"Elections Have Consequences" and "If You're Against Clinton, You're A Privileged Sexist".... AKA Thanks for pushing me away when we should be coming together

I've heard a lot about how Clinton won the primary so Sanders supporters should fall in line.  I've heard a lot over the last 9 months about anybody being against Clinton being a sexist and an enemy of women.  I've heard, more than a few times, that we (Democrats/liberals) should be in favor of Clinton because she's the most qualified and/or because she's a woman.

Let's start with the last and go backwards.

I don't believe in voting for someone because of their sex.  I'm blessed to have my mother for my mom and, at different periods of my life, my school committee member, my state representative, and my state senator.  I am extremely happy to have Senator Warren representing me in D.C.  And by the way, I'm explaining these two because I feel that if I don't, I'll be attacked for being anti-women in office... and even after saying these, I feel I still will.  I would have loved for Barbara Boxer to have run for President, or Elizabeth Warren for that matter.  But they didn't.  Clinton is by far the most experienced candidate this year.  She has her years in the White House as First Lady (which counts for something when you're an activist as she was), her years as US Senator in New York, and her years as Secretary of State.  She's held a variety of positions, giving her a wide variety of experiences, all helping her become extremely qualified from a background position.  But you don't hire someone just based on their previous jobs, you look further at them to determine whether they're a good fit for the position you're offering.  You ask whether they are as liberal as you'd like.  You ask if they're as much in favor of peace and as disinterested in war as you'd like.  And Clinton isn't either of these for me.  I said in 2008 when I said that she and Obama were far to centrist for me and I've said it again for the last year.  She's a centrist and she's a war-hawk.  That isn't to say she's not better than the centrist-but-racist-lunatic that the Republicans have nominated.  I dare say she's much better, but I pray that she doesn't embroil us in further wars, either fighting Russia in Eastern Europe or fighting terrorists in the Middle East... or some other force.  There's more to my decision than my sexism, which you've determined I have just because I wanted Sanders.  There's more to my decision than my male-privilege that allows me to say that I'm just as not interested in a female centrist war-hawk as I was the male centrist war-hawk that ran as the Republican Presidential nominee in 2008.  When you tell me I'm sexist and privileged, it doesn't make me more interested in our candidate.  In fact it makes me less enthused.  And when you ignore the reasons I'm not in favor of her and tell me that I have other reasons, that doesn't make me listen to you and think about your statements any further, it makes me angry with you and makes me feel that you have no idea what you're talking about.

You know what else makes me less enthused?  When people tell me to get over it or that "Elections have consequences."  Of course "elections have consequences," but let's just take a moment to remember that we don't always know the consequences of elections immediately.  Take this Presidential election, for instance.  Yes, I believe Clinton will be the Democratic Nominee.  Yes, I will be voting for her in November.  But we don't know a few things: 

1) Who will be elected President.  

2) How the utter dismissal of Sanders supporters' feelings and arguments will affect the young left-leaning members of our society and their future voting patterns.  

Let me address the first unknown first, because it's a little quicker to get to the point.  A recent poll has Trump ahead of Clinton.  Say what you want, but that is a very scary thing to me... even more scary than Trump's speech last Thursday.  What's even more scary to me is that Clinton supporters have been ignoring that Trump has been gaining on her for the last 6 months.

And then there's the second point.  Yes, elections have consequences and Clinton won the Democratic nomination (o.k., I'm assuming a bit but it's not a hard assumption to make), but that doesn't mean you should dismiss the hearts and minds of those you need in your camp, just because you don't see another option for them to choose. We should be coming together now, not hurting each other. Choose your words carefully, especially in public, especially to reporters, for your words will be heard and not just by those that agree with you. My words, I feel extremely confident, will be heard by those that do not agree with me.... and to those who disagree with me on this, I ask you to consider whether you really want to come at me and draw me toward that dark side that anger leads to or if you would rather follow the words of Clinton and work with love and compassion and work together to defeat Trump. Yes, I am angry at the DNC, yes, I understand you don't care, and yes, you should let me have my feelings and understand that they are not your own and that I will do the right thing in the end.

