The 800th (by Rightist Reckoning) Post

Powered by Journey videos (it's All Your Fault, Lisa Golden!), this compilation of opinionated and informative links owes its existence to 5 days of "no, that's not quite," and "but I have stuff to do!"  (Which led to commenting on lots of stuff on Dreamwidth--have I mentioned that I still have 3 invite codes?--in lots of different directions, because I half-know a lot of stuff--but not on useful projects or useful knowledge increase.  But I digress.)

Dave and Joe host a party for the holidays.  And why it matters:

It struck me last night just how wonderful this whole thing was. Joe and I, together, are hosting a 'do' at work. It wasn't that long ago when we lived in a time where gay people did not live openly, were not acknowledged as couples, did everything to avoid notice. Now here we are part of a relationship both acknowledged and honoured at work. Too, I will be there, as a person with a disability in an office that is fully accessible and where any of our members or staff with disabilities are welcome to drop by and participate.

Mexico City is down with that.

Ten people who might consider a much lower profile in 2010, according to Michael Arceneaux at The Root.  Also, some minor signal-boosting.

As someone who is conflict-averse, I winced along while reading Jill's posting:

We had the sense that all Bill Clinton wanted was quiet. I understand this mindset, I have it myself, coming from a family that experienced a fair amount of shouting fights and uproar in my childhood. When you grow up as a conflict avoider, you tend towards twisting yourself into a pretzel and jumping through hoops in a vain effort to just have some peace and quiet. It's a terrible way to live and it doesn't teach you that sometimes people will disagree and you have to learn that capitulation is not always the best way to resolve a conflict. You have to learn that your viewpoint is just as valid as anyone else's, and that you have a right to defend it.

And having mentioned Lisa (yeah, I know I'm being boring, but the universe is trying to trick me into a state of calm before dropping the next set of disasters on me, and in the interest of not having said disasters dropped, I'm trying to stay mildly paranoid (cue Black Sabbath).  Also to find the earrings that picked up my telepathic search for them and burrowed deeper into the apartment midden of Doom), I'm linking to parts 1 and 2 of her reaction to the reaction to Julie Powell's memoir, Cleaving.

The fact is - infidelity is but one way to hurt your spouse. There are sins of commission and sins of omission. No one ever wants to talk abut the damage done by withholding affection or love or intimacy. No one wants to discuss how marriages begun in one's twenties might just outlive their realistic shelf life when the couple reaches their forties, fifties or sixties. Perhaps the whole reason we've seen a cultural shift in the average age at which people marry for the first time is because the younger generations understand that who you are when you're twenty-two isn't the person you want to have picking out the person with whom you'll spend the rest of your life.

Why we have to keep on fighting for health care payment reform.  And what we lose by not having single payer, and how our politicians (and when I say "our politicians" here, I mean the ones who claim to be on our side) have betrayed us.

Brief review of Muhammad:  Legacy of a Prophet, with one of those quotable sentences:

Catholics cooperating with Quakers to promote understanding of Islam: interfaith activity is alive and well in Orange County.

Ann Louise Nixon Cooper, 1902-2009.

Last, and very much least:  Why rigidity is a bad thing.  From Obsidian Wings, with a whipped-cream sentence:

Unfortunately, the real world doesn't treat such inflexibility kindly.