The View From Across The Pond

...or The Rich Versus The Rest.

Politics is, at some level, about tribalism. To what degree varies from one individual to the next but, at some level, party politics is about cheering on our side and condemning theirs. Henri Tajfel proved that the very act of dividing people into groups, or them dividing themselves, creates prejudice against the outgroup and for the ingroup and that happens even when the differences are minimal, trivial or outright random. This is called Social Identity Theory and we can train ourselves to look past it but we cannot prevent it happening in the first place. So, at some level, party politics is about tribalism, us versus them.

Republicans know this. Their entire political machine is set up to exploit it. It's easier to exploit SIT with conservative politics because, while Democratic politics often tries to encourage us to look past that us against them instinct, Republican politics doesn't bother. Republican politics is entirely about "us" (the good, small-town, heartland, conservative America) against "them" (the pointy-headed elites on the coasts who think too much). Divide and conquer. Not the newest tactic but a time-tested and reliable one. What makes them Republican machine different is that they play this game of us against them for the benefit of another them: The "malefactors of great wealth", the monied elite, the Powers that Be by whatever name you choose to call them.

The PtB have a dream, you see. They've had the same dream for a long time, to create a society where the people are so desperate that they'll work for pennies, where workers can be hired and fired at will for any reason they see fit and where their employers owe nothing to the employed. It's not a complicated dream. It's the same "me first, last and only" dream that the PtB have always had. That's why so many of them love the works of Ayn Rand, because she was engaged in mankind's oldest philosophical pursuit, finding a moral cover for naked greed. And that's why the Republicans have spent so long attacking the safeguards society has in place. Because as far as they are concerned, anything that stops you falling into poverty is something that both costs them tax money and prevents you being forced to work yourself to death for them. "I owe my soul to the company store". Since the fall of feudalism, politics can be mostly summed up as the rich versus the rest and, for the least thirty-odd years, the rich have been winning. For that time period, productivity has shot up while wages have stayed flat and the tax burden has been shifted from the rich to, well, you. Yes, I've heard the excuse that "the rich pay most of the taxes" but here's the thing, that would be true even under a flat tax. They have more money coming in so even a flat tax system will take more from the rich than from the rest. I have also heard that excuse that "47% pay no taxes" and I have to laugh at that, purely because the kind of mind that could hear something that absurd and not fact-check it will believe anything. And then I think a little further and realise that what is being promoted there is yet another call to tax the poor and I stop laughing.

America doesn't treat it's poor very well. Nor does my own UK and I could do a whole essay about that but it's besides the point here. America tends to still be stuck on the Victorian notion that the poor are poor not through bad luck or simply because capitalism is designed to have winners and losers but through some moral fault of theirs. You can see this notion underlying all the myths about the poor; that the poor are lazy, fat, drug-addled (all statistically untrue); that they don't deserve medical care. It's the same notion that underlies the arbitrary time limits on welfare too. Again, don't think I'm saying that the UK is immune to this stuff (we're just as bad but it takes a slightly different form here because we have a slightly different culture), I'm just talking about the US on this occasion. The US tends to be rather anti-poor. I suspect that's because, in the fifty-odd years of the Cold War, capitalism became a sort of national religion in the USA. You can see that in the use of "SOCIALISM!" as an otherising epithet. The very idea of anything contrary to capitalism (and specifically, to unrestrained capitalism) is taken as some sort of heresy, the word "SOCIALIST!" proclaimed in much the same way as "WITCH!" was a few centuries ago. And, naturally, the label of socialism has been expanded now to cover all left-wing economic thought. The same people who would whinge like banshees if you labelled them fascist (the furthest right position), think nothing of labelling anyone of the left a socialist. Except they'll now insist that fascism was on the left and much the same as socialism. And if you can't see how that works to the PtB's benefit, you're not paying attention.

Incidently, don't think I'm propounding some grand conspiracy here. I'm not saying that the PtB work in concert. I'm using the term as a kind of shorthand for those who are both rich and politically-active. It's not a conspiracy so much as it's the case that those who are both rich and politically-active tend to see the world in a similar way (although there are exceptions, Warren Buffet being one example) and tend to work toward similar goals. Nor am I a socialist except in the manner mentioned above where everyone on the left is a socialist. Personally, I'm for a system where most things are left to private industry but a few key sectors that society relies upon (utilities, mail, healthcare and maybe telecoms) are either socialised or have a state-run competitor to provide a bottom-floor of service for price. In the US, you might call that Democratic Socialism. In my old PoliSci class, it was called a "mixed" economy. So, that's where I stand.

The last few years haven't been easy on anyone. They've been frustrating for those who think as I do. We've seen banks fall and while the solution was obvious (nationalise the damn things!), it was never mentioned by those in power. We've seen unemployment skyrocket and a too-small stimulus that helped some but not enough. And we've seen the GOP all but abandon any claim to not being the political arm of the PtB. Obama has been something of a disappointment. While always better than the Paleolithic/Pathetic ticket he ran against and always better than whichever maniac will end up representing the GOP this time (which will probably be Romney), he hasn't been the kind of transformative president everyone was hoping for. In fairness, he's also had to contend with unprecedented vitriol and obstructionism from the GOP. Obama is clearly going to be re-elected, barring massive fraud from the GOP and that too was predictable. One thing I never saw coming was the "Occupy" movement. Even now, I'm not sure if it will stick around or, really, what it wants. I understand that they're protesting economic injustice but not what they propose to rectify that, if they propose anything. Maybe, at 35, I'm too old to understand it.

Still, things are always worse on Main Street. Unemployment is high. Shops aren't selling much because no-one has money to buy anything. The GOP's control of the airwaves has turned piddle-down economics and "free markets uber alles" into common wisdom. They've waged all-out war against Keynesianism, re-written history to claim that it doesn't work. And yet, it does work. Not always and not perfectly but it does generally work. Obama's stimulus was only room-temp Keynesianism. Too large a portion of tax cuts for it to really qualify. His Jobs Bill was a good step in the right direction but that should have been proposed back when it was likely to pass but then, Obama wouldn't have been able to campaign for his second term on it (I like Obama but he is still a politician). And the GOP still push their master's agenda: Lower wages, no unions, no benefits, no entitlements. On Main Street, jobs are the most pressing issue. Without jobs, people can't buy and without people buying, businesses can't sell. Jobs are the main issue. But you'd never know it listening to Republicans. According to Republicans, the main issues are abortion, sharia and something called a "war on wealth". That last one is possibly the most disingenuous phrase concocted since "the death tax". Very few people actually resent people being rich. What we resent is them becoming rich at our expense.

In a way, I pity Americans. Not just because you have another year of campigning to sit through (campaigns here last four-to-six weeks) but also because your public debate about economics is so limited. You are not allowed to suggest alternatives to capitalism or even major modifications to it or you're marked down as a "socialist", a kook, a heretic. And it's going to take a very long time to alter that, if you can alter it at all (which will require overturning that bloody Citizens United decision). I wish it was going to be easier but I doubt it will be. But two things Americans have in abundance are energy and ingenuity and really, that's all you need.

The Backstop Theory

A lot of the time on here, I'm ranting about the excesses of the capitalist system. This may have led some people to believe certain things about my position on economic issues. In the interests of being hated for the right reasons, let me explain where I stand: I am not a Communist (in the Marxist sense). History has proven that full-blown Marxist Communism doesn't work. It looks nice on paper, it sounds very reasonable but, like a lot of reasonable ideas, it falls apart when you try and apply it to actual people. I'm not going to bother defining it further because it's failed and only complete idiots still think there is any great support for Communism. It can work for small groups, where the emotional tie between each individual prevents exploitation of the system but it doesn't work en masse. Nor am I a socialist. Now, before we go any further, we need to define what a socialist is. Contrary to the current view of the American right, socialism doesn't mean "anyone who opposes letting the poor starve in the streets". In the urge to label every single person or idea on the left as "socialist", the word has been broadened beyond use. No, actual socialism is where the people (usually through the mechanism of the state) controls all or most of the means of production and distribution. I'm not a socialist. The full-blown socialist system is both inefficient and creates a labyrinthine beurocracy.

However, I'm also not a great lover of capitalism, especially not in the "free markets uber alles" fashion currently en vogue in the USA. Capitalism is also often inefficient but, more importantly, the capitalist system inherently creates winners and losers. And while the winners are often admired far beyond any actual talents they have, the losers are too frequently despised. We call the losers "unemployed" or, if we're conservative and wish to blame them for their misfortune, "the jobless". Capitalism creates those losers. It has to, it needs the losers because their existance keeps wages down. I don't want to turn this into yet another rant about how our culture treats the unemployed but their existance is both a necessary part of and the inherent result of capitalism.
So, I find myself a nominal supporter of capitalism but only for the same reasons Sir Winston Churchill supported democracy, it's better than the other systems we've come up with.

