Not really wrestling at all, unless you want it to be

Dear Thistleburr,

I have too much for Twitter, so I'll do this here. And first, the definitions I'm referring to:

Tolstoy: True religion is the establishment by man of a relation to the infinite life around him; as long as in connecting his life with this infinitude and directing his conduct, there is also agreement with his reason and human knowledge.

Geertz: Religion is
(1) a system of symbols
(2) which acts to establish powerful, pervasive and long-lasting moods and motivations in folks
(3) by formulating conceptions of a general order of existence and
(4) clothing these conceptions with such an aura of factuality that
(5) the moods and motivations seem uniquely realistic.

I think Tolstoy is being overly optimistic if he imagines one can only do the religion of his definition. We all come up in religion just as we do in language, it's built in to the language and culture. What I love about the Geertz definition is that it's a beautiful tool for us to interrogate those ideas that we dislike, that we like, that we take for granted.

Rabbi Rami who spoke last night is suggesting that we become more awake and more humane if we learn more religious languages--not that we become Hindu or Muslim or such, but that we learn those languages thoroughly, and thus broaden our views of everything, just as when we learn French or Japanese.

Given that we live in an age of really remarkable religious illiteracy, I would like to see Christian people even do that with the religions they think they came up in, because I guarantee you that they really don't know them well at all. My own husband was technically raised Quaker, but spent a massive amount of time with his preacher grandfather, who was an oldtime Evangelical. Chris rejected that version of Christianity early, and has never achieved an adult's understanding or knowledge of *any* Christianity as a result--nor any other religion. He has no knowledge of the mystics, the history, the theology and *why* people have fought over baptism or the Eucharist, the evolution of thought and the rejection and rebellion of evolutions...I could spend the next ten years just getting him caught up on that one bit of the tapestry, and he's in about the same place as many Christian Americans.

So, I think Tolstoy's is a good definition for open religion, but my scholar mind won't allow me to say that the closed religions are somehow not religion--they definitely are, and meet a whole set of human needs.

Having now done all this work to figure what I do actually think, I would say that it's useful but limited and honestly, just a little unkind to people with different needs than his own--my training inculcated in me a good amount of compassion for people who are scared and in great need of security. Not to say that I think they should rest in that fear, and not strive to overcome it, but life is *hard* and I'm not sure everyone can do that work. I'm really not. Also, I don't believe anyone is done until they're dead. There's always the possibility that they'll grow and change, and life is so chaotic and wild, who am I to judge that they won't, or it won't be enough, or the 'right' kind?

Time Travel the Slow Way

Dear Wrestling,

This letter is mostly about what a big queer-mo I am--and wrestling! But hella gay stuff.

Tonight I went to PWX for the Battlefield X event, and it cemented them as my 'home' promotion. I'll do a different letter to talk about that more generally, but here's the crux of tonight, of right now, for me: I just a few days ago learned that there are more out wrestlers than I thought, and that Effy is one of them. I saw some of his shirts in the crowd, and sure enough, he was in the rumble. Entered to huge applause. Got in the ring, and while I couldn't really hear, it was clear there was history with White Mike, and they had an argument. Mike kissed Effy to more applause and cheers, and then Effy smacked the hell out of Mike, and began to fight in the rumble.

I grew up in Charlotte. I attended schools there during the AIDS crisis. I had friends who were gaybashed, beaten to hell. I was out as bi, and knew that I was taking my safety in my hands, and to be honest I've always been a 'with your shield or on it' kind of person, so I was prepared for that--mentally, anyway.

I had a very dear friend, someone I'd had a crush on for years, tell me very sadly that he really wished I wasn't going to Hell, because I was nice. Pat Robertson told my 15 year old best friend that it was because of people like her that he wanted the Bible taught in schools. Stuff like that.

So today I saw Effy, cheered. Kiss a dude. No parents grabbed their children and bolted. Still a family friendly show, no problem.

I missed the intervening years, you see. I spent them in West Virginia, as far from mainstream culture as it is possible to be in the West. I missed so much.

So. I drove home and started checking the internets, and was alerted to this.

As a big queer, of course this new chapter in the Golden Lovers has meant so much to me, but at the same time, coming from this weird time-travely part of the mid-90s, I keep waiting for them to pull the rug out from under me. Walk it back. New Japan to suddenly not be ok with it. Kota to come out and say, Sorry guys, I'm totally straight. Something.

And every time, Kenny and Kota  reassure me so so gently, that this isn't that. This is our story. This is the story specifically for the people like us--Ibushi is my age, you know. This is the story we've never gotten and always wanted.

I still haven't totally taken it in. But for some reason, that tee shirt has done more to make it real than anything so far. It's so silly, but I think that's just it: they wouldn't do something so quotidien just to fake us out.

Man, Wrestling. It's been quite a day, for me at least.

Yours draped in a rainbow flag, throwing beads to the crowd,

Autumn

Weltschmerz is my Favorite German Word

Dear Wrestling, 

This is going to be one of those letters that only gets 8-10 people to read it, bless. 

Weltschmerz is a German word that basically means "the pain you feel at the difference between the world, and how the world should be." Great fucking word, right? Sometimes I feel like that feeling is the single thing I feel most in my life--more than love or joy or anything. 

Sami tweeted earlier today how in the past 24 hours, there's been a big increase in the attacks on civilians in Syria--both conventional and chemical. He said his heart is in shambles, and I hurt for the people there and I hurt for him. 

His grandmother is still there. I've been thinking about that since I found out a couple days ago. I don't even have any grandmothers, haven't since I was 7-8. I can't imagine what that's like, to have a grandmother in particular in a war zone. And of course, his is far from the only one. 

I know that it's good I care about this, I know it's a sign of humanity. I'm fortunate that I can listen to the good advice I've heard from people in freedom movements over the decades, that if you can, you need to draw back a little sometimes, because it doesn't help anyone if you traumatize or retraumatize yourself. I find it really difficult though, because for the most part, my love and care are all I have to give, the only way I can feel like I'm helping--

But then, that's not helping, is it? Ok, compare to your own life: white ladies reading The Glass Castle may have felt very bad for poor people stuck in Appalachia, but it didn't do jack shit to help. It never fed me, it didn't even get them to be conscious consumers of energy and stop destroying the region in order to have cheap electricity. 

So, when you do this, self, all you're really doing is hurting yourself and imagining that it did anyone any good. It did not, that's an illusion. 

Keep giving every payday. Keep supporting Sami, keep spreading the word about SAMS. Keep your ears open for other ways to help. But don't beat yourself up and imagine you're helping. 

I know it's hard. I know. But you do really care about helping or feeling like you did?