Obama has stepped in it this time.
Speaking at a town hall meeting, and responding to a question about abortion,
(basically,about there being too many abortions), he had this to say:
Education, though important to avoidance of HIV/AIDS, is not prevention, let alone the 'most important prevention'. Education is information. It cannot stand on it's own. It must be put into practice. The best prevention is abstinence. It's not that hard to see how abstinence can work. But apparently, it is hard for somebody like Obama to see how it works the best.
But the most disturbing aspect of these remarks is this tidbit: I've got two daughters. 9 years old and 6 years old. I am going to teach them first of all about values and morals. But if they make a mistake, I don't want them punished with a baby.
Good. Teach values and morals. But don't teach them that 'making a mistake' can be erased by another act that christians (and he claims to be one) generally would find abhorant and immoral, under the guise of teaching "values and morals". You teach morals and values by teaching consequences to improper actions. There are no mulligans in the sex department. You can't reverse HIV. You can't reverse pregnancy, either.
Many commentators are jib jabbing all about these remarks. They are appalled that Obama would refer to a baby as a 'punishment', as opposed to a blessing.
But these blabbering mouths are missing the mark.
What is truly disturbing, and appalling, is the fact that Obama has just publicly endorsed the snuffing out of his own grandchild.
It's one thing to hold abortion as a basic fundamental right, a position I am fully in disagreement with; but a whole another thing altogether to actually say you want your own inconvenient grandchild killed while proclaiming yourself a christian man of values and morals.
Speaking at a town hall meeting, and responding to a question about abortion,
(basically,about there being too many abortions), he had this to say:
When it comes specifically to HIV/AIDS, the most important prevention is education, which should include -- which should include abstinence education and teaching the children -- teaching children, you know, that sex is not something casual. But it should also include -- it should also include other, you know, information about contraception because, look, I've got two daughters. 9 years old and 6 years old. I'm going to teach them first of all about values and morals. But if they make a mistake, I don't want them punished with a baby, or an STD at the age of 16."Obama is supposedly a christian man and he supposedly believes in teaching morality and virtue and all that other good stuff, but he's got it all wrong in this case.
Education, though important to avoidance of HIV/AIDS, is not prevention, let alone the 'most important prevention'. Education is information. It cannot stand on it's own. It must be put into practice. The best prevention is abstinence. It's not that hard to see how abstinence can work. But apparently, it is hard for somebody like Obama to see how it works the best.
But the most disturbing aspect of these remarks is this tidbit: I've got two daughters. 9 years old and 6 years old. I am going to teach them first of all about values and morals. But if they make a mistake, I don't want them punished with a baby.
Good. Teach values and morals. But don't teach them that 'making a mistake' can be erased by another act that christians (and he claims to be one) generally would find abhorant and immoral, under the guise of teaching "values and morals". You teach morals and values by teaching consequences to improper actions. There are no mulligans in the sex department. You can't reverse HIV. You can't reverse pregnancy, either.
Many commentators are jib jabbing all about these remarks. They are appalled that Obama would refer to a baby as a 'punishment', as opposed to a blessing.
But these blabbering mouths are missing the mark.
What is truly disturbing, and appalling, is the fact that Obama has just publicly endorsed the snuffing out of his own grandchild.
It's one thing to hold abortion as a basic fundamental right, a position I am fully in disagreement with; but a whole another thing altogether to actually say you want your own inconvenient grandchild killed while proclaiming yourself a christian man of values and morals.
Sorry, little grandbaby. No hope allowed for you.
8 comments:
Gino, I meant what I said the other night.
Until you get your head screwed on straight about the acceptability (hint: there is none) of men using women to fulfill their "need" for sex (and it isn't a "need," it is a craving, and that is TOTALLY different, no matter how intense), under whatever contractual model (prostitution, "traditional" [your term] marriage, long-term semi-committed relationships, one-night-stands, whatever), YOU HAVE NO RIGHT TO CONDEMN THOSE WHO FOLLOW YOUR OWN DEHUMANIZING ATTITUDES ABOUT SEX TO THEIR LOGICAL CONCLUSION.
Period.