When it works (and is properly regulated, which people like to forget), the inherent competition of capitalism works to keep prices low and standards high. However, there are a small group of sectors which pure capitalism does not and, indeed, cannot work for. These are the essential services: Water, gas, electricity, telecoms, retail banking, mail and healthcare. I call them "essential services" because living in the modern world requires using, or at least having the option to use, those services at all times. And that's why pure free-market capitalism cannot work for them. Because you cannot remove yourself from that market sector without, at least, massive inconvienience, the companies that supply those services are able to push up prices and slash standards with little to no repercussions. You can move between the various companies but you cannot easily remove yourself, you are a "captive market". These sectors do not work like others. If the price of, say, a Big Mac gets too high, you can go to Burger King (switch supplier) or you can skip lunch (remove yourself from the market altogether) but with the essential services, you do not (realistically) have the second option. Removing yourself from those market sectors is so inconvienient or, in some cases, dangerous, that you are effectively obliged to deal with them.

Since you are effectively obliged to deal with those market sectors, I thought up what I refer to as the "Backstop Theory". The idea is that, in those sectors, the state should set up and operate it's own business. A bare bones supplier from which you can buy your essential services from at the lowest possible cost. That provides a backstop, a bottom level of price for service that private companies must then compete with either by beating the price, providing a better service or both. Maybe I'm being naive but I always thought that was the essence of capitalism. I have heard various objections to this idea but most seem to amount to either ideaological objections such as the insistence that government can't do anything right (in which case, use the private competitors, what's the problem?); deranged conspiracy theories that claim the populace will be forced to use the government service in time (as an article of faith, this is unfalsifiable) and ranting about socialism (it's not socialism because the government-run services would still have private competitors).

In some of these sectors, the US and UK already have a backstop in action. In Britain, the NHS, Royal Mail and the retail banking services offered by the Post Office act as a backstop in their respective sectors. You can still use the private alternatives but, because the public companies provide a minimum of price for service, competitors must be notably better in some way to compete. In the USA, the Post Office provides the backstop mail service but, as far as I'm aware, none of the others. Healthcare would be one of the easiest to create a backstop by simply expanding Medicare to everyone (which would also make it a de facto universal healthcare system).

So that's my idea. It's not perfect and I'll be the first to admit that I have zero training in economics. The idea just comes from a lot of reading and thought on the subject.

Another Study Telling Us What We Already Knew

A new study featured in the New York Times ( http://www.nytimes.com/2011/08/17/opinion/crashing-the-tea-party.html?_r=2 ) tells us exactly what we already knew about the Teabaggers: They are, and always have been, the conservative base. The Teabagger "phonomenon" was only ever a Koch-funded rebranding of the same coalition of groups that make up the GOP's base: Racists, borderline fascists, outright fascists, anti-government kooks, backyard anarchists/Libertarians (I'm aware that the two have differing meanings but the Teabagger's variety of Libertarianism is essentially just anarchism), Randroids, single issue anti-gay and anti-abortionists and theocrats, united by living in a completely manufactured reality supplied by Faux News and the talk radio barkers.

The Teabaggers will take offence at both the study and my description of them. They'll dismiss the study the same way Bill O'Lielly dismisses studies he dislikes: By repeating the main points in a sarcastic tone (which stupid people think is a rebuttal) and describing the conductors as far-left radicals or extremists. It's so predictable as to be laughable, a worldview immune to self-knowledge or self-examination, "pay no attention to the nasty man" for grown-ups.

But this is the reality the Teabaggers live in, one where the way things are morphs into The Way Things Ought To Be and the teachinjgs of Jesus are filtered through Ayn Rand. This is a world where the left were just as bad to Bush as the right are being to Obama; where fascism and socialism are pretty much the same thing and Glenn Beck is a prophet. Where Reagan shrank government and balanced the budget while Clinton did the opposite, where Bush was a liberal (yeah, I only just heard that too), Social Security adds to the debt and Obama is a far-left socialist.

Now, none of the above is actually true. In most cases, they're the exact opposite of truth. The fact, for those of us living in a reality where facts matter, are that the left were nowhere near as bad to Bush, that fascism is corporate control of a nation and directly opposite to socialism; Reagan both grew government, never submitted a balanced budget and exploded the debt while Clinton shrank the debt and submitted several balanced budgets; Bush was ultraright and Obama is a fairly wimpy moderate.

But the Teabaggers, who are now the majority of Republicans, have a seperate world manufactured just for them. It's a world which not only tells them the above non-facts but provides a source they can quote. They have think-tanks like the Heritage Foundation that pushes absurd reality-denials from the right fringe into the mainstream; they can turn on their TV and listen to Fox tell them, they can turn on their radio and hear the barkers repeating their preferred "truths" all day long. Often, they can listen to them from an increasingly conservative mainstream media (in fact, the flat denial of reality that insists the most conservative media in the free world is actually liberally biased was probably the forerunner to all of this). This is a world where facts are not decided by things like verifiability or accuracy but purely by whether they agree with what Republicans are saying. If something agrees with a Republican talking point, it is revealed truth, gospel and unquestionable. If something disagrees with a Republican talking point, it's a scandalous lie and everyone knows it to be a lie. It's a completely self-insulating world where the gate-keeper of truth is purely convienience, whether it accords with the talking points or not.

One cannot reason with these people. It is a mistake to try because you are approaching the discussion from two completely incompatible angles. You, being relatively liberal, are approaching from a position of using verifiable facts. They, being conservative, are approaching from a basis where talking points are automatically gospel truth because they are talking points. Anything which disagrees is, by definition, a lie and can be disregarded. You're not just speaking a different language; by questioning the talking points, you're speaking heresy.

The BDFL Fixes The USA

For those who haven't read these previously, BDFL stands for Benevolent Dictator For Life, a position where I assume absolute power over the USA to correct the problem. It's an "if I ruled the world" flight of fancy. All dollar figures are in current dollars and shall be inflation-linked.

CONSTITUTION AND GOVERNMENT

- 2nd Amendment reworded to remove the words "and bear"; define "arms" to include only single-shot or semi-automatic firearms; restrict the right to ex-cons from owning firearms; establish national minimum age and mandatory firearms safety testing and ban control of a firearm while intoxicated.

- Create a right to an education through high school.

- Reaffirm right to abortion, subject to lawful restriction in the second and third trimesters.

- Create a Court of Constitutional Review, a three-judge panel nominated by the American Bar Association and confirmed by the Senate, who shall rule on the constitutionality of each law before it goes for the president's signature.

- New Constitutional Amendment clarifying that corporations are NOT Constitutional "persons" and are NOT entitled to Constitutional protections. Corporations are not persons for the purposes of the Constitution. They are fictional constructs used for legal simplicity and convienience, nothing more.

- A complete and blanket ban on any and all businesses spending a single penny on any form of political activism, whether through campaign donations, PACs or political advertising. Any violations of this law may be punished by a fine of up to one full year's profits (worked out as an average of the previous decade's profits) for a first offence. A second offence will see the maximum fine doubled and a third or subsequent offence shall trigger "election tampering" charges against the board members who made the decision.

- Blanket ban on all for-profit lobbying. Lobbyists exist to bugger up the democratic process, that is their whole reason for being. If possible, I would prefer to get rid of for-profit lobbyists and keep the concerned-citizen kind but, if necessary, I am prepared to accept the loss of the concerned-citizen lobbyists as the expense of getting rid of the for-profit ones.

- Automatic voter registration upon reaching the age of majority. This is relatively easy to do due to the Social Security rolls. Convicts do not have the right to vote but the right to vote shall be automatically reinstated upon release.

- Votes for cloture in the Senate set at sixty. It shall be lowered to fifty-five two weeks after the first cloture vote and to fifty-one (not counting the VP) a month after the first cloture vote. This is intended to curtail the rampant abuse of the filibuster.

- Bidding on federal contracts shall be open only to companies paying American taxes and all bids shall be available for public viewing unless judged to be a risk to national or federal security (a decision which WILL have to be justified to a court). No-bid contracts may only be used by the military and then only in circumstances where open bidding would constitute a security risk.

EDUCATION

- No Child Left Behind Act scrapped.

- Remove most formal tests (tests done by teachers for their own assessment still allowed).

- Impose national curriculum, setting general outlines and concepts which children in each age group should be familiar with. Individual schools and teachers can still decide how to teach them but have proven they cannot be trusted to come up with a curriculum.

- Teaching of "intelligent design" banned until it can come up with some peer-reviewed studies to assess.

- Sex education becomes mandatory from age twelve. The sexual health of future generations overrules the squickishness of parents. Such education shall obviously be taught in an age appropriate manner and shall include acknowledgement of homo and bi-sexuality, preferably making clear that both exist, deserve human dignity and will not cease to exist if someone disapproves.

- Teacher's will now be considered civil servants for purposes of working out pay and benefits (including pension options).

- Each school allocated funds for classroom expenses, removing that from the out-of-pocket teacher expenses.

- School libraries now funded through the newly created Department of Humanitarian Services.

