Darkside Rainbow

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…I am so, so dead.

[laugh] Seriously, though, Hikaru - don’t pay me any mind. You know I adore you just the way you are, political party and all; I just wouldn’t be me if I didn’t take the opportunity to poke you a bit. Besides, I doubt that looks even remotely like you. I think I gave you bad hair. [sheepish look] Sorry.

(For anyone who’s wondering why a reader’s showing up in the comic: he won the 1,000-comments contest. Half of the prize for that was a cameo in the comic.)

I think my hand was drunk while I was drawing this one. Not the rest of me; just my hand. (Though if you could have seen me while I was working on this last night, you might have thought I was drunk - playing Pink at top volume, bopping around in my seat and singing along. Loudly. And very off-key.) See, it’s sitting there sucking up the martini through one finger. I don’t know; maybe I should go back to drawing these on paper, even if it takes longer. Instead of getting better with the tablet, I appear to be getting worse…especially on Red. I don’t know what happened there.

And…gah. Giant wall of text. I have to start trimming these scripts down, although the amount of text isn’t quite such a sin in a single-panel comic. Those tend to rely more on text to expand upon the single illustration.

Anyway. Although it was meant as a joke, the “urban legend” attitude towards gay Republicans is pretty common. In fact, discussion of the seeming rarity of gay Republicans and the disparaging behavior towards them is what prompted a survey regarding sexual orientation and how it affects your choice of political party. Despite the widely-held belief that all that matters to gays and lesbians is a party’s stance towards gay rights, the survey showed that it was actually only a minimal factor in most’s choices. I know that my prior allegiance to the Democratic party had nothing to do with my sexuality.

Yes, that’s right. I, Mr. No Concrete Affiliation, where I’ll only loosely identify myself as an Independent…used to be a proud Democrat. Not because I thought Democrats were better for me and my personal well-being and ideals; I didn’t even think about it that way. I just believed what I was told, and grew up thinking what my parents taught me to think: anyone with dark skin in the deep South had to be a Democrat. It’s like that for many; they follow a political party because their families do. I listened to the party lines and repeated them without really knowing what they meant, or caring. There was a time when I wasn’t particularly politically-minded; I devoted my intellect more to programming and didn’t much care for the outside world. It’s a bit embarrassing to think about, honestly. The self-centered nature of youth, I suppose.

University taught me otherwise. University taught me about the world outside my small, sleepy town nestled in New Orleans’ shadow, taught me how to look at things as objectively as I could (as a naturally subjective being who can only know what his senses and subjective reasoning tell him), how to make decisions based on my own analysis rather than based on what I was told was right and best for me, or based on what everyone else “like me” was doing.

And when I stepped back and looked at both the Republican and Democratic parties, I realized…

…they’re both complete douchebags, and I don’t want much to do with either of them.

It’s amazing the things you learn when you open your eyes and think with your mind, rather than with the expectations of others.

So even if I don’t agree with the Republican party on much, I do have to say that I commend gay Republicans for, in most cases, choosing a political party based on their personal beliefs rather than just on what’s expected of them based on their sexuality alone.

I’m out of here until tomorrow’s rant and ramble. Before I go, though: how much do you want to bet someone’s going to start fabricating blame-laying stories about gangs of violent gays responsible for this, similar to the myths of lesbian gangs packing pink pistols?

no style, gay comics, webcomics, humor, gay comic strip, denver, arvada, colorado springs, new life church, youth with a mission, shooting

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…anyone else noticing that more and more of these comics end with me threatening people? I may want to do something about that sour temperament of mine.

Naaaaah.

So as the comic title says: despite my complete contentment with single life, the siege has already begun. My friends gave me about a month of space, a month of soft-talking and pitying “are you all right?” questions that I glibly ignored before they began the assault to find a new man for me. I foresee much stabbing in my imminent future. My friends and I have very different tastes in men. The kind of guys they’d hook me up with are usually men I’d run screaming from rather than give them my number.

…then again, I won’t even pretend that I’ve been doing that great a job of picking for myself, either. [headdesk] Yyyep. Me. Single. Good. And I swear to gods, if Red wakes me up again she’ll be experiencing that oft-mentioned shiv to the trachea.

(By the way, for a bit of comic trivia: while J, T, and a few others actually reflect real people in my life, Red is actually an avatar representing several of my friends. I have a disproportionate number of friends who all happen to be short, pale, busty lesbians with short red hair and either green or blue eyes. It’s completely by accident, and yet I somehow have my own harem. And they’ve all got attitude, and all love to turn it on me. The girl that I call Red in the comic has pretty much come to represent all of them.)

In more serious news: remember Senator Larry Craig getting caught soliciting for gay sex in a bathroom sting? (Republicans do love their bathrooms…) Well, despite his repeated assertions that he’s not gay, four gay men have come forward to confirm that he’s flirted with them in the past and to say that they’re sick of his denial. Even the guy who outed Ted Haggard has chimed in. At this point I actually feel bad for Craig; he’s trying to fight his way out of this, and things just keep sinking deeper and deeper. When something like this happens, with people suddenly conveniently coming forward, I tend to be skeptical and think it’s a ploy for publicity to defame the person accused. In this case, though, I’m torn; the four men really have nothing to gain by speaking out this way. If they were going to bribe Craig, they’d have been quieter about it. Who knows. Either way, I don’t see Craig getting out of this pile of dung any time soon.

I’m out of here. Tune in tomorrow for more rambling, or next week for a new comic (featuring Kujo Hikaru, winner of the comments contest).

larry craig, no style, gay comics, webcomics, humor, gay comic strip

Since Doug over at Current Events Watch snitched the topic I’d intended to froth at the mouth over today (we apparently rank below animals, so I suppose there’s nothing wrong with acting like a rabid dog, now is there?), I thought perhaps we here at DR might wind down with a little humor.

