In the 15 years I’ve lived in the Bay Area, I’ve had the luxury of not having to be that informed about politics. Whenever an election comes up, I don’t need to research the candidates for the Senate or House; it’s always Pelosi, Boxer, and Feinstein across the board. And whenever I’ve been urged to write my senator or congress people on a hot-topic issue, I’ve never felt the need — my senators and representatives have pretty much always reflected my interests exactly.

That came to a crashing end with the NDAA. I ignored all the entreaties to write my representatives, because I believed my senators would never support a bill with such blatantly unconstitutional provisions. After learning that both of my senators voted Yea, I realized that I was going to have to actually become a responsible citizen again.

That’s why I’m asking you, as one of your constituents, to reverse your support of PROTECT IP and SOPA. Anyone with even a passing familiarity with the workings of the internet can see that it does nothing to actually protect IP, because it does nothing to stop the most egregious pirates. It is a transparent attempt by media rights holders, frustrated that they’ve failed to do anything to stop piracy, to find someone — anyone — that they can sue. It should be clear that suing a content provider for the actions of one of its users would be as ludicrous as suing a department store whenever someone shoplifts a DVD.

In an environment where all of Washington is promoting “job creation,” it’s baffling to see a bill proposed that so clearly stifles start-ups and favors profitability (through lawsuits, not sales) of major corporations. While I appreciate the opportunity to be an informed citizen once again, I’d much prefer my representatives to vote on behalf of all their constituents, not just the most wealthy ones.

It didn’t seem to get him as angry as it got me — either he’s used to it after so many years, or else he realized that a barber shop isn’t the place to get angry even if you weren’t preaching to the choir.

Still, it got me thinking a lot about that phrase: “so many years.” How much time has been wasted arguing over something that’s simply, blatantly unfair? Every time someone — with the best intentions, usually — says that change will come in time, I just think of the dozens of photos I’ve seen of 60-to-80-year old couples coming out of courthouses finally able to get married, and I think about how many years they had to wait.

There’s a post on one of the Time magazine blogs today, pointing out Rick Perry’s comments about homosexuality in a book he published in 2008:

“Even if an alcoholic is powerless over alcohol once it enters his body, he still makes a choice to drink,” he wrote. “And, even if someone is attracted to a person of the same sex, he or she still makes a choice to engage in sexual activity with someone of the same gender.”

In “On My Honor,” Perry also punted on the exact origins of homosexuality. He wrote that he is “no expert on the ‘nature versus nurture’ debate,” but that gays should simply choose abstinence. Perry’s campaign did not respond to a request for comment on whether he maintains this view.

It got referenced on the Washington Post‘s site, again calling out Perry for his comments in that book.

Both posts fault Perry’s campaign for keeping silent on the issue, not making a more public response to his comments. I think both are missing the point almost as much as Perry is: he’s already felt the need to clarify to the Family Research Council that his anti-gay rights agenda hasn’t been stringent enough. To one audience, he tries to frame it as an issue of state’s rights; to another, he says of course same sex marriage is wrong and that’s why we need a federal constitutional amendment.

I don’t know why the bald-faced hypocrisy of gay rights opponents always surprises me. They claim it’s an issue of federalism and then propose Constitutional amendments or federal policy like the DOMA to oppose it. They complain that gay rights activists are trying to “redefine” marriage, and they respond by instituting state laws or constitutional amendments to define marriage as being for heterosexuals only. Fuckwits like Rick Santorum claim that everyone knows what marriage is, and that’s right. Everyone including millions of homosexuals, who know what marriage is, and who want to be married some day.

So calling out Perry for remarks in a three-year-old book is missing the point; you don’t have to dig that hard. Of course he’s against gay rights: he’s a GOP presidential candidate passing himself off as a populist. It’s not even Bachmann’s glassy-eyed refusal to comment on her earlier homophobic writings. Perry’s said what he thinks, and it’s a direct, almost cartoonish, regurgitation of the boilerplate Republican agenda. Hell, it’s not at all far removed from Obama’s comments on gay rights, and he’s frequently, bafflingly, praised as if he were some kind of champion of equality.

But back to the statements that Time quoted: it’s the typical nature-vs-nurture question, and I can’t help but wonder how many years have been wasted arguing over whether being gay is a “choice.” I can remember reading comments like Perry’s from at least seven years ago: “Okay, so maybe people are born gay. But even if you are, you can still choose your behavior.” You can’t help being gay, but you don’t have to act gay. You can (and should) be abstinent. Or even more helpful, you can change, and no longer “indulge” in the “gay lifestyle.”

That’s what self-described conservatives (and most organized churches, come to think of it) are calling compassion now. Even though it’s been almost forty years since the American Psychiatric Association stopped classifying homosexuality as a mental illness, people can keep talking about it as if they were. And getting a pass on it, because they’re being politically correct by acknowledging it may be innate.

Here’s the thing, though: “Born this way” is total, absolute bullshit. Not in the sense that it’s false, but in the sense that it’s totally, absolutely irrelevant.

The issue isn’t whether it’s changeable, but whether it’s harmful. That and equality are the only relevant questions in any discussion about gay rights. Can someone choose to be abstinent? Sure, but first you have to explain why they should. Can a gay man or woman choose to marry an opposite-sex partner and have children? Yes, but you’re going to have to explain why that’s inherently better than marrying someone they’re actually attracted to and in love with.

So often, these people have tried to claim that same-sex couples have the responsibility to prove to everyone else that their relationship is healthy. That’s just plain un-American. It’s the responsibility of the people trying to write inequality into law to prove that the relationships they’re banning are unhealthy. (And they’ve got to do it without the aid of a book that can’t be used as the basis of United States law, because not everybody in the US follows the teachings of that book).

I have to wonder if the anti-gay groups have purposefully kept the issue of a genetic basis for homosexuality in the forefront of the discussion, because it’s dominated every discussion of gay rights, for years. And it’s been an effective obfuscation and stalling tactic. Keep people talking about whether it’s genetic or not, and you can make it seem like it’s a complicated, nuanced issue with multiple sides and a lot of room for debate. You don’t have to address the question of equality, and you don’t have to reveal the truth: that you’ve got no valid, rational, non-religious-based opposition.

Maybe I’m just being cynical, and the years of argument over nature-vs-nurture hasn’t just been a total waste of time. Maybe it’s not a tragedy that couples have died while waiting for other people to decide whether they were genetically predisposed to love each other. Maybe it was worthwhile to get people used to the idea that people don’t just arbitrarily decide to go gay for a weekend ’cause it sounds like fun. Even the homophobes these days have to acknowledge that homosexuality is innate so that they can claim that they’re not homophobic; it’s finally entrenched itself in politically correct speech. Maybe the couples who are actually affected by the bigots are spending their time just being couples instead of getting themselves worked up about what anybody else thinks.

