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Archive for the ‘politics’ Category

While I let bigger (and possibly better) blog entries stew, here are a couple of images that might fall into the “bigger” and “better” categories:

In my last post I mentioned experiencing some bumpy emotions as I struggled to adjust my priorities and let go and cut back, at least temporarily, some stuff; in the days since that post I’ve emotionally adjusted, too. I now feel very content and optimistic about my new focus and happy to release myself of certain self-imposed obligations.

I’m being annoyingly vague, I know, but I just want to share that I feel happy and hopeful about my person(al life), relationships, business . . . where I’m/we’re at and where I’m/we’re going. It feels boringly repetitive to blog about them (“hasn’t Trixie said this a million times in the past seven years?”), but periodic realignments are necessary in life; sometimes the adjustment process is stressfully turbulent (even when the changes are positive, like when the person you love stops drinking or when you’re forced to recognize — AGAIN — that you aren’t superhuman after forgetting since the LAST time you were faced with that conclusion) but once you get used to it a whole new field of possibilities emerges and there’s . . . relief. And joy. And after some rest? New good things. More awesome. Progress made. Love shared. Delicious sappiness.

Anyway, I just wanted to say that things are good here!

Last month when Delia was on her way to her laser appointment she encountered a road block situation by the Hood Canal Bridge: border patrol. We were mystified by it since THAT IS NOT THE BORDER and we’ve never seen anything like that before and I’ve lived in Washington state my whole entire life. So maybe there was a terrorist threat to smuggle weapons from Canada and blow up a submarine or something as it passed under the bridge? Far-fetched, but it was the only legit reason I could think of for the border patrol to be fucking around in these parts.

I know I’ll probably regret posting this because it’s loaded with keywords that might bring people from our town and sparsely-populated region to this blog; that’s why I haven’t linked to our local papers’ coverage of it, because I totally do NOT need a trail leading from my porn site to our local paper and back again. But here’s a story on what they’re doing and how totally fucked up it is. Because we live within 100 miles of the CANADIAN border, they’re using 9/11 to justify slowing everyone down to pick out and harass anyone who looks Latino in a line of cars. We don’t live by the Mexican border, and in my whole life here I’ve never heard of migrant farm workers committing acts of terrorism whether they were here legally or not. So WHAT THE FUCK?!?

I cannot believe this is fucking AMERICA in this new century. It’s almost like traveling in time and space to some hideous place where all black people have a curfew and are detained by the strong arm of the law to show their paperwork, etc. “What are you doing on the highway without your papers?” And then the border patrol brags in the paper about how they “netted” however-many “illegals” they caught in their shitty little traps. And the white folk in the line of cars gawk as the men with guns chase the brown-skinned people who leap from moving vehicles to RUN into the woods to try to get away.

Where the fuck am I living? What the fuck is going on? I seriously cannot believe this shit and the people who have the pink balls to defend it. And they gleefully tell us to expect MORE of it. They’re ramping up! Their funding has been increased!

It boggles my mind the way these fuckers act so proud of their horrid, invasive, pathetic jobs. The way they won’t acknowledge for a second that what they’re doing is a violation of civil liberties and pretty much defeats the purpose of living in what we like to call a “free” country. Nothing personal against those who are just following orders and need their crappy job with the border patrol, but it makes me mad when I as a whore am shamed and vilified for my job but these guys? Get to walk around with their chests puffed out for stopping people without cause and wreaking havoc on people’s lives. For reminding all of us how weak this country really is and scaring us all into seeing the horrifyingly distinct possibility that freedom is something that too many Americans are happy to see flushed down the shitter if it means maintaining some semblance of white supremacy.

I can’t even imagine how angry I would be if I were an American Indian stopped and harassed at one of these checkpoints. I think I would lose my fucking marbles at the sickness of it, the US border patrol trying to keep brown-skinned people OFF land they stole FROM brown-skinned people. Where do they fucking get off?

