Best Of

I'm for them all especially National Clams on the Half Shell Day. I have an autistic TG employee so am sympathetic to that issue. People deserve respect.

@Vision said:
Going thru more head count reduction tomorrow at work. They told everyone to stay home this time..... 🤞

That's gotta be nerve-wracking. Best wishes.

Nice rink for minor league hockey

yeah.......but would make for a better person if it was 'learn from him' rather than the elite attitude of 'learn of him', in my opinion.

@Stubble said:
BLT on a brioche bun and sriracha mayo.

That looks fantastic

@CalvinAndHobo said:
I love watching musical prodigies do stuff like this. Chad Smith, the drummer for the Red Hot Chili Peppers, listens to 30 seconds of a song he’s never heard before, and then plays the rest of it off the cuff.
https://youtu.be/HMBRjo33cUE?si=CGwjHAXej9OVrtU7

I watch these all the time also. It's amazing makes me wish I had talent

The easiest way for me to think about it, and to decide where I stand on the various intricacies of each sub-issue, is to think about it like a mental illness. I'm going to use a metaphor to try to illustrate how I think about it.

Let's say that my friend had a relative who had schizophrenia. If this friend pulled me aside before meeting their relative and asked me to call that person King George, even though their name was Jason, because they'll freak out if I call them Jason, then I'd absolutely call them King George if it brings them any measure of mental stability. I've got absolutely no issue with that, even though it's pretty obvious this person isn't a king from the middle ages, and I'd feel a little stupid referring to them like that.

If we were to all go to a restaurant, and King George demanded to use the women's restroom, I'd feel differently. That impacts the mental or physical stability of the women in the restaurant. I think it should be up to the restaurant to decide whether they want to accommodate people with schizophrenia, and it should be up to the customers, be they women or schizophrenics, to decide to avoid that restaurant depending on what they choose.

If King George demanded to hold an after school program at the elementary school, to teach children about how to become a king, I'm opposing that without question, and voting against any school board members who try to allow that. It's one thing to harmlessly call someone King George instead of Jason, it's another to let King George present things as facts to children at an impressionable age.

I don't think any of the Christians I know believe that God made a mistake when He created people with mental illnesses. Schizophrenia is incurable. There are medications to keep it at bay to a degree, but it's still there in the background.

It's very hard for me to imagine someone who doesn't have a mental illness going through all the effort required to change genders. Thousands of dollars in medical expenses, ridicule from countless people, strange or angry looks from strangers when going out in public, a 4x likelihood of being a victim of a violent crime compared to a normal person, increased difficulty in getting hired. No mentally stable person is going to volunteer for that just for fun, and it can't be a coincidence that 40% of trans people attempt suicide, compared to 0.36% of the population as a whole.

I don't get angry towards trans people, and I don't think they're evil. I feel terribly for them. I can't imagine what it would be like to have a mental illness that made me feel gross in my own body, it's rather horrifying to imagine the emotional turmoil that would put me through. Same with hearing voices in my head. I'm very fortunate to not have either problem, and I have no idea how I'd go about being happy if I did.

With that said, I do not think trans people should have a right to make women or children suffer just to ease their own suffering. That's going too far, and if I have kids in the future, they won't be attending any schools that enable a mental illness to be taught to them as if it's a true fact. I wish there was a little more compassion, though.

Back when people with "other" desires simply wanted to be left alone I felt quite supportive. What do I care? Doesn't affect me. They shouldn't be persecuted, especially not by any public / governmental agenda.

Once the demands to (metaphorically) salute the Rainbow Battle Flag started, well, they lost me.

Of all life's mysteries, here's one that we were given an undeniable answer to.

And then, even in church, I'm told "But, God made them that way".

No. God the Father Almighty, creator of heaven and earth, is not a bungling bumbling fool who goes around putting people "in the wrong body". That's not acceptable.

Perhaps the god of these people does, but I don't accept their stumble-bum god who doesn't even have enough sense to know man from woman. That's a third rate low rent god you've got there. Not the same being, at all.