Civilorder

The International Day Against Homophobia, held on May 17 every year, is a rallying event offering an opportunity for people to get together and reach out to one another and take a stand against homophobia.

The cause for the International Day Against Homophobia, its central topic of interest, the common theme that provides information for each of its endeavours remains a universal, multi-faceted and historical phenomenon: homophobia.

Few minority groups have been as discriminated against as the gays and lesbians. But major breakthroughs have occurred, and homosexual people are stepping out of the shadows. From the outside, it could be construed that all problems have been solved. The media are sympathetic, public personalities come out, television shows feature lesbian and gay characters in scenes of everyday life. Nevertheless, the reality is quite different. Many individuals are unable to live their sexual orientation, encounter difficulties if they do, or end up role-playing to protect themselves.

Despite these dire situations, the implementation of the International Day Against Homophobia should not rest on a “victimization“ philosophy. In fact, the Day may be seen as a great opportunity to highlight positive aspects of homosexuality and celebrate the contribution of lesbians and gays to society.

Homophobia is an insidious process that channels its effects through subtle, usually transparent ways. No one is safe from hostile manifestations to homosexuality. Quite surprisingly, many homosexual individuals themselves adopt homophobic behaviour, hoping it would protect them against prejudice from their entourage. The International Day Against Homophobia aims to reach all groups of society, regardless of their sexual orientation.

An International Day Against Homophobia belongs to no one individual. It’s about all people hoping for a prejudice-free world that can provide a place at the table for everyone regardless of their sexual orientation. Inspired by all world theme-days, the day set aside to fight homophobia needs to be appropriated by all of those actively involved in civil society: gay and lesbian community organisations, those organisations focusing on other types of sexual diversity, unions, employers, private businesses, governments, public administration, professional associations, and all individuals seeking equality.

The best revenge is living well.

Its always a curious thing to behold when a member of the gay community turns his back on his fellow gay men and woman and is miraculously converted to straight. A certain gay man, Andre Bekker; is one of those who claim to now be a straight man (odd looking female at his side and all) who can ‘pray the gay away’.

Nutjobs like this one are nothing new. We have seen them ‘come and go.. and sooner or later cum back on another man again’.
I find it sad though that someone would be so arrogant as to twist religious scripture in order to condemn and judge people, all while claiming it is out of love. (But then Andre Bekker does like being one thing and pretending to be another I suppose)

Mr Bekker, truth is; you can no more pray a gay man straight than you can a black man to white! Am I saying God can’t do miracles? No, not at all, what I am saying is God won’t ‘fix’ what is not wrong.

While mister Bekker and his (clearly ignorant or desperate, possibly Lesbian, certainly ugly) wife are getting up to their crazy in their corner, what are we suppose to do?

Gay-rights activists like Damian Engelbrecht and others have been actively raising awareness on the matter because as they rightfully say, crazies like Bekker confuses young gay teens and fuel homophobia, bullying and segregation.

In reply to this Miss Bekker and her wife’s claims that ‘gays’ in general now (so that included you and me) are intolerant: So then, if someone calls your very existence an abomination and you try and stop them from causing the deaths of any more young people of your kind and you then react, then you are intolerant of others?
Hmmm, Andre, I don’t think you are very good at logical thinking my dear…
Then again I know you are not because if you were you wouldn’t have posed for a photo with that (let’s call it a) woman.

Do you think my attack on Bekker’s wife is vicious?
I think Bekker’s attack on those I love is vicious!
Have you ever stood next to the bed of a gay teenager who has tried to kill himself because of the false guilt demons like you spread Mr. Bekker?

Mrs Bekker, the comments about you are for effect only to make your gay husband open his eyes to what his evil tongue is doing. I’m sure you are not really a troll. (Now prove it and divorce that queen)

To conclude, back to my original statement. The best revenge is living well. Live openly gay. Support gay teens and build them up. Speak up against the crazies and love yourself for who God has made you to be!

The thing about relationships are that there aren’t really any rules but we all seem to think we know exactly what the rules are…
Don’t agree?

Don’t think that you think you know all the rules? – Okay; but think about how upset you were the last time a partner or potential partner didn’t act the way you thought they should have… When they broke your ‘rules’ …

I have spoken about the ‘Tribal Consciousness’ often in previous blogs. The tribal-consciousness is basically the conditioned popular opinion in a culture or sub-culture of how things should be done. The tribal consciousness affects how we view relationships too. Some even think they are not affected by it by acting opposite to the popular flow but in effect is still subject to it by reacting to it, be it then in an opposite direction.

