Register. Vote. Take A Stand!

"In the United States, voter registration is the responsibility of the people, and only 70 percent of Americans who are eligible to vote have registered." (RegistertoVote.org)

Let's do the math: There are more than 300 million citizens of the United States. 30% of 300,000,000 is 90 million people.  Even if only half of those people are over 18 years old and eligible to vote, there would be 45 million eligible voters who have not yet registered to vote.

Among the 70% of eligible citizens who have registered to vote, the number who actually do vote is shockingly low. The per centage of actual voters by age cohort ranges from less than 30% for registered 18-29 year olds, to a high of just over 60% for 60-69 year olds.  There is not a single age cohort from age 18-49 years old which has a voting record of more than 40%.

Why is it that in a nation that fought a historic battle for independence - not to mention the right to representative self-government - so few of the people today actually exercise that right by voting?  In a world where self-government and constitutionally-guaranteed individual freedoms are a rare and precious commodity, it beggars belief that people who have it do not appear to cherish it and fail to guard it vigilantly. The assumption seems to be that gains once made can never be lost. But history teaches another, grimmer, lesson.

"...that government of the people, by the people, for the people shall not perish from the earth." Abraham Lincoln, Gettysburg Address.

There is a lot of talk right now about a tiny cabal of extremely wealthy and influential people pouring billions into the upcoming election in order to ensure an outcome which will suit their own interests and not those of the people of the United States. In a democratic Republic, the idea that wealthy or religious elites could rise to such power and influence that they could establish a de facto feudal economic system and authoritarian theocracy - almost exactly the conditions over which this country fought the War of Independence - could only be possible if a majority of the people allow it to happen, through ignorance, through apathy, through intimidation. 

But the American people are made of sterner stuff than that. 

Don't just stand there...do it!

If every eligible voter in the country performed hir civic duty at every election, and if every eligible voter made it hir business to stay informed about the issues that face the nation, then it becomes far more difficult for any one group, no matter how well-organized and determined, to seize control of the government.

Make sure you are registered to vote. Don't assume that you are registered. During the primaries, thousands of people were shocked to discover that their names had been stricken from the voter lists without their knowledge. Florida has purged nearly 200,000 names from its voter list, including seniors and veterans. Pennsylvania is preparing to deny voting rights to nearly 10% of its eligible citizens. 

Voter suppression threatens our Republic, but there are still enough voters to put a stop to it, if only every citizen who can vote, does so. There are as many eligible voters who do not vote as there are who do -more, in fact. Voter turnout could potentially be double what it has historically been. The current voter suppression tactics - ambitious though they undeniably are - would not disenfranchise enough people to overcome the will of the people if only the majority would take a stand, register now and vote in November.

Your vote counts. It really is that important. 

Remind your friends and family to be sure to register and be sure to vote.  

Resources for Eligible Voters:

Can I vote?  Need help with voting? You've come to the right place. This nonpartisan web site was created by state election officials to help eligible voters figure out how and where to go vote. Choose a category below to get started.

Rock the Vote   Rock the Vote is a nonpartisan nonprofit organization in the United States whose mission is to engage and build the political power of young people.

Our Time.org   Declare Yourself is a national nonpartisan, nonprofit campaign to empower and encourage every eligible 18-29 year-old in America to register and vote in local and national elections.

League of Women Voters  The League is proud to be nonpartisan, neither supporting nor opposing candidates or political parties at any level of government, but always working on vital issues of concern to members and the public.

Register To Vote. org  In the United States, voter registration is the responsibility of the people, and only 70 percent of Americans who are eligible to vote have registered. RegistertoVote.org is a nonpartisan organization committed to reaching the remaining 30 percent. We simplify the voter registration process, making it faster and easier for you to get involved and become an active voice in our democracy.

Look Out, First World! It's Catching!

Even the Canadian PEARL (Polar Environment Atmospheric Research Laboratory) is threatened.

Just a reminder that religious fundamentalism is growing and thriving everywhere in the world:

Canada:

This week in Ottawa, Ontario, an international conference on evolutionary biology is being held. Scientists from North America and Europe will meet to discuss progress in biological research, further advances in evolutionary theory and many other topics of interest to practitioners of evidence-based science and the people who recognise its importance to humanity.

Ironically, however, the host country has been weathering an embarrassing number of popup storms in the officially clear skies of Canadian rationality and progress. Religious fundamentalists have "planted churches" in every province and territory, just as they have in the USA, and (just as they have in the USA) they have been patiently following a multi-year plan to "restore" Canada to Christianity (their own, narrow version, naturally). As in the USA, they started by undermining the foundation of modern, free society - public education - and as in the USA, their favorite targets are science and sexuality.

Canadian scientists march to draw attention to the suppression of evidence-based science.

"The cuts, according to the organizers' media release, are being imposed on critical research programs in Environment Canada, Fisheries and Oceans Canada, the National Research Council of Canada, Statistics Canada, through the closure of Experimental Lakes Area, the Polar Environment Atmospheric Research Laboratory and the First Nations Statistical Institute, and through the elimination of the National Science Adviser and National Round Table on Environment and Economy."
and

"There is growing concern in many quarters about what is being viewed as the government's excessive information control. Several organizations say they are concerned with what they call the silencing of Canada's federal scientists." Natalie Stechyson, The Ottawa Citizen.