Starting now, with this first day of the Democratic Convention, we're supposed to come together as a party.  But instead of the "let's get this done together" that should be filling my Facebook feed and that I should be hearing from my Clinton supporting friends, all I'm hearing are things like "suck it up", "your candidate lost so you should be excited for Clinton now," and "you're a sexist, privileged, white man."  The Republicans just displayed their discord... I guess it's our turn now.  Thanks for making it easy to feel good about getting behind our candidate.

X-Men: Apocalypse (spoilers... duh)

First off... spoilers... duh

So, let's start with the really quite desperately low hanging fruit.  There was a lot of concern about Olivia Munn's acting chops when it was announced that she would be playing Psylocke.  Sadly, or fortunately, depending on whether she's a good actress.  She had all of about 3 lines.  Those lines were rather blandly delivered, but they were pretty blandly written too, so is it her fault or the writer's?  We may never know.  What I do know is that Olivia (and the PR machine for the movie) made a huge deal about her enjoying fighting with swords.  I know that Psylocke is a badass fighter and has psychokinetic powers.  I also know that Psylocke in this movie spends all of like 2 minutes fighting, and most of that is just posed stuff and not actually combat.  Drawing your sword and putting it to someone's throat or cutting a car in half and then posing with lots of CGI do not count as combat.  So, yeah, as you may have figured out, I'm severely disappointed in the movie because of that.

Slightly less low, but still low hanging fruit.  Why... why... WHY are we still having Mystique appearing "naked"?  Admittedly, they finally put some clothes on her that was somewhat almost reminiscent of her comic costume, but it took the entirety of 2, count them TWO trilogies to get us there.  They had the opportunity with the semi-reboot to fix it, but no.

Next topic.  Can we, for the love of comic book movies, not force every movie to act as 10 different entities?  This one was not just completing the set of 3 movies and therefore rounding out the story arcs of several characters, most notably Magneto, Mystique, and Professor X.  But my biggest annoyance with the multiple-functions would have to be the attempt to promote the next Wolverine standalone, otherwise why divert to Stryker's facility at all.  Seriously, the action at Stryker's facility did not promote anything other than to remind us that Wolverine was there which then supports the post-credit sequence... which was also lame.  This movie is 2 hours 27 minutes, and how much could that have been reduced by using another, less time consuming plot device to get the 6 heroes away from the rest of the youth at the school?  Because this movie was trying to be too much, the story telling suffered.  This is just sad since this movie deserved better.

Back to sexism.  There's this great opportunity with the X-Men with such powerful women characters.  They, in fact, tend to be the most powerful of the X-Men.  Yes, Cyclops has his beam, Wolverine is near invincible, and Xavier, well, let's just put him aside for a bit.  Then you have the likes of Storm, Jean Grey and Rogue.  Talk about power houses.  Rogue was introduced in the original trilogy but never came to the fruition that would see her character truly showcase herself.  Storm was there too, and while she showcased her abilities, they were never quite awe-inspiringly, jaw-droppingly demonstrated as they really should be.  In this movie, we have the promise that we'll see more, since she's a horseman of Apocalypse... but no, we still barely see anything... just a bit of lightning in the final fight, not much more than that.  Jean Grey seems to be the only one we really get to see show off in a semi-constant manner.  O.k., and Mystique... she's also shown with her powers and her badass fighting (as poorly choreographed as it is in the original movie.  But I maintain that the women of the X-Men remain under-represented in terms of just how magnificently powerful they are, both in terms of their abilities and in terms of their characters.

There's one last thing that I'm going to complain about, at least in this post.  The villains.  And this topic has a few sub-topics.

First of all.. Magneto.  I get it, we need to have Magneto in every movie because he's a draw... but, no, seriously, please don't.  Have him show up briefly or something but don't have him be a lackey of the big-bad.  He's a big-bad on his own.  He doesn't need Apocalypse to empower him.  I must accept that this was a trilogy and therefore they're rounding out his arc, but perhaps in the next X-Men movie he can either play a much smaller role or not be there?  Perhaps he shows up to recruit for the Brotherhood but doesn't actually do anything else?  Or maybe it's just mentioned that he's off recruiting or hasn't been heard from?

