boytropolis

When Twitter diligently asks me "what's happening?", I should type
"another twilebrity is getting hacked, that's what!"

(I sincerely didn't intend to make this blog a photo album of tweetful
screenshots. It's just that...I spend so much time there...and I
happen to follow them...yeah...)

Posted via email from This Boy

Where's the option for Find Better Employer?

Posted via email from This Boy

Here are two fun words to start this article with:

1. Antidisestablishmentarianism - opposition to a movement separating the Church from the State, in support of forming a unified Church and State

2. Floccinaucilihilipilification - the act of estimating something as useless

These two are some of the longest words you can find in the English language. They are also convenient terms to be used when discussing the Comelec's decision to reject the LGBT partylist Ang Ladlad on grounds of moral corruption.

As some of you might care to know, the lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender minority was again disallowed from proper representation in local government. The first time, they said it was because the Filipino pink community does not hold the requirements for a legitimate partylist (important things like marginalization and regional membership). This time, they reason it was because these same men and women are not top-of-mind choice for societal role models.

The key topics in this issue are religion, morality, minority, culture, equality and the law. Very hard subjects to discuss but let's attempt to address them one by one.

The righteous gentlemen at the Comelec, as well as their supporters, headline their statement with a few of God's purported maxims. It can be any of these lines: God hates the gays so we also hate the gays; God only sees men and women who identify as heterosexual; God will allow people to be gay as long as they pretend to be straight. Add some quotes from the Bible for "veracity" and we get a prejudiced thesis. But since this is a subject of faith, which is a personal matter to begin with, here is mine: I believe in a God who only holds the rule of love, and from this love will come forth respect toward other people. With respect there is compassion and understanding, a willingness to comprehend the unknown. Before the pious and the sanctimonious dismiss the God I believe in, please let me know: how do you justify that a discriminating God is the kind of entity mankind should believe in?

Morality in this day and age is a game of finger-pointing in hopes of determining who's riding the high horse. To be fair, let's consult Merriam-Webster: morality is "conformity to ideals of right human conduct". If facts and figures are to be believed, heterosexuals are guilty of everything homosexuals have committed. We talk of volunteerism, education, sacrifice, self-gratification, pedophilia, murder, child abuse. Human endeavors that define us as good or bad people. Save for same-sex intercourse, there is not much difference between the two sexual orientations. Why, then, is there a division between the moral conducts of a straight person from that of a gay person?

Since there is not much difference between the straight and the gay, this implies that the generally straight populace has absorbed the homosexual bloc, so entitlement as a minority is not only pointless but also special treatment. True, the number of overt gay men and women might be growing, but it is not sufficient enough to influence a population into mainstream acceptance, let alone be heard by the authorities. A relatively small group of people holding voice in a public forum makes a huge difference in the exchange of ideas. This is what minorities are about: hearing and getting heard. How do you pursue acceptance, one that is honest and not just polite, without the presence of information?

The country is dominantly Catholic. We are very conservative people. The Church influences the State. This is the kind of culture we currently live in. But do these factors hold us back or move us forward? And do we want to stay dormant or grow as a nation? Not every devout Catholic holds the same principles as those of his/her peers. Heck, we even have the term "non-practicing Catholic" and God knows if they outnumber the practicing ones. Have you seen the news? Have you read the papers? We are hardly conservative anymore. We mix together a potful of cultural identities from other lands and label it as "Proudly Pinoy". We are Westernized, modernized, globalized. Does this mean being Pinoy is living in a foreign era yet closing ourselves from foreign ideas?

"Equality among men and women" is the fight of the feminists, a minority represented by Gabriela. Why are the LGBT people struggling to be heard when they are men and women themselves? Because some people find the distinction between gender and sexual orientation difficult to grasp. To some people, we only have boys and girls. To some people, the boys-who-like-girls and girls-who-like-boys are getting the same rights as the boys-who-like-boys and girls-who-like-girls. This is true, but not all the time. If it does not happen all the time, it shows an imbalance leering toward the heterosexual. Is this a valid recognition of the homosexual? Should this be the way of life if equality is what we aim for?

And because the law only recognizes males and females, some benefit and protection clauses never reach the pink spectrum. For starters, a same-sex couple does not have the privileges granted by the Constitution to married couples. Convincing the Catholic Church to allow two women walking down the aisle is close to impossible, we give you that, but asking the State for civilian rights afforded by the majority is not tantamount to demanding for special privileges or solitary vacuums from legal responsibilities. If the law sees every individual with the same discerning eye, then why is it not applicable to every individual?

