Originally posted by Elf on her blog at Dreamwidth.

There’s no shortage of blog posts and comments by Christians, saying, “please don’t consider me to be one of those nasty icky bigoted unthinking fundamentalists.”

* “Christianity is much broader, deeper and richer than fundamentalism.”[1]
* “I wish people wouldn’t lump all Christians in the same group”[2]
* “There is a vile strain of Christianity, indeed, but there are caring, thoughtful moderate and progressive Christians out there – millions of them.” [3]
* “I want it to be clear to you and your family that we do not all hate. We are not all bigots.”[4]

I could quote more. (The roundup for this post turned up half a dozen more easily; I’m sure I could find more than that with a bit of work. Just plug “not all christians are” or “all christians aren’t” into Google.)

As if I couldn’t tell them apart; as if I am incapable of noticing the difference between a kind and thoughtful person and one who spouts bigotry and oppression and quotes a book to support it. As if I hadn’t noticed that the majority of Christians, like the majority of people in every other religion, are basically decent folks who want good pay and healthy families and a bit of fun & leisure on the side. As if I can’t tell a mundane from a scholar from a wingnut. (Believe me, I know from wingnuts.)

And on top of the insult to my basic perception abilities, there’s the implication that I’m supposed to care which sub-sect they’re allied with. That I’m supposed to keep track of the myriad varieties of Jesusites and sort out which official doctrines are bugfuck nutso (um, we can agree there are some of those, right?) and which ones are just somewhat pushy and which ones are openly tolerant of real diversity—and among those, which allow how much individual differences within the sect identification.

As if it were my responsibility, as a non-Christian, to sort out which of the followers of J the C are rational and caring human beings, like their scripture tells them to be, and which ones are using the same scripture to justify hatred and slaughter.

They want, they tell me (or my friends, or my allies, or people who share some of my beliefs) to be accepted for who they are. They want to be judged on their own merits, not lumped in with a bunch of bigots who get media attention ‘cos they’re rich and white and male. They want me to understand that they’re “not like that.”

You know what I want?

I want my kids to not be expected to attend school on the days of our religious services. I want strangers not to offer me the blessings of a deity I do not worship. I want members of my religion to be able to meet in public, anywhere in the US, without risking slashed tires, broken windows, and physical attacks. I want the freedom to answer questions about my religion without fear of reprisal, even if those questions come from children. I want judges to stop ruling that non-Christian influences are dangerous for children, and giving custody to the Christian parent. I want my president to stop reminding me that he doesn’t represent my religion’s needs or wants, that he is oblivious to my religion’s truths.

And that’s just the basic, don’t-want-to-live-in-fear wants. I don’t dare let myself have wants that Christians can take for granted… the ability to walk into a random drugstore and find greeting cards with my religious symbols on them, libraries to stock books about my religion and treat them with respect, prayers of my faith offered by public officials in times of disaster, history classes that acknowledge the history and importance of my religion. The ability to move somewhere where all my neighbors will be of my religion, or at least, will not hate it. The ability to hang holiday decorations in my windows, or on my cubicle walls, without facing a barrage of annoying questions, much less vandalism.

The pie-in-the-sky dream? The ability to have a public temple in a city of less than 100,000 people, where the government forms are handed out in seven languages–or in a rural area more than 10 miles from the nearest library. The ability for a dozen neighbors to pool their funds, buy a tiny plot of land, and build a religious services building they’re pretty sure won’t get burned down within a year.

I don’t expect any of those to happen. Not in my lifetime, and maybe not ever. My religion’s weird, and there’s never been a whole lot of public acceptance of weird.

But I’d like to not have to hide my religious symbols under my shirt on the bus. And I’d like my kids to be free to attend our religious services when they’re supposed to happen, not on the nearest JHVH-inspired holy day.

So, umm. The “nice” Christians don’t like getting backlash about fundies. They believe they are persecuted by more restrictive branches of Christianity. Maybe they are. But they’re not lacking privilege because of it—not all persecutions break along privilege lines. They’re not being oppressed even when they’re being hated.

And it is not. my. job. To figure out what kind of Christians are which, to figure out who belongs to what sect and where their individual beliefs lie.

I’m big on individualism. REALLY big on it. Enough to override decades of experience that tells me that anyone wearing a cross is probably a danger to me and my family, or at the very least, a danger to my comfort.

I don’t *mind* the apologetics, exactly. They’re a phase; Christians who are waking up to their privilege usually go through a stage of “OMG, I’m not like those people! I promise!” And what wakes them up, and what exactly they realize, is of interest to their friends. I am *endlessly* fascinated by all sorts of religious discussion, including the eternal “creation vs evolution” debate that I really can’t understand as a dichotomy (I have no problems with both); I just don’t have the energy to keep running on that hamster wheel.

