Sex and Faith

I had a rough and violent childhood. My life was hard and challenging and often overwhelming in high school. When I needed help and support I looked for a community that could provide that. As a teenager my best option was a church. I've always believed in a higher power, and that view is ever evolving, so church was a viable option even though I don't believe in the general church rules for living. I managed to make it work, I found a great church that let me have space to grow and encouraged me to have a good future. I was an active member and truly enjoyed being there. My views on sex, politics and women's issues were at times obstacles to being close to some people but I was able to maintain many great friendships. I never really dated in the church because I knew what I was looking for wouldn't be there.

The church I went to was kind of awesome,  easily way better than the church Raptor Jesus preaches at.

My body is my own. My sex life is my own. I am happy to encourage and support anyone with their personal sexual choices. I believe sex should be a positive and happy experience in life and it should be on your terms. Enjoying sex is one of the great parts of being human.

I've been having sex since I was almost 18 and for the most part I loved it. Being ashamed about my sex life just wasn't an option to me. I was uncomfortable discussing it with others at first but college quickly lifted that problem out of my way. Sometimes the sex wasn't great, sometimes I wasn't entirely sober, sometimes I wasn't completely honest but mostly I have very happy warm fuzzy memories about sex.

True love waits years to appear. Sex is available right now!

As I got older my goal within my sex life became clear, I want to be a partner that you think of and have fond memories of. I don't want to be a trigger for someone else or a regret. I think I've been doing well on that front.

I believe that Jesus was a great man that made a lasting impact on the world. I try to be as Christ like as I can be in my daily life. I work with at-risk youth, I make sure to give food to the homeless nearly everyday, I show those around me that they have value in just being themselves. I don't aim to be a saint or a pastor or famous even. I just want to be good to others. 

My job has done the most to dampen my belief in God. When I'm working with a 9 year old girl that generally likes me but at that moment is trying to bite into my arm with all her being and her sense of self is shattered from a life of sexual abuse I can't see where God fits into this world.

Who needs a ladder when you have Timmy at the keyboard, I'm sure he'll do the right thing soon. 

At best God is a kid, his plans were not the best thought out or functional and he's lost interest much like a 12 year old that is constantly typing 'rosebud' to give their preferred Sims family a great life with no interest in the other people he has created.

Hey you look like me!

So as a chick I've often been sad when games don't bother to have a female character to play. Today I started playing Alice Madness Returns and was describing it to a friend.

ME: I'm playing as Alice but she has a big ass knife for killing
MOSTLY ASIAN FRIEND: So she's basically me
ME: No, she's a honkie
MOSTLY ASIAN FRIEND: So half me
ME: yes.

I'm not being racist, just accurate. I don't think it's bad to have characters that are white or male, I just think there should be more variety. I want to be able to play as a girl which is often not easy. Luckily I'm white so most female characters when they exist look like me. And you know most people relate better to characters that look like them.

Personally I'm not nearly as pale as Alice but I'm sure I'm as crazy as she is. Although I tend to wash the blood out of my clothes.

Many video games have a range of genders, races and sexualities but those are as rare as a stripper with a Ph.D in Mathematics. The first two inclusive games that come to mind are Mass Effect and Borderlands. Much has been written around the interwebs about Mass Effect and its gender and sexual inclusivity so onto Borderlands 2.

I played Borderlands 2 with my boyfriend and his friend(basically his non-sexual life partner) and they played as the commando and the siren so I was left with either a husky short male or a non gender specific assassin. The choice was easy. Zero, the assassin has a male voice but for the most part is gender neutral. Zero is fun to play but when Gearbox released a second female character I switched teams. Both the female characters are white and one is too young to have a sexual identity but the siren is mainly appears to be heterosexual. The non player characters are generally white and also heterosexual. I should note that the gunzerker appears as latino or hispanic, basically not white.

Here's a picture of Gaige to break up this wall of text. 

Overall the game is heterocentric which is going to be common in video games/entertainment for many more years to come. On the bright side the game is not heteronormative, the female characters have as many responsibilities, skills and talents as their male counterparts. There are fewer females in the game than men but I think it's closer to 1/3 females than the typical 1/4 ratio. Also many of the females are very strong and well developed. I found Tiny Tina and Moxxi to be more developed in the personality realm than some of the comparable male NPCs. There is also a remarkable amount of discussion about sexual pasts and it generally does not come off as the typical slut/stud dynamic.

In Borderlands the female characters are most often in overly sexualized outfits but in all fairness the male characters are also on display and their physical traits are nowhere near realistic either. The entire game is very sexual, one of the characters skill trees is sexual tyrannosaurus, I've seen pornos that are less sexually charged.

Clearly Borderlands is not a polite conversation sort of game but the raunchiness does go both ways along with a fair variety of characters.

Anyway back to my main point, damn am I lucky that I'm not trying to find a character that is female and hispanic and a lesbian.

Female MRAs

Most people will agree that men and women should be treated equally. Men and women should have equal access to school, housing, jobs and other public aspects of life.
Some people will say all persons should have equal access because the gender binary is a false dichotomy.

Then there are white men that insist they somehow got the short end of the stick in Western societies. Despite data from many sources, at many points and places in time indicate that white males have privilege and status that minorities don't even come close to achieving.

Being a white male makes life easier and there have been many great blogs explaining this fact so I don't feel a great need to go into that. Of course many undereducated white men think they have a harder life because educated women or minorities have a better job, car or house. While ignoring that most minorities do not have a better life than the large majority of white men.

These white men join Mens Rights Activists(MRA) and shout from the trailer top how rough their life is. Magically the MRAs have gained support from some women. These women have made claims that women should give up their right to vote and spend more time serving men. Along with promoting other MRA goals that basically encourage a strict gender binary and a return to racial segregation.

Success from keeping others down is not success. Getting a job because the potential employee pool is only other white men is not something to be proud of. Having a clean house but no food on the table because you have a housewife but no money for food is not worth bragging about.

Women should not be working to remove their own rights. People in general should not be removing rights from others. A more stratified society will not produce a better society. Yet that is somehow a belief with a strong following.

Fuck female MRAs. Your gender, race and socioeconomic status do not make you a better or worse person than others. Get off your ass, do something with your life, stop blaming others, lower your self-esteem to an 'unhealthy' level and maybe you'll realize there is a lot more to life.

Also, unless you are invited please do not think so much about my vagina.