Do you still remember the two words I gave earlier? Disestablishmentarianism and floccinaucilihilipilification. The first long word is applicable to the current stance of the Comelec--hiding behind a facade of self-inflicted religious supremacy. The second long word is what the Comelec is making us do--estimate it as something that is useless.

Dear Britney's management team,

Hi, it's me again, Christina "Genie In A Bottle" Aguilera. I hope you
got my previous email about Britney's account getting hacked, again.
Don't you ever get tired of being the butt of all jokes? I mean,
where's Chris Crocker when you need him? And does he know, like,
technical internet stuff? Maybe you can hire him to manage Brit Brit's
Twitter so she doesn't get penetrated so fast and easy like that
hooker from the "Gimme More" music video, which by the way wasn't racy
and slutty AT ALL compared to my "Dirrty" music video. You got that,
mamasita? I'm the bigger slut here so quit fooling around as if she
knows cocksucking like I do because you're only making her look like a
stupid chonga wannabe.

Anyway, sorry about that rant. I'm just getting really concerned about
this invasion of celebrity privacy. Why isn't anyone invading mine?!?
What is wrong with you people?!? Are my boobs not big enough for
you?!?

Just wait till my kid gets into preschool. In my next music video, I'm
showing my untrimmed vagina. Full frontal close-up let's see you try
beating THAT!

P.S. For the record, I'm the Illuminati girl here, not her. Will some
paparazzi please take my damn picture already?!?

Sending love with "The Voice Within",
Xtina

Posted via email from This Boy

Dear Britney's management team,

I'm not sure how your brains work but "1234" is not a secure password.
Surprise! Now please quit getting hacked because I feel for Britney.
She doesn't deserve to be fat and hacked at the same time!

Okay, I'm kidding. I love it when her account gets pwned by 4chan
interweb geeks. But next time, try using "password" as your password.
Nobody would ever guess that! I've been using it for years now and my
privacy only gets invaded every three days. Three days!

P.S. If you're really sneaky, replace the "o" with a zero, as in
"passw0rd". NOBODY will guess that, trust me. Unless you're dealing
with an Agent from The Matrix. If that's the case then you are so
fucked.

All my best,
Christina Aguilera

Posted via email from This Boy

The problem with most of us in Livejournal is we depended too much on each other. We made interesting entries because we expected to read interesting entries. We wrote drama because people liked it, aside from the truth that we liked to dwell in our own drama, and that for some weird reason Livejournal is conducive to writing drama (I would deduce that this is force of habit). When people got busy or got tired of the so-popular-it-deserved-its-own-term LJ drama or moved on to Tumblr, we started to speculate that Livejournal is dead. No. Michael Jackson is dead. A chick from the original Charlie's Angels is dead. Elvis is dead, or maybe alive and somewhere in Roswell, but Livejournal isn't dead. Because I'm still here, writing whatever or crossposting whatever, and you're still here reading. Something doesn't have to die because people, new social media or the organic flow of events dictated it.

Of course, I am not spewing ill will toward anyone who decides to quit Livejournal. I'm way mature than that, noh, and you can do whatever it is you desire. I'm just saying maybe this place can be great again and we can start achieving that by writing again.

This is my cat, Rusty. Originally named Rustom Padilla and destined to die a fabulous death to be reincarnated as Bebe Gandanghari, until my mother was seen looking under the couch shouting "Rustom! Rustom! Rustooooom!" after which I proposed a moniker that sounded more like a household pet and less of a closet queen action star.

Rusty likes to sleep comfortably. His bedroom demeanor may imply alpha male proclivities (notice the laziness that comes with the extension of his furry paws) but rest assured I will do everything in my power to turn him as gay as Gloria Estefan. If you know of any downloadable gay porn for cats available online, please, let me know.

Posted via email from This Boy

When we say "there are better ways to win an argument" we usually mean "debate" but everybody knows that shit doesn't work outside the air-conditioned walls of a vandalized classroom. Everybody, except debaters who haven't had exposure to the disconcerting reality of Life Outside Debate. (And as much as I hate being a party pooper...are you ready for this? There is Life Outside Debate and someday you would need to stop debating.) Just wait until you find yourself explaining fourteen levels of argumentation to a boss who doesn't care about what you think. Now don't go on killing yourself once you discover that even after flawlessly rebutting every single point of a worried business contact, he closes a deal with the girl who sucks his dick after buying him lunch. And don't even think of completely losing it when you present that polished CV to an interviewer, shining-shimmering-splendid with debate cap feathers, then she proceeds to ask everything about you except--you guessed it--debate. Where's that feedback form when you need it?

