Asante Samuel, bigot

John Aravosis absolutely nailed it in his post about Asante Samuel. Samuel is the football nitwit who said this yesterday about Jason Collins' decision to come out.

Nailed it. And this is exactly how gay people should respond when straight people insist that they hide their sexuality. Hets don't hide their sexuality. So why should we?

Oh, that's right. We're slaves to the opinions of witless straight bigots. I forgot for a moment.

Never mind.

A sequel to Xmas Carol?

Xmas Carol readers are clamoring for more. The feeling (at least, among readers who've spoken or written to me) is that a sequel is not only a good idea, but necessary. They're jonesing for more. Hmmm.

I wasn't planning to write a second book. However, I did write a note or two about how the story could continue if I chose to write a sequel. But this was an intellectual exercise rather than a plan. I really didn't think I'd do it.

But suddenly the story is calling to me. I think it wants to be written. Let me know in the comments if you'd like to see a second book that continues the tale -- or something entirely new.

I just might write that second book if readers cheer me on.

Note: This post was originally written for my Xmas Carol blog at Amazon. (Blog link on the right side of the author's page. Here's a direct link to the blog.)

The sickening "morality" of Roman Catholic bishops

Ireland's Roman Catholic bishops say the public should lobby lawmakers to reject a bill that would allow abortions to save the life of the mother.

The bishops in a statement Friday say the bill represents "a dramatic and morally unacceptable change to Irish law." 

Raping children is fine but saving the life of a woman is "morally unacceptable". That's Roman Catholicism for you. The priests speak of morality all the time but have no understanding of what the word means.

Old popeyguy returns to Vatican

I couldn't remain unplugged. I couldn't! Apparently, they whisked the former popeyguy into the Vatican by helicopter. It was very hush-hush.

No live TV coverage of the former pope's return was allowed by the Vatican. 

He is the pope who will never be seen, or so the Vatican fervently hopes. I think the curia should look into getting one of those invisibility shields from the US. They could drape it over the old popeyguy and he could trot around the Vatican without anyone being the wiser.

I imagine him standing next to cardinals, unbeknownst to them, and whispering hateful things in their ears.

"This new popeyguy is a liberal crazyman. He is the anti-Christ! You must defy him -- or you risk losing your immortal soul!"

And then he'd sneak away to whisper hateful things in the next set of holy ears. He might even influence Pope Frankie by whispering in his ear.

"You're a bad pope! You're not as good as the old pope! You are possessed by demons!"

I imagine this would work out nicely.

Some days

Some days, the world seems way too stupid to blog about. This is one of those days. I think I'll unplug. See ya later.

Frankie speaks

Today there was news about remarks attributed to Pope Francis. His comments, made during a church service, were transformed into a HuffPo article, the gist of which is that the pope condemned "slave labour" in Bangladesh.

"A headline that really struck me on the day of the tragedy in Bangladesh was 'Living on 38 euros a month'. That is what the people who died were being paid. This is called slave labour," the pope was quoted as saying at a private mass.

"Today in the world this slavery is being committed against something beautiful that God has given us -- the capacity to create, to work, to have dignity. How many brothers and sisters find themselves in this situation!" he said.

That's nice and all -- but there is irony in the pope's words. He worries about the slavery of denying a person dignity -- while at the same time insisting that gay people cannot be full citizens of the world, with the right to marry like anyone else. In this way, our dignity is stolen from us. And the thief is the Roman Catholic church (among others).

In my experience, Catholics are not good at grasping the meaning of their words. Popeyguy Frank is no different. Gays are treated like slaves in this world. If this is not the case, why do other people believe they can make critical decisions about our lives? It's as if we're pets rather than people.

There are countries that throw gays in prison. Countries are trying to pass laws which state that we must be murdered. There are public hangings of gays in Iran. Russia is presently mounting its most virulent campaign against gay people. There are laws in many countries that say you can't speak about gay people. That is the background against which we seek dignity -- including the right to marry. Is this really so hard to understand?

This pope is said to be a champion for the "underclass". He should start by looking under the heels of his own shoes. Perhaps he'd see us there.

This is disgusting

You know the story about the five-year-old who killed his two-year-old sister with a rifle? I tried to ignore it but it was on so many web sites, I finally read the story. Oy. Here are a couple of outtakes:

"It's a Crickett," White said, referring to a company that specifically makes guns, clothes and books for children. "It's a little rifle for a kid. ... The little boy's used to shooting the little gun." 

Are you throwing up yet. Wait!

The company's slogan is "my first rifle" and its website has a "Kids Corner" section where pictures of young boys and girls are displayed, most of them showing the children at shooting ranges and on bird and deer hunts.  

Okay, you can throw up now. What is wrong with these people? Ugh.