But if it takes another forty years of people being treated unfairly while bigots keep insisting they’re not bigots, that would be a tragedy.

Lately, there’s been something of a campaign against Chick-fil-a restaurants because of the restaurant’s ties to groups that campaign against same-sex marriage. It’s been a question for years, how closely the restaurant and/or its founders are associated with the National Organization of Marriage and Focus on the Family, if they’re associated at all. Most recently, the issue was a contribution to an event by anti-gay marriage group called the Pennsylvania Family Institute, an association that Chick-fil-A finally responded to with a cover-your-ass PR video which, unfortunately, didn’t say much of anything.

But it’s always been a case of guilt by association. Providing free food for an event by this group, members of the board also being members of this other group, that sort of thing. The blog posts always start out with righteous fury, and then fizzle out once the link turns out to be tenuous at best.

Now the blog Good As You is insisting there’s a clear link between the restaurant and anti-gay rights groups, and they have an e-mail exchange that will prove all of Chick-fil-A’s apologists have been wrong! A-ha! Finally, a smoking gun! Another blog, change.org, picked up the story with the headline Yes, Chick-fil-A Says, We Explicitly Do Not Like Same-Sex Couples.

Except they don’t say that.

The actual situation is this: the restaurant chain has a charitable arm called the WinShape Foundation. One focus of WinShape is WinShape Marriage, which sponsors retreats and “adventures” for “enrichment” of relationships. The writer of the blog (presumably) sent an e-mail to WinShape asking if its programs were open to homosexual couples. The answer was that they are not, because “WinShape Retreat defines marriage from the Biblical standard as being between one man and one woman.”

Granted, “The Charitable Arm of Chick-fil-A Admits It Does Not Admit Same-Sex Couples to Its Marriage Enrichment Retreats” isn’t quite as shocking a headline as “Chick-fil-A Says We Do Not Like Same-Sex Couples,” and it’d be less likely to get people clamoring to sign up for your facebook petition. But even on the internet, don’t we have some kind of obligation to accuracy?

I have little doubt that the Cathys (the family that founded and still runs Chick-fil-A) are in opposition to same-sex marriage. They’re publicly religious, the restaurant has been closed on Sunday since its founding, and thousands of religious people in Georgia still believe that Christianity and homosexuality are incompatible. It wouldn’t even surprise me to learn that they’ve made personal donations to NOM or other anti-gay rights groups, and it wouldn’t surprise me to learn that they voted for the same-sex marriage ban in Georgia.

But isn’t that their right? When we campaign for marriage equality, aren’t we campaigning for the right to believe things that other people may find abhorrent? Isn’t the entire campaign based on the principle that we all deserve equal freedoms as long as we don’t infringe on the rights of other people? Isn’t the promise that individuals will be free to choose for themselves what to believe, but the government can’t make such a distinction? That churches will remain free to hold ceremonies only for couples who hold their beliefs, just as they are now?

I couldn’t get married in a synagogue, because I’m not Jewish. And I couldn’t get married in most southern Baptist churches, because I’m gay. I don’t see that as grounds for activism. It doesn’t infringe on my rights until they start actively campaigning to deny me the right to marry. Being closed to me is not the same thing as being against me. And the restaurants are still not closed to me.

WinShape’s e-mail response, and their policy, may be enough grounds for some people to stage a boycott of Chick-fil-A. And that, of course, is their right. But it’s definitely not enough for me. In the case of the video game, Card didn’t just say that he doesn’t like homosexuals — he actively campaigns against gay marriage and in support of homosexual “rehabilitation.” Ties between Chick-fil-A and anti-gay rights activist groups are still a lot more tenuous.

If Good As You can present a genuine link between Chick-fil-A’s revenue and a group that campaigns against same-sex marriage, then I’ll be glad to join in a boycott. Until then, I resent their implication that anybody who’s not outraged by their accusations is being in denial, or somehow complicit with marriage bans. And I resent their continued practice of guilt-by-association, which just gives more fodder to the “slippery slope” arguments. I’m tired of people giving bigots and homophobes the opportunity to go on the defensive — to institute bans on equal rights while insisting they’re the ones whose freedom is being threatened.

No doubt I’ll be accused of making an exception just because I’m an unabashed fan of Chick-fil-A’s food, but I’ll just point out that they’re still impossible to get here in the Bay Area.

Some expressed fears about contracting AIDS or getting leered at in the showers. Others worried that it would get in the way of critical bonding at barbecues and bar outings. Still others said it would be an affront to their religious beliefs and harm the military’s credibility.

Except…

Overall, the study showed that about 70 percent of active-duty and reserve forces saw little or no problem with ending the 17-year-old policy, which critics have said is discriminatory, harmful to troop readiness and at odds with the military’s emphasis on honesty. But in a 13-page section of the report, dozens of quotes reflected the attitudes of the remaining 30 percent.

(bolding mine) That’s three paragraphs in.

I’m not going to belittle the opinions or concerns of people in the service. And I definitely don’t want to suggest that 30% of any population should be ignored. That’s one of the most infuriating things about the same-sex marriage debate, where the numbers are closer, but opponents insist that a simple majority means ignoring the opinions of millions in support.

But when 70% of the respondents say they don’t see a problem, and you put the focus on catching a fatal disease or getting leered at in a shower, that’s kind of a sign of a deeper problem. Hang on, it’s not just an over-reaction. It’s a problem of who’s given a voice and how much weight is given to that voice. It reinforces the idea that a minority’s desires — and not just desires, but rights — are subject to the comfort level of everyone else.

The most ignorant opinions — and “ignorant” isn’t used here as a pejorative, but simply a lack of awareness or exposure — are given the most importance. We’ve seen it in cases of civil rights, we’ve seen it with the rise of the Tea Party and cries of socialism. The media treats the fringe as a majority, and reinforces the notion that in a democratic society, we’ve got to get the support of everyone before we can move forward. But on some issues, you’re never going to get the support of everyone. There will always be opposition, going based on ignorance, fear, or prejudice. How long do you emphasize the importance of that opposition, instead of just doing the right thing?

In other news, a local 39-year-old in San Francisco declined to vote because he had a cold and was feeling tired and achey.

Ultimately, my vote wouldn’t have made a dent in the San Francisco results. But of course, that’s not the point. It’s the principle of the thing. And as you no doubt heard several times on Tuesday, if you don’t vote, you can’t complain.

But while I can’t complain about the results of the election, I did do my research, so I can complain about that. And every time I read up on all the San Francisco propositions on the ballot, I can’t help but complain. It always makes me feel like the mother of an unruly child at a department store. “NO. NO. You… take that off your head! Right now! Who taught you to behave like this? NO.”