Yesterday I walked across a field with my eyes closed. After the heavy grounded feeling of walking in wet sand for almost an hour, walking blind on hard-packed dirt with sunburned grass felt like flying with the wind in my face, blowing my hair around. Or floating, at least. The only other people in the field were three black-robed figures sparring with each other using long sticks. With my eyes closed they sounded like three people playing football. The field was so big it was easy for me to avoid walking into them even without the benefit of sight.

*****

We’ve been having some private stress around here (on top of the published stress of trying over and over again to get pregnant) so yesterday Delia canceled her show and we *finally* went to see The Dark Knight. I wasn’t nearly as excited going into it as I was Batman Begins and didn’t feel the same attachment to this one, maybe because I preferred the more solitary focus on Bruce Wayne in Batman Begins and the whole emphasis on creating and finding an alter ego for himself. The imagery in Batman Begins was also darker and more appealing to me in a sort of Robert Louis Stevenson way than Dark Knight, which everyone keeps describing as “darker” than BB but really was just more hideous, brutal and scary. Yeah, the humour was darker and everything felt more tragic because of Heath Ledger’s potent brilliance, but that diverted so much attention from Christian Bale that it wasn’t really about Batman or anybody except for Heath Ledger’s Joker. Oh yeah, I do love the whole commentary on human nature being a dual thing of dark and light, I’m just saying that it didn’t speak to me on a deeply personal level the way Batman Begins did.

As I get older, it’s harder and harder for me to watch movies without being bored and annoyed by what seems like derivations from other movies I think are “better” or strike me as more original just because *I* happened to see them when I was younger and was first introduced to certain themes. There were a lot of familiar elements in The Dark Knight, but it really was awesome enough that it didn’t annoy me, especially since I recognize that there are *no* original ideas (plus, having no familiarity with comics or specialized movie knowledge I KNOW I’m completely ignorant of where some of these things “originated”). I felt like I recognized stuff from In the Line of Fire and freaky cross-dressing a la Silence of the Lambs. Since I know nothing of the comics and never even saw Jack Nicholson’s Joker, I couldn’t help totally associating the smile/scar with the Black Dahlia, especially since I just picked up another book (with the ghastly pictures) about the case.

Anyway, I loved the magic trick with the pencil and lines like “whatever doesn’t kill you simply makes you… stranger.” Favorites aside from Heath’s performance? Maggie Gyllenhaal’s Rachel Dawes was SO much better than Katie’s — LOVED her, and the chase scene/shootout with the semis. We also loved the political commentary on whether or not the threat of terrorism justifies spying on people, etc. Still, I don’t feel compelled to see this one more than that once in the theater (unless we could see it in IMAX). I really wasn’t prepared for the violence, and of course it always annoys me when there’s no swearing in a movie but there’s plenty of freaky brutality (I could not hack the part at the end when the dogs and Batman were being beaten with the pipe) and it gets less than an R rating; just having the knowledge in my head that our government is prosecuting people for “obscenity” even for just writing taboo stories and that they refuse to let COPA die makes me resentful when I see how violence in movies is embraced in America as totally acceptable for young people to watch. I can’t watch this stuff without thinking, “so THIS is okay for thirteen year olds to see but the sight of my clitoris will scar them for life?” Whatever. It’s not that I want kids to see porn or that I don’t appreciate a movie without swearing or that I think violent movies should be boycotted, it’s the nonsensical double standards that drive me up a wall.

