Race isn’t even a function of skin color any more than gender is about chromosomes or genitalia. It is a social construct that just happens to use skin color as the justification of some of its justifying myths. But race/racism doesn’t even need skin color to function. This article acts as if the most culturally prominent justification myth of the construct of race is somehow the construct itself. The thing is however, that the construct is more than capable of sustaining a life of its own even when the skin color justification is removed. 

If that map blew your mind as the article seems to suggest that it should, prepare to have it blown yet again. Here, have a listen:
http://stateofthereunion.com/home/season-3/pike-county-oh

On a side note, this makes me think of that awful South Park episode, ‘Mr. Garrison’s Fancy New Vagina’. If I remember correctly, it used the ‘hilarious’ analogs of transracialism and transspecialism to discredit transsexualism. Except that the idiots did not really get that since race, sex/gender and species work in such different ways, so does the blurring of their traditional boundaries. And instead of doing some research into how these phenomena tend to express themselves in real life, they went and made up their own ‘ridiculous’ and ‘hilarious’ versions to drive their smug transphobic non-point. This is why I fucking hate South Park.

Here by the way is one of the ways in which transspecialism has actually expressed itself:
http://www.radiolab.org/2010/feb/19/lucy/

If anything, Sowell’s sloppy attempt to frame an argument against same-sex marriage on legal grounds is even more laughable than the bible-thumpers’ claims.

Marriage is a social/economic institution that grants certain state-created privileges to pair-bonded couples. As it stands, it discriminates against a vast array of *people*, based on relationship preferences and situations over which they have no actual control and/or should for no conceivable reason be penalized for.

Of course, gay marriage does not even in and of itself reverse this fact. But it helps a little.

According to the internal ‘logic’ of this absurd ‘action’ argument (‘DOMA discriminates against *actions*, not *people* neenerneenerneener!’), interracial coupling also constitutes an ‘action’, so a ban on interracial marriages should also be also fine and dandy. He contradicts his own logic of course.

He also says: “Race is not part of the definition of marriage”

But guess what? IT USED TO BE

He then goes on to argue that gay and straight couples should not have the same legal standing because gay couples are not economically identical to straight couples. But straight couples are not economically identical to straight couples either, nor are gay couples to gay couples. But when you look at the entire suite of privileges and responsibilities embedded in the construct of marriage, they actually work out as much *overall* for gays as for straights. 

Of course the schmuck brings children into it. Nevermind that this actually undermines his sill-ass argument.

Gays often raise (and sometimes conceive, what with transman/cisman couplings, etc) children together, and straights can be infertile. So if the whole body of law regarding marriage and children doesn’t rule out infertile straight couples (whether they choose to adopt or not) from the institution of marriage, then it should be able to handle gay couples as well. Or is the columnist suggesting that children raised by gay couples are so fundamentally different that they just don’t deserve to be in the same legal structure as those raised in straight couples? This is veering very far away from the whole ‘action’ argument indeed!

Basically he is arguing for the abolition of marriage without realizing it. I’m totally down with that by the way.

If taken to its logical conclusion, his categorical argument of difference would rule out marriage as an institution entirely due to the vast differences in the lives of various married couples. But if the institution can handle that array of difference, isn’t that in and of itself an argument that it is more than suited for this tiny one that has been introduced by gay marriage? 

The lines that he draws are entirely arbitrary. The only reason that he gets away with this intellectual laziness is because these lines are supported by old and widely held societal prejudices.

“Those who think of women and men in the abstract consider it right that ex-husbands should be as entitled to alimony as ex-wives. But what are these ex-husbands being compensated for?”

Wait, what?
Ex-husbands who receive alimony are generally stay-at-home dads who either gave up or delayed their careers to take care of the kids. So what are they being compensated for? Same thing that ex-wives are. Alimony is designed to keep both members of a couple in an approximation of the lifestyle ‘to which they are accustomed.’ Alimony is given out on that basis. Well that, and on the relative quality of the legal representation of all parties involved. But you know what I mean. How does this make any less sense for the gays again?

And finally, for an argument that claims that gay marriage advocates fall into thinking of people in the abstract, it is incredibly short on actual real-life examples from places where gay marriage has been a thing for quite some time now. In fact I looked through the article again and found that his ‘concrete’ and ‘realistic’ case is built entirely on pie-in-the-sky-is-falling hypotheticals and leaps of faith that are, if we are to apply the standards set in his own trumped-up charges against gay marriage advocates to his argument, completely removed from reality.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2013/mar/07/hugo-chavez-body-permanent-display-caracas

I was sad because I had no shoes, until I met a man who had no feet. Cheered me right up, that did. But then I thought about it some more and got sad again. Gave the guy with no feet a call. Surely old Stumpy would make me feel better again.

So I call him and he picks up the phone, all cheerful and shit.

He’s like “Hey man, long time no see!”
So I say “Hey what gives- why are you so happy all of a sudden, short stuff?”
And he tells me: “You’ll never believe it, but I met this one dude who didn’t even have any shins! I am on cloud freakin’ nine over here!”

Well, I didn’t know if I should feel better or worse. Thought about it for a while. Decided I would feel better if I went to meet this no-shins bloke. So me and Stubby No-Feet amble on over to the Shinless Wonder’s corner. I got a piece of glass stuck in my left foot on the way, but I swear that it hurt a little less every time I glanced over at my friend’s sad beaten-down stumps.

So there was No-shins, big as life, standing on his knees at his usual corner with his cracked begging bowl in front of him. And I swear to you on the grave of my sainted Great-aunt of blessed memory- he was grinning cheek to cheek.

Long story short- No-shins had just met a guy who didn’t have any hips either! So we make the Kneewalker bring us over to him. And lo and behold, Mr. Too Hip For Hips is smiling too. 

And so we made our rounds, hoping to find a miserable wreck every time but instead coming upon yet another uncannily cheerful person with even less body parts than the last guy. As you can well imagine, it got a little frustrating after a while and each leg of our journey (no pun intended, really!) took about twice as long as the last.

Well, there were 15 of us by now, and from what the blind and deaf fellow without any arms or legs told us between giggles, this next guy would be our salvation. And let me tell you- he did not disappoint. 

You had to be there, man- but I swear- he was just this disembodied head on a lazy Susan. He had this wonderful look of pure rage and despair on his face, and he was spinning round and round like an old fashioned police siren, his mouth wide open blaring out “FIRST WORLD PROBLEMS FIRST WORLD PROBLEMS FIRST WORLD PROBLEMS”

Greatest thing that ever happened to me. I’ve never had a bad day since.

Been seeing lots of talk about “is demisexual a even valid identity” and such. I just don’t get it though. Lots of people obviously identify as demisexual and are willing to withstand bullying and ridicule to continue asserting it. They are obviously very serious about it.  So yeah- it passes the identity test with flying colors. The Académie Française might disagree, but that is not how identities work. If people flock together under a common descriptor of their being and experience, that is an identity. And nothing else can add or subtract an ounce of validity from it. 

Its not that economic sanctions never work- its just that they are not working against the Iranian state, and it is unlikely that they ever will. The problem with sanctions is that they don’t effectively encourage people to rebel against their governments. Instead, a good portion of people in the targeted country tend rally around their governments in opposition to the callous foreign powers that have decided to starve them out. Off the top of my head, I can really think of only a single exception. If I remember correctly, sanctions actually helped destabilize Apartheid in South Africa. This was however largely due to the special nature of Apartheid. Black South Africans could not be induced to rally around a system that was dedicated to their dehumanization and enslavement.  The Iranian system simply lacks such a vulnerability.