Earth Day, Dr. Seuss Style

As many of you know, I'm reading a list of 50 books that have been banned for political, religious, or ridiculous reasons over time. Books like Forever, by Judy Blume (my review) because they detailed a girl's decision about whether or not to become sexually active, or The Satanic Verses by Salman Rushdie, which is about a battle between God and Satan through two men (my review).

Well, I just recently read The Lorax by Dr. Seuss, which was banned because it's an allegory for poor treatment of Earth and loggers in California didn't like that so much. It's a story about the greedy Onceler who comes to the Lorax's territory and begins cutting down truffula trees, using the tops to make "thneeds" out of them, something *everyone* needs. He goes out of control, cutting down all the trees, polluting the air, and destroying the habitats of various types of fantastical creatures. The Lorax tries to warn him that he's hurting everyone numerous times, but the Onceler goes right on with his industry. Finally, the truffula trees are gone and everyone leaves, and all he's left with is a pile of rocks that say "Unless..."

Unless we do something. Yeah, this is an Earth Day post. I'm not a hippie-tree-hugger by any means, guys. I'm not going to move into a tree once I get to UC Berkeley. But I think that even when this book was published in 1971, Dr. Seuss brought up a good point. If we're not careful, we'll ruin this Earth for future generations. So, let's do our part. I'm not asking you to bomb a manufacturing plant (in fact, please don't do that), but let's use ceramic mugs instead of plastic cups for our coffee in the morning and carpool to work/school/the movies. I'm not saying that we should ban cars or wear only hemp or whatever. I don't know how much I believe in global warming (I'm not a scientist, I can't look at those figures for myself and draw my own conclusions), but I know for sure that the coral reefs off the coast of Australia are dying, and I know for sure that we're deforesting the Amazon at an alarming rate, and those are beautiful creatures, God's creatures, that need a place to live too.

Think about that today. When our kids are born, and their kids, I want the world to be just as beautiful as it is today, if not more so. I don't want it to look dark and sad like it does where the Onceler lives.

Getting In On The Controversy

I didn’t participate in Day of Silence this year, though I wanted to. My mother is coming into town to visit me and while she is very supportive of gay rights, she is not so supportive of me not speaking to her. Also, I had my big law discussion class and it was inconveniently scheduled that today would be a “speaking” quiz in which we all had to put forth an opinion to get a grade, and while I do believe that equal rights are more important than whether or not I get an A, it was kind of just an icing-on-the-cake reason not to.

Despite all that though, this is a little story/quote thing I wanted to share in support of this day. I’m sure you’ve heard it before, but in case you haven’t, take a read. It’s short.

An engineering professor is treating her husband, a loan officer, to dinner for finally giving in to her pleas to shave off the scraggly beard he grew on vacation. His favorite restaurant is a casual place where they both feel comfortable in slacks and cotton/polyester-blend golf shirts. But, as always, she wears the gold and pearl pendant he gave her the day her divorce decree was final. They’re laughing over their menus because they know he always ends up diving into a giant plate of ribs but she won’t be talked into anything more fattening than shrimp.

Quiz: How many biblical prohibitions are they violating? Well, wives are supposed to be submissive to their husbands (I Peter 3:1). And all women are forbidden to teach men (I Timothy 2:12), wear gold or pearls (I Timothy 2:9) or dress in clothing that ‘pertains to a man’ (Deuteronomy 22:5). Shellfish and pork are definitely out (Leviticus 11:7, 10) as are usury (Deuteronomy 23:19), shaving (Leviticus 19:27) and clothes of more than one fabric (Leviticus 19:19). And since the Bible rarely recognizes divorce, they’re committing adultery, which carries the rather harsh penalty of death by stoning (Deuteronomy 22:22).

So why are they having such a good time? Probably because they wouldn’t think of worrying about rules that seem absurd, anachronistic or – at best – unrealistic. Yet this same modern-day couple could easily be among the millions of Americans who never hesitate to lean on the Bible to justify their own anti-gay attitudes. ~Deb Price, And Say Hi To Joyce

I’m a Christian. But I support gay rights.

See, we have this concept in the US of separation of Church and State. It’s why we’ve only had one Catholic president — we don’t want the Pope, or anyone or anything else — trying to dictate our lives. So, why should we let a book, a book that only 76% of Americans believe as truth, dictate the laws governing what 100% of Americans are allowed to do? I’m not a math major, but that must mean that 24% of Americans are not Christians. As of July of 2009, the US population stood at 307,006,550, meaning that Christians who try to force everyone else to live by the Bible are forcing 73,681,572 people to live by a standard they don’t believe in. Because, yes, homosexuals, bisexuals, transexuals, whateversexuals are people too.

Maybe I’m naïve, with my whole idea of fair and allowing everyone to enjoy the same freedoms they’re supposed to be guaranteed by this nation, but it seems really fucked up to me that we (yes, I’m including myself here because I am a Christian) think we get to tell other people what the “right” kind of love is and discredit their’s.

And before you say this nation was founded by conservative Christians and should be run by conservative Christians: No, no it wasn’t. It was founded by liberal-extremist DEISTS who were basically agnostic and believed that there might be a God maybe, but Christ was not His son. Just saying.

img cred.

One Day Without Shoes

Love. Love. Love.

It was definitely a sweats day last Thursday, haha. Yeah, I play in the dirt sometimes. :)

Did you go barefoot? If so, link up pictures! :)

Day Without Shoes

There's this company, called TOMS Shoes, that does a really awesome awesome thing. For every one pair of shoes you buy from them, they donate another pair to someone in the world who doesn't own shoes.

And on April 8th, aka THURSDAY, they're sponsoring a world-wide event called One Day Without Shoes.

It's exactly like it sounds. On April 8th, we're all going to go barefoot for the day to raise awareness for people around the world that go without shoes every day. It'll be good for us -- we'll get a glimpse of what it's like -- and good for them because people WILL ask why you're going barefoot.

Well, here's why I'M doing it:

• In some developing nations, children must walk for miles to school, clean water, and to seek medical help.
• Cuts and sores on feet can lead to serious infection.
• Often, children cannot attend school barefoot.
• In Ethiopia, approximately one million people are suffering from Podoconiosis, a debilitating and disfiguring disease caused by walking barefoot in volcanic soil.
  
• Podoconiosis is 100% preventable with basic foot hygiene and simply wearing shoes.

Will you join us? RSVP here.