Alright, it's been a while since I've outright offended people. I think it's right about time I do so again. Of course, that statement is actually a joke. Really. Honest. I mean it.

Okay, so you don't believe me. Well phooey!

Anyway, this diary entry might actually piss some of you off. i don't mean to offend, but I'm going to state my outrageous opinions anyway. And, as an added disclaimer, for those of you who think that I will or have apologize/d for my opinions you're wrong. I have apologized for offending. But my opinions are mine. Sometimes I don't communicate them the way I want to. AND, I hate pissing people off in most cases. However, I do not apologize for what I believe. (in most cases.... the cases where I do apologize, is when I realize after the fact that my opinion was wrong)

Anyway, the disclaimers uttered... let's get on with the offensive opinions.

White chocolate is simply, unequivically and completely the best confection ever created. Seriously. It is. There is absolutely nothing of a sweet nature that is better. Unless it's dehydrated pineapple covered with White Chocolate!!! If you don't agree with me, then you can simply turn your little ass around and walk it on out of here.

*looks at you to see if you're buying this*

Okay, so that wasn't my real point, but I figured that if I would put something humorous first it might take a little of the heat off what I'm intending to say.

However, if I were to really think about it (something I try to avoid) most of you will probably either not have an opinion on this matter, or you'll never have thought about it. Something like that.

I do get concerned with how others see me. I don't want to be someone who is known as a border-rider. I don't like being the "neutral" party all the time. Granted, I don't want any fighting going on around me, but I think that sometimes my reticense to state my opinion boldly is because I don't want someone to be pissed off that my opinion differs from theirs. Atop that, I don't want to have to apologize afterward for having hurt feelings.

Granted, I know that I personally can't hurt anyone elses feelings. I can be the reason someone else chooses to feel hurt, but I don't have the power to make someone feel, think, say or be anything they don't want to be.

Hot damn, I think I'm going to dedicate tonight's entry to tangents and asides. *nods*

Granted, I can't make anyone else feel, think, say or be anything they don't want to. That does NOT mean that someone else won't feel hurt because of something I"ve said or done. BUT, what I've said didn't actually make them feel a specific way. What I've stated may have triggered a learned response which in turn triggers a specific feeling.

Such is the case with the whole pavlovian theory... Pavlov's dog learned to drool at the sound of a bell. It didn't mean that he was hungry. It didn't mean there was food. But, because the dog associated the bell with food so often, the dog simply learned to drool whenever it heard a bell.

I know that all of you with pets have seen this phenomenon in your own lives. Run the can opener and the pup/cat "knows" it's dinner time. NOT because the pet is hungry. And not because the pet smells food. But because the pet learned to associate the can opener with dinner.

Likewise, emotions are most often a learned response. Emotion is not instinctual. It is learned. One learns, through fairy tales, stories from parents or whatever source, that when sad music plays, it means they should be sad/depressed.

We as a species learn how to feel. Or rather, we learn by watching those around us, those people/things which influence our lives, what to do and say in specific circumstances. Same with emotions. Because of conditioned response, when one hears about a divorce, the reaction is most generally a sorrowful compassion. Death... the conditioned response is sadness. etc. Christmas, in most cases, the conditioned response is joy. Loud shouting with angry voices, the response is usually fear... etc, etc ad infinitum (I should probably learn how to spell the fancy Latin phrases I stick into my entries neh?)

The point of this particular aside is this... Once one figures out that their emotions are reactions, rather than conscious choices, they can change their lives tremendously. So many people complain about how they're not happy.

Okay... if you're not happy, make the conscious choice to be happy! I'm dead serious about this folks. If you're reading this and you concentrate on figuring out exactly what you're feeling... figure out what the emotion is that is prevelant... Then, understand that most of you simply reacted with that emotion. It's not like I reached into your head, flipped a switch and "made" you feel something as if you were some robot I could control......

*stops, thinking about that*

But, what if you were all robots that I could control? Hmmmmmm, what if you all are simply figments of my imagination? Little faceless figures that I've created in my own fantasy world so that I could feel less alone????

OR, what if I"m actually, in some "real" reality laying in some chamber where I"ve been since inception with these images and activities pouring through my brain???

What if I really am living in the Matrix????????

OKAY, back to the original point, the whole reason I started this damned entry in the first place. Or rather, the aside about apologizing for offense rather than apologizing for opinions....

===don'tcha just love how I ate up so much of this entry in stupid, meaningless rambling???===

I think back to that entry I wrote on the whole gay marriage thing. Ya know, the one where Donny was rightfully indignant about my stating that gay relationships were wrong.... He had every right to be irritated about that. I apologized to him, and to the others who wrote to me about that.

Not because of my opinion clashing with theirs, but because I had misstated my opinion. I apologized for the offense I caused by not paying any damned attention to how my words would be interpreted. The point I had intended to make in that entry so long ago is the same opinion I hold today... that most gay marriages are wrong/sin. BUT, I believe that because in most states/cities same-sex marriages are not legal. That's it. That was the whole point of that long-ass entry. Amazing how I can sometimes wrap things up in a simple paragraph and yet I expound upon them unceasingly just to take up space. Ya know... Kinda like how I"m making the particular paragraph continue to grow, not because I have something important to say in it, but because I simply want to make it a long-ass paragraph to prove a point that needs no proving. *winks*

Okay, now, Back to the initial point I had intended to make... the whole reason I started this particular diary entry anyway!!!

So, Artificial I..........

