Hadrian's Rage (20 page)

That powerful haiku, written by the deceased Tara May Fowler, exemplifies the very foundation upon which our country was built and is crumbling. At but twenty-two years of age, this young woman had gained a sense of maturity and understanding of human nature beyond the reckoning of most. Perhaps this was due to her having to live in this world as an outsider condemned to looking in as opposed to being allowed to act as a participant. You see, Tara Fowler was straight. Her sexual orientation, something decided by her body in utero, is deemed a plague by our society. Yes, our President has signed the bill making heterosexuality legal, no longer requiring adults to be expelled or our youth necessarily forced into reeducation camps, but that alone hasn't stemmed the tide of hate. In fact, it is as if all the haters are now crawling out of the woodwork, desperate to force those brave enough to come forth with our true identities back into hiding.

Tara had a unique philosophical outlook on life. She was not religious. She, like her mothers, was an atheist. She did not look to any deity to justify and condemn the good and evil of this world. “All that is man is man,” she would say, “and every man is man.” She explained these odd notions by stating that humanity was more than just one race; we are the human race. According to Tara, all of mankind is one man splintered and at odds with humself. Humself? Oh, how we all laughed when she said that. “What in the name of all that's gay and glorious is humself?” we queried. “Humself,” she replied quietly, “is my word for the human pronoun.
We are all a part of hum.” When we asked her why she didn't just use the pronoun Mx
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, she replied, “That's for the intersex and transgendered. ‘Hum,'” she insisted, “is for everyone.” She had odd ideas, but they were beautiful. Hum, as Tara explained it, is humanity—not he, not she, not trans, not intersex, but a blending of everyone. When we pushed her to explain this further, she claimed that hum had been splintered and that now we are separate entities. Hum is shattered, and every part of hum is splintered into separate beings: intersex, transgendered, women, and men. Her dream was for humanity to embrace “humself” once again. It saddened her that the focus of humanity was so separate and destructive. In the end, she best expressed this idea in another haiku:

Curious as to how she had come up with this philosophy, I asked her to expound. She pondered for some time, as was her way. Tara was never one simply to spout out notions. She considered her ideas, allowed them to ferment and formulate, and then she'd smile when understanding finally came to her. “I guess it dates back to my welcoming ceremony.”

You may well wonder what a welcoming ceremony is. Christians have a similar ceremony with baptism. Unlike baptism, which offers the child up to God, this ceremony welcomes the new child into the pentagram of life, or the five elements. Tara explained the ritual her mothers performed when she was but a few months old. Family and friends had gathered, and Tara was dressed in a small frock the colors of the rainbow. She was laid upon the kitchen table, which had been placed in the center of the room. There were no chairs; everyone gathered around the table to watch the proceedings. First, Tara's mother lit a candle and placed it at Tara's head. “This candle, my daughter,” she said, “is to bring you the light of wisdom and understanding. May it guide you through the darkness of this life.” Next, she placed a bowl of earth at Tara's feet. “This earth, my daughter, is for you to stand firmly upon. Stand tall. Love your planet. Honor her. Treasure her. Protect her.” Next a bowl of water was placed by Tara's
right hand. “Water, my daughter, is the blood of life. Drink of it deeply. It will heal and cleanse you. Share this gift generously with others.” Lastly, a toy windmill was placed by Tara's left hand. First, her mother blew on the wings to allow it to spin and show its power. “Wind, my daughter, is the breath of life. It represents strength. The wind is your breath and your soul.” At this point, Tara's mother stepped back, allowing her mama to step forward. Mama Cecilia then lifted the infant Tara from the table and held her high for everyone to see. “You, my child, my lover's heart's desire, are the fifth element; a human amongst humans. Live for one. Live for all.” We were all in tears by the time Tara finished that story. Her mothers, I know, suffer grievously now. They brought this woman into the world. They welcomed her to life, and now they must say goodbye. It is not for the parent to bury the child, but that is what the prejudices of our society ultimately dictated for them.

So, why did Tara come out? Why did Tara not just pretend to be someone else? I have heard many people asking this question through the wave. “She set herself up for this abuse,” they claim. “She never should have told anyone she was straight.” Tara never went around announcing her sexual orientation, nor did she believe in hiding it. She came out to her mothers when she was quite young. And although her revelation came as a shock, even an unwelcome one when the truth was first revealed, her mothers were wise enough not to impose a sentence of reeducation on their daughter. Tara was able to continue attending her regular middle school, go on to high school, graduate, serve time in the military, and go on to challenge uni at the great Augustus's halls of academia.

Tara was highly respected by her professors. She held a GPA of 94 percent. Although she did not qualify for a uni entrance scholarship, she did receive bi-annual semester uni scholarships that helped cover the cost of her tuition. Professor Politis referred to Tara as one of the most ingenious students she had encountered in years.