Ladies and Gents, I’m going to clue you in to the most beautiful thing about men: the second that you begin to agonize and worry over whether you should or should not be flirting/dallying/doing whatever with us, we will choose that opportune moment to say just the right thing to ensure that you’ll never want to again. Gay, straight, young, old, we are a self-resolving problem. It’s convenient, it’s efficient, and as prevalent as it is, it’s a miracle that any of us manage to maintain viable social interaction. Give us enough verbal rope, and we will eventually hang ourselves.

The simultaneously best and worst example of this?

The dreaded pickup line.

To paraphrase Alex Hitchins, it takes a great deal of courage for a man to spot an attractive member of his preferred gender and take on the burden of approaching them, knowing that the first words that come out of his mouth with most likely determine whether or not this person will smile at him or throw their drink in his face. With that in mind, you’d think we’d take better care with the things we say. You’d think we’d try our best to be straightforward and engaging, rather than making sad attempts to be clever and witty even though we know we’ll fumble and fail at every turn.

We hardly ever learn, though. I’ve been victim to a number of cringe-worthy pickup lines myself, from the Harry Potter guy and his magic wand to the admittedly attractive woman (yes, women do it sometimes, too, just not as often - don’t think you’re off the hook, ladies) who approached me in the line at the movie theatre and, without so much as a hello, told me to meet her by the side of the building by the blue Camaro and she’d take me back to her place and we could…well. You get the picture. She walked off before I could say a word, leaving me gaping. I can’t help but wonder if she actually waited there, and if so, for how long.

You can’t even escape it online. I still have my membership on OutinHouston.com, created during the experiment that led to The Steve Incident, and now and then I check my e-mail on the site. Just yesterday I ran across this lovely gem, dated 11.16.07:

“ha baby wanted to know would you like to hook up an mess around alittle an if so when because I would like to taste that juice **** 4 its milk but i dont swallow but like to taste it all so let me know baby mike..”

Censoring asterisks mine, typos his. Not…that censoring really does much to lower the ESRB rating of that little gem, nor would proper grammar and punctuation make it any more appealing.

But Mike, you see, is a persistent one. Since I never answered his first e-mail, yesterday he sent me another, this time with a picture attached:

“ha guy lov the photo of you an wanted to know would you like to hook up an mess around at my place if thats ok with you are i can cum to you as well baby me lives on the southwest 59/hillcroft an love to suck on a sweet **** today if thats ok with you baby mmm ..mike”

Oh, Mike. You and your homonyms! So witty. I truly admire your dogged determination. It takes quite a bit of courage to view a total stranger’s profile online, read their commentary, and gather the balls it takes to honestly think that anyone would be impressed by that approach, let alone by getting it twice. Mike, you and I need to have a little talk about subtlety. Really. And while we’re at it, here, let me lend you my little pocket edition of Webster’s handbook of grammar and style…

Can’t fault the man for knowing what he wants, though.

I have to say that my most memorable experience with a bad pick-up, though, happened in a gay bar where another ex, Arturo, used to bartend. We were dating at the time, naturally, and I dropped by the bar just to see Arturo and say hi to the owner, as he was an old friend as well. It was a busy night, so I found a spot on the bar and stayed out of the way, amusing myself by watching the typical drunken non-complexity of the night life. I wasn’t particularly projecting an air of availability, but I suppose this fellow was just drunk enough to give it a shot. He was actually rather handsome; dark hair, eyes in a particular color that I have a weakness for, and just a trace of a sexy English accent. I might have entertained the idea of flirting with him to pass the time if he hadn’t stumbled over, grinned at me with a touch of inebriated charm, and said,

“Is that a cucumber in yer pocket, luv, or are ye jes’ ‘appy to see me?”

Cue the expected raised eyebrow and flat look. “Neither.”

He just grinned wider, though, and at this point I could tell he was building up to something. “Got a nice big cucumber in me pocket for ya.” He patted his hip, and against my better judgment I glanced down. Sure enough there was a long, large, clearly-outlined bulge in his rather tight pants. At that point my brain broke; I didn’t even know how to process that, but he wasn’t done yet. He snickered and said, “No, really, it’s a cucumber.”

He wasn’t lying. He stuffed a hand into his pocket, rooted around a little, and dragged out a genuine lean and green cucumber, already starting to wilt from being shoved in there for so long. He waved it under my nose, nearly giggling.

I cracked up laughing.

It turned out his name was Rick, he actually wasn’t so bad, and yet I still made him promise to never use that line on anyone again. He gets points for ingeniousness, but dear gods…how drunk do you have to be to think that stuffing a cucumber down your pants is a good idea?

I could probably deluge you with stories both hilarious and horrifying all day, but I think you get the idea. I’m sure you’ve all got plenty of stories of your own. Bad pick-up lines, funny come-ons that ended up as epic failures…we’ve all experienced them. I suppose it’s universal, and honestly with such a legacy I’m surprised that gay men and straight men don’t get along better. We all suffer from the same foot-in-mouth syndrome, after all.

We’re just lucky that there are a few people out there who find that struggling awkwardness cute.

relationships, romance, dating, bad pick-up lines, flirting, horror stories

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The fact that this happens more often than you might think is one of the primary reasons why, at the ripe age of 27, I’m already a card-carrying member of the Cantankerous Old Men Club^TM.

No, I’m not really that mean - though you can bet this and far worse things often run through my head when I find myself in a situation like this for the millionth time. I have given a few people very politely-worded anatomy lessons regarding the fact that women, on average, have breasts - while I tend to be distinctly lacking in that area. They generally decline lesson two on more in-depth anatomical differences. I do so wonder why.

It’s mostly my face that gets me in trouble; I’m not particularly feminine otherwise. The part that amuses me, though, is that people often treat me as if I chose to be born with the face of a particularly angry and murderous three-year-old Korean girl. [eyeroll] Yes, people, while I was just a wee zygote I decided, “Hey, I think I’ll develop into a poofy-lipped big-eyed boy-thing of outwardly indeterminate gender. That’ll be fun!” Of course, I might not get mistaken for female so often if I’d let Carlos have his wicked way with me and cut my hair, but I found out the hard way a few years ago that short hair doesn’t do anything for me. Short hair makes me look like an extremely butch lesbian.