HEALTH

- Commission created to study existing methods of providing universal healthcare around the world. 1 year for studying those methods, followed by six to nine months to create a model for universal healthcare in the USA. In theory, coming late to the party should be an advantage since you can study the methods other nations have tried, using the best parts and avoiding the worst until you come up with a special and uniquely American system. The USHS (for lack of a better name) shall focus on preventative health and shall provide healthcare to all citizens, regardless of age, race, class, employment status or anything else, funded through taxation. This includes abortion through the first trimester or when considered medeically necessary to preserve the life or health (including mental health) of the mother.

- Doctor's office and hospitals shall provide condoms free of charge to the public. This is intended to prevent and reduce STI rates.

- As the USHS is rolled out, it shall absorb both Medicare and Medicaid, leading to a cessation of both those programs.

- Having a prescription filled shall attract a small fee, initially set at ten dollars. This is not intended to cover the cost of drugs, it's intended to stop you from bothering your doctor with minor shit that just needs a couple of asprin or a roll of antacids.

- Legislation preventing the US government from negotiating drug prices repealed, legislation obliging the government to negotiate on drug prices substituted.

- As the health care and abortion services of Planned Parenthood will no longer be required due to the USHS, funding for them shall be removed.

MILITARY

- 20% reduction in military budget, targetted toward obsolete and/or unneeded weapons systems.

- Veteran's medical care rolled into USHS.

- Mental health added to veteran's care.

- New requirement that troops be given at least two years at home for each year in a combat area (may be waived in times of national invasion or rebellion).

- Ban on sending troops to war without full kit for each and every trooper (again, may be waived in cases of rebellion or national invasion).

- Remaining troops out of Iraq as soon as logistically possible, out of Afghanistan within the next eighteen months and out of Libya as soon as logistically possible without a Congressional authorisation.

- Minimum age of military active duty raised to eighteen. Recuits may enter training at seventeen but may not be deployed until eighteen. This may be waived in the event of national invasion or rebellion.

ECONOMICS

- New top tax rate added of 50% on household incomes above $1 million annually.

- Capital gains taxed as income with the exception of one (1) house, designated as the primary residence. If the household only owns one house, that shall be designated as the primary automatically. If more than one is owned, the designation may not be moved more often than once in every five year span.

- Nationwide network of JobCentres created. New legislation that every job for which application is open to the general public (i.e. headhunting not included) shall be notified to the JobCentre which shall display such jobs in each Centre and on their website. Each Centre shall also have phones and computers available (free of charge) for the purpose of applying for jobs and will even mail in applications upon a jobseeker's request. Short courses shall also be provided in such job-seeking skills as CV/resume writing, interview technique, basic computer literacy and so on. Advice shall be available for those interested in opening their own business and small loans shall be available for such things as buying an interview suit, attending interviews and relocating for work.

- Welfare "reform" enacted under Clinton repealed. Welfare goes back to being a non-time-limited entitlement but administered through the JobCentre and contingent upon actively seeking work (we leave Congress to work out the details of what "actively seeking" means). Legislation introduced obliging all businesses to firstly, respond to job applications (nothing more disheartening for a job seeker than companies that just ignore applications) and secondly, respond to JobCentre enquires about interview attendance (too many horror stories of people who lose their welfare because companies couldn't be bothered replying).

- The BDFL's administration has no intention of rewarding the lazy or workshy but if you genuinely cannot work or if you genuinely cannot land a job despite your best efforts, we will look after you.

- Creation of the Rebuild America Corps (name up for debate since I don't much like it). This is a central plank of the BDFL's platform. The RAC shall offer employment to unemployed persons (starting with the long-term unemployed) and ex-convicts (if we want people to reform, they have to be given the opportunity) to rebuild the USA's crumbling infrastructure along with various community enhancing projects like clearing graffiti, building low-income housing or beautifying countryside. Wages shall start at minimum wage and, so much as is possible, respect worker's religious/philosophical commitments (For example, Muslims will be given time out for their required prayers). So much as is possible, workers existing skills shall be respected (i.e. administrative slots shall be mostly filled by unemployed clerical workers). However, workers can request assignment to alternative areas if they wish to broaden their skills (for example, a bricklayer can request assignment to a weatherising team to broaden his skills) and can earn on-the-job certification in that area (i.e. our bricklayer can earn his certification in weatherisation). The RAC shall work with local charities and government in assessing local needs and desires. Since the USA currently has both a crumbling infrastructure and a high percentage of unemployment, the creation of the RAC will address both problems. As time goes on, the RAC will become a beloved institution, it provides teenagers with their first real jobs, allows the unemployed to retain their dignity with the feeling that they are contributing to society and earning an honest wage doing so and allows ex-cons the opportunity to rebuild their lives with an honest trade. Social perception of the unemployed turns around when the average citizen can see teams of RAC workers in hi-vis vests rebuilding the local community.

- Once the economy is back under control (which we estimate at 5-8 years), our administration will introduce free tuition at college and/or trade schools for anyone who does not already hold a college degree or professional certification.

- Estate tax reinstated on estates above $2.5 million. All family-owned farms, the property designated as primary residence and any works of art or historic import which are exhibited to the public shall be exempted when working out each estate.

- Congressional committee instituted to examine the corporate tax code for loopholes and write legislation to close them.

- Moratorium on foreclosures, to be reviewed after six months. Legislation that if the company holding your mortgage cannot produce the legally required paperwork in court, your home is signed over to you and they have to swallow the loss.

- NAFTA/CAFTA renegotiated with a view to limiting both agreements to goods which cannot be produced in the USA.

- Any company which moves it's production facilities overseas for the purpose of maximising profits (note, this is quite different from a company getting out of a particular sector or closing a money-losing division) shall see their import duties doubled for the next ten years AND must pay it's redundant workers a minimum of two year's salary (worked out as an average if wages vary) as severence.

- No board member may be paid more than fifty (50) times the wage of the companies lowest paid employee, including bonuses and benefits. This encourages the raising of wages across the board, channels more of the profits to the stockholders who actually own the company and prevents the board voting themselves exhorbitant pay and benefits packages. This shall not apply to sole trader and partnership businesses on the grounds that they are risking their own time and money.

- Minimum wage raised to $10 an hour for small businesses, $12.50 an hour for corporations nationwide. Individual states may raise it further if they choose.

LAW & ORDER

- Cannabis consumption legalised in private residences. In public areas (such as bars), it shall be at the discretion of the owner. Buying and/or growing cannabis for personal consumption shall be legalised for those of or above the age of 18. Selling cannabis shall require a sales license for selling intoxicants in the same way as alcohol. Like any other adult pleasure, cannabis is age-restricted (initially set at age 18) and driving while under the influence is banned (driving under the influence of anything which alters perceptions is a bad idea). In other words, if you want to smoke a fat doobie in your living room, it's no business of the law. If you grow your own for personal consumption or with a few friends, that's equivelent to brewing your own beer and, again, none of our business. All persons imprisoned for simple possession or consumption of cannabis shall be freed as soon as logistically possible.

- In the case of drug charges for simple possession or consumption, there shall be a presumption against imprisonment and toward rehabilitation. It is cheaper, more effective and more humane to rehabilitate addicts rather than imprison them where possible.

- We shall create a commission of chemists, scientists, sociologists and criminologists who shall be charged with assessing the effect of various drugs (including alcohol, nicotine and caffeine for comparison purposes) on both the individual and society and making recommendations on the legal status of each drug which shall, except in exceptional circumstances, be made law.

- Moritorium on the enactment of the death penalty while racial disparities in sentencing are studied and resolved to the BDFL's satisfaction. Outright ban on enacting the death penalty on anyone with an IQ of or below 75 or with a physical or mental age of below 18.

- Option of sentencing prisoners to LWOP (Life Without Possibility of Parole) shall be introduced in all cases where the death penalty would be available.

- Mandatory drug screening and, if necessary, rehabilitation shall be introduced in all prisons, starting with and concentrating on soon-to-be-released prisoners (more effective that way).

- Nobody under 18 shall be tried as an adult without the concurring opinions of two psychologists that the accused is mentally an adult.

- Enactment of the "Romeo & Juliet" law. Where both partners are within both four years of one another AND the junior partner is within 18 months of the age of consent, sexual intercourse shall NOT be considered rape and neither partner shall be considered a sex offender.

- Top-to-bottom ongoing review of criminal law to ensure constitutionality. This will take years but needs to be done.

- Nominations for the SCOTUS shall henceforth be made by the American Bar Association (who shall nominate those it considers moderate in their views and cast-iron adherents to the principles of law). Nominations shall be considered/confirmed by both branches of Congress, requiring a passing vote in both chambers. Recess appointments shall NOT be allowed for the SCOTUS. Confirmation shall be for a term of twelve years, upon which Justices must either retire or be re-nominated and re-confirmed. There shall be no limit on how many terms a Justice can serve and Justices may retire at their own discretion at any time.

- A new Ethics Committee shall be created to police the SCOTUS Justices. The current Justices have proven they cannot be trusted to act ethically without a watchdog.

- The Citizen's United decision overturned and quashed.