But being interesting & entertaining doesn’t mean something is new and innovative. There’s a good deal of Special Snowflakism in most “All Christians Are Not Like That” posts. And more in most comments on news blogs.

Sometimes I’m amused by it. Sometimes I’m interested in a particular perspective. Sometimes, I seethe at the reminder that they have the safety to speak about their religious beliefs and practices, in public, without fear of reprisal. (Oh, I can speak up. I live in one of those aforementioned cities of over 100k people. Nobody cares what my religion is; I can dye my hair blue and wear black robes in public and nobody blinks. What I can’t do, is safely move to a city ~100-300 miles away where the rent would be 1/3 of what we’re paying, and be just as public.)

I am never happy about the reminder of how *trapped* I am.

People exist on the other side of this monitor. What you are reading right now is not what someone is, it is what someone is presenting to you. All you see is that which is presented, nothing more.

Even if you know them, see them every day, you still only see what they present. You don’t see into their heart, you don’t see the depths of their mind, you don’t know what they are REALLY thinking at any one point.

All you see is one facet of them.

Like a diamond that has been cut and shaped and polished, there are all these tiny pieces that reflect light when you turn it. You might be able to see several facets at one time, but you will only get a light reflection from one at a time.

That is what is being presented to you when someone types things into a computer page. You see ONE facet of them. You don’t see any more, just that part that they choose to show you.

So how can ANYONE judge someone on the other side of the screen?

All you see is what is presented. Is that one little part that is shown really something that you can base a decision about what their life is like?

I have had people who have judged my life based on some part of me that they see in my journal, in my blog, in my emails, or in a picture of me. They decide that it is enough to make a decision about who I am and what I do and do not do. They use that to decide if I love, if I am a good person, if I will help in a given situation and more.

I have been called deviant. I have been told that I am an asshole. I have been told I’m a freak. I’ve been called every kind of name under the sun. Why? Because I chose to live my life in the open. I chose not to hide myself like many people do. I present to you exactly what I am. There are not hidden parts of me, I am open to any question anyone wants to ask.

Have I done bad things? Yes. Do I have regrets? Certainly. Do I feel I have lived my life as best I can? Not by a long shot. Am I happy with who I am? Yes and no. I am who I am.

I don’t mind being judged by those who don’t know. I don’t mind being told that I’m a horror or that they can’t stand me.

That’s why I published the negative comment on my post “A Letter to My Family.”. Someone decided that they wanted to say that I hate women, that I feel like a failed man. All kinds of other things. It doesn’t hurt.

Yes, initially it did hurt some. I took time to think and not react emotionally. I chose to let others see what was said, exactly as it was said. The person was obviously too scared and cowardly to sign their name. None of that really bothers me.

What does bother me is that someone thought that they knew me enough from what I present to make an accurate judgment. That’s a stupid fallacy, and I hope that this post has showed you all just how stupid that is.

I love people. There are some individual persons that I can’t stand. But they have their own problems to work thorough. I chose to take the facet that was shown to me and reflect it back, showing them that little tiny mirror, showing themselves. Sometimes, as is shown in many stories and plays, sometimes those mirrors show who someone really is, and there’s times when that is uncomfortable.

I can look in those mirrors and not hate myself anymore. I used to, now when I look in the mirror, I see the person I want to be, and the person that can be. I am at peace with that.

So sling your best barbs. Do whatever will make you respect the person in the mirror in the morning. If that means hating me, have fun.

I love you anyhow.

If you hate me, if you want to see me dead, if you think I should cover myself in flamable gel and set myself on fire and die in an inferno, AT LEAST HAVE THE FUCKING COURTESY TO SIGN YOUR NAME SO I KNOW WHO TO NOT CARE ABOUT. Don’t send me something anonymous and then act like you have the higher moral ground.

Dear Family,

I know you read this site, probably not regularly, but often enough to see this. So I’m writing this letter to you all to inform you of some things.

First off, as some of you know and have known for some time, I’m transsexual. That means I was born in the wrong body. My soul is female, and always has been. I am in a male body, and it’s felt wrong my entire life.

Because I believe things happen for a reason, I have not done anything before now. I have since found out that the reason I was born like this is because I was supposed to give my DNA to my daughter. She was meant to be born of me with a specific lady. Because the technology does not exist yet to allow us to take the DNA from one female and use it to fertilize another female’s egg, I was born male.

If you think about it, I have never been male. I don’t like most things that men are supposed to like. I don’t like sports. I don’t like repairing cars, or even have any interest in cars beyond transportation. I am not competitive. I don’t confront people well. I don’t really stand up for myself or assert myself at all. I hate “tooting” my own horn and I work best when left to do things as I may.

I like playing with dolls. I like dressing them up. I cry easily. I am more emotional than logical. I make a better mother than I do father. I enjoy looking pretty.