And don't even begin to think that women don't crave sex too--we just crave it from the spiritual side, and so the craving isn't always recognized as "sexual" unless we find someone with whom the connection works--just like men seem rarely to understand that their connection-craving is also spiritual, unless they find a partner with whom the spiritual part of sex works. (This whole "sex can be just (physical) sex" thing is a total lie--but it's finally understandable to me why men can think that; more in a bit.)
Societally accepted/encouraged abortion is the most evil thing I can think of. You know I agree with your "conclusion."
But the second you think it is ever in any way at all ok to coerce a woman into sex, you are part of the reason abortions happen.
I don't even know if you can imagine this, but how would you feel if a woman tried to force a spiritual connection with you? Have you ever had it happen? I've seen women do it to men, it is ugly and very very wrong ... I'm nauseated just thinking about it. I am pretty sure I'm strong enough to do it--but I don't, and I don't think I ever have. Possibly it doesn't happen too often because few women realize they _can_ do it. But I'm fairly sure there is jack shit you, personally, could do about it if I decided to. Now, your wife could maybe protect you (depending on her ability and awareness), or if you have a bunch of aware and able women-friends maybe, and obviously you can (and should) put your faith in the protections God offers ...
But what I've very very recently realized is that we have been taught for so long (what, 6000 years or so?) that women have no effective (acts-out) strength, that even with all this feminism stuff, we are still trying to match up to the men--because we can't imagine any other way of being strong. And obviously men have no real reason to think there is another way, so they don't expect it of us.
But I was recently informed that men do not have a DSL connection to the Eternal--I always assumed y'all did, because I do, and why would I know differently? But apparently you generally don't. And women generally do. And in this, is the key to why your mental constructions about sex and marriage are so very very wrong--which I've always known them to be (since, you know, they have been presented by society my whole life), but I could never previously figure out what the right answer was.
This would, by itself, revolutionize the world if people took it to heart, and it is the direct answer to your incorrect assertions:
Marriage is not "man protects woman, woman offers body in gratitude"--which is more or less what you've said recently and off and on in the past. Marriage should be, "man protects woman (physical realm), woman protects man (spiritual realm), both learn from the other how to grow in the non-instinctive realm as they grow in communion, and sex is the most powerful, but not the only, expression of that communion and the way that the most intimate teaching, learning, giving, receiving, and communion take place."
Sex is either a gift (woman wants to give the man the physical connection he craves, man wants to give the woman spiritual connection she craves), or else it is one or both person(s) using the other.
There can be no contract. The contract concept destroys the possibility of permanence (how much change can a contract absorb?) and fundamentally dehumanizes the relationship. (I assume this is why so many Christian scholars are trying to round-out the concept of "covenant" relationships right now ... because our society is so stupid about glorifying the "contract" idea, like it makes actual sense. Pfft. And we are surprised marriages fail?? WHATEVER!)
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Accepting the "I need/deserve/am owed sex" concept means het men will (logically!) feel justified using women. And that means women will
1) react properly to being used--by rejecting being used (before or, more problematically, after the fact)
or else
2) be stuck with the results of ASININE ASSUMPTIONS (which, yes, often enough the women themselves accept(ed))--they are not stuck with the results of healthy love and partnership, these are the results of social pressures from everyone (you) who holds the assumptions and tried to teach them the assumptions/enforce the assumptions.
Not that I advocate abortion, but it takes a special sort of openness to healing to not resent such a baby. And as my mother pointed out to me with my first child, the child first learns about what complete caring (God) love is inside the womb--a mother can't hold back, or the baby will be (psycho-emotionally/spiritually) handicapped. If an accidental baby happens, the entire social assumptions setup is much more likely to push a woman into resentment and despair and disconnection--even if she doesn't react by having her baby killed, these assumptions make it much harder for her to be the mommy a baby needs.
I'm (obviously) glad you recognize abortion is evil.
However, nearly every time you open your yap about it, you give all of the women in the virtual room reasons to think protecting the right to abortion is MORE necessary. Because your attitude about sex is ass-backwards. It reflects very neatly Western Civ attitudes (and more or less the entire world's "traditional"--last 6,000 years or so, as far as I can tell--attitudes).
