A Pair of Deuces

It is always interesting and enlightening when your opponent tips his hand or reveals his next play. Even if it shows something you had already guessed, there is a satisfaction that comes from knowing that your guess is right.

For instance, when Planned Parenthood is caught repeatedly lying to and deceiving women, they have tipped their hand. It becomes clear that what we guessed—that they do not care about the wellbeing of women and are only in it for the money—is true. Similarly, yesterday's decision in Perry v. Schwarzenegger, and the arguments surrounding it, tip the hand and show their motivations.

In this case, what tips the hand is not just what is said, but also what is not said: I still have not heard from any gay "marriage" advocate why a government ought to grant special recognition to gay relationships. Instead, the argument seems to be, "well, heterosexuals get marriage licenses, so we should to." This is an argument with the maturity of a two year old.

Lest we forget, remember that gays are not banned from getting married. Any two men could go to Vegas and profess their undying love for eternity—or at least the next seven to 15 years—in front of their friends, family, or loved ones. This isn't merely about marriage as a social institution. This is about marriage as a government-sanctioned relationship. And that's the case that I've never heard made.

To me, gay "marriage" seems kind of like a male tampon. What's the point? If the point of marriage is to encourage through law the just and proper use of the sexual facilities so that children grow up with their parents and women are not abandoned by deadbeat dads, why do those whose sexual acts cannot result in children need these same legal encouragements? But I suppose our society has drifted away from that notion of marriage. Marriage is just something you do to make you feel good. And feeling good is so important that now, apparently, we have a fundamental unenumerated right to a marriage license.

The usual arguments for why government ought to recognize gay "marriage" tend to invoke things such as hospital visitation rights or power of attorney. These arguments fall flat once you realize that all 50 states already grant hospital visitation rights with a simple legal document. And power of attorney can be granted to anyone, not just a spouse, again with a legal document. In fact, the state of California already grants gay couples all the same benefits as married heterosexual couples. They already have everything except the title.

Which is what tips the hand. Gay "marriage" isn't about equality, it's about approval.




Despite common social prejudices, homosexuals are in every way legally equal to heterosexuals, and enjoy all the same rights and benefits. They can't be fired for being gay, they are not taxed more, they don't have separate drinking fountains, or have to give up their seats when a straight person gets on the bus. They even have all the same rights and restrictions regarding marriage as does a heterosexual: a straight man cannot marry another man either. Despite claims that they're "second-class citizens", they clearly are not, at least from a legal perspective, and to call them such is an insult to those who really were second-class. Some may say, "but what about the military!" Even they don't ban homosexuals. Only homosexual acts, which is a different thing entirely, unless you maintain that a person and his actions are equivalent.

No, the real second-class citizens are those in the womb. They are the ones to whom basic human rights are denied. I wonder how the gay-rights lobby would react if it could be demonstrated that an unborn baby was gay. Would he suddenly start having rights? Perhaps we should jump on the phony "gay gene" bandwagon.

But the gay "marriage" advocates aren't interested in mere equality of persons; they want gay relationships to be considered equivalent, and that's the approval they got in this decision. "Rather than being different, same-sex and opposite-sex unions are, for all purposes relevant to California law, exactly the same," says Judge Walker, an H.W. Bush appointee, reassuring us that Souter was not the only judicial activist Bush appointed.

Of course, from my side of the sexual revolution, and as a father, I wonder if Judge Walker has ever held a baby, or understands the difference between sexual unions that might produce offspring and those that can't. But then again, things that are obvious from my perspective on this side of the revolution, seem to baffle those on the other side. I mean, don't we already have ways of preventing sexually transmitted disease and unwanted pregnancy? It's called "consider the consequences of your actions." What's the fuss about?


And in the end, that's what this all boils down to: furthering the agenda of the sexual revolution. The sexual revolution was one aspect brought about by a changing social philosophy; that of self-gratification as the highest good. Of course, self-gratification comes with a price. There are consequences to deal with.

Take food for example. "Hungry? Why wait?" The Snicker's slogan perfectly summarizes this philosophy. I want what I want now. But wait! There are consequences to our actions! If we eat whatever we want whenever we want, we'll get fat. It should come as absolutely no surprise that the nation's biggest health risk is obesity and the most frequently performed medical procedure is abortion. Those are related. Of course, we want to forestall those consequences, but we don't want to work at it. The gym is hard work, as is chastity. We prefer our consequence alleviations in pill form. Introducing birth control pills and diet pills. Those, too, are related.

