Mad World

And I find it kinda funny, I find it kinda sad . . .

~Mad World

Double standards are insidious, poisoning the atmosphere with malignant bigotry. The self-important, seeking preferment by the ostracization of people and ideas, present their villainous dictates as good taste or decency while engendering a stifling hegemony, the throne of tyrants. You’ve not spoken the truth, you’ve made them cry; you’ve not argued against their latest power grab, you’ve been rude and barbarous.

And when discourse is muted, the only recourse is war. So, we have Trump. I didn’t vote for him because I thought he’d bring unity, or even because I believed he would be a great president; I voted for him because he seems to be the kind of guy who would take a mallet and smash this cultural strangle hold so that people can step out of the closet and begin arguing ideas free from the oppression of false emotion. It should be mentioned that the other candidate appeared to be the remains of the witch upon which Dorothy dropped a house, a less than appealing option.

I’ve been well acquainted with this bigotry, and witness to its subversion of decent people. I have been on the receiving end of its corrective measures, its emotional bullying. Once I was cornered, my friends—we had grown up together, our society a bulwark against the chaotic cruelty of life—pressuring me to tell them why, and so I did. I wasn’t going to share in eating their candy because the company supported Planned Parenthood. We argued, and I was by no means dispassionate.

I could stand their disagreement, or even their anger, but that’s not what I faced. Unable to face me like men, they turned their backs upon me like women. I was an outcast from a coalition of outcasts. Over time we patched things up, but now I always know. I know that ideas not vogue should remain unspoken, that our friendship is just one wrongthink away from falling apart. Though today I greet them with a smile, I celebrate my birthdays alone.

They’re still the same: easily offended, and ready to snub. Self-appointed arbiters of a twisted ideal of decency, I now laugh where I once cried. As adults it seems preposterous, can they go throughout their lives never dealing with opposing ideas? If their emotional whims will not be catered to, they will leave.

So as the cake was cut, I spied them leaving. They despise me, will not tell me the truth: They’re just going home. It has nothing to do with the pastor’s remark, nothing to do with him saying marriage was between a man and a woman. To their bubble they retreat, instead of eating cake.

The cake is good.