FLASH POST: Political Party Implicitly Accepted as Religion in the United States?

CONTENTS

1. FLASH POST: Uncivil Agreement: How Politics Became Out Identity
2. Personal Status as It Relates to The Lextopia


Anybody read Uncivil Agreement: How Politics Became Our Identity by Lilliana Mason yet? I haven't, but it sounds interesting.

Interesting interview of Lilliana Mason at In A Minute with Sam Sanders podcast about how our political party affiliation has reached the level of religion. Per the interview, Mason makes the hypothesis that since the passing of Equal Rights legislation in the '60s, affiliation with a political party has become a strong aspect of our identities; so strong, in fact, that party affiliation has become analagous to religious affiliation. I wonder if this implicit understanding/acceptance of party affiliation as religion contributes to "gerrymandering protection" in which initiatives against maladaptive gerrymandering has creating "competitive districts" as one of its goals.

I've put this book on my to read list, but I'd be interested in hearing other peoples' thoughts on this phenomenon. Does such a phenomenon feel true? Does party affiliation analogous to religious affiliation contribute to the tension in America today? Does this phenomenon contribute to our media consumption bubbles? Any other thoughts that this possible phenomenon brings up for you?

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PERSONAL STATUS AS IT RELATES TO THE LEXTOPIA

I haven't written in about a month and a couple weeks ago. At about that time, I had started physical therapy. I had fractured my heel in a bike accident in which after a complicated sequence of events, a delivery van-truck had rear ended me. I got flown over the handle bars, landed on my right foot, then stumbled to the ground. I tried walking around a bit. Feeling enough discomfort in my foot, I decided to stay on the ground until I got picked up by my wife and brought to urgent care. Other than my heel getting fractured, I had maybe a scratch or two.

I've been lucky with this injury. Most people who get this injury are contractors or people in the construction industry who fall off ladders, roofs, or some high-up location. About two weeks ago, I asked the orthopedist how long I should expect pain even after I'm walking fine. His long explanation cut short: I'm such an outlier on the side of good luck (just cracks and no displacement of bone in my heel), the orthopedist didn't know how much longer I'll feel pain. Most people who get the injury have their heel all cracked up and scattered around their foot, requiring surgery, screws, and largely never able to work in their industry again, hoping to get onto workers comp disability or something. In the long run, even though this experience hasn't been a fun ride, I've had a comparably minor injury (though humbling since I needed crutches, have had to use my body in ways it wasn't built to be used, and IT'S SO DAMN EXHAUSTING!).

The orthopedist had initially prescribed bed rest but still fine for me to work for the first month and a half. The orthopedist also told me to take off the protective boot when in safe locations and move the foot around to cut down on how much physical therapy I'd have to do later. Other than soreness from using my arms and crutches to move around and sadness at my leg atrophying a bit from disuse, I didn't feel much pain. Exhaustion and soreness from moving around, yes, but not much pain. I could even do some occasional writing, especially on The Lextopia when I got up about some social or political issue.

Once physical therapy had started, though, the pain and extreme soreness started. Getting an atrophied leg and foot working again takes some hard work. My best comparison is like the day after taking a stretching or dance class for the first time, except physical therapy feels like that first class EVERY TIME. So upon initally starting the physical therapy, the pain from it made thinking straight for a length of time difficult. I got caught up a lot on some backlogged television, but I really couldn't concentrate well enough to do much more, and I've got plenty to do!

About a week and half ago, I started walking again without crutches, on my own power. I started the day after an orthopedist appointment. The doctor told me everything looked fine enough that it's up to me and the physical therapist on how much weight to put on the heel, how much not to use the crutches, and when I can finish the physical therapy. I started taking the bus because I could walk that far. I admit with the snow storm this weekend and the ice that could have accumulated on the sidewalks, I may have to reconsider my own capabilities. Balance and pain still cause issues, especially with suprise movements (when I could easily balance myself or trip myself into a balanced position without trouble when fully able).

