26) Weddings.
Marriage is a contract to produce offspring. Any sensible interpretation of this includes adoption and divorce.
The catholic church allows lots of divorces, but in its efforts to evade this obvious fact, pretends to have a time machine instead.
Domestic partnership is a matter of doing all the things married people do, but without the legal contracts or parenthood, the legal paperwork of divorce, or the legal rights.
Civil partnership is a domestic partnership with the rights of marriage tacked on, but not the marriage contract.
None of which has anything to do with the wedding ceremony, which is a religion-coated affirmation of the already existing contract.
Deciding to live together because you love each other has nothing to do with anyone else, so there's absolutely no reason to subject your respective families to each other.
Deciding to raise a child together because you were careless enough to let it be born...is something that families can certainly help out with. But spending vast amounts of money to bring them together in a dull church service before feeding them badly catered food while they try vainly to get along...
I mean, why? What exactly is the point? Seriously, what is a wedding supposed to achieve? Don't tell me it cements the bonds within and between families, because we've both seen plenty of families and we know it does no such thing.
So far as I can tell, it's an expensive party with a disco and a couple of fights at the end.
27) Funerals.
If you feel the need to celebrate someone's life, do it while they're alive. If you do it after they're dead, it'll sound insincere - not least because it usually is.
If there was something you wanted to tell someone all their life but you didn't, what the fuck were you waiting for?
And if you're going to dispose of a health hazard that used to be a person, don't pretend you're doing it for their benefit.
28) Immigration controls.
You think it makes sense to have quotas for jews, Spaniards, Mexicans, East Europeans etc? Why? You don't know do you. No, you don't, because you've never thought about it. If you had, you'd realise it doesn't make sense and never did.
You think there's no room in your country for more people? You fail basic geography.
You think there's not enough jobs or wealth for newcomers? You fail basic economics.
You think they'll steal away your women? You're just a basic failure.
You think foreigners smell bad and eat funny food? You're a worthless racist fuckwit and you should be forcibly deported, if only for the irony.
29) Royalty.
What exactly does a royal family do? What is it there for? What functions does it fulfil that no one else could?
Bring the nation together under a common figurehead? I'm not sure why that should be a good thing, but in any case, footballers do a better job of that, and footballers also provide more entertainment.
Conduct diplomacy? We've already got people who do that, and do it much better. They're called "diplomats" - and sometimes "political leaders".
Provide tourist attractions? There are indeed tourists who come to see the big houses and pageants of recently invented tradition. None of which actually requires an immensely rich semi-dysfunctional family of unemployable inbreds.
30) Homophobia.
So, you're a man and so am I, and you hate me because I have a kind of sex you don't want to have. But you don't hate people who have other kinds of sex you don't want to have.
Oh I see. You're afraid of me because you think I might find you attractive. Which is frightening in some way, somehow. But you're not afraid of women you don't find attractive...finding you attractive.
What's that? You're threatened by my having emotions and drives you can't understand. But you're not threatened by other people having emotions and drives that are beyond your comprehension.
If you were, you'd feel threatened by women. Oh, I see, you do.
I never thought that a funeral was for the dead but for the living. Same goes with monuments.
ReplyDeleteWeddings are just big parties! I go for the free food, some dancing (they always play YMCA and do the electric slide), and plus, if I'm drunk enough (and find an equally toasted wedding guest/party member), I'm looking at getting laid--as my standards (and hers) have been lowered considerably.
ReplyDeleteBirthday parties are for the living--funerals are for those left behind. Like wedding parties, I've been to good ones and bad ones and just plain weird ones. Still, if I'm drunk enough (and find an equally toasted mourner), I'm looking at getting laid--as my standards (and hers) have been lowered considerably.
As for immigration control, look at what happened to the American Indian (and the South American Indians). Had they used strict immigration control and policed their borders closely, they might still have their lands, instead of living a sad, drunken, pathetic existence in the wastelands of America, their once proud heritage the comical centerpieces of casinos and cheesy tourist attractions. But that's what they get for feeding those Englishmen and helping them survive the winter. Englishmen are like cats; you feed them once and they'll never go away!