- Gambling legalised for over-18s nationwide. Premises and persons whose business is gambling (i.e. casinos, bookies, arcades, etc) must be inspected and licensed for the usual safety checks and for keeping out the underage and/or the intoxicated. Businesses and persons engaged in the gambling trade have the usual freedom to refuse service but are obliged to refuse service to anyone they consider underage or intoxicated. Repeated violations of that rule may result in the revokation of the license. Providers are also obliged to provide a receipt of placed bets and to pay out on production of a valid slip for a winning bet. It's at their discretion whether they pay out if you don't produce it so keep hold of your betting slip. There shall be a 5% tax on bets or winnings (gambler's choice) in sports gambling.

MISCELLANIOUS

- DOMA overturned.

- DADT overturned straight away, military integrated tommorrow.

- Civil marriage extended to same-sex couples within the next six weeks. The law shall be written in such a way that in all respects but the very, very technical (such as exactly how "consumation" is defined), same-sex marriage shall be considered legally identical to hetero marriage. The six-week delay is purely for logistical reasons. Military granted a three-month delay to prepare (for example, by building additional married couples quarters).

- Israel gets six months to sort out some kind of reasonable compromise with the Palestinians (or make what the BDFL considers a good faith effort) or we cut off aid.

- We institute the BUSA (Benefactor of the United States of America) medal. This conveys no additional rights or priveliges but is intended to be the highest civilian award the USA can bestow and equivelent to a British Life Peerage, a way for the USA to single out and appreciate those civilians who have made a remarkable contribution to the country. All US residents shall be eligible for nomination but a maximum of twelve medals can be handed out each year (save for the first year, to allow the nomination of all the Founders) and there is no minimum number. Being awarded a BUSA should be the highlight of anyone's life, an honour equivelent to the Noble Prize and a way for the country to say a secular "well done, thy good and faithful servant". No publically elected official shall be eligible for nomination until thirty (30) years after their death (intended to prevent both the pro forma nomination of past presidents and using the BUSA to make political hay). These are intended to be the greatest civilians the USA has ever produced and should be recognised accordingly.

- Federal purchases of goods must be spent within the USA unless no American company produces the required goods. For example, if the USHS wishes to purchase ambulances, they must purchase from a US company unless there is no US company producing suitable ambulances.

- Creation of the Department of Humanitarian Services. This department shall be the agency responsible (or co-responsible in some cases) for bettering the citizen's condition. In other words, their job is to fight for the improvement of the citizen's life in all areas. Sometimes, they shall be acting alone (for example, library funding now falls under their remit) and other times, they will be liasing with other departments (for example, with the Department of Justice in formulating rehabilitation recommendations). Other departments have a complex agenda where different pressures must be evaluated and weighed, the DHS has only one: The improvement of citizen's lives.

Things We Should Have Learned By Now

Earlier this evening, I was having a conversation on one of Scott's posts with a nice chap called Lars who I don't think I've met before. And we ended up talking about the need to put some decent funding into space research so we can get off this damn rock. Not everyone, just the vaguely sane people (I realise that a mentally ill guy calling himself part of the "sane people" is just dripping with irony). And the new society we'll set up. Our new society will have it's problems, as any society does but in contrast to what we have right now, we'll have learned from our mistakes. The mistakes we've made in this society, mistakes that are now so embedded as to be near-impossible to correct, we'll already know to avoid them. Oh, for sure we'll find all new mistakes to make but we'll know to...

Keep carbon emissions below 350 ppm.

Three hundred and fifty parts per million is the scientifically established safe level of carbon emissions. Above that level, the earth gets warmer and we're all in trouble. Below that, the temprature stays the same or, just possibly, even drops. Granted, the new planet we set up house on will have a slightly different safe level but we don't know what that will be yet so I've just used the earth's limit. We'll have to do this on our new planet because this one is already fucked. The very concept of climate change is now so politicised that it's impossible to do anything about it. In the halls of power, they're not talking about how to deal with this problem, they're talking about whether the problem even exists. The cap-and-trade program that Obama's endorsed won't help the problem and might even make it worse and even THAT is too much for too many. And that's something else we'll have learned:

Don't let politicians decide science by vote.

Science is done by scientists. The second politicians start discussing science,. it becomes politicised and that inevitibly means it becomes a matter of party affiliation. The politicians we have now refuse to do a damn thing about the fact that our planet is melting. Abstinence-only sex-ed clearly and provably doesn't work but politicians keep funding it because they think it should work. Stem-cell research, which could save or improve countless lives, doesn't get funded because politicians know shit about the science involved. A basic rule of humanity is that humans are, by and large, fucking dense. We have this really cute idea that one side makes their decisions by emotion and the other side makes theirs by cold, hard reason. It's a cute theory and, like most cute theories, it's bollocks. Research done with people who actually can't feel any emotion (mainly due to brain damage) shows them to be utterly indecisive and that's because humans rarely make decisions by reason. We use reason to rationalise decisions we make by emotion. And one of these days, I'll write one of these essays about how terrifyingly easy it is to manipulate the human mind. Point I'm making is that most people make their decisions by emotion and politicians, who have very well-paid staff who know that, know how to manipulate those emotions. And nowhere is that more apparent than with science. Because most people don't understand science and don't really want to.

Don't let everyone think they're an expert on everything.

I might catch some flack for this one but I studied law and I'm currently studying criminology with psychology. Law is a subject where everyone instantly considers themselves expert. Some case comes before the SCOTUS and everyone thinks they understand the issues at stake. Plain truth is, law uses specialist language and principles and most people don't have the experiance or training to understand them (or why "activist judge" is a nonsense phrase). Medicine is the same way. I'm mentally ill, I have been for some time. As soon as you admit that, especially on the internet, you get a bazillion orders from everyone and their dog that you should take vitamins, take excercise, stop taking your meds. Advice like this gets people killed. Among my many other problems, I have Major Depressive Disorder. Telling someone with MDD to stop taking their meds drops their life expectancy to a matter of weeks. The climate change "debate" is the same way; people without a day's training or experiance in climate science who instantly think they know better than trained professionals who have devoted their lives to studying the subject. Biblical literalists (they like to call themseloves "Bible-believing" like literalism is the only form of belief) who think they know better than paleontologists who've spent their whole lives immersed in study and will still tell you that they don't know everything about the subject. And it's because we've eliminated the concept of expertise. We've gone from "your opinion is valuable" (which it is) to "your opinion counts as much as anyone else's" (which it doesn't). Yes, the experts in a subject can occasionally be flat wrong, no arguments there, but they are a damn sight more likely to be right than muggins off the street who thinks Glenn Beck is a prophet and The Sun is a newspaper. When people who have studied the subject are talking, either ask some sensible questions or shut the fuck up. If Gordon Ramsay is trying to teach you how to cook, shut the fuck up and listen. If John Dicey is trying to teach you law, shut the fuck up and listen. If Kurt Angle is trying to teach you how to wrestle, shut the fuck up and listen. Asking intelligent questions and taking notes is also encouraged. Our society has become terrified of telling people that they don't know what they're fucking talking about. It's said that the more you know about a subject, the more you become aware of how little you know. I'm sure that's true but I think someone needs to add the caveat: The less you know about a subject, the more likely you are to think yourself an expert in it.

People are people are people.

This one really should be a no-brainer but our society still has problems with it: Treating everyone the same, giving everyone the same rights. And yes, I'm talking partly about letting gay people get hitched. Now personally, I don't see why anyone would want to marry but that's besides the point. Usually, at this point, some dickhead starts saying that gay people have the same right to marry someone of the opposite sex as everyone else but that's bullshit, that's playing fucking word games. If that worked, we could shut down every church except mine. You still have the freedom to be a Satanist like any rational person after all. There is a reason the phrase "one size fits all" appears in no known Constitution or Bill of Rights anywhere and that's because you don't have freedom if the state bans everything else. Loving V. Virginia defined marriage as a "fundemental human right" and sorry, wingers, there is nothing so extraordinary about same-sex marriage that the ruling has to add "this includes the queers too" (yes, I believe in reclaiming unpleasent words. I also believe in hitting people who use them unironically). Likewise, I can't see why any gay person would want to join the military especially right now but if straight people have the option of getting their nuts shot off, gay people should have that option too. Gay people are exactly the same as straight people in almost every regard; same plumbing, different wiring. That's the only difference. Some guys want to shag Johnny Depp, some girls want to shag Angelina Jolie. I'm bi so I'll take both (because I'M HARDCORE! and only fans of old-school ECW will get that joke). Look, humans are pretty simple and we're mostly much the same. We almost all want the same things. We want shelter, food and drink and we want someone to share our lives with. Yeah, I'm talking about love. Love is what redeems us, it's what makes us something more than just a super-evolved ape and love, real love, is so rare in this world. Every seer and visionary down through the ages has told us the same thing. Buddha, Mahatma Gandhi, Jesus; all of them said the same thing, the same thing John Lennon said: Love is the answer and you know that for sure. Are we really stupid enough, petty enough and spiteful enough that we would shut off someone's chance at happiness (or permanency, depending on your experiance of marriage) just because a guy likes cock or a girl likes pussy? A lot of us are that petty and that spiteful and that baffles me. I'm not a very nice guy (despite this rep I've bafflingly acquired) but even I'm not that much of a bastard.