I like that Psylocke walks away having witnessed Apocalypse being betrayed by both Magneto and Storm.  I love that both Magneto and Storm betray Apocalypse with good reason... but Apocalypse dies (or so it seems).  I'm tired of the arch-enemy dying at the end of the movie.  If Apocalypse hadn't just woken up during the movie, I would have been more accepting as he could have created other villains over the years that would come up later.  The original X-Men trilogy had a common enemy, even if Phoenix stole the show in the final part of the final episode.  I want a bit more of that.  And the enemy doesn't have to be on the forefront... you could have had Apocalypse show up, create 4 horsemen for the X-Men to fight, or create another super-villain, and stay in the background and come back in the second and third episodes of the trilogy.  Magneto, it can be said, is that common villain I'm looking for... and I agree that he could have been, but I would say he hasn't been in this trilogy.  In fact, he's played roughly the same role in each of the first two movies: reluctant hero -> villain.  And then he transitions in this movie to the pattern of villain -> hero.  But he's never the big-bad.  He's always reacting to others.  This is fine, but I want something a bit more.  I want the leader of the Brotherhood of Mutants.  I want a series of movies based on the sentinels.  I want Apocalypse empowering mutants and sending them to battle the X-Men on his behalf.  In short, I want a big-bad with staying power that doesn't just do a quick one-off thing in each movie (such as sending the missiles back at the ships that fired them or parking a stadium around the White House and taking over a few sentinels for around 30 minutes).

And lastly, Apocalypse deserved better story telling.  He's a big-bad and you saw that he needed an introduction.  Do that introduction well and don't rush the rest of the story.  You could easily have made this movie a two-parter.  Introduce Apocalypse, let him start recruiting, have the X-Men tangle with a couple recruits... maybe even kidnap Xavier in the first movie and blow up the estate and leave that as the cliff hanger.  That way you spend an entire movie just on the recruiting and don't rush through it.  The first movie becomes more a story about the formation of the 4 Horsemen and the second movie becomes a much better movie about the X-Men coming together and finding their ability to work together.

Alright, that's it for the moment.  Hope you enjoyed this rant.  Have other aspects of the movie you didn't like?  Do you feel I've judged the movie too harshly?  Let me know.

Clothes and sexism

As discussed previously, I'm evil and sexist.  Accepting that, I'm going to point out a few things about fashion.  Don't worry, this will be short.

First, the easy stuff that's not surprising to anyone.  Women's clothing is horrific and sexist.  No functional pockets and sizes being wildly different by company are just two ways in which this is the case.

That said, and here's the stuff I'll get flack for and proves further how I'm evil and sexist, expectations from men and women are different and have undertones of sexism too.  Professional clothing.  For a long time, women's professional fashion tended toward the showing of skin.  This is obvious sexism as it treated women as sex objects.  As time has gone by, offices have become more accepting of women wearing a much larger variety of clothes, including many that disregard the earlier sex-object fashion sense.  Men's professional fashion, on the other hand, while also changing, has not changed nearly as much.  Men are expected to wear pants.  Not shorts, pants.  In business casual environments we're allowed to wear t-shirts, but to be truly professional, we have to wear long-sleeve shirts, preferably button-down dress shirts.

I've heard more than a little discussion about how offices keep temperatures lower than women would like and that some of the reason for this is that men wear suits and therefore the office temperature is set to make them comfortable.  Here's some quick, highly unscientific observation on my part: women prefer much higher temperatures than men.  There is a constant complaint in my office of the building being too cold and as constant that complaint is, the men don't feel cold at all, ever, in any room, period... and we're not wearing suits.  We're wearing long sleeve shirts and pants, yes, but no jacket.  The top button of our dress shirts (or indeed sometimes the top 2, depending on the guy) are open.  And now we're back to that point I was making in the third paragraph.  Would the men wear shorts if we were permitted?  Probably.  I'd certainly be more comfortable in shorts and a t-shirt, but that's not considered professional.  I'm limited to long pants, whether it be "smart" jeans or long dress pants.  If I could, I'd wear "smart" jean shorts or dress shorts.  I'd still be perfectly fine with the temperature by the way, I'd just be slightly less likely to be sweating on any given day.