The easiest way to deal with consequences is pretend they aren't consequences. They just happen to unlucky people. Pregnancy becomes and accident. Poor young girls who didn't do anything wrong are, in our president's words, punished with a baby. But if babies aren't a consequence of sex, then there really is no difference between heterosex and homosex. But then if there's no difference, the only possible reason for opposing it is bigotry. So it's easy to understand why that term is bandied about so often in the debate. (I propose a corollary to Godwin's Law: as the length of conversation with a liberal increases, the probability of being called a racist, sexist, homophobe, or bigot approaches 1.)

But simply denying the consequences for yourself is not enough. We require approval for our actions. What a sinner likes the least is to be called out for his sin. It is little wonder that the heterosexual revolutionaries are on the homosexual bandwagon. Legal approval for gay "marriage" gives further approval for fornication.

For this reason, I often feel sorry for the homosexuals who have been caught in the fight for chastity, used as both a human shield and a weapon by the revolutionaries. The real fight is not about whether homosexuals should be granted the rights of heterosexuals. It's over the fundamental nature of sex, and the proper attitude towards it.


A society that embraces gay "marriage" is one that is doomed to suffer unwanted pregnancy, sexually transmitted disease, divorce, broken families, and abortion. Of course, homosexuality can only propagate one of these things, so one may ask how the others are related. Gay "marriage" is not the cause but rather the symptom. While the pro-matrimony camp likes to make the argument that homosexual unions will weaken marriage, I suspect that the damage has already been done. The fact that we are at the point where we are having fierce debates over the legalization of gay "marriage" indicates that already the notions of chastity have fallen by the wayside. Governmentally-sanctioned homosexual unions can't make things that much worse, but they certainly can keep them from getting better.

I simply cannot imagine a society that encourages homosexuals to fornicate freely, and even grants approvals and blessings to them for doing so, and at the same time demands that heterosexuals take complete responsibility for their actions and treat sex as the awesome and terrifying power that it is. No, sex is either completely free for all, or is completely sacred to all. And if its as cheap as a Snicker's, people, particularly women, will get fat.

This is, of course, related to the abstinence education debate. Abstinence education is only as effective as society permits it. If children have 30 minutes in school being taught that refraining from sex is the only sure way to avoid pregnancy and STIs, and the rest of their waking lives is spent in a culture that drenches them with sex, sexual imagery, and the idea—furthered by permitting gay "marriage"—that sex need not have consequences, what message are they going to learn? Of course they will have sex. But then we have those nasty consequences to deal with! Unwanted pregnancy and STIs abound! The "solution", then, is to hand out condoms like they're candy. But of course, this only furthers the idea that sex is free. More sex and, when the condoms inevitably fail, more pregnancy and disease.

From my side of the revolution the solution is clear: chastity. But then I am called a bigot who promotes inequality for daring to suggest such a thing.


So the choice is between chastity and fornication, homosexual unions and matrimony, happiness or sorrow. Gay "marriage" represent such a tiny part of it. The damage, if any, done by one gay couple fornicating is negligible. The damage done to the society that encourages it is immense.

Idiot of the Day/Week/Month.

"The Taliban can perhaps be admired for their conviction to their faith and their sense of loyalty to each other," says Rt. Rev. Stephen Venner, the new Anglican bishop to the British Armed Forces.

More (via WDTPRS)

Other quotes:

The Taliban have been responsible for public beatings, amputations and executions, and have launched bomb attacks on Afghans. They often refer to foreign forces as “Crusaders”. The bishop said some of their methods of combat were not honourable or acceptable, but he argued that it was unhelpful to demonise them. (What do they have to do before we can speak negatively about them?)

“We have to involve all the people of Afghanistan to find justice and prosperity for all,” he said.

I like Fr. Z's comment: "And the Taliban are… what… going to change their minds and decide to cooperate with the Westerners? If we talk nicer about them are they going toooooo… stop beating their women?"

Also QFT in the article is Col. Richard Kemp:

“Elements in the Taliban do not act from a religious perspective and it is important to turn them around.

“But there are many others who will not be persuaded. Their central creed and ethos is about violent oppression.