I make progress every day. I don't walk perfectly and balancing on one foot still remains difficult, but I'm getting there. Hopefully in a couple weeks, I won't have to think too much about how far I can walk before I will get exhausted and frustrated from both weakness and pain. Maybe I'll be back to walking to the grocery store and feeling the compulsion to walk around to expend some extra energy. Nonetheless, without Lyft, Instacart, or the elevators at work and home, I don't know how I would have made it through the last two to three months!

Suffice to say, I believe that my cognitive abilities will return to enough of a baseline that you'll see more at The Lextopia. I'm working an essay about the basic emotion/instinct of disgust and bigotry, which I hope to publish soon. I also have a backlog of personal stuff and paperwork to gather together for the claim on my injury, so hopefully that stuff won't get too much in the way.

In the meantime, I plan to integrate more "Flash Posts" like the beginning of this section into The Lextopia. Flash posts will be things that just grab my attention throughout my days that I think my readership will find interesting. Hopefully you will! Don't feel shy about commenting or even "Buying Me a Coffee"! The more I'm "bought coffee", the more I can hopefully post.

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Representing Gays in Narrative

OR REFLECTIONS ON FANS AND THE ADVOCATE THINKING CHARACTER ON HEROES IS/WAS GAY

I copy and paste the following entries I made to discussion at the Chicago Speculative Fiction Group:

12/26/2006 5:39 pm:

I got the following 'official news' from a Hollywood e-mailing I get regularly:

'NBC Counters Claims That 'Heroes' Character Is Gay
NBC has denied that Zach, the young superhero played by Thomas Dekker on Heroes is gay, despite the fact that on his MySpace webpage he describes his sexual orientation as "not sure." The issue had been raised by the gay-oriented blog afterelton.com. However, at least one other blog has noted that Dekkar has been signed to costar in The Sarah Connor Chronicles, based on the Terminator film franchise and that his character is likely to be written out of the story line. Meanwhile, Heroes creator Tim Kring is quoted in the gay magazine The Advocate as fending off the speculation about Zach's sexual orientation. Kring sent out an email message to websites where the claims appeared saying, "We apologize for misleading the audience and wish that we could have handled things better on our end. But making a TV show is often a very imprecise business. As you stated, Heroes is a big sprawling drama, and there is no reason to believe that a gay character will not be represented on our show in the future. It is my hope that if we do, we do it with honesty and dignity."'

12/27/2006 6:13 pm:

Kring's e-mail was clear?

Honestly, I think it could go either way. When I watched it, I never caught any gay subtext. I caught 'invincible cheerleader' not being interested in the guy and the 'popular' kids being Fing assholes, like 'popular' kids will be in high school.

And from what I've read from writers and producers when it comes to making TV shows, fans can totally misinterpret things happening in a show. On top of that, good writers and producers often don't like to reveal information that's more than needed about characters, settings, situations, etc. etc. so that they can have the flexibility to provide surprise or change something if it works better for the story. Half the time, that's where a conflict between fans and writers/producers can come from: fans think that a certain direction goes against continuity while writers/producers never created continuity about certain issues.

Heroes never outright said anything about the character. Except for 'outside the TV show' franchise outlets, the show never really made any clear references to the sexual orientation of the character, except to show one characters lack of sexual interest in him (when they had become quite close as friends) and high school antagonists acting like real jerks to him. Then again. . .I'm not saying the character isn't gay. . .I'm just saying it was never officially established, which I think is actually pretty cool.

As for Kring's e-mail, it sounds like they would want to present homosexuality in a different light, unless the letter's just smoke & mirrors. I just don't think there's enough established evidence to say either which way.

And why the hell am I so worked up about this matter. . .other than I think, inside the show which I take as canon compared to the franchise and media sources, that the writers and producers have left it open enough that they could make him gay, not gay or not even make it an issue.

12/27/2006 7:07 pm:

Quote [from Out.com]:
Heroes will feature a gay character, according to Kring and Fuller, who is now writing for the show. In the pilot a popular high school cheerleader with superhuman invulnerability selects a loner from her class to divulge her secret to—though he’s not revealed as gay in that episode. Kring admits, “I’m feeling a little odd about it, because I literally haven’t even discussed it with the actor yet.”


