Tag: Relationships

Rights

A long time ago, I was taught a brief sentence in a political science class. It should be a summary of resolving all disputes between people. Its origins are cloudy, but it applies more today than ever before:

Your rights end where my nose begins.

You can swing around all you want, but if you hit me, that’s an issue. The Left does not understand or respect this, which is the genesis of all of the Culture Wars and crises of the past few years.

Think about marriage.

A secular marriage was a state-issued contract between a man and a woman. Now, it’s between any two people. Fine. Whatever. That’s the law. it was a poorly-conceived opinion in many eyes, but it created a right, so that’s the law. It also got tons of “Likes” on Facebook, which if you read the opinion, is what the Justice was apparently trying to achieve.

I think it’s bad law. I think it was a horrible decision. However, the results don’t bother me – the process that created the results do.

My belief is that there shouldn’t be a law either way. The State should not be in the marriage business. Anything the State regulates eventually causes conflict because somebody is on the wrong side of the regulation. Also, it’s not like marriages are regulated very well, since some people have collected so many of them.

A sacramental marriage is a secular marriage blessed by a minister of a Church. Each Church may have different ideas about what constitutes a valid couple for marriage than the State does. For now. A Church may also have different ideas about what it takes to invalidate a marriage, since the civil contract is relatively easy to cancel.

The point many are missing is that changing the law does not change people’s beliefs. It also does not make those beliefs invalid. The State is not in charge of beliefs. This is where the swinging is hitting peoples’ noses.

So, any two gay people can get married. However, many of the early couples seemed hellbent on finding service providers who are not comfortable (for any number of reasons) with the concept of gay marriage and then suing them out of existence when they won’t comply.

There is a word for this. Bullying. Isn’t that what the gay community has been fighting against all these years? Maybe the Human Rights Campaign should help protect those whose religious beliefs go against what some potential customers demand.

I’m happy to officiate any marriage ceremony, but I’m happier if I know the couple ahead of time. I’m an ordained minister. I have a laminated card and everything. I think it’s up to you who you choose as a life partner. I also do hope it lasts forever, because I’m divorced, and the divorce was one of the most painful periods of my life, and forever altered my relationships with my family, my friends and my Church. If your partnership is legal, since the State pushed its way into it, I’ll officiate it and try not to judge. However, if I was not comfortable performing the ceremony, why couldn’t you just find a minister who is? It’s not like I’m the only lapsed Catholic, divorced and re-married, online-ordained minister out there. Do you really want unhappy people forced to work at your most important day?

There are levels in the Universe.

I can fight for your rights. I can support your rights. I can accept your rights. I can tolerate your rights. I shouldn’t have to participate, if it is against my beliefs. My not participating does not prevent your right to get married.

Why is the Left not happy until everyone believes what they believe? You won. Stop being sore winners.

You have the right to get married. People have the right to follow their religious beliefs. Neither right is stronger than the other. However, the State should not compel people to go against their religious beliefs for commerce, and that is what is happening. This is not “I hate those people because of their color or condition”. This is “I fervently believe this ceremony is invalid in the eyes of my God, and I do not want to take part in this ceremony.” It’s about the ceremony, it’s not about the people. All of the recent decisions basically say the right to be gay is better than the right to be religious.

I am not very religious. I’m more spiritual, as in, “There is a God, but He’s not paying much attention to what’s going on down here, except apparently for global warming – and I’m pretty sure He doesn’t actually give a shit about global warming”. I do not feel particularly welcome in my Church because of my divorce. However, we all have the right to believe what we believe, as long as it doesn’t harm others, and we shouldn’t have others tell us that we’re wrong and we have to do it their way. If I don’t have Baptists or Methodists dragging me to services every Sunday, why do gay people want to drag me to their weddings?

It certainly would be easier for the religious people to just do the gay weddings, smug in the knowledge that the happy couple will someday burn in Hell for all eternity. However, that’s not how many of those people believe. They don’t want to be involved at all. They don’t want to become collateral damage. Why can’t those people just be left out of it?