It’s not just that it all reads like petty squabbles between members of the board of supervisors. (And considering the history of squabbles between supervisors, it’s probably best for those to play out on the ballot instead of City Hall). It’s that it feels like they believe San Francisco has a reputation to protect, and by damn they’re going to perpetuate it. And if they’re this goofy in San Francisco, I can only imagine what it must be like in Berkeley.

At least we didn’t get a “rename the sewage plant to make fun of Dubya” proposition this year. It was enough just to make it illegal not to have a place to sleep.

“Big surprise! We expected nothing different from Judge Vaughn Walker, after the biased way he conducted this trial,” said Brian Brown, President of NOM. “With a stroke of his pen, Judge Walker has overruled the votes and values of 7 million Californians who voted for marriage as one man and one woman….”

Their desire for appeal is understandable, considering the clear bias of Walker, who is, of course openly gay. (And who was originally nominated by Ronald Reagan, failed to be confirmed because of liberal opposition to his “insensitivity” towards homosexuals, was again nominated by George H.W. Bush, and was unanimously approved by a Republican-majority Senate).

This outrageous demonstration of the separation of powers has sent shockwaves throughout the nation, raising deeper questions about the fundamentals of American government, such as: “Have any of you people ever read a high school Civics textbook?” Understandably, the defendants in the case were quick to express their outrage:

California Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger: “For the hundreds of thousands of Californians in gay and lesbian households who are managing their day-to-day lives, this decision affirms the full legal protections and safeguards I believe everyone deserves. At the same time, it provides an opportunity for all Californians to consider our history of leading the way to the future, and our growing reputation of treating all people and their relationships with equal respect and dignity.”

California Attorney General Jerry Brown: “In striking down Proposition 8, Judge Walker came to the same conclusion I did when I declined to defend it: Proposition 8 violates the equal protection guarantee of the Fourteenth Amendment of the United States Constitution by taking away the right of same-sex couples to marry, without a sufficient governmental interest.”

Supporters of Proposition 8 — who are not homophobic, just deeply committed to states’ rights and the freedom of religion, no honest — lament this as yet another example of the long, unsettling history of judicial activism in the United States. Loving v. Virginia, Brown v. Board of Education, where does it all end? The very concept of activist judges legislating from the bench is the antithesis of the ideals our country was founded on.

Brian Raum of the “Alliance Defense Fund” — again, not persecuting gays but defending the democratic process — paints a nightmare scenario:

“The majority of California voters simply wished to preserve the historic definition of marriage. The other side’s attack upon their good will and motives is lamentable and preposterous,” Mr. Raum said. “Imagine what would happen if every state constitutional amendment could be eliminated by small groups of wealthy activists who malign the intent of the people. It would no longer be America, but a tyranny of elitists.”

Imagine what would happen if every citizen’s rights could be eliminated by large groups of wealthy religious activists from out of state who introduce new discrimination into a state’s constitution under the hypocritical guise of “defending” an institution. It would no longer be America, but a tyranny of bigots.

After all, seven million people voted in favor of Proposition 8. Are we going to say that the opinions of seven million people are less valid than the opinion of one man? (Well, one man and the 6.4 million men and women who voted against the proposition?)

As Fox News responsibly asks: “I’m not sure but shouldn’t voters views count for something?” The ballot didn’t even include an “I’m not sure” option; it reduced it to a simple “for” or “against”. (Well, a simple “for a ban against the right of same-sex couples to marry” or “against the ban for the right of same-sex couples to not marry.”) If we can’t trust the right of disinterested strangers to make uneducated decisions about the rights of others, then where would we be? Advancing the issue to an appointed third party who makes decisions based on nothing more than years of legal training, familiarity with constitutional law, the merit of the prosecution and defense’s cases, weeks of deliberation, and a public ruling subject to appeal? In America?

Meanwhile, thousands of gay men and women were unavailable for comment at press time, as they are waiting for the judicial process to continue through a lengthy series of appeals and continued deliberation while watching thousands of their friends and relatives in real relationships have their marriages acknowledged without resistance. Or were spending years if not decades praying to be “cured,” waking up every day filled with self-loathing and a desperate wish to no longer be different from everyone else, lying in bed staring at the ceiling contemplating the likelihood of dying alone and wondering if suicide would be better. Or running for office on an anti-gay-rights platform.

(And incidentally, to the helpful people pointing out that marriages shouldn’t be the responsibility of government in the first place: Feel free to introduce a separate proposition outlawing civil marriage in California, and see how far you get with that. Until then, back the fuck out of the business of the thousands of people who believe in marriage, have spent their whole lives picturing themselves getting married just like their parents and friends did, want to share that marriage with the world, but can’t because they’ve had to spend years hearing assholes trying to convince them that they chose to be perverted or that they were born “broken.”)

“When you appeared with your ebay fortune and complained that California has become a welfare state, what did you mean by… Ms. Whitman? Where did she go this time?!”

Yesterday on Gamasutra, Christian Nutt posted a column about the political and social ramifications that come with something as simple as buying the Xbox Live Arcade game Shadow Complex. The issue in particular is that the game is part of an ongoing collaboration with science fiction author, outspoken homophobe, and campaigner against equal rights for homosexuals Orson Scott Card.

Nutt’s column is thoughtful, balanced, personal, and well-written, but I have two problems with it. First is that he frames the discussion using a thread from the videogame message board NeoGAF. He has a reason for this, but the overall result is like attempting to spur a debate on health care reform based on a discussion among riders of a MUNI bus being driven by crap-flinging monkeys: you’ll get a reasonably representative sample of intelligent and idiotic opinions, but they’re presented in a forum run by inept morons who don’t just foster juvenile vapidity, they actually discourage genuine insight.*

But my bigger problem with the column is that I think Nutt goes to too much effort to be even-handed, presenting it as a complex, nuanced issue with valid beliefs on all sides. He has good reason for this, too: his main point isn’t about gay rights, but about the significance of games in society, and the too-quick dismissal that social issues don’t matter because “it’s just a game.” And although it’s an opinion piece, it’s presented on Gamasutra, a website about videogames. It’s not a forum for a debate on same-sex marriage or any other political or social issue, except insofar as games are affected.

Fortunately, this blog doesn’t have any such restriction.

Shades of Gray

It’s perfectly understandable that Nutt would present this as a complex issue with many equally valid viewpoints, simply because we’ve been conditioned to see everything that way. We value moderation. We quickly dismiss anything that seems too extreme; if Nutt had gone on a tirade about Card and about gay rights, instead of mentioning how he was personally affected by the issue, then it would’ve given readers a too-easy excuse to dismiss him as having an “agenda,” and ignoring his core message about the role of videogames in society.