Don't let megacorporations buy news providers

Another one that should be a no-brainer but has become so deeply embedded that we'll never get it out. Wingers love to trot out that survey where most reporters admit to having liberal social views (although they always ignore the part of that same survey that shows reporters generally have conservative economic views). Thing is, reporters don't decide what goes into news media, editors do and editors tend to be conservative and part of the reason editors tend to be conservative is because they're the ones accountable to media owners and the corporations that generally own the media tend to be conservative. In fact, corporations generally tend to be conservative and that's entirely logical. To be conservative means to be opposed to, or at least wary of, change and corporations that are successful enough to own media outlets don't want change, they've already got the world arranged just the way they like it. In fact, corporations generally want change rolled back, preferably to the Gilded Age when workers were desperate and had zero protections (see, Scott Walker). That anyone could actually believe that the US media is predominantly liberal simply proves what I was saying earlier about how easy it is to manipulate humans because the US has the most conservative media in the free world. Even the channel considered most liberal, MSNBC, has a Republican former elected official for three honkin' hours every morning.

Don't let them buy politicians either

Oh boy, the Citizen's United decision was a fucking catastrophe. The US system of funding political campigns is perilously close to outright bribery. The politicians would have us believe that the millions fuinnelled to them by corporate donors doesn't affect their votes. You have got to be kidding. Look, basic human nature dictates that if someone plays a big part in placing you in a position of power and priviledge, a position that if you're careful, you can extend into a lifelong gravy train (see Gingrich, Newt; see also "crook"), you are at least going to feel warmly about that person. And politicians are no different. If Exxon helps get a pol elected, he is, at very least, going to give Exxon more of a hearing than he would of a company that hadn't given him millions of dollars. Now, Republicans have given up any pretence of being anything other than the political arm of Big Business but the Democrats aren't a great deal better (although there are a few notable exceptions, take a bow Dennis Kucinich). We are asked to believe that politicians are both "just like you" and also such a rarified breed that basic human emotional drives don't apply to them. Of course, if they didn't apply, they would be psychopaths which is scarcely more reassuring. And speaking of psychopaths...

No Ayn Rand.

Do I even need to justify this one?

Corporations are not people.

First off, a corportion is not a person. The basic definition of a human being can be found in any encyclopaedia, while a corporation is a piece of shorthand we use purely for legal convienience. Now, "personhood" is, to some extent, also a legal construct but from it's very beginnings, it has had a specific meaning: A (born, although that came later) human being. Not an automaton, not an animal and not a legal construct. A corporation has all the advantages of being human but none of the drawbacks. A corporation cannot starve, feel cold or wet or have it's heart broken. A corporation doesn't have to worry about paying the rent or keeping the electricity turned on. In a lot of ways, a corporation is closer to a vampire (the traditional folk tale version) than a human; it's sole reason for existing is to generate profit which it then uses to generate even more profit. Indeed, legally, that is the only duty of the corporation and it's directors. Humans are not so simple. Humans have numerous competing needs and desires. If you could look inside the head of even a mentally healthy person, you would see a constant struggle between desires for basic survival needs, for status, for companionship, for a hundred things. Not the corporation. It has only one desire.

Secondly and politically, an individual is limited to a campaign contribution of (I believe) $2,400 per cycle. A corporation may, however, make limitless donations in kind (another legal construct, in kind means that the receiver enjoys the benefit even though no cash changes hands) by buying tv time. Since tv time is likely to be a, if not the, major outlay for campaigning politicians, that amounts, in effect, to unlimited campaign contributions. And because a corporation is an automaton (lacking self-direction), those contributions will be made at the behest of the board of directors. By filtering the contribution through the corporation, the limit on contributions has effectively been abolished for directors. The US system of campaign financing is already perilously close to outright bribery. Whether we wish to alleviate that complaint rather depends on whether you plan your future to include elections or auctions.

Thirdly, this creates an unholy mess of legal principles. A human may commit crimes and, if caught, may be fined. Fair enough, a corporation may be fined as well (although they rarely are and never enough to make a difference). However, a human may also be imprisoned or, if the crimes are severe enough, executed. A corporation cannot be imprisoned and while it can be executed after a fashion by being wound up, those responsible for the crimes of the corporation walk away, free and clear and quite possibly to commit the same crimes at another corporation. Further, the law depends on a balance of rights and responsibilities. The responsibilities are usually implicit but they are there nonetheless. For example, your right to keep and bear arms carries the responsibly to do so responsibly. We might quibble over precisely what "responsibly" means but we do not deny that we have that obligation. Your right to free speech carries the rsponsibility to excercise that right with some care (the "yelling FIRE! in a crowded theatre example) and so on. Well, if a corporation is a legal person and has rights, what are it's responsibilities? It has only one responsibility: To gorge itself, to profit just as much as it can. That is it's only consideration. Legally, that can be it's only consideration. This is roughly equivelent to raising a child to believe that his only responsibility is to satisfy himself, come what may. We call people like that psycho or sociopaths. Ambrose Bierce once remarked that a corporation was "an ingenious device for obtaining individual profit without individual responsibility".

Fourth, a corporation is a psychopath. I touched on this above but it needs spelling out. Some humans have, for reasons we do not yet fully understand, a conscience and sense of empathy which is either extremely minimised or absent entirely. These people are called psychopaths ("sociopath" means the same thing, both are covered by Antisocial Personality Disorder). Contrary to popular belief, they are not automatically violent but because they lack conscience, because they feel no empathy or remorse, if one decides that his personal desires will be best satisfied through violence, he will act to satiate those desires as soon as is practical. A corporation also has no conscience, no sense of empathy or remorse. The people in charge of that corporation may do (or may not, a surprising amount of business leaders test out as psychopaths) but because decisions are made at a distance from the subject, that conscience may well not be sufficient to prevent a decision from causing damage. When you see your customers every day, when it's actual people coming into your store (for example), your subconscious marks them down as human, like you, and therefore beings you can feel empathy toward. However, if your only contact with your customers is as numbers in a book, account names on a profit and loss record, you don't think of them as entirely "real". That's not a unique thing, it's a perfectly normal human trait. It's the same reason why Americans were more emotionally affected by 9/11 than the London Tube bombings, it's the same reason I was more emotionally affected by the Tube bombings than by 9/11. Because I've visited London many times and used the Tube frequently, it was more emotionally real to me than the destruction of a landmark on another continent that I'd never visited or seen or known anyone who was there. That reduction of emotional impact for things with which you are not personally familiar is entirely normal. It is also entirely normal for humans to feel less concerned about the plight of someone distant from them (among others, it was observed by Milgram in his famous experiment). That's absolutely textbook human normal (note: "normal" does not mean "nice". Humans are a lot less psychologically pleasant than we like to believe) but when you combine those two perfectly normal psychological mechanisms, you end up with teh simple fact that, for the CEO atop his ivory tower, most of his employees and customers barely emotionally exist for him. It doesn't take a psychopath to poison the Gulf or dump hexavalient chromium into the water supply, all it takes is those two psychological mechanisms and the constant pressure to profit. If you are only barely emotionally aware of your employees and customers, why not drive them harder, why not slash their benefits and wages (real wages have been mostly stagnant for years), why not skip the safety testing?

I haven't brought you on this little journey to rant about the evils of corporations (although I could do that too). Rather, I am making the point that the corporation insulates it's controllers from the consquences of their actions to a great extent and thus, the corporation is able to take tremendously harmful actions without the soul-searching which a (mentally normal) human would be subject to. And thus, it can buy politicians to enable it without any second thoughts. And that's when politicians (especially Republicans) are not already doing it's bidding under the common misaprehension that being pro-capitalist necessarily means being pro-corporatist.

Fifth, and finally: If corporations are persons, why can't they vote? No, I'm serious. If corporations are legal persons, then they are covered by the protections of the Fourteenth Amendment. That makes them citizens and that entitles them to vote.

And I haven't even gotten into the politicisation of the courts yet...

A Meandering Rant About Sexuality

Today, I'd like to talk about sexuality a little.

I am a bisexual man. For those lacking a high-school education, that means that I am sexually and romantically attracted to both men and women. My current (and hopefully, last) partner is female. Unlike most bisexual people, I don't have a gender preference. Most bisexuals have a preference for one gender or the other so it's pretty common to see bisexual people describe themselves as a quarter hetero or seventy percent gay or whatever, that's very common. I'm slightly unusual in that I'm a pretty straight-up (forgive the pun) 50-50 who doesn't noticeably skew toward either gender. If I list the people I am sexually or romantically attracted to, it contains a roughly even number of men and women including a few (such as Clea Duvall) who are themselves gay.

