The Three Fingers of Fate

that being of course, homophobia.

I've been quietly observing the insanity of admitted homophobes who celebrate their finger-pointing at gay men and lesbians. I wonder about their diet mostly. Would the old Dan White "Twinkie defense" apply to these people. David Brock pithily commented about Ann Coulter in Blinded by the Right that she seemed to survive on "cigarettes and Chardonnay." When I read admitted homophobes' rantings, I can't help but think of my Dad when he was soused. He drank a case of beer a day for decades and I got to a point where I deeply hated the shell of a man he had become. Because of that mediating factor of booze, I don't think I really got to know the man, and now he has the Alz, as I like to call Alzheimer's. Perhaps because of all that aluminum that floated around in the beer which was packaged in cans made of the not-for-human exposure stuff. (That being said, I do use foil to bake/roast my veggies.)

I can't help but think of these people that way because they remind me of any and every addict I've ever met, no matter what their political persuasion or how integrated they may seem to be. There's just something breathlessly addled about these folks. It's like I can hear the shallow breath behind the words they've typed/spoken into the ether, as if they were overweight wheat-allergics still eating flour and tipping the scales at 300 pounds (like I used to), wheezing as they lift themselves up another flight of stairs.

I write these words in part because I sort of identify with their predicament--that they see what I see, that their lives are swirling down the drain and they have to clutch at some scapegoat so as to not see their own role in the situation. When someone points their finger, after all--well, most 12-step people know where this is going--

3 fingers are pointing back at them.

(Perhaps past/present/future, or mind/heart/soul or father/son/holy ghost or maiden/mother/crone anyone?)

I know that P.Ro and R.Kni and G.Bu and D.Che and P.Bu and J.Fa and J.Do are all sick and suffering folks who feel they must lash out at "the infernal Other" but ultimately call their attention back to their batshit crazy selves. They refuse to see their own role in the cesspool around them, and so foreclose any opportunity of real change in their lives. Instead these people think they can will everyone to hate the people they hate, and wonder why all these people get mad at them. Brokeback Mountain and all the other Oscar-nominated films must be a real kick in the fists for them, bucking up to try to put the focus on the triple-finger self-directed threat they're running away from.

Think of it--these people suffer under the delusion that others want what they have. I don't know anyone who wants what Pat Robertson has, not his millions and certainly not his ethics or lack thereof. But that's archonic-addictive thought for you. I wonder if some of these people will ever wake up or if their addictions will shoo them into their graves before too long. I know that some of these people are bound and determined to shoo others into their graves, and may justify it as a mode of creating "heaven on earth." Pretty blood-soaked heavenly vision they have, all in all. Not much they can say to that, except to laugh a bit hysterically not unlike Audrey II in Little Shop of Horrors.