If you lower the cost of things, people will buy more of it…. [I]f you lower the cost of uncommitted sexual encounters, you completely dissociate sex from pregnancy and birth and a lifetime of child care. People will engage in more uncommitted sexual encounters.
~ George Mason University law professor Helen Alvare, explaining the idea of “risk compensation” – and why she believes more contraception hasn’t led to fewer unintended pregnancies, as quoted by NPR, September 7
I didn’t want the responsibility, I wanted the sex. And so the easy way out was abortion. That’s what I thought. Just pay $300 and the problem goes away…. I thought if you just wanted to have sex just do it, what’s the big deal? I didn’t realize how important sex was – that people die from sex, that people are born from sex, that hearts are broken and kingdoms fall to the ground as the result of sexual immorality. I didn’t know any of that – all I knew was what I wanted.
~Former Broadway star and post-abortive father David MacDonald, LifeSiteNews, May 17
….The Post goes on to report that even though the curriculum includes assignments such as these and refers students to a Columbia University website called “Go Ask Alice” — which details sexual positions, types of sex that don’t include intercourse and more — the Department of Education maintains it is promoting abstinence first.
The Times and the Post both report that parents have the “right” to opt their children out of lessons about contraception methods. An op-ed in The New York Times last week calls this opt-out “very limited” in terms of parental control. The op-ed contributors Robert P. George and Melissa Morchella state that it is undeniable the curriculum is “sexualizing children” a younger and younger ages and that mandates such as this “violate parents’ rights”:
But no one can plausibly claim that teaching middle-schoolers about mutual masturbation is “neutral” between competing views of morality; the idea of “value free” sex education was exploded as a myth long ago. The effect of such lessons is as much to promote a certain sexual ideology among the young as it is to protect their health.
But beyond rival moral visions, the new policy raises a deeper issue: Should the government force parents — at least those not rich enough to afford private schooling — to send their children to classes that may contradict their moral and religious values on matters of intimacy and personal conduct?
[…]
Unless a broader parental opt out is added, New York City’s new policies will continue to usurp parents’ just (and constitutionally recognized) authority. Turning a classroom into a mandatory catechism lesson for a contested ideology is a serious violation of parental rights, and citizens of every ideological hue should stand up and oppose it…..
After watching this video I thought of something. The left bemoans “occupations” by America in Iraq and Afghanistan, and by Israel in the Middle-East. This being said, they seemingly — wholeheartedly — accept occupation in places like D.C. [Wall Street] and the Smithsonian Institute? Very odd.
Chicago was the scene of more than one protest this weekend. Not only did the Occupy Wall St. folks deliver a Windy City edition, but protesters also gathered for the Midwest Anti-War Mobilization rally (they eventually joined up together). Blogger Repel Pundit caught up with one alleged protester to get her views on what was really going on and even her thoughts on the flag. It was a jovial, yet candid, interview.
What do I mean? Well, when asked if she thought this was a “patriotic march,” the girl answered, “I don’t– I mean, I don‘t think we know what we’re doing enough for it to be technically patriotic. (Laughs.) I mean, come on, this is like crazy liberals, I don‘t even know what’s going on.”
That certainly fits into the popular criticism that recent protests are disorganized, and that many of the protesters are struggling to unite around a message.
She had more, though. After saying she thought the American flag represented “nastiness,” Rebel Pundit asked when that change occurred. “I do not know enough about American history to be able to give you that answer.”
All right then. Here‘s to hoping the simple explanation is that she’s Canadian:
1) Liberalism creates a feedback loop. It is usually impossible for a non-liberal to change a liberal’s mind about political issues because liberalism works like so: only liberals are credible sources of information. How do you know someone’s liberal? He espouses liberal doctrine. So, no matter how plausible what you say may be, it will be ignored if you’re not a liberal and if you are a liberal, of course, you probably agree with liberal views. This sort of close-mindedness makes liberals nearly impervious to any information that might undermine their beliefs.
2) Liberals sources of information are ever present. Conservatives are regularly exposed to the liberal viewpoint whether they want to be or not. That’s not necessarily so for liberals. Imagine the average day for liberals. They get up and read their local newspaper. It has a liberal viewpoint. They take their kids to school, where the teachers are liberal. Then they go to work, listen to NPR which has a liberal viewpoint on the way home, and then turn on the nightly news which also skews leftward. From there, they turn on TV and watch shows created by liberals that lean to the left, if they have any political viewpoint at all. Unless liberals actively seek out conservative viewpoints, which is unlikely, the only conservative arguments they’re probably going to hear are going to be through the heavily distorted, poorly translated, deeply skeptical lens of other liberals.
3) Liberals emphasize feeling superior, not superior results. Liberalism is all about appearances, not outcomes. What matters to liberals is how a program makes them FEEL about themselves, not whether it works or not. Thus a program like Headstart, which sounds good because it’s designed to help children read, makes liberals feel good about themselves, even though the program doesn’t work and wastes billions. A ban on DDT makes liberals feel good about themselves because they’re “protecting the environment” even though millions of people have died as a result. For liberals, it’s not what a program does in the real world; it’s about whether they feel better about themselves for supporting it.
4) Liberals are big believers in moral relativism. This spins them round and round because if the only thing that’s wrong is saying that there’s an absolute moral code, then you lose your ability to tell cause from effect, good from bad, and right from wrong. Taking being non-judgmental to the level that liberals do leaves them paralyzed, pondering “why they hate us” because they feel incapable of saying, “That’s wrong,” and doing something about it. If you’re against firm standards and condemning immoral behavior, then your moral compass won’t work and you’ll also be for immorality, as well as societal and cultural decay by default.