“In many ways it is a mistake to compare their faith of extreme holy war with the kind of religion of peace and understanding that the bishop follows. They wouldn’t show understanding of his faith.”

I like that guy already.

What is it about the mindset of leftists that makes them unable to understand that there are, you know, bad people out there who cannot be reasoned with? Oh, right, they do understand. They just think the bad people who can't be reasoned with are those on the right, Christians, and those who disbelieve fabricated numbers about global temperature trends.

For a thought experiment: suppose someone were to make a rather innocuous statement about their own, personal belief that marriage involves a man and a woman. For argument, this person can also be somewhat airheaded and wear a bikini. How does the left treat such a person? Demonize him, of course! He is evil! He is hate-filled, homophobic, and prejudiced! In short, accuse him of behaving towards gays exactly how they behave towards him.

Now, suppose that that person not only thinks that marriage involves a man and a woman, but that those who think otherwise are the devil, homosexuals themselves ought to be beheaded, and woman can be publicly beaten on a whim and treated like trash. Suddenly, the mindset shifts from demonizing that person, to thinking "golly, gosh, gee. Demonizing him gets us no where. We need to work with him to secure a better, brighter future."

I think it is [insert that SF author's name here; you know who I'm talking about] who talks about PC being a disease of the mind that prevents those afflicted with it from seeing the evil except where it's not. His key quote (from this very interesting post):

No matter how many people are killed, and no matter how loudly and clearly the Jihadists announce their intentions, our public figures will continue to insist that George Bush is the only threat and the only enemy. From time to time they will also admit that the world is in grave danger from large Oil Companies or from unbridled consumerism or from fundamentalist Christianity.

What was of interest was that in the comments to that very post, many people confirmed exactly that statement: that, despite that a murderer had massacred dozens while shouting "Allah Ackbar," the only threat they were able to see was that a Christian Theocracy might try to use that petty distraction to take over the country.

Another example was from a semi-recent Family Guy episode, in which Stewie invents a device that allows him to travel to parallel universes. After he and Brian use it an end up in a place that looks like something out of the Jetsons—flying cars, futuristic technology, etc.—Stewie explains that this is a universe where Christianity never existed, and therefore science was free to develop unhindered.

Of course, this is absurd. As Michael Flynn has demonstrated, it was Christianity that gave rise to the scientific revolution. And since it was Christendom that turned back the Muslim invaders, not once, but three times—at Vienna, Tours, and Leponto—and saved Western Civilization, in a universe where Christianity never existed, we would all be living much like the Taliban, in caves milking goats.

Seth MacFarlane suffers greatly from the disease of leftism, and it is ironic that, should the Taliban and their ilk be successful, he will be one of the first with his head on the chopping block, what with his shows featuring so much crude sexual humor.

And of course, the disease of PC is as old as the disease of leftism. When the United States was in a decades-long standoff with perhaps the most evil nation the world has ever seen, save perhaps Carthage or the Aztecs, and our enemy had so many spies within our government that even a drunk from Wisconsin, listing random names from the top of his head, could guess a few, the only threat the leftists of the time were able to see was that of the drunk. I once read an interesting article pointing out how stupid it is that McCarthyism has become synonymous with witch hunts—looking for evil where none exists—when the term for that should be "liberalism". (Are you now, or have you ever been a Global Warming Denier? An evangelical Christian? A "homophobe"?)

I have read many articles and posts that try to explain why this mindset exists, and I must say I still do not understand it. This is a very rare thing for me to say. As C.S. Lewis says, "I believe in Christianity for the same reason I believe in the sun. Because not only can I see it, but by it I can see everything else." The wondrous thing about Christianity is it so thoroughly explains human behavior, with the concepts of a fallen human nature, original sin, and yet a burning desire for God and the divine. In it, one can see the cause of great atrocities and evils that men commit against their fellow men, such as the holocaust, but also one can see the reasons for such great sacrifices and acts of love, sometimes in the middle of these tragedies, such as the sacrifice of St. Maximilian Kolbe.