So does Christian Bale’s alleged assault of his mom and sister ruin my appreciation of his acting? Ummm, no. Just like a president cheating on his wife has absolutely zero to do with whether or not he’s a good president, whether or not Marky Mark is a homophobe or a racist has nothing to do with my enjoyment when I watch Boogie Nights or Entourage and I still think PYT is a fucking awesome song whether or not Michael Jackson is a pedo. Given the rant I just made, it probably surprises you to hear that I don’t relate to people who can’t enjoy a celebrity’s work because of their crimes and supposed personal flaws (which may or may not be true, but we will never know). It’s not that I don’t enjoy juicy gossip about famous people, but it’s just another form of entertainment to me that is separate from whether or not I enjoy their actual work. Like, is it really a surprise to Christian Bale’s fans that he’s a freak? The guy wanted to starve himself to 100 pounds only eating an apple and can of tuna a day for The Machinist; were you really not aware that he’s fucking mental? Apparently, because I’ve been reading whining from women who think they can’t adore him anymore. YOU ARE WATCHING HIS MOVIES, NOT DATING HIM!

So yeah . . . sometimes I can separate things. Other times? Not so much.

*****

In addition to taking the night off for a movie, I also made emergency reservations for a three night stay at the beach next week, so our Sunday, August 10th and Monday, August 11th shows will be canceled. We will do some shooting while we’re there, but mostly we just need to get away. Yes, we have a beach here, but Puget Sound and the Strait aren’t the same as the actual ocean. I didn’t know it until Delia told me, but the timing is perfect because we’ll be out there for the meteor shower. She also just happened to order some things from REI before we made these plans so it all fell into place perfectly since the days I happened to find open rooms and camping spots weren’t my first pick before I knew these things, but just happened to be after the REI stuff will arrive and during the meteor shower.

Thanks to our friend Nerdy Anna for pointing out this post on Feministe about porn sparking a discussion about whether or not “feminist porn” exists, etc.

Honestly? I only hastily skimmed the post and avoided taking a close look at the comments. Not because I don’t think it’s a worthwhile discussion. Not because I don’t want to help “represent” the feminist pornographers of the world. But because for me right now, the most feminist thing I can do is make money and be free of debt, because paying credit card companies tons of interest is totally not feminist. With that being my focus I view reading and participating in these oft-irrational discussions as a big waste of my time. I was much MUCH happier reading the Feministe post on The Golden Girls which I, of course, agree with.

WARNING: reading the following rambling may be a total waste of YOUR time, but it was highly therapeutic for me to write about it.

I’ve got a number of drafted blog posts and of course plenty of thoughts about sex, feminism, porn, and all that “good” stuff (or bad stuff, depending on your perspective). But I’ll take this opportunity to just briefly touch on a few of my positions and answer the question, in short form, of whether or not I think the porn *I* make is feminist.

*Making money (and especially being self-employed, and especially making GOOD money, ESPECIALLY if it’s better money than men are making and especially all of these things in THIS country and cultural context) is feminist. Even if you’re making money on something that seems totally counterproductive to feminism.

*The interesting thing — the KEY thing — is acknowledging that behaviors and products (and I use that term very loosely — could be a piece of merchandise or the end result of certain behaviors or a speech or whatever) can be feminist in some ways, and not in others. You can do something that makes feminist progress in one area, but is regressive in another. That duality is intrinsic to the movement(s) and anybody who thinks it’s possible to be and live and think and affect 100% feminist is fucking delusional. Because you can’t control other people’s reactions. Because sometimes making progress in one direction means distancing yourself from another point on your (or the group’s) carefully mapped travel plans. Because everybody has something unique to contribute, and while they might excel in one area, they won’t in another. THAT’S WHY WE NEED DIFFERENT WOMEN REPRESENTING DIFFERENTLY. Because it’s not feminist at all to think we all want the same things, or to demand that we pursue the same things. Because it’s humanly impossible to consistently put FEMINISM before yourself all the time. Because for some of us feminism means putting OURSELVES (specifically MYSELF or YOURSELF, in your case if you are a woman) first. Because life is just way more complex than “feminist” or “not feminist”.