Read the full story: Science community to protest research cuts....  Ottawa Citizen, July 8, 2012.

Also, while Canadians are rightly proud of their country's official recognition of the humanity and equality of LGBT people, there has never ceased to be a determined opposition to it (coming mainly from religious groups, as usual), and they are making gains:

Canada: Marriages of Foreign Gays are Invalid,  MSNBC, January 2012

Gay activist murdered in Halifax, Halifax Chronicle Herald, April 17, 2012.

Southern Ontario School board hires security after threats because of upcoming vote to ban distribution of Christian bibles in public schools  story.

Europe:

Even in 2007, some Europeans recognised that creationism was posing a serious threat to education in European countries. In October of 2007, PACE (Parliamentary Assembly Council of Europe) adopted resolution 1580, The dangers of creationism in education.

Giant's Causeway creationism "controversy" in Ireland.

This opinion piece in the UK's The Daily Mail manages to be anti-science, anti-American AND tell readers that "no matter how fast and far we run from Him, we always seem to make our way back, rather like someone lost in the forest." From sneering condescension toward science and scientists (Carl Sagan...infantile?) to barely concealed, seething contempt for anything American, this piece is not to be braved without donning a hazmat suit. Oh, and it is dissing the potential discovery of the Higg's boson.

Asia:

Pakistan's only nobel laureate, physicist Abdus Salam, is shunned in his home country and references to him are stricken from school textbooks. Salam did pioneering work in the effort to discover the subatomic Higg's boson (often misleadingly called the "god particle"). Story here.

Indian skeptic charged with blasphemy for rationally explaining a "miracle".  Friendly Atheist, April 14, 2012

Sanal Edamuruku's situation worsens. (The Humanist, July 4, 2012). After being hounded out of India for revealing the simple scientific explanation for a Catholic "miracle", Sanal Edamuruku has been the target of an international manhunt at the urging of the Catholic archdiocese in Bombay.

Gone Fishing

On vacation until July 1. I'll be checking in each day and hopefully I will post a bit, too.  Try not to flood the blog with comments while I am gone. LOL

Voter Suppression Threatens The Republic

Wait!  Don't skip this post because you've been registered to vote forever and are pretty sure it doesn't apply to you. Even if you think you are registered to vote. Even if you have been voting for decades, please take a moment to ensure that you are, in fact, still registered to vote.

Recent news about Republican attempts to suppress the vote highlights just how important it is for citizens to pay attention to what those in power are doing.  Voter suppression has become the most egregious of the tactics in a campaign pockmarked with slimy pits of lies, disinformation and outright intimidation.

It is not just imperative that Americans "get out the vote" this year, but it is now necessary to ensure that citizens' legal right to vote is protected from a campaign to disenfranchise even longtime voters with no reason to think their voter registration would be problematic. Seniors, disabled citizens who do not and cannot have a driver's license, and millions of poor working Americans - for whom acquiring the notarized documentation, filling out the legal paperwork, paying fees and taking time away from their jobs to file for government IDs present insurmountable hurdles - all face potential disenfranchisement in the upcoming election.

Republicans continue to argue disingenuously that they are protecting voter rights by placing more and more roadblocks in the way of the poor, the elderly and the disabled because, they claim, they are protecting us all from potential voter fraud. Repeated studies and investigations into voter fraud have proven that it is exceedingly rare, and that the threat that potential voter fraud poses to the electoral process is minimal. Conversely, the potential for harm to the democratic process resulting from voter suppression practices is very high. In third world countries, American observers stand by to ensure that evidence of voter intimidation and suppression can be recorded and publicized. Who is watching out for the same thing in the USA?

This is a democratic Republic and it is the right and the duty of citizens to protect our own rights and freedoms. Knowledge is power, but action is even more powerful. Let's start paying attention, spreading the word, and mobilizing our fellow citizens to hold our government representatives accountable when they overstep the bounds and try to impede our right to vote.

First stop: knowledge.  To wit:

ACLU on voter suppression:

"During the 2011 legislative sessions, states across the country passed measures to make it harder for Americans – particularly African-Americans, the elderly, students and people with disabilities – to exercise their fundamental right to cast a ballot. Over thirty states considered laws that would require voters to present government-issued photo ID in order to vote. Studies suggest that up to 11 percent of American citizens lack such ID, and would be required to navigate the administrative burdens to obtain it or forego the right to vote entirely."

Rolling Stone   Ari Berman's excellent article on Florida's purge of voter rolls to suppress Democratic vote:


"Imagine this: a Republican governor in a crucial battleground state instructs his secretary of state to purge the voting rolls of hundreds of thousands of allegedly ineligible voters. The move disenfranchises thousands of legally registered voters, who happen to be overwhelmingly black and Hispanic Democrats. The number of voters prevented from casting a ballot exceeds the margin of victory in the razor-thin election, which ends up determining the next President of the United States.


