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| Queering Excellence: The Immorality of Individual Success in Modern America |
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| Opinion - Global Warning | |||
| Lisa Jain Thompson | |||
| Tuesday, 23 February 2010 16:00 | |||
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Fairfax, VA, USA. We live in an age that calls into question the qualifications for excellence. No single person is allowed to be a success: no one can be that good. In a world full of queers, some of us are queerer than most. We must have cheated, we must have been lucky; we could not have succeeded on our own. The game must have been rigged from the start. Just when you think you have finally achieved success, the democratic American mass attempts to pull you back down. This is nothing new, it’s what we do. It’s only louder and easier to organize since the advent of the internet. Difference is inherently undemocratic. A black swan is always a threat to government and religion and the self-appointed arbitrators of democratic morality. In the great swell of humanity that is the democratic process only properly costumed rebels are permitted to exist unmolested, only culturally approved thoughts are encouraged and tolerated.
Washington, DC, USA. Science observes the universe, records what has occurred, and then develops a testable  theory that can explain those observations and make predictions on future ones.
Albert Einstein was very good at thi...It can be dangerous to be different. Being different can be hazardous to your health. The self-appointed many see their role in life as performing a critically needed societal function – the redistribution of achievement and the cross-leveling of success. Success is defined as privilege, individual achievement as only possible if society’s rule set was unfairly manipulated. Success is the two bit punk who intrudes on the quiet desperation sung by everyman, a stone in the shoe of the less visibly successful, reminding them of the reality of their day to day survival. Self-appointed spokesmen rise up decrying the motives of anyone who is different from the rest of humanity.
Your success makes everyone else feel bad because they aren’t as successful. Your actions are hurtful and cause pain to those who cannot do what you can do.
And when all else fails To be excellent in what you do is seen in some circles to be un-American. Their theory of democracy is that everyone must be the same, no better, no worse than other fellow citizen. To stand-out, to be successful is to declare that you are better than everyone else. But perhaps you are. Not every achievement is the result of luck; not everyone who is successful started out privileged and rich. To assume that anyone who exceeds the average norm does so by breaking the rules that everyone else must play by or as a result of favoritism and friends in high places distorts the human condition. We are not all born with equal talents. Some of us make a better astrophysicist than others. Some of us can run 100 meters in 9.58 seconds. I can do neither at the moment but it would be easier for me to become an adequate astrophysicist than a world class sprinter. That’s just the way the cards are dealt. I am, however, a fluid, articulate writer and have been one since the age of ten or so. And that is also the way the cards have been dealt. The talent is inborn and has less to do with my working class upbringing than it does the expression of my parent’s and grandparents’ genes when I was conceived. Just as being born transsexual is the result of neurobiological processes that were set in motion the moment the ovum accepted the sperm. You aren’t trying to be elite, you aren’t trying to be superior, and you certainly aren’t trying to be a separatist. It’s just who you are. And it’s different. Not better, not a cut above everyone else, not arrogant or self-centered, just different. It can be dangerous to be different. Being different can be hazardous to your health. Especially if the left hand wingnuts pounding the podium and insisting you are identical to all their friends and right hand wingnuts are insisting you are delusional at best and shamelessly depraved on the worst days. OK, so I’m different. At least we aren’t all the same. If we were, we wouldn’t need to hold elections, would we? The self-appointed experts could make all the decisions and tell us how we must live. But who’s to say that isn’t their ultimate plan anyway? One last thought before I go: That seems to be as good a definition of a working democratic republic as any. Anyone got a problem with that? NotesConan O’Brien the night he surrendered the Tonight Show.
 Ms. Lisa Jain Thompson is a Co-Founder & Principal of TS-Si. She also serves as a Contributing Editor and columnist for the TS-Si website. She maintains another site, StarPoet.com, for her poetry and literary works.Ms. Thompson's signed articles contain her own opinions and do not necessarily convey an official position of TS-Si, its partners, or affiliates. Lisa welcomes your comments. Use the form below or email via her TS-Si Contact Page. We will not divulge any personal details or place you on a mailing list without your permission.
 The TS-Si News Service is a collaborative effort by TS-Si.org editors, contributors, and corresponding institutions. Sources can include the cited individuals and organizations, as well as TS-Si.org staff contributions. Articles and news reports do not necessarily convey official positions of TS-Si, its partners, or affiliates. We welcome your comments. Use the form below to leave a public comment or send private correspondence via the TS-Si Contact Page. We will not divulge any personal details or place you on a mailing list without your permission.TS-Si is dedicated to the acceptance, medical treatment, and legal protection of individuals correcting the misalignment of their brains and their anatomical sex, while supporting their transition into society as hormonally reconstituted and surgically corrected citizens.
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and the TS-Si Research Service are collaborations of TS-Si officials, staff, contributors, and corresponding institutions. The contents do not necessarily convey official positions of TS-Si or its owners, participants, partners, or affiliates.