I get why people do evil things—original sin makes us selfish—and I even get why people go to such great lengths to cover up their evil—the conscience forces them to face their guilt or deny it. So I get why the left attacks Christians; if one is in love with sin, one does not want to be confronted with the fact of his sin, so one becomes violently opposed to those who point out the sin. "The Revenge of Conscience" spells out that case with more clarity than I could muster in my lifetime. But I absolutely do not get why leftists are willing to defend those who point out the sin not with words, but with the sword. This would be akin to if King Mwanga of Uganda—reproached by the Christian missionaries for raping boys—sent St. Charles Lwanga and his companions to their deaths then, upon having war declared upon him by his worst enemy for the same crimes, he said "aw, we just need to hug it out."

Perhaps G.K. Chesterton comes close to solving the problem. In his introduction to The Everlasting Man he states the purpose of his book was to point out that many of the criticisms shown towards Christianity in his day were simply because the critics were too close, and that if they just stepped back and looked at it from the same distance from which they saw the Oriental religions/philosophies, they would be able to better understand it. I get this up to a point. Perhaps the leftists hate Christianity because it is at home. It is like their neighbor criticizing them for doing evil as opposed to an unknown man on the other side of town. But this still does not work for me, because when that unknown man from the other side of town comes to your door and beats your wife and daughter because you're evil, he is no longer distant and remote. So when a Muslim commits a massacre in Fort Hood, Texas, The United States of America, I fail to see how the criticism is remote and distant.

I think Mark Shea is probably closest to the (hehe) mark. In an article he wrote a while ago (which I don't have a link to. Sorry. Take my word for it), he mentions that he and Philip Pullman agree on something: that those who oppose the Church will unite with whoever they can find, no matter how much they disagree, in order to oppose Her. Apparently, in one of the books in the His Dork Materials trilogy, a character—a leader of the witches, I think (it's been a while since I read the article)—gives some speech about how in their upcoming fight against the eeeeeeevil Magisterium, they would find themselves allied with those with whom they otherwise have nothing in common, and with whom they would normally be enemies.

Mark Shea agreed with this point, and drew the parallel to alliances made against the Real Magisterium. I suppose this makes sense from the diabolical chess point of view—the devil plays his pawns as one team—but not from the human reason point of view. The pawn can't see the whole chess board, so why should he trust the black pawn next to him, who in other circumstances would slit his throat? I mean, it's not like the pawns actually believe there's an all-seeing and all-evil mind behind their moves.... Right?

I suppose I may have stumbled across a partial answer while reading an article by Theodore Dalrymple (quoted here by John C. Wr—that SF author) and also in an interview with Andrew Klavan (again, quoted here). The two key quotes were thus:

British intellectuals, as George Orwell once remarked, have long harboured a hatred of their own country and its culture. This attitude has deeply infiltrated the political class and has therefore come to affect legislation. All cultures are equal except ours, which is the worst. (Dalrymple)

And:

So desperate are they to display their tolerance, to claim virtue and open-mindedness for themselves, so secretly ashamed and guilt-ridden and self-hating are they, I guess, that they will give aid and comfort to a philosophy that turns everything they’re supposed to stand for on its head. (Klavan)

This made me wonder. Is the leftist hatred for Christianity and tolerance towards those less tolerant than Christianity born from some sense of guilt and self-loathing? Perhaps.

Perhaps the left does indeed recognize the truth of G.K. Chesterton when he wrote in Heretics:

Everything else in the modern world is of Christian origin, even everything that seems most anti-Christian. The French Revolution is of Christian origin. The newspaper is of Christian origin. The anarchists are of Christian origin. Physical science is of Christian origin. The attack on Christianity is of Christian origin. There is one thing, and one thing only, in existence at the present day which can in any sense accurately be said to be of pagan origin, and that is Christianity.

If that is the case, that the left does, in some subconscious way, recognize that all their institutions and customs and laws, everything they hold dear—the university; the scientific revolution; the ideas of the rights of man; the desire for social justice, equality, tolerance; the importance of reason and intellect—if they recognize that all these things are Christian, but hate Christendom for whatever reason, be it the faults—real or imagined—of ages past, or the simple condemnation of the wrongs they commit, then they would have no choice but to hate themselves.

Christians, of course, do not have to hate ourselves for the wrongs we have committed. We have Christ's redemption to wash clean the sins of the past. We can admit that the crusaders shouldn't have killed the jews, that Galileo shouldn't have been rebuked by the inquisition, and that indulgences shouldn't have been sold without hating the crusades, the inquisition, and the acquisition of indulgences. But when you reject Christ, you reject all means of partaking of his redemption. You find yourself part of a culture that has committed wrongs, but with no way to have those wrongs forgiven. The only recourse is to hate the institution.