If this scenario sounds familiar, that’s because it happened in Florida in 2000. And twelve years later, just months before another presidential election, history is repeating itself."

CBS  Lucy Madison reports of mass mailings and robo-calls falsely telling voters that they should not or could not vote in the June 5 Wisconsin recall election.


"(CBS News) As voters head to the polls Tuesday to decide the fate of Wisconsin Gov. Scott Walker, reports out of the state suggest that robocalls are being placed informing voters, falsely, they don't have to vote if they signed the recall petition.


There have also been reports of mailings going out to voters telling them they can't vote unless they did so in 2010, and of people going door-to-door telling voters they don't have to go to the polls if they signed the recall petition, both of which are also untrue."

Raw Story offers a disturbing national roundup of stories from numerous states whose Republican governments are pulling out all the stops to disenfranchise voters. One excerpt (from LAWeekly):


"In a brazen attempt to steal this fall's election, Florida's Republican lawmakers have outlawed voting on Sunday, an African-American tradition. Indeed, across the United States, from Montana to Maine and Texas to Tennessee, 41 states have recently passed or introduced laws to restrict voter registration and early voting, and generally limit suffrage.


It's the greatest show of racially fueled political chicanery since turn-of-the-century laws banned scores of African-Americans from casting ballots. More than 5 million voters — largely nonwhite — could be kept from the polls, according to New York University's Brennan Center for Justice:

'State governments across the country enacted an array of new laws that could make it significantly harder for as many as 5 million eligible Americans to vote. Some states require voters to show government-issued photo identification, often of a type that as many as one in ten voters do not have. Other states have cut back on early voting, a hugely popular innovation used by millions of Americans. Still others made it much more difficult for citizens to register to vote, a prerequisite for voting'. "

Don't be caught off guard by voter suppression tactics. Go online and be sure that your voter registration is secure and that you will not be disenfranchised this November.  Here are some handy links to information and resources:

FAQs About Voting, Smart Voter (League of Women Voters).

USA Gov. page on voting information, including a link to voter registration deadlines by state and easy-to-navigate information links to answers for frequently asked questions about voting, registration, voting from overseas, working on elections and trouble-shooting.

USA Gov Resources for voters

Brennan Center of Justice Election 2012, information for voters and resources for assistance with barriers to your right to vote.

Here is a 2008 video about voter suppression tactics which is depressingly prescient - it is a brief but thorough overview of the methods and traps used to suppress the legitimate right of American citizens to vote. Please watch and share:

Atheist/Secular Blogathon 2012 Coming Soon!

Jen McCreight, (Blag Hag) has done a blogathon for the past three years to raise money for the Secular Student Alliance.  For 24 hours, she posts a new blog post every 30 minutes, with no pre-writing or auto-posting allowed. Caffeine-fueled, crazy, funny and sometimes amazing, an exhaustion-propelled blogathon can be a fun-filled experience for everyone!

This year, Jen has snagged some victims organized more participants!  There is a schedule of featured bloggers here, but I can tell you that Dale McGowan, author of Parenting Beyond Belief (not to mention awesome blogger at The Meming of Life) has just posted that he is in!

Other bloggers on the roster include: Greta Christina (Greta Christina's Blog), Hank Fox (Blue Collar Atheist), Al Stefanelli (Al Stefanelli), and Natalie Reed (Sincerely, Natalie Reed)!

The Blogathon participants are hoping to raise plenty of funds to continue the growth of the Secular Student Alliance, which is one of the few organizations available to high school and college students as an alternative to the numerous religious organizations which dot campuses across the nation.

cru?  WTF does that mean?
Oh well, it's definitely not a group with
an agenda - look how hip this logo is!

One such powerful, secretively-funded and agenda-driven religious group is Campus Crusade for Christ. Campus Crusade for Christ has recently changed its name in what they claimed was a bid not to hide its explicitly Christian religious agenda but to remove the word "Crusade" which they seemed to have only recently discovered that some people find objectionable. The fact that this change coincides with an increase in the number of secular student groups attempting to be recognized on campuses - and the fact that secular and atheist student groups are often denied official recognition based upon a college's professed policy of not endorsing a religious viewpoint (blithely ignoring both that secular organizations are not religious and most colleges currently have long lists of recognized religiously affiliated groups on campus - my irony-meter just went past bust) definitely had nothing to do with it! The new name "CRU" retains the core of "crusade" while hiding the Christ, which suits this organization just fine because it is not at all deceptive or contradictory. Hiding the fundamentalist religious agenda behind a banal "it's all about hip, youthful, community fun" public face is the Campus Crusade modus operandi, and the stylishly meaningless new logo fits right in with their cool, aw shucks, honest-to-godliness stealth strategy.

Openly and honestly secular,
promoting freethinking and
freedom of and from religion.

In spite of continued opposition, the Secular Student Alliance is growing!  Compared to Campus Crusade for Christ's $500 million annual budget, the SSA's annual budget of less than $1 million makes it hard to compete, and yet they are growing.

