Dawg Day Afternoon

This just in from Iron Nick (or IronNick) --

"lol, what an arrogant jerk! And you're worried about getting too many gropes? And comments about being hot??? Just goes to prove that you're not the only delusional dullard around. Me thinks you do protest too much, but there's good news--29 Plams is a great place for you to be planted. Maybe it could be re-named 30 Palms to include you, you cerrtainly have the nuts for it. Nevertheless, kudos for your musical talent--I admire you for that, and it's a convenient excuse if you'd ever have to tangle with a real man."

Now, we know the profile he was responding to; it was listed in the first post on this blog. (Go on, I'll wait while you reacquaint yourself with it....) It is responses like these that bring me to the ongoing question: just what the fook is it with fags that, upon reading my profile, they feel compelled to hurl bile and invective my way? I mean, these are guys who, one imagines, would ordinarily simply change the channel if James Dobson came on. What is it about reading a personal profile that so sets 'em off?

My theory -- and it's only a theory; there's no fooken way I'll ever be able to prove it -- is that they look at the pics, get all excited, and create this image of me in their bubbly li'l heads. Then they read the text, and it has nothing to do with the image they created. This hurts their feelings, so they (to borrow a word from the psych biz) decompensate. They vote democrat and decompensate when "their" candidate abandons them and votes for DOMA. They put a "No War in Iraq" bumpersticker on their car and are chagrined when Shrub maintains the rightness of his course, preaching perfectly pitched to the pitch-perfect choir. They actually believe that abortion as a medical procedure is threatened (exactly what this issue has to do with being queer, I'll never know; all the queer folks I know with kids went to elaborate lengths to plan for the births). They are the perfect enemy, just as easily manipulated, just as bloodthirsty as those they claim to oppose. And this prodigiously stupid battle will never end as long as the fundamental American outlook of us v them remains. Colony v nation, state v state, north v south, rich v poor, race v race. A wiser man than I once said, "The point is not to enlarge the circle of acceptance; the point is to erase the circle."

Taking One for the Team

My buddy Hitman was deployed to the Sandbox four days ago, and I fooken miss him.

Post Scrip

Creativejuice, the feller in the previous post, felt compelled to respond to me. "And thank you for taking it upon yourself to judge me," he wrote, after I commended him for behaving like an adult.

What the fook is it with fags and judgment? He clearly prevaricates in his correspondence with me, yet when I point this out, it's judgment. Hmm.

Okay, there's this odd little philosophical brick laid in the foundation of Homoland (for those who just joined our story, Homoland is my name for the Castro district in San Francisco; it is a far better nomenclature than 'gay community' as far as I'm concerned). And this little brick sez, "We are not straight; we are gay. Therefore, gay is what straight is not." Next to it is a little brick that sez, "There are no standards. Our strength is in our diversity, and we are all different; judgment was used to belittle us and divide us, therefore judgment is bad."

There's just a teensy problem with such an understanding: without standards, you have mob rule. Community, by its nature, cannot exist without standards. C'mon, lambchop, think to the French revolution (and before you get snooty by asking 'which one?'), when they did away with months and years, and call their time Year One of the Revolution and so on, dissolved marriage as an institution, banned the church and jailed clergymen, squatting rights came to bear (didn't matter if you owned the land, merely that you lived on it). On and on. Tell me, who came to power? And what did ol' Robespierre do? And who destroyed him? And were they themselves destroyed? (Here's a lovely quote: "If the spring of popular government in time of peace is virtue, the springs of popular government in revolution are at once virtue and terror: virtue, without which terror is fatal; terror, without which virtue is powerless. Terror is nothing other than justice, prompt, severe, inflexible...It has been said that terror is the principle of despotic government. Does your government therefore resemble despotism? Yes, as the sword that gleams in the hands of the heroes of liberty resembles that with which the henchmen of tyranny are armed.") Let us remember these folks were lefties. (Go on with yer shit about Shrub; I ain't impressed. Do you actually believe you're saying something new about W. and his cronies?)

What about them Bolsheviks? Who succeeded them? And what sort of dictator was he? And what did he do?

My point is not "Oh, those wacky lefties." My point is what happens when you eschew standards egocentrically, thoughtlessly. When you say, "Let's make 'em up as we go along and reinvent ourselves and make our own society cuz those old ethics were just so tired and, well, they didn't speak to me; that's all about straight white men."

No, I didn't misspell the title to this entry. It's a little scrip for the odd syndrome at the heart of Homoland. Why is the act of pointing out a man's lies called judgmental? All you do is notice him lying.

