Luckily, no one ever really wants my opinion at this pseudo-junior-high nonsense

I have been sitting with my fellows at lunch the past couple of days, privately disgusted with their societal conditioning and their hobbies and behavior. I'm sort of grateful that nobody ever says, 'Dev agrees with me! Don't you Dev?' in the midst of their weird petty nonsense, because I'd have to respond honestly 'No, I really don't agree with or have anything in common with any of you.'

Ugh.

Anyway, this article about the lack of maternity leave offered in the US illustrates one of my biggest problems with the system as it is now.

Last night, some poor bright-eyed optimist down at the AZDem party called to ask my (prescripted) opinions on the 'issues' and to talk about the Arizona Senate (which, I should point out, is not the same as the Arizona Senators-- you may not have heard of the people running for AZ Senate, while McCain's recent bid for presidency means that he is actually somewhat better known). While I strongly support Rich Carmona for AZ Senator in the national sense, I dislike both of the candidates for the AZ senate.

Here is why: Lewis has been in the office, and yeah, the Republican party has pretty much embraced being the big bad villains their opponents say they are, especially the last couple of years and especially here. Lewis represents more of the same-- more judges telling sexual assault victims that they are to blame for the society that is willing to hurt them, more Jan Brewers with more terrible decisions-- and his past record is still pretty much full of that.

Ableser, on the other hand, is a Nice Guy Mormon, who (among other things) moved for the Book of Mormon (albeit unsuccessfully) to be added to a potential law permitting bible-study as an elective in public schools. And his record is notable because he's missed a few votes, which makes it hard to see his perspective.

The reason this election sucks-- the reason why people like Danny aren't even bothering to vote-- is that this is not a government representative of its people. (I should think the bullshit with the DNC updating their statement against the obvious opinions of the people present at said convention is plenty demonstrative enough of this.) There are no options for me. The Democratic party is too afraid to take a stand in favor of the equality, rights, and admittedly socialist notions that I think would govern a better future for the majority of the people in this country. The Republican party is based too heavily around destroying my rights, and the rights of all underprivileged peoples, in the interest of benefiting the wealthy. I don't even hate them for being what we essentially call evil corporations-- I hate them for being short-sighted, idiotic evil corporations, the sort that aren't built around being sustainable at all. When I hear the logic behind many of their party stances, it feels like I'm listening to a supervillain explain how he's going to destroy the world, just because it's evil.

I want to say to this guy, "Well, where are you going to live?"

But the Republican answer seems too often to be, "Who cares about five years from now! I want my fantasies of unending wealth NOW!"

So that doesn't satisfy my desire at all, either.

There are parties that we could support, but realistically the system has evolved to mostly weed them out by requiring such a ludicrous amount of money to be a viable candidate that people of the Libertarian or Green or etc. etc. etc. parties cannot really run for office at all.

Anyway, so I sat through this bullshit survey, and I grit my teeth, and I answered many of the questions truthfully-- that is to say, "your survey is meaningless because it doesn't include my actual opinion." "Well, what's closest to..." "There IS no option I want. I'm left without a candidate because the system doesn't work."

I just can't be working like I do, talking to women who are about to lose their apartments because they haven't been able to find a job that lets them work while having three kids that their boyfriends left them with, and their boyfriends haven't been paying child support-- I'm sorry, I can't be seeing how SHITTY this country really, truly is, and then saying 'oh yeah, I'd totally vote for rich white guy #64, because I guess he's slightly less detestable than rich guy #27.'

I'm sick of people pushing religion into politics, and I'm sick of religion, because religion doesn't give two shits about women's rights, their health, or their quality of life.

Anyway. Today I'm just in a kind of shit mood.

Yesterday I wrote some DA:O fanfic over on my tumblr. It's the result of realizing I actually like Zevran, I just don't much care for fandom's Zevran.