No, I’m not kidding. Sihaya and Indikaze may remember that episode. Four feet of hair gone in a matter of minutes, leaving me staring in horror and wondering what the hell I’d just done.

So I will deal with being naturally androgynous, and with the amusement and annoyance it causes, and think my snarky thoughts to myself, and move on. And speaking of moving on, now that I’ve bored you with this oh-so-fascinating ramble…I’m out until tomorrow.

Oh, and by the way, the art on this one stinks.

~Adri

no style, gay comics, webcomics, humor, gay comic strip, androgyny

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…what? They can’t all be about being gay. My life doesn’t revolve around being gay, so my comic won’t always, either.

So…yeah. I don’t know if I’ve mentioned this before, but part of my highly-mixed ethnicity includes a significant portion of Native American blood. When I say I’m part Native, I don’t mean “I’m white as hell but think it makes me cool to say that I have a great-grandmother nine generations back who was a blue-eyed Cherokee princess”. I mean “You know, next summer I really should take a trip out to visit my uncle and cousins on the reservation.”

So on matters of principle, I don’t celebrate the current common American idea of Thanksgiving - but I also don’t take it as seriously as the comic makes it sound. Every war has a loser, and the victor is often those with the best weapons and superior numbers. I’m not happy that Native culture has been either murdered, assimilated, or erased and is in danger of melting away entirely, but being an a** about it to Americans who enjoy Thanksgiving won’t change the past. So I have my principles, but try to keep a sense of humor about them - hence mocking both myself and my friend a bit via comic. (My friend was wrong, though, when we had this conversation. I do celebrate Christmas, just not from a religious standpoint - more from the “spirit of giving” standpoint, which is why I call it Happy Shiny Buy Things for My Friends Day, as I love giving gifts. And the only reason I don’t celebrate Easter is because I often forget about it until the day after, which happens to be my favorite holiday of the year (especially since it occurs after almost every holiday): Cheap Candy Day.)

For something a little more GBLTQ-topical, Anji sent me a link yesterday regarding the ongoing and tiresome battle over an Okeechobee, FL high school’s gay-straight alliance - in which the school board called the alliance a “sex-based club”. That statement alone is a horrible demonstration of the ignorance in society that helps to perpetuate both prejudices and stereotypes. Understanding one’s sexuality and gathering with those who also seek to understand their sexuality and fight for their rights doesn’t mean that they’re also gathering to act on that sexuality. Being gay isn’t just about having sex, and gay issues aren’t just about sexual experimentation or gratification. At this point the actual sex involved is practically tangential; there are so many more issues of human rights involved that I can’t believe anyone would think a gay-straight alliance, intended to promote tolerance and acceptance, was nothing more than a “sex-based club”.

But that’s not all from the WTF Factory today, kids. Not by a long shot. Apparently, if you disagree with the GBLTQ rights that a particular employer offers its workers, the answer is to buy out as much stock as possible in that company in order to gain a majority interest and, via shareholder vote, force those dirty gay supporters to comply with your beliefs. No, I’m not joking. Reverend Ken Hutcherson is urging conservatives to do just that with Microsoft.

That goes beyond extremism and into insanity. One can assume that most of these people don’t even work for Microsoft, but they’re so bothered by the fact that M$ - who really can’t be redeemed in my eyes, but at least this is one point in their favor - dares to support GBLTQ workers’ right to equality that even though it doesn’t affect them, they want to strip that right away. Why? Because it constitutes “pushing the homosexual agenda”.

What. The. Hell. That’s not pushing a homosexual agenda; I’m about as sick of that phrase as I am of the phrase “sanctity of marriage”. There is no homosexual agenda. We don’t distribute manifestos regarding our secret plan to conquer the country and turn it into a giant disco version of Fire Island; we don’t try to convert or recruit; we don’t do anything other than ask that we, as minorities, are afforded the same rights as other minorities contesting against the majority. We ask to be treated like human beings, like citizens, with the same rights and protections as anyone else. We aren’t asking for superiority. We’re asking for equality.

That’s not an agenda. That’s long damned well overdue.

Hutcherson even thinks that the battle for civil rights for gays can’t be compared to the battle for civil rights for African-Americans…just because ex-gays exist, but ex-blacks don’t.

Just because a biological trait such as homosexuality isn’t physically apparent doesn’t mean that it’s any different from one that is, such as skin color. They share a common factor: they’re things we’re born into, not things we choose. Ex-gays haven’t really stopped being gay; they haven’t changed that biological trait. They’ve been conditioned to ignore it and act against it, and often are psychologically damaged as a result.

The comparison between the two struggles for civil rights is still quite apt. The prejudice against those who are different hasn’t changed; the tactics of discrimination have. Hutcherson wants to say they’re different because homosexuals were never forced to ride in the back of a bus; blacks were never sent to ex-black camps and mentally reconditioned to think they aren’t black, either. It doesn’t change the fact that both minority groups have been discriminated against, denied rights and privileges, abused, and ostracized in the past - and both still are now. Both are treated as less than human; there was a time when being black was viewed as a perversion, an abomination in the eyes of God, and black people were somehow less than human. Isn’t that how homosexuals are treated now? We’re told that we’re sick, we’re sinners, we’re filthy in the eyes of a God that loves and welcomes anyone but us, that views us as little more than rutting animals.

Hutcherson wants to use the race card to play up the struggle of African Americans for equality as somehow superior, morally above the struggle for GBLTQ equality. It’s not. They are the same, and equally deserving of consideration.

We’re all the same. If people could realize that, we wouldn’t even have these arguments.

no style, gay comics, webcomics, humor, gay comic strip, microsoft, gbltq rights, lgbt rights, gay and lesbian equality, workplace equality, reverend ken hutcherson, gay-straight alliance in okeechobee florida, thanksgiving, native americans

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Just so you know, never in your natural lifespans will you catch me making that face ever again.

