Tag Archives: acronym

Convert

Convert: (v) to change; transform.

All my life, I’ve been asked to convert.

As a young boy, I was threatened that we would soon convert to the metric system. Still waiting.

I had to convert to being color-blind. I wasn’t raised that way, nor was anyone else under the age of twenty.

I was told to convert to the idea of divorce, and then to the concept that dividing children between households was wise, even though Solomon passed on the idea.funny wisdom on words that begin with a C

Each time it has been explained to me that for the sake of tolerance and mercy it is good that I allow for other people to have their choices.

I had to convert to the practicality of pro-choice, even though I find abortion enigmatic.

But now I’m being asked to convert to sexuality. I have always believed that sexuality is having an orgasm. I do not care how you reach that climax, nor should you be interested in my path.

But we were told to convert because of the stigma, prejudice and animosity toward homosexuality. Excellent. This made me more open, congenial and kind to lesbians and gays. Then I was told this was insufficient.

I was informed that even though lesbians and gays were “born that way,” there is another group—bisexuals—which should be included, even though their existence brings to question the assertion of being born gay. Not satisfied with the LGB community, transgenders were thrown in. Transgender actually has nothing to do with sexuality but is a processing in the lives of a few people to discover in what gender they truly find themselves.

Then, this was no longer sufficient. Even though for years it was the LGBT community, a Q has been added—for “questioning.” This is apparently for people who were not born in any particular way, who are deciding who they want to be, even though we originally said this was not something you determined.

What is obviously missing from the acronym is an H—for heterosexual.

Why would that be?

I guess if I want to convert to something, I would like to see a consistency in thought rather than trying to jump on at the amoeba stage and hang around for the entire evolution… to being human.


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Admirable

Words from Dic(tionary)

Admirable (adj.): arousing or deserving respect or approval: e.g. he has one admirable quality.

B.T.P.Y.A.

It’s an acronym I came up with in the 1980s. I put together a little traveling show, along with my oldest son, who was sixteen at the time and flirting with insanity. I thought it would be a great way for us to connect and maybe enrich the lives of some other folks along the way.

It stood for: Be the Person You Admire.

It’s a rather simple principle, asking a very powerful question: what is the purpose of admiring–granting admiration to someone or some cause–if you’re not prepared to mimic the virtue which you acclaim?

For instance, many people have great admiration for Abraham Lincoln but still find themselves enslaving certain portions of humanity in the prison of their own minds.

There are billions of folks who adhere, with great reverence, to the divinity of Jesus of Nazareth, who nevertheless do not agree that the most important thing in life is to treat those who are considered “the least” as valuable.

There are so many things we admire, but we do it from afar. Matter of fact, we even have a phrase to handle that: “I admired her from afar.”

Now, I personally have had an unrequited crush on a woman in my life AND I have had a requited sensation which led to romantic bliss. I can truthfully tell you–the second one is better.

I do not think we can continue to express admiration without emulating that which we proclaim to be beautiful, significant or holy.

Case in point: I am not a Christian because I like church. I tolerate church because I’m a Christian. Church, to me, is one of those institutions which has become weak and sometimes pointless and needs my mercy, generosity and support. I do not abandon the church because she sometimes embarrasses me.

But in the style of Jesus, who I admire, I continue to love the unlovely, lift up the downtrodden and energize the grave.

B.T.P.Y.A.–if we would just follow through on the things that generate admiration in our spirits, and give ourselves a chance to “Xerox goodness,” doing our best to replicate some of the value, we would improve our lives by leaps and bounds.

Admiration is often a way to escape the responsibility of doing something ourselves.

OR … it is a roadmap which will take us to a destination where we can create our own admirable deeds.

Acronym

Words from Dic(tionary)

by J. R. Practix

dictionary with letter AAcronym: (n.) a word formed from the first letters of other words. e.g.: radar, laser

I think you have to go back to the old rotary phone. It used to be really fun to come up with acronyms  by using your telephone number, looking at the letters that were available under each numeral and coming up with a spelling for your company or organization.

Acronyms used to be so popular. It was a way of remembering answers for tests. You would select an acronym, and each letter would represent an answer for your test, and the word would stimulate your memory for the answer. (As you can see, it’s actually easier to apply than to explain…)

For a while, preachers used acronyms a lot to illustrate their sermons in an attempt to get people to remember the points past the parking lot, to where they picked up the box of chicken, to go home and watch football.

Then somewhere along the line they became hokey. They became laughable.

I think it’s based around what I refer to as my “layer theory:”

  • Things remain cool as long as cool people are doing them. it doesn’t really matter WHAT they do–just that people we have decided are really superb and special do them.
  • Then the friends of those cool people start doing the trend, creating a second layer. It still remains cool at that point, but a whole lot more common.
  • At that point, the relatives of the friends of the cool people start putting into practice this popular gizmo. Then it becomes so average and everyday that we all kind of smile when somebody does it, but we’re really hoping that soon it will stop.
  • Finally, the enemies of the relatives of the friends of the cool people start picking up on the practice. At this point, all the comedians in the country, all the sane individuals, and everybody who is sick to death of the new idea that has now become like used Kleenex, begin to mock and make fun of what was once considered to be the hippest thing in the world.

It is an American evolution–and acronyms are very near the point of being bombarded.

So if you have an acronym you still want to put forth, do it very quickly–and be prepared to remove it with just as much haste. Because I think we’re really on the verge of acronyms becoming the butt of every joke:

B.U.T.T.– Better Understand Tomorrow’s Trend.