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June is Proud To Be Me month

June is the Proud To Be Me month.

Whoever you are, wherever you live, whatever your skin color or who you sleep with, nothing says more about you than who you are by how you treat others, how hard you work, how honest you are. In other words, skin color, sexual behavior, gender, etc have really nothing to do with anything, and there is no reason to be “proud” of things you can’t change about yourself.

Want to feel proud of yourself, for good reason? Donate time to a real non-profit organization engaged in directly improving people’s lives. The Bethesda Mission here in Harrisburg feeds and clothes homeless people, discarded military Veterans, abused mothers with their children in tow. When you help these down-on-their-luck people, you should feel proud, because you have made the world a better place, at your own expense, and yet you know you have come out richer.

On the other end of the spectrum are ridiculous things of which to be proud, like skin color and sexual behavior. Yes, skin color was once something for James Brown to sing about, but that was then, and this is now. We are not still living in 1968, or 1958. Black people run most of America’s cultural institutions, and they are well represented in every nook and cranny of professional life.

And sexuality? Isn’t this a private matter? I think so. No one needs to know what you are doing, and only destructive perverts in essence rape those around them by sexually forcing themselves on us. What a shallow thing to be “proud” of, this raunchy and gross physical behavior. In this time of wide acceptance, acting like yesterday was the Stonewall Riot is just as silly as pretending Americans are still living in 1968 racial tensions.

If anything, we should each be proud of ourselves for being our best selves in ways that show we have choice and agency. For example, I always always always hold doors open for women. Occasionally a woman will either object to it, or more commonly, thank me and acknowledge the less and less common favor. My response to everyone who comments is this: “If I don’t hold this door open for you, I know my mother will leap out from behind that shrub over there and kick my butt.”

Meaning, I am proud of living the old fashioned civilization-sustaining values and behaviors that my mother and father instilled in me. Living this way and making other people’s lives better as a result makes me proud to be myself, my best self, my good self. You can easily do the same. All this other nonsense, you can give it a pass.

Participated in 2nd Amendment Rally; where was NRA?

Just in from the field.

PA Rep. Daryl Metcalfe, Kim Stolfer of Firearm Owners Against Crime, and Larry Pratt of Gun Owners of America organized and led a wonderful pro-freedom rally just now at the Pennsylvania Capitol steps in Harrisburg.  Dozens of state and local elected officials, from both parties, Democrat and Republican,  stood in the rain to show their appreciation and support.  State Senator Tim Solobay (D), an ass-kicking big guy and the senate’s official “Walking Refrigerator,” proudly wore his Western PA gun rights hat.  State Senator Scott Hutchinson (R), stood tall in the rain and cheered on the speakers.

Constitutional rights should not be a partisan issue.  Sadly, too many Democrats make gun ownership an issue, when it has zero to do with crime control.

Missing from action was the NRA.  No official presence, no speaking role, no unofficial presence.  What is going on here with my favorite organization?  Organizational snafu?  Too much pride?

Citizen, activist, and elected official speakers alike championed America’s unique freedoms, quoting often from their own life experiences and from America’s founding fathers.  Each speaker pointed out the hypocrisy of anti-freedom gun-grabbers, who are more comfortable in a feudal hierarchy than in the free Republic we have fought so hard to keep from tyranny.

Standing at the top of the steps, looking out over the sea of rain-soaked citizens, with their American flags, Don’t Tread on Me banners and similar hand-held signs, I was choked up with emotion.  As every past year, I feel honored and fired up to have participated in this year’s annual PA Second Amendment Rally.