Lurking for Love

Being the sort who looks for love in all the wrong places and being former, I will often start an online conversation with a guy if he states his location as FPO/APO AE or the like. Here is a transcript of an exchange prompted by such an opener, from a very popular men's (okay, fag) site; the correspondent, creativejuice, states in his profile that he is 50 years old:

BigDumbDawg
What branch you in?

creativejuice
branch?

BigDumbDawg
You state your location as APO AE. This leads one to believe you are deployed in the Arab Emirates. I inquired as to which branch of the military you're in.

creativejuicenope.
sorry. i'm in the states. denver in fact. not in the military.

BigDumbDawg
You may wish to edit your profile to reflect that.

creativejuice
if you read the description it says where i'm from but i will take that into consideration.

BigDumbDawg
Sir, I mean no offense. However, it is disrespectful to those servicemembers stationed in the Arab Emirates for someone who is not so deployed to give the appearance that he is.

creativejuice
understood and no offense taken but i'm not sure how i am giving the appearance that i am deployed. because my location says AE? could itbe possible that i might be employed there?

BigDumbDawg
Why lie? "APO AE" is a standardized abbreviation; that's how it gives the appearance you're overseas/military. You're how old and don't know this? You selected it and don't know this? Prevaricate as you wish, but please don't disrespect those deployed.

creativejuice
i see i hit a nerve with you and i wouldn't want that so it will be changed sir.

BigDumbDawg
Thank you for at long last behaving like an adult.

Okay, there's no real reason for thanking a grown man for behaving like one. Truly. What irks the fook outta me is that the guy sees no problem with misrepresenting himself in a disrespectful manner. When his lie is pointed out for what it is, he still ignores the fact that he lied, makes the matter *my* issue, then condescends to do the right thing. A bracingly American trait, that. And gay guys, particularly those on the political left, wonder how they contributed to the current political climate. If, as leftist types are wont to say, the personal is the political... well...?

Am I overreacting? Well, this *is* a fooken blog. Sheesh.

"Your Eclectedness...forgive me if my humble "grope" has in any way offended or perturbed you...I read your "Fooken" profile, and now realize why you are single...I must say, you have an impressive vocabulary, hombre, and, in my presumably worthless opinion, which you most likely will confirm, you are the first "Redneck/Savant" I've ever encountered here; or anywhere. Just curious, did you vote for Bush, chico? I leave you now, Your Immenceness...forgive...I am dirt before you...:-) *kiss, kiss*"

One always starts with an arresting opening. The paragraph above was written by a feller from Victoria BC, having been so moved by an online profile of mine.

The profile:

"Call me Deke. Am very much the big bro type; don't call me 'dad', don't call me 'sir'. The last thing I want to hear out of your ill-mannered and uninformed cakehole is how hot you think I am. Looking for companionship and one lasting battlebuddy; redheads, muscles, ink, former and AD military, brains, heart are all desirable. Younger than me and shorter than me sometimes produces an effect over which I have no control. Honesty is essential; strength that matches mine is compelling. Make conversation, treat me with simple respect and we'll get along fine. Former MOS 0311 and 5565; prefer own species (jarhead) for, uh, FTX and related merriment. I play rough. BC/KO, electro, singletails, chastity, gelding, guns, knives, piercing. I'd just as soon blacken a man's eyes or split his lips as kiss him. Yeah, I'm single. Live in fear. Gropes are summarily ignored; if you can't make conversation and must rely on prefabricated gestures, return to the cliched hell in which you surely live.

"I play piano (I'm damn good) and alto sax (I need improvement). Groove on Messiaen, Debussy, Reich, Crumb, Stravinsky and Hildegarde of Bingen; enjoy Cannonball Adderley and Bill Evans, too. I read a lot (Pynchon, McCarthy, Delillo), enjoy old movies (big James Cagney and Edward G. Robinson fan), good food, camping, hiking and swimming nekkid. Fooken love weight-training, rugby (I play lock) and shooting (own a Taurus PT99, pre-brady, bwar-har-har). The quickest way to piss me off is to treat me like an object or an accessory (use of the word "look" as a noun puts me in mind of fingernails on a chalkboard); this also means I don't enjoy hook-ups or one-offs. Do I have an ideal mate? Yeah, I do; you probably aren't him, but ya could try to impress me. If HIV status is an issue, I'm not you're man; this is not a circuitous way of revealing my sero-status, rather it is a direct way of saying I don't tolerate the petty bullshit associated with twats who demand I be one or the other before they'll acknowledge my humanity or desirability."

The 'grope' that he mentions refers to a prefabricated message the site provides, presumably for, well, hell, I dunno. If a guy can't make conversation face to face, does providing him with a pre-written option truly do any good? What sort of association could one have with a man who can't speak for himself? -- because he's "shy" or he "never knows what to say." To paraphrase, if you can't say anything, don't say anything at all.