“But,” you cry, “we never saw you do any of those things!” That’s because I learned to counterfeit being a boy very well. I would do something that was unlike a male and I would be corrected, usually by my father, and I learned not to make him angry. So I pretended to be a boy and to do boy things. I found things that boys did that I could enjoy too, like shooting guns and hiking in the woods. But women like to do that as well.

When I would act in a dainty manner, I would be told to not act so prissy. When I would turn to my father for comfort on something, I was told not to wear my heart on my sleeve, to grow a spine and to stand up for myself.

All those pictures of girls I had up in my darkroom? They weren’t so I could look at the pretty girls and do what boys would do, it was so I could look at their clothing and to try to figure out what it would be like to wear them.

Sisters, I used to sneak into your rooms and steal your clothes, hoping I could wear them and that they would fit me. Our oldest sister even found me trying on makeup once, and helped me get it all off so Mom wouldn’t see. It felt right to have on a dress.

No, I was never attracted to boys, probably the only “male” thing I did. I bought things for myself, hid them and nearly got thrown out of the Army for doing that. Yeah, they thought I was gay.

I lost girlfriends because of this. They would find the only thing I had, a leotard I bought while in Indiana and  would have a fit, thinking I was cheating on them. This happened about three times. And once again, I wanted to be in her clothes instead of being in her, if you get my meaning.

Mom, I tried to talk to you about this. Each time you rejected me. The last time you told me flat out that you didn’t want another daughter. That killed me inside. It hurt so bad to be rejected by the one person I thought could understand. So I tried again to live a male life.

But you know what? I make a better housekeeper and mother than I do breadwinner and father. I am tired of living this lie.

So here it is. I’m transitioning to Female now. No longer will I be the male you know, I am going to be female. It is something I have been working for all my life. Yes, literally.

There’s one story that illustrates how long this has been going on.

Granny Myrtle had come over to our house in MJ at one point. I can remember this like it was yesterday. One of my cousins came over as well along with her parents. I was upstairs in my room, entertaining my cousin. Granny had just recently given me some cowboy boots or something like that. It was clothing at least. I wrote out a request to her that she make me a cowgirl outfit, dress, vest, gloves and all, and hide it inside a set of cowboy clothing that she would give me at one point, so I could trick you all into thinking I was a boy. I really wanted the cowgirl set. I thought the skirt and gloves were so cute and I couldn’t stand it.

Anyway, I gave this note to my cousin to give to Granny Myrtle when they were gone from the house, so you didn’t find out about it. She left and went right downstairs. When I realized what she was doing I FLEW down and snatched the note from her just as she was giving it to Granny Myrtle. You, Mom, yelled at me for being rude, and I was punished for it. But that was nothing compared to what I knew would happen if my secret came out.
I never forgave my cousin for that either.

Mom, I know you sent me to the psychologist when I was 12 to “cure” me of this condition. That was the first time I told you this. You passed it off as being sexual attraction, and I tried to set you straight. You wouldn’t hear me. You were so in denial that I couldn’t believe it. So I played along.

I tried telling you later, you refused to listen to it at all. I gave up. The last time was after I was married and my wife was pregnant. She was all for my being myself and transitioning right then. I lived as a woman for several months. Had dresses and makeup and shaved everything and the whole nine yards. Then I told you for the last time and got my final rejection.

Well, I’m done living what anyone else expects of me. I’m tires of being the Big Brother, the Son. I’m going to be the Oldest Sister and the Daughter I should have been from the first. I’m tired of trying to be what you want me to be.

I know that some of you won’t be able to accept this. Father, I’m sure that you will see this as my final trip into apostasy and that I absolutely need to be deprogrammed by someone and my soul saved. But I’m telling you now that I have soul searched for the last 37 years and I can’t take it anymore. I absolutely cannot be what I am not.

I’ve tried it your way, all it has brought me is mental illness and heartache. You don’t know the number of nights I went to sleep with tears in my eyes, BEGGING God to make me a girl before I woke; BEGGING to be female; telling Him that I would give anything to be a girl. It was my nightly mantra for some time during puberty. I would keep anything that a girl lost because it was my “secret dress up store”. I found Mom’s wig, I wore her dresses. I felt best when I was wearing her boots in the winter, and I cried when I couldn’t get them on my feet anymore.

I remember being young and listening to how Mom and Dad would talk about Christine Jorgensen or Billie Jean King. I would listen in to those conversations a lot when you were playing cards with your friends. I would sneak into your friend’s daughter’s room and grab her dresses out of the closet and put them on. Sometimes the seams would pop, I was the cause of that.

I hated my body and I still do. Mom, I know you panicked when you thought I was trying to slice off my genitalia in the tub one night. I wasn’t quiet that desperate, I knew it would most likely kill me if I tried it. I just wanted them to go away.

So, here it is.

