(no subject)

I just had someone tell me to my face that America should not interfere in the practice of honor killings, because that would be interfering in someone's culture. Words cannot express how angry I am--I think this is the first time I've truly lost my temper in that class, as a matter of fact.

See, when we designate culture an all-express-paid pass to hurt people, when we say that we can't interfere in someone's beliefs even if they're hurting people, what we say to the person being hurt is "You don't matter enough to cause an argument over." When we designate culture more important than individual rights, we abandon anyone oppressed by that culture to the dogs.

Culture is not more important than lives. Tradition is not more important than people. I break tradition every damn day by being who and what I am, okay? Fifty years ago, it was American culture for women to get married right out of high school and not work unless they had to, for gay people to live closeted their whole lives, for black and white people to be segregated. We threw those traditions out, and America's a better place for it. But our culture changed! Yeah... for the better.

I hate it when structures and ideas are viewed as more important than people are.