Ephemerality

Sex is too powerful. Sex is half a billion years older than we are. This idea that we have sex? Bullshit. Sex has us.

—Dan Savage (via psychichange)

(via counterpunches)

Oh, and the remains of another child were found buried in the yard; a third child—an infant—was placed in foster care. But it could’ve been worse—they could’ve had gay parents.

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Dan Savage, Every Child Deserves a Mother and a Father | Slog

Dan’s Every Child Deserves a Mother and a Father series should be a must read for everyone who opposes gay adoption. 

Marriage is defined by exclusivity—it’s defined by monogamy—but only when gay people want to get married. Straight people don’t have to be married to be monogamous or monogamous to be married.

Marriage is permanent—it’s for life—but only when gay people want to get married. Straight people have been marrying and divorcing and remarrying and redivorcing for centuries.

Marriage is about bearing and rearing children together—not the turn of phrase I would’ve chosen—but only when gay people want to get married. Straight people can be married without rearing children and rear children without being married.

Marriage is—and I’m just going to quote this bit—”renewed by acts that constitute the behavioral part of the process of reproduction.” In other words, straight sex is magic—it makes babies!—and straight sex that doesn’t or can’t make babies (“In the butt, Bob”) is still magic because it “renews” the marital bond, i.e. it reminds you why you married that person in the first place (“She’s really been on my nerves lately, but… man… she gives excellent head”).

—Dan Savage, This Marriage Abstraction | Slog

If Bishop Vangheluwe had ordained a woman—just one, just once—the church would’ve defrocked him faster than you can mumble “and also with you.” This piece of shit raped a child over and over again, for 13 years, and not only is he still a prince of the church, the church is defending him, protecting him, hiding him, paying him. (The Church also spirited him out of Belgium while he was still under investigation and was facing possible criminal charges.) And this is the same Church that had this about gay couples adopting children: “Allowing children to be adopted by persons living in such unions would actually mean doing violence to these children.” Pope Benedict XVI wrote that. The same man who is protecting this child rapist.

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Dan Savage, Child Rape, Inc. and the “That Kid Wanted It” Defense | Slog

Just in case you needed another reason to hate the Catholic church. I know I didn’t.

I’m not the first gay man that women have turned to for advice about love and sex, Maggie, and I won’t be the last. And aren’t you a practicing Catholic? Not knowing what women are like (or taste like) has never stopped the Pope from offering his unsolicited advice to women—no birth control, no abortions, no oral, no anal, no handjobs—and it’s hypocritical of you to suggest that I’m not qualified to advise women, since I won’t fuck ‘em, without first telling that old fag in Rome to STFU already.

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Dan Savage Is Coming For—For! Not On!—Your Children! | Slog

I <3 Dan Savage. Preach on. 

Savage’s main point is not that monogamy is bad, or even unattainable. He just knows that it’s hard work for most people. He wants to debunk the myth that if you’re a normal person, and you really love your partner, you will never want to have sex with anyone else. Savage wants people to stop torturing themselves because their desires don’t line up with an arbitrary social ideal. As he sees it, there are two ways of dealing with this predicament. You can either embrace monogamy as a difficult but worthwhile project because you like to live that way, or you and your partner(s) can figure out some other arrangement that you like better. The first step is being honest with the people you date and choosing people who want what you want. That’s one reason why Savage is always harping on disclosure. It’s no longer ethical, or practical, to assume everyone wants the same thing.

—Lindsay Beyerstein, via [What’s Love Got To Do With It? | Slog]

And you have to love how Santorum is out there mewling about being the victim here and about civility—this from the man who compared people in stable, loving same-sex relationships to dog fuckers and kiddie rapists, this from a man who would make gay and straight sodomy illegal, ban gay marriage and any other protections for same-sex couples, and prevent loving same-sex couples from adopting children who need homes. This from a man who would literally destroy my family if it were within in his power to do so. And the “Savage Love” gang? All we did was make a dirty joke at his expense. There has been no effort to strip Rick Santorum of his civil rights, no moves to nullify his marriage, no one has suggested that his children be taken out of his home, no one is trying to prevent him from having more children. No one has compared Rick Santorum to a dog fucker or a pedophile. Compared to Rick Santorum, my readers and I have been models of decorum and restraint.

—Congrats, Savage Lovers | Slog

Why does society consider it more moral for you to break up a marriage, go through a divorce, disrupt your children’s lives maybe forever, just to be able to fuck someone with whom the fucking is going to get just as boring as it was with the first person before long?

—Susan Squire, I Don’t: A Contrarian History of Marriage (Savage Love by Dan Savage)