The left, however, feels no guilt over the sins of the Muslims. To them, I reason, it does not matter whether Christians or Muslims have committed the worse crimes. They are part of Christendom, but not of Islam, an therefore have guilt about the one, but not the other.

This is the only way I can make sense of the issue. I do not, otherwise, understand why one would hate the one who says you are a sinner, but love the one who wants to behead you for your sin.

Several fellow students (all of them women) in my writing class have left perfectly polite comments on my last two homework assignments. I have decided that I am going to go get the town crier all over them.

The comments:

At the beginning of chapter 3, Jack gives Regina the order to depart Arcas spaceport with the command "Miss Burke, take us up." Three women in the class seemed to take exception to this. One circled "Miss" and wrote "Pilot"; one wrote "Ms."; and a third circled "Miss" and left the note "Wouldn't she have a title with more dignity?"

In the next week's homework assignment, Regina referred to herself as "the new gal" aboard the ship. One of the women circled it and wrote "Women don't like this word" and gave several alternatives, such as "girl", "pilot", "crew member", "mate".

Really? Women don't like that word? You are speaking for all women? Then why do I hear my grandmother use it so often? Are you contending that she is not a woman?

Concerning the implication that "miss" is a title without dignity, this one single sentence demonstrates and proves with one single breath the heinous thing, and my biggest gripe, with political correctness: political correctness seeks not to avoid offending, but rather to find offense where none is intended or, even more likely, even present.

Does anyone argue that when Jack refers to Regina as "miss", he is doing it specifically to degrade her, or demean her? (He is quite capable of  doing this in other ways.) Would you argue that if I held a door for a young lady and said "let me get that for you, miss," that I am purposely and actively, with malice aforethought, trying to show my superiority over her, lower her dignity, take away her right to vote, and chain her to the kitchen?

Please. Be surd. (absurd : surd :: incest : cest)

The "best" argument I have heard against the titles of miss and mrs. is that these titles "chain a woman's identity to her marital status, and thus make her a slave of her husband" which is logic on par with "if a woman weighs the same as a duck, she's made of wood and thus a witch." This betrays what John Wright so expertly points out about those who follow the Religion of PC: "They think (or rather, they feel) that when they are calling one thing by another name, that the actual nature of reality changes. They put themselves in a position where they can no longer talk about real things. Words are severed from referents."

He is, of course and as always, right. Those who worship at the altar of PC, and also those in the left wing (usually the same crowd) believe in the magic of language relativity: that is, by changing the way we refer to something we can change the nature of the thing itself. This seems to me to be closely associated with moral relativism: the belief that we can change morality by wishing it away. What is wrong for you or for another is not wrong for me because I don't want it to be. We see this in other aspects of life, too: if we call a "baby" a "fetus", it is no longer human, and can be killed; if we refer to people as having "gender" instead of "sex", then by changing their gender, they can change the fundamental nature of themselves. News flash: if I name my cat "rover", refer to her as "the dog", and feed her dog biscuits, she still won't bark. Sex is a biological and supernatural reality. Changing how we refer to it won't change its nature.

The reality of miss and mrs. seems to me to be far more innocuous. In a society where men purse and women allure, one would expect simple and obvious social cues that would indicate to the pursuer if the allurer is available to be pursued. Titles are one aspect of this, as are rings (hence, a woman wearing an engagement ring; I think of a man's wedding ring more as a reminder to himself than as a signal to other women). Were we to live in a society that operated in the opposite fashion, where women sought out a mate, bought him dinner, escorted him to the opera, and took him home and kissed him goodnight on his porch, I would expect the titles to be reversed.

But the PCists, of course, are chained to their idea of language driving nature; thus if we call an unmarried woman "miss" and a married woman "mrs.", we are saying that her nature changes when she gets married. Since they feel this is offensive (and I have never heard a good explanation for how it is offensive, probably in no small part because they feel rather than think it is offensive) they think (or rather, feel) that by changing a woman's title to the generic "ms.", we have somehow altered her nature and the nature of marriage.

