CRIMES AGAINST NATURE
One of the charming things about New Orleans for a fairly new resident like myself, who loves the city and its tell-it-like-it-is, let-it-all-hang-out culture, is the delicately phrased offense of “A Crime against Nature”. Although I xpect the major concern for offending “Nature” in this case reflects attitudes more deeply imbedded above the Orleans/Jefferson parish line, than below it. Nevertheless, as a pastor I have found myself on occasion called upon to make bail for a friend charged with this arcane Crime, although in my estimation his real offense is sartorial: wearing Rhine stone spectacles and an ill-fitting aqua knit pantsuit of a certain age while hitting on a vice officer, whom I suspect was more offended by the Rhine stones and aqua knit than being hit on. At least I would be.
Recently however, I have come to think that this particular category of crime ought to be retired as it relates to ill-dressed transvestites with no fashion sense and the bad judgement to hit on police disguised as good looking men on the prowl. The category ought to be retained, however, to describe another, more disturbing offense, which ought to arouse and offend the dignity of all open minded residents below Canal. A new vigor has come into an age-old dream of our city worthies, and one worthy in particular, who has taken it as a personal mandate to Clean Up the French Quarter. This Crime Against Nature is the offense of arresting people caught urinating in the street. That, the arrest, is a shocking Crime Against Nature.
In my estimation as someone who likes the Quarter pretty much as it is, or even as it used to be 20-odd years ago, would be very distressed if it became Disney Land on the Mississippi, with only entertainment and vistas that are suitably family oriented, in this particular case meaning a very exclusive kind of traditional family: one momma, one pappa, and some kids. In accommodation to the modern world of course, the kids don’t all have to have originally belonged to both of them. Without voiding their claim of being traditional, some of the kids may once have been just hers and some just his, suggesting a less than unflawed past, but not admittedly a flawed present.
I may be working from an old out-dated version of the Gospel, but my version says that Jesus Christ was most concerned about those we call the marginalized, the non-conforming, including the poor, the demon-possessed, the unclean–even including unclean street people–not to mention the sick (mentally as well as physically). Jesus even had the temerity to say that the harlots and tax collectors would enter the kingdom of Heaven before the self-proclaimed righteous. But others read the Gospels differently than I do, and I am willing to let them be indifferent to the unclean and care only about the clean and righteous if they want to.
Because of my reading of my old out-dated version of the Gospel, however, I do hate to see all this flotsam and jetsam of the world run out of the part of town I moved into, hoping I might be able to tell them about an old-fashioned–dare I say traditional?–Good News that God loves everybody. I love it here because I like telling everybody God loves them even if they can not or do not want to clean up their acts. Maybe it is not my place to tell them how clean their acts ought to be. God loves them from everlasting, as the Psalm says and not because of any particular merit of their own. When I was baptized, I promised to respect the dignity of every human being and I do not think respecting their dignity is telling people they can not live in my part of town because they might offend the tourists, most of whom I imagine would be disappointed if they saw nothing in New Orleans but the same sanitized world they can find at Disney’s Epcott Center.
Which brings me back to Crimes Against Nature. The real crime against nature is encouraging folks to drink a bladder full of beer and providing no place to get rid of it when Nature calls. I hope someone with better knowledge of human physiology will correct me if I have it wrong, but is not urination the natural consequence of drinking fluids? Now I wish one of the City Worthies would tell me what we are supposed to do if Nature calls as a result of drinking
water, or soda pop, or even eating snow cones, but especially after imbibing several brews, the very life blood that courses through the arteries and veins of the French Quarter economy. Sure you can go to a restroom if you need to go when you are still in the place where you bought the beer, but what if you leave the bar where you bought it and you are walking along Bourbon street when you get an urgent call. Well, I supposed you could pop into the nearest bar, but wait! The restrooms are only for customers and you are not one there. So OK, you go in anyway and order another beer so you can use the rest room. I imagine the City Worthies would leave it undrunk on the bar top and just use the restroom and leave, but City Worthies have unusual powers not possessed by tourists and mere small-bladder citizens like myself. So, you take your beer and go on walking down Bourbon Street, but you have not solved the problem, you have just made it worse. In order to be legal, you have now entered an endless loop that will leave you hopelessly drunk and liable to arrest for barfing on the sidewalk and, to the outrage of all non-urinating people as far west as Algiers, you have to relieve yourself on the sidewalk. Now you could just go in your pants, but I had rather go to jail than humiliate myself like a first grader who did not yet know about one finger or two fingers.