This isn't to say debate is but a prolific waste of time. Hardly. This is only to say truth number two: nobody likes a know-it-all. Nobody likes a smartass. Nobody likes your academic superiority and nobody likes your academic snobbery. In Life Outside Debate, people will smile when you wax nostalgic of good old days spent reaching for speaker score 80 a.k.a. Jesus Christ Came Down From Heaven To Debate. These people will politely smile, listen intently and realize they couldn't give a shit.

And truth number three: don't talk too fast. People don't like that either.

Posted via email from This Boy

We've always known it's like a Brazilian cave down Britney's punani but what we didn't know is that this wondrous place of spelunking adventure is really a man-eating orifice with razor sharp teeth. I've always wondered what a Venus Flytrap would look like if it was a vagina and then, just like a universe conspiring to make my dreams come true, this happens. There are no pictures (sadly) but my visualization skills are a-maaay-zing cos I ain't no creative for nothing.

If you still want pictures, please google Brit Brit's shaved beaver photos (you horny motherfucker).

Posted via email from This Boy

And I don't even know this guy. Although he looks like an undercover sex maniac from Western Europe who preys on little boys and big girls (and when I say big I mean big fucking phat girls, political-correctness aside) but holds a day job at the local Red Cross center in Berlin or Amsterdam or anywhere prostitution is viewed as culturally awesome. I want to marry him and his Jamaican gradient and our wedding vows? It's all over his face.

(by www.andrewjohnstone.com)

Posted via email from This Boy

English translation:

Even if he's virile as a leather-clad S&M daddy from the 80's, Dakota still felt shivers down his spine. "What is this delicious travesty growing between my legs?"

Darby, or Emmery, or whatever his name is because the image is too fucking blurred, was also shaken in disbelief. "Dude. Your dick is, like, turning into, you know, a snake or something. Sweeeet."

And then suddenly... "Hiissssssshh I will cum on your faces with the sperm of a thousand Japanese pervs if you do not give me a little BJ hiissssssshh!"

To be continued

Posted via email from This Boy

A thank-you note for the incompetent, the indifferent and the plain stupid.

(image from www.leighreyes.com)

Posted via email from This Boy

The corporate mash-up of a cinema hallway, museum, Toys "R" Us and your friendly neighborhood park that moonlights as a cruise spot. One (that one being me) could only wish they turn it into a smoking area. Or a coffee shop. Or maybe just a smoking area.

Posted via email from This Boy

As in, I am so over it. Change has finally come to good old me and the things I used to know and love and hate and cannot live without, they have been filed away in the ugliest plastic folder that National Bookstore has in stock.

My legion of fans might wail in desperation as I announce today that I'm officially over with being dramatic. I simply cannot bear the sight of four people crying, maybe three if the other one is already over me, but sometimes and more so eventually, declarations would need to be released to an imaginary public. Yep, boys and gays: the drama queen has finally retired his career. My time is now spent on admiring the shelves of awards accumulated over the years. One favorite in particular is this trophy I got for the episode "Falling In Love For Two Years With The Concept Of A Lover And Getting My Heart Broken In The Process". Good times.

There is also one less person in the meat market and one less profile in most popular gay personals websites. Believe me when I say, dads and sons, that the pink community can shut me off at least temporarily from its rainbow-tinted gaydar while I pursue other interesting hobbies such as drunken flirting with cab drivers or shopping for books but never reading them or googling synonyms for words such as "jaded" and "cynical".

The profoundly hysterical subculture that is misleadingly called "Philippine debate community" might also remain indifferent with the intrapersonal affirmation that I am over competitive debate. See, geeks and closet gays? It is possible to accept that life has so much more to offer than trading back issues of The Economist. The only downside to forgetting I was once a debater is also forgetting to visit the BBC website and instead waste my time reading old posts at chuvaness.com while crafting a (hopefully) knee-slapping, face-palming, side-splitting tweet. Log on to twitter.com/barnyrivera for more info.

Don't you ever get the wrong idea that my life has turned peachy overnight. It was a long, painful process which I would rather not describe in detail but in rather abstract concepts: Wind blows my hair now / I stare into the sky now / Sun is now shining. An amateur poet can seriously kick my ass but I'm also over that fact and besides who the fuck reads haiku.