You are losing a son and gaining a daughter. I’m probably going to lose you all because of this. Yes, I know what the Bible and what the Prophet say about this, I’ve read very carefully. If you don’t want to talk to me anymore, I totally understand. I’ll hate it, but I understand. I’m not changing my mind, nor can you “save” me or “cast the demon out of me”. This has been a LONG agonizing road I’ve traveled. I won’t be the first Male to Female transsexual to lose their birth family. Thank the Gods that my wife loves me, and that my daughter loves me as well, and they both support me in this.

I guess this letter is a couple things wrapped up into one. It’s a “goodbye” letter to you. It’s a “how could you” letter. It’s an explanation of why I was so fucked up when I was young. It is a letter talking about all the signs you all saw and totally ignored. It is the removal of blame from you and an explanation of how it is.

It’s an invitation to have a relationship with the girl who is to be.

It’s a plea to not reject me.

You all seemed to be okay with my daughter coming out as a lesbian, well, I am now also. I love women, I’m married to one, and I want to be one. Not such a huge leap.

I really love you all. I don’t want this to destroy 40+ years of memories, but I refuse to try to be someone I’m not. I do that all the time and it’s fucked me up beyond anything. I’m tired of it. You can’t know how tired.

Thankfully I will still have friends left. Maybe they can suffice.

Your daughter and sister,
Joyce Anne Phillip

Originally posted on 11 November, 2009

I hate PeTA. I hate what they stand for, I hate what they do, I hate how they go about doing what they do.

Let’s start with the surface shit: They are Eco-Terrorists. They go to very public events, toss paint and blood on people who have never done any of them any wrong, traumatizing them and destroying their clothing. They do this at fashion shows, where the people who design and make these clothes are showing off their wares, in hopes of making money, and thus PeTA is destroying the livelihood of others. (1) (2)

Then there comes the donations of monies to actual terrorists. People like ELF (Earth Liberation Front) and ALF (Animal Liberation Front) who think that destroying property and costing private citizens millions of dollars is a good thing. Who think that the waste in lumber, stone, masonry, copper, plastic, steel, gypsum, synthetic fibers and rubber that were used in the building they just destroyed is a way to reclaim the Earth and HELP the environment recover? Let me clue some people in, the materials have already been cut and shaped. Destroying them only means that they will have to be cut again thus wasting more of the Earth’s resources. And this is all because they lost a court battle. (3)

Cool, so by their reasoning, if someone gets fired for gross incompetence on the job, that person can go in and blow up the building? That’s what it sounds like to me.

Please note these names, Animal LIBERATION FRONT, Earth LIBERATION FRONT…. This sounds suspiciously like the PLO (Palestine LIBERATION ORGANIZATION) which almost everyone will agree is a terrorist organization.

And PeTA supports this with their money. With the money they raise through donations. They have been proven to have given money to these creeps, in the tune of $1500 in one case, and there could be more. (4) There is currently a petition to get PeTA’s tax exempt status revoked for this. (5) That’s right, they don’t have to pay a dime in taxes to support a terror campaign and wage a terror campaign themselves with your money. It’s not just me that thinks this way either, the FBI does too. (6)

Then there is sheer irresponsibility. While looking over the site http://www.rickross.com for information I could use to reference what I have been stating about PeTA for years, I came across this gem: http://www.rickross.com/reference/animal/animal32.html “PeTA revives anti-milk campaign”. I started reading the article, and was shocked and appalled. Basically what PeTA is advocating is that college students should go out and drink beer instead of milk. That’s right, they are ADVOCATING under-age drinking, drunk driving, boozing the college days away. They want kids right out of high school to waste the years they could be spending learning how to live the rest of their lives in a beer-fogged haze.

Why? “[The cow's] babies are taken away from them within a couple days of birth — often within a couple hours of birth — and you can hear these animals, the babies and the mothers, wailing in agony.” So because the cattle are lowing, meaning calling and talking to one another and needing to be milked, AS THEY DO ALL THE TIME, PeTA wants your children to go out and have drunk driving accidents. MADD (Mothers Against Drunk Driving) are up in arms about this and have been for a while. They were up in arms about it when PeTA originally brought this campaign forward the first time.

Then there is their idiocy and their short-sightedness. It’s not just the corrupt labs they want to get to stop animal testing, it’s ALL labs. It’s not only the factory farms who abuse their animals to get milk from them, it’s ALL cattle everywhere. It’s not just the plants where the calf are kept in a tiny pen to make sure the veal that it will become is tender and succulent, it’s ALL cattle breeders. What happens when all these cattle are released? Where do they go? What do we do when we have cows walking the streets? Going feral and attacking people? Do we shoot them?

I asked PeTA this very question, and have received NO response despite being promised that they would get back to me in two weeks, it’s been two years and still nothing.

