ANDY DUGAN

I couldn’t agree more…

I got these statements from Spytap’s blog, but they are right on and I couldn’t agree more… 

The simple truth is that I’m:

• Pro-choice, because as a man, I’ll never have to get an abortion. Thus I feel that the women I love should be able to make their own (painfully difficult) decision without my influence.
• Pro-private gun ownership (to a point - no grenades or flamethrowers, people.) I don’t know how I feel about open-carry of hand or long guns, but I think we all have the right to defend our person and property. I’d actually be fine with open carry of swords though. Seriously.
• Anti-war in most cases that don’t involve a direct attack on the country. I’d call that “Pro-defense” but in a 1984-esque, drug-induced, fever-dream sort of way, most people consider “defense” to be synonymous with “offense” now. Double-speak, indeed.
• Feminist. Because I have eyes, ears, and a brain.
• Pro-Gay Marriage. There isn’t a single logically valid, nonreligious argument against gay marriage. If the only thing you have to fall back on it “it violates my religion for them to marry” then not only is your argument constitutionally invalid, but you don’t understand what it means to live in a democracy based on personal freedoms.
• Pro-drug legalization in all forms, because while I don’t use drugs aside from alcohol and caffeine, I believe that A) people should have a right to use and abuse their bodies as they see fit, and B) drug prohibition has hurt exponentially more people than it has helped.
• I believe that we should cut our military spending in half (oddly enough this doesn’t earn me the respect of tea-partiers or other fiscal conservatives, whose stance seems to be that government spending is bad only so long as it directly helps people, and good so long as it directly kills people in the name of helping people.) Spend money on the people here at home.
• Pro-education, as it’s the most direct spending that has the most positive impact.
• Neutral on Unions, for a whole host of reasons. I think they simultaneously serve and hinder a greater purpose.
• Pro-universal health care, because I believe that if we want to consider ourselves a first-world country we should act like it. If that means I spend a few more bucks, then so be it.
• Anti-death tax, because I think that it just reeks of unfairness. There are better ways to accomplish not having a domestic aristocracy.
• Believe that Social Security can be improved, and perhaps scaled back in some fashions, but shouldn’t be eliminated.
• Anti-political party, because I believe that parties - more than anything else - have contributed to the apathy, lack of knowledge, and breakdown of discourse in American politics. I think by forcing people to learn more about candidates, and by not expecting or encouraging voting in a bloc, we could streamline progress to a massive degree.
• Anti-corporate political spending, because I’m not naive enough to believe that a multinational corporation has my best interests in mind, or is actually a person.
• Pro-environment, which includes pro-alternative energy. I like nuclear, wind, solar, and tidal energy. I dislike coal and oil. I like the Earth; it’s where I live. We’re breaking it. Let’s start by breaking it less, and maybe we can eventually find an equilibrium.
• Anti-anti-intellectualism. Willful ignorance is an affront to the entire evolution of our species. We evolved to be less stupid. You should want to continue to get smarter. Stop devolving, you fucking morons.