I'm over drinking to get drunk, I'm over monthly rations of wanton coitus, I'm over friends turning into sudden strangers, I'm over the constant yearning for an intellectual audience, I'm over whining and complaining and forced submission, I'm over whatever it is you might have done to me but rest assured it will be carved in my heart forever and you will be properly labeled in morally demeaning terms.

The only bad thing about being over a lot of things is there is nothing more to blog about. What am I supposed to do, write about how happily wasted I was at last night's party?

Don't forget. Don't you ever forget.

(http://blogsecret.tumblr.com/post/202628603/11067-to-the-youth)

Not a lot, but we'll manage. Or try to manage, since time management was never a strong suit.

Bought an inordinate number of books that will probably take a year to finish. Still not even halfway through Neil Gaiman and Terry Pratchett's Good Omens and it's been over a month since I bought it. Want to start with Warren Ellis' Crooked Little Vein because Joss Whedon gave it a good review at the back of the book and Joss Whedon rules because he made Buffy the Vampire Slayer, of which I had a season six marathon the previous weekend. It was good.

Getting slightly addicted (because addicts never admit their addiction) with Twitter. For real? I'm only blogging now because I don't want this journal to die, and I can't think of anything to tweet.

Having trouble writing. I hate myself when I write. Hate hate hate myself. I call myself a writer, I work as one, but I don't feel like one. Was never really a fan of self-pity (this dude is more of the angsty-depressed kind) and I believe I'm one hell of a good writer--remember, kids, to always believe in yourself!--but I don't know, I'm in some sort of funk. Maybe there's just nothing interesting to write about. Nothing interesting in my life, unless you wanna hear how hopelessly jaded I've become. I'm choosing if "jaded" or "practical" or "realistic" or "beyond clever" is the right term to use.

I'm also kind of wondering why I still haven't memorized Taylor Swift's "You Belong With Me" even after playing it continuously for two days during work hours. Maybe after three, four?

One day I'll make sense again, I promise.

 As corny and as pretentious as this sounds...

I think I need to find myself again.

I got lost in the world of routine, morning traffic, bills, internet distractions, social networking, bookstores, expensive coffee, professionalism, corporate issues, new friends, old friends, false appearances, interpersonal politics, shaky relationships, jadedness, hopelessness...

All of that is not me.

I know who I am.

I'm going back to it.

For some strange reason I am greatly affected by Alexis Tioseco's death. I have never met this guy. I do not know this guy before he was murdered. It only took a few Google searches to see for myself who he is and how important people like him are in this country.

He had passion. Passion to change something, turn it from something bad into something great. Something everyone thought was close to impossible. He believed. And God knows how hard it is to hang on to a belief, when everyone around you would rather choose to quit, or when things happen that make you feel all your efforts are worthless, fated. He believed he can make a difference and strived hard to do it.

He wrote to incite change, to provoke emotions, and all of this--the writing, the dedication--put to a stop by some senseless mad man. My heart broke because he wasn't able to see the change he wanted to see. We can say his efforts weren't put to waste but why would anyone deserve to die like that?

Last night, Cory Quirino was relaying his experience being kidnapped. She was held captive for around 19 hours and things got worse hour after desperate hour. She said, "Huwag na natin kuwestiyunin ang Diyos." She said it because all those things that happened to her during the ordeal, even if situations got worse, they all led to her freedom.

Maybe Alexis' death serves as a reminder for people like me to never stop believing and that only death can stop a person from fulfilling his dreams. He may have died brutally but his death gave birth to hopefully a hundred, a thousand or a million awakenings. That no matter what happens, we don't stop moving forward. We go on and do what we feel is right, what we think is for the betterment of everybody.

Nobody that unselfish, that passionate for change deserves a dark ending to a life so young. But if this...this thing that happened to him should bear fruit to make his dream come true, if it moves us from our seats and gives us our wake-up call...then Alexis, my dear unknown friend, you did not leave this earth in vain.

Aurora, Bambu Spliff, Calla Lilly, Collie Herb, Duster, Electric Superfox, Falling at Zero Degrees, Imago, Mom’s Cake, Paraluman, Peacepipe, Pedicab, Playphonics, Rare-Fi, Razorback, Severo, Skabeche, The Bernadettes, The Camerawalls, The Coffeebreak Island, True Faith, Turbo Goth.

Tara!