"So, what's the problem?" you might ask.  Well, it's 2-fold.  First, there's a hidden double-standard that nobody talks about.  Women have professional clothing that is a lot lighter and airy and doesn't have to cover as much of the body... but the range permits heavier clothing that covers just as much as men are required to wear.  The second part of the problem isn't a sexist problem at all, it's an environmental one.  By forcing men to wear heavier clothes, by forcing us to be warmer, offices need to be cooler, which requires much more energy in the summer.  In the winter, everybody wears heavier clothing because, well, it's colder outside.  But in the summer, when we should all be wearing lighter clothing so we're not as hot outside, men aren't permitted to.  Yes, we would still need air conditioning even if everyone were allowed to wear lighter clothing, but we would need less of it.

So, there's my rant on clothing.  Yes, I know, I'm a man and can't possibly understand the hardships of women and the demands on them from fashion.  Yes, I know, clearly these hardships of men are nothing in comparison to those of women (even though professional clothing for women now is far more diverse than men's clothing and includes clothing that is virtually the same, if not identical, to men's).  But you know what?  You already pointed out that I'm a sexist by simply being a man, so, why shouldn't I prove it a bit by speaking my sexist mind.

I am Become Trump (aka the problem with shame tactics)

O.k., so clearly I've been shamed into hating myself by people who's purpose in shaming me was to get me to fight harder for their cause.  People use shame in this way a lot and it seems they do so more and more.  This tactic is alarming and sometimes gets people to think about the issues and to change their ways... the problem is, what happens if that tactic turns someone off and in fact changes the person's ways so they are fighting less for the cause, and sometimes even fighting against it?  

Prime example: I feel shame for being a man.  I recently felt that I couldn't say something (I even edited a paragraph out of my recent post... yes, that post was edited, hard as that might be to believe). This reminds me of Trump's statement that men are afraid to say things about women.  Now, to be clear, I do not support Trump... but this one statement of his rings a bit true.  And let the further shaming begin.  Just as women's rights groups were quick to respond saying that while Trump is afraid of women saying things, women are afraid of real things, like rape, sexual abuse, regular physical abuse... I expect you're saying this right now.  I am shamed, but Trump's statement is also ringing truer to me.  

We have to be careful how we use this tactic, for it can easily have side-effects we weren't expecting. And maybe that's fine with you.  Maybe you've already made the calculation that your side will gain more out of the shaming than it will lose.  If so, my hat is off to you, as is my support.

Sincerely,

Privileged Ill Intent

p.s. - do Trump and The Kingpin now remind you of each other?

I am the Ill Intent

I understand that, as a white man, I can't conceive of how it feels to be black in this country.  I understand and respect that.  I've learned, over the last couple years, that I shouldn't comment on the opinions of blacks nor the tactics of those fighting injustice.  I've also learned that I am the adversary of those fighting injustice, simply by not fighting that injustice every day myself... in truth, I do not fight that injustice every month or nearly at all.  I used to like to think that I was a supporter of equal rights and privileges between races, but I have been told on several occasions that those who do not fight for those things are the adversary... so I am trying to accept that I am that adversary.

I also understand that, as a white man, I can't conceive of how it feels to be a woman in this country.  I am slowly coming to terms with this.  I have been informed recently that, here too, if I am not fighting the injustices placed upon women every day, I am the adversary of women's rights.  I am slowly realizing that I cannot make judgements about how important things are, such as the first woman to be the Presidential nominee of a major political party in the US.  I apologize to any who I have offended by belittling this accomplishment of Clinton's by comparing the US to other nations around the world or by suggesting that it is equally, if not more important to agree with the politics of the candidate you're in favor of.  I am a man, and have been told that I am therefore complicit in the rape-culture we have here in the US, which is disturbing to me, but I am working on accepting this too.

I'm going to digress here a bit and do something unusual for my posts.  I would like to ask for the opinion of women who are reading this post.  Would you be equally as excited the momentous occasion of the Republicans nominating Carly Fiorina, if they had, as you are about the Democrats nominating Clinton?  My feeling is that you would be, but I'd genuinely like to know what you think.  I'm not saying you'd be as in favor of Fiorina becoming President, just excited by a major political party in the US nominating a woman.

