After I hit publish on my last (on my god, totally boring) post, I clicked on over to Tweetdeck to read some tweets and Facebook stuff (that thing is such a time waster but I love it).  I was scrolling down and came across a post made by one of my in-laws and seriously, it PISSED ME OFF.

It’s no secret that I married into a (mostly) deeply conservative family.  That is something that I came to terms with long ago.  And hey, I know that we (talking about all humans here) aren’t always all going to get along or agree about everything.  Different opinions are good.  They’re healthy.  And usually I’m totally up to discussing politics–with civilized people who will allow other opinions to exist. I have no problem sitting down with someone whose opinion is different and discussing hot button issues or saying “so why do you think that [whatever] is better than [whatever]?”  Or “I heard about [this kooky thing] and thought you might know more about it.”

But here’s the thing:  some people in this ultra conservative clutch aren’t really conservative.  They’re just….haters.  I think that’s the best way to describe them.  Liberal Haters.  They don’t necessarily subscribe to the actual tenets of the Republican party or conservativism but boy, do they hate the liberals. And anything associated with liberals. Or endorsed by liberals.  And boy do they hate anyone who doesn’t agree with their views.  And boy do they hate doing their research and learning facts.  But boy, do they love to spout off about politics and current events and things where, really, you should do some real research before going off on the liberals or the president and I’m sorry, but Fox News does not count, simply because even by their own admissions (according to the Daily Show, the only source of current events revelations that doesn’t make me want to punch a baby) they don’t actually air much real news.

[pausing to take a deep breath before I accidentally go off an a whole other rant]

One of my in laws is regularly posting stuff on Facebook.  And you know, he’s entitled to his opinion.  I don’t ever comment on his posts because, well, I don’t want to get into an argument with someone who is likely to simply say “you’re just not smart enough to understand how the real world works because you have a liberal brain!” (no kidding, a different in law actually said that to me once and if I wasn’t so damn mad at the time I probably would have laughed).  But today I look over and I see his post about the “holiday” tree and  a crack about “Obama’s god” and… well, let’s just say something involving Mohamed. And I wanted to scream.

First of all:  “Holiday Tree” is actually far more accurate a description of the thing we decorate each year since there is no actual “Christmas” tree.  There is no goddamn evergreen or fir tree in the Christmas story. It actually has pagan ties and, given the symbolism of the evergreen tree (lasting life, or something to that effect), it would probably make more sense to have it up at Easter. But Easter is in the spring and green trees are wintery, so there you go: we put it up at Christmas time–which, in all historical accuracy was probably not in winter.  But whatever.

Second of all:  President Obama is a Christian.  He got into a whoooooollllllllle lotta trouble during the election because he wouldn’t denounce his CHRISTIAN pastor (at least at first) and instead talked about going to that same CHRISTIAN church for years.

Third of all:  President Obama is not a Muslim. See my Second of all.

Third and a half of all: Every faith has extremists and jerk-wads who make the entire faith look bad.  Even if President Obama was a Muslim, who gives a frack? Islam is a peaceful religion.  If you don’t want people to judge Christianity by a some of the crazy wahoos that give it a terrible name, don’t do the same to Islam.

Fourth of all:  The idea of a Muslim trying to create a holiday called [racially slurred joke about Muslims and Christmas]  is utterly offensive to pretty much everybody across the religious spectrum.

Fifth of all:  This is just my opinion but I think  that all of the monotheistic religions worship the same God.  They just call him/her/it by different names.

Sixth of all:  Even if they didn’t, since President Obama is a Christian (see Second of all and Third of all) that means that “His God” is “your” God too sparky.

Seventh of all: If memory and my limited knowledge of the bible serves me correctly, Jesus and the God that Jesus called Dad were all about the love and not using them as excuses for being assholes.  They were all about the tolerance and being kind to others.  They were not at all about trying to force people to believe in them or condemning others who chose a different faith to subscribe to. So… suck on that.

I don’t post about stuff like this very often simply because I don’t like the damn drama that will undoubtedly be wrought by those who hate my opinions and now are part of mykids’ family tree (when I have kids).  But every once in a while I just…. it’s so….. arrrgggghhhhh.

Methinks I’m going to regret publishing this but…..