persecution even more of a hell when they got to this side of the pond. Any reason or time people put down their guns long enough to kiss is good.