We treasure objectivity so much that we’ve begun to let it corrupt the idea of free speech — we’ve taken the idea that everyone has the right to be heard and inferred that everyone has the right to be believed. We want to find debate where there is none; we want to give equal weight to all opinions. Even when those opinions are completely invalid, are easily proven so, and don’t deserve to be given equal weight. And instead of guaranteeing a society in which everyone is heard, it results in a society where only some are heard, apathy rules, and sound ideas are drowned out by noise.

Sound over-dramatic? Not if you look at the (impressively reasonable) discussions on that Gamasutra column, as well as on other blogs and message boards that have picked up the story. It’s sparked by a videogame, but you really can see it as a microcosm of American society on the whole, and in particular, how American society has treated the issue of same-sex marriage:

• Derision: “It’s only a game, what’s the big deal?”
• Stall tactics: “It’s not like a boycott will accomplish anything, and people will eventually recognize Card for what he is, anyway.”
• Deflection: “A boycott will have a chilling effect on artists and free speech, where artists will be reluctant to express themselves for fear that they’re punished for having unpopular opinions.”
• Obfuscation: “If I had to give up every piece of entertainment that had one awful person working on it, I’d have to give up everything and live like an Amish person!”
• Obfuscation via The Rule of Tangents: “I won’t boycott an entire game just because one person who disagrees with me happens to be tangentially related to it.”
• Marketplace Realities: “All you’re doing is hurting the developers! We don’t know how much money Card is making from the project.”
• Moral Relativism: The “GayGamer” blog recommends “…if you want to play the game, play it. Enjoy it, but offset the hate: if you buy Shadow Complex, donate $5, $10, $15 if you can spare it to a gay charity. Let them know why you’re giving the money.”
• Moral Relativism via Drama-Cessation-and-God-Bless-Americanism: One of the commenters on Nutt’s column “outs herself” as a conservative Republican (on a board filled with screaming liberals! How daring!) and goes on to say “In the US we are so fixated in [sic] being politically correct with the minority wanted to [sic] thought/opinion control the majority. If a creative person had created a game or work as used as narrative that was a rapist, child molester, killers of gays, Jews, etc. THAT is a gravity and severity [sic] litmus test we should use for a boycott. Thanks (insert your God here), we do not live in countries like China, Iraq, and Russia were [sic] this open debate is possible without repercussion.”
• Apathy: “I only care if the game is good or not. I don’t care about the politics of the people behind it.”

So basically, we’re told that this is “just” a videogame with no political agenda. And the issue is a complicated one with many shades of gray, and it’s important for us as good-thinking people to find compromise and a common ground. Which in regards to same-sex marriage in general and Proposition 8 in particular, is absolute bullshit. Because it’s not an issue with multiple valid sides; there are exactly two: right and wrong.

There are plenty of issues I feel very strongly about. There are even issues — like the current health care reform kerfluffle, for instance — that I not only feel strongly about, but am absolutely 100% convinced that my opinion is the correct one. But even as convinced as I am that I’m on the side of right, I recognize that an issue like health care affects everyone, and compromise is essential. Whichever way this goes, we all will have to pay for it, one way or another. I can’t get “my way” without affecting someone who doesn’t agree with me.

Same-sex marriage is not in that category. Let’s be absolutely clear on this, because opponents have done a depressingly spectacular job of re-framing and confusing the issue: There is absolutely no valid rational, moral, or ethical objection to same-sex marriage. None. Period. Opponents have had years to present one, and they’ve failed, repeatedly. Every attempt is easily dismissed, so opponents have resorted to deflection and obfuscation: it’s really about state’s rights, or the establishment clause, or freedom of religion, or “the will of the people” against “activist judges.” Political parties use it as a political issue to rally support when convenient (we might not be able to get everybody to agree on economic policy, but at least we’re all agreed that we don’t trust the homos). And opponents have always made sure that it gets turned into a popular vote, so that they can take advantage of numbers and of voter apathy (it doesn’t affect me directly, so I neither understand nor care) to do their work for them.

It’s not a political debate; it’s nothing more than a blatant example of relegating a minority group to second-class citizenship. It’s punishing people for being “different from normal,” and — this is the part that always strikes me as the most astoundingly unfair — it does this by punishing the very people who most want to live “normal” lives. But they’re told they have to be patient and to subject their own beliefs to the beliefs and opinions of strangers. The rights of couples to form long-term relationships that are acknowledged and celebrated by society, is trumped by the rights of people in conservative pockets of the state (and Utah, for some unfathomable reason) to go into a voting booth and anonymously say that they’re made uncomfortable by the gays. In a society that is supposed to guarantee that everyone is heard, a sizable minority is being ignored. Their voices are drowned out by people completely unaffected by the issue, demanding that they be heard. (The whole time insisting that they’re the victims).

And we’re supposed to believe that choosing not to support one of the most vocal and self-congratulatory homophobes is a “chilling effect?” What’s genuinely chilling is how effectively these assholes have manipulated and corrupted the concepts of free speech and representative democracy. To the point where people aren’t just willing but obligated to sacrifice some of their liberty, just to make absolutely certain that someone else has the right to say that he hates them.

The Complex Question

So the issue of civil rights is neither a complicated nor nuanced one: there’s right, and there’s wrong. Where it gets complicated is when it comes time to decide what you’re going to do about it.

For starters, everybody’s been dancing around the question, but one thing is true: If you buy Shadow Complex, you are giving some amount of money to an homophobe who actively campaigns against same-sex marriage and equal rights for homosexuals. That’s not in question.

[Note: This is in question, and I should've done more research before stating this as fact. Card's writings are still out there as a matter of public record, so that he's a jerk hasn't changed. And the game series is still an ongoing collaboration with the team at Chair Entertainment, in the sense that more books and games in the same game world are planned. But according to Chair's Twitter stream, Card licensed the property from them to write a book, and the game is based on that book. There's still no definitive statement as to whether he gets any money from the sales of the game and all.]

Orson Scott Card is not just someone who happens to have opinions that differ from mine (and I would hope, yours), and voted a particular way on an issue. He’s someone who’s outspoken in his opinions and has actively campaigned to limit the rights of others. He’s made a stand. Don’t equate it to somebody who keeps a private opinion you don’t agree with, or say that it’s unrelated to anything else and that it’s none of your business. He’s made it public, and he’s made it your business. (I saw someone on a message board trying to equate it with calling for a boycott of Spore because Will Wright contributed to the financial campaigns of conservatives. That’s a ludicrous analogy, both because Wright has always been politically neutral in public, and because his contributions were to candidates, not individual issues. If Wright’s ever voiced a political opinion in public, or stated a specific part of the platform he was endorsing, I certainly haven’t seen it; it wouldn’t surprise me at all that someone with as much money as he presumably has would be a fiscal conservative. Whatever the case, he has in no way been as outspoken as Card, and the comparison is insulting).