As mentioned before, one of the primary aspects of political correctness is how it assumes offense where none exists. To refer to a married woman by a different title as an unmarried woman seems reasonable to the normal, rational person. In fact, these are the terms that were used for decades, if not centuries, and no offense was meant or taken. But then one day (and that is probably quite literal) some follower of the dogma of PC decided that words that had no offense attached to them before suddenly were offensive and that they had to be changed. Granted, language changes, but suddenly deciding that words have new meaning never before intended is not the sort of gradual change as "chuse" changing to "choose". Other examples of this include suddenly deciding that using the pronoun "he" to refer to groups of mixed sex is offensive, where it never was before, and that the term "secretary" to refer to those with a secretarial job, is offensive. (I once asked a PCist why it was that "secretary" was demeaning to women. She explained that it was because it harkened to a time when women were only allowed three careers: secretary, teacher, and nurse. She did not explain why "teacher" and "nurse" were still allowable. (This is one reason I'm Catholic and not PC; the rules are far more intuitive and easier to understand.))

Another aspect of Political Correctness is that it only seeks to find offense directed a certain groups that are mascots of the left. Surely, the PCists object to "offenses" against blacks, American Indians, women, homosexuals, and other "protected" groups. I have never heard one so much as flinch at offenses directed at Irishmen, men, Catholics, or evangelical Christians. Somehow, Muslims have weasled themselves onto the "protected" list, which means those outside the Church of PC get to watch, with wonderful bemusement, how those in the PC Church "protect" from offense those who are probably the least PC, and indeed viciously hate some of the other protected groups. (For instance, my writing instructor mentioned, perhaps in a doubt of the faith, that she was having a hard time accepting the PC dogma that fundamentalist Islamic societies had a "right" to horribly abuse their women. I remain blissfully outside of PCism, so I can answer as any sane man should: no such right exists and we can kill the bastards for doing such.)

If you want evidence of how imbalanced the double-standard for offensive speech is, look no further than the NCAA. Remember a few years ago when, out of sensitivity to "Native Americans" they tried to outlaw all schools with American Indian mascots? (They apparantly had a very selective use of "Native American"; I am a native to America too, but they didn't outlaw any team called "the Josephs". However, since no team with that name exists, perhaps they thought it a non-issue. I will give them the benifit of the doubt, and assume that they would have.) This, of course, was a monumental search for offense, such that they must have been using NASA's Spitzer space telescope to find it, as they clearly ignored the fact that many colleges with American Indian mascots do so with the approval and blessing of the tribe! One thing I found particularly interesting was that the University of Illinois Fighting Illini were to be banned, because "Fighting Illini" is offensive. However, there never was any mention of banning the University of Notre Dame Fighting Irish. How, exactly, is "Fighting Illini" racially insensitive and "Fighting Irish" is not? Are you going to argue that the Irish have not been oppressed? Are you going to argue that it is politically correct to portray Irishmen as drunken, brawling, leprechauns, but incorrect to portray American Indians as tomahawk-wielding warriors with feathered headdresses? Now we must play a game of measuring relativism, and explain why one offense is more offensive than the other.

So it is because of political correctness that society jumps at imagined shadows of offense, but only those shadows cast from a certain angle and from certain objects, that you have to turn your head sideways and squint to see, but then it just looks like a bunny. It is because of political correctness that I can't say "miss", but no politically correct person would bat an eyelash over the term "hocus pocus", with all its associated anti-Catholic bigotry. (For those not in the know, "hocus pocus", originally, was a mockery of the Latin words of consecration: "Hoc est enim corpus meum" or "This is my body", the climax of the Mass, and that sacred moment when a host of unleavened bread is turned into the Body, Blood, Soul, and Divinity of Christ. I, personally, do not take offense to "hocus pocus", because I know that no one today uses it to offend Catholics, and probably no one who is not Catholic even knows where the term comes from. I would not stoop to correct someone who uses such a term in ignorance.)  It is because of political correctness that I can't refer to a secretary as a secretary, but the followers of PC can—and do—take Our Lord's name in vain, without so much as a worry or care to whether or not they offend me (and I do take great offense to that). I am not in a protected group; I am not worthy of avoiding offense towards. (In fact, someone once argued on this very blog that it is allowable to insult and offend white Christians because they have it coming.) But if those followers of PC don't care if they offend me, on what grounds do they argue that I should not offend them?