The reason why is simple: young people are turning away from the manipulative clutches of religion in higher numbers than ever.  Help SSA out in their effort to provide options for freethinking youth. Read freethinker bloggers (several suggested blogs linked to the right), donate to Secular Student Alliance so that they can meet or exceed the projected goals shown below and most of all...

Enjoy the blogathon!

Let's keep the growth of REASON going!

Obama Defeats Romney!

That's right, Democrats, this could happen to you. 

Fear-mongering and racial
dog-whistling are the stock
in trade of Super PACs.

James Carville wrote an opinion piece for CNN last week which spoke directly to my greatest fear about the November election: I am worried that there is a sense that the president (and the Democratic party) has the 2012 election sewn up. "After all", I keep hearing, "look at the Republicans!  They squabbled ridiculously over the primaries - flip-flopping endlessly on favorites before finally settling reluctantly on Mitt Romney for their presidential nominee. The roster of candidates was so bad, it almost seemed like a joke, and the lukewarm acceptance of Romney seemed to point to a dispirited party base who would probably stay home in November. Barack Obama is a sure winner in November!"

Let's get real, here. This is dangerously complacent thinking.

The Republican base that has been nurtured so assiduously for the past two decades through religion and fear-mongering will not stay home and sit out the election, no matter how disappointed they may be in their nominee. Because no matter how little they love Mitt Romney and how miserably uninspiring they find him, their hatred for President Obama provides inspiration that is greater, fiercer and more enduring. It will be the desire to throw President Obama out of the White House which will mobilize the Republican base this year; distaste for Mitt Romney notwithstanding. Mitt at least is white, male, and willing to pander to the religious and the rich.

 Billionaires flock to Republican operatives' Super PACs.

With the advent of super PACs and corporate "citizens", the power shift in the United States in favor of the wealthy and privileged has lurched more dramatically to the far right, tiniest stratosphere of society. People speak about a return to the "gilded age" and they do not mean a golden age for everyone. Money is power. A few very rich people and corporations can and do influence elections. With Citizens United, the Supreme Court handed the powerful few even more power to influence elections and to see to it that their chosen candidates win and keep power.

Voters are swayed by advertising. People believe or at least are emotionally manipulated by the messages that saturate the television and radio airwaves throughout an election campaign. And most people accept what they are fed through advertising uncritically. Super PACs are pouring millions into negative advertising campaigns every week because they work, and reports of equivalent money and power coming from average Americans, unions or one George Soros are greatly exaggerated.

"Newsflash: Nothing is in the bag. Nothing can be taken for granted. Everybody from the precinct door-knocker, to the Chicago high command, to the White House, to the halls of Congress, to the Senate and House committees, to congressional leadership, here is a simple message: If we don't get on the offense, reconnect with the American people, talk about how the middle class is in a struggle for its very existence, hold the Republicans accountable and fight like the dickens, we are going to lose." James Carville.

Vote Romney for a new gilded age!

The dirty tactics have already begun, and these smear campaigns will be bankrolled by fewer than 100 wealthy, powerful donors. This election could - literally - change the course of American history. We are on the brink of an abyss: poised to plummet - possibly for good - down into the kind of quasi-feudal society from which our forebears escaped. Everything that has been good about America has been bad for those who would prefer a society where a few can live like kings, surrounded by a vast and impoverished labor force willing to work for low wages, thus increasing the "kings'" wealth and power.

Writers and speakers and ordinary citizens who care about the future had better be paying attention. We must keep these issues in front of people. We must keep the electorate engaged and aware that this election matters. This is the year to knock on doors, make phone calls, write and speak out for the future of the American dream. People who care about the 99% had better fasten their seatbelts - we are in for the fight of our lives.

Sex, Pregnancy and Consent

A Facebook friend recently posted a link to an interesting story about the possibility of a future world where responsibility for - and control over - reproduction could eventually be more evenly shared by men and women. In the blog The Last Word on Nothing, Sally Adee discussed pregnancy, abortion, women's and men's rights in light of ongoing research into the development of external womb technology. Whether it is futuristic fantasy or a real possibility, the topic of ectogenesis shines a spotlight on one of the thorniest issues related to heterosexual human sexuality: unplanned pregnancy.

Coming soon: a brave new world?

Right now, though, there is no handy external womb to help level the moral playing field between men and women when it comes to decisions about preventing or coping with unwanted pregnancy. Women must face all of the emotional and physical risks and demands of a life-altering, physically-depleting, potentially life-threatening experience which results in their almost total loss of bodily autonomy and they usually face most of the burden of the financial and social costs as well. Men who father unplanned children may be held legally responsible for some, none or all of the pregnancy-related medical costs in addition to nearly two decades of child support - if they accept the responsibilities of paternity (or can be proven to be the biological father of a child and forced to accept responsibility).