Maybe it’s like a big scavenger hunt. There are tons of things on our list, things we should have RIGHTS to. Maybe you go look for education. Maybe sister over there goes and looks for health care. Maybe another goes and looks for safety. I hope there’s someone out there looking for reparations. MAYBE I WILL LOOK FOR THE MONEY. Maybe I will look for proof that my body is not YOUR body, and maybe you’ll be fucking confused because you think that if I sell my body to a man that I’m violating YOURS. Maybe I will have time to hold your hand and we can find RATIONAL THOUGHT together, huh? Wouldn’t that be nice. Maybe we’ll all accept that we all have the right to anger, and that a lot of it is righteously directed at each other.

Maybe you have no clue how often I advocate for some of the most unpopular feminist causes and rights while I am in some of the most hostile environments for doing so in the first world. Maybe you have no idea how much thicker the leather is on my militant boots than yours and your buddies, with your unproductive running-off-at-the-mouth. Maybe you underestimate how much more effective being feminist is on this platform than on yours. Maybe I love getting ALL. FIRED. UP! Maybe that’s why I suppress my work on it so often. Because that fire comes close to incapacitating me with screaming.

This is so not short or coherent the way I planned for it to be, but it’s making ME feel better, and THAT is feminist.

*Do I, Trixie, make feminist porn (if such a thing exists)?
I do think feminist porn exists/is possible. I totally disagree with anyone who thinks it’s a contradiction in terms. At the root of that mistaken belief is a huge double standard regarding PLEASURE, but that’s a topic for another time.

Many people would say, “yes, Trixie’s porn is feminist”. I personally would say that the the individual chunks of porn I/we make are only feminist sometimes. I will also say that I do not *want* all of the porn I make to be feminist. Because my sexuality and personality do not always cooperate with feminist ideals, nor do other people’s. Because our fantasy worlds cannot and should not be bound by politics. Because sex as we experience it/feel it TRANSCENDS politics (even if it never transcends politics in reality). Because sometimes you specifically fantasize about un-feminist things because your ideals have created such intensely taboo triggers. Because it wouldn’t be feminist to deny myself all of me. Because the most feminist thing I can do is MAKE MONEY and to represent myself as a feminist while I do it.

The major way my work is feminist (outside of or next to the money-making arena) is that I consistently remind people who I belong to (MYSELF) in contexts where it is unexpected. My body belongs to me. I consistently assert my will, my self-ownership, even when it is counterproductive to making sales. My work as a whole is feminist because I REFUSE TO BE A NON-PERSON or a partial person or a person only part of the time. Anybody who looks at my work as a whole (or even/often just in small parts) can see that I REPRESENT MYSELF AS A WHOLE PERSON. To an extent that I think very VERY few people, men OR women, in ANY industry or from any walk of life, are willing to do or are allowed to do or know how to do or are brave enough to do or have risked as much to do. I AM A WHOLE PERSON, and my work in porn is contained within that and presented from that place of wholeness. Being a whole person and INSISTING UPON wholeness everywhere is awesomely feminist. Paradoxically it means that I cannot BE wholly feminist or affect in feminist ways all of the time.

I could spend a lot of time describing what I mean by “a whole person”, but I’ll just clarify a little by saying I don’t mean “perfect” or “finished” when I say “whole” On the contrary, I mean I am and deserve to be and insist upon staking my claim on IMperfection, meeting my primitive needs, fucking-up, growing sideways and in general pursuing happiness.

You *can* make feminist progress in your own life and in others’ by making art that is gender conscious, class conscious, and power conscious EVEN WHEN your representations of it are stereotyped and politically incorrect (sometimes BECAUSE they are, especially if they’re totally campy and over-the-top). Especially when it acts as therapy and finds meaning/truth. And MOST especially when it’s presented in a broader context that is overtly or even covertly political and/or built on a feminist foundation or told by a feminist voice (even when some of those stories and characters played are distinctly NOT feminist).

I, presenting myself as a whole person, am the context. In everything I do. And I am feminist. That is the powerful truth in my life and work and someda
y I hope I’ll be better at articulating it.

Attending our county convention yesterday as an Obama delegate counted as my social event for 2008; so what if I only struck up conversations with three people? That’s more action than this hermit usually sees.