You who claim to be Catholic through intellectual search sure's Hell aren't in line with Church teachings around this sex and marriage stuff. Thinking prostitution should be legal SHOULD have been a clue for you, along with a bunch of other things you occasionally mention with a "but never mind that messiness behind that curtain" attitude.
But besides the bitch-out, I also meant the good part of what I said the other night: If you think about it (hard, she says bitchily, still really angry), you will see that having more women be more happy all around you because they don't have to worry about every het man thinking "women, including her, are holding out on me" (which leads to really bad conclusions, quickly and extremely logically, I'd hope that's obvious but apparently it's not) ... having more women be more happy and feeling more safe means more (het) men will get more sex more often and the sex will be better (for everyone). It's a straight-up tradeoff: you-all feel less entitled/gypped, we are happier and more secure, and therefore more likely to jump you.
Holding onto this "how can I get some" attitude, that can even begin to think thinks the "frigid" woman gets what she deserves when her abuser steps out ... are you surprised women avoid sexual realtionships, and then sex once in a sexual relationship? (Modern women, conversely, seem surprised when men avoid the intimacies we crave--um, hello, when they KNOW you can kill their child on a whim, and then you might bitch them out because you "had" to kill their child, do you THINK men are going to be all about intimacy?? Yarr!)
You support--repeatedly you did! well, you know how angry I was--you support the proposition that women should be physically available to men--and then you condemn the natural result, that really, truly unwanted babies will result (but dammit, those people should have to suffer their consequences, despite the fact that I am part of imposing the American sicko attitude that they accepted and acted from).
Abortion is (I hope and assume!) the greatest evil in the world today. We are implicated to the extent that we (society) feed the abortion monster by sexualizing everything and telling women they are stodgy or misguided or stupid if they don't want to be used or more and more objectified ("it's just natural for men!"--yeah, I know it is, I'm not even denying that--but God gave us each other to help each other expand our existence, not to use each other to snurgle deeper into our reptile brains). (That reptile brains thing applies to both genders. 'Not man-bashing.)
A woman should not, ever, be used (and nor should a man). I can't imagine why this is not OBVIOUSLY true.
Sex should not ever be contractual--what a waste! What a sin! What a complete misuse of the potential in the gift God has offered humans!
Women are right to yell and fight about being held in bondage by these social "mores." They are wrong to then hurt someone else (baby) because they have been hurt--but most people do that. Society has definitely taught an entire generation, from, if spiritual resonance exists (which it does), before birth, that abortion is probably an OK way to "deal with" their pain/difficulty/"problem."
You have no right to denigrate women who object to the "need"/"OK to use" mental construction you espouse--they are speaking truth and you are NOT. Are not. Not. It is a lie from Satan that I assume you hold because noone has previously asked you to really examine how untenable and inevitably damaging to human relationships it is. I believe you want human relationships to be healthier. Or I wouldn't be bitching you out, again.
The only right you have to speak against abortion is because you happen to be speaking truth--but what you speak is not justified by what you think. And speaking truth with lies to "support" it makes people on the fence reject the conclusion (and people against it feel more justified) for the ugly mess of lies on which you imply it can be "based."
Find a joy to present them--a true reflection of God as he wants to be reflected in our relationships--and then maybe 'feminists' won't feel justified knee-jerk dismissing your conclusions (well, "assertions," since they are not based on anything that actually supports them) about sexual 'consequences.'
Jesus, Gino, how does any of what you typed the other day about Spitzer/prostitution reflect God's love for the world and his peoples, or the type of relationships God calls us to?
KR: plain and simple, there is a word for spouses who with hold from their partner.
its called 'divorced'.
its not my rule.
i didnt enforce it on anybody.
but it is the human condition.
any decent man will always return home to a warm bed. its just the way it is.
as a result, the wife lives a better, more secure lifestyle, and her kids are better off as well.
hey, its not of my making.
it just is.
and this predates feminism, and will outlast it, as well.
find any man, and inform him beforehand that he has no reasonable expectation of sex in the marriage, and he wont show up at the altar.
not my rules.
it just is.
now, you gonna address the burning house or mugger scenarios?
