No, really, according to comments I recently read the GQ community oppresses the cisgendered world (aka, most of us-people whose sex and gender are congruent by birth). Why? Because they get to choose what they are day by day, they’re more special than the rest of us!

As a sexual health specialist (in training, of course), I can’t help but find the very core of all this debate ridiculous. People are born with a sex (mostly binary being a case of X and Y chromosomes), gender (a spectrum, not a binary) develops over time. It doesn’t even settle in as something that’s permanent for most people before five or six. Plenty of little boys will say they’re going to be mommies, little girls daddies, and change their minds later. And for some people it doesn’t ever become a solid thing. That’s not a choice someone makes, it’s who they are. Gender is a fluid concept that stems from inside the individual. The reason for that we can debate infinitely, but at the end of the day it’s internal and it’s something that isn’t chosen, it just is what it is.

Most people are cis, and good for them, they’ll have a much easier time of it. Some people aren’t, and those people get the short end of the stick societally – especially if their sex doesn’t fit their apparent gender. Intersexuality and gender dysphoria are not readily accepted by most, especially from the cisgender world. In no way does being genderqueer oppress someone cis because they get to “make a choice” on their gender, they don’t have that kind of power. The cisgender world does have that kind of power, and it uses it violently. Just as people have been assaulted for sexual orientation they’ve been assaulted for their gender orientation – even the medical community has been guilty of many a malpractice related to intersexuality, “correcting” genitals that had no actual problems besides being atypical under the guise of mortal danger.

Nobody was ever murdered for being cisgender. That’s not true for everyone else, and to say the former is oppressed by the latter is an exercise in painful ignorance at the absolute best, silent compliance with the oppression that DOES go on now.

Reframe the argument as “bisexuals are oppressing straights because by being bisexual they get to make a choice” and it’s obvious just how ridiculous it is to everyone who wasn’t enraged/frightened by Dragon Age II’s universal love interest system. But because of social ignorance toward gender some people actually think this is an okay argument to make. They still call transgendered folks liars, still attack people who don’t fit into their binary mold, or even claim to be under attack.

They’re wrong, and I pray society finally begins to move on. There are cultures who’ve had third genders for a thousand years now, and yet we can’t manage to find our way there. But we’ll be better people for it once we do.

After going to a small youth theatre show I’ve been reminded how much I fucking hate stage parents. I also hate most motherfuckers in theatres (live, in this case) because they don’t know how to act right, but stage parents are the worst of them.

Don’t call out your child’s name during the show. They’re not the only person in the cast, it’s not about them, and it’s a distraction to their performance, and everyone else’s. You also aren’t entitled to photograph the performance, with or without a flash, just because your child is in the show. Don’t get up and leave as soon as your child’s performance is over, that just proves you’re a self-centered asshole and probably only there to bask in your child’s reflected glory.

Let’s just go so far as to say don’t yell things out at all. Applaud, and applaud loudly as warranted. But shut the fuck up as you’re doing it.

Shut the fuck up during the performance especially and restrict speech to whispers during scene changes. If it’s anything musical, save your applause until a number is OVER rather than interrupting it.

Don’t start a last clap contest during scene changes just because you think it’s funny. It’s not cute, nobody’s laughing, we just think you and the other guy doing it with you on the other end of the theatre should be punched in the face and removed from the building. This applies to yelling “encore” after a show that isn’t a musical concert as well. What kind of encore is a play going to have? Are they tacking on an epilogue they write in the back? No? There isn’t any? Did you yell that for any reason besides needing attention? Fuck you.

Why exactly is it everything Cox has OnDemand can’t fast forward? It’s not such a huge deal at the beginning of a show, but if you miss the last four minutes of an hour long show, it’s not on demand, it’s when they let you have it. It’s easier and faster to just pirate the damn show at that point, which I thought was what they were trying to avoid with this system.

When you DO try to do it, you get the “Enjoy this <network> program. FFWD is unavailable during this show.”

Fuck. You. If I want to skip ahead to where I was, I should get to. And don’t give me this condescending “enjoy” bullshit.

Cox Advanced TV-”Because we ignored the basics!”

I know I’m a little odd in how much attention I pay to anthropomorphized foodstuffs. I acknowledge that. I also expect a fair amount of this in the world, be it as a dancing non-edible mascot, or sapient but unaware version of the food (or one eager to be eaten) even. Or one that apparently knows it’ll be eaten after it dies.

Even the M&M commercials implicate being eaten as an annoyance at most. As if they simply regenerate whatever is bitten off, or reincarnate spontaneously, though it’s a little offputting.

But Hot Pockets really jumped the shark on this one with the sideshots “Brothers” commercial. Food introduces itself. Okay. Food says “Hey, we’re brothers!” Okay. One of the three sideshots is grabbed by an offscreen hand and eaten, leaving the other two shaking in terror.

Now we’ve got a problem. Sapient food grieving for lost siblings as it pleads for its mortality is NOT on the list of things I’m up for eating. Sure it’s just a commercial, but the idea is firmly planted and thoroughly terrible. What the fuck was Nestle thinking? There are autistic kids rocking in their chairs right now all over the country.

This is a farce of the highest order,provided by Aetna.