Since I can't think of a witty or snappy end to this article, I will let the inestimable John Wright do it for me, even though I think I am over my allocated "John Wright quote or link" quota by quite a lot this month:

Quoted for Truth:

The rudest society imaginable is one where everyone is hyper-sensitive, thin-skinned, and willing to see insults where none are intended, and, most of all, a society were everyone demands, as a matter of right, as a matter of entitlement, that no one cross or offend his ultra-fine nerves, which have been sandpapered to the most exquisite pitch of sensitivity. The professional crybabies have been given a trump card that wins every hand and always collects the kitty. So, we get more crybabies. Dignity, adieu: rudeness, hail! Hail, horrors!

Today marks the 36th anniversary of the day the Supreme Court of the United States of America decreed that my child has no inherent rights.

It is interesting how becoming a father has influenced my view on abortion. Prior to last November, it was such an abstract thing. We were always talking about other people's children, some other child, outside my monkeysphere. I knew through reason that we were talking about some one that I should protect, but it's hard to muster feelings for an abstract concept. Even my own nieces and nephew, I did not begin to feel a bond with until after they had been born, after I had held them in my arms. My choler over the issue was driven more by the ignorance and lack of reason on the part of those who sought to promote it, rather than over the loss of any life.

But now, I have a hard time maintaining a stoic, rational distance from the issue. Now, it's personal.

On November 1st, my purpose in life—the very point of my existence—changed. A change of such magnitude had only occurred once prior, on January 10th, 2004. Before January 10th, the meaning of my life was simply "to know, love, and serve God in this life so I can share ever-lasting happiness with him in the next." On the tenth of January, 2004, a new reason was added: to Love my wife, as Christ Loves his church. And finally, on November 1st, a third reason was added: to protect and nurture our children so that they, too, may one day share in God's love.

When I die, and am judged before God in all his majesty and glory, he will ask me two questions, in particular. He will ask me: "Did you love your wife as I have loved you?" and "Have you raised your children to know me, and strived with all your might to keep them from all harm?" If I cannot answer both those questions with a powerful, resounding, unreserved, unhesitating "yes" then I will be in serious, serious trouble.

And that is why my fury is beyond anything that this world could cause when there are those who would deny my solemn responsibility to protect my child.

Perhaps the most common justification for abortion is that it is not really killing an inoccent human life. It is merely a "removal of the mother's tissue". Abortion is sometimes referred to as "the extraction of menses", or as I heard one pseudo-feminist refer to it, "just like getting your tonsils removed, only safer," an assertion so ludicrous (read from point 22 at the bottom of page 24 (30 by the pdf's numbering) to point 100) that it would be funny, if it did not involve the wounding of millions of women and the deaths of millions of children.

These people do not really anger me so much. Instead, I look at them with confusion and pity. Their claim that my child is not really a child, but instead just a part of my wife, is so out-of-touch with reality that I can only shake my head in wonder at the monumental ignorance and denunciaton of what is manifestly true. I have seen pictures of my baby. I have seen him bouncing and dancing in the womb, as alive as you or I. I have seen and heard her tiny heart, beating furiously, pumping her own blood through her own veins. For someone to come up to me and assert "that is not a child" or "that is not really alive" or "that is a lump of undeveloped tissue" is beyond reason and reality. It is as if some one came up to me and said, "your car is such a very fiery shade of red." I can only wonder if this person really occupies the same reality as I. Do I really need to argue such a thing? Is the truth not self-evident for anyone with eyes to see?

No, these people do not anger me; they merely arouse my pity.

The second group of people are those who recognize the humanity of the unborn, but are too cowardly, or too uncaring to do anything about it. These are the John Kerrys of the world; the "I personally believe abortion is wrong, but I'll be damned if I'm going to do anything about it." (And it is likely they will be.)

These people I look upon with disgust. While they claim to be on my side, functionally they are opposing me. Not only do they refuse to offer help, but they actively prevent my ability to safeguard my wife and child. They refuse to give me recourse to the law to be able to bring to justice those who would prey on the most innocent. These are the ones that, If they really do believe that abortion is wrong, then they are willingly and blithely condoning the largest holocaust the world has ever seen. It is cowardess of the highest and most ignominious kind. It is shameful and disgraceful. It is as if, when the Soviets come door to door looking for Gypsies, Catholics, Poles, Ukranians, or other Undesireables, I simply stood by and watched as they dragged my neighbor away. "I feel for you man," I might say to the poor, condemned neighbor, in an attempt to make him feel better, "but who am I to tell Comrade Stalin what he should do with his own body?"

