- clean my apartment
- get up every 10 minutes for a snack
- watch 2 movies on TV
- watch a 3 hour Friends marathon
- watch some cat videos on YouTube
- open Microsoft Word, decide to take a break.
- stare at Facebook like I actually cared about everyone's awkward personal life rants
- read twitter for literally 2 hours
- Write the headings for every memo section. Progress!
- go on every Tumblr with memes about law school or funny things in general
- Go back on Facebook and pretend to care some more about people's awkward personal life rants
- pretend to care about doing my taxes for 30 seconds
- realize my mom will do them for me and stop caring
- Write a sentence on my memo. Clearly this deserves a break.
- go back on Facebook and change my profile picture after thoroughly stalking myself for an hour
- change my Twitter picture and theme
- Change it back
- Change it again
- Watch Fashion Police
- go to Applebees and order take out because I already ate all the food in my kitchen today
- Come back and go on Skype instead of reading for my memo
- Open Blogger, realize that people actually occasionally read what I have to say
- be amazed for a few minutes
- decide this would be more fun than actually writing my memo
- start panicking because I haven't written my memo
- convince myself its cool because I have 4 more days
- Hey, I have headings and a few sentences. Progress!
Saturday, January 26, 2013
Procrastination
Things I have done today aside from write my memo for law school:
Thursday, January 10, 2013
Acceptance vs Ignorance
So today, I came across a blog that discussed why Christians should love gay people. The intention of that blog was to send a message that everyone deserves love, and that all religions preach to love each other without discrimination. While the writer clearly meant well, I couldn't help but get extremely frustrated while reading, for more than one reason.
Let me just throw in a disclaimer here - this is NOT going to be about religion, nor am I going to discuss my personal thoughts on religion. This is going to be my opinion on why people have it all wrong, even when they think they're doing others some good.
First off, the writer compared loving gay people to loving drug addicts, alcoholics, the homeless, diseased, and those who are struggling with all sorts of ailments. You know, people who struggle to be something unaccepted in our society - people who need our love most. Just take a second to think about that. Why is this something that people commonly do? This awful connotation was the first thing that made me angry. Homosexuals are not sick or mentally disturbed or addicts. They're PEOPLE.
Secondly, the writer went into a brief discussion of whether or not being gay was a sin, and whether or not you should care. The discussion was resolved by saying that a person's sins are a personal thing, and it's not your job to care about it. Um, what? So, love the sinners? But he went on to say that we're all sinners, so at least he's being inclusive.
Overall, it was clear to me that this writer truly believed he was writing something positive. His ultimate message was that everyone should love everyone, and he wanted to distinguish his belief in Christianity from those of the people belonging to the Westboro Baptist Church who have been known to hold protests with anti-gay signs, etc. (His words, not mine). However, I couldn't help but notice the above mentioned flaws in his argument. As long as anyone associates those who are gay with those who have diseases or addictions or ailments, nothing will be OK. True acceptance is not looking at a person and ignoring the fact that they're gay so that you can justify still loving them. It is not believing that God will resolve that person's sins, so you may as well love them while they're alive because you wouldn't want to be there on their judgement day. True acceptance is realizing that we are all human beings and that being gay is not a choice or a mental illness. True acceptance is taking a genuine interest in the lives of your friends and loved ones, not ignoring the parts you struggle or refuse to accept. One thing that I find terribly frustrating (and I cannot imagine how it feels to constantly be asked things such as this) is when people who pretend they're being accepting ask, "how's your friend?" instead of asking how the person's boyfriend or girlfriend is. Don't you realize everyone sees right through that question and the only thing you are pointing out to that person is how much you don't accept them? If love and acceptance is something new to you, I respect you for trying. But, really?
A person's sexuality is none of your business. It does not affect their ability to think, function, work, study, or perform other human abilities. It does NOT define them. It is part of them, yes, but it should not be the only thing (or anything, really) that is on your mind when you meet someone or know anything about their personal life. It truly baffles me that in the year 2013, people still categorize others based on their sexuality and go as far as denying equal rights because of it. Its disgusting, really.