Anyway, I once had a coworker rant and rave about how these immigrants are taking over--I asked him, taking over what? I didn't realize that a lot of Americans were lining for jobs cleaning pools, mowing yards, and doing housekeeping. Then he said, those people need to back to their own country. And I exclaimed, "I didn't know you are a Native American!" He looked at me like I was stupid and said, "I'm not!" Everyone else started laughing, and when he finally got the joke, he was pissed and didn't speak to me for a week--and what a lovely week that was!
I would luv to visit Buckingham Palace just so Liz can adopt me! I don't need any fancy titles--just let me live off the British taxpayers in fancy palaces and take extravagant vacations all over the world. Talk about winning the lotto!
Homophobes are like racists--small minded idiots who need to be spayed and neutered before being released into the general population.
@EROSWINGS: Don't forget the Chicken Dance!
ReplyDeleteBecause of my conservative Christian upbringing, I am very anti-marriage. I see no reason why I should “submit” to a husband, nor do I believe I need a man to be the “head” as I have a brain of my own, thank you very much. I don’t want someone staying with me because he feels bound to me by either religious vows or civil contracts – I want a man to be with me because he wants to be.
ReplyDeleteI have left written instructions that when I die I do not want a funeral. Can’t stand the thought of all those empty platitudes about what a good person I was and how I’m in a better place now when everyone knows I’m a complete fuck up and probably burning in hell.
I am baffled why men who get off on the thought of two women together are so frightened by the idea of two men being together.
The Former TardisGirl
@David: Someone once said "The purpose of memorials is to enable forgetting."
ReplyDeleteThey're to help the living pretend to remember.
@Eroswings: It's good to know American fuckwits are just like British ones. Maybe every nation has it's own kinds of genius, but stupid is the same everywhere.
@MJ: The last time I saw the chicken dance...was at an all male disco. But they were all (at least officially) straight. Indian wedding discos have slightly different rules.
@Anonymous Female: You were raised to be submissing and accepting - and are neither. I was raised to never make a fuss and never ask awkward questions. I know a lot of socialists who have children, who very rarely are.
It's almost as though there's a pattern here.
Kapo, you rather miss the point on homphobia. Most of us heteros couldn't give a flying toss about your emotionsn towards other men, but we do find the idea of whacking your todger up another bloke's sweaty bum a bit of a turn off.
ReplyDeleteHence the ridicule and such - but it's not a real fear; rather a desire to avoid people with unhealthy sexual habits.
And yes, I've worked with many gay teachers over the years (no shortage of them in EFL, is there?!), but I could never consider one as a friend - an acquaintance, yes - for the above reasons.
@The TEFL Tradesman
ReplyDeleteA couple of things I've noticed about straight men.
1) They think more about gay sex than gay men do. They talk about it more, and in more graphic detail - as you demonstrate.
We just do it, you lot obsess about it.
2) They always assume gay sex is anal, but whenever they're "missing their girlfriends" or "their wife doesn't understand them" or they're just "totally drunk and horny"...they always want oral.
And they assume we're just begging to give it to them - as though we're the loose sluts, not them.
3) They think they're doing us a great favour by tolerating us, though we're the ones constantly exercising forbearance at their smug, patronising hypocrisy.
Anyway, given the choice between sharing a flat with a gay male TEFLer, a straight male TEFLer, or a female TEFLer of either persuasion...I perfer to adopt a local stray dog.
A couple of things I've noticed about people who tend to generalise to suit themselves...
ReplyDelete1] No we don't. Wherever did you get that idea?
2] As per above.
3] Toleration is not the same as patronising (a fellow human). And I don't think you're entirely right, either, about 'smug, patronising hypocrisy'. Why 'hypocrisy'?
Most of us are prepared to accept gay people, despite their apparent disability / dysfunction. Just stop banging on about being gay - big deal!
You're right about the dog, though.