I have said for a while that I am an equal-opportunity hater.  I'd also like to think I'm a fair pisser offer.  If you're mean, it doesn't matter who you are, what you look like, etc...I don't have time for you. 

Well, hang onto your seatbelts, because here comes my latest rant and you may need to either hope the seatbelt holds, or that it gives and expels you into that great blue yonder.

So, here's my latest set of thoughts.

Be who you are and own it.  Anything else, and I don't have time for you and your sniveling.  If you're going to be straight, gay, bi, Christian, agnostic, atheist, other religion, homeschool, unschool, other school, prolife, prochoice, hunter, animal right activist, um, you get the point....OWN IT.

However, don't expect to be able to change my way of thoughts, very much in the same way I will respect your belief system and not try to change yours'.  Unless you're a meanie poopie head.  Then your arguments are invalid and don't count.

Please understand, when I say "own it" I don't mean "flaunt it" or "throw it in people's faces".  There's something to be said about a deeply held conviction when you don't have to be ostentatious to prove you hold such.

I've warned for years that one should not bring me into an argument assuming I will be on one's side.  To assume that is just as faulty as assuming that I am overweight because I am gluttonous.  Both examples also would prove how much one truly does NOT know me.

So, I'm about to piss a lot of people off.  I ran through this with my husband, and he teased that I may not have ANY friends after this.  Actually, I hope this does make some people mad.  At themselves.

Social issues that are dividing in nature should be kept under tight control.  In other words, hold your convictions.  Own them...but be careful in sharing them because you could isolate the very person you NEED beside you in times of desperation.

Here is where I start really stepping on toes, so if you don't want to know, stop reading here.

On such hot topics as gay rights and unions...if you're not gay, don't know any gays, don't love any gays, don't want to marry any gays, then you don't have an opinion and you need to zip it.  Extending rights to people who just want to love each other will NEVER diminish the rights of anyone else trying to love each other.  Now, on that same issue, unless you want me and MY honey playing grab-ass and tonsil-hockey in public in front of YOUR children, please do not do this in front of my kids, my family.  I have NO need to bring my bedroom outside of my house.  I am secure in our relationship and I hope you can obtain that same security in your relationship. 

If you are liberal or conservative or just don't give a crap, please stay respectful.  Such terms as "stupid" and words that tear down do not do anything to make your point.  They make you sound uneducated and actually diminish whatever important issue to which you were trying to bring focus.  Own your charisma, but really?  Being mean?  You are bigger than that.

Here's a personal issue...and, yes, I am going to go there....Abortion...Once again...this is a very personal choice....and if you don't have a uterus, or you could be a help to someone facing this decision, or you could be the other part of this decision making team...but if you don't know what it would be like, if you can't imagine it, than please, save your judgement.  It is NOT yours' to decide.  If you haven't ever been raped or faced a life-threatening issue when pregnant, please do not pretend that you would know what you would choose.  And if you're not willing to take and raise a baby from a mother in a crisis pregnancy, please spare us your hate-mongering signs.

If you believe in Jesus, act like it.  If you're a moral person, own it.  If you have some brain inside your head, some version of right vs. wrong, be nice already.  Your treatment of people far overweighs the beliefs you claim, and you may actually minimize your message the moment you open your mouth. 

I'm not the moral compass--far from it.  I mess up.  I have made poor decisions in my life.  But I have made far more positive decisions, and one thing I've learned is that all of us, as long as there's breath in our lungs, have a chance to change our destiny.  But all of us should have the chance to live the life we want.  If we're not hurting anyone, what can it hurt?  I'm fully expecting that all of us will have to answer for our decisions in the end, and it's an individual appointment.  No one will be there with you.  Here on earth, though, think of it this way....if you wouldn't want it forced on someone else...don't force it on anyone else.  You're not going to be the one to have to answer for anyone else...so just be kind to your fellow earth inhabitants.