The Kind-Hearted Smart Aleck

I see that today is "Pan Visibility Day." Yes, go to your kitchens this instance and show some respect to your pots and pans! Okay, so this has nothing to do with kitchen appliances and everything to do with "pansexuality." What is "pansexuality"? I'm so glad I asked. It's when one is sexually attracted to all genders. But wait, aren't there just two genders, which would therefore make the person bisexual? Not necessarily, but I see your confusion. While many use the terms "sex" and "gender" interchangeably, there is technically a difference between them. When you think "sex," think genitalia (just the word, don't actually picture those odd looking things). So, with exceptions, there are two sexes - male and female (again, there are exceptions). However, gender has more to do with how a person identifies, which goes past just their nether-regions. Yes, this is where things get really confusing, but please bear ...

The Pew Research Center just released the results to a poll they conducted with regard to voting. I found the results to be interesting for the simple fact all demographics agreed with each other, except for one. Pew asked participants whether they felt that citizens should register ahead of time in order to vote or if everything possible should be done to make it easy for citizens to vote. All of the following demographics agreed with the latter approach, and I'll list the numbers accordingly: Democrat: 84/15 (+69) Black: 79/19 (+60) 18-29: 71/27 (+44) Hispanic: 64/35 (+29) Coll grad+: 62/36 (+26) Women: 62/37 (+25) HS or less: 61/37 (+24) Total: 59/39 (+20) 30-49: 59/40 (+19) Independent: 57/41 (+16) Men: 56/41 (+15) 50-64: 54/43 (+11) 65+: 54/43 (+11) White: 54/44 (+10) Some coll: 53/44 (+9) Look at those numbers again. Here are 14 demographics, as well as the total, who all agree that we should do everything in our power to make voting easy for citizens on ele...

In a move which surprised even God, the Republican Party has guaranteed a victory in the upcoming presidential election, as they declared that an African-American lesbian will be their lone candidate, and due to that, their nominee. Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell said this about the party's decision:  "We were getting a little fed up with all the talk about our party waging a war against women, being anti-gay, and being unappealing to minorities. So we thought Destiny Beaver would be the perfect nominee to help improve our image among women, African-Americans, and the LGQRWXYZ community, or whatever in the heck that is, and would guarantee us a victory come election day because of that. I mean, just look at it this way: We've always had the white men's vote; now we've also got the women's vote, the blacks' vote, the queers' vote, and maybe some other dark-skinned people's votes too. We can't lose!" McConnell was then aske...

Billionaire Johann Jimmy John took to the streets this past weekend with a Bible in one hand and a sign which read, "Our freedoms are gone which is why I don't have the freedom to do this," in the other, to, as he put it in his discussion with us afterwards, "Be the toughest freedom fighter the world has ever known!" When I asked Mr. Jimmy John what the ultimate message with his protest was for the country, here's what he said in response: "As a white Christian straight male billionaire, I feel like my rights are going out the window one by one, day after day. Muslims can now worship here. Guys can marry guys. Women can work outside the home. Some blacks can vote. I mean, what in the world is going on here? What happened to the days when I knew where my place was and knew what to expect of everyone else? The days when women would have dinner ready by the time us guys got home from work and they'd spread their legs for a 20-second dessert afterwa...

Over the past several weeks and months, I can't tell you how many times I've read or heard stories which focused on female victims of sexual assault needing to take more responsibility to prevent these crimes from taking place, and frankly, I'm sick of it. Why, so often, do people place the full weight of responsibility on the shoulders of sexual assault victims, as opposed to the actual perpetrators of the sexual assaults? Almost every time I hear people talking about such situations, they mention one or more of the following: - "She shouldn't have been wearing something so revealing. She was kind of asking for it." - "She should have known better than to have drank so much at that party. That was pretty stupid." - "She should have come prepared, brought some Mace, a gun, or something." - "She should have brought some friends along that she fully trusted." - "She shouldn't have flirted with/been so nice to ...