Because socializing both bores and overwhelms me, I love getting my social time doing things with an agenda where there are rules guiding behavior and people in charge of reinforcing those rules. Parliamentary procedure definitely fills that need, and the lady I complained about here did an awesome job of keeping people in line, pushing them closer to the microphones, speaking coherently and just being generally awesome. She only used one acronym demanding clarification from an audience member which she explained without apology; you’ve no idea how much I admire that in a woman. While the acronym thing bugs me, I love her unapologetic down-to-business attitude.

It was both a relief and a disappointment discovering that the next caucus happens at the same time we’ll be attending the transgender conference where we’re on a panel so I couldn’t even try to get elected to move on; you wouldn’t believe how many people couldn’t grasp the concept of a thirty second speech, couldn’t keep their name tags swiveled around so people could see their names, and didn’t even understand why the timekeeper was waving her arms at them after they’d been droning on in a disorganized fashion for upwards of 90 seconds!

Anyway, it was fun being surrounded by liberal people getting a charge out of showing off their familiarity with Robert’s Rules of Order. I loved every minute of it, including the annoying parts/people. The Kucinich fanatics even made wonderful hyper-idealistic points and invited us to join in their futile, counterproductive bid to send as many “undecided” delegates on as possible. It was inspiring, it really was; in addition to preferring structured social events, I also like people-time that has an inspirational and/or change-making purpose, so I loved being in a crowd of people who are all excited about the positive changes our next president can bring and empowered to be part of that.

I wound up bonding with a lady who of course asked me what I do for a living. As usual, I first responded with the deliberately vague “webmaster”. With her lovely shining smile she probed deeper, asking, “so what does that mean exactly?”

I liked her and felt like she was a relaxed person, so I told her; “I make porn sites.”

Her smile stayed on, bright white and wide and her eyebrows perked up naughtily while she asked me to repeat myself. I laughed and teased her, “you heard me: PORN!”

She loved it, responded with fascinating disclosures about herself, and thanked me for making her day.

Here’s the latest on our conception attempts along with a fertile piece of art I’m coveting.

Delia and I are trying not to eat out so often; we’ve actually done pretty well with that this year. It’s not that I mind spending the money on it because we don’t go totally crazy with it, it supports local business people and I need to get out of the house SOME time, but we aren’t even enjoying it that much anymore and do it more for comfort than anything else.

Anyway, we’re now motivating ourselves not to eat out by listing frivolous things we want that are in the eat-out price range and focusing on those when we feel tempted. $20-$25 is our average lately since we usually split something, so at the end of every week we manage not to eat out we’re rewarding ourselves with $25 each. Is that dorky? Whatever.

Since we didn’t eat out for a week, I used my money plus some other in my phone sex money stash to buy her:

I feel good about my purchase, partly because it’s something beautiful (way prettier than leftover mexican food) and partly because I bought it from some awesome bus-dwelling people. It’s always interesting to me when I compare what other people charge for their arts/crafts/work to what *I* charge for access to my porn, stories, shows and spycams. In many ways they’re incomparable, but at first glance I have to gasp at how relatively inexpensive it was to buy something as gorgeous as this doll, something that must have taken hours to make — something I myself can’t fathom having the time, talent, skill or patience to to make. It’s amazing to think about all of the life that goes into something like that from the sheep to the person collecting the wool to all of the steps in making the doll: shaping, dying and whatever else I’m clueless about.

It makes me wonder why I don’t buy MORE beautiful, handmade things. I love them, but it always strikes me as a luxury/something I’ll do LATER, when I don’t have debt; that way of thinking is pure fucking nonsense, though. And it really seems RIGHT for me to cycle the money people spend on me as luxury/entertainment/personal support by doling some of it out to other small-business people and artists, right? On top of that I think I feel more inspired to do better work when I spend time looking at and touching other people’s beautiful work. I spend most of my money on plastics and electronics and such, justifying it as being “for work”, but forgetting that I need personal/spiritual juice for my work to be worth doing.