Then there is the third group.

These are those who do not merely deny my resposibility to protect my wife and child; they do not merely fail to help me guard them from the butchers who would take the innocent life and, in the process, grievously wound my wife. No, the third group are those who openly champion the cause of the butcher. They are the ones who stand up and applaude those evil men who would slice my child into pieces and suck him out of my wife's body; or poison him with salt; or pull her feet-first out of my wife and then, when she is mere inches from birth, slice open the back of her sweet, precious little head and suction out her brains; or use any one of the cruel and barbaric practices that have been designed to destroy those who are most innocent and most needing of our protection. They are the Gloria Steinems and the President Barack Obamas.

If I lived in a less civilized time, or if I did not have the benefit of a faith informed by reason, these people would drive me to take up arms, and give me cause for violent revolution to defend the rights of those I love.

And they ought to thank God that I am Christian, for in my righteous fury, one of the only things holding me back is the hand of Christ on my shoulder, and his voice in my ear, whispering "love your enemies, do good to those who hate you, and forgive them for they know not what they do."

One of the things I love about our faith is how rational it is; that is, how much it just makes sense. It is very rare that, so long as I am looking at the world from a Christian perspective, that it confuses me or doesn't make sense, particularly where human behavior is concerned. With the concepts of Original Sin, or man's fallen nature, or our innate desire for God, or the natural law, or guilt, or conscience, Holy Mother Church has very well instructed those who, like me, are not wise enough to figure out why people act as they do.

For instance, a man commits an evil. "Why did he do it?" people ask. "Because of his fallen nature, he inordinately desires created things, or things of this world, and is inclined to love himself over others," I know. Or, a group of people who commit evil may seek to legitimize it, or gain public acceptance for their evil acts. I understand this to be an act designed to assuage a guilty conscience. Or if a person acts with heroic selflessness, risking his life to save a child from a burning building, I can understand this as the person acting on his innate desire to do what is good, and he knows what is good through the natural law. It may be that all three of these happen within the same context; for instance a association aimed at the repeal of anti-arson laws sets fire to a building, causing a passerby to rush in to save the occupants. In fact, historically, these have all happened in the same context: Hitler was an evil man who sought to massacre the undesirables because he was fallen and prone to sin; the Germans who worked to accomplish his ends made excuses for why it was right, because they needed to appease their consciences and bury their guilt; and even in the midst of great evil, some rose above it all to show incredible love and compassion, because of a heroic desire for God and what is good.

(NB: the question of how people come to act as they do is, as are all questions of how, a matter of the sciences, particularly psychology and sociology, and are worth studying. For instance, what biological and environmental influences cause one man to commit evil and another to do good.)

It is because of this instruction that I am sometimes briefly astonished that, to this day, some people defend the sexual revolution as a good thing, until I remember that not everyone has the benefit of being brought up with such wisdom. To someone like me, who has a bit of intelligence but not a shred of wisdom, the revolution may look like a good thing. I mean, what could be wrong with throwing away outdated and pointless sexual mores? But when you look at the issue with the understanding provided by the Church, the problems become immediately obvious.

Chastity is part of the natural moral law, which is inscribed into our hearts and discernible through right reason. It governs our actions and helps us to act lovingly towards and promote the dignity of others and ourselves. By following the natural moral law, we can work to bring happiness. To act contrary to the natural law brings unhappiness and sorrow.

"The natural law, present in the heart of each man and established by reason, is universal in its precepts and its authority extends to all men. It expresses the dignity of the person and determines the basis for his fundamental rights and duties:

"For there is a true law: right reason. It is in conformity with nature, is diffused among all men, and is immutable and eternal; its orders summon to duty; its prohibitions turn away from offense . . . . To replace it with a contrary law is a sacrilege; failure to apply even one of its provisions is forbidden; no one can abrogate it entirely." (CCC 1956)

From this perspective it is easy to see what will happen when you casually toss aside these morals, "when you empty the relationship between the sexes of all moral significance and destroy the customs and institutions that govern it": women become a commodity, children become a possession, family becomes unnecessary, and murder becomes justifiable.

All the previous is just a very long-winded and roundabout way of introducing this article, which highlights one particular negative outcome of the sexual revolution: an increase in violence towards and abuse of women. 

And it makes sense.