None of the above is a big problem for two people who have freely chosen to take on these risks; who have planned for and consented to a pregnancy and who happily plan to be jointly responsible should the pregnancy result in the live birth of a child.  The above risks and responsibilities become a serious problem, though, when the two people have not planned for and consented to pregnancy. The physical, psychological and financial risks to a mother and the psychological and financial risks to a father of an unexpected pregnancy are far too high for the possibility to be dismissed lightly. Consent to sex does not mean consent to pregnancy. Pregnancy is easily prevented by mutually respectful sexual partners and it is easily aborted in the earliest stages in the unlikely event that responsible contraceptive efforts fail. Childbirth should never be accidental, unplanned or forced.

No sex, no problems!
That should work!

But, the uncomfortable truth is that, in a religion-soaked culture, people who are sexually active - especially young people with uteri - are presumed to be consenting to the possibility of pregnancy whenever they have heterosexual sex - even if it is non-consensual sex. This has been strenuously underlined in society through abstinence-only pregnancy prevention programs, suppression of contraceptive information for sexually active young people, rape victim blaming, and waves of legislation designed to restrict access to female-controlled birth control and abortion services - even if pregnancy has resulted from rape, incest or coercion. The religiously-motivated "abstinence only" advice to repress natural, healthy sexual desires by avoiding all forms of sexual expression is nearly as ineffective as it is stupid and psychologically abusive.

Less loudly proclaimed, but no less true, is that young people with penises are presumed to be consenting to the possibility of pregnancy whenever they have heterosexual sex, too. The law in most states requires young men to contribute child support toward their progeny's expenses until 18 years of age. Since young men do not suffer any direct physical, educational, social or employment interruptions due to pregnancy, they are often in a far better position to prosper in life than their pregnant female counterparts. The gap widens throughout life as fewer than half of pregnant teens ever manage to finish high school and less than 2% complete a college degree even by the age of 30. Yet, a depressingly small per centage of men actually meet these responsibilities.

Reading the comments under the article on external wombs, I was not surprised to find the often-cited complaint from a male reader that it is unfair that a man may be legally required to support children that he may not have wanted. This speaks to the point above: that the role of men in an unplanned pregnancy is very much downplayed in society, leaving many men surprised and angry when they discover that they may be held legally responsible for support, even if they did not consent to fatherhood.

Sure, give your heart,
but don't lose your mind!

In a perfect world, no unplanned pregnancy could ever occur. But, we do not live in a perfect world. Therefore, it is essential that sexually active people respect and care for themselves as well as their partners in a happy, healthy relationship, whether it is a long-term, monogamous partnership or a single joyous sexual encounter. Luckily, wherever there is safe access to affordable, reliable birth control, this situation can be easily handled by caring - and responsible - sexual partners. It's true that contraception is not a perfect tool for preventing unwanted pregnancy: the failure rate for contraception when only one sexual partner "handles it" is higher than necessary for many reasons, but the main reason is usually operator error. However, when more than one form of birth control is used simultaneously, the failure rate drops significantly. The logical solution to that problem is for both sexual partners to use a reliable form of birth control to protect themselves and each other from operator error. If a condom is one of the two contraceptives used, there is the added bonus of protection from STDs!  Win, win!

I think the foundational understanding should be this: healthy, sexually mature human beings should be able to enjoy worry-free consensual sex. It is one of the joys of being human. In healthy heterosexual relationships, all participants take responsibility for protecting themselves and their partners from unplanned pregnancy. Unless both partners have willingly agreed to try to become parents and both have explicitly consented to actively pursuing parenthood every time they have sex, then both partners must assume that there is no consent to pregnancy, though consent to sex may still be enthusiastic. For every single sexual encounter except those explicitly meant to result in conception, all participants should use some form of contraception.

Indispensable equipment
for fun, sexy times!

What if your partner will not use birth control?  If your partner will not use birth control, perhaps s/he is assuming that you have consented to the possibility of parenthood. You know what you need to do: Correct the assumption before you have sex! If you correct the assumption and your partner still refuses to use birth control, then it is time to consider whether this person respects you and deserves to have a sexual relationship with you. Why would you want to have a sexual relationship with a person who does not respect you? There are millions of people in the world - quite a few of them very interested in a healthy sexual relationship with you. Get out there and find someone else who respects and cares about you!

Look, if you are a man who is unprepared to become a father, or if your partner has not explicitly consented to try to become a parent with you right now, then do not engage in sex without using some form of male-controlled birth control. Men who, like the commenter on the ectogenesis thread, whine immaturely that "she said that pregnancy is unlikely! (she lied!)", or who complain that they think wearing a condom reduces their pleasure (so they won't wear them, dammit!) are men who are too immature for sexual activity.  It is every human being's responsibility to prevent unplanned parenthood. There is a wide array of products out there designed to enhance your sexual experience safely and at least one of them will work out just fine for you. Sex feels great with or without a condom, but subjecting your partner (and yourself) to the risk of an unplanned pregnancy because you want an already awesome experience to be even better (for you) is a lousy way to show respect and caring to a partner.

All-important accoutrements
for fun, sexy times!

