Tag: oligarchs

I Like It Like That

I like it, I like it, I like it like that!

That was another song turned into a great gay dance remix back in my slutty single days. It made me laugh when it became a Burger King commercial; it’s weird to hear something you were dancing to and singing along with at three in the morning drenched in sweat and missing your shirt being used to sell Whoppers, but could there be anything more indicative of what our country is all about than art being used to sell products? There’s nothing in this country we won’t commodify, is there?

It’s cold again this morning–33 degrees outside, and I can certainly tell this morning from the cold seeping in through the windows. Our power went out overnight; Paul was up working on his laptop, and kept working on his laptop until the power came back on, two hours later. Paul isn’t very tech savvy, but he does know how to turn his phone into a hotspot and connect so he’s on-line. (I had all the Entergy alert emails in my inbox when I got up this morning.) Not sure what caused that–we rarely lose power outside of hurricanes–but wouldn’t be surprised if it was cold related, somehow. Tonight I have to run errands on the way home–I was tired when I got off work yesterday, but did manage to write for a bit; will try again tonight–and also have to deal with a jury duty summons, which is aggravating. It’s a pain to deal with; I can’t get coverage for my clinic shifts if I don’t know I am going to serve or not, you know. Ah, well, something else to deal with, I suppose. I don’t mind jury duty–I actually enjoyed serving the one time I was picked to sit on one, and even got a book out of it, so more power to jury duty, seriously–but the hassle of dealing with re: work isn’t that awful, either. Of course, it’s criminal court, so as a crime writer I doubt I’d get picked (I made sure to mention “award-winning crime writer” on the on-line registration this morning, as well as “sexual health counselor”; I can’t imagine either would be on any attorney’s “oh we need HIM for sure” criteria); but as I said, I don’t mind being picked, once I get the work situation sorted. I’ve also been called to serve in February, during Carnival, which is simply delightful–but then again, maybe Scotty could be called to serve on a jury during Carnival? That could be interesting.

So, all the social media sites connected through Fuckerberg’s Meta bullshit have done away with fact-checking, and quietly did away with protections for marginalized people (including queers) one can only assume that Zuck the Fuck has his head firmly implanted between some massive sagging orange butt cheeks. Have fun up there, oligarch. There was a reason you didn’t get laid until you were rich enough to attract women, and it wasn’t how weird and pasty you look, you sociopathic cretin. But will all the billionaires, oligarchs and tech-bros united behind this government, in order to better loot the country and burn the world to the ground, backpedal if and when this regime gets the Reign of Terror they plan to implement gets turned back on them? The last time we had robber barons it eventually led to the collapse of our economy, which then spread world wide and led to World War II. So glad nobody in the stupid country can be bothered to read history, or read it correctly. If your knowledge of US history is predicated on reading books by Bill O’Reilly, congratulations on joining the Manifest Destiny cult–but you know nothing, Jon Snow. I don’t know if I am ready to leave Facebook, but it’s not been fun to even be there much anymore, and I care a lot less about Threads. Maybe it’s time we all admit social media was a destructive force to our society and we can go back to direct messaging or text or whatever…although if social media continues to be throttled to death by greedy billionaires, what will publishers tell us to do to market books anymore? (Social media does not sell many books, no matter what anyone says; it was just another methodology for publishers to place the onus for marketing and promotion on authors while cutting marketing budgets.)

And every day that passes brings the country closer to the abyss of the looters being in charge again. We’re very close to a breaking point–and while I am all about class solidarity for sure, I am not so willing to overlook so many racists and homophobes and white supremacists, either. Sure, solidarity to bring back regulations and anti-trust and anti-monopoly laws, Medicaid (not Medicare) for all, and to rebuild the country’s infrastructure and educational systems are the most important battles right now, and I will fight with anyone shoulder-to-shoulder to save this country from the doom that came for every empire in history so far, but those social issues aren’t going to go away, either–and once we get the rid of the major enemy, than we can focus on societal ills like prejudice and bigotry and government-sourced religion.