Also, Card isn’t tangentially related to the project. Apparently, his credit on the game is just a “Special Thanks.” And accounts vary as to how much influence he had on the world-building and the setting, but everyone involved (Card included) says that he didn’t contribute to the game itself. But that’s not his entire involvement. He sure as hell is involved enough to promote the game and attempt to generate sales based on his name. You can’t have it both ways: using the marketing tag-line “based on a novel by Orson Scott Card” while simultaneously saying he had nothing to do with it. It’s pretty well-known that George Lucas has little day-to-day involvement with game production at LucasArts, but you had better believe that the company uses his name to sell their games. This is nothing like saying, “I love Half-Life 2 but I heard that the 2nd Assistant Art Director said something anti-semitic once, and now I have no games left to play!” Again, Orson Scott Card is a guy who’s written several essays on the moral failure of gays and the invalidity of gay relationships, on how liberals are destroying democracy, and who is prominently featured in the game’s promotional material as one of its key collaborators.

So the only questions are: how much money is he getting? And how much do you care?

Peter David’s got answers, of a sort, to both questions. He’s the one who wrote the script to Shadow Complex (so he’s more involved in the actual game than Card is), and he jumped into the comments on the column with both arms swinging. To the first question, he doesn’t give out much detail, because the details of that financial arrangement genuinely aren’t any of our business. He just says that a boycott wouldn’t affect Card that much (nor would it affect David himself). The only people hurt by even a widespread boycott — which, let’s all be realistic, is highly unlikely — would be Chair, the developers of the game.

We don’t know and most likely won’t ever know exactly how much money Card gets from a purchase of Shadow Complex. Although the game is based on one of his novels (purportedly a right-wing fantasy, a thinly-disguised parable against the evils of the liberal elite), the book is essentially a licensed novelization of a game world created by the developers. It may have been a one-time licensing type deal, he may get a cut of every sale, he may get nothing at all from the game and instead treat it instead as advertising for his book. (I’m assuming the last one’s pretty damn unlikely).

[Note: If it is a case of a novelization of an IP licensed from a game developer, that situation isn't unlikely in the slightest.]

And personally, I don’t think that makes a bit of difference. Even assuming that development were free, and every penny of every $15 sale of the game went directly to Card and then that went directly into a special fund to have gay men put into re-education camps, one person choosing not to buy it wouldn’t ruin the whole scheme. Even a hundred people, or considering how much money went into support of Prop 8, even ten thousand people. The question isn’t dollars but principle. However insignificant to him, he’s either directly or indirectly getting some small part of my money. Do I want to endorse that? How much do I care?

[Note: Again, it's irresponsible to assume that Card gets money from game sales.]

Your Opinions and Why They’re Stupid

Peter David’s got lots more to say about the second question, how much we should care. He accuses Christian Nutt of using the column to advocate a boycott of the game (he wasn’t), and he decries boycotts as an example of “inelegant,” “intolerant,” “cheap, vicious and small-minded” “scare tactics.” He claims that it’s a question of free speech and tolerance: you don’t counter intolerance with more intolerance, and rather than stifling the voices of those you disagree with, you should make sure that they’re heard so that they’re eventually exposed and discredited on their own merits. He borrows a story from Neil Gaiman about “killing someone with kindness” and extrapolates from that the notion that buying the game will somehow end up with Card’s opinions being discredited. He claims that the “inelegance” and “intolerance” of boycotts is because of their chilling effect, punishing artists for voicing unpopular opinions, and enforcing their silence out of fear of financial repercussions.

To be clear: I like Peter David. In addition to being a pretty good writer, he’s an outspoken proponent of social, political, and artistic issues where he and I are in absolute agreement, including gay rights in particular. By all accounts, he acts according to his conscience, and he’ll take a moral or ethical stand even if it’s an unpopular one. Because he’s been outspoken about freedom of speech in the past, it’s easy to accept that his stand on this one is motivated by his beliefs and not money or personal gain. So in short: great guy. I still think he’s way off base here.

David uses some extremely tortured word-wrangling and context-manipulation to accuse Nutt of advocating a boycott, using this phrase: “That’s why it’s okay to skip buying Dragon Quest IX or Shadow Complex.” Even taken out of context, that’s hardly a Call to Arms. If David believes that “you can skip buying a videogame” is a vicious and small-minded assault on free speech, then I certainly hope he never finds out about Metacritic.

But David’s accusation becomes even more ridiculous when you take the line in context:

The medium of games is intrinsically capable of the heights of meaning and emotion that film is; our discourse must rise to that level as well.

And that’s why it’s acceptable to talk about this. That’s why it’s okay to skip buying Dragon Quest IX or Shadow Complex. If we can have meaningful political discussion in other media, we can have it in games.

That’s not an attempt to stifle debate; it’s exactly the opposite! It’s acknowledging that yes, there is room to talk about games in a larger context. If it bothers you that a game was produced in collaboration with a bigot, you should be able to say so. If you decide that your objection to a game isn’t limited to the game itself, but to the opinions of its creator, you should be free to say that. You shouldn’t have your opinion stifled with “don’t be stupid, it’s just a game.” (And, I’ll add, you definitely shouldn’t have a moderator shutting down your debate after saying it doesn’t matter). That attitude contributes nothing and in fact drags down the entire medium to be nothing more than a juvenile, pointless, meaningless diversion.

If games are an expressive medium, then there is some communication going on, and that communication doesn’t take place in a vacuum. We can and should be able to talk about games not only in terms of game mechanics and whether or not they’re “fun,” but about the environment in which they exist. What does the game say? What do its creators say? Why insist that videogames are so trivial and inconsequential that they can’t spark a discussion about something larger? Like, for instance, same-sex marriage, or civil rights, or religious intolerance, or funding for political campaigns, or sweatshops in developing countries, or free speech?

It’s my belief that what you do matters — everything you do. I think it’s ridiculous to believe that encouraging people not to buy Shadow Complex because of Card’s involvement is an assault on free speech. But I think it’s ridiculous because it’s an expression of free speech. What’s not ridiculous is that underlying idea: that small, seemingly trivial decisions can ripple out to have much greater ramifications. Saying “it doesn’t matter” or “what’s the big deal” or “what are you hoping to accomplish” isn’t just apathetic, it’s dangerous. It does matter, all of it.

Ignorance, Apathy, and Moving the Goalposts

Ignorance and apathy are easily manipulated by people trying to further their own agendas. As a computer science major, I was familiar with the work of Alan Turing, but completely ignorant about his pretty horrific personal life. After being outed during a criminal investigation (in which he was the victim), he was forced to chemical castration by the UK government, and he committed suicide shortly after. I first heard about the story via a twitter message from a Mythbuster. If somebody else first learns about the Rape of Nanking in conjunction with the composer of music for a videogame, then what’s wrong with that? What matters is that we learned something.

