The Snakes That Ate Our Public Discourse

The Smithsonian Magazine recently ran a fascinating story called "The Snakes That Ate Florida" about the Burmese pythons that have been released into the Everglades and are wreaking havoc there. With no natural predators to keep their numbers down, the pythons are gobbling up most of the mammals (rabbits and such) and are now moving on to bigger prey -- deer and crocodiles. They will fundamentally change the Everglades and they pose a problem for which there is no real solution.

It began with some folks wanting exotic pets and getting bored of those pets and not wanting to dispose of them properly - so they dumped them in the Everglades.

Being the political junkie that I am, I could not help thinking about the rise of right wing hate media, and the very similar effect it has had on the media in general. It began with voices with like Rush Limbaugh and has spread like a wildfire through the nation's media outlets, which had little defense against the onslaught. We were used to media outlets telling the truth. We expected journalistic integrity. We assumed these voices were being fair and balanced. What we've discovered is a hotbed of conspiracy theories and a whole lot of what mama used to call "stinking thinking." Given recent technological breakthroughs, literally anyone can plop themselves down in front of a microphone or camera and start broadcasting their views to the world -- and it shows.

In the Everglades, folks began to notice the rabbits had disappeared. And birds. And other small animals. There was a stillness to the Everglades - but beneath the surface of the waters, a genuine menace lurked.

In the world of media, we have reached a similar situation. Many voices have gone silent. Newspapers have, by and large, become cheerleaders for business interests; few bother with the hard-nosed investigative journalism that was once expected and considered the norm. Giant corporations have gobbled up most of the little newspapers and television stations and radio stations. There are few independent voices.

Our public space -- where we discuss issues and ideas and politics and policies -- is very much like the Everglades. Broad, expansive, with plenty of room. On the surface, it looks pretty good. But beneath the surface lurk predators against which we have little defense. We have pundits, politicians, and now even a president, who tell the most outrageous lies and promote and foster the most ridiculous conspiracy theories, and we are continually caught flatfooted and unable to respond. We seem to have reached a "post-truth" moment where the truth seems to be whatever we want it to be and we are literally bamboozled on all sides by a bewildering array of "talking points" and "spin," to such an extent that it's doubtful if anyone at all knows what the actual truth of any particular subject is. We are learning hard lessons about the power of propaganda. We have pastors and priests who seem to have nothing to say, or who say far too much -- indeed our most prominent pastors and priests are right there in the thick of it, spewing the most extreme views (and like all the other extremists, raking in endless piles of cash for their efforts).

Like the Everglades with its python problem, there's no way of knowing where it's all heading. What we do know, in  both situations, is that nothing will be the way it used to be -- and the casualties are piling up.

One interesting fact researchers have learned about pythons: They can swim. For very long distances. One researcher told the story about fishermen who came across a python in the ocean -- 15 miles from the shore. Imagine being out on that ocean, thinking you are safely by yourself and far from the madding crowd -- and there, in the stillness and blessed quiet of your own thoughts, surrounded by miles of emptiness -- there, swimming alongside your boat, is a giant predator ready to tango.

Food for thought.

We're Queer. We're Spiritual. Get Used To It.

I'm one of those queers who goes to church.

I get looks. Of course I do. And I get questions, the main question being, Why?

My response is always, Why not? Why shouldn't I go to church? Am I not allowed? Don't I also have a soul, or is spirituality the exclusive realm of the heterosexual?

Some of my queer friends are so over church. Proudly, militantly atheist, they look down their noses at little church mice like me. From their superior, lofty perches, they can't fathom why any queer person would set foot inside a church. Bless their hearts.

It took me a rather long time to realize that just because a lot of God's fans hate me, God himself doesn't necessarily hate me. And just because the priest or pastor says bad things about my kind from the pulpit, it doesn't necessarily mean God is speaking through them.

In fact, it could be that God is saying something through me as I sit there in the pews -- something rather more powerful than another long-winded, torturous traipse through Leviticus. Perhaps God is bigger than we want to believe. Perhaps there is more to both heaven and earth than what we understand. Perhaps God made me just the way I am -- and likes me that way and would not have me any other way. Perhaps it's not my calling to hide my light under a basket, but to let it shine.

Don't let me be the one to spill the beans, but a lot of queer folks do church. Growing up Catholic, I can safely say that most every priest and religious brother I knew was gay although not one would admit it.

I became a religious brother myself, and the reason why I'm no longer a religious brother is because my superiors asked me one day if I was gay, and I was honest. The  next day I was asked to leave. The others lied and got to stay.

If telling a lie (and therefore sinning) was the price of being a religious brother, well, obviously it was not the life meant for me. And what does that say about the many priests and religious types who tell that lie every day because they're afraid of being kicked out? Some of those folks are very prominent people in Catholic circles. How do they live with themselves? Who are they fooling?

The condemnation of homosexuality goes way back. Fair enough -- but that doesn't make it legitimate. That doesn't mean our understanding can't evolve and grow into something more compassionate and honest.

We are often told morality cannot and does not change, but that's not quite true. Today, owning a slave would be abhorrently offensive. But not so long ago, owning another human being was the status quo. In fact, on this front, the Catholic Church didn't get around to condemning slavery until the 1800s. Are we to believe that slavery was morally acceptable for all those centuries before that, or did the Church finally realize that slavery was moral reprehensible and evil?

Divorce used to be absolutely forbidden. And in fairness, one must point out that while Jesus said nothing about homosexuality, and very little about human sexuality, he did go out of his way to say things about divorce -- and modern churches and the people in their pews seem to have no trouble whatsoever completely ignoring what he said on that score.

If our understanding of marriage can change (and it probably needed to), perhaps our understanding of homosexuality can also change.

It's not that morality "changes." We mature. We learn new information. We gain new insights. We get better.

So ... I go to church. Make of it what you will, but don't ask me to explain myself because I don't have to, no more than anyone else who goes to church. I go because I want to. 

I have my own "religious beliefs" when it comes to sexuality and relationships; they are vastly different than those of my fundamentalist neighbor, but that's the beauty of having freedom of religion. I'm allowed to come to my own conclusions. I am not required to follow his. I can decide for myself -- and I do.

I have the feeling that the "kingdom of heaven" is filled with tax collectors and whores and other disreputable sorts and misfits. The "least of these." And perhaps, indeed, the last shall be first.

Time will tell.