If you are a woman who is unprepared to become a mother, or if your partner has not explicitly consented to try to become a parent with you right now, then do not engage in sex without using some form of female-controlled birth control. Women who have become unwillingly pregnant may whine immaturely that "he promised that he would look after contraception!(he lied!)", or who complain that the pill or the IUD may have unpleasant side effects or that it feels too slutty to plan ahead to prevent pregnancy, are women who are too immature for sexual activity. It is every human being's responsibility to prevent unplanned parenthood. There is a vast selection of products out there to enable you to enjoy worry-free sex and with a little effort you will find the one that works well for you. Sex is a wonderful enrichment of life, but subjecting your partner (and yourself) to the risk of an ill-timed pregnancy because you want an already awesome experience to feel thrillingly (for you) spontaneous is a terrible way to show caring and respect to a partner.

We have sexual relationships with other people: our actions affect our partners, and we must have the maturity to treat them with the same consideration that we hope for ourselves. Control over your own fertility should never willingly be ceded to another person, not only because unwilling or unplanned parenthood can and often does result, but also because every child deserves to be conceived knowingly and deliberately by two people who have made a conscious choice to be parents.

Religious conservatives get it so wrong when they declare that extra-marital, non-procreative sex is immoral. Consensual sex is moral, natural and good. But, consensual sex does not mean consent to pregnancy. Whenever you engage in sex without using personal birth control, you are unfairly denying your partner the right to consent to or not to consent to a possible pregnancy. And do you know what?  That would be immoral.

Ah, the joy of consensual sex!

Wait, Consent Means WHAT?

The future of American women?

Individual freedom and the right to bodily autonomy - the principles behind our understanding of consent - were the principles upon which many of us assume the Supreme Court's Roe v Wade decision was based, although the case itself was focused on a citizen's right to privacy around making decisions concerning her bodily autonomy and medical care.  Laws which deny a woman the right to bodily autonomy - including laws that deny a woman the right to control what happens to her own body in favor of giving any potential fetus the "right" to use her body against her will or without her consent - are an unconstitutional denial of individual freedom because they relegate a woman to a legal status that is less than human. The legal precedent that a woman actually has the right to consent to the risks and responsibilities of pregnancy, and an equal right to decline consent to those risks and responsibilities was thought to be finally established. But since Roe v Wade was argued as a case for privacy, it has never been a guarantee of women's reproductive rights. It has always been vulnerable to attack, either through court challenges or through legislation which has chipped away at it.

One way or another, the
Republican Party will find
a way to control those sluts!

From the moment Roe v Wade was decided, the religious right began working to overturn it. Outraged that women had at last been granted the right to choose if and when to be pregnant -  a right which conflicted with the patriarchal order which demands that men have complete authority over women - the "moral majority" began a campaign of slut-shaming, raising the specter- never far beneath the surface in any misogynist culture - that uncontrolled women would engage in wildly promiscuous and "irresponsible" sex and darkly warning that the new law would bring about the downfall of American civil society  However, when this tactic initially only gained traction within the most conservative and misogynistic segments of society, conservatives realized that the problem was that a majority of Americans in the late 1970's actually respected a woman's right to choose - and that most Americans believed that the consensual sexual activity of women was no more society's business than the consensual sexual activity of men.

Religious conservatives soon zeroed in on "consent" as a potentially malleable concept that they might be able to use to drive a wedge between women and their human rights, thereby setting the stage to put women back in their traditional place.  In order to overcome the legal issue of consent, religious and political conservatives began working tirelessly - using tactics including slut-shaming, abstinence-only purity campaigns inserted into public schools, and falsely equating microscopic blastocysts with full term babies - to entrench the notion that recreational sex involving the conscious avoidance of pregnancy is shameful and that only marital sex which welcomes the prospect of conception should be recognized and supported by society. Their aim was to increase public acceptance of explicitly Christian sexual mores in order to garner voter support for their social agenda. The ultimate goal was to get this explicitly Christian theology enshrined into law: that whenever a woman has consented to sex, she has automatically consented to pregnancy, too.

That's right, ladies, when you consent to sex, you consent to
pregnancy. And when you don't consent to sex, you
consent to pregnancy, too! You and your uteri are in a perpetual
state of consent to pregnancy! Ain't patriarchy grand?

Eventually, extreme conservatives began to worry that exceptions for rape and incest could possibly become a loophole through which some lying women could escape unwanted pregnancy, leading to the push for the elimination of exceptions for rape and incest as legal justifications for abortion. Building on the false premise that a conceptus is equal to a full-term baby, conservatives argued that a fertilized egg, no matter how it came into existence, is an innocent life deserving of protection. Completely ignoring the question of whether a woman who has been raped is deserving of society's protection and adroitly sidestepping Roe v Wade, forced-birth groups wrote bills denying abortion rights to women even in the case of rape or incest which their political arm, the Republican party, sponsored in state legislatures. In one giant leap of cruel imagination, conservatives managed to establish as a serious idea that even when a woman does not consent to sex, her consent to pregnancy should be automatic in the eyes of the law.