Tara was studying to be an educator. She would have made a fine teacher, too. Smart, witty, creative, and always ready with a jest if the mood of the room felt down, her goal was to teach high school history and politics. To quote Tara, “More than ever, it is critical for the minds of today's youth to be aware: aware of whom they are, aware of their surroundings, the decisions they make, and most especially, the decisions society is making for them.” Never did words ring more true than these
for the citizens of Hadrian. We are indoctrinated—from the moment we take our first breath, right through to the day we die—on the right way to live, the right way to think, the right way to feel, and the right way to love.

Tara chose to break the bonds of stereotypes and strove to be her own soul. She gathered to herself a small group of friends, who, like she did, believed in the concept of equal love. Her writing, her actions, her very words all expressed the idea that all members of humanity are equal and that no one—no one—be pushed aside. She fought for this belief, and, sadly, she died for it, too. For as much as Tara knew of the cruelties of this world, she had the deepest respect and hope for humanity. “Inside every intersex woman, man, and child,” she would always say, “there is the truest desire to do what is good.” When confronted with the questionable acts of her peers, Tara always found a way to justify them. “Misguided though many are, deep down, they all really want what is good and right in this world.” Her solution to this conundrum was “Education.” Tara's greatest hope was one day to walk into the classroom and provide opportunities for the students of our future to open their minds and learn to choose what is honestly best for humanity. For Tara, this best was acceptance. The kind of acceptance she didn't get when she exposed her sexual identity to two young women she had thought were her friends.

Tara didn't deserve such a brutal and torturous death. She was kind, gentle, and thoughtful of others' needs. That these women were able savagely to rape and murder her only testifies to the overwhelming hate that fills the very heart of our great country.

And even now, if Tara could speak to us from the grave, she would say these women who beat, raped, and murdered her, were merely a product of their environment. That society had educated them to hate and be cruel, and that, as a result of this lifelong indoctrination we have all endured, they actually believed that what they did to her was in the best interest of humanity. And we all know that isn't true. Let me give you one more taste of what Tara Fowler had to offer our world. The last poem she wrote was a sonnet. It was her plea to humanity—to all of us, whom she liked to call “Hum” titled “Frangible Essence.” A copy of the poem can be found in Tara's memorial card you were asked to download. You may wish to follow along as I read.

Frangible essence. That indeed describes our Tara. It describes her awareness of humanity's great destruction. It describes her understanding of humanity's great potential.

Today, two mothers grieve the loss of a beloved child. Today, a brother grieves the loss of a beloved sister. Today, friends grieve the loss of a most steadfast companion. My name is Dean Stuttgart, and Tara May Fowler was my friend.

If we all listen to those like Dean Stuttgart and Melissa Eagleton, everyone would foolishly come to believe that we should embrace our strai brothers and sisters. They claim we can successfully integrate heterosexuality into our mainstream culture. Well, I am sorry to disappoint those of you who have fallen for this nonsense, but this is nothing but a big fat strai lie! I do not say this because I hate strais. I am fully aware that the strais within our borders are our own children, which is why it is incumbent upon us to raise and educate our youth correctly. Allowing our youth to believe that opposite sex attractions are acceptable is simply wrong. They need to know that these abhorrent sexual desires are the very reason why Hadrian was established in the first place. This nonsense, this shilly-shallying around the idea that we are all the same, we are all one humanity, is both absurd and dangerous.

In fact, one key reason why the strai agenda has managed to garner popular appeal, especially amongst our youth, is the idea that strais are somehow the same as we are. They are not the same as the rest of us. Our youth do not understand how massively harmful and promiscuous the strai community is. Their inclination to procreate is the greatest threat facing our planet. The Big Strai Lie (BSL) has a number of facets including:

Let’s break down these lies, shall we?

To begin with, there are not a lot of strais in Hadrian. No one under the age of twenty can claim to be anything less than a 2 on the Kinsey scale.
That means, with the right education, no one in Hadrian need ever choose a straight lifestyle. The proponents of the BSL blatantly ignore all the evidence provided by our geneticists regarding the human genome and their success at having eradicated the heterosexual gene from Hadrian’s procreation bank. No zygote lacking the homosexual gene is ever implanted into a female. No child in Hadrian is born straight. So this fact destroys both the first notion that there are a lot of strais amongst us, and lastly, that people are born strai. Not in Hadrian!

Next in the BLS is the belief that being bisexual is somehow okay. No, it’s not! This whole notion of being bisexual is obscene. If you are with someone of the same sex, then you are gay, and great for you. If you are with someone of the opposite sex, then you are straight, and to those people, I say, “Stop putting yourself, the country of Hadrian, and the rest of the planet at risk of further population expansion!”

The third part of BSL suggests that heterosexuals can use birth control and Planned Parenthood to stop over-procreating. To that, I say, “Look outside our walls! There are over twenty billion pieces of evidence out there proving that heterosexuals are not capable of controlling themselves and holding back on over-procreation. If heterosexuals could control their sexual desires, the world wouldn’t be in the mess it is in today!”

So, please, the next time someone tries to bamboozle you with the BSL—the Big Straight Lie—you refer them to this
Salve!
episode. And to that, I say

Vale!