A reader did something today I wish more of you would do. She sent me a news story that had her, I guess, fuming. Her thoughts? “This is un-fucking-believable, really.”
Colour us simpatico, then, because my sentiments at first glance were, “Holy MOTHERFUCKER.”
If you’re one of the number who calls America “the Land of the Free”, it’s time you check your thoughts, pal, because it seems to me to be “the Land of the Paradox”, and that’s putting it lightly at best.
The gist of this story is simple: Cheat on your spouse, and face 1st degree criminal sexual conduct.
I wanna know why the Court of Appeals is allowed to smoke high-grade doobage when no one else is.
Look, I’ve been cheated on. My longest lover ever was sleeping with someone before we split, and after we split, he was married within nine months. Do the math.
Did I hate him? You’re fucking right I did. In some ways, I suspect I still do. I’d certainly never trust him again, as a lover, as a friend, as anything. Would I wish he’d be imprisoned for what he did to me?
HELL NO.
He fucked up. I know it, he knew it. That’s the way the game goes. I took the chance of following my heart, but it seems my compass needle broke long before I got out that door.
We’re talking about passion, matters of the heart, all that. I don’t believe in infidelity. If you’re unfaithful, you deserve getting your ass kicked to the curb. If you aren’t kicked to the curb, there’s your hard proof that your lover’s nth degrees better than you are—they’re giving you an invaluable second chance. Don’t fuck it up.
But JAIL? Criminal prosecution? All because you followed the tick-tock of your heart in one weaker-than moment?
And this is from the nation that claims it’s the GOLD standard of “freedom”? Yeah. Right.
I’ve never been unfaithful. God willing, I never will be. I honestly don’t believe I have it in me to hurt someone like that. But I’d never stake my life on it. I’m a passionate person. I’m impetuous. I’m the very definition of spontaneous. And I’m human. I err. It’s what we do. We make mistakes, then we pick up the pieces and struggle to carry on. I’d be a liar or a fool to claim it’ll never happen to me. I just don’t know what kind of sparks I’m destined for, in a relationship or out. None of us can know that. We’re human. We’ve all erred.
But we sure as fuck don’t need to round up a lawyer for fear that the law is going to stick our asses behind bars ‘cos we didn’t know how many martinis were one too many on a quiet night in a piano bar with one too many beautiful, lonely companions.
Unless, of course, you’re a member of the Appeals Court of Michigan, where, apparently, creativity and the ability to read between the lines is a rarely-seen quality in the legal minds of the day.
Fuck, man. I don’t even need to argue this. Unless, of course, you’re some holier-than-thou religious type who’s never taken liberties or fucked up on a lonely night when the thought of being not-alone was far easier to bear than the reality of being just that.
The Land of the Free. Let’s amend that. How about “The Land of the Mostly Free, Provided You Follow Every Law And Every Legal Sub-section Therein”?
Nah. Not too catchy, now, is it?
Get fucking real, Michigan. I can only hope, and pray, and dream, that the High Courts in that State can get a grip.
Like I say, I think adultery deserves a royal ass-kicking. But by the maligned Significant Other, not some fucking holier-than-thou court appointee. There should be no legal basis to decide these matters, at least not to this degree.
Here in Canada, Pierre Elliott Trudeau, our infamously rebellious prime minister at the time, declared in 1969 that the government had no business in the bedrooms of consenting Canadians. Yet here we are, nearly four decade later, and the American jurisprudence still seems to think it omnipotent in all matters of American life. When is someone going to clue them in, anyhow?
This erosion-of-freedoms thing is clearly getting worse before it gets better. And you, my fair American friends, where the fuck are YOUR voices? These are your voted representatives, and yet your indignation is nothing but a muffled whine in the corner. Speak, or forever hold your piece. After all, this is clearly the bed you have made for yourselves. Or is it? You still have time to be heard, I would think. There’s one more circuit of judges for this case, if only you would deem it necessary.
After all, take it from me, a fiercely proud Canadian: Sometimes, the most American thing you can do, is to question the powers that be.
After all, we Canadians learned it from the very best. But sometimes we Canadians have a very pressing question: Where, exactly, are “the best” now?
Well?