'TIS THE SEASON (To Push Your Religion on Others)

November 29, 2006 - Wednesday


'TIS THE SEASON (To Push Your Religion on Others)

Season's Greetings everyone!

You may have heard in the news this week about the hubba baloo in Chicago about a nativity scene at a local tourist site. A judge has ruled that the nativity scene can stay, but the venue can not advertise a movie about the nativity on video billboards around the event. The idea being that the video (and audio) advertisements cannot be ignored by non christian guests but the nativity scene can be avoided.

And that's what living in a melting pot has come to. Ignoring one another, and using the law to force people to be ignorable. Living in a "tolerant society" in modern America means living the fantasy that no one else exists.

But we ALL exist. Christian, Muslim, Jew, Buddist, Atheist, rich, poor, the homeless, the criminal, single mother, illegal immigrant....ALL OF US EXIST. To try to pretend otherwise is literally delusional. And the concept that America was founded on was a land where everyone could live in mutual respect for individual choice. YOU get to decide who you are and I get to decide who I am, and both of us will defend that right to individual choice from anyone who would try to take it away. It is what makes us countrymen. What makes us brothers and sisters in the American family. Our willingness to defend LIBERTY. Liberty and justice for ALL.

And that's the thing about liberty. Liberty and justice have to be for all, or they are no longer liberty or justice. When liberty is given only to the priviledged, or to the moral majority, it changes from liberty into oppression. If justice is given more to whites in the court of law, prisons become slave camps. The founding fathers set us off on this mission of liberty and justice for all, but we have yet to achieve the dream.

In fact what we have is something more of a nightmare. The courts are too busy regulating how loud you can celebrate your faith to dish out justice. Big retailers are going back to a more christian biased "Merry Christmas" greeting by their clerks (yes I'm talking about you, Walmart) instead of a simple and inclusive Happy Holidays. What's next, the ten commandments on the courthouse wall?

What we should be doing on the holidays is sharing traditions. The nativity is often shoved down our throats, but the response isn't to repress the nativity. It is to celebrate our other traditions loudly and with pride. A menorrah in the mall holiday display. An effort in schools to teach all religions, so we can understand what the hell is Ramadan. A Kwanzaa parade down the Magnificent Mile is sure to bring bounty and goodness to all in the coming year. Then just around the corner we can all go down to our local China town and get our Chinese New Year on. (Happy Year of the Fire Pig). The holiday season is about love, peace and tolerence. It's about sharing joy. What better way to share joy than to open our homes, our hearts and our traditions to everyone. I say pony up to the bountious buffet of life and try a bite of everything. You never know, you just might find something you never thought you'd like....

So I sing out a challenge to every atheist, Muslim and Jew in America (and all you other faiths as well). Sing the driedel song from the rooftops, host a Ramadan dinner for your non muslim friends, build huge non faith based winter wonderland displays on the courthouse steps. Don't let the Christians drown you out with their Harking and Heralding. The chorus of the American dream is most beautiful when everyone sings loud.

PS: I would love to be invited to Ramadan dinner. Do they serve dessert? mmmmm dessert.

HAPPY HOLIDAYS TO ALL!!!

Read more...

WORLD WAR III: Jews vs. Muslims

July 26, 2006 - Wednesday


WORLD WAR III: Jews vs Muslims

As anyone who has a TV must know by now, World War III has begun. Or at least thats what the media is calling it. And by it I mean the Israeli invasion of Lebanon.

But see, here is what I think is messed up. Even just stating the fact, THE FACT, that Israel has invaded Lebanon is bound to piss off some of my Jewish readers. There is a phenomenon among some American Jews to have a blind allegiance to Israel, no matter how heinous Israel behaves. "But Hezbollah, and the soldiers, they have our soldiers." But who do you mean by they? Hezbollah? That is a large multi national organization with facilities all over the region. But Israel is bombing Lebanon. The airport and infrastructure. Even when we invaded Iraq, we didn't blow up the airport. To destroy the infrastructure of another soveriegn nation seems vindictive at best, and war mongering at worst. The airport did not steal the soldiers. Criminals did. But as is Israeli policy, the conservative run Israel feels it has the authority to bomb and kill anyone that may be related or have contact with terrorists.

In comparison, when shoe bomber Richard Reed was arrested, US military planes did not blow up his mother's house. Such a thought is absurd. As Americans we know that everyone is only accountable for his/her own behavior. Criminals are the bad guys, not necessarily their families. But so many American Jews I come across are willing to suspend their American values when discussing Israel. Why?

When the nation of Israel was formed by the UN after WWII, it was seen as a solution to the grave situation of a long suffering people. To give them a homeland. But the land that was given had people living on it, however spread out they may be. As part of the charter in creating the nation of Israel, the UN prescribed that Israel take steps to create a Palestinian state. So many decades later, they are still fighting over this.

A big part of the problem is Jerusalem itself. It is the holy place of at least 3 world religions and sharing holy places has never been easy. As it stands now, no solution to the conflict in Israel is possible because Israel doesn't want to share Jerusalem.

