At Random

Roommates:

I've not mentioned Ben here. Ben and I have been together for seventeen years, since he was five weeks old and I could carry him in one hand. He's still pretty lively, but is starting to have lapses -- I think it's the onset of senility, but so far it's not desperate, just occasionally inconvenient. He's fading from black to a rich dark auburn color, and is quite an attractive cat, although he's gotten pretty bony lately. (Under "lively": I just had to take a break from writing to play string for a while, so he would shut up for a minute and let me concentrate -- umm -- did I mention vocal? It doesn't seem to have sunk in that he should be feeble at this point. The things we do for peace and quiet.)

He's lasted through several boyfriends and has always been there when I needed some uncritical comfort. I told him once that if he were six-four and had his balls, I'd marry him. I meant it. Like me, he's fairly reserved, but very affectionate once you gain his trust, independent, stubborn, but ultimately reasonable.

We were made for each other.

Thus Passeth the Old Guard

Thomas Kuehn, in The Structure of Scientific Revolutions, points out that one essential element in a paradigm shift is for those who adhere to the old paradigm to die off. They have an investment in the current order that seems to obscure their ability to examine evidence or to approach new theories with objectivity.

Charles Socarides is dead.

Marriage:

One group of wildmons gives up. From NYT:

A rare rift among conservatives, however, led the two groups to promote dueling same-sex marriage bans while sniping over which proposal was better. At the center of the split was disagreement over how far the camp opposing gay marriage should go in trying to repeal the significant spousal rights domestic partners are granted in California.

Polling conducted for ProtectMarriage.com by Harris Interactive last summer showed that while a majority of voters supported a same-sex marriage ban, there was much less support for taking away the rights domestic partners already have, Mr. Pugno said.

The public mind is an odd thing. Let's face it, Americans, for the most part, want to be fair and generous. It's part of our self-image. We can be stirred up by rhetoric and do nasty things because of it, but we don't really want to treat people badly, in general. (I make an exception for the wildmons. They live to demonize someone, and it doesn't really seem to matter who -- communists, the Soviet Union, liberals, gays, it's all one. It must be really hard to have to hate someone to justify your own existence. On my better days, I pity them.) Consequently, you have opinion polls like the one above, because "marriage" has become a buzzword that denotes an ideal state that is largely made-up from whole cloth. But people are resistant to taking away rights that have been granted. People in general also seem to be willing to allow civil unions and domestic partnerships as a legal vehicle for recognizing gay relationships. They do begin to recognize those relationships as legitimate. It only took forty years.

The irony, of course, is that the wildmons just don't get it. Blinders? Mmmm -- yeah.

We're going to win a war we never declared.