So…if you remember the comic where the wenchzilla was mocking me over my horrible “T-Mobile Magenta” (now trademarked as a color, how ridiculous is that?) RAZR mobile phone…it’s now been happily replaced by a sleek, sexy little black Motorola W490 with a 2GB MicroSD card. I love it; it lets me set stored MP3s as my ringtones without having to specially send them to myself via browser or text message via mobile17.com like I had to on the RAZR. After converting to MP4 format, I can fit a good nine full-length movies on the thing (okay, teeny tiny full-length movies, but still) with about 500MB left over for a selection of MP3s. It does e-mail, IM, ‘net browsing, and all kinds of other nifty little things, leaving me wondering: why the hell would I need a $400 brick-shaped iPhone when I have my sleek little $100 flip phone that does pretty much everything the iPhone can with the exception of the touch screen (which my fingers are too large to use comfortably, anyway)? Especially when the iPhone locks you into overpriced AT&T plans that don’t even do half what my T-Mobile plan does, and yet cost twice as much.

…yes, I am proud of being cheap. I call it being frugal, prudent, and economical, because it makes me feel better about being…well…entirely cheap. The only thing I don’t like about the phone is that even the headset plugs in with the mini-USB jack, so I can’t use standard stereo earphones with it when listening to music or watching movies on the go. Instead I had to buy a special set of stereo headphones with the mini-USB connector, but that was only $3 more.

Okay, I’m done rhapsodizing about my happy new non-pink phone. Pink sunglasses are fine. A pink phone? That’s just pushing it too far along the “flamingly out there” spectrum. Yeah, yeah, I know, real men wear pink. I guess I’m a fake man who loves his little black phone. Oi. (…although the touchpad still lights up with a lavender backlight. Lavender. C’mon, Motorala, wasn’t the neon blue good enough?)

And no, that’s not what it looks like; I’m not suddenly developing hetero tendencies on you with Red back there. My friends are just very snuggly people; I’m very…not. They’re also very contrary people, and like to take advantage of moments of inattention to creep up on me and see how much they can get away with before I notice and the instant “NO TOUCHIE-TOUCHIE!” reaction kicks in.

Ahem. Anyway. If the art’s even more drunken on this one, I actually have an excuse this time. I don’t know what’s wrong with my tablet, but I think it’s been quietly ingesting copious quantities of crack when I’m not looking. I couldn’t get any decent pressure sensitivity or stroke recognition out of it at all last night, even after replacing the battery, recalibrating the pen sensitivity and settings, and rebooting everything just as a catch-all and a failsafe. This thing took so long that I might as well have done it on paper, but then I still would have had to fight the tablet and Photoshop on the color. Bah. I actually tried to get more of her full face in there, but I kind of had to go with what I could wrestle onto the screen. This way’s probably more accurate anyway, considering that at the time the wench was trying to bite my hair. Gah.

Yes, I have weird friends. Like I said last time: shiv. Trachea. ’nuff said.

That’s it outta me. I’m gone until tomorrow. Ciao.

no style, gay comics, webcomics, humor, gay comic strip, t-mobile, motorola razr, motorola w490, apple iphone, at&t, real men wear pink

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Those of you who remember my old comic are probably quite familiar with that threat to stab someone with a pencil. Hell, I probably still have the icon of it lying around my hard drive somewhere; at one point it was practically my catch phrase. Thankfully I haven’t put anyone’s eye out. [clears his throat] …yet.

So yeah, NaNoWrimo and writing chapter two of my second novel kind of combined to take over my weekend. By the time I was supposed to settle down to draw the comic I had planned for this week I was sleepless, completely wasted on coffee, and practically cross-eyed from eyestrain.

Trust me, a screencap of the novel with some pretty text overlaid is far preferable to the drunken, noodly scribbling I would have subjected you to had I tried to draw in that state. (Edit: this morning I woke up and had a few spare minutes before work at my other job, so I upgraded this at least a tiny bit so it’s not just a screenshot with dialogue. Now, at least, it’s a “through Adri’s eyes” perspective.) Next week you’ll get more oddly-proportioned drawings, ubiquitous pink sunglasses, and poofy lips.

Although I can’t blame the weekend’s distractions wholly on NaNo. I’ve been trying to plan a 2008 relocation to Chicago for months now, for many reasons (not least among them being that Chicago does tend to be a bit more gay-friendly than Houston). Yesterday I sat down and after several hours of phone calls, research, and calculations, budgeted the whole thing - covering every expense down to a travel carrier for the cat and gas costs (as I’m probably going to rent a U-Haul trailer and just drive it, because I’m insane like that).

Let’s just say I’ll be working overtime for the next eight months, because apparently one catty fag and one faggy cat can blow more money on an 1100-mile cross-country trip than Paris Hilton at a Prada blowout sale.

So…yes. There you have the reasons for a quick and dirty comic. Hopefully it still amused you, at least a little.

…and no, the dragons in the story aren’t really gay - so Sihaya, stop plotting strange and disturbing Rez/Van fanfic. The Singe/Van idea was scary enough. [smirks]

no style, gay comics, webcomics, humor, gay comic strip, NaNoWriMo, National Novel Writing Month

If you’re looking for something of substance, skip back a post, because you won’t find it here. I know I’m supposed to be gone for the weekend (and catching up on my NaNoWriMo word count), but someone posted this to my LiveJournal friendslist and I just had to share:

 
Oh my god. I’m torn between laughter and sheer horror, but I really can’t stop giggling long enough to be horrified. That is freakin’ priceless, I swear to gods - and so, so very wrong. The worst part is that it makes me think of some self-styled “leather daddies” who dress and act like that seriously.

If you want to be analytical, it’s a delightfully tongue-in-cheek mockery of some of the more out-there aspects of the American gay subculture that some could even take as an insult, but it’s all in good fun. But oh, man, those kids…I almost choked on my coffee watching that.