Being bisexual is not the same as being gay. It's not the same as being straight either. I think a lot of people who are gay or straight forget that. It's not the same as being a gay man who occasionally likes pussy (forgive the vulgarity) or a straight man who sometimes like cock. I'm a part of both worlds but, like the half-native kid in the fable, not truly a part of either because our society places so much emphasis on who you sleep with that neither side entirely "gets" the bisexual person. And that causes all kinds of misunderstandings and preconceptions.

We are not just greedy. Yes, as Woodly Allen said, being bisexual automatically increases your chances of getting a date on Saturday night (although really, not even that since gay men are rarer than straight women). Yes, I have a lot more options for porn than most people but human desires are not controllable. I can choose whether I act on those desires but the actual desires themselves aren't somethign I can control. More to the point, nor can anyone else. In our society, it's still something of a stigma to be gay (although, granted, things have improved a lot in recent years). Up until a few years ago, it was still illegal in Texas to be gay. Since this didn't make any notable difference in the number of gay people from Texas, we have to assume that our desires are in-born and, to some extent which we don't entirely understand yet, inate. Looking at that world, why on earth would anyone choose to be gay or bisexual? They wouldn't. Unless that desire was something inate about them. And just like gay people, my attraction to both genders is inate.

However, that doesn't mean that I must have a mate of both genders to be satisfied, that really would be greedy. Straight men and gay women, I'm sure you see dozens of girls every day that you find sexually attractive; straight women and gay men, you must see dozens of shaggable guys every day, right? Well, it's the same for us. Yes, men and women feel different, having sex with each is a completely different experiance but newsflash, that's true of individuals as well. Thinking back on the women I've slept with, each of them felt completely different and utterly unique and the same is true of the men I've slept with. If you can manage to avoid sleeping with the unique and attractive girl at the office, why should it be any different for us? Being attracted to the guy in the bookstore doesn't mean I am any more inclined to cheat on my partner than anyone else (although Johnny Depp, if you're reading this, you're on my list so gimme a call). And while we're on the subject of different tactile sensations, there are these things called sex toys which people can buy and simulate a whole range of sexual experiances. It's not like the days where the only way to simulate gay sex was to buy your girlfriend a fake moustache, there's a cornucopia of dildos, vibrators and costumes in a rainbow of colours. Seriously. Some of them even ejaculate. And for the phonomenally paranoid: No, a liking for taking it up the ass, fabulous though it is, does not mean you're gay anymore than a liking for blowjobs does. If you like shagging people with tits, no matter how you like shagging or being shagged by them, you're either a straight man, bisexual or a gay woman and a quick look down in the shower should enable you to figure out which. Unless you're into tranny porn. In which case, hey, whatever floats your boat, no judgements here.

No, I'm not confused about my sexuality and I'm not going to quietly place myself in a checkbox as I get older. I used to be confused about my sexuality. When I was a small child, I was sexually molested by a male relative. No, that didn't cause me to be bisexual but it did make me very screwed up about my sexuality for years. Because I associated guy-guy sex with being molested, I buried that attraction for many years. It was only when I got to university in my mid-twenties that I felt able to start dealing with that. It took some years to sort the attraction that I felt toward guys from the rage and humiliation I felt as a result of the molestation but you didn't read this to plumb the depths of my psyche so all you need to know is that I eventually dealt with it. Now, doubtless there's someone reading this and asking themselves why I couldn't have stayed repressed about guylove all my life, why I had to sort out my attraction to guys. Because fuck you, that's why. Something anyone acquinted with me should know by now is that I think sexuality is incredibly overcomplicated by our culture and that I have a pretty combatative nature (I worship the original rebel, for goodness's sakes). I won't be repressed, not by faux-morality, not by self-appointed moral guardians and not by the infirmities of my psyche either. More to the point, love is a rare thing, transcendent and pure. Love is what makes us more than just a super-evolved ape. Every spiritual visionary worth his or her salt has said the same thing from the dawn of time. Ghandhi said it, Martin luther King said it, even Jesus said it. The same message every time: As John Lennon put it "Love is the answer and you know that for sure". Nothing dignifies humanity like love, nothing else makes the shit of this world, the war, death, hatred and pineapple on pizza, worthwhile like love does. And it is so rare, so vanishingly unusual, to find that one person. That person who can celebrate your triumphs and comfort your tragedies. I don't believe in "you complete me" because I don't believe that being alone necessarily makes you incomplete but it is so rare in this universe to find that one person who feels like home that if there was any chance of finding that person in your own gender (and I'm not talking about completely straight or gay people, they're incapable of being romantically interested in their own or the opposite gender, that's just understood), wouldn't your response to those saying you shouldn't even look be "fuck you" as well?

Personally, I think sexuality is mainly about what feels good anyway. That's not a value judgement, it's a suggestion that the human sex drive is inately hedonistic and that's not a bad thing. For some people, girls feel right and that's good. For others, guys hit their sweet spot and that's good too. Look, if you're a straight guy, you're not going to enjoy having sex with another guy. It's won't feel good to you, no matter how good he is at sucking cock because you're straight. Likewise, a straight woman is not going to enjoy having sex with another woman, no matter how firmly she straps her boobs down or how skilfully she pilots a strap-on. It's about what feels good and that's fine. The only rules worth any notice about sex are so obvious that rational people usually just take them as read (but, for the terminally dense: No kids, no animals, make sure everyone's consenting and if you're even slightly unsure of anyone's sexual history, use rubbers. Oh, and the host picks the music). Beyond those aforementioned guidelines that should be so obvious anyone of age automatically assumes them, it's not like there are rules. Somewhere in the myriad complexity of human chemistry, there's some kind of switch that says if you're gay, straight or somewhere in-between. Most people end up being straight because humanity needs them to be straight to ensure the continuation of the species (the evolutionary process is dumb and doesn't understand things like IVF), somewhere between eight and twelve percent of people turn out to be gay and an unknown percentage turn out to be bisexual and it's all ok. But most of our views of sexuality date from the Victorians and a time before we learned to control our fertility. We feel we have to justify our sexual choices constantly. An example is the debate about whether being gay is a choice. Now, all the research (which is not entirely conclusive yet but very nearly so) says it's not a choice but why should that fucking matter anyway? Yes, I know the idiots use it to beat you over the head with a stick of "choosing to be immoral" but the idea depends on the preconception that there is something less desireable about being gay than there is about being straight, it's a justification for something that doesn't need a justification.

Why some people are gay is a question of only academic interest. It's an interesting question for biologists, psychologists and geneticists but beyond the halls of academia, it doesn't matter, it's irrelevent. If you start from the viewpoint that being gay or being straight is as morally neutral as having green or blue or brown eyes, then who cares why some people are gay? Even if being gay is a choice (and, again, it's not), why should we discriminate against it? I'm not discriminated against because I choose to have a beard (with the exception of a very radical feminist I once knew who said I was "aggressively asserting" my masculinity and thereby reinforcing the patriarchy), my partner isn't discriminated against because she chooses to dye her hair so why the hell should we discriminate against someone because of why they like to have sex with even if it was a choice (yet again, it's not)? It's stupid, an irrelevent distinction that should only be of interest to the individual and the person they're sleeping with. Now, some idiot Crusader (and boy, are you on the wrong blog) could make some noise here about being gay damning you to stinky hellfire but that's a threat only convincing to people in the rowboat with you. My chosen holy book says that some will love the same sex and some will love the opposite sex and it's all good. You have to assume that being gay is immoral in order to make the case that being gay is immoral. That's called circular reasoning, buddy, and it's not welcome here (although Conservapedia will love you). No-one is offering to legislate the moral precepts of my faith, nor should they and I would fight them if they did. A few obsessed morons might say here that some people might choose to fuck kids and if I think all choices are acceptable, how can I discriminate against them? Well, firstly, look up the phrase "informed consent" and learn why children (and animals for that matter) are incapable of giving it and secondly, fuck off to another blog and be thankful we aren't having this discussion in person.

See, another area where we overcomplicate sex is when we talk about explaining it to teenagers. Conservatives love to play this card, "if you allow gay people, you'll have to explain sodomy to kiddiewinks". Talk about begging the question. Since you already explain to them that mummy and daddy love each other very much, where's the problem in telling them that some boys love other boys and some girls love other girls? And as for the ones who don't even want their kids to know gay people exist; well, firstly, they're going to find out eventually, no matter what you do. My mother owned lesbian cats, gay people are openly in media these days and if they've got an internet connection, five seconds is going to teach them way more than they were ever curious about. Secondly, fuck you, you shouldn't even be allowed to raise kids. No, I'm not being hyperbolic. You can raise your kids to have any kind of values you'd like but when you want to selectively edit reality because of it? Yeah, I think Child Services is justified in taking your kids away at that point because you're no different than the bigot who said they didn't want their kids to know black people existed (and if you're going to use the word "choice", see above and fuck you too). You get to have your own opinions and your own values but you don't get to have your own facts and the fact is, gay people exist, they are only different from you in irrelevent details and you don't get to make a shitstorm about that.

