george michael

do you find it funny that george michael sang faith?

not really. why is it funny?

maybe funny is not the exact word, but he was singing this song about a relationship he was trying to get out of, the person was begging him to stay, he was saying he wanted something more and he also didn't want to get hurt again. he didn't want to screw himself over like he did in the past, etc. thing is, we just had faith that he was singing about a woman simply because he was a man singing a love song. we just made a huge assumption. when he came out, everybody was like "what?!! george michael is gay?!! but what about the songs?". we never even considered that the lyrics didn't say her or she or anything that specified he was singing to a female. but in faith we saw a straight man when in reality we were looking at a gay man.

well, his image was heterosexual. so the messages we get would be hetero too. besides, a song is just a performance. he doesn't literally have to be singing to a man or a woman.

yyyyyeaaaaaaaaaah... not the point i was making. actually, what you're saying proves my point though. his image was hetero, but it wasn't based on fact. yet we bought it in faith.

oh. i read you now. you're talking about how easily we buy into things... even when we have no proof right?

can't get anything past you eh sherlock!

whatever brother. we have a tendency to do that though. it's just how we were brought up. take santa for example. we train our children to believe in santa without giving them the slightest reason to. even here in trinidad where a sleigh, boots and a red long sleeve suit with fur is totally irrelevant, we feed them the santa story. and we don't even have the decency to tweak the story a little to make it logical for them. we put on our sweetest voices and tell them that santa delivers gifts all around the world in one night. on a sleigh that flies. pulled by reindeer. one of them has a nose so shiny it glows. then comes the bad part. the reward for being good all year is that this fat man will fly his ass to you wherever you are and give you all the things you wished for. but if you're bad, he's not going to give you a damn thing. and we tell them this. make them write notes to santa, buy them gifts and tell them santa got their notes and brought them. so they can be happy, aaaand maybe so we can control them a little bit with "don't do that! santa wouldn't bring you your bike eh!". what kind of happiness is that? well... ignorance is bliss.

sounds familiar too. "don't do that! you'll burn forever and ever in the deep deep dark dark deep dark pit." george michael said it in careless whisper: to the heart and mind ignorance is kind. there's no comfort in the truth. pain is all you'll find.

when you look at it, it's not bliss though. it's actually fear. if i do xyz, i won't get my toys. so i'll do abc. or if i don't do xyz, i will burn in hell. what about doing abc because abc is good to do? even if no toys or hell is the penalty associated. how about not doing things for the big reward, but just being motivated to do good... full stop.

that's it. why give me some intangible thing to hold on to? just to control me? but then again, if i allow it to work, maybe i need to be controlled. i mean, if you want me to believe in unicorns, just show me one. i just need to see it one time and i'm good. if you show me unicorn food, or a horn, or a unicorn shoe. i'm not committing to that. i can't take that to the bank.

maybe you can't, but a lot of people do. just flip through the channels on a sunday morning. they're taking it to the bank tax free to boot. that's just how it is.

conditioning is a hell of a drug. me, have faith in whatever you want, just don't force it on me. bring your evidence and i'm with yuh.

i hear that. me, i'll just keep it here... and don't say nuttn.