*****

On Saturday I’m doing my civic duty at our county convention as an Obama delegate; I’ve canceled my shows that day rather than rescheduling them; there was no way I could get my other work (shoots, webmastering, etc.) done this week if I crammed show day into another slot. What I *have* done, though, is put a chat session at 9 pm Saturday night. I know that’s probably going to make it unattendable for some people, but I’m not sure when I’ll be home from the thing and want to have dinner and a break in between (my social juices being in always short supply).

aka “Acronyms and the People Who Love Them”.

I grumble whenever I read a blog post, a letter to the editor or anything intended for a general audience using an acronym or abbreviation that hasn’t been spelled out; unless you are writing for a special audience of people you shouldn’t assume everyone will know what you mean when you type out XYXY blah blah blah.

Today I found myself *especially* annoyed when I read this email about who qualifies for affirmative action when choosing delegates for State and National conventions:

*The WA State goals of their 97 delegates is: 6 African Americans, 3 Native Americans, 10 Hispanics, 3 Youth (between 18 and 24), 7 LGBT (if you have to ask- you are not one), 9 Asian Americans, 3 disabled

Sigh. And if you are too busy being cute or evasive that you can’t spell it out, then your email isn’t really helpful in answering people’s FAQs (Frequently Asked Questions). FYI: LGBT stands for Lesbian, Gay, Bi(sexual), Transgender.

I know I’m guilty of assuming my readers understand the terms I use. I know I don’t always explain things as well as I could (and am sometimes just guilty of shitty writing, like the way I totally didn’t explain up there that the reason I *got* that email was because I am an Obama delegate to one of the low-level meetings where they decide who becomes a delegate to the NEXT level and so on; if you’re a minority, you have a better chance of being selected to move on). And I know that other people who drop acronyms without defining them are usually in a hurry or DO write for people who share their specialized knowledge (though I think they can really alienate people who DON’T but are seriously trying to understand the writer; it bugs me when unnecessary hurdles are placed between me and information). This case just REALLY chaps my hide because the person writing it 1) acknowledges that some people might not know what it stands for, 2) decides that the information isn’t applicable to anyone who DOESN’T know, 3) decides to withhold the information when it would take just as many keystrokes to spell it out as it did to deny us the information, and 4) is just really insulting and patronizing to people who aren’t “in the know”.

I’m sure the person writing it didn’t MEAN to be an asshole, but it’s so TYPICAL of Democrats and “Liberals” who are so busy bullshitting themselves and each other with their social awareness and intellectual elitism that they don’t even bother to notice that THEY AREN’T HELPING OR EDUCATING ANYBODY outside of their literati circle jerks. Oh, sure, most people these days probably have an idea of what LGBT stands for and I wouldn’t have even batted an eye at the acronym if it weren’t for the flip secret-password remark afterwards.

I imagine there are a lot of people, older people or even younger people just becoming self-aware, who don’t go to fucking rallies and meetings and parades and stuff and maybe have not even given any thought to the possibility that they are part of a special group. I feel like too many people assume that the whole world is full of social butterflies and they don’t GET that some people don’t identify with the cliques and the crowds and the activists with their secret codes and handshakes. And WHY do you want your readers to have to interrupt the flow of reading whatever it is you supposedly want them to hear and understand just so they can consult a dictionary or encyclopedia or google to find out something you could have explained in four words or less?

I would be more sympathetic if the authors of these things were writing a fucking telegram or a tweet or something else short and sweet BUT THEY NEVER ARE!! These people invariably have the time and energy to write at least fifty-nine exhausting paragraphs telling you more information than you could possibly ever want or need, letting you know what they had for breakfast and how many hours they slept the night before and every single model of camera they’ve had since they were in Kindergarten, but they refuse to trouble themselves with two to ten words that are actually fucking relevant. You torture yourself reading these people’s writing, you know they have something important to say, and while you’re giving yourself a migraine staring intently at your monitor they HURL these sharp pointy rocks at you every so often just to break up the monotony: ASFW! MRPQ! WOS-VINA!!

