Another Quote

Another quote I pulled from a fashion blog I read religiously but never comment on because the comments entertain me fully. projectrungay.blogspot.com

""As we found out later, Joe doesn't really do insincere politeness. He's genuine, and when he says "Let's have lunch or drinks," he really means it. Believe us, in the 5 years of publishing this blog, we can't tell you how many people who never have any intention of doing so, say "Let's have drinks" to us."

Oh, I believe you all right. I literally did not know the meaning of the word "flaky" until I had met an American person for the first time.

But how could I have known that "We should hang out" really just means "goodbye", with zero intention of ever actually hanging out?""

I felt this was worthy of a comment as I think this is a flaw of the majority of Americans. I don't understand why Americans assume no one ever wants to spend time with them, and if someone says they want to, more likely than not, you never will. I think it's a combination of things. It's a "coolness" thing. An "I'm so busy I have no time for anyone thing, therefore I must be cool," combined with a poor confidence factor of "If I actually talk to this person they are going to think I am creepy and stalking them". The obvious answer to this dilemma for most Americans is to friend the person on facebook so they can stalk the shit out of them at their leisure without consequence. I guess I never realized it was a cultural thing until I read this comment though. To me, as an American, it's almost proper etiquette. I can remember times being distinctly weirded out if someone contacted me after meeting at a party only one time to hang out. It seems to be some sort of unwritten rule that you have to see someone a certain number of times before it becomes ok to spend time with them outside of that setting in a friendship type manner. Dating is excluded from these rules. I think it's because forced awkwardness is another unwritten rule of dating, and meeting someone only once and seeing them again almost guarantees awkwardness. I would like to point out that I am sure there are people to whom these rules don't matter and who march to their own drum, but I agree with the commenter that it is a distinctly normative thing to assume in our culture that even if you say that you want to "hang out sometime" you really don't mean it in most cases, and the other person is supposed to accept that without question and without getting offended. People are fucking weird. All of us.

Social culture is so strange when you break it down. I guess it becomes more obvious how ridiculous something like this is when it is mentioned to you by someone from the outside looking in.

Someone's Comment

"Man, mid twenties is a hard time. I feel like there's this societal pressure to have all our shit together, and that people who even vaguely do pretend that everything is super awesome and they're super together - and you know what I've discovered, whenever I've gotten close to anyone? No one has their shit together. Everyone has some aspect of their life, usually several, where stuff isn't together. And that's OK. That's being human. There's a lot on our plate in the modern world (really, any world - how nice is it to not worry about Tetanus and Cholera, amirite?) No one is all the way together. Let's celebrate the good we have. Sometimes our houses are messy. Sometimes we don't know what we're doing with ourselves. And I should stop drunk LJing. But so be it. Life is OK. What you're doing OK. "

A comment on a post from TQC, aka The Question Club, my absolute favorite community to stalk on Livejournal, and also the reason that I never delete my Livejournal account. Thank you. I needed this comment. Too fucking true. Anyone who wants to refute this point and try to prove their perfection...go ahead. All that means is that the next day your cat will die, your car will break down, you'll get laid off, and then to top it all off a bird will take a shit that happens to land on your head. Sorry people, that's just the way the world works. Appearances are just appearances. The people who are truly happy in their lives are the ones who are able to roll with whatever happens and laugh through the rain.

Planned Parenthood

The issue of Planned Parenthood has been brought to Congress, and while I usually avoid talking about politics, as a woman, it's an issue that just can't be ignored. It's also an issue I feel very strongly about. The issue here is to cut government funding for Planned Parenthood in order to lower our deficit.

One word can sum up how I feel about this. Ridiculous. Oh, also ludicrous. Completely backward, irresponsible, and quite honestly a little disgusting. It is pretty easy to see the arguments, and the people behind them. For whatever reason, Planned Parenthood seems to be in popular media associated almost exclusively with abortions. People who don't know any better and are anti-abortion think this is entirely beneficial. Except...the money that the government gives to Planned Parenthood does NOT cover abortions and never has. The government does not fund abortions in any way. If I want to kill my fetus, I'm paying for it myself, out of pocket. Planned Parenthood does, however, perform abortions if a woman chooses to have one, so it's pretty obvious that this "brilliant" plan to reduce our deficit is a masked attempt of conservatives to push along their anti abortion agenda. They don't want to back an organization that provides abortions to girls whether or not the majority of the services offered and utilized by women there are extremely beneficial to women and women's health. PP offers routine gynecological care as well as free screenings for all STI's and cervical cancer. They also offer many different types of contraception, pregnancy planning, etc etc etc. PP is great because it is easy, and it is anonymous. Their primary mission is to keep women healthy and educated. There are statistics that prove that they have succeeded. I have always felt at ease knowing that no matter what happens, I can rely on Planned Parenthood to be there in case I need it. I, in fact, did utilize their services at one point. I wanted to go on birth control. Not living at home at the time and not wanting to wait for an appointment with my regular ob-gyn, I used PP. It was easy, it was quick, and it was anonymous. For girls who can't afford a regular OB, Planned Parenthood is there. It makes me very angry to see this country even considering a piece of legislation so backward. It seems as if they would rather our country regress. America needs to stop being so afraid of change and move forward. We should be a nation of progress. It frustrates me that we are seeing things like this happen in today's day and age when women in the past stood up and said, hey, boys. We matter. We count. Our health counts. Our happiness counts. We can take care of ourselves. We want to take care of ourselves. And we're going to do that if you like it or not. Women have proved themselves, for years. We have proved ourselves to be intelligent and competent. Women successfully raise children while holding full time jobs. These things happen every day. In spite of all of this progress, we are still faced with politicians who can't come up with a better plan to reduce their deficit than denying millions of women preventative medical care.

My answer is, to the men: You are not women, and you will never understand what it is to be faced with even the prospect of carrying a child, and the life changing consequences that can have. You don't know what it feels like to worry constantly that you may get pregnant and not be able to support a baby, and that the guy might disappear as soon as your baby is born, and you might be left alone. You will never understand what it is to make these choices because you will never have to. Please, listen to the women who have fought hard to have things like Planned Parenthood available to them. Cutting funding will only increase the number of children born into unfortunate circumstances because of lack of access to proper contraception. More women will die, and we will spend more treating diseases and cancers in their later stages rather than preventing them or treating them early on. Planned Parenthood may provide a service that goes against your morals, but that is not the service you are cutting. Give us women a chance, please.
To the women (who are for this legislation): You insult us, and you drive us further backward in time. Do not deny the millions of women that have benefited from PP's services in favor of your own selfish beliefs.

I have a very hard time understanding women who speak in favor of things like this. It makes me think that they have never had anything denied them in their life and have always been able to afford quality care. You have to learn how to step out of your own shoes into another person's. You have to learn how to be critical of your own upbringing, and see where your beliefs truly come from. Educate yourself, learn, and read, and exercise compassion even when it is difficult. You never know where a person is coming from.