Skeletons On the Yellow Brick Road.

Bosom friends!

There is nothing better than a good cry first thing in the morning.

I committed the fatal mistake of watching the viral video with the hugging skeletons that has been circulating on Face Book since yesterday.

Here is the link, make sure you have a couple of tissues handy:

Hugging Skeleton Video

                                      

Filmed by Ad Council on Valentines Day and posted on their YouTube channel on March 3, this video, Diversity & Inclusion - Love Has No Labels, had almost 14 million views and counting.
As the film begins, we see two figures hugging and kissing behind the screen, and since it's an X-ray screen, the figures are skeletons - as such, gender unknown.
First of all I thought "those bitches are soooo skinny!". 
When the skeletons emerge from behind the screen the crowd sees they are two women.
As the video progresses, we meet couples, friends and families from every race, with different disabilities, of every gender and religion, because love is diverse and has no labels.

I usually feel about this kind videos the same way I feel about going to church: painful and unnecessary.

It's very easy to paint such progressive and utopian pictures when the bigots are left outside of the equation. However in this case I bought it right away. Perhaps the choice of the music and the fact that the issue is very close to my heart made the cynical and sarcastic voices inside my head shut up for a minute.

Still once the moment was passed those voices came back in a triumphant parade.

Yes, LOVE has no gender, no race, no disability, no religion. Love is egalitarian by definition right?

These are the words of the Ad Council:

A lot of us make snap judgments based on what we see—whether it’s race, age, gender, religion, sexuality, or disability. Yet most of us aren’t even conscious of our prejudice.
That’s why it’s called implicit bias (bias is a tendency to prefer one person or thing to another, and to favour that person or thing ). 
The important thing is to educate ourselves and watch for biases when they surface.
Big things are at stake, too. Implicit bias influences how people are treated and how they interact with each other. It can also perpetuate disparities by altering someone’s ability to find a job, secure a loan, rent an apartment or get a fair trial.
To end bias, we need to become aware of it. And then we need to do everything within our power to stop it. In ourselves, others, and institutions. The world will be a better place for it. 

Where do I begin?!?!

I will speak for myself since it is a delicate subject, but can anyone state that they have never being caught making a judgment based on what they see?
Personally I do that on a daily basis, like going to the toilet or talking to myself.
There you have it, my path to modern thinking is like the yellow brick road, I have heard of it but can't find it on Google maps.
I do make snap judgments. Actually mine are Flash Gordon judgments, they work at the speed of light.
The thing is that I have been snapped judged my whole life (for the way I dress, my "not so butch" ways, the fact that at six I wanted to become a ballerina and went for it). I know that's no excuse but certain idiosyncrasies are hard to shake. I believe that before "others" started judging every single particle of me I used to be a force to be recon with. If I had kept it up, now I would be bigger than Lady Gaga and wiser than the Dali Lama. Unfortunately being called any kind of names and being treated like the village freak set me back quite a bit. Don't get me wrong, I am a frigging success in my eyes but I had to start from zero way too many times.
Despite this I still can't manage to be a better person in this respect. I can't help but thinking "what I see is what I get". I do have an open mind when it comes to relationships and human interaction in general but I can't honestly say that appearances do not influence my judgement.
On the other hand I am hardly ever fooled by true genuineness of actions. In other words worthy actions make a worthy individual. Looks and talk are cheap.
If your love is genuine the way you look, who you pray to and all the rest is not any of my business.
I try to appreciate the nature of your actions and let you live and prosper.

If it was just about LOVE life on this planet could be a way easier walk in the park.
To the mix we have to add gender, race, disabilities, religion, jobs, loans, rent and all the rest of the crap that we have to deal with as part of the short time we have on this planet. 
That's sounds more like a walk in the park at night in a very dangerous neighborhood.

Ciao for now.