Its that simple question once again; what do you really really really really want? Note the four reallys…

Might it be that you think you want or do not want a relationship based on your opinion or idea of a relationship is or should be and not based on what ‘a’ relationship really is?

I think having a rulebook for relationships is insane as no two relationships can ever be the same, similar perhaps but never the same as no two humans can ever be the same.

My young friend has a good heart. He is an attractive boy but very torn by life. See my friend is a hopeless romantic, even more so than me. He believes (according to the ‘rules’) that a relationship is: Two people holding hands, a house with a white picket fence, a cat and a dog. My friend needs all of an hour to fall in love. My friend gets hurt, a lot!

My older friend has many lovers but is committed to none. He has very few love related complications in his life. My older friend consciously or subconsciously creates an environment where he is seldom alone. He puts on a brave and happy face but I often see he doesn’t know who to cling to when the rain sets in. He hides the dark times well, even from those he has known for years but once in a while at 3am in the morning I receive a message with his tears.

My other two friends were together for years, they followed all the most popular relationship ideas. Recently an engagement was broken, the physical reason was clear but the real reason was stalking from day one…

Love you see is not just a feeling. Feelings come and go with moods. Love is an act of your will. You can decide your partner on a spiritual connection that you can’t explain or define and that doesn’t need to measure up to any specific criteria.

Yes the feelings are important too but they will not be consistent in intensity or at all consistent for that matter.
Obviously there has to be a connection and your core values need to match, atleast mostly but ‘compatibility’ is a learned thing.

Mostly people who are 100% compatible don’t make good relationship material as it doesn’t bode well for balance and after a while one or both of the partners are going to go out looking for that balance.

I think to tie it all together and to make my point its important to firstly understand the four reallys:

The first really is an idea or a feeling of need and mostly un-specific. Relating to relationships, its that thought of, perhaps I want that.

The second really is a wish. More specific although not well defined. “I want someone in my life but I don’t know who I want or how I want them in my life.”

The third really goes with a verbalisation and a formulation. Perhaps not yet saying yes I want a relationship but saying I am open to one. Most of us get stuck in the middle of the third really or/and try hammer together a relationship in the middle of the third really. You can’t, you need all four of the reallys.
The second part of the third really is the ‘formulation’. This is where you need to ask yourself what you want or need from a relationship. NOT what you want or need your partner to look or act like but what you want or need. Companionship? How much of it? Security? In what ways? Sex? Yes sex too (will get back to sex later on again) Support? How will you define support? The inner you will know what questions it has.

The fourth really – act – a simple truth in life is that we only get two kinds of things, that which we really really really really want and that which we really really really really do not want. The fourth really is acting on the first three reallys after you have gone through and completed them. You now know what you want, you are able to communicate it and now you pour yourself into it. You work on it. You forget about all the reasons the tribe says it won’t work and you focus on the one reason, your own ‘act of will / love” why it will work.

Perhaps a simpler example to understand the reallys -

One day you walk into your lounge and get a feeling that something is missing, there is an empty spot. (First really) Later you have a wish or need to fill that spot and think that you perhaps need a chair or a table (second really) You make up your mind that it should be a chair, you know how big it should be about and what you want to use it for (third really) you then go to the shop and go find a chair that matches the needs and wants of your first three reallys. You pay for it (meaning you work (worked) for it) and take it to your lounge. This is very simplified but gets the basic picture across.

To explain how we get what we really do not want -

You get an idea that you wouldn’t like your partner to cheat (first really) You start saying to yourself I don’t want him/her with someone else (second really) you start defining to yourself what it would feel like when they cheat and with whom you think they would cheat (the third really) and then you start reacting or acting jealously and controlling as if they have already cheated. Often forcing them to because you have become cold (the fourth really).

What I’m saying is this then. Don’t allow your idea of what a relationship should or shouldn’t be force you into our out of one for that matter. Be true to what you really really really really want and not to what you think society says you should want. Make peace with the fact that there are no rules. See every relationship as a unique symbiosis on its own. You can’t compare one with the other as an absolute. Don’t dwell on what you really do not want for then you will create that too.

While on the topic, a matter related but a bit off the topic is also important to look at; sex.

You are a human with a mind/soul, a body and a spirit or a body a conscious mind and a subconscious-mind if you prefer that way of looking at it.
One third of you then is flesh. Let’s face it, we are programmed to mate or have sex. Its one of the major human instincts.