Lest there be any doubt about the intentions of the religious conservatives and their hired guns in the state and federal legislatures to render the legal notion of female consent completely irrelevant and completely powerless, forced-birth organizations created "personhood bills" which they instructed their Republican lackeys to sponsor and pass in various states. "Personhood" bills, if signed into law, would confer the full rights of a "person" - a deliberately vague term, but generally considered to be equal to a live-born child - to all fertilized ova. Such laws would criminalize most forms of female-controlled contraception, emergency contraception, assisted reproduction and, of course, all abortions. They would also open the door to state-sponsored invasion of women's privacy and health care rights since legally protected "persons" could potentially be "murdered" before a conception is discovered to have taken place. Furthermore, such laws would criminalize anyone who attempted to help a woman abort the conceptus "person" either by performing a surgical procedure, providing medical abortifacents, or driving a woman across state lines to obtain an abortion in a non-"Personhood" state.

Got that, gals?

"Personhood" laws are the holy grail of the forced-birth movement and the ultimate goal of religious conservatives. If passed, such laws would strip women of all bodily autonomy in matters of reproduction. Women would be denied female-controlled birth control, they would be denied emergency birth control if their partner's birth control fails or he refuses to use it and they would be denied abortions - even if they are impregnated by rape and even if their health or lives are endangered by a pregnancy. In short, thanks to the twisted culture of "life" pushed so ruthlessly onto them by religious conservatives, women would be compelled to sacrifice their happiness, risk their health and even lose their lives because a single-celled conceptus has been granted a right to occupy her body which supersedes all of her rights including her humanity, her dignity and her right to life.

Keep that contraception out
of those sluts' hands!

The Republican Party, which has degenerated to little more than the political arm of the conservative religious right, has been striving relentlessly to ensure that women will be legally forced to bear all of the negative physical, social and most of the financial repercussions for any unplanned pregnancy, while the churches themselves underline and enforce the subordinate and inferior position of women in the culture. Through tireless efforts to withhold access to contraception from women, the religious right ensures that reproductive control remains primarily in the hands of men. Thanks to ideologically-driven appointments to the FDA and the business interests of both drug companies and the medical establishment, only male-controlled methods of reliable contraception are available without a prescription, forcing women to navigate (and pay for) "care" from layers of medical and pharmacy gatekeepers before they are permitted to obtain reliable female-controlled contraception.

Religious patriarchy allows society to label unplanned pregnancy a "women's issue" in spite of the fact that it takes both a man and a woman - both failing to use effective contraception - to create an unplanned pregnancy. The fact that society allows unplanned pregnancy to be framed as a women's issue reveals the depth of the unconscious misogyny which lays the responsibility for - and the consequences of - an unplanned pregnancy squarely in the woman's lap, while little thought - and almost no censure - is directed toward the "guilt", the "promiscuity" or the "irresponsibility" of the man involved.

The old joke about keeping women
barefoot and pregnant?
Not so funny anymore.

More insidiously, when pregnancy and the laws restricting women's rights over when and if they will become pregnant is framed as a women's issue, conservatives ensure that half the population at least may ignore the very real danger to women's health and safety. Few men pay attention when women's rights are being stripped away because the phrase "women's issue" is unconsciously received as a signal that the subject is unimportant and less than men's other concerns. Even men who love the women in their lives are lulled into a false sense of "nothing to worry about" as their wives, their sisters and their daughters are slowly but surely reduced to the legal status of walking wombs compelled under threat of criminal prosecution to gestate the offspring of any man who succeeds in impregnating them - whether by mutual and loving consent, by accidental failure of birth control or by force.

In this way, the religious patriarchy ensures both that women cannot control their own reproduction completely (since women - even abstinent women - can be, and often are, the victims of forced impregnation) and that no man - not even a rapist - needs to accept the decision of a mere woman on the question of whether or not he can use her body to reproduce. That is because the "right to life" of a conceptus is, in fact, really just an extension of men's rights. A conceptus is always some man's potential offspring, and at its core, religious teaching is all about enshrining the right of every man to reproduce. If women are allowed the freedom to choose, some men would almost certainly have difficulty finding a willing mate with whom to procreate. Religions which enforce the authority of men over women and which restrict the freedom and choices of women therefore speak to the root of cultural misogyny - men's fear of the potential power of women to control their (men's) ability to reproduce. "Right to life" is actually the trojan horse by which male rights over women are being inserted directly into women's uteri. That's right. It's a great big legal 'fuck you, women'!

While religions pay lip service to condemning male brutality and offer assurances on how a "godly man" behaves, they strenuously resist efforts to enact laws which could increase rape prosecutions or extend protections for women against sexual assault, citing concerns about - you can guess - men's rights. The ultimate social priority of religion is to confirm and enforce the authority of men over women. To that end, religious conservatives - and their men in government - are willing to grant even rapists and abusers privileges over women, to safeguard the authority of "godly" men. In short, in order to protect the privilege of all men, themselves included of course, even "godly" men who profess to abhor rape willingly award rapists and abusers the right to reproduce using women's bodies against their will. As always, there is no thought spared for the humanity of the women who would be sacrificed to this Christian ideology. At best, they are dismissed as the "blessed" recipients of a "gift from God".