Now what should happen, and what the UN should have done in the first place, is to make the city of Jerusalem a city state, like the Vatican in Rome. A nation soveriegn unto itself run by a city council. Now I know that no one will do that, so while I'm at it let me throw out another idea.

Why don't we sell Jerusalem to Walt Disney Co. and they can make Religion Land, a faith themed amusement park? Just think of the rides: Moses parts the Red Sea Log Boats, Jesus's descent and ascent from Hell, Mohammed's Conquering Ride. It would raise awareness and tolerance of all religions. The city would be run off the revenue and as such would be a modern paradise. Think of the concession stands: Kosher Moshe's Holy Hotdogs, 2 Fishes & 7 Loaves Fish and Chips, Hasan's Happy Halal Meat. By selling out all of our religious values maybe we will find the one value that seems to be in short supply....the value of Human Life.


In all seriousness, I urge each of my readers, Jewish, Muslim, Secular, Christian, Buddhist, Hindu, Pagan, Agnostic, whatever you are I urge you to understand these three things.

1. Israel does NOT represent Judaism. Just because Israel does something doesn't mean Jews have to support it. As such it is not Jewish people's fault if Israel acts stupid.

2. Invading a soveriegn nation for the actions of a few of it's citizens is wrong. It was wrong when we did it, it is still wrong now. War is for fighting countries. Interpol is for fighting international criminal terrorists.

3. This is not WWIII, but it could be if we all sit idly by and let the values of international diplomacy be flouted, by our leaders and by the leaders of other nations. It is time we all go back to acting civilized. Or we could lose civilization itself.

So I say....
End the war in the Middle East. All of them. Before it's too late.

Yours in Furious Comedy,
Suzzanne Monk
2 Boob Productions

Read more...

Gays, Christians and the Reality of Marriage

June 5, 2006 - Monday


Gays, Christians and the Reality of Marriage
(repost from 2005)


According to the US Supreme Court decision last year to legalize sodomy, it is now legal to take it (or give it) in the ass. State laws that have been on the books for decades making anal sex punishable by law were shot down by the high court's decision. Now, at long last, gay men and kinky heterosexuals alike can ass boink in freedom, without fearing a police raid mid thrust.

But freedom for ass sex has brought with it the new gay mantra. "Legalize Gay Marriage!" Gay activists have seized the day in order to further their agenda of legal gay marriage in the US. And the conservatives are in an uproar about it, stumbling over themselves to make new laws defining marriage as heterosexual, "between a man and a woman". And the press is enjoying all the racy material. Sodomy! Gay Marriage! Heterosexual! Words like that sell papers. The news hasn't been so sexual since the Clinton scandal days. Even the Pope got a little press out of the deal. And so on and so on.

Liberals argue that legal marriage is the right of every citizen and to deny the right to marry is to deny a person's humanity. Conservatives claim that allowing gays to marry will decay the institution of marriage and then destroy society and humankind as we know it. To all these people marriage is the lynch pin of a healthy society. They all take marriage to be this sacred state of being.

Marriage in reality is far from sacred. It is as mundane as it comes. Dishes, mortgages, work, kids. Trying to find time to squeeze in some intimacy between work and laundry and dinner. It is a full time job, an all the time job, a balancing act between partners, lovers, parents and hopefully friends. And there are a few job skills that one needs to do the job well: compassion, consideration, compromise to name a few. Watching the way the pundits have brutalized each other over this issue, it seems neither group has the tools for marriage anyway. Both sides seem really busy walking around with the wrong kind of head stuck up their asses.

So let me respond to both sides.

To the conservatives I say this: America is a secular nation. If you want a religious state to enforce your "moral" opinions as law, move to Vatican City, or become Muslim and move to Iran. Gay marriage isn't going to ruin the institution of marriage. The institution was born flawed. It was born as a means of controlling valuable property; namely women and children. Explain dowries, brideprices and white virginal dresses (the safety seal on a woman to make sure she wasnt tampered with.) Even today the father still 'gives away' the bride. Anyway, you all should stop trying to control everyone else's behavior and get your own life right. Start with, "Judge not lest ye be judged" or "whoever is without sin throw the first stone."

To the liberals I say this: Marriage is not a ticket into society's loving, accepting arms. Legalizing gay marriage will not free you from the shackles of second rate citizendom. It will not tear down the fences between you and your suburbanite neighbors. It will not make your partnerships more fulfilling. It will however allow the government more control in your life. Along with marriage rights come divorce rights, where a single sexual infidelity can be legal grounds for a lifetime of alimony. Where monogamy is part of the law, and where what you do (or don't do) in the bedroom is grounds for divorce. Marriage laws will always allow the government access into our private sexual lives because marriage is about our private sexual lives. If the liberals want everyone to be free to make their own sexual choices, they should be fighting to get government legislation out of marriage instead of giving more relationships over the province of political moralism.

To everyone else I say this: People are gay. Get over it. To each his own. Live and let live. Different strokes for different folks. And if we can get a whole new group of folks to pony up the fee for a marriage license, let em'.

The states could use the revenue.

Read more...