Re: RAT cop outs and other out things

["Kensington Smith" <smith@avn.com>]

----- Original Message -----
From: Donna Sherritt <ohbelladonna@hotmail.com>
To: <rat-list@whirl-i-gig.com>
Sent: Monday, February 14, 2000 4:17 PM
Subject: RAT cop outs and other out things


> Over the weekend, I responded to Jonathan's comments in a private e-mail
out

queer-identified bi gnostic mysticist. teetotaler. in spirit. ha ha.
vegan. no, ovo-vegetarian.
s/m-id'd pro-porn feminist. spiritualist pagan. Hmmmm.
Hummmman.

I've got a lot of labels at my disposal, you see. I've acquired these and
more, I've applied and discarded identitystratifiers, I've railed against
them, I've fallen back on them, I've tried them on for size, I've outgrown
them. I've changed my mind I've changed my mind I've changed my mind I've
changed my mind (Lori Carson). I try to explain myself to myself and to the
world, I've tried to codify and sort out and explain the world to myself.
we most of us seem compelled to do this. I don't really know why it's not
enough to just be.

because of 1. My Labels and 2. This Urge to Label and 3. Fear of Conflict
and 4. The Involvement of People Who I Like and Respect in an Argument and
after a lot of time and careful consideration I'm going to respond to this
thread, this way (even tho I'm sure everyone else is done with it/it was all
a big misunderstanding/it was just a joke. sorry. no sense of humor.)
this is from www.salon.com, their lead today: "I started speaking out
against the casual, mindless anti-white racism I had always ignored. We're
not talking Klan violence here. The vast majority of the people I worked
with weren't racist. But there was a fairly common, reflexive use of white
as an epithet -- white politician, white funder, white teacher -- without
modifier or qualifier. White had become shorthand for 'arrogant, ignorant,
out of touch.'"

Replace "white" with "christian." Or, you know, mexican or transgendered or
epileptic. This is not right. That's all. It's so convoluted and turned back
on itself, the "marginalized" reflecting the exact genus of hate they have
been subjected to, mirroring vindictive against another group
("christians"), kicking the dog, as it were. We all deserve to be
individuals first. These identifiers we choose and apply to inform others in
a general way about who we are would, in the best of all possibles, be
regarded as secondary; and how responsible we make individuals for crowd
mentality must be tempered with an understanding of uniqueness and human
frailty. This, of course, is almost impossible, being that we are bears of
very little brain and we've all pretty much agreed to make this society
thing, this civilization thing, work, even if our consent is only inferred
by virtue of us continuing to kick about the planet, alive. It's hard work
to allow every person a clean slate, when they come to you queer, when they
come to you black, when they come to you christian and it's so much easier
to assign them to a group, to your previous experience of the thing they
purport to be, and be done with it. This is sociopsychology and it's normal.
And it's often lazy and hateful, no matter who's dishing it out, ofcolor,
het, President, prole.

Then there's all the stuff about The Other ("four white chicks'll kill a
black one,"-Samuel Clemens), but I think the above's quite enough. Thanks
for a thought-provoking exchange, goddamnit.

sign me read the expiration date before you buy the milk
or something
xox rebecca gray in l.a.
p.s. please see the similarly disturbing article at www.salon.com