I'm not gonna end my thoughts with telling you some story about my gay friends who are amazing and just as good as my not gay friends, because I believe that's part of the problem. You shouldn't suddenly try to accept others because it suddenly affects you in some way. For those wondering, I'm not gay. And I'm not writing this because I just discovered a close friend is gay and had some magical epiphany. I'm writing this as a human being, asking other human beings to stop and think about how you perceive others. I'm asking you stop judging people and stop making it your business to deny anyone their civil rights. So, before you have some profound epiphany where you realize, 'hmm, gays are people?' please stop and think about how your words can be equally damaging in a different way. If you're going to be a friend, be a real friend and take a genuine interest your friends lives. Don't be one of those people who "loves" someone else as long as they don't talk about their sexuality. It doesn't count if you let them talk but judge them silently. It doesn't count if you think it's not your job to judge because God will take care of that later. It doesn't count if you let the fact that you know another's sexual preference is not the same as yours even be a thought in your mind. It only counts if you genuinely care and accept those who are gay as real human beings, equal to yourself. So please, even if you think you're being kind and accepting, make an effort to understand the difference between acceptance and ignorance.
Let me just throw in a disclaimer here - this is NOT going to be about religion, nor am I going to discuss my personal thoughts on religion. This is going to be my opinion on why people have it all wrong, even when they think they're doing others some good.
First off, the writer compared loving gay people to loving drug addicts, alcoholics, the homeless, diseased, and those who are struggling with all sorts of ailments. You know, people who struggle to be something unaccepted in our society - people who need our love most. Just take a second to think about that. Why is this something that people commonly do? This awful connotation was the first thing that made me angry. Homosexuals are not sick or mentally disturbed or addicts. They're PEOPLE.
Secondly, the writer went into a brief discussion of whether or not being gay was a sin, and whether or not you should care. The discussion was resolved by saying that a person's sins are a personal thing, and it's not your job to care about it. Um, what? So, love the sinners? But he went on to say that we're all sinners, so at least he's being inclusive.
Overall, it was clear to me that this writer truly believed he was writing something positive. His ultimate message was that everyone should love everyone, and he wanted to distinguish his belief in Christianity from those of the people belonging to the Westboro Baptist Church who have been known to hold protests with anti-gay signs, etc. (His words, not mine). However, I couldn't help but notice the above mentioned flaws in his argument. As long as anyone associates those who are gay with those who have diseases or addictions or ailments, nothing will be OK. True acceptance is not looking at a person and ignoring the fact that they're gay so that you can justify still loving them. It is not believing that God will resolve that person's sins, so you may as well love them while they're alive because you wouldn't want to be there on their judgement day. True acceptance is realizing that we are all human beings and that being gay is not a choice or a mental illness. True acceptance is taking a genuine interest in the lives of your friends and loved ones, not ignoring the parts you struggle or refuse to accept. One thing that I find terribly frustrating (and I cannot imagine how it feels to constantly be asked things such as this) is when people who pretend they're being accepting ask, "how's your friend?" instead of asking how the person's boyfriend or girlfriend is. Don't you realize everyone sees right through that question and the only thing you are pointing out to that person is how much you don't accept them? If love and acceptance is something new to you, I respect you for trying. But, really?
A person's sexuality is none of your business. It does not affect their ability to think, function, work, study, or perform other human abilities. It does NOT define them. It is part of them, yes, but it should not be the only thing (or anything, really) that is on your mind when you meet someone or know anything about their personal life. It truly baffles me that in the year 2013, people still categorize others based on their sexuality and go as far as denying equal rights because of it. Its disgusting, really.
I'm not gonna end my thoughts with telling you some story about my gay friends who are amazing and just as good as my not gay friends, because I believe that's part of the problem. You shouldn't suddenly try to accept others because it suddenly affects you in some way. For those wondering, I'm not gay. And I'm not writing this because I just discovered a close friend is gay and had some magical epiphany. I'm writing this as a human being, asking other human beings to stop and think about how you perceive others. I'm asking you stop judging people and stop making it your business to deny anyone their civil rights. So, before you have some profound epiphany where you realize, 'hmm, gays are people?' please stop and think about how your words can be equally damaging in a different way. If you're going to be a friend, be a real friend and take a genuine interest your friends lives. Don't be one of those people who "loves" someone else as long as they don't talk about their sexuality. It doesn't count if you let them talk but judge them silently. It doesn't count if you think it's not your job to judge because God will take care of that later. It doesn't count if you let the fact that you know another's sexual preference is not the same as yours even be a thought in your mind. It only counts if you genuinely care and accept those who are gay as real human beings, equal to yourself. So please, even if you think you're being kind and accepting, make an effort to understand the difference between acceptance and ignorance.
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