WHAT IS THE

SET STANDARD?

I've always felt like an outcast. As a child, I rummaged through our housing project at all hours of the day and night smoking cigarettes, experimenting with other boys, riding my bicycle 4 miles away from home (resulting in a curfew ticket by the police), and dreaming of a different life...A life with more money, a healthier family, and the privelege of others around me who (based on their attitude and lack thereof) didn't deserve a pinch of it.

White people of all ages called me a "nigger". Black people ridiculed my Jewish nose and not-nappy hair and asked why I talked/acted/sat/breathed like a "white person". When I came out as gay in college, my family made it clear that I was going to hell. Despite the love (read: "history") my own flesh and blood has for me, they could "never attend my wedding" because my lifestyle was "against God." Tough love...all because of a pre-determined (and ignorant) set of qualifications that makes someone or something "normal". But, a lot has changed since then.

set a standard – (verb)

(1) To create a widely recognized model of authority or excellence;

(2) To establish what is normal, familiar, or usual