Paganistan: Notes from the Secret Commonwealth

In Which One Midwest Man-in-Black Confers, Converses & Otherwise Hob-Nobs with his Fellow Hob-Men (& -Women) Concerning the Sundry Ways of the Famed but Ill-Starred Tribe of Witches.

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In Which Our Intrepid Blogger Gets Angry and Lays a Curse

Posted by on in Culture Blogs

Words matter.

That's why I'm laying a curse upon a certain word.

Not wishing to draw said curse onto my own head, I will refrain from writing the word here, for indeed it deserves neither to be written nor spoken.

But this much I will say:

The word that I hereby curse is a portmanteau of “romance” and “bro” (sic).

This sneering, belittling, condescending term denotes an intimate emotional relationship between two men.

And everyone knows that men shouldn't have those.

 

To the West I Proclaim It:

I curse this word as sexist.

 

What's the word for an intimate emotional relationship between two women?

 

To the South I Proclaim It:

I curse this word as heterosexist.

 

Everyone knows that men shouldn't have intimate emotional relationships with one another.

Men should have intimate emotional relationships with women, instead.

 

To the East I Proclaim It:

I curse this word as homophobic.

 

Especially when applied to non-gay men, the word implies that they're “acting” gay, which of course we all know that men shouldn't do.

 

To The North I Proclaim It:

I curse this word as shaming of men who dare to bond emotionally with other men.

 

I repeat: everyone knows that men shouldn't have intimate emotional relationships with one another, not even non-sexual ones.

 

I therefore curse this word.

 

I curse it. I curse it. I curse it.

By Sun I curse it. By Thunder I curse it.

By sulfur, by levin-light, and by lightning-strike I curse it.

 

I hereby call upon all people of good conscience to strike this word from their vocabulary, and to join with me in saying:

 

 So mote it be. So mote it be. So mote it be.

 

Because homophobia kills.

That's why.

 

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Poet, scholar and storyteller Steven Posch was raised in the hardwood forests of western Pennsylvania by white-tailed deer. (That's the story, anyway.) He emigrated to Paganistan in 1979 and by sheer dint of personality has become one of Lake Country's foremost men-in-black. He is current keeper of the Minnesota Ooser.

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