Movie Review: An Inconvenient Truth

Do you know how many polar bears drowned due to global warming last year? Al Gore does, and the statistic is part of his presentation on global warming that, intercut by interviews and images of Al Gore on his environment crusade, is presented in "An Inconvenient Truth." Al Gore is funny, engaging, and heartfelt in this movie which presents global warming in a way that is easy to absorb for the average viewer, even if you aren't a scientist or a hard-core environmentalist. Well, at least I think. I am a pretty hard-core environmentalist (or at least a poseur of one) and have a reasonably good understanding of science. The graphics are wonderful and scenes from Al Gore's political past of trying to fight this in America will touch and infuriate you. Gore comes across not so much as preachy, but coaxing and supportive.

This movie was particularly helpful for me because, though I've never been skeptical about global warming, I have been unclear as to how scientists were distinguishing this from normal warming trends in the Earth's history. And now I know. Though we are currently at about the same level as previous peak temperatures of long ago Earth, as determined by ice sample analyses, the carbon levels in the atmosphere are at all time highs and are continuing to grow, and we know that heat and carbon go together. Which means that current heat is not abnormal, in the scheme of the great geological past, but it will get hotter. Every scientific article published in a peer reviewed journal agrees with this evaluation. It is only in the lay-world that there is doubt about global warming. And we must not doubt any longer. I cannot convince you to care about the extinction of species, or the houses that are collapsing in greenland as a result of melting permafrost, or future generations of refugees who will be forced to leave coastal areas, but you should know that you are responsible for this.

To learn more about global warming and what you can do to reduce your carbon emissions visit

climatecrisis.net

Go see the movie. It's worth it.

A Marriage of Equals

Here are two pieces from the Washington Post:

Gay Marriage amendment Fails in Senate

Washington Sketch

The first is an article, the second an editorial. Both concern the re-introduced marriage amendment. All I can say is, I am ashamed for my country. Let us ignore, for the moment, whether I support gay marriage or not. This matter is not for the federal constitution. Marriage is a matter of interpersonal relationships, not a crucial government issue. If the marriage amendment, which would define marriage as the union between a man and a woman, became a part of the Constitution, it would be the only constitutional article of its kind. To incorporate marriage into the Constitution is to say that the very structure of our government and our nation is dependent upon a particular type of personal relationship among our citizens. How incredibly weak and ridiculous does that make the USA sound?

Now to what the amendment is about. To define marriage as the union between one man and one woman is to leave democracy behind and turn the USA into a theocracy. There is no secular reason to keep homosexuals from marrying. After all, partnership is partnership. Two people of the same sex can have a joint household, combine their assets, and care for each other in times of need just as two people of opposite sexes can. There is no anthropological reason to assume the necessity of the nuclear family with one father, one mother, and 2.3 children. In fact, societies where there is traditionally strong ties between extended kin generally have lower incidences of major depression.

The religious reason lies in the belief of orthodox Christians, Jews, and Muslims that sexuality cannot be separated from procreation without being sinful. Hence the protester quoted in the editorial who cites the danger of homosexuality encouraging masturbation. After all, one cannot create children through masturbation, so masturbation is sinful. Edited to add, in response to a note: I know that Orthodox Jews do not consider sexuality per se sinful, and that enjoyment of the sex act is considered necessary for both partners and that physical and spiritual fulfillment in this case are intertwined. However, my understanding is that Orthodox Jews understand the story of Onan and Tamar as an injunction against masturbation, and of course Leviticus forbids a person to lay with a man as with a woman, which is hard to interpret in any way that doesn't relate to homosexuality. So sex only becomes legitimate in a procreative model, i.e., man and woman. However, I do not know what the opinion of Orthodox Jews on birth control is, so I am more than willing to be educated on this, or corrected if my understanding about the Orthodox Jews and the Onanian dogma is wrong.

This belief is incredibly archaic. We live in an era where contraceptive is safer and more reliable than ever, AIDS is sweeping through Africa and India, and the globe is becoming grossly over-populated. Besides which, how is this anyone's business? How did these "activists" ever get the idea that what goes on in other people's private lives is their concern? If I choose to marry another woman, how does that affect anyone else? It certainly doesn't demean heterosexual marriages. Denmark, the first country to legalize same-sex marriage, has a divorce rate of 2.81 per 1000 people, as opposed to the prejudiced USA's number of 4.95 per 1000 people.

The truth is that numerous kinds of sex acts, including masturbation and homosexuality, are known in nature. In fact, anyone who has ever had a dog hump his leg knows this. So there goes the belief that homosexuality is unnatural, practiced only by degenerates. Of course, there are some who would argue that the bestial nature of these acts is what makes them so reprehensible. In which case, I can only suggest that these people stop eating, sleeping, or going to the bathroom.

Modern marriage is the joining of two individuals who enter into a partnership not because they need each other, but because they want each other. Today women can work and men can stay home and raise children. As we have dispensed with strict gender roles, so have we negated the need to only consider marriage as occurring between a man and a woman. We live in a nation which was one of the earliest to separate church and state. So why should the religious convictions of some be allowed to affect the civil liberties of others?

I'd like to conclude with a link to Glaukopis's satire and this thought: we are created in God's image, so why not revere our bodies in all the ways possible?