| What Crawled Up My Butt? |
Normally I am the easy go lucky guy. Don’t make waves, let people walk all over me. Be the one the lets others make decisions so as not to go against what people want to do. Try and take the positive, high road to everything. Try and make the best of everything, especially if it affects someone else. Well this post will not be like that. I might offend a few people and for that I am sorry but I just feel I need to say something.
Today I saw a rally going on. The rally was Diversity Michigan or something to that affect. Now here is a little background before I go further. Two separate issues were voted on by the people of Michigan. The end result is they said we do not want you to be able to use race in the decision of who is admitted into the states public universities although it is more far reaching than that. The second thing, passed in 2004 and challenged many times bans gay marriages and also applies to same-sex domestic partner benefits.
Fast forward. For better or worse that is where we are now. Anyway this rally was saying how we need more Diversity in Michigan. They were going on and on about it. But now here is what burns my butt about this.
Almost everyone that attended, and by the way there probably was a bit over 100 people there, almost every one was white. I saw several people on stage that were speaking and a little less than half of them were Hispanic, or Chinese, or black. I saw press there and who where they interviewing? They were interviewing a black woman. I think there were only 3 people or so in the “crowd” that where black. And now watch the press do the following.
Show the interview with that woman. Never interview anyone that is white. Show non white speakers. Show the “crowd” as if it is huge and all these people were really into the rally when in fact that was a very tiny group that seemed to attract very little attention. Give you the impression that this is the most important thing going on and we need to pay attention to it.
Here we have the people that report the news actually making the news. I hate that and it really needs to STOP!
Now on the diversity front I have mixed feelings about it. I have a hard time understanding why same sex couples should be able to get benefits from their partners when two people just living together can not. Now I know they can not legally be married where as the couple can get married but still, I think the right way to handle this is to allow civil unions and allow this to be applied to everyone, not just same sex couples. Don’t call it a marriage however as I see married being reserved for a man and a woman. I know, not very flexible but what can I say. As to the admittance to universities this one touches on a nerve with me. Growing up I was unofficially told you are white and you are male (imagine that), don’t even think about applying for a job here. This was unofficially told to me by a friend that worked at the place I was applying to. The same thing applied to college admittance. Now this did not affect me but what happens is if you are female you get some points. If you are a minority you get more points. So someone that did the same or even worse on admittance tests would score higher and get admitted to the college and I would get the “Sorry Charlie” letter. Explain to me how that is fair.
OK I should not have typed the last paragraph. I am sure that will not be popular but grrr.
UPDATE: OK, the media has surprised me. Through the magic of DirecTV and Tivo I watched all three major news stations in my area and no one covered the story. I will see if the newspaper covers it. I think maybe some faith has been restored.
Today I saw a rally going on. The rally was Diversity Michigan or something to that affect. Now here is a little background before I go further. Two separate issues were voted on by the people of Michigan. The end result is they said we do not want you to be able to use race in the decision of who is admitted into the states public universities although it is more far reaching than that. The second thing, passed in 2004 and challenged many times bans gay marriages and also applies to same-sex domestic partner benefits.
Fast forward. For better or worse that is where we are now. Anyway this rally was saying how we need more Diversity in Michigan. They were going on and on about it. But now here is what burns my butt about this.
Almost everyone that attended, and by the way there probably was a bit over 100 people there, almost every one was white. I saw several people on stage that were speaking and a little less than half of them were Hispanic, or Chinese, or black. I saw press there and who where they interviewing? They were interviewing a black woman. I think there were only 3 people or so in the “crowd” that where black. And now watch the press do the following.
Show the interview with that woman. Never interview anyone that is white. Show non white speakers. Show the “crowd” as if it is huge and all these people were really into the rally when in fact that was a very tiny group that seemed to attract very little attention. Give you the impression that this is the most important thing going on and we need to pay attention to it.
Here we have the people that report the news actually making the news. I hate that and it really needs to STOP!
Now on the diversity front I have mixed feelings about it. I have a hard time understanding why same sex couples should be able to get benefits from their partners when two people just living together can not. Now I know they can not legally be married where as the couple can get married but still, I think the right way to handle this is to allow civil unions and allow this to be applied to everyone, not just same sex couples. Don’t call it a marriage however as I see married being reserved for a man and a woman. I know, not very flexible but what can I say. As to the admittance to universities this one touches on a nerve with me. Growing up I was unofficially told you are white and you are male (imagine that), don’t even think about applying for a job here. This was unofficially told to me by a friend that worked at the place I was applying to. The same thing applied to college admittance. Now this did not affect me but what happens is if you are female you get some points. If you are a minority you get more points. So someone that did the same or even worse on admittance tests would score higher and get admitted to the college and I would get the “Sorry Charlie” letter. Explain to me how that is fair.
OK I should not have typed the last paragraph. I am sure that will not be popular but grrr.
UPDATE: OK, the media has surprised me. Through the magic of DirecTV and Tivo I watched all three major news stations in my area and no one covered the story. I will see if the newspaper covers it. I think maybe some faith has been restored.
Posted by barman at 10:31 PM::
I agree with you that the press shouldn't fabricate the news, but that's about all we agree with here.
Equal opportunity was put in place because people in general are prejudice. I'm not talking just about race either. That also goes with gay marriages, women in the work force, the less educated, age, etc and with all races and both sexes. There is even predujice against people that are over weight. I could go on and on, but I think you got my point. Just remember that there is prejudice every where you turn and it's not all about race.
Speaking about gay marriages, why shouldn't gays be allowed to get married and have all the benefits married heterosexual couples do? What good reasons do you have for saying you "see married being reserved for a man and a woman"? The Bible says so, it's just not right? What?
Gay couples love each other as much as a man and a woman love each other, don't they? They cry for each other when things go wrong like heterosexual couples do, don't they? If you were gay wouldn't you want your partner there with you if you were in a hospital ill? And making the decisions about your treatment? Gay couples can't do either most of the time. That isn't fair to them.
K, rant over. Congrats on the 27 lb weight loss! I'm just starting on my program so know how hard it is.
Tony a lot of my thoughts are really not based on much more then, I don't know, emotion possibly. When I said something about no same sex marriages I did mention civil unions and I assumed with that would come a lot of what you mentioned. If I am wrong than I take back what I said. I mean it makes no sense that you say certain things can only happen to people that are married but you are not allowed to get married. I really am confused on this and a lot. And you know what, I would love to hear what people say. I say you are never to old to learn. I now I made a big about face of what I thought about women in the work force. Anything is certainly possible.
Anyway Tony, thanks a lot for what you shared. With the more I know and the more opinions I see the more I will grow.
don't ever worry about posting something whether it's popular or not Bryan, it's your blog and a place for you to vent.
People can choose to read it or if not....come over to my blog.LOL
You have some good thoughts and I appreciate you posting them.
I'm too tired today to think or I'd comment on it.
tc
Bryan, you are dead on with how I feel too. I, too, am tired of being told that I'm not allowed to apply for a job or to a school because I'm not the right sex or color. We see this every day in our local school district. My girls are penalized because they are caucasian and have two married parents that live in the same home. They are marked down when taking standardized tests for the aforementioned.
I agree that marriage is between a man and a woman but do also think that civil unions are the way to go. I base my feelings on emotion as well as religion.
I'm tired of the biased news. Living in the state capital, it seems that anything that happens at the Capital is made to be a big thing whether or not it really is.
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