Ah, yes, we could provide public restrooms maintained by the city for the convenience of our visitors and citizens, who after all come to the French Quarter to fill their bladders, even if it is not the end result that we talk about when we promote our many charms. We invite folks to come party, but we do not tell them where they can go potty when they must face the mundane consequences of the partying we encourage. We do not want to pay for maintaining public pissoirs as they do in Paris. Besides, think of all the old fashioned Crimes Against Nature that might happen in public pissoirs.
There is a solution, even if, and excuse the pun, it is a little potty, as the British would say. The city should require every establishment that sells liquids of any sort–be they water, soda pop, or snow cones–to give the purchaser a ticket or token good for one free potty stop at any other establishment that sells liquids. Better still, make these potty pieces look like Doubloons, and make them of a golden hue to carry out the theme. Stamp a date and the name of the festive occasion on them, and I guarantee people will collect them and sell their collections for huge profits on e-bay.
Alas, I doubt the City will accept my idea. City Worthies do not get to be worthies by having either a sense of humor or a sense of compassion. I believe however, that eventually the Supreme Court of Louisiana with its usual profound insight and compassion towards Crimes Against Nature will decide it is unconstitutional to encourage people to drink without making provision for a legal and convenient place to urinate. The court will decree that the city provide a remedy or stop issuing liquor licenses. Unfortunately I suspect that the worthies, instead of issuing potty pieces as I suggest, will opt for compulsory cauterization at the city limits requiring us all to carry a picture ID attesting to such. That will keep those street people where they belong, wherever that is, but to tell the truth, I for one will be pretty Put Out [sic] about it.
One of the charming things about New Orleans for a fairly new resident like myself, who loves the city and its tell-it-like-it-is, let-it-all-hang-out culture, is the delicately phrased offense of “A Crime against Nature”. Although I xpect the major concern for offending “Nature” in this case reflects attitudes more deeply imbedded above the Orleans/Jefferson parish line, than below it. Nevertheless, as a pastor I have found myself on occasion called upon to make bail for a friend charged with this arcane Crime, although in my estimation his real offense is sartorial: wearing Rhine stone spectacles and an ill-fitting aqua knit pantsuit of a certain age while hitting on a vice officer, whom I suspect was more offended by the Rhine stones and aqua knit than being hit on. At least I would be.
Recently however, I have come to think that this particular category of crime ought to be retired as it relates to ill-dressed transvestites with no fashion sense and the bad judgement to hit on police disguised as good looking men on the prowl. The category ought to be retained, however, to describe another, more disturbing offense, which ought to arouse and offend the dignity of all open minded residents below Canal. A new vigor has come into an age-old dream of our city worthies, and one worthy in particular, who has taken it as a personal mandate to Clean Up the French Quarter. This Crime Against Nature is the offense of arresting people caught urinating in the street. That, the arrest, is a shocking Crime Against Nature.
In my estimation as someone who likes the Quarter pretty much as it is, or even as it used to be 20-odd years ago, would be very distressed if it became Disney Land on the Mississippi, with only entertainment and vistas that are suitably family oriented, in this particular case meaning a very exclusive kind of traditional family: one momma, one pappa, and some kids. In accommodation to the modern world of course, the kids don’t all have to have originally belonged to both of them. Without voiding their claim of being traditional, some of the kids may once have been just hers and some just his, suggesting a less than unflawed past, but not admittedly a flawed present.
I may be working from an old out-dated version of the Gospel, but my version says that Jesus Christ was most concerned about those we call the marginalized, the non-conforming, including the poor, the demon-possessed, the unclean–even including unclean street people–not to mention the sick (mentally as well as physically). Jesus even had the temerity to say that the harlots and tax collectors would enter the kingdom of Heaven before the self-proclaimed righteous. But others read the Gospels differently than I do, and I am willing to let them be indifferent to the unclean and care only about the clean and righteous if they want to.