Turing’s story happened in England in the early 50s, a time and place I would’ve assumed had already long abandoned that type of gross injustice. Currently in Iraq, gay men are being hunted down and murdered by religious extremists; that Newsweek article quotes a man as saying that Hussein’s Iraq may have been oppressive, but at least it was secular. (With the numbers of people getting killed in Iraq every day for various reasons, as well as the widespread oppression of women in even peaceful areas of the region, it’s a story that’s easily overwhelmed). Those are, hopefully, things that we can’t imagine happening here in the U.S. But what it says to me is that “stop being so over-dramatic; that couldn’t happen here” isn’t calm and reason, but apathy. The only reason that it can’t happen here is because we refuse to let it.

Do I believe that buying a copy of Shadow Complex will result in death squads rounding up and murdering gay people in California? It seems highly unlikely. But then, I wouldn’t have believed that religious groups would be permitted to introduce a proposition onto the California ballot in 2008 that would deny civil rights to a minority, much less that it would pass. Apparently I’m not that good at predicting the future.

And I have to wonder how a society gets to the point where imprisonment, chemical castration, and eventually murder are condoned. I suspect it doesn’t happen in big, sweeping changes like we see in the movies (or videogames), but that it’s a gradual process. People slowly and methodically chip away at liberties, foster fear and mistrust of minorities, and then look around to see if they got away with it. And when they’re met with silence and apathy, they can go on to the next step.

The other thing that helps is using moral relativism to keep moving the goalposts, so that everyone gradually loses sight of the difference between “acceptable” and “unacceptable.” Here, we’re getting it from the right and the left. Our persecuted California conservative Republican from the comment section says that boycotts are fine against “a rapist, child molester, killers of gays, jews, etc.” but that spreading homophobic rhetoric is simply free and open debate. Or in other words, “calm down, he’s not killing you, he’s just saying that you’re mentally unstable and campaigning to have the government take away your rights.” So bigotry and homophobia are a natural and wonderful part of the American political process, but murder is where she absolutely draws the line.

Over on the left, the GayGamers turned the already wacky idea of carbon offsets into a “hatred offset.” They suggest that if the idea of Card’s involvement in the game bothers you, go ahead and buy it, but donate the same amount of money (or however much you can spare, really) to a gay charity. Hey, here’s another idea: if the idea of Card’s involvement in the game bothers you, don’t buy the game. And still donate the money to a charity. Even if the idea of having a net effect of zero appeals to you on some “do no harm” level, I’ve got to remind you that you just contributed to a project that by your own admission helps support hatred. Am I also allowed to club baby seals as long as I plant a tree for each one? I’ll admit that I’m not that familiar with either Buddhism nor Catholicism, but I did always assume that the concepts of karma and confession were more oriented towards doing good instead of just trying to cancel yourself out.

“Love the Painting, Hate the Painter”

And here’s something else I never would’ve believed: that a crackpot could write a manifesto calling other people “tragic genetic mix-ups” (he’s no homophobe, though!) and calling the government his “mortal enemy” and promising to “act to destroy that government and bring it down,” and still have companies eager to work with him. I’d always believed that that’s the kind of thing that hurts a resume.

But hey, the guy can write (according to some)! That’s all that matters, right?

On one of the discussions online about the game, I saw the expression “love the sinner, hate the sin” corrupted into “love the painting, hate the painter.” It’s a sentiment that’s been repeated frequently (including by Peter David) in the comments of Nutt’s column and elsewhere: you have to be able to separate the art from the artist. Judge a work on its own merits, not based on your judgement of the person who made it. It’s how we can appreciate the music of Richard Wagner even knowing he was an anti-semite, recognize Birth of a Nation as a landmark film even though it and D.W. Griffith promoted white supremacy, acknowledge the beauty of Frank Lloyd Wright’s buildings even though he was by all accounts kind of a douchebag.

I’ve always had a problem with that idea. As important as art is, there’s a whole hell of a lot more to life than art. And being a good human always trumps making good art. And most importantly: it’s not impossible to do both. I’ve been lucky enough to meet a lot of extremely talented people in my various jobs, people able to create things that I wouldn’t hesitate to call “genius.” And, true to the stereotype of the tortured artist, some of those people were insufferable pricks. But most of them — not a few outlying exceptions, but most of the talented people I’ve met — are genuinely good people, friendly, unassuming, and also absurdly talented. The idea that being a well-adjusted person is the “price” of genius, that you can’t create great things without alienating people, is a myth.

Art is about communication. If you want a work of art to speak for itself, then shut up and let it speak for itself. If you make your personal views known, then that becomes another part of your communication with the human race. Imagine you’re sitting in a concert hall, a pianist comes on stage, sits down at the piano, and begins playing the most sublime work of musical magnificence you’ve ever heard in your entire life. After a minute or two, still playing, he faces the audience and launches into a tirade about how Mexicans are by nature lazy and shiftless and are destroying the country. This goes on for a few more minutes, at the conclusion of which, he plays a breathtaking finale, fireworks come out of the piano, and he stands up and shouts “Hitler was right!”

I don’t know about you guys, but when the show’s over, I’m not thinking about the music. I’m thinking, “Geez, what an asshole.”

But what if the guy doesn’t make it part of the performance? What if he just puts a note in the program: “There will be a fifteen minute intermission. God hates fags.” What if he keeps it out of the show altogether, and just waits until a TV interview afterwards when he talks about his music and his involvement with white supremacist organizations? What if he keeps it unrelated to his music, and instead writes it on his weblog, “Just One Guy’s Opinion About the Inherent Inferiority of the Jews”? There are people who see a distinction in each one, and are able to see where one case is acceptable while the rest aren’t (or believe that they’re all separable and acceptable). But I don’t see any such distinction; I believe they’re all part of the same thing: they’re all the message this guy is sending to the world.

Boy-on-Boycott

Of course, while the “debate” around civil rights isn’t complicated, the situation with Shadow Complex in particular genuinely is. It is by most accounts an excellent game. According to those who’ve played it, it expresses no political or social agenda. And most significantly, it’s not the work of one person, or even a group of people who share the same opinions. The guy who wrote the script is an outspoken proponent of free speech and civil rights; the people in charge of the studio producing the game are, by Nutt’s account, perfectly nice and seemed supportive of his relationship (or as Card would describe it, aberrant “liason”); and the guy whose name is attached to the project as writer of the novel on which it’s based, is an unrepentant hateful asshole.

Obviously, I’m not buying the game, but then that’s not much of a sacrifice, since it’s not a game I was interested in, anyway. Even despite that, Card’s involvement is the breaking point for me: however insignificant the actual amount, he is getting some money for the game, and that’s not something I’ll support, on principle. It’s a shame that that decision will also affect people who don’t necessarily share Card’s hateful views, but then the fact remains: he hasn’t kept his views a secret, they knew he was a bigot when they decided to work with him, and they didn’t have any problem with that.