Anyway, I shot myself in the foot (as I like to do) by writing back to the person who sent the email:

It *is* possible for someone to be “LGBT” without knowing the politically correct and cool acronym that goes along with it. I’m not sure what is accomplished by acknowledging some people might not know what it stands for and then denying them the explanation. Also, people who AREN’T queer or transgender might like to be in the know; it would help raise awareness where it’s lacking. Just because people are interested in participating in this particular process doesn’t mean they are politically savvy about every special interest group out there.

I’m sure whoever wrote this didn’t mean to be insulting or maybe they were just in a hurry when writing it, but it would have taken about the same amount of keystrokes to spell it out as to dismiss the information as inapplicable to anybody who doesn’t already know. I feel like a lot of communiques (not just this one) from the Dems assume readers have information that many do not; it alienates people by making them feel like they’re not part of the in-group and undermines real communication and education when all it would take is a couple extra words typed out to introduce acronyms. If the goal is to make people aware and invite them to become involved then why not spell it out instead of withholding the information?

I know it seems like a small thing and I’m not trying to make anyone feel badly about it; but it did chap my hide a little. It’s not a big deal, but it can be frustrating when I (and maybe other people) read these emails and feel like they’re not really written for everyone who identifies as a Democrat in this county, but are intended for people who are already super-involved and up-to-speed on everything. I don’t need a reply or anything, and I do know what LGBT stands for . . . just offering it as food for thought.

I know, I know — you have to be living under a ROCK to not know what LGBT stands for, right? But there are lots of people living under rocks, many of them quite happily, and they are JUST the people who DO need to know what LGBT stands for so when you alienate them? It’s really counterproductive.

And you know what else? If I hadn’t read that email I wouldn’t have known that I actually have an on-paper edge for going to the next level; yes, I *did* think about my sexuality and my partner’s gender identity as things that make me special/representative of a minority group, but I totally hadn’t thought about it being, like, OFFICIAL. And seriously, I actually have had and will continue to have qualms about counting myself as part of that minority group because I believe the *majority* of people are bisexual and I don’t believe I’ve “suffered” enough personal persecution because of my pansexuality to “deserve” to check a special box; this might come as a shock, but I spend a lot more of my time thinking about porn and sex work and promiscuity and making money than I do about the intersection of my comparatively mundane sexual preferences with personal political privilege (I think about it with regards to OTHER people and I think about how scary it is to live next to violent misogynist rednecks while in an “alternative” relationship but I just didn’t happen to wander across thinking about affirmative action having anything to do with me *personally* in an up-and-coming kind of way; I think about the ideas of things and sometimes the reality of them comes as a total shock). So guess what? If *I* have trouble knowing how to identify myself, I of the blogs and websites and ope
n-mindedness and college-education and whatever, then it’s not hard for me to imagine a whole lot of other people are unsure too. I mean, I’m pretty sure that at least half the individuals in the world know less than I know (individually, not combined!). Not to be an asshole, but seriously. FWIW.

WTF? LGBT FTW.

Oh, I know similar complaints could be made about using “big” words that the average reader doesn’t use on a daily basis (if ever), but I honestly think big words are different from acronyms; you can usually suss out the meaning of a big word based on context clues and familiar-sounding PARTS of the word. If not, the reader has only missed out on ONE word, not a whole batch like those contained in an acronym which is often the subject of the sentence, not just some fancy-sounding adjective thrown in for its saucy sound.

If you’re looking for good spontaneous conversation, ALWAYS LOOK FOR THE MAN WITH THE TOOTHPICK. He’s a conversationalist. You will know his interest in your conversation was reciprocated if, at the end of the conversation, he tosses away the toothpick. If he THROWS the toothpick and says, “aw, to HELL with you” while he walks away then it means you’ve found a debate partner for life.