5) Liberals tend to view people as parts of groups, not individuals. One of the prejudices of liberalism is that they see everyone as part of a group, not as an individual. This can lead to rather bizarre disparities when say, a man from a group that they consider to be powerless, impoverished victims becomes the leader of the free world — and he’s challenged by a group of lower middle class white people who’ve banded together because individually they’re powerless. If you listen to the liberal rhetoric, you might think Barack Obama was a black Republican being surrounded by a KKK lynching party 100 years ago — as opposed to the single most powerful man in America abusing the authority of his office to attack ordinary Tea Partiers who have the audacity to speak the truth to power for the good of their country.
6) Liberals take a dim view of personal responsibility. Who’s at fault if a criminal commits a crime? The criminal or society? If someone creates a business and becomes a millionaire, is that the result of hard work and talent or luck? If you’re dirt poor, starving, and haven’t worked in 5 years, is that a personal failing or a failure of the state? Conservatives would tend to say the former in each case, while liberals would tend to say the latter. But when you disconnect what an individual does from the results that happen in his life, it’s very difficult to understand cause and effect in people’s lives.
It’s no secret that liberals and conservatives don’t get along. But, if there’s any one thing that we’ve learned from the liberal love of sensitivity classes and situation comedies, it’s that once people get to know each other and learn about each other’s beliefs and concerns, all legitimate differences melt away. So, with that in mind, I’d like to relieve the concerns of our liberal pals by telling them what we conservatives are really like. Think of it as sensitivity class – for liberals. Granted there may be a few conservatives here and there who disagree with me on these things, but as someone who has known conservatives all my life, I can assure you that they’re the exceptions, not the rule.
1) I don’t hate black Americans, Hispanic Americans, gay Americans, Jewish Americans, Muslims, or any of the other groups that liberals obsessively claim that conservatives hate. In all fairness, you could probably make a great case that I strongly dislike Nazis, Satanists, Fred Phelps’ clan full of weirdos, and Noam Chomsky, but who doesn’t? Not only is it extraordinarily offensive to be falsely accused of hating whole classes of people, it’s really bad for America to try to falsely convince tens of millions of Americans that they’re despised and hated by half the country.
2) I’m not rich, I don’t have any particular love of rich people, and I’m not being paid off by the Koch brothers (although they’re welcome to start at any time.) Of course, I also don’t envy the rich, think it’s “unfair” that they have more than I do, or want to punish them because Paris Hilton and the Kennedy family don’t deserve their money. So, am I “in the pocket” of the rich? No, it can just seem that way if you’re comparing conservatives like me to people who seethe with resentment for people who’ve done well in life.
3) I’m not “anti-science.” I like science. I read books about science. In fact, I’m extremely dubious about embryonic stem cells and manmade global warming because I’ve been convinced by science-based arguments. Moreover, it seems rather odd that the “pro-science” side of these debates seems to rely on pleas from Michael J. Fox, sad stories about polar bears, and iffy claims about “consensus” when the “anti-science” side seems to trot out statistics and science-based arguments. Let’s face it: You don’t have to accuse people of wanting birds to die to get them to buy into the theory of gravity. If you can’t convince people to buy into a scientific argument with science, then maybe your evidence is a whole lot shakier than you seem to think.
4) I’m an anti-authoritarian, non-conformist. That’s one of the reasons I don’t like the government inserting its tentacles into our lives, it’s why I work for myself, and it’s a big part of why I’m on the Right. People think we take “marching orders” from Rush Limbaugh, Fox News, or the Koch brothers? Hell, conservatives are the only real rebels left in American society. We’re the ones who have the courage to say that we’re not victims, that we don’t care if Hollywood and the media disagree with us, and we’re willing to advocate policies we think are good for the country even if we’re called “mean” for it. You can be the biggest jerk in the world and you’ll still be patted on the back for being “compassionate” by everyone from Lady Gaga to the teachers at your kid’s school, to the New York Times if you’re a liberal. Want to be slandered, demonized, and constantly accused of being things you’re not because you believe in doing the right thing? Be a conservative.
5) I love women and I don’t think they should be barefoot, pregnant, and chained in the house on a clothesline that runs between the bedroom and the kitchen. As a matter of fact, I’d say I’m more supportive of women than a lot of liberal feminists today because while I don’t think women HAVE to be stay-at-home moms, I consider that to be every bit as much of a valid and important career choice as being a corporate VP. Also, isn’t it a bit ironic that conservatives are accused of “hating women” in a country where Sarah Palin and Michele Bachmann are wildly popular on the Right, while liberal men launch non-stop misogynistic attacks at them and their families?
6) I’m a compassionate person. I give money to charity, I’ve bought groceries for people, and I’ve held fundraisers on my blog to raise money for people in need. In fact, one of the biggest reasons I’m a conservative is that I believe our philosophy is the best way to do good in people’s lives and preserve the best things about this country for future generations. This baffles some liberals, who can’t seem to understand how that can be the case when conservatives oppose so many government programs that “help” people. What they may be missing is that if the government is not an unalloyed good, but a “necessary evil,” then its “help” is often as counter-productive as tossing shotguns into the middle of a drunken barfight so people can “protect” themselves. Compassion is about what you do personally, not what government programs you advocate funding with other people’s money.