Birthday spunk

First off, thanks to everyone that called, IM'd, left facebook messages, emailed, or made it out to the Buckshot for my birthday. Special thanks to those that traveled from Stockton and the East Bay, and I had a great time!

Anyhoo, I'm in a pretty feisty mood right now. I'm totally all fired up and want to punch a corporate jerk right now. Well, more like "I'm in the mood to volunteer to clean up a beach, or help organize a protest," but yeah, the idea of punching is much more visceral, immediate, and funny (although it's not funny if someone actually gets punched).


But that is beyond the point. So two incidents that make me both happy and sad.

1. At my birthday get-together at the bar, some creepy white guy (important due to sociological power dynamics) comes up and gets all up in one of my female friend's face and tries to kiss her. She says "eww, get off me" and he lingers. I shout "Hey, she has a boyfriend, back off." He says something like "I'm married, it's not a big deal." (Yes, like being married is an excuse to be a jerk...if this is true I feel sorry for his wife). I then respond with "Why don't you stop sexually assaulting people you fucking dickhead," then I turn around back to my shuffleboard. He later walks by and whispers to me "It's fine if you want to talk big in front of your girlfriend, but if you want to brawl, let's take this outside." I respond with "Whatever. I don't fight idiots."

So this story make me happy, as I totally called this guy on his shit, but it fucking pisses me off as I still felt so helpless as he tried to harass my friend. I wanted to give in and go fight that guy outside (although he was probably a lot stronger than me and I've never been in a fight) as sometimes I wonder if people like that just need to get basic human decency smashed into their face with a pool cue. But I realize that if I play their game, they win, and if I keep it all verbal, I win. The jerk eventually left (although I was worried he'd just stick around and harass my friends) and I then proceeded to get really drunk and enjoy myself. But for the first hour or so after that happened, I felt the urge to just bash a stool over that guy's face.

2. I got called in for jury duty today. When it came for me to introduce myself to the court, I told them I worked for UCPD before, my friend got his hand shattered by a rubber bullet, and when the judge asked me if my experiences would allow me to be an impartial juror, I replied "No offense to anyone in this room, but I don't believe the criminal justice system works."
I was quickly excused and they went on their lunch break.

Now, it may seem like I just said this to get out of jury duty, but honestly, with all the police brutality, the overflowing of prisons filled with non-violent crimes, the fact that the war profiteerers aren't criminals but people who grow pot are, I don't have a lot of faith that the criminal justice system is working. Believe me, I am a firm believer of a trial by one's peers. But I also believe in justice, not necessarily the law. Why is cocaine less of an offense than crack? Why does our government use weapons that cause birth defects? Our laws are fucked up. As a compromise to my crazy utopian ideals, I'm down with the idea of police, but police that stand up for what is right, not for what is easier or what the law says.
Laws are rules written by rich white men, not rules agreed upon by all. Even the constitution is suspect to me, as they sure as hell didn't have the opinions of any women or people of color. I'm down with constitutional guarantees, as I agree with the spirit of it, but a rewrite with the input of the minorities would be much better.

3. I realized that I was part of the 2% that voted for Ralph Nader when Gore lost the presidential election by 2%. Now, most democrats (well, I should say most people in general) say that we're to blame. I used to be a bit ashamed of that, I used to think that maybe if I just compromised a little and voted for Gore, things would be a lot better.

But then I had an epiphany. I realized that it wasn't the fault of 2% of voters that caused Bush to become president. It's the fault of the 51% that voted for a completely incompetent and dangerous moron. You blame the Greens and Nader for the lost? I blame the Democrats for not being more progressive. However, even more so I blame the Republicans for..well, being the conservative anti-humanitarians they are. In my mind, 2% of us got it right.

I think it's a sad state of affairs when idealists are blamed for trying to make things better. We didn't compromise. We voted for who we believed would be the best candidate for making the world a better place.