The Evil Petting Zoo

I am white. I grew up in a suburb that skewed decidedly upper-middle-class. I am gay. I am currently pursuing a college education tailored towards a career in the entertainment business. I'm a guy. I live in Massachusetts, and plan to go to Los Angeles soon. I have Asperger's Syndrome. I am a geek. I work one job for minimum wage, and am desperately trying to get another for the summer.

Am I normal? Depends. What the hell do you call "normal"? The fact that I'm on the autistic spectrum likely skews me several degrees off balance. Gays are a noted minority, but at my college, probably half the male student body is gay. Then again, I'm also a white male, which means I'm common as dirt all across this fine US of A. Massachusetts and LA have been separated out by common knowledge as where the "weirdos" live by some common knowledge that I cannot contribute to, falling only behind San Francisco. But I come from a middle class background, which is pretty much average across America these days (though likely shrinking). What I'm saying is, I'm a mish-mash of traits, and can't be analyzed for any one factor.

Oh, and what I'm also saying is that Chris Matthews is a leaking asshole, but we already knew that.



MATTHEWS: OK. Let me ask you about how he -- how's he connect with regular people? Does he? Or does he only appeal to people who come from the African-American community and from the people who have college or advanced degrees?

Ah, yes, the perpetual skink hunt for the "regular person." The kind of thing that sends normally rational reporters to the literal fucking middle of the country to pester farmers for their folksy wisdom. The kind of thing that convinces ostensibly liberal commentators to throw over gays, blacks, and women to seek out "the common worker", who most certainly is not gay, black, or a woman. And, as seen above, the kind of thing that leads us to marginalize entire constituencies because we fetishize the myth of the true American, the blue collar bowler who never went to college.

Now, I'm not knocking the blue collar people. They do a damn good job, and they need their voices heard. But I am sick and tired of how media personalities paint the "regular" man as the be-all and end-all of politics. Blacks? Nope, too few. Gays? Nope, they dress funny. Women? No, they have vaginas and breasts and such. Urban people? No, they're too weird. People with college educations? Nah, you know what all that book-learning does to a potential constituent. Everyone knows that the only person who matters in America is the straight white male factory worker.

So, once you're done catering to them... what about the hundreds of millions of other people in America?