They cop out by saying they won’t answer anything that is already covered in their FAQ, but when I looked at their FAQ, the entry says:

“What will we do with all the chickens, cows, and pigs if everyone becomes a vegetarian?It is unrealistic to expect that everyone will stop eating animals overnight. As the demand for meat decreases, fewer animals will be raised for food. Farmers will stop breeding so many animals and will turn to other types of agriculture. When there are fewer of these animals, they will be able to live more natural lives.”

Then they go on to say “look at how animals raised for food are treated!”

In other words, they don’t care. They have no plans for taking care of a cattle overpopulation. I keep seeing visions of the markets in India, where starving cattle are wandering the streets, unable to eat because the humans won’t let them eat from their stalls except for one day a year. Where feral cattle can attack humans because they don’t fear humans at all. I guess PeTA would also protest wholesale slaughter of those attacking cattle, a shotgun blast between the eyes. I can imagine their horror.

Then they go and do something like this: http://www.milksucks.com/prostate.html and http://psa-rising.com/upfront/giuliani-PeTA.htm in which they ask if you “Got Prostate Cancer?” (Then) Mayor Rudy Giuliani was diagnosed with prostate cancer, not something that is worthy of ridicule. They plaster his face on a billboard, put a milk moustache on him and then open his (most times) fatal disease up as a reason to give up milk. (7) (8)

And PeTA is pleased with this controversy. They want this kind of publicity because it raises awareness of “problems” they see in society. They are barely sorry when this kind of campaign harms people and does nothing for the animals they supposedly care for.

In other words, they are attention sluts. They want the attention directed at them, and if everyone isn’t paying attention to them, they stamp their feet and complain until people do pay attention. Freaking drama queens.

The problem is that while the cause may be important, their means of doing things is very insulting. Instead of being moderate and reasonable about this whole thing, they are going to the extreme left and demanding everyone join them. They are advocating not a gradual reduction in production and consumption of milk and meat, they want it all to stop immediately. Instead of offering alternates for leather and other animal skins they simply demand that it stops being used immediately. Instead of praising and honoring those who use animal products responsibly (and reasonably), they paint everyone with the “exploiter” paintbrush and use that as a way to attack.

I mean, when a fashion designer goes out of his way to buy fur from animals who are being slaughtered anyhow where the fur would be waste, and to use that in his designs, one would think that a reasonable person could see that as a way to make sure that some animal lives instead of being slaughtered for its fur only. But no, PeTA goes out of their way to make sure everyone sees them as an exploiter just like those who wantonly waste animals and the worst of the worst.

Like their sensational video (WARNING! EXPLICIT VIDEO) that was taken “undercover” in the KFC chicken farm. They not only got a video that was out of context, but then got all these idi… uh, stars to jump behind them and call for a boycott of KFC. Like that’s going to affect their sales any or how that rancher treats their chickens. It won’t stop anything, and it only makes the starlets look like hypocrites when they are caught eating chicken.

And their terror tactics aren’t limited to adults either. Here’s a nice card that was created JUST for the children in our midst who love to have Easter or Ostara, cute little chickens and bunnies and eggs. http://www.PeTA2.com/ecard/easter/easter_p2.asp What do you think this is going to do to the average 8 year old? How about the average 12 year old? Screaming fits, nightmares, claustrophobia and more.

What’s next? Christmas with the execution of your dinner?

I call PeTA hypocrites for a simple reason, they are.  I have some anecdotal stories about how PeTA goes to protest someplace like KFC and because it’s winter outside, they wear LEATHER COATS.  Read that again, they wear leather coats while protesting someone for using inhumane methods to slaughter the chickens.  Hypocrisy, pure and simple.

And they can’t claim that they are doing this for the animal either. A reasonable person would think that if PeTA takes an animal to care for it, that the animal is better off, right? Not at all. According to one source(9), and this was national news for some time, in 2007 PeTA, the People for Ethical Treatment of Animals (in case you don’t remember) euthanized more than 90% of the animals left in their care. In 2007 alone, PeTA took in 1997 animals and adopted out 12, and killed the rest. They have been actively doing this since 1998 and as of the table I found they have killed 19,215 animals.

Read that closely, Nineteen Thousand Two Hundred Fifteen animals. These are dogs, cats, horses, birds and so on that can be trained to do other jobs and to help people. Ratters, seeing eye dogs, drug sniffing ponies and so on. Spaying them and neutering them is an easy process, it prevents more unwanted animals from being born. But instead of treating these animals with dignity, they make a slaughterhouse of their shelter.

Now, far be it from me to say that we don’t need to destroy unwanted animals. I get upset when I see some “no kill” shelter euthanizing an animal. When I read that a group whose stated purpose is to take care of animals and shield them from the cruelty of mankind, and then I read that they kill the same animals put in their care, well, I see a color that has nothing to do with “red”.

