the awesome/terrifying freedom

my god!!! what is the deal with these ads above my blog? i'm ready to vomit. this is a direct result of google's recent acquisition of blogger. now google can place their own advertisers above blogs that register on various word searches. so by writing about gay people and hate crime legislation, i get an ad from google that puts an ad for a 'jesse dirkhising' search next to a 'focus on the family" search.

these 'ads' are strange. the larger section of the ad is paid for by specific sites, and the smaller area at the bottom is adspace for google to promote themselves by supposedly offering relevant searces to the readers of a specific blog. i like it when ariana huffington or bill maher appears, but all the right wing stuff? do me a favor and don't click over to those sites. it will only encourage them.

on the good side of all this, i didn't know who jesse dirkhising was until last night. he was a 13 year old boy, raped and murdered by gay men in arkansas shortly after the matthew shepherd case reached full media saturation. jesse got virtually no press, and has since become a poster boy for right wingers needing evidence of a vast gay conspiracy within the news media. for them, it proves a hipocrisy when reporting 'hate crimes;' that news organizations will go out of their way to protect the fragile image of gay people, perhaps trying to avoid a similar storm of protest after andrew cunanan was headlined as 'the gay serial killer.'

and here's the problem with the term 'hate crime.' was jesse's death a 'hate crime?' how do you determine whether these two sick homos were taking out an agression against straight people, or if they were just plain, equal opportunity, sick fucks?

there's too much to write.. i'm undecided on where i stand regarding hate crime legislation. i have to think it through some more. true, a person's intent can never be known - we can only judge by action - and it is possible on some level to look at a person's pattern of behaviour and determine motive. but should there be a separate category for 'certain types' of hatred? is hate crime legislation a form of inverse social justice affirmative action? i support affirmative action... should i support this?