[Note: Scratch that; the game looks like it was cleverly designed and it's a heck of a lot of fun. I wish that someone would make a definitive statement as to whether it benefits Card financially, because if it doesn't then I'd have no problem buying the game.]

Is that “punitive” against Card? Is it an attempt to hurt him financially, to signal that I find his opinions unacceptable? Is it a wholesale rejection and dismissal of whatever value his other work might have, based on his opinions on one set of issues? You bet your hairy ass it is!

Free speech guarantees that Orson Scott Card can express his toxic opinions without fear of government intervention. I would never want to see that fundamental right taken away, even as he uses that right to advocate removing the fundamental rights of other people.

What free speech does not guarantee is that Card is freed from taking responsibility for his words and actions. It does not mean that his words must be given the same weight and validity as those of a sane person. It does not mean that his freedom of speech trumps the freedoms of those who want to speak out against him. It does not mean that Liberty will perish if he discovers there’s no longer enough of a market to support him financially (there are more than enough non-hateful writers who can’t make a living on their writing for me to panic at the thought of a bigot having to make do with nothing more than his royalty payments from Ender’s Game). It does not obligate me, contrary to Peter David’s bizarre logical leaps, to give him money to somehow demonstrate that I’m a better person than he is.

I wouldn’t advocate an organized boycott of the game, but only because boycotts tend to backfire instead of having the intended effect. (And the anti-gay movement has already had far too much baffling success portraying themselves as victims). I don’t think it’s “silly” or “pointless” at all, especially not because it’s “just a game,” and not because Card’s opinions (as opposed to his right to express his opinions) need to be defended.

But if you’ve got a problem with Card’s involvement, then instead of a boycott, I’d propose doing exactly what Christian Nutt did, and the person who started that message board thread did, and people online are continuing to do: get the word out and let people know something they might not have known before. Tell people about the big picture — you’re definitely not going to hear it from ads or reviews — let them know who the major players are and the extent of each one’s involvement with the project, and let people know why you’ve got a problem with the game. Let them be the ones to decide whether they think it’s “silly” or “hypocritical” or “no big deal,” and let them decide whether they want to buy it or not. If you know what Card’s said and done, and you realize that he’s benefiting from your buying the game, and you don’t have a problem with that for whatever reason, then no problem. There’s at least a dozen reasons why someone could reasonably justify getting the game, and probably a dozen more unreasonable ones. As long as people are making informed decisions, that’s what free speech is all about.

[Final Note: After reading more about this topic online, I've seen the conversation go off on some wacky tangents, with some pretty creepy allegations being tossed about. In particular, the assumption that because the studio is based in Utah, the developers are Mormon, and because of that, they're probably Republican and more than likely agree with Card's views! I want to put as much distance as I can between myself and that nonsense. I neither know nor care whether some or all of the developers are Mormon or Republican or whatever; that's not anybody's business until they choose to make it your business. Even if it were a matter of public record, it's not only ridiculous but dangerous to assume beliefs or actions based on someone's religious or political affiliation.

When I said that "they knew he was a bigot when they decided to work with him," I made it sound as if mere association with somebody like Card is enough to condemn someone. I worded that very badly, and I wish I hadn't said it. The idea I was trying to get across was this: if you go into business with someone who promotes bigotry, where your business is funding them, then you need to be prepared for the consequences of that. But I just don't want any of my money going to Orson Scott Card; it really is as simple as that. I'm not interested in guilt by association.

I'm not interested in conspiracy theories, either. I'm taking everyone involved at face value. Card's made his stand clear, so there's no gray area there. Peter David has said what the game is "about" and that it doesn't promote any agenda, so there's no gray area there, either. Chair have said that it's their IP that was licensed, so I'm interpreting that to mean that the game is in no way "Card's work." Microsoft and/or Epic have marketed the game using Card's name, but I've seen and worked on plenty of games that use a well-known name in the marketing material, but that person doesn't receive any cut of the sales. My opinion about not wanting to separate the art from the artist still stands, but it doesn't seem like Card is in any way "the artist" in this case (as opposed to, say, the novel Empire). And I still don't want even an insignificant amount of my money going to Card, but it's not clear if even a penny would.

In a more clear-cut case, I'd still have no problem recommending a personal boycott (as opposed to an organized one), because whether or not it's "effective" is moot: again, my $15 isn't going to make or break anyone, but then, I'm not trying to "break" anyone. And I'm not trying to convince anyone else to buy it or not buy it, either. What I'm doing is saying, "I feel strongly enough about this issue that I'm choosing not to buy this, and I want you to know exactly why I'm doing it." Know what you're doing, and decide for yourself; what matters is that you're aware of the issue and you're aware that it's important enough to me to make a big deal about it. It's become apparent that I still don't know enough about this particular game to make a clear-cut call one way or the other.]

*Seriously, the idea that NeoGAF has somehow become one of the most visible forums for videogame discussion on the internet should be an embarrassment to everyone who makes and plays videogames. In a world with the Something Awful Games forum, the Penny Arcade games forum, and hell, even Quarter to Three, there’s no excuse for having to put up with that nonsense at all, much less using it as representative of videogame fans overall.

Stewart did a good job with the interview, making his point forcefully without being disrespectful to his guest. He raised almost all of the relevant points, he explained them well, and he called Huckabee on his weaker points.

But it’s just infuriating to see this left as a simple disagreement between two passionate but mutually respectful sides, when it’s not. Huckabee brings nothing to the table, and every single one of his arguments is easily refuted:

• Earlier in the interview, Huckabee talked about being against “intrusive government.” He then proceeded to argue that banning same-sex marriage is justified, which is the very definition of intrusive government.
• “The only way that we can create the next generation is through a male/female relationship.” Which means that marriage is solely about procreation. But to the best of my knowledge, heterosexual couples are still allowed to marry even if one or both of them is infertile. Even more alarming, heterosexual couples can be married even if they don’t plan to have children! If Huckabee is concerned about the definition of marriage, then the definition of marriage should be “two adults who can and will produce a child.” But that’s not what he says, he says “a man and a woman.”
• “30 states have had it on the ballot, and in all 30 states, it’s passed.” Might doesn’t make right. We have a judicial system specifically to guarantee that the rights of a minority are not overwhelmed by the will of a majority. But when the judicial system does its job, people scream that they’re “legislating from the bench.”
• “…even in states like California, which no one would say is socially conservative.” Except for San Diego, the majority Catholic Latino or Baptist African American populations of LA, and most of the rural areas in central California. Which everyone understands are socially conservative, and are exactly the demographic that voted in favor of Proposition 8.
• “It’s not that they’re saying they’re going to ban something, as much as they’re going to affirm that it’s how it’s always been.” As Stewart points out, Prop 8 in California does ban same-sex marriage. Claiming that it’s not a ban is completely disingenuous and cowardly.
• “If we change the definition, then we really do have to change it to accommodate all lifestyles.” The slippery-slope non-argument is nothing but bullshit. It’s the second-oldest argument against same-sex marriage, and the most easily refuted. Huckabee’s ridiculous example of “the guy in West Texas who has 27 wives” is nonsense: that is a fundamentally different construct than two consenting adults entering into an exclusive contract of marriage. To equate same-sex marriage with polygamy is nothing more than a lie.
• “There’s a difference between the equality of each individual and the equality of what we do, and the sameness of what we do.” and later “There’s a big difference between a person being black and a person practicing a lifestyle.” Hot on the heels of the slippery-slope lie, is this, the oldest argument against same-sex marriage, which is that being gay is a choice or a lifestyle. While there are millions of people who would be able to patiently explain to Gov. Huckabee that it isn’t a choice, and that the word “sexual orientation” instead of “sexual preference” is more than just PC name-wrangling, the fact that being gay isn’t a choice is actually irrelevant to this discussion. Because the choice that people are making is choosing to enter into a stable and loving relationship with another adult. If you can rationally and logically prove that that “lifestyle choice” is detrimental to society, then you are welcome to ban same-sex marriage, but you’ll have to ban heterosexual marriage as well.
• “Religious people don’t have the right to burn others at the stake, they don’t have the right to do anything they wish to do.” Except, apparently, violate laws regarding the tax-exempt status of religious institutions and use their finances to campaign for political issues that affect people who don’t subscribe to their religion.
• “Those who support the idea of same sex marriage have a lot of work to do to convince the rest of us.” No, you arrogant bastard, those who support same-sex marriage don’t have any obligation to ask for your permission before entering into the same types of relationships that millions of heterosexual couples are granted by default. Actually, Stewart put this one a lot better than I did. It’s a fucking travesty that people can be subjected to the demand, “You say you’re not a pervert? Prove it.”
• “If a person does not necessarily support the idea of changing the definition of marriage, it does not mean that they’re a homophobe.” No, if a person’s a homophobe, it means that he either doesn’t understand (or care to understand) homosexuality enough to know that it’s not a “lifestyle choice,” or that he believes that homosexual relationships are detrimental enough to society that they should be relegated to a lesser legal and social status. If a person supports the idea of changing the definition of marriage, it means that he wants to write it into law that marriage is about sex and procreation and not the loving relationship of two consenting adults. So apparently, Huckabee is both.
• “Words do matter. Definitions matter.” And just as Huckabee doesn’t like being called the word “homophobe,” I suspect that thousands of married couples don’t like having their relationships called “civil unions” or “lifestyle choices.”

Stewart put it well: like the issue of abortion, the issue of same-sex marriage has passionate people arguing on either side. But this is not like that argument, because there aren’t two valid sides. There is just right and wrong — wrong both in the moral sense that it’s a gross inequity and is fundamentally unfair, but in the more relevant logical sense. There’s simply no rational or logical justification for banning same-sex marriage. People have tried over and over to present the issue as if it were a rational difference of opinion, and over and over again they’re proven wrong. That’s why they toss the hot potato to state amendments, where the people can vote on the issue without having to provide a rational justification.

Whenever this issue pops up, you always see someone trying to smooth over the situation by saying “we’re making progress” or “people will see the light eventually” or “fighting bigotry always takes time.” The question is why does it take time, every time? How come every time you want to teach people to treat each other fairly, you have to start over from scratch? That’s not the sign of the inexorable progress of time; that’s the sign of a severe learning disability.

I can remember hoping for more substance than sound bites and petty insults in this election, more talking about actual issues instead of transparent attempts at media manipulation. And I keep trying to rein in my under-informed liberal rage, reminding myself that these people are not idiots to be dismissed, but merely sometimes fallible adults with differing political views than mine. I genuinely, sincerely want there to be intelligent debate again, instead of increasingly polarized name-calling.

But the issues come down to one candidate whose economic, domestic, and foreign policies have been proven failures over the past eight years, and one candidate whose policies may or may not work but at least he’s genuinely committed to improving the country. And as much as it dismays me to fall in the “Economy and wars are boring! Let’s point and laugh at the funny pretty lady!” camp, I’ve got to acknowledge that it’s a pretty serious issue when your candidate for the second-highest office in the country doesn’t understand the United States Constitution.

I mean, come on:

“If [the media] convince enough voters that that is negative campaigning, for me to call Barack Obama out on his associations,” Palin told host Chris Plante, “then I don’t know what the future of our country would be in terms of First Amendment rights and our ability to ask questions without fear of attacks by the mainstream media.”

That’s right: she said that freedom of the press violates the First Amendment.

It was alarming enough when she revealed a basic misunderstanding of the role of vice president — not at that Q&A session that was quickly dismissed as “gotcha journalism,” but during the vice-presidential debate, where she ominously hinted at giving the role even more power than Cheney has given it.

But explaining how the First Amendment works is something that you have to do for stupid excitable people on internet message boards. You shouldn’t have to explain it to a candidate for Vice President of the United States.

Should the unthinkable happen, and she gets elected, are we going to have to explain everything to our VP? That the freedom of speech does not mean freedom from people pointing out that you’re saying stupid things? That the freedom of religion also guaranteed by the First Amendment means that even if the GOP weren’t blatantly manipulating suspicions about Obama’s religious faith, that that still wouldn’t bar him from office? That when she types MAVERICK in all caps it comes across as shouting? That it’s improper to mix up your official and personal e-mails — oh, wait. I’m sure she’d have no problem recognizing the ;) smiley, but will we have to explain that ad hominem attacks are lousy for debates, and that RTFC stands for Read the Fucking Constitution?

I can’t imagine what other basic internet truths the conservatives could manage to screw up, maybe Godwin’s L… wait, hang on, what’s this article in the New York Times all about:

On one, polls that are “tightening” are emphasized over those that are not, and the rest of the news media is portrayed as papering over questions about Mr. Obama’s past associations with people who have purportedly anti-American tendencies that he has not answered. (“I feel like we are talking to the Germans after Hitler comes to power, saying, ‘Oh, well, I didn’t know,’ ” Ann Coulter, the conservative commentator, told Mr. Hannity on Thursday.)

Ah, there we go. Don’t ever change, Ms. Coulter.

On the one hand, I want to believe that this country is founded on cooperation and the fair and just resolution of conflicts, and that only by working together as mutually respectful adults can we accomplish anything. But on the other hand, I think that after all this, anyone who would vote for a McCain/Palin ticket has to be a fucking moron. I’m having trouble reconciling these disparate philosophies.

In the meantime, my advice for Governor Palin: lurk more.