Thanks to Keres for sharing. Now I’m going to be snickering all night.

This is why I love Japanese television.

hard gay, Japanese TV, omgwtfbbq

This morning I had trouble choosing between news topics to ramble about, and finally just gave up and decided to touch briefly on the ones that caught my interest/amused me/outraged me the most. This is going to be a long one, I suppose. So without further ado:

GOP State Rep Resigns Amid Sex Scandal - Associated Press

Remember when I asked who’d be next among the noisy right-wing anti-gay GOPs to get caught with his pants down and a you-know-what replacing the foot in his mouth? Turns out it’s Washington state Rep. Richard Curtis, who’s voted against gay rights legislation in the past and yet who apparently has no problem having sex with strange men he meets in erotic video stores…and then telling the press about it.

Now granted, this was while telling the press about an attempt the man (Cody Castagna) made to blackmail him, but Curtis might have wanted to choose his words more carefully when detailing the attempt. Might he be innocent? Possibly. Do I think he is? After the latest string of scandals, it’s hard to say. This could just be an attempt by a gold-digger to capitalize on the scandals plaguing the right-wing and cash in at yet another representative’s expense, and Curtis’s admission is actually just a result of poor phrasing.

And it could just be another hypocritical conservative trying to cover his butt, too.

I went to a Catholic school as a child, up until third grade or so. I remember in kindergarten the school staged a play that involved a great number of us dressed up as barn animals and singing. I don’t remember what the play was about, and while I still have the videotape of it, I don’t think my self-esteem could survive watching it to refresh my memory. I do, however, remember that I was cast as the donkey amidst constant teasing that it’s suitable because I’m stubborn as a mule. (Or, now that I’m older, you could just say because I’m an a**.)

I also remember - and now we get to the point of this humiliating little anecdote - that one of the closing musical numbers involved all of the children lining up to sing, “I don’t wanna be a hyyyyyypocrite! ’cause they’re too hip to it!” with the associated and expected hip motions involved to emphasize. I also remember MawMaw White (yes, MawMaw, not MaMa) smacking the crap out of us with wooden cooking spoons if we a.) got it wrong or b.) did anything hypocritical.

I’m not even a Christian anymore, haven’t been for as long as I can remember, but I do still have a major problem with hypocrisy. The lesson was drilled into me early, and drilled into me hard. Maybe a few of these hypocritical politicians need to spend a humiliating few hours dancing around on stage in a donkey suit while a crazy old woman with a wooden cooking spoon stands threateningly over them. That alone could be punishment enough for not practicing what they preach, and I’ll bet they’d remember the lesson for a long time.

At least Curtis had the good grace to resign.

Phelps Clan Ordered To Pay $11M In Anti-Gay Military Suit - 365gay.com

Please allow me a moment of hysterical, maliciously cackling laughter.

…

Okay, okay. [wipes tears of mirth from his eyes] I’m done.

No, wait, no I’m not. [dissolves into snickers]

…okay, now I’m done.

You just don’t know how it made my day to see Phelps and his cadre of loonies getting what they deserved for their insane and cruel actions. In this case they’re being punished for picketing the funeral of a soldier killed in the Iraq war:

(Baltimore, Maryland) A grieving father won a nearly $11 million verdict Wednesday against a fundamentalist Kansas church that pickets military funerals out of a belief that the war in Iraq is a punishment for the nation’s tolerance of homosexuality.

Albert Snyder of York, Pa., sued the Westboro Baptist Church for unspecified damages after members demonstrated at the March 2006 funeral of his son, Lance Cpl. Matthew Snyder, who was killed in Iraq.

The jury first awarded $2.9 million in compensatory damages. It returned in the afternoon with its decision to award $6 million in punitive damages for invasion of privacy and $2 million for causing emotional distress.

Snyder’s attorney, Craig Trebilcock, had urged jurors to determine an amount “that says don’t do this in Maryland again. Do not bring your circus of hate to Maryland again.”

Yes. And I say it again, in all caps, YES. These people have set a wonderful example that I hope others follow. It’s not even about financially punishing Phelps and WBC. It’s about making them see that their brand of intolerance, their brand of hatefulness, is beyond inhuman and will not be tolerated by the people that they inflict themselves upon. I hope others follow suit, and make it quite clear to Phelps that he and his kind are not welcome.

Of course, he’ll probably just say that he’s the next Noah, the only true believer who’ll be spared when God destroys the world with fire…

Kucinich questions Bush’s mental health over Iran - Reuters

This isn’t really topical, but it gave me another good giggle anyway. When a man who claims to have seen a UFO questions your mental stability, you’ve got problems:

WASHINGTON, Oct 30 (Reuters) - Democratic presidential candidate Dennis Kucinich on Tuesday mockingly questioned President George W. Bush’s mental health for saying Iran’s nuclear ambitions might trigger World War III.

“I seriously believe we have to start asking questions about his mental health,” Kucinich, a quirky, long-shot candidate in the race for his party’s presidential nomination in the November, 2008 election. “There’s something wrong. He does not seem to understand his words have real impact.”

[...]He told The Inquirer he did not believe his remarks about Bush’s mental stability were irresponsible. “You cannot be a president of the United States who’s wanton in his expression of violence,” Kucinich said. “There’s a lot of people who need care. He might be one of them. If there isn’t something wrong with him, then there’s something wrong with us. This, to me, is a very serious question.”

Amen, man, amen. You may be a little off your nut yourself, but you make a good point. It’s well-known that Bush’s own staff have questioned his stability under stress as far back as his first term, and pondered if he was back on the sauce. At this point it’s just a lost cause. We’ve got one year left to wait it out, and hope he doesn’t push any disastrous big red buttons. Then Laura can drag him off to the ranch and let him be as violent and disassociative (I really think the man has problems grasping reality) as he wants to be, out of the public eye.

