Shit that pissed me off – 2/10

The autotuned “Time of My Life” by the Black Eyed Peas

I know this song has been around for a long time but the new radio station at work has this blasted thing on a heavy rotation and I want to cause physical damage to the speakers every time it is on.

I don’t mind cover songs at all.  The original of this song is hardly one of the greatest songs every written.  What it does have, however, is voices that sound like they feel something close to the emotion conveyed in the song lyrics.

Try this: turn on your computer’s voice simulator and have it say “I love you.”  Now have your significant other do the same thing (preferably right after you’ve helped them have an orgasm).  Which do you prefer?  If you answered “a,” you will probably love the version of the song above.  If not – stick with the original.

America the Beautiful and The Star Spangled banner – the Super Bowl version

Everyone remember 9/11?  Yeah, I figured.

Do you remember how, since 9/11, they have added “America the Beautiful” the Super Bowl pre-game?

What ticks me off about this is what they had the public address announcer say after “America the Beautiful” but before “The Star Spangled Banner.”  What he said was this:  “And now, to honor America, please welcome two time Grammy Award winner Kelly Clarkson who will sing our National Anthem.”

Or something close to that.  I know the number of Grammies she won was important.  Madonna has won seven – they pointed that out at the halftime show.  Screw you Kelly Clarkson!

Anyway, my point is this – what the hell was “America the Beautiful” for if it wasn’t “to honor America?”

The whole thing is a blind patriotic circle jerk anyway.  Let’s sing a couple of patriotic songs, show some pictures of soldiers serving overseas and then make a shit ton of money.   That last bit probably honors “The American Way” more than either of those songs ever have.

America collectively freaks out over a middle finger during the Super Bowl halftime show

Pardon my stronger than usual language but hey America – get the fuck over yourself.  The NFL and NBC are falling all over themselves to apologize for the fact they failed to blur the obscene gesture and the virgin eyes of football fans across the nation were treated to something they have probably seen no more than a few hundred times when driving in rush hour traffic.

Every Patriot fan knows what that gesture means because at least five times during the Super Bowl they shouted “would one of you assholes just catch a fucking ball????”

Are we such a nation of puritans that we can’t get past a little bird flipping?  I’m writing this on Monday but I have little doubt that at least one Republican candidate for President (I’m betting Santorum) will point to this as evidence of deteriorating moral values in America.  Just you wait.

(I didn’t see any clips of Santorum saying this but he was too busy being smug over his continued appeal to right-wing crazy people)

A Federal Appeals Court Rejects Proposition 8 in California

We all know that I’m a strong proponent of gay marriage. This ruling is worded very narrowly to apply only Proposition 8.  Because it applies only to the state of California, it seems unlikely that the Supreme Court will even choose to consider the appeal, which will mean the ruling of the lower court will stand.

So why does this piss me off?

Because the people who are standing up for Proposition 8 are such jackasses.

Take this quote from the story I linked to above: “The Alliance Defense Fund, a conservative Christian legal foundation that backed Proposition 8, said it was not surprised that ‘this Hollywood-orchestrated attack on marriage — tried in San Francisco — turned out this way.'”

Screw you, asshole.  You lost and the judges made the point that you passed Proposition 8 specifically to discriminate against a certain group of people – which is fucked up.

You have never once managed to prove that gay marriage is a threat to anything more than your comfort level because you don’t like being around two guys (or girls) kissing.  I don’t like being around churches either but I haven’t tried to pass any laws getting them out of my state, have I?

They talk about the “will of the people” but if Proposition 8 were on the ballot in California this year, it wouldn’t pass.  If there was a voter initiative to strike down proposition 8, it would pass.  The people who are against Proposition 8 don’t want to fight this issue on the ballot every couple of years though.  You know why?

Because civil rights are not decided by majority rule.  You are wasting millions of dollars in money and hundreds of hours in time over something that is  none of your fucking business.