And while we're on the subject of the sacred little bastards (yeah, I don't like kids, does it show?), if your kids are even interested in sex at that age, they have bigger problems than the existance of gay people. Fact is, the reaction of small children to seeing naked people is much the same as their reaction to seeing a parrot for the first time: "Mummy, what's that?". Dirty jokes sail completely over their heads until they hit puberty so unless you set out to make it something shameful, your kid is not going to be damaged by knowing that Brian and Tom love one another. By the time they do hit puberty, Google and Playboy have already taught them the basics anyway. Parents tend to think that kids are way more innocent than they actually were anyway. They like to think their darling little bundle of joy convieniently discovers sex when they get to the age of consent and they don't even like to consider that their kid masturbates underage. They can't fool themselves completely with boys since the basket full of soiled Kleenex is a dead giveaway but, hey parents, little Fiona is probably rubbing one off right now, you better rush off and stop her! See, this is such a stupid waste of time and it's largely because we've internalised the idea that sex is something to be ashamed of. We try to train kids to think that giving themselves pleasure is a terrible thing. Hell, when I was at the age when I was discovering masturbation, my parents moved me into a room without a door. Seriously, normal room, open doorway with no door there. I'm not trying to turn this into a rant about the various ways my parents did their level best to mentally cripple me (and, in fairness, they were pretty screwed up themselves and didn't have a clue what they were doing) but the fact is, masturbation is normal, it's part of the pleasurecruise of self-discovery we all go on during our teens and it should be. Masturbation is sex without the dangers. You can't get pregnant, catch an STD or even get stood up by your hand at the prom. It's sexual pleasure with literally no drawbacks. Way I figure it, parents should be singing the praises of masturbation to their kids. OK, you're within the bounds of reason to ask Tommy to shut the door but at least he's not fucking in there. In fact, if you want to delay your teenagers first full coital bonk, you might want to extoll the virtues of mutual masturbation while you're at it. You'd be surprised what teenage boys will settle for. Your kid would literally sell his soul for a quick feel of boob through clothing and you think he's going to turn down a quick handjob? No, he's going to agree very enthuasiastically, enjoy it enormously and be exceedingly grateful. If he's got any brains, he'll also keep his mouth shut about it (teenage girls, the single best threat is "If you tell anyone, you'll never get another one"). Full blown sex can lead to pregnancy, STDs and complicated family gatherings, mutual masturbation just leads to Kleenex, snuggling and a desire to raid the fridge. There's a shitload of things people can do to get their rocks off without actual penetrative sex and I would suggest mentioning all of them. When you should start singing the virtues of handjobs and dryhumping is a question I'll leave to your discretion, you know your kids better than I do. Just make sure it's not too late and be sure to point out, repeatedly if necessary, that just because you can doesn't mean you have to. If you don't like them, don't want to go that far or even if you're just not in the mood, saying "no" is not only acceptable but required (and if you're an adult, "no" is your only acceptable response). Sex play, even the kind that stops short of penetration, is a game for two or more players and it's a lousy game unless everyone is enthuasiastic about playing. And if you find a copy of Hustler in your kid's room (either gender), just quietly put it under their pillow and forget about it.

A lot of conservatives like to imagine some golden age (almost always, the Fifties or earlier) where sexuality was something that seemingly didn't exist. If you're into that kind of thing, it might be a reassuring fantasy but it's a fantasy nonetheless. Fact is, our attitudes toward sexuality are actually pretty recent. And I don't mean "recent" as in the Sixties either. the sexual revolution of the Sixties was actually very dependent on class. If you were middle-class, not much changed for you. You still fucked at drive-ins but you were still quiet about it. In the counter-culture, we've actually gone backwards since then. According to the recollections of some of those who were around at the time, the liberalisation that the birth control pill allowed was such that for many women, it would be as simple as seeing someone they liked the look of and asking "Do you want to fuck?" (small note, I am applauding the women who were that up-front with their sexuality). Our attitudes toward teenage sexuality are no more than a century old and, in many cases, much younger. Shakespeare made Juliet all of thirteen years old (another note, that play is about the short-sightedness of young love, stop holding it up as a romance when it's a tragedy). The accounts of coppers from Victorian London are full of reports of having to move along children as young as elevn or twelve from copulating in gutters and yes, child molestation is as old as humanity as well. We are unique not because we are the first generation to have such things happen but because we are the first generation to be aware of it, we are the first generation to both know the extent of the problem and be in a position to do something about it and prevent it. Porn is as old as humanity too. In fact, our porn is relatively tame compared to that of ancient peoples which included incest (Egyptians), pederasty (Greeks), bondage (Romans) and bi or homosexuality (absolutely everyone). Again, it was really only in Victorian times that we even bothered trying to control porn. The sexually adventurous woman of the Sixties mentioned above wasn't really doing anything which men haven't done since the beginning of time (and the only reason women haven't done it just as long is because of the danger of pregnancy which the pill liberated them from). Hopefully, the generation of girls now being raised will understand that men love sexually direct women, it removes all the guesswork. The old system of putting out subtle signals if you were interested in screwing? Yeah, some men (including me) are absolutely hopeless at reading them. So we don't dare make a move, Either we are entirely oblivious to those subtle signals you put out or we don't trust ourselves not to be misinterpreting them. She just put her hand on my knee, is that a green light? No, maybe she's just being friendly. No, don't chance it. And we talk ourselves out of intimacy that way for years. So the advent of women who were clear and unambiguous that they liked sex and they would like to enjoy it with you, women like that were a miracle to me and men like me and not just for those reasons. The idea that someone would actually want to have sex with us, would find us sexually attractive and be prepared to say so, unambiguously, with no room for misinterpretation... The women who did so live forever in our memories, not just as masturbation material (although sometimes as that too) but because, when we have been rejected far more often than we have been accepted, punched far more often than we have been kissed, when the reaction of virtually everyone to you has been one of mockery or disgust, to be able to summon up a memory of someone in your head who clearly, vocally wanted you is something that lives forever in your mind.

We're going to back away from that subject now because I've realised that I'm revealing rather more about myself than I feel comfortable revealing or subjecting my readers to.

I'm not just looking to save sanity here but adjusting our attitude to sexuality to be less royally fucked up might literally save lives too. See, 99.9% of us have sexual desires (a miniscule number of people, for hormonal reasons, have no sexual desires at all) and every single last one of those people will find some way of releasing those desires. No exceptions, this is a biological impeartive engraved deep in our lizard brains. Some way, sometime, everyone will find a way to release those desires, even if they're celibate. Hell, especially if they're celibate. Even priests and nuns will masturbate and even if they've got Batman's willpower and don't, tough shit, your brain will give you sexy dreams and pretend to fuck while you're asleep anyway. Surpressing your sexuality your whole life is simply not an option and guess what happens when people try? Yeah, they get fucked up. Seriously fucked up. In my meatworld life, I'm partway through studying for a degree in Criminology. It's slow going and I have to do it by distance learning because of my mental problems but it's fascinating stuff in a horrifying way. Here's a little snippet: Did you know serial killers are subdivided by motivation? And did you know what the single largest subcategory of serial killers is? Yeah, it's sexual sadists. Now, we don't entirely understand the psychology of serial killers yet but there are certain things that sexual sadists have in common. They all exhibited the "unholy trinity" of bedwetting beyond the age where that's common, animal abuse and arson. Traumatic head injuries during chilhood or adolescence aren't present in every case but they crop up more often than coincidence would allow and there's one more thing which every last one of them has: Their sexuality was warped beyond recognition. Some were sexualised very early in life, some were raped by family members continually (Fred & Rose West, a highly unusual case of true folie a deux serial killers, both came from families where incest was common) and, in many cases, their sex drive was surpressed as it developed. I could go into why surpressing the sex drive would lead to sexual sadism (and I may do so in a future essay) but for simplicity, it's like trying to force a wedge into a rock; either the wedge gets warped or the rock breaks. If you don't let a sexuality develop on it's own and in it's own time, it will either warp the person's sexuality or it will break their mind altogether. Human sexuality is an incredibly powerful force and it is near-enough relentless. Sometimes it drives us to distraction, sometimes it drives us to crime (look up the psychology of arsonists sometime) but it cannot be denied.

And it doesn't need to be denied, not really. We've been doing this since before we were really humans, it's just sex, not launching a space shuttle.Sex isn't a matter of debate, it's not something you need an instruction manual for (although you might need an instruction manual for good sex). We needn't be ashamed of doing what makes us feel good (yes, annoying conservative, subject to the guidelines above obviously) and I think that's something an awful lot of people need to learn: Just because it feels good doesn't make it wrong.

For Gits And Shiggles...

I present to you, the one provable faith, the Church Of Google!

The Church Of Google homepage.

How Did It Come To This?

America was a healthy baby,
born in blood and pain but then,
aren't all babies?
Healthy but like all young life,
she was fragile,
and her parents worried.

As she grew, America struggled,
with redskins and blackskins,
and with herself.
And as she grew, she dreamed,
she imagined goals for herself,
and her parents worried.