Gino, fuck it man, I am not saying you should settle for less sex! Read it again. I am saying there would be more and better sex. More and better. Happier wife = better and more frequent sex, from what I've heard and read and experienced.
And the Catholic Church, when it is not being held back by bullshit pre-Christian "ages old social order" that the "faithful" simply can't see past, is pretty feminist. As was America, pre-imposition-of-Greco-worshipping-Renaissance-thinking; women owned lots of businesses for themselves before the interesting set of laws were written declaring men the only citizens.
This "ages old social order" you speak of in your other post is based on men overpowering women and other men. It is a dumbshit basis, that is used to "justify" all sorts of dumbshit things. And I ask again, how does that reflect God, whom we are supposed to reflect? This post was after all a rant against the lack of basic Christianity in Obama, yes? What is more basic that "we are supposed to try at all times to reflect Jesus as best we can?"?!?
And I was very serious, did you even hear the threat (not from me specifically, but generally)? It's a little more obscure than physical rape, but women can (as a general rule, as far as I can tell) overwhelm men spiritually. I think God let the whole smackdown happen to the pre-historical matriarchal-type cultures in the Middle East (and everywhere else) because that's pretty much exactly what those women did: they got themselves all set up with cities and agriculture and didn't "need" men (as much) to protect them anymore, but didn't stop trying to control them as they used to perceive they "needed to" for self-protection. Some of the cultural edges in the Greek literature (Especially some of the stuff abot Sparta) and in the OT (who is it, Amos?, who can't keep his wife from the fertility rites at the Temple? he calls her all sorts of interesting names ... ) ... some of the edges in the early historical record speak to this: the real lack of power men had in the face of that, the real control they were screaming against ... and we are still living in the natural backlash to those women of 6,000 years ago.
Men are now doing the same thing, claiming it is just 'the way things are,' and thinking they have a right to demand things they "need" of their "partners."
Bullshit, Gino.
And if that ends in divorce, who's standing in front of the throne of God at Judgement Day, boyfriend? The frigid wife? "Oh, Honey, I know he just got more and more demanding and listened to you less and less as he felt more frustrated until he felt justified stepping out on 'a woman he' for some surprising reason 'didn't recognize anymore,' but you know I held you and designed you in your mother's womb to be used by a man in return for his protection and really, you should have put out more." Yep, that's God all over. Love goin' to mass every Sunday to receive that SOB into my life. It's just so healing.
And Gino, rape, burglary, fire, muggers--they happen, no shit, and they are horrible. But in our society, and most societies, they happen rarely. (That would be one of the advatages to the whole "society" thing.) And those that do happen often happen while "the man" is at work, not just at 3 AM when potentially you could do something about it (nasty people being pretty savvy about how to not get beat up while they take advatage, ya?). And any single woman who plays her cards well can garner the subsidiary protection of most of the men around her--without putting out!--and so this whole marriage as protection thing is not only outdated it is untrue. A phantasm. 'Having a man' is psychologically huge for a woman--but in reality, life is pretty livable without a dedicated male partner. Especially if a woman has God to lean on.
You are arguing from a reality that only existed because of violence, and is built upon expecting a fight.
Most of the women I know who have ever experienced violence or violation, it has been from "romantic partners." Women have real cause to fear male partners, on lots of levels, Gino, and that fear is more rational, statistically speaking, than the more dramatic fears of nighttime rapists and viscious muggers and (anything but a minor) housefire.
I'm surprised you were by implication trying to justify your marriage contract scenario using such gossip-rag hype.
Try again.
friggin blogger
not supposed to be a ;) after that kr ... pulled it from a different comment and I didn't notice in time : P
i'm not justifying divorce from a religious perspective, just a social one.
but lets back up:
"(This whole "sex can be just (physical) sex" thing is a total lie".
wrongo, baby.
i can be just physical. dont ask me how i know, but there's been some great smokin-hot wall-shakin sexy sweaty sex that meant nothing in the morning. not saying its prefered. just saying its possible.
