Time to log off

There is a saying that I like very much that goes something like this: You don’t have to show up for every fight you are invited to.

I think about this saying a lot when I get into online “discussions”. I think that there is something about disembodied text that just brings out the worse in people. Sometimes I get sucked into a discussion and have a tremendous urge to be the last person to post a comment. This happens even when I know I am talking to someone who has the coherence of my grandfather 3 months before he died of Alzheimer’s.

I try to avoid bulletin boards or comments on blogs if there is an argument brewing. However, with all of the crap that is being said about the Foley scandal, I found myself showing up for the street fight, invitation or not.

The postings were on belief.net. I felt like I was in some kind of Alice in Wonderland upside down world. According to the thread, homosexuals are oversexed, miserable, have multiple partners and absolutely shouldn’t be allowed to get married, and Rep Foley proves it.

I have to laugh about the oversexed part. I should be so interesting. Honestly I am so tired from working and taking care of the baby, sex is the last thing on my mind. In fact, I have a pile of laundry and dishes, a living room full of toys and dried baby food my shirt. At this point, I don’t want sex so much as a clean house. Though, I’d take sex too..

And I just have to wonder, who are these people that they are talking about. These hypersexed, multi-partnered, drug taking, circuit chasing, youth loving, prada wearing gays? I’ve seen them on tv. But, I live in a very gay neighborhood, and nobody that I know is like this. The gays that I know worry about sending their kids to kindergarten and when to make a run to Toys R Us.

There is something about getting into an argument with someone who insists something is true that you know isn’t true that makes you feel a little crazy. I had a friend who would insist that all lesbians had been sexually molested. I pointed out that I hadn’t been sexually molested and neither had my wife. But she would just repeat her claim over and over. After a while you need to just stop arguing. And if you are online, you need to log off.