Online dating is an interesting phenomenon which appears to be steadily growing in popularity. While I've given such sites a gander on multiple occasions, despite its growing popularity, I see many pros and cons about such sites. As far as pros go, I think the main one is, unlike when attempting to start a conversation with someone at a bar and only going off their physical appearance to prompt you to do so, these sites provide a great deal more information, which can be quite helpful. As I've always said, no matter how physically attractive a person might be, that attraction can only hold my interest for so long before I get bored and lose complete interest in getting to know her better, and I start thinking, "Well, if I had known she couldn't hold a decent conversation before approaching her, I would have saved myself this headache and not talked to her at all." At least with online profiles, it can save people time, energy, and money on Advil, because they...

Conservative commentator James Taranto has come under fire for a op-ed he recently posted in The Wall Street Journal , entitled, "Drunkenness and Double Standards - A balanced look at college sex offenses." Taranto spends a decent amount of his time cherry-picking cases where men were wrongly accused of rape, before appearing to insinuate that intoxicated female rape victims are just as much to blame for the event as the male rapists. The common denominator for him is alcohol, which he believes is the main reason for this alleged double standard with regard to sexual assault in our country. In the article, Taranto writes the following: "Winerip notes that between 2005 and 2010, 'more than 60 percent of claims involving sexual violence handled by United Educators'--an insurance company owned by member schools--"involved young women who were so drunk they had no clear memory of the assault.' We know from Sgt. Cournoyer that the accused men typically ...

When we make plans with people, does our interpretation of language with regard to time alter based on what part of the country we reside? Just yesterday, I, who am originally from Nebraska, was making tentative plans with someone, who has always lived in Ohio. She's back in school, has already reached the burnt-out stage, and said, "The Saturday after Thanksgiving (when finals are over), we're going out and getting plastered!" I laughed, and said, "Sure, sure. That sounds like fun," before thinking about what she just said and realizing I'll have family in town Thanksgiving weekend (Wednesday through Sunday), so I had to ask, "Wait, which Saturday is this? You said the Saturday after Thanksgiving, right? If it's THAT Saturday, I'll have family in town, so it might need to be the following weekend, if that's okay..." She chuckled and said, "Oh, that's right - you're a Nebraskan. I'm not talking about the ...

Like with the term "love," of which there are 27 definitions in the dictionary, there doesn't appear to be a universal definition of the word "sex." The dictionary defines the term as follows: "Sexual activity, including specifically sexual intercourse." Yet regardless of the definition, sex means different things to different people. According to the law, two people are said to have had sex if any penetration occurred. However, if this is to be taken literally, then women have sex with themselves all the time. For some, sex is any and everything that occurs below the belt for two people. But, while it's understandable to refer to as oral sex as a kind of sex, when a person asks another if he or she has had sex with another, they're solely inquiring about intercourse. Perhaps one's definition of sex comes down to two main factors: 1) Whether they're a black-and-white or shades-of-grey thinker on the subject and 2) How they def...

While many men, especially among Congressional Republicans, seem to feel that the purported wage gap between men and women is just a myth, a new report illustrates otherwise. In an April report just released by the NWLC (National Women's Law Center), it showed that for a woman just to break even with a man when it comes to lifetime earnings, she'd have to work 12 more years than him. Over the course of 40 years, the average full-time working woman makes $443,360 less than the average full-time working man. This isn't fair and this isn't right. In order to try and equalize pay for equal work between men and women, please write your local Congressmen and women, sign petitions, and spread word. Two such petitions you can sign are at the following links: http://www.dccc.org/pages/equal-pay http://www.change.org/petitions/senator-durbin-we-stand-with-you-to-fight-for-equal-pay-for-women http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/05/09/gender-wage-gap_n_3245967.html

So, I had an interesting discussion with a female friend of mine yesterday - with the topic being drama and jealousy. She and I had a disagreement on, generally-speaking, who was the more dramatic gender. While I stated that I felt on average, women were more dramatic than men, she disagreed and felt the opposite. Of course, I was just speaking in general terms and then she specified her position, by saying on the "jealousy-drama" front, guys were far worse than girls. I then told her that on that particular front, she may be right, but I think it's pretty close and I think it's difficult to scale that specific kind of drama, because the two genders often times exhibit jealousy in different ways - with the males being more blunt and obvious about it. However, a friend of mine in Omaha almost refuses to be friends with girls, that or she winds up losing those friendships when it all comes down to it, because there's too much drama. She's told me she really pref...