Personally, I see PeTA as a thorn on the side of groups like Greenpeace and The Global Defense Council, groups who are actually working to help the environment and help the animals they claim to love. They are hypocrites in the worst way. They protest Westminster because it’s exploitation of dogs and because of the strict breeding standards for the purebloods. Then instead of neutering/spaying the animals in their care and finding loving homes for them, they kill them.

A supporter of domestic terrorists; hypocrites; users of tactics of terror and horror against impressionable children; users to divide families due to moral issues; all around idiots who don’t care of the damage they do.

I objected to those environmental groups who spiked trees and who raided whaling ships, but I’d take those groups every day and twice on Sunday over a group like PeTA. I’d advise anyone who is thinking of supporting PeTA to think again, very seriously.

Now, before someone misconstrues this article and thinks that I advocate and support slaughterhouses and the cruel practices that some factory farms do, I don’t.  I hate seeing calves who stand in a pen barely big enough for them, so that the veal that they will ultimately die to produce is as tender as possible.  I hate some of the practices that I know happen out there.  Animals are here to be used, but they are also to be husbanded and shepherded and taken care of or they will go away permanently.  Mankind is not here to dominate the world, we are here to live in harmony with the natural world.

What I object to is the militant stance that PeTA has decided to use to get their point across.  Their point of not harming animals is a good one, and there needs to be advocates for those who can’t speak for themselves.  But PeTA’s stance is so far out there into wack-dom that I can’t believe that they are still considered seriously by the Western World.  As far as I am concerned the moment they picked up firebombs and encouraged others to go out and kill, they lost all credibility.  They became as bad as what they fight against.

This was shared by a friend of mine on Livejournal. I think it’s important enough that everyone needs to see it.

Listen to the audio as well as watching it.

What with the constant improvements in software, I re-updated the site to the most recent install of WordPress. I was worried that there would be problems with the older stuff, and even though it broke a plugin that allowed me to put all the pages into categories like the posts.

So that’s it then, I made my choice. Ditch the old and in with the new. Now, however, all the pages for the various articles are part of the timeline of the site, just like any other post. You can see the whole thing just by using the navigation at the bottom, but I warn you, there’s over 800 posts now.

Anyhow, just letting you all know.

I haven’t unprotected the previous post because I have to talk to a doctor first. When I do, I’ll make a decision to unprotect it or not. wish me luck.

Okay, as you know I’ve been playing with WordPress since the Journal got moved over to that format. I’ve put most of the content of the Journal up as pages instead of posts.

Let me explain a bit for those of you who are not WordPress gurus:

WordPress is a blogging software. In that it is like Livejournal, Dreamwidth, Movable Type and many other platforms out there. I use WordPress because it is I) free II) scalable and III) able to be hosted on my OWN servers, which means I control all that you see and do and how it is used.

This presents problems, however. The content I have here is mostly articles that are put there for you to read. This isn’t a shock, but the WAY that WordPress implements this is a PITA. Pages are for content that is not dynamic, that is static and doesn’t change (I am aware that all three of those mean the same thing, I’m trying to give a context to those who don’t know). But, pages are also outside the structure of WordPress.

It would be like you have a diary over here. In that diary you put all the things you come across, things you think, things you write. But at the same time, you have a three-ring binder that you have really special articles you keep coming back to and rearranging. Both of those, the diary and the notebook, reside on the same shelf on your bookcase, and that’s all that is there, just your diary (full of entries from all the way back to before) and your notebook of special things. You have an index in which you have the contents listed out.

The shelf is WordPress, the diary is the blog side of this software, and the notebook is the pages side.

There’s advantages to having it ALL as a diary, adding the pages back into the timeline of the blog. You can see where in the life of a person this particular thought came to them. You can read the entries before and after and get a feel for what was going on at the time. But having the pages separate also isolates them. You can’t find them easily anymore.

I think I have solved the problem of finding an entry by having the categories on the left. Those indexes have all the entries of a category, both blog and page. I’ve had to hack the code to do it, mainly by using someone else’s plugin that will assign categories to the pages (for WordPress does NOT do this by default, and it’s a feature they are unlikely to bring into future revisions).

But now I’m at a point where I am tearing my hair out.

Recent updates to WordPress have broken part of the function of my site. Mainly it has made the Page Category Plus plugin stop working (the one that assigns categories to the pages). This removes those pages from the index completely, leaving them hanging out in the open. I could get something to list all the pages in one place, but you wouldn’t be able to tell an entry from The Tree from a Review.

As a result of that, i’ve had to downgrade my install of WordPress. This makes it vulnerable to hackers (since it is no longer supported). But I got the function back.

I COULD reintegrate ALL the pages back into posts (getting rid of the “notebook” and putting the pages back into the “diary”) with something else I have as a plugin, but I’m reluctant to do that since it would break the “structure” I have in my brain of what goes where. Pages are the Book of Shadows, blog posts are the Book of Mirrors (or metaphysical journal).