Make sure things are healthy and alive in that bedroom! Leave your grandmother out of your mind when you get in between those sheets! Try new things and experiment with your partner. Where sex is concerned there also are no set relationship rules; live a little!

Probably one of the most fundamental ways two people become one is during sex. Where two completely different beings become one physical body so to to speak. Make sure you don’t neglect this part of a relationship.

To tie it together once more: If the spiritual connection was there, work on the interaction of the souls and make sure the physical is taken care of. All, in line with what you want and not what you think you should want.

Truth is, it is complicated; that doesn’t mean it shouldn’t be the greatest thing in your life.

Novo! It says on the new Aquafresh intense-white-toothpaste tube. Three things cross my mind:
1. Does it remove tobacco stains?
2. How many arguments have started with the way someone ‘chooses’ to press the toothpaste tube?
3. If this one is new intense white, are there people who prefer less white? As the old product has not been replaced.

I have a silly habit. I smoke. Teeth-bleaching as effective as it is, is quite painful. The effects of this bleaching would last a lot longer if I didn’t smoke but nonsense as it is, I like smoking; I keep on smoking.

I am not a great fan of the television. I like movies and certain series but for the most part television is not important to me and I quite rarely use mine on a day to day basis. One of my pet peeves on tv is soapies.

I regularly use to loudly voice my opinion on the silliness of soapies but in the future will refrain from doing so. You see, my good friend the green engineer pointed out (in great wisdom) a technical point I was missing. I smoke, that in itself is a much sillier and way more physically harmful habit than watching a soapy, and I probably waist the same amount of time a day on doing that than someone spends watching their soapy, so why do I judge? I no longer will.

Nonsense as it is some will choose to keep on watching a soapy because they enjoy it as I will keep on smoking as I enjoy it. Its just the human condition, we are all very different and that’s good.

Another key to being happy is thus to accept other peoples habits that annoy you as you remind yourself that some of your habits annoy them. Its better then to sow seeds of acceptance and later to reap acceptance.

This brings me back to the toothpaste tube. I like to squeeze it from the back; neatly! (This is a gay blog you see; you will read thigs like, from the back, neatly).

It use to greatly upset me when someone squeezed it in the middle with their whole hand until one morning I realised that.. that person only had the use of one hand due to a handicap. Where anyone chooses to squeeze their toothpaste tube for whatever reason suddenly became very irrelevant to me.

Its all just part of the human condition…

What I still have no clue to is if there are people who prefer their teeth less white and thus will prefer to buy the old Aquafresh and not the new one.

Would you make important life decisions based on information from the People-magazine?

Without hesitation most, well most sane people, would answer NO. Strangely enough, a lot of us make decisions with information from an even more unreliable source – gossip.

Gossip – idle talk or rumour about the personal or private affairs and past of others.

More often than not it is the person spreading the gossip that has a personal reason for gain in spreading the story. That heartfelt warning or heads-up might be nothing but a cleverly disguised attempt at manipulation.

Gossip is all about the ego. In my journey to happiness another step I have discovered is that you have to take the ego out of the equation.

The ego is the ‘I’ part of your personality. The part that continually asks: “what about me?” when interacting with others.

The ego is an important part of every human and needs to be secure and taken care of but it should not be the dominant factor in our dealings with others. Look to your purpose here.

The ego is the part of us where insecurity and the need to control is kept. When an ego is fuelled by insecurity and a need for control the mouth is quick to turn to gossip.

There is an old wisdom that remains true to this very day and will serve you well. “When you don’t have anything good to say about another person. Say nothing at all.”

What often makes gossip so enticing is that it is usually laced with a small bit of truth. Twisted and out of context truth without exception but still. This is the bait to get your ears or mouth hooked.

You are not a fish. A fish gets its mouth hooked by bait. You have a brain, you can decide for yourself about others. You don’t have to go around like a fish and follow the school. (See the blog about leaving the tribe again).

Gossip also loves to refer to a person’s past. People are not their past. If that was true, you too would have no capacity for change or growth and thus there would be no hope.

The law of sowing and reaping also comes into play here. Some call it Karma. Next time you gossip or listen to gossip; ask yourself: Am I willing to reap the harvest of the seeds I am sowing?

In conclusion, another step to true happiness and healthy relationships is to not spread or listen to gossip. Move away from the physical ego and seek your true spiritual purpose.