If you wouldn’t take your vegetarian, PETA-supporting, lesbian friend to a dog fight, maybe you shouldn’t force religious strangers to celebrate your gay wedding.

Murder By Reason of Poetry

Katie
You have a big ol’ belly,
And you’re kinda smelly.
You remind me of Mom.

Murphy
You seem kinda bitchy,
And you’re always itchy.
You remind me of Mom.

Rocky
You’re a wee bit lazy,
And you’re kinda crazy.
You remind me of Mom.

Ripley
You’re always nappin’,
And your gums are flappin’.
You remind me of Mom.

You know where this is leading,
I’m lying here bleeding.
Just for singing this song.

(Don’t ever sing silly songs to your dogs. It can get you killed. Apparently.)

A Strange and Disturbing Relationship

Full disclosure – I’m divorced and have alienated any number of people over the years, so I’m certainly not an expert at relationships (even though my second marriage has lasted four times longer than my first so far – although it may end when someone special reads this post.)

That said, there is one relationship I simply don’t understand at all – that of a woman and her cleaning lady. First of all, I hope “cleaning lady” is PC, I think they used to be called maids and before that, they were servants.

First, cleaning ladies strike fear in women’s hearts. Ask yourself this – do men snake all the pipes and replace washers before the plumber arrives? Do men replace fuses and make sure all the wiring is straight before the electrician arrives? Of course not – that’s why you hire a professional. So, why is it mandatory to pre-clean the house before the cleaning lady arrives?

Contrary to their ability to strike fear, cleaning ladies also seem to be confidantes. I do not know any male who has invited their plumber or electrician to their wedding, but I can think of at least one woman who invited her cleaning lady, and I know one woman who hosted her cleaning lady’s wedding.

Every time I hear about the relationship between a woman and her cleaning lady, I flash back to an old Seinfeld episode, where Jerry starts sleeping with his maid, and it turns out she’s really a hooker. She also starts doing less and less work, which may be a more critical point from the male perspective. Sex is fine, but those curtain rods aren’t going to dust themselves.

When men complain about the costs of a cleaning lady, the counter argument is usually that the current one is worth the money and a cleaning service (e.g. an anonymous cleaning lady with no connection to the woman of the house) would be much more expensive. The secondary argument is that if someone were paid to actually clean the entire house, then the woman of the house would have to pre-clean properly in advance. (“I admit it. The house is cluttered. How could someone possibly clean it?”) What?

My one theory is that a man should just cancel the cleaning lady and then tell his Spousal Unit that the cleaning lady has been rescheduled to the next day. Then, the Spousal Unit will frantically pre-clean the house in preparation.

The other issue – where I am not alone – is that the cleaning lady puts things where she thinks they belong, even if it should be intuitively obvious where they belong. “Let’s see, I have a clean glass. Here is a cabinet with 337 glasses in it. So, I guess this glass belongs in the cabinet on the other side of the kitchen with the plates. Also, all the husband’s shaving equipment is lined up neatly by the bathroom sink. It must belong in the drawer under the other side of the sink beneath the tampons, or perhaps in the closet in the other bathroom.”

As a man wiser than I once said, “The cleaning lady comes every two weeks and it takes me two weeks to find the stuff she put away.” (I would quote him directly, but I’m protecting the innocent.)

I am not friends with my plumber or my mechanic. There is a part of me that would like to discuss my Spousal Unit’s failure to get excited about my new blog (and my inability to tell her why this really hurts) while my mechanic is watching the oil drain from my car, but I don’t think he  likes being distracted. Also, I have no idea what his name is, which makes it harder to confide my true feelings in him.

If I had one of my friends helping me with work around the house, I would be paying in beer and pizza, not cash. They probably wouldn’t expect a clean area to work in, either. Mainly because they live alone, and they don’t have cleaning ladies.