[Originally posted on February 19, 2009]
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/29259293/?gt1=43001
No offense to any of my Indian/Pakistani friends, but when people debate why the US has only bombed brown or very-swarthy people in recently memory, I hope beliefs like this are why. And that bombs only hit idiots like this. I know they didn't, but I'm trying to express my wish that they did. (Please note that I'm apparently apologizing for decisions that not only weren't my own, but that were undertaken by a country I am not a citizen of.) Marrying a dog. To ward off tiger attacks. Fucking stupidity.
This post isn't about race. It's not about ruralism vs. suburbanism vs. urbanism. It's about the same thing most of my other posts are about, which is stupidity. In this case, the morons happen to be Indian, but do not ever think that this type of insane belief is exclusive to Hindus or Indians or any specific, definable group. I'll warn you in advance, I may include a joke or two, and if they (jokes) offend you, don't read my posts.
I suppose, if I were a hack, that I would start with the headline. Okay, so I'm a hack: "Indian boy marries dog to ward off tiger attacks".
Sounds like it's straight out of the Weekly World News, but it's not. The Munda tribe believe that this marriage will prevent the groom from being eaten by wild animals. And it's not the only one: the Internet is full of stories of Indian children being married off to various animals for lunatic reasons.
Let's ignore the "parenting" rant I so want to let out for the moment, and focus on the stupid: Wild animals like food. If you're a wild animal, I imagine that protein = goodness, especially if you're a carnivore.
No, wait: I can't ignore it. The parenting thing is just too stupid. What this marriage is supposed to accomplish is to remove the responsibility of caring for their child. If you live in a rural area and don't want your child being eaten by a wild animal, I imagine that keeping an eye on them would be a fairly major concern in your life. But hey, as long as you've married them off to a dog, I guess they can just run off wherever.So let's get to what I'm actually writing about: Gay marriage. (HA! Didn't see that coming, did you?! Me neither.) One of the main arguments I've heard from Conservatives in Canada is: If we allow two men to marry each other, where does it end? If a man loves an animal, can he legally marry it, then?
My most logical response is: No, you fucking moron. Of course not. The first example is human, and the second is not. Obviously at some stage of development, someone goes from being asexual to either being straight or gay. Want proof? Find a straight, effeminate, high school boy. Ask him if, because of his lisp and lack of luck with the ladies, he'd like to invite even more unfounded and consistent harassment into his life, by coming out (Thank you, David Cross, for that argument). Since most people discover their sexual identities in high school, and high school is a pressure cooker of emotions, harassment, experimentation, and ridicule, do you really think that some people "choose" to be gay, under those circumstances? This concludes the pro-gay-marriage section of this note, since I think it's a stupid debate and I'm far more distracted by the stupidity of the article anyway...
In the exceptionally unlikely scenario that I was your preacher, and I told you in one fiery sermon that binary was the Devil's language, and we should shun the Internet and all computing methods except pen & paper, would you go along with it? Probably not. Obviously I'd be wrong, and it would be pretty easy to show that I was wrong. So what if I said, "God wants you to stop worshipping graven images"? Would you never look at another picture again? Like, even cat memes? I mean, what I said was vague (what constitutes "worship"?), so can't your response be vague (ignoring it)?
But what if I said something like, "If this boy marries a cactus born of the SW desert around Medicine Hat, your family will achieve everlasting life"? Seems equally stupid to me, but some people would interpret the certainty of the predicates as proof that I was right.
Don't be a moron.
It seems to me that what's wrong with fundamentalist (and most, overall) religions is a lack of a sense of humour and a sense of irony. As Lewis Black said (paraphrased), "if your preacher/priest/imam/rabbi/religious leader says, "if you kill yourself for god, you'll get 71 virgins in the afterlife" (BTW: If you read any of those religious-leader titles and were offended that I didn't capitalize the right one: fuck you, stop reading my note), and your first reaction wasn't "BWA-HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!!!!!", you have an issue with reality. And under-developed senses of irony, comedy, and criticism.
As far as I see it, the only time you'll be able to be all, "See! I was right!" about religion is after you're dead and unable to communicate. That's the problem with and the reason why faith works: anyone who knows anything about it can't let you know. (Unless you count the Catholic Saints, but really, who does? They have sex with little boys. Or at least their "holy" emissaries on Earth do.) Or cold-reading psychic readers.
I have yet to see a religion that can beat the cynicism/comedy/irony test (except for Eastern ones which deal only in NOW, because at least they don't claim certainties about the uncertain). Before you find yourself blindly adhering to a particular line in a sermon, ask yourself: Am I going to feel like an idiot for agreeing with this later? Is it really right?
Would I marry a dog to avoid being eaten by tigers?
Hell, translate that to North America: would you marry a coyote to avoid being eaten by a mountain lion? Did either of those species exist when that arbitrary rule came into being?
If a religion is "true", it's either universal or it isn't, right? Either it's right for everyone or it's wrong. So can you think of the last time you heard of an Australian toddler marrying a dingo? A Russian baby marrying a wolf?
Superstition is not the same as religion, and superstition is not the same as belief. I personally don't care what your beliefs are, because no matter how strongly you feel them, they don't affect me. And if they do, you're doing your religion wrong. You're making about as much sense as...I don't know...marrying a dog to avoid tiger attacks.
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