To you, you won’t see a difference. You will have navigation links at the bottom of EVERYTHING and the date the particular piece was posted on EVERYTHING, as well as any tags I have landed on those particular pages. Net effect is the same structure you see now.

So, I’m kind of questioning and second guessing myself.

Also, any time I add an article or “page” to here, it would show up in the RSS feed and on places like Dreamwidth and Livejournal. So more people would get notified when something new goes up.

There’s lots of people out there that use their WordPress exactly like this, but I think it’s stupid. However, it is looking like I will have to cave in regardless. I don’t wanna, but it is looking that way.

So, advice? I’ve put down all that I know and think in this post. Any thoughts or suggestions to help me make this decision? Come to Daven’s Journal, log in with your Livejournal or Dreamwidth account and comment.

(You can do that by putting your web log site in the “Open ID” field of the login section to the left. Just type in http://(yourusername).dreamwidth.org or http://www.livejournal.com/(username) and hit “login”. It will take you to a page on Dreamwidth or Livejournal asking you to authorize this, and when you do so, you now have an account HERE. Cool, huh? You can do that with a lot of logins.)

Long posts, articles and such, would be cut so that they don’t screw up your friend’s page on those sites, and lead you to the entire article here. Same with the RSS feed and so on.

Help.

(Daven’s Note:  I am  unsure as to the copyright status of this particular document, but I have contacted the author several times to request permission to reprint it here, but I have never gotten a response.  I hope that the author will contact me if they have a problem with it being reprinted here.)

Everything I Know About Romance I Learned From the Addams Family

Morticia: “Oh darling, do you remember the emotional roller coaster, the raging hormones, the constant heartache of our first love?”
Gomez: “Yes. Too bad we can’t relive that agony.”

Looking back, I realize that I have learned a great deal from television, much more than I ever did from parents, educators, scoutmasters, the church or even Willie the greasy transient behind the grocery store. Whenever I needed to know how to navigate through life’s stormy waters, television was there.

When I needed to know how to read, count and consider sock puppets as intellectual equals, there was Sesame Street, The Electric Company and ZOOM. Jeopardy, Family Feud and the $100,000 Pyramid helped fill in those gaps in my knowledge that grade school inexplicably skipped. The Price is Right taught me rudimentary economics and comparative shopping, while Emergency! helped me learn the vital importance of having a cool head and thousands of gallons of water under pressure.

And when I was casting about to find role models to show me how men and women should act together, how romantic love can best be expressed, how sweet love can be and how a couple can be far stronger than its component parts, where did I turn? To my parents, who, as best as I can recall, kissed each other in front of me exactly once (on their anniversary)? To the neighbors, who had a median age of 83? Ha! Off to the tube I went, but for the most part I was disappointed. In the morning all the husbands were cads, scoundrels or evil twins, married to hopelessly naive wives or fooling around with backbiting witches. In the evenings all the wives were either scatterbrained idiots with patient husbands or they were sensible sufferers with stumbling spouses. Sure, there was Pa Walton, but I could hardly see myself asking him why my wee-wee got stiff. Where were my role models?

They were waiting patiently, in syndication. The original Addams Family television show ran from 1964 to 1966, a bit early for me, but I caught all the reruns and they changed me forever. Just imagine a child from a very non-demonstrative family being exposed to Gomez and Morticia for the first time. Finally, people that might have actually produced their own children! I won’t take the time here to go into Addams Family history, but I would like to pass on the lessons I learned from these legendary lovers.

You can keep the fire in your relationship if you keep stokin’ it

Gomez: “Remember how I carried you over the threshold that first time?”
Morticia: “Not just over the threshold. Into the living room, up the stairs and into our bedroom.”
Gomez: “And out the window and into the cemetery.”
Morticia: “I was unconscious.”
Gomez: “Covered in dirt and decay. Oh ‘Tish, let’s go to the cemetery and resurrect that magical moment.”

In matters of the heart, you can never go far enough over the top. Don’t suppress your feelings, hide your passions, or wait until the “right time”. Gomez’ hot-blooded passion is legendary, and there was never a time so fraught with activity that he wasn’t ready to drop everything, often literally, to ravish his wife. Obviously a man with his priorities in order. No matter what he was doing, you always knew that there were untold depths of passion simmering just below the surface. Theirs was the first fiery romance ever seen on television, although they weren’t the first TV couple to be shown in the same bed. That honor went to The Munsters. Go figure.

Gomez: “Tish, how long has it been since we waltzed?”
Morticia: “Oh, Gomez. Hours.”