Lastly, on another non-gay-related topic, Sihaya sent me this link regarding University of Delaware students and “ideological reeducation”, followed by the University’s rebuttal. There’s a grain of truth somewhere in a middle ground between the two, I’m sure; I’ll let you draw your own conclusions. Thanks for the link, Sihaya.

Sorry I was a little behind in updating today (I usually like to write my articles the night before or wake up good and early to get them up before six a.m.); last night I crashed and let myself sleep in for once. I may be a little erratic on updating early in the mornings this month anyway, though unless hell freezes over I’ll still be posting an update every weekday. I’m doing NaNoWriMo this month, using it as a kickstart to get through the majority of my second novel without procrastinating, and that’s going to be dominating my writing schedule every day. If any of you are doing NaNo and want to keep track of each other on the way through, post your profile link in the comments. I’m Deadsong on the NaNo site. Good luck to you if you are participating.

And to everyone: I’ll see you tomorrow.

Washington state representative Richard Curtis, gay sex scandal, extortion, Cody Castagna, GOP, Maryland judgment, Phelps lawsuit, Albert Snyder, Matthew Snyder, funeral protests, Fred Phelps, Shirley Phelps-Roper, Christian protests, anti-gay protests, Westboro Baptist Church, WBC, Democratic presidential candidate Dennis Kucinich, president George W. Bush, mental stability, University of Delaware, ideological reeducation

You know and I both know what people love to say about those Navy boys (and I do so love a man in uniform). Months out at sea with hardly a woman in sight? It’d take a lot more than military discipline to stop a few antics that would make a night in Vegas seem tame, and no doubt hundreds of Navy men have been guilty of uttering “I’m not gay, I was just…” …well. You fill in the blanks there, Jolly Roger. “What happens at sea stays at sea,” indeed.

Only this time, it didn’t.

Navy Doctor’s Sex Tape Trial Begins - Associated Press

WASHINGTON (AP) — A Navy doctor accused of secretly videotaping Naval Academy midshipmen engaged in sexual acts committed a “flagrant violation of trust,” military prosecutors said Monday as the doctor’s court martial began.

Cmdr. Kevin J. Ronan is accused of using a video camera hidden in an air purifier in his home to tape midshipmen he hosted at his house last year. He is charged with seven counts of conduct unbecoming an officer, three counts of illegal wiretapping and one count of obstruction of justice.

The Navy began its investigation in January after two men, one a midshipman the other a former student at the academy, turned over to authorities recordings they said they found in Ronan’s home.

In his opening statement, Navy prosecutor Lt. Justin Henderson said Ronan recorded midshipmen either with partners or alone in his spare bedrooms, edited them down to the sexually explicit content and transferred them to DVDs. He said thousands of gay pornographic images were found on Ronan’s home computer.

Ronan “violated the trust of his midshipman sponsorees,” Henderson told the jury of six Navy officers hearing the case at the Washington Navy Yard.

Well, that just blows the lid off “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell,” doesn’t it? You know, I’ve always wondered where those porn videos of bona-fide military boys getting it on came from. I always just assumed they were actors (and despite what you’re thinking, no, I’ve never watched one to determine for myself, get your minds out of the gutter - and as an aside, yes, I did find it necessary and relevant to link the word “porn” to a site about Paris Hilton).

As stringent as the military is about ejecting anyone accused of homosexuality, it would be a little self-defeating to knowingly allow oneself to be videotaped in pornographic materials intended for commercial distribution. Such media could could be seen by just about anyone. Of course if a commanding officer happened to catch one of his privates (no pun intended) putting on a performance on a Grunts Gone Wild DVD, he’d then have to explain what he was doing watching said DVD…

Snark aside, I really have to wonder what kind of setup Ronan was running that he even had the opportunity to make so many tapes of midshipmen gettin’ down and dirty. Is it common for sponsoring commanders to say “Here; as your sponsor I give all you pretty little students permission to get your boots good and knocked while you’re weekending in my home”?

Now technically, my prior silliness aside, the AP article doesn’t say the tapes themselves were of gay sexual activity; just that there were images of gay porn on Ronan’s hard drive. That doesn’t mean that the images were necessarily taken from the tapes, although 365gay.com puts their own spin on it by taking the same article and titling it “Navy Doctor’s Gay Sex Tape Trial Begins“. Still…I doubt it was standard procedure to allow the men staying with him to bring women home - although I’m sure a few made it in anyway. It’s the weekend, guys are on reprieve, and they’re going to head into town to pick up women. But no doubt a few of the tapes - just by the law of averages - involved a few of those midshipmen getting it on with each other or with men they brought back to Ronan’s home. Who knows whether or not they ended up sold under titles like Military Maneuvers #3.

Regardless of the sexuality involved in the encounters, Ronan’s behavior still constituted gross misconduct unbecoming of a member of the U.S. Military (or at least unbecoming of the ideal of a member of the U.S. Military, as I think we’ve all heard plenty of horror stories about how military men can behave in certain situations). No matter what jokes I might make about the setup of the situation and the irony behind it…I do feel bad for those who were secretly taped. Many would likely be humiliated to discover that their sexual exploits had been published in such a way, and in some cases discovery of what took place on those tapes could cause problems in their everyday lives. I don’t quite buy the blackmail theory, and hope Ronan is prosecuted appropriately.

I’m done. Until tomorrow - happy Halloween, and anchors aweigh.

Maybe I’ll get myself a cute little sailor costume…

gays in the military, navy doctor sex tapes trial, kevin j. ronan, don’t ask don’t tell, gay servicemembers

 
That’s right, the obligatory Halloween comic (with a teensy bit of animation, gasp!). Let’s see…a cranky hermit of a writer who gets really twitchy about people touching his stuff, keeps his home just a little untidy without being slovenly, and spends the day pacing around in his boxers muttering to himself about bad writing and writing in general? Yeah, I’d say I’m shaping up to be another Mort Rainey. This is not a good comparison. I only hope I don’t end up putting a screwdriver through my cat; I rather like the little furbutt.

