How I Start My Day
I wake up…roll out of bed…hit the bathroom for a bit and shave and freshen up…get dressed…halfway…and wander across the hall to my front office and sit down at Mowgli, my office computer. Mowgli runs CentOS, a Linux variant based on Red Hat Enterprise which I let run constantly. I check Thunderbird, my email client for any new mail…glancing at my Institute mailbox for any problems that may have cropped up. I have several processes that run overnight that check on systems I am responsible for and they email me reports when they’re finished. In one of my other mailboxes, usually every morning, is an email from Google News. I have a search set up to send me headlines every day relevant to GLBT news. I am also on several GLBT news mailing lists.
Here’s a smattering of the headlines that greeted me as I sat down to my computer this morning. They are eminently typical…
This being Louisiana, I wondered if the bill was as doomed for adding race to its language as sexual orientation. Naturally it was sponsored by democrats and bulldozed by the republicans, one of whom was proud to say the bill was opposed by the Louisiana Family Forum. Why does a group that claims to be about families hate children…you ask?
Can’t let the gay kids have a prom you know…. Let alone safe schools…
He says gay people can get married…just not to someone of their own sex…and that proves the law does not discriminate against us. And atheists had to obey the anti-religion laws in the old Soviet Union too, which proves the communists weren’t discriminating against Christians…
Gay US Anglican bishop speaks of physical threats against him
Rev. Wright Defends Tuskegee Experiment, Anti-Gay Comments
Conservatives launch web campaign to retain gay military ban
Shareholders Reject Bid To Strip Gay Protections At Wells Fargo
And…finally…
There is a gay candidate running in North Carolina. Granted it’s a pretty red state, but he’s doing well in the polls despite the fact that the democratic national committee is trying its level best to sabotage his candidacy. That’s bad enough. But then along comes our ersatz national gay rights organization and they won’t endorse the gay man’s candidacy because that might offend their beltway party pals in the DNC…who don’t want gay people running in high profile national races.
Meanwhile, grown adults in Louisiana voted throw gay school kids to the bullies, republicans in Pennsylvania are claiming that they’re not bigots simply because they want to write gay citizens out of their state constitution, haters are threatening one gay religious figure while another religious figure incites religious passions at gay people at the National Press Club, the right is thumping keep gay people out of the military, they’re pushing anti-gay shareholder resolutions at gay friendly corporations and I just woke up and sat down to look at the news.
Welcome to the typical day of a gay American. Now I have to finish getting dressed for work.
