The Michael Sam TV Kiss: What Are We To Think?
Most all of us , in varying degrees, try to be objective about our response to change and tolerance. The problem is, we all viewed the TV kiss wrapped in our own cocoons of ethnicity, religion, culture, custom, experiences, genetic nature, environment, and personalities. That is considerable baggage to carry in any attempt to be objective.
One of my favorite quotations is this one: “I can’t define pornography, but I certainly know it when I see it.” I don’t remember the author, it may well have been a Supreme Court Justice. In the case of the TV kiss, I suppose we all struggle to define how we should feel, but we all do know how we felt at the time. Of course feelings are not facts, are not ethical principles, and are not uniform from person to person. So where does this lead us? Are all these varied feelings equally valid? Is there a ‘proper’ response?
When it comes to ethics there is only one universal principle, a principle that is established everywhere, in every human culture. It is thus part of our human genetic make-up. And that principle is the Golden Rule. When is the last time we have ever heard any minister, priest, rabbi, Cleric, Ayatollah, or other such titled religious leader, preach against the Golden Rule? They may not follow the Golden Rule, but they don’t attempt to preach against it either. “Do unto others as you would have them do unto you” simply reeks with fairness and ethical qualities.
It is difficult to seriously insist that our own inherited religious ‘Bible’ or sectarian doctrines trump someone else’s inherited religious ‘Bible’ or sectarian doctrines.
This kind of mentality about one’s inherited or marriage adopted religion often leads to the most horrific kinds of inhumanity to humanity possible. Everywhere we look these ‘chosen’ (by inheritance) groups are trying to exterminate each other: Catholics and Protestants in Ireland; Tutsi and Hutu in Rwanda, Arabs and Jews in the Middle East, Muslims and Buddhists in the Far East, the Sunni and Shiites in Iraq, the Russians and non Russians in Ukraine, the Muslims and Christians in Africa, and so it goes, on and on in perpetuity.
With all the above in mind, along comes a black football player on TV, overcome with emotion about being selected in the NFL draft. Well, we have seen these reactions many times, not just on TV with the football draft, but in real life when we are present when something really good happens to someone in life. Maybe they just got a good job, or got married, or won the lottery, or their team won a championship, etc. Well, maybe so, but a black football player sobbing and then kissing a white homosexual lover and then stuffing cake in the other’s mouth on TV in front of children and all sorts of others who find several aspects of all this disgusting. No doubt Mr. Incognito would go bonkers over the sobbing. What kind of man does that on TV? He needs Incognito to toughen him up a bit. Then there is the interracial bit, what is going on here, can’t either one of them find someone with the same skin color with whom to fall in love? Can’t they stand their own skin? And kissing each other on TV? What they do in private should be left in private (unless it mimics are own inclinations). And the mouth cake stuffing, what is that suppose to signify?
It is difficult to criticize feelings. The feelings exist, that is fact. So what do we do, just have everyone with differing feelings duke it out? I suppose Incognito would say, of course, and may the toughest win. Well, our own country has been duking it out in Vietnam, Iraq, Somali, Lebanon, Korea, varied South American countries for like 50 years and while we killed more than others have killed us, what has anyone won?In all the groups fighting each other mentioned in a previous paragraph what has any side ever won? Certainly not peace or prosperity. All they have is one common feeling—revenge. Revenge is actually their one common religion.
The neat thing about the Golden Rule is that it solves most human conflict.
Does it affect any of us who Sam falls in love with? What parent has much luck deciding who their son or daughter falls in love with? Look, if we wish to have the right to fall in love with whomever we want to fall in love with, then by the Golden Rule others have the same right. To understand why we ourselves fall in love with who is impossible to understand, let alone why any other two fall in love. So live and let live is the only solution, and certainly better for all sides than genocidal battles. Suppose Sam were heterosexual, and he and his girlfriend had a foot fetish? Then they might kiss each other’s feet. Some couples hold hands going down a street, others don’t. Where is right and wrong here? The only time feelings can be banned is when the feelings hurt others in a significant way. That goes against the Golden Rule. If Sam loves a guy that doesn’t mean any other particular person should. Like James Baldwin once said: ‘Everybody’s journey is individual. You don’t know with whom you’re going to fall in love—if you fall in love with the wrong color, wrong religion, wrong sex—you fall in love.”
And so it goes with varied sexual acts. Pornography has so many variations in sexual proclivities that it is simply astounding. Some prefer not to have sex hardly at all, if at all. Is there something wrong with them? And why would someone want to be tied up during sex? Or oral sex? Or anal sex? Are there any sex acts, outside of those necessary to reproduce which can logically be explained? Of course not. If there were much logic to it we would all discuss our sex lives in detail in social situations. Let’s forget sex for a moment. Why would anyone choose stuffing cake in another’s mouth as an affectionate gesture? If this is a non sexual affectionate gesture why don’t we greet guests at the door by stuffing some cake in their mouth?
In the end, live and let live—coupled with the Golden Rule—is the healthiest way to live our lives. When we can’t do this, then our lives will be filled with anger, irritation, and intolerance. Life is great theatre and we need approach it more, and enjoy it more, for the theatre it is. The question is not why is Sam doing what he did on TV but why we even give a rat’s ass who Sam loves, or kisses, or finds stuffing cake in a mouth affectionate? Did I too have feelings about it all? Of course, but no more so than many things I see which are different. We need to reserve our anger for when someone or some group is doing or advocating something which will hurt others. If there is no victim, there is no crime. There are precious few exceptions. Strangely, love itself can generate a victim or victims. The tragedy is not who loves who, but that love between two people often does not last.