Remember the argument that Saddam Hussein and Al Qaeda were working together. I'll admit that there's no clear cut evidence for or against it, but that whole premise was created in a similar manner as this. I don't see anything in quotes about the cheerleader's friend being gay. It's a conclusion that the article writer came to.

A musician friend of mine once told me how interviewers will write something in an article about her as if she had said it. In reality, though, the musician friend never said anything of the sort and doesn't even think that way.

Honestly, that's one of the main reasons I would rather ignore apochrophyllic sources other than fan discussion about the a piece of work, based on what the piece has released as information.

This whole topic, frankly, does make me see some merit to the Right wing accusation of a gay agenda. If The Advocate makes loose connections about what a head writer/producer says and it has something to do with homosexuality, THEN IT HAS TO BE TRUE. . .kind of like if the United States President creates loose connections through rhetoric by bringing up Saddam Hussein the day after 9/11/2002 and mentioning Hussein and Al Qaeda close together, THEN IT HAS TO BE TRUE.

I'm not trying to make any kind of political statement. I'm just saying that people fall victim to a rhetorical device that creates loose connections, which they believe. And if enough people believe it, then it becomes a meme and a social truth. . .which is not rational.

12/27/2006 7:09 pm:

PS I don't mean fans necessarily make truth. I'm just saying that I enjoy discussing ideas and hypotheses that fans have about pieces of narrative and art.

12/27/2006 11:03 pm:

Gosh, I'm stuck on this for being a straight guy.

Nonetheless. . .the argument on the
http://popculturejunkies.com/2006/12/13/heroes-closeted/ Website pretty much perpetuates stereotypes of what a homosexual is, simply by their taste in movies.

And:

Quote [from show]:
"Are you flirting with me?" "Oh god no, really, no."


I totally read that as me in high school being majorly shy around a girl I like. I can count on three hands how many times I would have tried flirting with a girl then reject that I was doing it. I don't think I'm gay. . .you can ask my fiancee.

In other words, assuming a character on TV or in a movie is gay. . .hell, talking about your "gaydar" strikes me as something that perpetuates the stereotype of what it means to be "gay."

Now, I'll admit, stereotyping can sometimes be used for good use, especially when used not to offend anyone. In this case, however, I can see it expressed negatively, not necessarily by you, [name struck], but society, in general.

I see in a world that has people attracted to the same sex wanting to have equal treatment when it comes to romantically loving someone, the "this character is gay" really doesn't come off as responsible (unless you hate gays and want to perpetuate the stereotypes) when the conclusion is based on arguments of stereotype.

If Heroes, in the end, decided to retract the storyline, then I think it's actually somewhat dumb to criticize them for it. If the argument is based simply on the representation of characters attracted to the same sex on a pure statistical level, they have half of a worthwhile argument. If the gay character thrown in simply for representation acts as a stereotypical gay person and is the only gay character on a show, then I think that could be very irresponsible. . .unless it's making a clever point.

Heroes might be able to make some kind of clever point about how society reacts to homosexuality, but that would involve a point about gay people being "mutants," which isn't necessarily reponsible, either.

I guess what I'm saying is that I agree with the supposed "smoke & mirrors" Kring e-mail. If you're going to have gay people on the show, it has to be done in a responsible manner that doesn't perpetuate stereotypes nor try to point out same-sex attraction as an aberration. After all, I would think with the whole same-sex marriage v. civil union controversy, gay people would rather be portrayed as a norm rather than a point about how different they are from the rest of the human race.

But then again, I'm sure there's a responsible and clever way to approach this one. After all, there's the controversy now about the people that argue American citizens should just consider themselves "Americans" and not have to parade their ethnicity around and be proud of it. If a gay person doesn't get portrayed stereotypically, then there's probably something to say about them conforming to the "keeping it in the bedroom" ideology when straight people are allowed to have PDA, marriage and other "normal" things.

So, in the end, I guess Tim Kring can't win. I wonder. . .in my novel, if I don't have any gay characters or describe the color of people's skin, have I caved into pressure. Especially since I wouldn't know how to approach it without possibly misrepresenting the experience of non-white people.

I'm even scared of having women in my novel. . .how am I supposed to represent the women's experience when I'm a man?

OK. I've rambled on too long.