Ok, digression ended.  I imagine that I will learn in the coming years that I am equally complicit in other social injustices... whether it be toward Hispanics, Asians, transgender, homosexuals, bisexuals, ... the list goes on.

I would extend this philosophy to include that I am the enemy of the green movement.  After all, I drive my Prius to work rather than bicycle or take public transportation.  I use more electricity than my house will hopefully soon produce using roof-mounted solar panels.  I eat meat, which is not as environmentally friendly an option as being a vegan.  The list goes on.  I am coming to terms with this as well.

O.k., so I'm essentially evil and an advocate for all that I feel is wrong... It's an interesting dichotomy that I am working my way through understanding.  I have been working on it for years now and it may well take the rest of my life to fully understand it, but I do know one thing: this further explains my self-loathing and my feelings of obligation.  I would like to take a moment to apologize to all who I have harmed in the past and all who I will inevitably harm in the future, whether physically or emotionally, whether through action or by expressing my opinion or by expressing facts which are not as pleasing to hear or as helpful to the narrative that they would like made at a particular time.

A speech from the Netflix DareDevil series comes to mind and I will leave you with it:

"I'm not a religious man, but I've read bits and pieces over the years. Curiosity more than faith. But this one story... There was a man, he was traveling from Jerusalem to Jericho when he was set upon by men of ill intent. They stripped the traveler of his clothes, they beat him, and they left him bleeding in the dirt. And a priest happened by, saw the traveler, but he moved to the other side of the road and continued on. And a Levite, a religious functionary, he came to the place, saw the dying traveler, but he, too, moved to the other side of the road, passed him by. But then came a man from Samaria, a Samaritan, a good man. He saw the traveler bleeding in the road and he stopped to aid him without thinking of the circumstance or the difficulty it might bring him. The Samaritan tended to the traveler's wounds, applying oil and wine, and he carried him to an inn, gave him all the money he had for the owner to take care of the traveler, as the Samaritan, he continued on his journey. He did this simply because the traveler was his neighbor. He loved his city and all the people in it. I always thought I was the Samaritan in that story. It's funny, isn't it? How even the best of men can be deceived by their true nature. ... It means that I am not the Samaritan. That I'm not the priest, or the Levite. That I am the ill intent who set upon the traveler on a road that he should not have been on."

Trump, Clinton, Political Parties, and Labels... Evil Confining Labels

As unpopular among my friends as it is, I'll start by acknowledging that, similar to the title of this post, Sanders isn't going to make it to the Democratic nomination.  Is Clinton cold in saying that she's got this locked up?  Not really.  Barring something extreme, like her being indicted in the next 2 weeks or something coming out in the next couple months that drives the super delegates to go against what the Democrats have already voted in favor of, Clinton is the nominee.  Sanders would need 70% of the remaining regular delegates just to tie the Clinton in regular delegates.  Now... 70% isn't impossible, but New Jersey and New Mexico have closed primaries and Sanders isn't winning closed primaries... and then there are the super delegates.  Even if Sanders can manage to get 70% of the remaining votes, he still needs to convince super delegates to switch sides, and switch sides heavily.  If Clinton gets 13% of the vote and the super delegates remain where they are, she wins the nomination... that's right, she needs 13% of remaining votes and for super delegates (read Democratic establishment... i.e. the camp that wants Clinton) to maintain their announced positions.

