If you're a queer conservative I don't get it. What have they done for you lately, those conservatives? Nada. Sure, there are fiscal conservatives and religious conservatives, bla bla bla. You wanna be conservative, great. Happy for you. Really. Enjoy the environmental degradation, the social injustice, the letting the meek rot because after all they shall inherit the earth, the anti-queer propaganda. Or just ignore those issues. Ignore them and accept conservatism on the basis of the issues you DON'T want to ignore. But really, when the day is over, YOU are able to publicly announce your queerness NOT because of conervatives' efforts, but because of the efforts of the open-minded liberals who've fought to make homophobia a stigma.

I get that being queer and conservative challenges norms, and that my attitude towards conservatives (and moderates, for that matter) is intollerant and partakes of the same kinds of "us/them" discourses that I think are fucked up for a democracy to have. To what do I owe this rant, then? Domestic spying's on a roll at the federal level, and here's how it manifests locally:

A University of California Los Angeles alumni group has been offering students up to $100 to "supply tape recordings and notes from classes to expose professors suspected of pushing liberal political views on their students." Several prominent members of the group, including US Congressman James Rogan (R), have resigned their membership. So wait, what's a liberal again? And what's a dangerous liberal? Are they two different things?

Ah...the trickle down effect. I've always had LOTS of faith in it. See, Bush authorizes domestic spying, and this makes it okay for smaller entities to spy also. "If Big B does it, we should too." Rest assured, the trickle goes back up, too. Who is analyzing the information gathered by the aforementioned alumni group? Probably conservative politicians higher up the chain of command. It's a web of spying. Lucky for us, the web strings are coming into clear view. Bear in mind, a spy-prone group may be watching a queer group why? Because they'll reason that most queers are liberal and therefore a threat to our nation.

Check out the brief version of the UCLA spy story at guardian.co.uk. Or the more thorough (yes, longer) version of the story by the LA Times.