Soon, she left her home to learn,
she met the one who shared her heart,
her name was Liberty.
And for a time,
the two were happily inseperable,
But still, her parents worried.

Her parents went to their grave,
the way all flesh must go,
and America mourned.
Her safety shattered, her innocence gone,
a feeling we all share eventually,
and her parents still worried about her.

For years, they grew and prospered together,
America and Liberty,
taking the world by storm.
They went to the stars and then to the moon,
they made all equals,
and her parents worried.

So how did it come to this?

America's children lie dying,
murdered by the suits they paid for their care,
she lies cold each night.
America has done things,
she never thought she could,
and her parents worry.

She has tortured bones and torn flesh,
squeezed the lifeblood from the earth she walks,
sold everything she believes in.
She doesn't know herself anymore,
doesn't recognise the life she leads,
and her parents worry.

And Liberty's a whore,
raped in an alley and left to die,
expiring in the smell of piss and beer.
America hasn't room left in her heart to care,
too frightened of what she can do to do anything,
and her parents worry.

When she feeds the poor, they call her a saint,
when she asks why her children are hungry,
they call her a commie.
And the man in the window,
sobs and weeps at phantoms,
and her parents fear.

They tell her she's mad or bad or worse,
for wishing her children,
a better life than she had.
America is old now and she cannot remember,
a time when she dared to hope for something else,
and her parents shed tears.

Cold and alone and jumping at shadows,
America slumps defeated, not by others,
but by herself.
By her arrogance and her carelessness and her denial,
that she had failed those dreams of long ago,
and she asks out loud,
to no-one in particular,
"How did it come to this?"

Randomness Break

So, I've been watching a lot of Sex And The City lately (yes, fuck you, I'm a guy who watches Sex And the City, it works best if you think of it as a satire). I can't decide if the show is pro- or anti-feminist. On the one hand, all the women in the show support themselves through successful careers (amazingly, since the plot often requires them to be dumb as posts) and they're sexually liberated (mostly). On the other, all of them are obsessed with finding the perfect man and getting married (Charlotte anoyingly so), the obsession with designer labels is just pitiful and some parts of the show are just stunningly anti-male (seriously, imagine half of those jokes being made about women and the uproar that would follow). Oh, and they all drink far more than is healthy although I'm willing to let that slide on the grounds we mainly see the characters in social situations. The mixed messages on feminism was something I got used to watching Buffy but with Buffy, the premise of the show constantly reminds you that these are not normal people. If you spend your teenage years beating the shit out of vampires, werewolves and the occasional robot, your worldview isn't going to be remotely normal.

What's interesting about the show, apart from the aforementioned indecisiveness, is the attitude of the characters toward non-vanilla sex or sexual orientations. While the gay character we see most often, Stanford, is slightly camp, he also manages to avoid the twin traps of gay characters in TV (being either celibate or wildly promiscuous). Although the premise of the show requires him to be as unlucky in love as the other characters, Stanford manages to be a warm and sympathetic character. Less sympathetically treated are the bisexual characters we meet in one episode. Although protrayed as pleasent people, the fact that they are far younger than Carrie (our POV character) and Carrie's reaction to them, means that their bisexuality (or possibly their tangled personal relationships) comes across as just one of those crazy things that the kids do these days.

It's amusing that TV can't seem to decide how to deal with bisexuals. Statistically, there are far more of us than there are exclusively gay people but while gay people have gradually become accepted and respected characters in TV (and about time too, don't misunderstand) but when we appear on TV, we always end up portrayed as either gay people who occasionally have sex with the opposite sex, straight people who occasionally "experiment", greedy or just flat-out insane. The idea that there are people who tick both boxes on the form marked "fucks girls" or "fucks guys" seems to make otherwise gifted writers lose all grasp of ambiguity (Kevin Smith and Joss Whedon, gifted writers both, take a bow). Naturally, there are a few exceptions. The entire main cast of Torchwood are portrayed as bisexual to one degree or another. The omnisexual (men, women and sometimes non-human species) Captain Jack is mostly portrayed as just slightly different although most of his on-screen lovers are male (possibly to accomodate John Barrowman's real-life orientation). His on-off relationship with his seneschal, Ianto, is portrayed as positive, loving and supportive which is part of what made Ianto's meaningless death toward the end of Children Of Earth bloody annoying.

Here's the FYI on what you need to know about us bisexuals: There's nothing to know. My faith teaches that love is the intermingling of souls. Some people find that with the opposite sex, some people find that with the same sex and it's all good because the love, that most important and rarest of elements, remains the same. Oh, every couple has their quirks but the love shared by two men or two women is exactly the same quality of love as that shared by a husband and wife. Bisexual people are exactly the same. We find love where we find it. This world is so hostile, so stacked against love in a million ways, that it seems absurd to place additional barriers in the way. Humans are animals, yes, but we are also something more and it is our capacity to love and to be loved that makes us something more than just a superevolved ape.

But, to return to the original rambling over a TV show, it seems another human quality is our capacity for sexual invention. In the course of the three seasons of the show I've watched recently, we have heard about: Anal sex, watersports, oral sex, chemically assissted sex (both clinical and recreational), any amount of costume play, threesomes (every possible variant), etc, etc. The main characters, all highly experianced sexually, always react to these with a mixture of bewilderment and disgust. These are women who have laid so much pipe you'd think they'd sprung a leak (and I mean that as a compliment) and they react with horror at the idea of anal sex? Do TV writers believe that real people only fuck in the missionary position? Fact is, for as long as humans have been fucking, they've been inventing different ways to fuck. Apart from the chemicals, all of this has been around for as long as we have records. Charlotte (yes, most of the sexually naive plots involve Charlotte, she's the naive character) eventually blows off the anal sex proposition with the hysterical rant that "I don't want to be the up-the-butt girl because no-one ever marries the up-the-butt girl and if they do, I'll be Mrs up-the-butt". Quite apart from being both stunningly naive and insanely stupid, the absurdity here is screaming at us. The characters obsession with rules regarding sex is self-defeating. It's sex, not a space shuttle launch. Of all the dumb shit humans do, sex is one of the few that really does come instinctively. It's sex, the only rules are the ones you make up for yourself.

Actually, strike that, there are rules. Here are the rules:
1) Consenting adult humans only. Sex is a grown-up game for grown-up players. Don't invite the under-age, the mentally under-age or your pets.
2) Fellas, either grow a beard or shave. Stubble only worked for Don Johnson.
3) Ladies, ditto. Most of us don't much care if you shave all over or go au naturel but stubble burn is just as annoying for us as it is for you.
4) Never tell the truth about your partner's genitals unless the truth is complimentry or something that can be easily fixed (i.e. requesting a wash is fine, requesting piercing isn't).
5) Ladies, if a fella goes off too early, don't make a fuss. Even if you're trying to be sympathetic, it comes off as pitying.
6) Fellas, if you go off too early, the correct response is not to roll over and go to sleep. The correct response is to use fingers and tongues to keep your partner on the boil until you're ready to go again.
7) Ladies, do not be ashamed to say what you want. Contrary to popular belief, asking a guy to fuck you rigid will usually be met with a sigh of relief. Having to always make the first move is nerve-wracking, especially in this day and age of sexual harassment lawsuits. I have no idea how gay women handle this one, anyone want to enlighten me?
8) Pulling out the toys is fine but give your partner warning first. Saying "you mind if my little plastic friend joins in?" is fine and it's a lot less stunning than having Black Beauty suddenly appear between the sheets.
9) Don't shag someone else's significant other if you can avoid it. Look, stuff happens and the heart does as the heart does. Sometimes, life gets complicated and love even more so. I know that as well as anyone but be aware that when you crash land into someone's love life, the stakes get very high, very quickly. Poly couples, make your own rules here.
10) If you're into casual hook-ups, that's fine. No judgements here. I happen to be a big fan of sexual pleasure and if it's just two people giving each other pleasure for the night (or day or lunchtime), that's fine. But for casual hook-ups, two additional rules apply: A) Rubbers are mandatory. No excuses, ifs, ands or buts. Unless you met your playmate at an HIV+ support meeting, slip on a rubber before you slip into your lover (ladies who love ladies, you get to skip that one); B) don't say "I love you" unless you mean it. If it slips out in the heat of passion, just try not to do it again. Everyone is in love when they're cumming and if they say it, don't hold them to it. But, in general, be up front about your intentions. If all you're looking for is a memorable night, say so.
11) Unless your partner is able to give a firm clear "Yes", don't go there. "FOR GOD'S SAKE, FUCK ME!" counts as well. If in doubt, "Are you sure?" is a good way to check. Granted, we've all fucked when we were beer buzzed or slightly high but if your partner isn't able to affirm their assent in a clear voice, settle for making out. That way, worst you'll have in the morning is a little embarassment.
12) No-one gives a shit about your porn stash. Really. This is the Internet Age, any of us can find any porn we want any time we like. Tits, cocks, pussys and asses are not a rare commodity anymore.