And on that note, I am heading into the spice mines. Have a lovely day, stay warm, and I’ll be back tomorrow morning.

I’d Be a Legend in My Time

Thursday morning. I had a great day at the office yesterday, but running errands became challenging. It had to do with passwords, my debit card’s PIN code not working, and so I was only able to run one of my errands because getting it taken care of required ridiculous amounts of Kafka-esque insanity, that began because of one of my email accounts passwords stopping working yesterday afternoon, which started a snowball effect that started dominoes falling. But it finally worked out, I came home exhausted from frustration, but managed to get a lot of work done last night before a lovely night’s sleep. we also watched another episode of The Diplomat (adding Allison Janney to the cast? BRILLIANT). I got the best night’s sleep too–probably the exhaustion from the stress of dealing with this insanity of passwords and PIN code trauma last night. But today should be a good day. I have to do a reading for the Publishing Triangle tonight at six my time, and then I get to slide into the work-at-home day before the weekend, which will be spent focusing primarily on Scotty. I’ve also committed stories to two anthologies I have to get written at some point.

I can’t pretend that I’m not concerned about the future of my writing career, given the coming takeover of the country by the oligarchs. I’ve already been hatefully banned and gone after by the right many many years ago (over twenty, at this point), so what does the future hold for queer writers? At the very least, they are going to label any book with any queer content as pornography (like they did to me twenty-one years ago), and shadow ban them on bookseller sites, bookstores, and public libraries–if not outright banning. I think that’s the next big battle I’m going to have to dedicate my energy to; rather than being overwhelmed by the horror of what’s to come I am going to need to pick and choose which battles I can expend energy on.

And yes, I am making Paul and I my primary concern.

My boycotting of the legacy media continues, and as far as I am concerned, I will never go back to any of them. The way the legacy media–and the CEO’s–are bending the knee and groveling before their new, foul Lord and Master has been thoroughly disgusting. I don’t believe that our “checks and balances”–already turned into a joke the first time around–are going to hold. Now they’re admitting a recession is going to come because of their economic plans for the future–imagine being voted in because prices are too high and implementing policies that will make everything harder for the common folk.

Given this, I guess I really shouldn’t have been surprised that The Advocate1 published a “think piece” by some poseur towing the corporate company line about the publicrtefm reaction to Luigi Mangione and the murder he allegedly committed a few weeks ago. It was so rote, so written-by-the-numbers, and therefore so predictable I would think the person who wrote it (whose name I won’t dignify by repeating) would have been embarrassed to put his name on it. If I’d been asked by my corporate oligarchs to write a piece misreading the room so thoroughly and completely, I would have complied, but would have demanded my name not be on it. What made it even more pathetic was its scolding tone, chiding his audience (theoretically, queer people) and shaming people for thinking Luigi is a hunk (or whatever the lame euphemism he used was), implying that the only reason anyone was supporting him (or whatever they are doing) is because he has pretty privilege. Does anyone else see the flaw in this argument? First of all, I don’t appreciatexz some corporate bootlicking piece of shit (hey, you’re going to sit in judgment on people, prepare to be fucking judged yourself) implying that all gay men think with their dicks. Sure, many do, and I am sure there are any number of gay men (and straight women) who would be more than happy to let him have their way with them (sadly, it wouldn’t be much fun for him, giving his spine situation), and maybe that has colored their reaction in some ways…but I was on #teamshooter before we knew what he looked like, and most people were. He got a lot more attention because of his looks…but this whole thing has not been about his looks, and never has been. In other words, The Advocate, congratulations on continuing to be the absolute worst.

That may very well be a subject for an essay over at Substack, and yes, I am well aware that I am very overdue for one. And on that note, I am heading into the office. Have a great Thursday, Constant Reader, and I will chat with you again later.

  1. I’ve hated that joke of a publication for well over twenty years, and rather than abating, my contempt over the years has only deepened and grown as they get progressively worse. ↩︎