Because of my reading of my old out-dated version of the Gospel, however, I do hate to see all this flotsam and jetsam of the world run out of the part of town I moved into, hoping I might be able to tell them about an old-fashioned–dare I say traditional?–Good News that God loves everybody. I love it here because I like telling everybody God loves them even if they can not or do not want to clean up their acts. Maybe it is not my place to tell them how clean their acts ought to be. God loves them from everlasting, as the Psalm says and not because of any particular merit of their own. When I was baptized, I promised to respect the dignity of every human being and I do not think respecting their dignity is telling people they can not live in my part of town because they might offend the tourists, most of whom I imagine would be disappointed if they saw nothing in New Orleans but the same sanitized world they can find at Disney’s Epcott Center.
Which brings me back to Crimes Against Nature. The real crime against nature is encouraging folks to drink a bladder full of beer and providing no place to get rid of it when Nature calls. I hope someone with better knowledge of human physiology will correct me if I have it wrong, but is not urination the natural consequence of drinking fluids? Now I wish one of the City Worthies would tell me what we are supposed to do if Nature calls as a result of drinking
water, or soda pop, or even eating snow cones, but especially after imbibing several brews, the very life blood that courses through the arteries and veins of the French Quarter economy. Sure you can go to a restroom if you need to go when you are still in the place where you bought the beer, but what if you leave the bar where you bought it and you are walking along Bourbon street when you get an urgent call. Well, I supposed you could pop into the nearest bar, but wait! The restrooms are only for customers and you are not one there. So OK, you go in anyway and order another beer so you can use the rest room. I imagine the City Worthies would leave it undrunk on the bar top and just use the restroom and leave, but City Worthies have unusual powers not possessed by tourists and mere small-bladder citizens like myself. So, you take your beer and go on walking down Bourbon Street, but you have not solved the problem, you have just made it worse. In order to be legal, you have now entered an endless loop that will leave you hopelessly drunk and liable to arrest for barfing on the sidewalk and, to the outrage of all non-urinating people as far west as Algiers, you have to relieve yourself on the sidewalk. Now you could just go in your pants, but I had rather go to jail than humiliate myself like a first grader who did not yet know about one finger or two fingers.
Ah, yes, we could provide public restrooms maintained by the city for the convenience of our visitors and citizens, who after all come to the French Quarter to fill their bladders, even if it is not the end result that we talk about when we promote our many charms. We invite folks to come party, but we do not tell them where they can go potty when they must face the mundane consequences of the partying we encourage. We do not want to pay for maintaining public pissoirs as they do in Paris. Besides, think of all the old fashioned Crimes Against Nature that might happen in public pissoirs.
There is a solution, even if, and excuse the pun, it is a little potty, as the British would say. The city should require every establishment that sells liquids of any sort–be they water, soda pop, or snow cones–to give the purchaser a ticket or token good for one free potty stop at any other establishment that sells liquids. Better still, make these potty pieces look like Doubloons, and make them of a golden hue to carry out the theme. Stamp a date and the name of the festive occasion on them, and I guarantee people will collect them and sell their collections for huge profits on e-bay.
Alas, I doubt the City will accept my idea. City Worthies do not get to be worthies by having either a sense of humor or a sense of compassion. I believe however, that eventually the Supreme Court of Louisiana with its usual profound insight and compassion towards Crimes Against Nature will decide it is unconstitutional to encourage people to drink without making provision for a legal and convenient place to urinate. The court will decree that the city provide a remedy or stop issuing liquor licenses. Unfortunately I suspect that the worthies, instead of issuing potty pieces as I suggest, will opt for compulsory cauterization at the city limits requiring us all to carry a picture ID attesting to such. That will keep those street people where they belong, wherever that is, but to tell the truth, I for one will be pretty Put Out [sic] about it.
posted by Glynn Harper @ 8/28/2003 03:22:00 PM
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