===An unamusing aside that has absolutely nothing to do with this entry in whoe or in part... It's been so damned long since I've actually kissed someone with deep passion that I wonder if I can still kiss. ... Now we return you to you rregularly scheduled entry already in progress... plus some===

So... Artificial Insemination. What is it about this thing that bothers me? Is it the artificial part? No. Is it the insemination part? No. I'm not against science. I'm not against aiding husbands and wives who, for some reason or other, can not impregnate naturally.

However, I'm against the concept (pun accept but not intended) of anonymous sperm donation and anonymous impregnation. Same for egg harvesting. *rolls her eyes*

And this is why...

Whether the male and female have sex or not is irrelivant. When a man's semen is part of the creation of a child, he becomes a parent. (which is aparently not aparent {so sue me, I'm in a punny mood}) Likewise, whether she carries the egg or not, when a woman's egg is used in the conception of a child, she becomes a parent.

AS far as I understand, the people who donate eggs and sperm for artificial insemination rarely, if ever, know who gets said donations. Likewise, the children which are produced from said donations, rarely, if ever, know who their biological parental units are.

Am I the only person in the entire world who sees something wrong with this scenario?

The offspring of the above named donations will act and think like their biological parental units. I don't mean behavior, for that can often be altered by external stimuli, however, I think that a person's thought paterns are built through the genetic makeup.

I believe this because of two specific points. 1) My adopted brother had a thought pattern and method of problem solving that was completely foriegn and vastly different from mine. Not just a little different, but vastly. And, his thought process/problem solving/method of living didn't coincide with anyone in our family. Literally.

He was exposed to his biological mother for less than a day, I believe. His biological mother gave him up for adoption before he was born, so she popped him out. I don't think she even held him once, tho I'm not sure on that. His biological father was involved for the conception only.

Thus, external stimuli didn't effect his behavior/thought patterns etc even a little bit.

And, reason 2)... I knew my biological father (I call him my sperm donar... ==And thus we discover the impetus for this whole damned entry... amazing how that works, neh?== because I don't consider him a father in any true form of the word. Thus, biological father is far too familial to use in referencing him. Sperm Donar fits tho)

Regardless... I was exposed to my sperm donar for a little less than a year, total time (he was a long-haul trucker, gone for great amounts of time, gone more often than he was home) And he and my mother were divorced just after my second Christmas. I think I was 5 months past my first birthday. But I was kinda young. I don't remember accurately.

So, I knew my sperm donar, had his influence in my life for less than 16 months. Far less since he was gone at least half that time on hauls.

And yet, throughout my life, while I was growing up, I would often hear my mother stating in awe that I looked like my father Or that I was using words like he did. My speach patterns are similar to his. My body shape is similar to his. My musical gifts are similar to his. Hell... I didn't have him as an external influence, and yet, I displayed traits and behaviors which were the same as his own.

Those two factors give me enough "proof" to state that a person's genetic makeup dictates how they think, how they act, etc. And THAT is a major reason for my irritation/disapproval for artificial insemination.

When you create a child... a living, breathing, thinking being, you are NOT playing house. You're not making something that you can mold and shape into whatever form you want. You are giving life to something which is it's own creation.

You have a responsibility, as the person instigating the creation of said life, to raise, train and maintain that life until it can do so for itself. If you are donating semen or eggs, you may very well be doing a "service" to those incapable of impregnating naturally.... However the temporary service creates a future, long-term disservice.... IE: Motherless and Fatherless children!!!

*sighs*

I am irritated so greatly because of my fundimental belief that true and responsible parenthood requires a married mother and father previous to pregnancy.

I know that most of the rest of the world doesn't hold the saem opinion. I'm not stating that others should hold the same opinion.

However, it is of vital importance that my future husband, whomever he may be, hold the same belief. In my personal version of reality, invasive science should play no part in child conception.

My opinion--- Man and woman meet, marry, have sex, bear children, then raise them. In that order. There is no pre-marrital sex. THere are no extra-marrital affairs. There is no artificial insemination unless there is some reason the couple can not conceive on their own. AND, if artificial insemination is necessary, Only the husband's semen should be used to fertilize the wife's eggs.

If either the husband can't produce semen, or the wife can't produce eggs, then they shouldn't have children. I believe this with my whole being!

I have thought about this a lot in my short lifetime. If my husband, God forbid, should be sterile, we won't have children. I will not adopt!!! I simply won't do it unless God tells me to. If I am barren, God forbid that be the case, then we simply won't have children.

===I have actually thought I might be barren. Four years with my ex. We used birthcontrol twice. And that was before we were married. ---one of the main reasons I so devoutly stand up for no pre-marrital sex. Had I not had sex with my ex before we were hitched, I wouldn't have gotten hitched! (how do you like that? An aside within an aside)--- I never got pregnant. Tho there was once I thought I might be... for a month. *chuckles* Those skipped periods really flip a woman out sometimes. I have thought I might actually be barren, but I haven't ever done that going-to-the-doc thing to get it checked out. If I am barren... then I simply won't have children.===

There are some women out there who think they don't need a man around in order to be a mother. If that's your belief, more power to ya. If you're a guy and think that donating semen for the purpose of providing a service to others is your gig, then more power to ya. I just won't do it that way.

Oh, and for those guys out there who think that donating semen is a great way to make a quick buck... frag off. That's just so totally irresponsible in every possible way!!!

Course, that's simply my opinion. *chuckles*

As a final disclaimer... I reserve the right to change my opinion in the future. I have been known to do that. However, not until my current opinion is proven wrong or completely falable.

Now... With all that stuff said... I close this entry...

Peace unto thy hearts, mine dahlinks.