RIP Mildred Loving

Thank you, Mildred and Richard. I can't say it any better than this post at Shakespeare's Sister. The quote at the end is particularly beautiful.

The primary

Are you excited about the primary? I'm not. Nauseated, maybe, but certainly not excited. But of course I will vote because, as the quote attributed to Plato says, "One of the penalties for refusing to participate in politics is that you end up being governed by your inferiors."

So, here's my sincere contribution to Get Out The Vote efforts. Sorry about the formatting; I do not have mad HTML skillz:

Thank you, Tom Tomorrow

Saw this originally on Bartcop, but I'm linking to the original out of respect for Tom's work. Please, please look at this cartoon and heed its message, Democrats. If the link doesn't work anymore, try this one.

Signed, Dub, crying in the wilderness

In memory of my father, 1933-2007

I've been catching up on several months of Ode Magazine and was particularly struck by this passage from a column in the September issue:

He comes to believe that all his choices are stamped on the destiny of the world, because of the infinite repercussions inherent in each one of them. Daniel becomes aware of the importance of his thoughts, his words and, most significantly, of making gestures of love toward others, or even toward the Earth itself. He comes to see everything as the seeds of an eternal harvest. For the first time, he has the feeling he is living in each moment. He blesses the sun that caresses his skin, the water that refreshes his throat, the wind in his face.

“How come I feel all this gratitude, when I’m going to die?” he asks me. “Soon I shall be the wind and the water and the sun. But most of all, I’ll be the sparkle in the eye of a man whose mother I took care of or whose child I healed. See, that’s my soul. What I’ve made of myself: I, who already exist everywhere and who will exist forever.”

One morning there’s a brief message on my desk: a printout from the hospital computer, bearing that most discreet of all euphemisms: “Daniel M., C.T.B.” Ceased to breathe. Yet I can’t help wondering whether in fact he has only just begun.

ProJo: Malice or Stupidity?

There's a famous quote with unknown origins that says something like "Never attribute to malice that which is adequately explained by stupidity." That quote has come to mind a few times recently when looking at the Providence Journal.

On 29 September, the ProJo ran an article about same-sex couples living in Rhode Island who got legally married in Massachusetts. The article reports that there are more than 200 such couples in legal same-sex marriages in the state. Okay. But the headline says R.I. home to 200 same-sex couples. As in, 200 same-sex couples, married or not. Big difference there, particularly since a study to which the article refers (PDF) notes that there are more than 2400 same-sex couples in Rhode Island. So the headline, which is all that many people will read, misstates the correct number by a factor of twelve. I know from dealings with reporters over the years that generally they do not write their headlines--the editors do. I am fairly certain that Scott MacKay would not make such a big mistake, so clearly the mistaken (or at least incorrect) headline comes from a careless (?) editor.

Then we come to 7 October. A letter to the editor from Tucker Lieberman (disclosure: I know him slightly) explains that, contrary to the overblown, nasty rhetoric in a recent op-ed, transgendered people have been protected by civil rights law in Rhode Island since 2001, and the sky has not come anywhere close to falling. A good letter, but what does our headline writer use to label it? Time for R.I. to protect the transgendered. So apparently the headline writer only barely skimmed the letter before writing the headline. Lieberman's clear point is that RI already protects transgendered people.

Yes, the most likely explanation is stupidity. But given that it is apparently the same set of editors who choose to publish such nasty, deceptive op-eds on LGBT issues in the first place, one does wonder if malice is also involved.

Who knew that.....

...the NY Post had a Uganda edition? Here we read that:

Red Pepper's Sunday edition ran its "expose" of prominent gay and lesbians, under the headline "HOMO TERROR! We Name and Shame Top Gays in the City."

You can see the actual Red Pepper article here and here. I guess there really is nothing new under the sun.

Another reason to love Nova Scotia

This story just made my day:

Two students at Central Kings Rural High School fought back against bullying recently, unleashing a sea of pink after a new student was harassed and threatened when he showed up wearing a pink shirt.

The Grade 9 student arrived for the first day of school last Wednesday and was set upon by a group of six to 10 older students who mocked him, called him a homosexual for wearing pink and threatened to beat him up.

The next day, Grade 12 students David Shepherd and Travis Price decided something had to be done about bullying.

"It’s my last year. I’ve stood around too long and I wanted to do something," said David.

They used the Internet to encourage people to wear pink and bought 75 pink tank tops for male students to wear. They handed out the shirts in the lobby before class last Friday — even the bullied student had one.

"I made sure there was a shirt for him," David said.

They also brought a pink basketball to school as well as pink material for headbands and arm bands. David and Travis figure about half the school’s 830 students wore pink.