Two down, forty-eight to go

Yesterday, the California State Supreme Court recognized the right to form a family relationship for all its citizens, homosexual and heterosexual alike. It joins Massachusetts as only the second state in the Union to recognize this right.

Some people will call this a “special right” or “judicial activism”; they argue that the law, in its majestic equality, forbid straights as well as gays to marry others of the same sex, that asking for that right is asking for something unnecessary and somehow fundamentally wrong. I’ve never really agreed with this line of thinking; the law, in its majestic equality, has in past years, forbid white as well as black to marry outside their races, to attend each others’ schools, or to ride in the same train cars.

We have a long way to go. Most of the other states have decided explicitly to deny full faith and credit to homosexual marriages legal in other states. It’s still acceptable, in most circles, to make an insult out of someone’s sexuality; people like Sally Kern can attract standing ovations and thousands of public supporters. That said, I think it’s easy to criticize too much; progress to freedom and equality is a very slow thing. It’s only been fifty-four years since Brown took the Topeka Board of Education to the Supreme Court, forty-four since Mississippi Burning. By comparison Stonewall (thirty-nine years ago next month) is a fresh memory.

People who believe in the freedom to love have two states down and forty-eight to go. It’s a very long road.

That’s OK.

I believe we’ll get there.

Really, They Happen By Accident

Rio frustrates me, almost more than any of my other characters, because Rio has no stories. He really does happen by accident, drifting comfortably along from one moment to the next. I’ve talked to him about it, as it were, and he’s simply happier that way, even if it means I wouldn’t normally share him with the world.

There’s something endearing about him, though. Rio feels infectiously, wonderfully right, and every time he stops by to visit, I never have the heart to turn him away. He is a strange and beautiful person, and I adore him for it. Even though all I really have are snapshots of him, I’m going to share him anyways, in hopes that you’ll enjoy his company, too.

I Think They Happen By Accident

Happiness is having a cute boy who kisses and cuddles just as well as he fucks you up the ass. It can’t be just any cute boy. Most of the time a cute girl will be better for you; girls are soft and smooth and civilized, but the right boy is, too, and the right boy is perfect. You want one of those shy, subculture boys, just a little awkward, the kind full of songs that nobody’s heard and foods that nobody’s eaten, dreams that nobody believes and books that nobody reads. Mine is named Rio. It even feels right, Ree-yo, stroking your tongue stroking back along the roof of your mouth, then flicking forward, making your lips purse just a little, like the memory of a kiss. You want a boy like Rio, with an honest, easy smile and sleep-mussed hair, bright, clear eyes and a cute girl’s butt in snug-fit pants, a boy who loves to writhe beneath you as much as he likes to hold you down. There’s nobody better in the world.

I think they happen by accident.

Misplaced Priorities

Oklahoma State Legislator Sally Kern‘s priorities may be just a little bit misaligned.

I could be wrong, of course. She could be right. 1000Gears encourages a very pronounced “love however you wish” sort of philosophy. That last category is unfortunately empty right now, but I’m working on it. It’s a difficult subject for me, as you may imagine. Mrs. Kern presumably comes from a less-libertine background and sees the world through a different lens.

From my side of the argument, given that Americans consume more resources per capita than just about anyone in the world, it might be good for the world if more of us elected to get our collective rocks off in non-reproductive ways. There are several good alternatives for straight-oriented people, too, if you’ll excuse my empty tag again (I have no good excuse for its absence).

From her side of the argument, she believes something about “God’s word” and a fear of indoctrination. I respect that, in my own way. Religion has a tremendous influence on the way we view the world; our interpretations of God’s word shape our priorities and it’s unreasonable to expect us to neglect that. If she feels that Leviticus 20:13 is God’s highest command to her, then I respect this as her personal decision, even if I disagree with the decision itself. For my part, I confess to a weakness for pork, rare steaks, and the occasional shellfish, so I lean more towards Matthew 25:40 myself.

Her opinion, though, remains her opinion, and I respect her right to share it. Personally, given our ham-handed foreign relations, ballooning national waistline, worsening fuel crisis, abysmal trade deficit, and impending credit collapse, it’s a little hard for me to see how a little more safe, sane, and consensual love-and-let-love could be bad for the country. I guess that’s just a matter of priorities.

Intoxication

N.B. The copy of this story in Envy, the YaoiCon 2006 anthology, contains a number of misprints and editorial errors. I am very sorry for the inconvenience.

Yellow-throated songbirds pecked at the bars of their tiny, gold-wire cage, blinded and too fat to fly, searching in vain for the trays of millet and grapes, oats and figs that someone had taken away that morning. A soft mewling startled them, but they soon forgot it, oblivious to the sleek, golden-skinned cat-prince watching them. Tybalt licked his teeth contemplatively, sprawling in the Roman couch beside the cage. He flicked open the top and plucked out the fattest, laughing quietly at its futile squirming. It amused him for a moment, but soon he grew bored again, and he thrust it, head first, into a glass of brandy.

It didn’t take long. The bird drowned in minutes, its struggles against his hand growing weaker and weaker until they stopped altogether.

“That’s cruel, Tybalt, even for you.” Tybalt’s guest, a gentle sylph of a boy, just barely a man, tried to look away, but the beautiful tragedy entranced him, somehow, and he could not.

“Well, I miss her, and their suffering eases my own.” He plucked the bird’s feathers deliberately, one at a time, tossing them back into the cage. “You wouldn’t deny me that, would you, Methyst?”

Methyst buried his face in his hands, running his fingers back through his short, dirty-blonde hair. “Still her, even now… Tybalt… It’s been seven hundred and fifty years.”

“Seven hundred and forty-nine, two hundred eighty-seven days.”

“Even still.”