"Queer Beer"

A bit of a rant today Space Travelers. This has been bothering me as long as I've been aware of it (which is now about a decade): The bear trap.

When I was becoming curious about alcohol in my teenage years, and began experimenting I quickly discovered that some alcoholic drinks were enjoyable, and others tasted like piss. What I also picked up on (like the observant youth I was) is that men and women had different drinking expectations, and whoever the authority on this was remained hidden in the shadows.

Drinking was an experimental endeavor in high school. I understood drunkeness only to the capacity that you'd seen others act abnormally. Even in the case where I might observe an individual sick or hung over, I had no ability to empathize. Wanting to feel what it was like to drink and be inebriated was far more alien than the more readily understandable media message about drinking: Holding a beer made you look cool, tough, and likable. As a awkward young man who was convinced he was alone in awkwardness, beer seemed like it made sense as a part of the formation of who I'd like to be.

One problem, I couldn't stand it. Beer sucked. Every time. I began looking for a new drink which could offer the exploration outside of sobriety and simultaneously offer me the social reward that I was pretending not to want. Casually. What I found instead was that the rejection of beer seemed to be in part a rejection of manhood. It was as if beer itself was a part of the blueprint of the modern man. I didn't understand this right of passage.

The next step was trying to find a beer I liked, because the types of beer that I had access to at high school parties (the type of beer that is sold in 30 packs) was scoring pitifully with me (and still does). Once outside of the more commercial hemisphere of the beer landscape, I found it much more difficult to navigate what I was supposed to try and how to even start determining what I liked. In college, I did find a few beers I liked (I remain rather loyal to Delirium Tremens). Despite finding some tolerable candidates, and an exclusive list of beers I moved into the enjoyable column, I started to wonder if I had simply traded one beer trap for another? Had I taken the elitist bait?

Admittedly, the dilemma was significantly smaller at this point. I had made excellent friends with wine, and had something of a friends with benefits relationship with a gin and tonic made with Hendricks Gin (two limes for me cause I'm fucking special). Still, I wanted to figure out where beer and I stood and if we were more than just frenemies with a common social circle. I began to wonder if there were other men like me who felt like me, that they were staying in this relationship because they didn't know how to get out. Things weren't terrible, but where was the spark?

To recap where I'm at now, let's watch some commercials.

When I was young, I understood that drinking was as much social as it was utilitarian.



As I experimented, I learned that men drink beer, and that it was cool. Damn cool.



Then I learned that not drinking beer, made you less a man. If you wanted to sip on a Zima (do they even make this stuff anymore?) or a Smirnof Ice, you're being made a cuckold by a beverage while you sip your "queer beer." I believe "bitch beer" as was the popular phrase in the jock strap community (saints, all). It makes me wonder sometimes. How many gallons of the beer consumed in a given day is done in the name of not being a "pussy?" Hell, even drinking the wrong beer is a white flag these days.



I'm a little wiser now. Don't get me wrong here, I still struggle with beer-gender. Typically, it's more about when I'm not drinking beer. There's some sort of artifact thought in the back of my head "should I be drinking a beer instead?" The wiser part of me is the part that reminds me that what I'm experiencing is very powerful and effective marketing. Rationally, we all know that beer has fuck nothing to do with a person's sexuality, yet it's so simple to get caught up in the meme of beer glory and heaven, owned and operated by the St Pauli's girl.

When I think about beer-media right now, I try to make it into something positive/constructive. As a feature on the gender landscape, I think my struggle with male self image as it relates with beer must in someway be a exercise in empathy for me. The intense media pressure to behave withing certain social norms and obtain degrees of material success is something that is not alien to women. Many women struggle with their self image and how they square peg the the round hole of main stream media acceptance.

Dear Space Travelers, be conscious of the media you digest and how you digest it. This really isn't about beer. It's about the car we're supposed to have, the job we're supposed to have, and the endless chase after six pack abs. The first message of an ad is that you lack something. I'm here to say, you bought a DVR so you could skip the commercials, so do it. No DVR? You can find something to do for four minutes that won't insult your self worth.

Cheers.

How Free?

Hello Space Travelers, you're staring at possibly the most terrible offences to Islam: An image of the Prophet Muhammad. I drew it. Me. I'll tell you why.

Recently, the creators of South Park aired an episode which featured (kind of) Muhammad. On screen, he was a stick man, and later a black box that read "censored." The point was simple: Your beliefs can't dictate my life and my speech, or rather that of Matt and Trey. The creators and various staff received death threats for this. Eventually Viacom (parent company of comedy Central) said they would pull the episode. This displeased a lot of people. It wasn't because the episode was particularly good either (it was par for the course if you ask me), but simply the principle that people had successfully leveraged violence to get their way.

I'm not really the type to provoke, and certainly as a I drew this, I was concerned about the Muslims that have nothing to do with this issue. Would drawing this make incense them and send the wrong message? Would it marginalize a group further that has been struggling to fit in? In the end, I decided to draw it and let it be what it will. I admit that I'm not well schooled in the dogma surrounding the rule about recreating the image of Muhammad. Perhaps in the end, what comments will come will serve to open up the dialog that is so terribly absent. Either way, I know that if this is truly an offense, it is not worth my life (or anyone's). I get offended daily. I'm not going to hurt someone. If this is serious enough that people are being threatened, the Muslim world is going to have to do some honest introspection on how they find harmony with the rest of the world outside of their customs. There is one question: Do you value free speech over being offended? I do, even if my blood boils as I listen to cruel bigots like Pat Robertson use it to demoralize the entire gay population or even the people of Haiti.

I've never been a USA USA USA rah rah rah type, so when I say that I value the freedom of free speech, it's not some flag waving crap. Our ability to express ourselves without the fear of the government, and without fear of violent reproach is the foundation of all free societies. On May 20th, many artists (both professional and amateur) will partake in the drawing of the Prophet Muhammad to stand in solidarity with those who have already been threatened with violence. While it inspires a warm feeling inside, I hope it also serves to remind us how fortunate we are to be one of the free societies in the world that we can do this. Plenty cannot claim the same.

I won't use the line that if we don't use our right's we lose them. That's a Tea Party rationale for bringing guns to a protest. Instead, I'll keep it simple, don't do this because it's "cool," or "controversial," it isn't a funny. I'd be just as worried about our freedom of speech if it became nothing more than a punchline, even if it started with a joke.

Closing thoughts from Thunderfoot:

vLog Unspecial 05: Lullaby

Good evening Space Travelers all timeouts come to an end and when you've got something to say (or sing), you should do it. No sense in dying with your music still inside.



It's not the greatest recording, and the urge to erase and rerecord was very strong, but I'm okay with it not being perfect. Anyone can be impressive, and singing into a desktop mic on a webcam in my gym clothes: Not charming. I guess no matter how I was clothed, I'd still at some level feel naked. shaaring this kind of thing is very personal and intimate.

I feel like many things are changing in me lately, and not just physically. I hope to share many of those things here, and perhaps with a melody at times. This boy has a song.

Sweet Dreams Space Travelers.

Time Out

Feel the burn Space Travelers. I've been going through lots of great changes as of late. I will be blogging a lot in the near future, but not here. I've been struggling to keep up on the posts here due to many new life changes. You can read about what I'm doing at my newest blog venture: The Metrics of Me.