From 8 to Love

Hi, Mishpuchah. Sorry it's take so long to shake off the weird combination of euphoria and horror (euphorror?) that followed the election and cobble together a post.

On the one hand, welcome to the Obama era, right? Lots of good stuff is going to happen! Yay!

On the other, what the fuck's up with passing Prop 8, Cali? (For our readers in Bahrain and Dublin who've been out of the loop, California narrowly passed a ballot initiative that changed our consititution to ban gay marriage.) That's some bullshit. And though the writing is on the wall, historically speaking, and 8 will be invalidated either by a court or by another popular vote (possible slogan for the counter-initiative: This time it's even more personal), we'd be lying if we said we weren't stung by this loss, this disgusting slap in the face to our friends.

So, let's review just a bit of recent history. Gay people turn their queer eye on your crappy fashion and make you prettier so you can get laid and advise you on turning your dump of a living room into a suburban palace and pepper your lame-ass sitcom with witty dialogue and produce your awards shows and write your speeches and take your temperature and administer your company and engineer your buildings and you're all, like, what have you done for me lately? Let's face it: If the gays ever go on strike, the straight world will end up curled up in a fetal position on the floor in about 14 hours. But their pursuit of happiness? Talk to the fuckin' hand.

But ranting gets us nowhere, and there's enough of it going on.

This whole struggle is about love. Those of us who argued against 8 - and we get it, we could've been louder, clearer and more effective - were motivated by the heart.

So we're going to shine our Jew-light on love. We're going to start telling love stories - gay, straight, whatevs. Relationships and valentines and ooey-gooey tales of romance. Bring it on. Because no matter what anybody says, love is love.

Tell us your love stories.

Sticking It to Hitler: Election Pony Edition

A Plea for Tolerance and Mr. Sparkles, by Simon

Must I begin every post with an abject apology? What's the point of not atoning at Yom Kippur time if I have to whip up a fresh batch o' sorry every time I crawl out from under the teetering pile of whatever that is my work week to blog at y'all? Zut alors, if you'll pardon my French.

But it was clearly time to say hey, because I peeked at the previous word-ball Sera and I had chucked up at this bitch and it was from, like, the Harding administration. And besides, it's election time and I've got something all-consumingly important to say.

I wants a pony. And you can help.

Y'see, the gay community (and its heterosexual minions, who slavishly advance The Gay Agenda) approached me to help do some outreach for the No on 8 campaign. And while I was sympathetic to the cause, I also felt I should have some compensation. Was that so wrong? It was not; the gays understood. So: Terms were discussed. Offers and counter-offers were tendered. And after many tense hours of negotiation, the requisite item was agreed upon.

Pony! PonyPonyPonyPooooooonnnyyyy!

Now, to be fair, it wasn't totally unanimous. Some of the gays on the gay board of directors, like JohnO., were a tough sell:

Every boy has to have a dream... but imagine if we gave Simon his pony. What's next? Botox for Billy? Disney for Danny? Italy for Ian? And none of them are even dying of cancer! There simply must be limits. If Prop 8 is voted down he'll be receiving a box of condoms and the phone number of a good divorce attorney like everyone else.

But I turned on the waterworks and he finally came around:

Alright! Alright! Don't cry. You can have the friggin' pony. Jesus. You all know what a soft touch "we gays" are when a grown man starts to cry. Especially when it does not involve a Judy Garland song, the film "An Imitation of Life" or the news that we've missed a season end sale at Barneys. Oh, to be a social stereotype.

Victory! So anyway, GayCo didn't say exactly how much I'd have to raise to be united with my fetlocked friend, but that I'd have to make "a solid effort."

I set up a fundraising page at ActBlue called Stand Up for Love. You can go there and contribute to the No on 8 campaign to stop the evil religious fuckwits from writing discrimination into the California constitution.

You can put in a few bucks to say that we really ought not to interfere with the right of same-sex couples to solemnize their relationships.

You can drop a few bills in the kitty to affirm that your gay friends deserve to pursue happiness, and the people who would try to prevent that are morally bankrupt shitheads (who, as it happens, only take the Bible "literally" when it suits them and have no scruples about resorting to blackmail).

You can deposit some dough because defeating the curdled and desperate and mean-spirited and cruel initiative known as Prop 8, for fuck's sake, is another way of sticking it to Hitler.

Or you can just contribute because every dollar brings me closer to Mr. Sparkles. I promise I'll feed him and brush him and walk him around and oh please please please please please.

OK, enough yammer. Click the thing and make with the giving. It's pony time.

Oh yeah, and don't forget to vote against Prop 8, and also for that one guy.

Update: Here's a killer new ad against 8, narrated by Sam Jackson.