(If you don’t know who Mort Rainey is…go read a bloody book, kid. And no, I’m not really as batty as Mort. Look at me as the saner version. Well…if not saner, at least not dangerously violent. …ever notice that most writers tend to be just a tiny bit unhinged?)

If this one looks a little more like I was practicing mastery of the ancient Drunken Artist Style, that’s because I was drunk when I drew it.

I’m kidding, I’m kidding (I don’t drink nearly as much as I make it sound here - maybe one nightcap a month or so). Art’s just one of those things where some days you’ve got it, some days you don’t. Last night I didn’t really have it; might have had something to do with the fact that I’m wearing month-old disposable contact lenses, I don’t have another pair to switch them out with, my prescription’s expired, and every time I call my optometrist’s office to make an appointment, no one answers the bloody phone. Pain in the arse. So my eyesight’s not all it could be, right now.

Yeah, yeah, excuses, excuses. This one’s another fully tablet-drawn one; I’m starting to prefer doing it that way, as since I normally build my backgrounds in Photoshop anyway this just makes for easier layer compositing without having to edit out whitespace or painstakingly paint so much of it in. Cuts my work time down from eight hours to four or five. Hopefully, if I get my tablet PC (though I’m seriously considering a cheaper knockoff version of a Cintiq instead) next month, it’ll take even less time and look less scribbly.

Aren’t you just fascinated by these little details of the comic creation process? [eyeroll]

Anyway, I’ve got things to do, so I’m out of here. See you tomorrow with a rant, a snark, a snicker, and gods only know what else.

~Adri

P.S. Thanks to everyone who wished me well when I was under the weather over the weekend. I’m feeling a bit better now, even if I’m not wholly up to speed yet.

no style, gay comics, webcomics, humor, gay comic strip, halloween comic

Passing out for a while…really didn’t make me feel any better, unfortunately. I’m really not feeling up to one of my usual dissertations today, so I’m just going to leave you guys with some links to a few points of interest for the day. Sorry, guys. Hopefully a weekend’s rest will fix everything.

Song Links Saggy Pants to Being Gay: Although this is horribly homophobic and of course assumes that being identified as gay because your arse is hanging out (and apparently on offer), this still cracks me up. It’s part of a citywide campaign to stop “saggin’”, a fashion faux paus that’s been around for years: wearing your pants practically around your knees. The whole thing’s just ridiculous, honestly - that anyone would wear their pants that way, and that anyone would use slurs on sexuality to try to get them to stop.

Florida Prison Guards Disciplined for Allowing “Gay Wedding”: Officiate a fake lesbian inmate wedding that is in no way legally binding, and lose your job. No, I’m serious. Just because two lesbian inmates staged a fake wedding, the guards who allowed and witnessed it were either fired, resigned, or suspended. Not only that, but the women were separated, with one sent to another facility. Am I the only one who thinks that’s a little much? It’s not like they staged a riot, and prisons put on various inmate performances all the time, such as plays and talent shows (and reenactments of Thriller…). If they wanted, they could look at this as another inmate group activity, rather than flipping their sh*t and punishing people so broadly for something that basically has no effect anyway and didn’t place those gathered at any more risk than other group activities. Last I checked, few prison guards had the power of ordained priests anyway.

Gay Baby Creates Controversy in Italy: This one is my favorite out of the lot for today. I don’t know if you remember when Sihaya sent in an Ask Adri question regarding shock advertising and some interesting ad campaigns shown in Europe, but this is the latest in one such campaign: a newborn child with “HOMOSEXUAL” stamped on its wristband instead of the usual birth information. The poster was widely circulated in Tuscany, Italy as an effort to promote activism and awareness of discrimination. Personally, I love it. I think it’s striking, compelling, and gets a very clear point across. The people of Tuscany…not so impressed. Even gay activists there think it’s over the top. What do you think?

More Toddlers Infected With HIV In Kyrgyzstan Scandal: On a more serious front…the latest in the mess in Kyrgyzstan involving hospital staff accidentally infecting people with HIV has gone so far as to affect 2-and-3-year-old children with the disease, by transfusing them with tainted blood or injecting them with tainted needles. People have been fired over this, but that’s not going to fix anything for those children. Maybe they can be among the first to receive ready treatment from the latest HIV miracle therapy…but they’ll still be on medication for the rest of their lives.

Update on the comments contest

We are currently at 757 out 1,000 comments, leaving 243 to go. C’mon, guys, you can do better than that. (Or did I just offer crappy prizes? Maybe I should do another survey; that gets you guys talking…)

Oogh. Okay, sitting upright is getting to be problematic; I think it’s time to go curl up in bed with the rest of the day’s workload for my other job, try to plow through that, and then read my new book (hush, it’s a recaptured piece of my childhood) until I fall asleep. I’ll see you guys with a new comic on Monday; have a good weekend.

Ciao,
~Adri

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Gasp! Two panels! …well, one panel reused and edited.

The weekend edition post about J.K. Rowling outing her own character reminded me of a conversation I had in a Starbuck’s a few years ago. I’ll bet everyone who’s ever been hit on by a male Potter fan has had some rendition of this conversation. The Starbuck’s was annexed onto a Barnes and Noble, as so many of them seem to be these days, and I’d just stopped in to buy a few books and then settled at the Starbuck’s to read one of them and have a latte. I didn’t even realize it was the release night of one of the books in the HP series, though it didn’t take long to figure it out with all the impatient Potterites swarming the store and the coffee shop.

And it didn’t take long for this guy to come zipping up to me to deliver what he probably thought was the most clever line ever. I don’t remember who he actually said; it wasn’t Dumbledore, I do remember that. I just subbed that in to be relevant to current issues. It might have been Snape or Remus or…bah, I don’t remember. But I do remember just how fast he hauled arse out of there. I probably could have been a bit nicer about telling him I wasn’t interested, but where’s the fun in that?