"But the second you think it is ever in any way at all ok to coerce a woman into sex"
explain coercion.
if i mount my sleeping wife, is it rape? what if she 'responds' while still basically asleep?
if she says she's not in the mood, but does me a favor anyway,cause she loves me, is that coerced? is it wrong?
Gino, there is no proper differentiation between social and religious perspectives. Either God created us, in which case He has some legitimate things to tell us when we aren't doing what He knows we should, or God didn't, in which case why do you bother being Catholic.
No, Gino. Sex can be just physical seeming, and maybe for men it can even be just physical. But women are always trying to engage, instinctively, spiritually--and they will always therefore have spiritual consquences. (Really, the men do too, but y'all are a little more immune to that because you are not as open/desirous that way.) Someone I know was horrified to be handed a pamphlet from an Evangelical church that declared that every time you have sex you take on all of the spirits of that partner (and therefore all of their historical partners). I don't think that's accurate--but you do open yourself to them, especially at the moment of climax.
Coercion--yes, that is the part you don't seem to be getting.
Women suffer constant coercion--it's not like men go out and coerce, but societal pressures actually directly affect women, every time they are exposed to them, in a way that (as I understand it) they do not affect men. And if a woman is with a man she loves, she will want to please him, and will by nature say yes to more than she would desire. If she lives in fear of losing that man, she will instinctively say yes to a lot more.
The shit thing is, men are totally sideswiped, because a man saying a hesitant "yes" to something means "yes, but I had to think about it." [When men hesitate at all, which is of course fairly rare about everything except proposing marriage, as far as I've seen ;).] A woman saying a hesitant "yes" (physically or verbally) to something means "I'm saying yes but I would really like you to ask further why I'm hesitating" or "I'm saying yes but I wish I thought you would let me say no without risking you leaving me" ... or "I'm not sure please help me make the transition"--that's an especially fun one, because the man hears "yes," and she means it, and then the man takes off and she is hurt because he (unawarely) pushed past her ability to meet him ...
what I actually came to type:
PS I have never been frigid--in case my general hotheadedness didn't make that clear.
PPS "Because of your stubborness Moses let you divorce your wives," he replied, "but at the beginning it was not that way." Mt 19:8 There are lots of other interesting Jesus-words that you are clearly not choosing to believe. (Which brings me back to my old assertion, God came as a man because He needed to fix man-thinking that had gotten too entrenched, and none of the men would have listened to a woman! A woman says that stuff about divorce--well, look at your reaction to me, eh? Jesus was the only way men might listen to the messages that are so counterintuitive for them!)
Oh, and a woman desires, when she feels safe and has had a chance to grow into the physical aspects of sex, just as much sex as a man. If a woman is being asked to give more than she desires, the man needs to make her feel more safe and spend dedicated time helping her learn--in a way she is comfortable with--how to be fully present phsyically.
Again, Gino, I'm not trying to tell you, "you shouldn't have sex"--I'm trying to tell you it can be done a better way, and it will be better for BOTH parties.
God doesn't work for only one side, even though He is nowadays advertised to do so. "Male and female, He created them." "In Our (God's triune) Image," it says.
A proper understanding of and living of our humanity has no room for power plays--they are not in the Trinity, they have no place in helathy humanity. That is a huge part of the revolution Jesus offers, in all aspects of life. (Well, except the "power play" that is rejecting evil spirits ... but they were only lying about having power in the first place.)
Giving. It is all giving in love. If you think of taking--and especially if you think of "how can I take" or "needing" to take--well, that just can't work out well.
I would think the divorce rate that resulted once "traditional" marriage was questioned would tell you that. Remember that the divorce rate shot up steadily from the 1950s (when families were still "traditional") all through the 1960s--it's not because of the free sex movement or the dissolution of society. It's because marriage as previously structured is untenable for longer lifespans and a society that makes physical life safe enough that women generally don't have to buy personal protection. So women divorce to get away from being used for sex, and men divorce to get away from being used for financial support without enough sex, and everyone is very very unhappy, and moves on to second and more relationships and is suprised when those don't last either.
We all need to turn around and question the assumptions.
It's like so many questions (schooling, medical "care," etc.)--you have to get below the power-struggle model to see what might be healthier.
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