On a personal level, I have been known to sing improvised operatic love songs across the house and break into the “I Love You Desperately” jig in the mall (oddly enough, the “I Love You Desperately” jig is strikingly similar to my “I’d Sure Like a Blowjob” interpretative dance, but she seems to be able to tell the difference). The greatest gift you can offer your lover is proof that they are everything to you and that their very existence makes your eyes light up and your blood race. Or whatever. Sure, she’ll appreciate the diamond, but she’ll remember the time you woke her up at 3 am for a surprise picnic in the bedroom, complete with dessert and frisbee.

Seize the day, by the throat if necessary

Morticia: “Gomez.”
Gomez: “Querrida.”
Morticia: “Last night you were, …unhinged. You were like some desperate, howling demon. You frightened me.    Do it again.”

Love is not something to save until you can duck into the bedroom, away from prying eyes.
Love is not something to keep quiet and cold.
Love is not something to hide from your friends or co-workers in fear that they may think less of you if they see how weak you become in the presence of your lover.
Lasting love demands expression at every moment, even during PTA meetings, emergency room visits and arraignments. What do you care what anyone else thinks? Do they hold your heart? Do they set your mind ablaze with their smile and their devilish eyes? Do they look as good in manacles? I think not!

Wednesday: “Why can’t we have parents who don’t like each other – like all our friends.”
Pugsley: “Yeah. Some kids get all the breaks.”

And never hide your passion from your children. There are few things more guaranteed to give your kids a sense of peace and security than to know that their parents still love each other deeply, and frequently. Although you may want to keep the leather straps in a locked container.

Embrace variety

Morticia: “Don’t torture yourself, Gomez. That’s my job.”

Passionate love takes many forms, why limit yourself to just one? It very well be true that your preferences lean towards vanilla sex, and more power to you, but it never hurts to investigate the alternatives a bit. Why not see what happens when you strap her down, kiss her lovingly, and start heating up the poker? You may be surprised what gets you hot – tight clothes, handcuffs, graveyards, disembodied hands…

Morticia: “So, you still desire me? The old ball and chain?”
Gomez: “Forever!”
Morticia: “I’ll get them.”

Your lover may discover heretofore unsuspected attractions to fire, pitchforks, or even an uncontrollable physical reaction to foreign languages and bullfrog noises. How tragic it would be to live your life without ever once tasting such splendors! Open your mind and give it a try! Please be sure to observe all safe sex procedures – condoms, dental dams, sharp edges, oiled anchor chains…

This attitude extends itself towards a general acceptance to pretty much everything. You could never imagine any member of the Addams Family being prejudiced against anyone just because of their color, gender, religious preference, sexual orientation or the current state of their mortality. They accepted anyone that walked in their door, no matter how bizarre or mundane, with delight and glee. And The Addams Family was my first taste of gender equality; not only was Morticia a fully equal part of the household, but she was a better fencer.

Relationships are hard to kill, even with a chainsaw

Gomez: “Never go to bed angry, or on fire.”

I learned a lot of things from The Addams Family, and some of the most important involved how to be a man and how to treat a lady. Gomez was the consummate gentleman. Unfailingly polite, never less than courteous, he carried himself proudly and spoke his mind. He kept himself fit, he was always impeccably dressed, and he loved his family with a frightening intensity. Sure, there was the occasional hint of prior atrocities, but what fascinating man doesn’t have a few minor peccadilloes in his mysterious past?

Wednesday: “Why are men so predictable?”
Morticia: “Because it makes it easier for us to control them”

And Morticia. Hauntingly lovely, a perfect lady to her bones. There was never a doubt that she was the mistress of her own future. My wife remembers watching the show as a child and noticing Morticia’s poise and grace, and she credits Morticia’s utter calm, low-lidded smile during Gomez’s uncontrollable French attacks as her first lesson in how easily men can be handled. She is also strongly protective of her loved ones, and even the occasional death in the family only serves to draw her and Gomez even closer together, often as primary suspects.

They support each other utterly, they are confidants and friends, and they even share fashion preferences. I have been fortunate in that regard myself – if I came home and announced I had bought a trampoline for the living room my good lady wife would immediately start moving the couch, no questions asked.

Gomez and Morticia Addams are a joy to watch, a thin veneer of formal manners stretched thin over lusty devotion. I sincerely hope that I can attain the same level of style sometime before I die. Or, possibly, immediately afterwards.

Just finished posting a new review.

Weiser Field Guide to Cryptozoology

I’ll spoil it a bit for you and say that I rated this highly.

I’ve also been doing tweaks to the site. I’ve had to roll back to a previous version of WordPress since the upgrade to the latest and greatest broke about half the functionality on my site. So that’s a pain.

But I also got some new stuff in place. I took out the “shortcode links” on the pages and posts, so that’s new, I added some fields to the Author Information and then updated the author page.

I have six more books to review sitting here, but I’m not sure when I get to them. I have to go to the store now.

Ugh. Love it.