…this is why I’m going to be (newly) single for a long, loooong time. [snrk]

If the art looks a little odd, it’s because it’s wholly tablet-drawn in Photoshop with a stark black brush instead of a light pencil. I’m actually pretty pleased with it; except for the differences in the line heaviness, it’s not that far off from art done by hand on paper. I got lucky last night and managed a little decent hand-eye coordination with the tablet. Normally my tablet drawings look a bit more drunken than this, although the lines are still a bit more scribbly than my pencil lines.

I don’t remember what book I was reading back then (it might have been Stephen King’s Everything’s Eventual, but I’m not quite sure), but if you’re curious about the book actually depicted in the comic, it’s a story from my childhood that I recently rediscovered when I saw a movie version of it on Toon Disney. As a child I read Angela Sommer-Bodenburg’s The Little Vampire so many times that I wore out the cover on the library copy, and the local library fined me for it. Yesterday I went on Amazon and ordered a copy of it, so hopefully it’ll be here soon.

I remember being fascinated by the relationship between the young boy and the young vampire; back then I was too young to look for subtext (and there really wasn’t any there, it is a young adult book) and really didn’t know about homosexuality at all, but I think that book honestly may have been one of the things that first triggered a subconscious interest in other boys. I can’t believe I forgot about it, but it has been well over a decade. S’pose I bought a copy out of nostalgia; I can’t wait to read it again, even if I’m a bit old for it now and age will probably wear away much of the wonder and the gloss.

Who knows, maybe I’ll still love it.

no style, gay comics, webcomics, humor, gay comic strip, harry potter, j.k. rowling, hogwarts, dumbledore is gay, slashfiction

[facepalm] I’m so not into Harry Potter. Don’t ask me why; I don’t have a problem with J.K. Rowling, I respect her talents and her accomplishments, I think she wrote a very good series with engaging characters…that somehow failed to engage me anyway. I guess it’s just not my thing. However, I just couldn’t pass this up. Half of my fandom-enamored friends are just about wetting themselves over the news that apparently, Rowling has announced that Albus Dumbledore is/was gay. (Is? Was? Series is over, so I guess “was” is appropriate.)

That’s right, the revered headmaster of Hogwarts was gay - and now it’s canon. As someone who adores seeing strong gay characters in fiction who aren’t wholly defined by their sexuality and whose sole point in the story isn’t just to be gay, I love this revelation. I also understand why Rowling would wait until the end of the series to make this announcement; I doubt Dumbledore’s sexuality had anything to do with the story, and if it had been known before he end of the series, he might have been seen as the token gay character. (…it might also have encouraged even more Dumbeldore/Harry fanfic than there already is, although I shudder to think that there may be a sudden upsurgence in such fics now that fandomers have this to work with. Scary.)

Now as someone who doesn’t quite get the obsessive nature of fandom…I’m just staring in wonder as certain corners of the internet practically explode with the buzz. Hell, I had to skip reading half of my LiveJournal friendslist because all they were talking about was this.

So there. If you’re a Potter fan, now you know, and I’ve done my duty by reporting on gay news in an one of my areas of personal interest: popular fiction. Incidentally, no, Richard Harris (pictured above) - the actor who played Dumbledore in the Harry Potter films - was not gay.

Everything’s news to someone, I guess.

harry potter, j.k. rowling, hogwarts, dumbledore is gay, gay characters in fiction

Sorry I’m so late updating today, kids. In a little personal (and yet at least topical to this site) TMI, I spent my early morning sending the boyfriend the dreaded Breakup Letter, making him the ex again for the second time in four years, even if I’m not quite sure he’s aware of it yet. I? I am going to happily enjoy being single for a long time. I go through about a man a year (better than a man a month), and I’m tired of it; besides, all I want is a normal guy, and it’s practically impossible to find one of those in the gay community. Trust me. I’ve tried. Anyway, I rather fancy the artful image of myself as the solitary, cynical writer, clove in one hand, drink in the other, and a stack of dog-eared manuscript pages on the desk in front of me while my glasses try to fall off my nose.

See? No such thing as a normal gay guy. [snrk]

Anyway. So I’m sure you’re not the slightest bit surprised to find out that hey, I wasn’t much in the mood for updating this morning. And I’m still not in the mood to go digging through the news for something to sermonize about. Instead, I feel like snarking on something a little.

Lately I’m noticing a growing trend in my site metrics: search strings that show that users are looking for a “gay quiz”. Not my Diva Quiz, but a quiz that will somehow analyze their personal habits, personality traits, and dress styles to tell them if they’re gay or lesbian. As if we somehow all share some uniform in style, habit, and personality. Really, a gay quiz should be horribly easy. And so now, without further ado, I present to you:

The Gay Quiz

1. Are you turned on by/attracted to members of the same sex, but not particularly affected by members of the opposite sex?
     (a) No
     (b) Yes
     (c) I like both.

Answers Explained

If you answered (a): You’re straight.
If you answered (b): You’re gay/lesbian. Wow, that was easy, wasn’t it?
If you answered (c): You’re either bi or gifted with a strong libido that doesn’t care whose leg you hump as long as you find satisfaction.

Now was that really so bloody hard? No? Then why does anyone need a multi-question quiz for that? Hell, it even works if you’re transgendered, as I know the gender questions can get confusing because some people don’t quite get that you define your sexuality after you define your gender identity. If you’re FtM and you’re attracted to guys, you’re gay; attracted to girls, you’re straight (and woe on the person who calls you a lesbian). If you’re MtF and you’re attracted to women, you’re a lesbian; attracted to guys, you’re straight (and hell will befall the person who calls you a gay man). Still easy.

Now if you’re androgynous/genderqueer/asexual…um…you just are what you are. Have fun.

I’m gone. I’m thinking this is a weekend to curl up with a martini, the cat, and a good book. Enjoy your weekend, kiddos.

gay quiz, boyfriends, gay and lesbian quiz, are you gay, are you a lesbian