(Unfortunately) More Proof I Lack in the Humor Department

The other day, I was randomly surfing blogs and came across one titled "Yellow Gal" at http://yellowgal.blogspot.com/

Since having moved to the DC area from heavily Asian-populated California locations, I've felt more and more that as a Filipino I get overlooked in discussions of race (because they so centrally revolve around black/white racial dynamics), and that I am less and less recognized as a person of color (because not black=white).

In reaction to this, I have taken to more adamantly proclaiming my Filipino identity, in my everyday life, as well as in my academic pursuits. When I saw "Yellow Gal," Vickie Nam's anthology YELL-Oh Girls!: Emerging Voices Explore Culture, Identity, and Growing Up Asian American and Frank H. Wu's Yellow: Race in America Beyond Black and White immediately came to mind. While Yellow Gal's blog mentioned neither of these texts, I still felt a sense of connection and camaraderie. I even went so far as to post a comment in response to her post about persimmons.

After submitting my comment I continued to surf her previous posts, and saw one entitled "10 Reasons Why Gay Marriage is Wrong." Immediately, my heart fell and I got sad, cursing myself for having felt connected to someone who would put out what I perceived as a homophobic, heterosexist post.

Resigned, I clicked on the link to read the post. To my joyous surprise, it was a satirical (re-)posting that served to show the ridiculousness of such reasons. Just another example of how I lack in the humor department.

Apparently, I need to better remember the Indigo Girls' song, "Closer to Fine": "The best thing you've ever done for me/ Is to help me take my life less seriously"

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(At the end of this post Yellow Girl says, "Re-post this if you believe love makes a marriage." I don't agree that "love makes a marriage"--it's too much to go into that right now, another post, another day, perhaps--but I'm reposting the list anyway.)

(A post from the "best of craigslist")

01) Being gay is not natural. Real Americans always reject unnatural things like eyeglasses, polyester, and air conditioning.

02) Gay marriage will encourage people to be gay, in the same way that hanging around tall people will make you tall.

03) Legalizing gay marriage will open the door to all kinds of crazy behavior. People may even wish to marry their pets because a dog has legal standing and can sign a marriage contract.

04) Straight marriage has been around a long time and hasn't changed at all; women are still property, blacks still can't marry whites, and divorce is still illegal.

05) Straight marriage will be less meaningful if gay marriage were allowed; the sanctity of Britany Spears' 55-hour just-for-fun marriage would be destroyed.

06) Straight marriages are valid because they produce children. Gay couples, infertile couples, and old people shouldn't be allowed to marry because our orphanages aren't full yet, and the world needs more children.

07) Obviously gay parents will raise gay children, since straight parents only raise straight children.

08) Gay marriage is not supported by religion. In a theocracy like ours, the values of one religion are imposed on the entire country. That's why we have only one religion in America.

09) Children can never succeed without a male and a female role model at home. That's why we as a society expressly forbid single parents to raise children.

10) Gay marriage will change the foundation of society; we could never adapt to new social norms. Just like we haven't adapted to cars, the service-sector economy, or longer life spans.