“Indiana Jones and the Raiders of the Lost Ark”

Yeah, this one is petty.  I can’t spend all of my time being annoyed by Rick Santorum.

Raiders of the Lost Ark is my favorite film.  I love every minute of it.  What I hate is the fact that Paramount decided to call the film Indiana Jones and the Raiders of the Lost Ark  when it released the movies on DVD.   Presumably they did this because they figured that people who were fans of the other two Indiana Jones films were unaware that they were sequels.

Thing is, Indiana is one of the Raiders of the Lost Ark!  He’s one of the dudes looking for it!  The question is who is going to get there first.  The new name doesn’t make any sense!  It is, at best, redundant.  It’s like calling the film A Raider of the Lost Ark and the other Radiers of the Lost Ark.

I can only hope that when they release the film on blu-ray (and why the hell haven’t they done that), they will realize that people aren’t stupid and the name of the film is Raiders of the Lost Ark.

Coe College

I attended Coe College for one year in 1985-86.  I made some good, lifelong friends there.

But the school wasn’t for me.  I wasn’t happy with the theatre program and because I was a theatre major, I made the decision to leave the school.  At the time, I was an eighteen year old kid and I hated hated hated Coe College.

My attitude has cooled over time.  It wasn’t the college that was the problem so much as it wasn’t the right college for me.

Thing is, they keep calling and mailing me and asking me for money.  They even tell me that they see I graduated from Coe in 1989.  No – I left in 1986.

I’ve told them several times that I didn’t graduate from Coe and that I regularly contribute to the college I did graduate from and would they please stop calling me and sending me letters because they are wasting money.  I try not to be petulant because the poor undergraduate on the other side of the phone is just doing this as part of their student aid package.

But after I got another phone call this week, I’ve reached the point where petulance seems to be needed.  Next time they call, I’m going to say that they shouldn’t call themselves an institute of higher learning until they can finally learn to leave me the hell alone.

The Amazing Atheist proves that atheists can be jackasses

There are some folks out there who think all atheists are jackasses.  They are wrong.  Most of us are people who don’t believe in god and would prefer if we didn’t have every else’s gods shoved in our faces all the time.

As in any subset of humanity, however, there definitely are jackasses who are atheists.  This dude is one of them.  He’s an atheist who is also a part of the “Men’s Rights” movement and he seems to think that telling women they deserve to be raped is hilarious.

I recommend against clicking on the link.  Even though it is a link in which PZ Meyers rips into this guy, he includes some truly offensive quotes that will piss you off.  This guy feeds off indignation and anger.  Does he really believe that women deserve to be raped?  I don’t think he does.  I think he’s doing it to get a reaction.  I think he believes he’s funny

He’s not.  He’s just an asshole.

White house getting ready to cave on the issue of contraceptive coverage at Catholic institutions

You ever notice how the separation of church and state always comes up when the state is telling the church how to do something but never when the church is telling the state how to do something.

Take Rick Santorum (no). He’s a Catholic who has said he believes that we should make contraception illegal. That is a faith thing in which he is suggesting that all Americans should be subjected to the requirements of his faith.

But when the government says that Catholic hospitals and schools should include contraception as part of the health care packages they offer to their employees, that is government trying to impose their values on the church and that isn’t OK.

Now I believe contraception should be available to everyone along with comprehensive sex education that teaches them how to use it.  I think someone who goes to work at a Catholic hospital because – I don’t know – they are a nurse and that is where they can get a job shouldn’t be denied access to contraception because the Catholic Church is run by a bunch of old men who really don’t give a shit about women.

I’m not sure a government mandate is the way to go because it simply allows the Catholic church to bawl about the separation of church and state and the fact is, they will probably win that argument.

Which is what pisses me off.  If I tried to say that the anti gay agenda being pushed by the religious right was a separation of church and state issue (it fucking is), they would tell me that this is a Christian Nation and as such, our nation should reflect Christian values.

Try to tell the church to do anything, however, and they have no problem with the first amendment at all.