Alright, enough upsetting blog post, let's move on to something similarly depressing.  Trump is the Republican nominee.  Why is this depressing to me?  Is it just what it says about the right wing of our country?  Clearly that's all it could be because if you listen to the news, Trump is awful and has no chance of winning.  That would seem great except for that the news has no feel for how Trump got this far in the first place.  They've been talking about how Trump is horrible and therefore people are going to turn on him any moment now.  So, the good news, Trump has severe unfavorable ratings.  The bad news is that so does Clinton.  The good news is that just about every demographic hates Trump.  The bad news is that the Right hates Clinton just as equally as many hate Trump.  But there is hope.  The demographics... thank goodness for demographics... if they stay true to their past support patterns, the Democrats will have an easy time winning, IF they get out the vote.  And there's the wild card.  Who will get out the vote.  Both sides can play up anger and hatred of the other side.  My fear is that we'll turn toward actual political positions and Trump will reveal that he's a moderate, just like Clinton... and potentially in some ways to the left of Clinton.  This one's really confusing to me to be honest and I don't know where people will turn.  I know that I don't want Trump if only because of the statements he's made in the race and how he's come this far.  Clinton's a centrist, slightly right of center actually, but she's pretending to be to the left because of Sanders.... but now comes the pivot for both candidates.  ~sigh~

Ok., one last thing before I go... people are making a lot of hay over political parties and the nomination process.  I keep hearing pundits say that people shouldn't be so upset at the parties because they're private organizations.  One thing that has been pointed out is that people who are independents because they don't want to be labeled are upset because they haven't been able to vote.  I can see both sides of this, but here are two things to consider:

1. The news is saying that people are upset at the political parties because of the closed primaries.    That's not all we're upset about.  There's also the structuring of the debates so that most Democrats wouldn't watch them and therefore wouldn't be able to see the contrast between Clinton and Sanders as readily.  The political parties have more to do with who gets nominated than just the primaries themselves.  The Democratic Party leadership has been supporting Clinton from the start.  This is what angers Sanders supporters, not the primaries, but the way that the party leadership has been openly against Sanders.
2. The primaries on the Democratic side have fallen into the following pattern: Sanders wins states that allow independents to have a voice and have caucuses.  Clinton wins states that don't allow independents to vote and have elections.  Let's take out the last part of each sentence and focus in on the first.  Independents are leaning toward Sanders and are upset about not being able to vote in closed election states.  What's equally interesting, if not more so, is that independents tend to vote the same way from election to election.  Some vote Republican every time, others vote Democratic every time.  So, why are they independent?  They say it's because they don't like labels, they don't like being tied down to anything.  I've said this before and I'm saying it again, get over it.  You want to have a say in the politics but your state is overwhelmingly in favor of Democrats or Republicans and therefore your vote in the general isn't as powerful?  Your state has closed primaries?  Fine, pick your side and vote in the primary.  Labeling yourself as a Democrat doesn't mean you agree with the establishment, it just means that in the Primary you get to vote in the Democratic Primary.  Done.  Fin.  That's it.  You're not confining yourself.  It's not like you're saying you're a straight, male, Catholic... you're saying what party you're affiliated with, i.e. which side you're going to try to have an impact on.  Oh, and if you're going to tell me that by refusing to pick aside, the establishments will pay attention and change their ways... if that were the case, would they not have heard and changed by now based on people not voting?  Abstinence from the political process won't change those that have power over it, it never has, it never will.

Was Trump Actually Right?

Last week, Trump told Chris Matthews that, if abortion were illegal, women getting abortions should be punished.  There were two paths of thinking this led me down:

1. When should the person purchasing the illegal act/item be punished versus when should it be the provider?  In most cases, I would say it's the provider: drugs, guns, murder.  There are a few where it should be the purchaser instead, the primary one that comes to mind for a potential is prostitution.  There's also the potential for the purchaser and the provider should both be punished.  In the case of abortion, there's an interesting predicament, which leads me to thought-path #2.
2. Why do pro-life people think that abortion should be outlawed.  My understanding is that they feel it's murder.  They feel that personhood begins significantly earlier than I do.  IF you feel that abortion is murder (I do not), why would you not feel that the woman seeking the abortion should be punished?  The pro-life movement seemed to instantly distance itself from Trumps statement and even lash out at him for it, Cruz included.  So, I ask Cruz, if person A brings someone to be murdered by person B, is person A not going to be charged with accessory, at minimum?  So, how is the person within the woman different from the person outside the woman?  I feel it necessary to remind everyone reading this that I do not believe the thing that is growing within a woman is a person, I believe abortion is not murder, and therefore the doctor is not murdering someone and the woman getting the abortion is not an accessory.... but I'm curious what the distinction Cruz makes is.