Cure Zemmiphobia in our Lifetime!

Before I say anything else, in case anyone wonders why I put Adsense on this blog, it isn't that I think I can get rich by putting a Google ad on a blog with this kind of circulation. I was motivated by the promise Google and blogger (who are one and same, if you don't know) to match the ad to the content of your blog. I'm sure this is some sort of a word-counting program, but I do think it's hilarious that the ad Adsense selected for my blog against the YMCA's non-profit status was "Start Your Own Non-Profit Online!" If it stays this hilarious, I'll keep it.

Which is why I think it's time we talked about mole rats. Anyone who sees my profile sees that I have successfully (so far) stolen the image of Rufus the (Hairless) Naked Mole Rat from Disney's Kim Possible. So yes, I am a big Rufus fan. To date I count ten (or thirteen, but I didn't pay for three) Rufus plush toys I have purchased on e-bay.

The truth about the Rufi is, they are evolving from the original Rufus Prime (the one on Kim Possible) through and intermediate stage of chubby, shiftless and mostly alcoholic Rufi, to (as fans of A Sitch in Time know) the eventual emergence of the Rufus 3000, muscular, intelligent Rufi who sound curiously like Worf from Star Trek. These days, they are mostly to be found drinking tequila in stolen UPS trucks. But I digress.

So I was really shocked the other day to discover (unless I am being duped by some widely promulgated internet extremely non-urban legend) that an accepted entry in the list of phobias is Zemmiphobia, defined as Fear of the Great Mole Rat. I'm a little vague on what exactly this is, but as far as I can tell it exists in Sumatra. Just what the Great Mole Rat is, I don't know. The little creature in the first picture, above, is a hairless naked mole rat. They live in Africa and are known to the natives as sand puppies. They are about three inches long, live most of their lives in the dark underground, and live in hives. They are eusexial and are organized like bees, with a queen, workers, drones, etc.

HR1 and Deuce, second pic, don' t know, because they are modern Rufi and in the adult case of HR1 are more interested in the Gin 'n Tonic Blue Beast. As far as they are concerned, Boss Rufus (below) is the Great Mole Rat. But he's just a Mole Rat royalty.

If you go online and research mole rats, you will find they are a variety of animals lumped together by name who are not necessarily related. Naked mole rats are neither moles nor rats, but are closer to the possum and the gerbil. So far I haven't figure out if there is a really big one that lives in Sumatra. If there is, and it's as ugly as the little ones (sorry Boss), I understand why people are afraid of it, when they don't have the cultural advantage of our civilized phobias. Is this an imaginary beast? Are these people living in the 21st century version of the old maps that said "Here Be Dragons?"

I work with a general manager is who the best example I have seen of homophobia. Being heterosexual and having lived in San Francisco, I have never understood why a certain group of males feels compelled to go around ranting about gays. Why some people are so hurt (yes and afraid) by who other people sleep with is not something I have understood. I admit to being that way myself when I was less than sixteen and my sexuality was forming, but what is the excuse in middle age?

Personally, I admire gay people. They seem to be richer and smarter than the rest of us as a whole, and more creative. Not to mention neater, a trait I can only envy. And the ones who are Out are brave. If I were gay, I would be proud to be, and whether the fact that I am not is a matter of heredity or environment is not important.

See, this guy fears non-Christians as much as he fears gays. I am still inclined to think his extreme homophobia is an indication of some sort of deep denial about impulses he has. Sleep-deprived and drug-addicted, he goes through life in a haze that produces bizarre stories which I believe he believes are true. But I am usually these days inclined to think that the motivation of these misfit all-Americans is to validate their own existence with cultures that don't accept them but can't afford to reject them. The Christians. The Patriots (notice how all the warmongers these days never fought in a war?). The heterosexual (whose masculinity, unlike that which is natural and unthinking for those who are truly and comfortably heterosexual, is a matter of forced attainment). These people would all be beaten shitless in the naked jungle, just like the neo-Nazis would be the first thrown into the concentration camps by a real Nazi regime (look at what happened to the anti-Nazi Polish underground after the Soviet takeover).

I am barely touching on a deep subject here, and I intend to come back to it. But just think; make all the homophobes and the GWB wimpass warmongers into zemmiphobes. Think how harmlessly all that negative energy could be discharged.

And in the meantime, in the words of Blue Oyster Cult, Don't Fear the Rufi.