I say all this after we walked home from our precinct caucus yesterday and had the best roadside political conversation with a guy with a toothpick and silver braid, wearing a Carhartt jacket over a Harley t-shirt. He stopped us as he got out of his pickup to ask what the caucus was like.

It was interesting. It’s only the second time we’ve attended one, but today’s was MUCH more exciting since there seemed to be more Democrats with some fucking common sense (last time the hyper-idealistic simpletons all threw their shit away on Kucinich; those folks were still there yesterday, I kid you not, providing the dictionary illustration for the word “futility”). Judging from what we saw in our precinct and the one next to us, Obama had a huge lead over Clinton in our town (and of course the entire state of Washington).

Both Delia and I felt sad that now that we HAVE to vote by mail, the caucus is really our only opportunity to gather together with other voters en masse to publicly participate in the process. Oh, I know there are other opportunities to get together and be all civic-minded, but those are usually just a handful of people with very specific interests. It’s just not the same and now they’re trying to get rid of THIS, too, and simplify things with a regular primary. I know voting by mail is cool because it’s so easy and convenient (and a way to avoid the nightmare of electronic voting machines), it’s just sad that we lose the sense of doing it socially as a community, and in some cases as a nation. Voting seems like even more of a farce by mail. It leaves me feeling disenfranchised as a citizen. It’s like using the free address labels The March of Dimes sends you without bothering to send them a donation. If I don’t have to leave my house and mill around with strangers in a location I would never otherwise visit I might as well be voting for American Idol; devoid of the common ritual, the process feels trivialized. Actually, voting for American Idol probably feels LESS trivial because at least people have a limited window of time to cast their votes (so are voting TOGETHER) and enjoying the ritual of tuning in next time to see the results.

All we have left is going to see fireworks together or sports in a stadium, and that’s just not the same because we attend games and fireworks displays and concerts as observers, not participants. I suppose we still have rallies and parades and protests to participate in, but that’s almost TOO much participation. Besides, for all of the work people put into it, there’s no official record of what you’ve done unless you get arrested or win a trophy and nobody in the general population cares about the outcome regardless. I would say at least we still have the pledge of allegiance and singing the national anthem together, but nobody except conservative automatons seem to appreciate the bliss of joining into rituals of mass brainwashing the way I do. Oh well. I suppose there’s always traffic court.

Since socializing is not a high priority for me and I tend to enjoy it more in structured environments, losing the opportunity to vote the old-fashioned way is a pretty big blow to my human experience. I loved sitting in the bleachers yesterday with strangers chuckling and criticizing our disorganized party, laughing as they moved their lips unintelligibly with their predictable head-in-the-clouds lack of awareness that nobody could hear their brainy soft-spoken voices while the rest of us in our typical passive Democratic style failed to speak up and point out that WE COULDN’T HEAR THEM. If we’d been Republicans, someone would have immediately stood up and cupped her hand around her ear or made the “up! up!” motion or screamed, “LOUDER!” Those gentle hippies, our brethren. How I wished we could import some of the audible obnoxiousness of our enemies, the loud-mouthed Republicans who know how to ORGANIZE an event and properly strategize.

At some point I realized it might be easy to become a delegate to the county convention, so we stuck around for me to push through the small cluster of other hopefuls and sign up to go. I felt a little cheated that it was all left up to chance (whichever people grabbed a paper and signed up first are going, apparently) instead of competition. I imagined if I were a Republican I would have had to FIGHT with some fat-ass in a red sweatshirt to EARN my spot. That would have been more fun. Perhaps the competition will be stiffer to move from county to the district caucus, though.

I am picking out outfits now, plotting an escalation of attractiveness to try to get to the state convention. If my sordid porn career prevents moving that far along I can console myself with the knowledge that at least I won’t have to go to Spokane in August June, which is a nasty hellhole.