If I went in for a physical – a full workup even, if I got a physical, a colonoscopy, a prostate check, and an STD screener and I came out clean, it’s a twenty five dollar office visit, standard rate. But if I have the clap or high cholesterol, it’s a diagnostic test and subject to the full deductible. In fact, I can have LESS tests done. I can just get a physical, but pay more than if I got all those tests and ordered up a physically impossible pap smear to boot because it showed high cholesterol or something that needed treatment. I could spend $500 less in actual money by reducing the number of testing supplies needed and used, but still spend more because of the result.

Now this obviously has one real purpose, and that’s to prevent me from seeking preventative care. It’s to keep me from going even though I should because while I can certainly afford the $25 to keep an eye on things, I can’t afford the full cost. So I can’t take the chance on a physical. And neither can most of the working poor, I’m willing to bet.

So…who’s still actually defending private insurance again? Why haven’t we gone to socialized medicine, where you save money by encouraging prevention and people get the health care they need?

I think this is a topic that really needs explored more. Op ed incoming?

By playing the earworm chorus an average of once every 4 minutes.

First, fuck you, My Chemical Romance, for selling your awful song to at least three commercials in a 3 day span. Second, fuck you awful commercials for buying it.

But most of all, fuck you Sims 3 ad buyer for making sure the song runs at least twice a break on the late night 18-25 year old markets, who are, by the way, your least likely Sims purchasers to begin with. And even if they had some enjoyment, I think you just got rid of them by being more annoying than an eDiets commercial.

I hope the person in charge of this dies by sustained exposure to a 200 DB noise.

In the “this is not news” category, local Fox affiliate is doing a recap of their favorite videos of the year. Oh, and it’s with awful clown car music. Nope. Nothing annoying here. No need for the original sound or context of the video at all, let’s just play some awful circus music and run the videos at double speed instead. And they did for several minutes. I don’t know who just put together the video recap footage that aired at 9:45 pm tonight, but I hope they didn’t get paid for it.

Running all the footage at 2x+ speed is annoying enough, playing awful clown car music just turned it from a bad waste of airtime into the desire to shove pencils in my ears to provide some relief.

Instead, I turned the channel and wrote a complaint letter; I’m not sure I’ll ever turn back to the local Fox news, for fear of someone deciding to go for a sequel.

Just after Thanksgiving, or as I alternately call it, Manifest Destiny/Don’t Trust Whitey day, Rush Limbaugh suggests Indians should pay reparations because we introduced tobacco to the pilgrims.

You know, he’s got a point. A lot of people have been hurt by tobacco. Big business has been sued for genetically engineering it to make people smoke five packs a day. We should have told them we only smoke ritually on occasion in small amounts.

And they gave us so MUCH. They gave us those wonderful (pox infested) blankets, they showed us new (involuntary) hiking trails, gave us new land (which was worse than the old land they destroyed or took), alcohol(ics, thanks to the addictive and highly toxic nature and our unfamiliarity with booze), and just treated us so damn well and (had un)protected (non-consentual sex with) us. And to me, that means we owe them.

Rush, we’re so sorry you smoke cigars like you do. We’ll take the blame for oxycontin too. And, good friend that you are, if either should kill you, we totally accept responsibility. 100%, full stop.

It’s the simple things in life…

That piss me off the most. I spent all day looking for a simple fucking milkshake. I went to two Wal-Marts to get ice cream. Both closed due to water damage. I went to QuikTrip. Their milkshakes are self-serve, you put the cup in the machine, it blends that fucker up, and you enjoy. Not anymore. The milkshakes are there, but now they’ve expanded to include Reese’s and Butterfinger flavors. Anyone with a nut allergy, such as myself, is fucked.

I gave up a while, and tonight said “fuck it, I’m just hitting the grocery store.” The website said they’re open until 11:30. It was only 10:30, I was set.

I asked someone a simple yes or no question before leaving, which it took them a full half hour to answer. The website fucking lied, the store closed at 11.

I get no milkshake today. Every attempt has been thwarted, and now every store is closed.

It’s a simple thing. Totally minor, and yet I am filled with rage over this. No rational reason, just that I’ve spent a solid hour or more of my day trying to get a simple thing done, and it’s been utterly impossible on every level.

Fuck.

Posted via Android. Apologies for misspellings and extraneous periods. That key is right by the space bar.

Fuck you, Palin. You can’t talk about running the US as a nation of equality like it was intended at the same time as you tell an entire group of the population they’re worth less than you as human beings. You may actually be the worst person on Earth. You lie blatantly, revel in hypocrisy, and engage in personal assaults at the same time you complain you’re under fire. I don’t doubt that you wools run a totalitarian fascist regime given the chance, but call it freedom protection, grizzly style. And people would eat it up. You take pride in ignorance, you turn stupidity into a virtue. If there’s really as hell, I take comfort knowing you’ll be there. Considering you may be Satan herself, though, I’m not sure how comforting that is. All I know is you’re unbelievably stupid or a complete sociopath. Either way, I don’t know why people fall for it.

Urge to expatriate rising. If this woman gets into office come 2012, I apologize to the world, and suggest we all get in our bunkers before she presses the red button.