This is already a real thing in
the conservative Christian world

In the Republican vision of the future - as in the past it idealizes - "freedom" and "rights" will only fully belong to men and to the potential offspring of men, while women will be, at best, reduced once again to second-class citizenship, and, at worst, returned to sexual and reproductive slavery. Political, financial and social oppression of women, reproductive slavery and viciously misogynistic church-mandated rules of correct behavior and dress (for women only) are the unceasing reality for millions of women in theocracies around the world.  All of these forms of oppression of women are rooted in the desire of these conservative societies to control the sexuality and reproductive freedom of their women. Almost without exception, societies based upon religious laws which both deny women fully human status and hold them accountable for the sexual activity of both genders strictly limit female freedom and impose exaggerated requirements for modest dress on their women and girls.  If a Christian theocracy is successfully installed by conservatives in the United States, ever-deepening oppression will become the inevitable future for women and girls here.

Religious conservatives want Roe v Wade overturned because they oppose the principles of individual freedom and the right to bodily autonomy for women upon which the decision was based.  That denial of those rights would relegate women to less than human status is exactly the point. Second-class status for women would be a feature, not a bug, for Christian conservatives since the Bible commands that women are not equal but subordinate to men. Bible-based religion asserts that man is the original human and woman, taken from man, is less than human. This is the reality of Bible-based governance. It seems like a nightmare from the dark ages, or some dystopian futuristic novel, but this is really happening right now in the land of the free and the home of the brave.

Attention Supreme Court: The People Will Decide

Another in the long line of inexplicably "surprising"  revelations that seem to be coming fast and furious these days:  a Pew Research Council poll shows that public disapproval of the U.S. Supreme Court has tripled during the hearings regarding the Affordable Healthcare Act.  The American people have registered their awareness, once again, that conservative lies criticisms about progressive trickery are more often than not breathtakingly brazen projection.  The "activist liberal judges" we have heard so much about for so many years have failed to materialize in any powerful way, while the United States Supreme Court has been stocked with activist Republican conservatives. Finally, the American people seem to be waking up to this reality.

The religious right and the libertarian wing of the Republican party have long accused "the left" of a litany of evils ranging from the myth of the "liberal media" to the incredible accusation that "godless socialists" were bent on destroying this country. For years, the fiction that these "dangers" from the left not only exist but are a threat to all patriotic Americans has been promulgated and, unbelievably, accepted by a majority of conservatives and even some liberals in the USA. Always prominent among these false claims was the suspicious accusation that the left was somehow packing the judicial benches across the land with "activist" judges.

Even while their own churches and business leadership were busy organizing followers to do their bidding in the voting booth, even while powerful conservative backers were financing the establishment of a network of schools and colleges to produce an entire generation of dedicated workers for their pro-religion, anti-social cause, even while libertarian billionaires and billionaire churches planned and financed a scheme to infiltrate every school, every influential profession and every level of government, right-wing American leaders and their followers continued to accuse the left - that scary, elitist, monolithic left - of trying to do the very thing that they were actually doing.

Patrick Henry College est. 2000

It was the uncertainty and unease felt by the great American middle class following the social and sexual revolution of the 1960's that set the stage for the right wing's greatest opportunity, and its leadership did not waste it. Acting quickly to fill the void that social turmoil often brings to the collective psyche of a population, the religious right shifted its proselytizing and church-planting into high gear. Money was poured into the establishment of Christian schools and "colleges" which popped up all over the country seemingly overnight.  Massive infusions of cash from the coffers of wealthy churches and like-minded wealthy corporations enabled the construction of old-looking, brand new campuses, to give the air of legitimacy to institutions created for the singular purpose of graduating a generation of ideologically-driven businessmen, lawyers, doctors and politicians to fill the leadership positions in the future, theocratic, conservative America of their dreams.

Yet, notwithstanding such a well-financed and determined strategy, the right-wing has found it an uphill battle to beat down and crush the independent American thinker. The traditional wide band of moderate Americans in the center of most policy debates throughout our modern history has been eroded far more slowly than the so-called "moral majority" might have expected given their relentless religious and political proselytizing.  Even at the pinnacle of their power in 2004, the extreme right was only able to grab the top ring of political power with a surprisingly small margin, barely heaved over the finish line by an incumbency that was only made possible by an activist Supreme Court, disturbing voting irregularities and the fear and uncertainty of war.  The fact that - even with a well-funded, carefully-planned, long-term strategy to undermine and further weaken the American social contract using religious indoctrination and inflammatory political propaganda - right-wing conservatives have only managed to thoroughly convert roughly 30% of the population to their extreme ideology says something encouraging about the resilience and independent toughness of the moderate American center.

Polls taken last week indicated public support for the Affordable Healthcare Act is split along partisan lines, but that support is rising as the provisions of the Act are beginning to go into effect. A small majority want the bill struck down by the Supreme Court - many because they think the Act goes too far, but some because they object that the Act does not go far enough. This comes in spite of the fact that, when questioned about specific provisions of the law, a much larger majority of respondents actually support many of them!  While the libertarian arm of the Republican propaganda machine (via conservative-dominated media) has seemed to succeed in muddying the waters in the short term, it seems that the American public is beginning to smell a rat. The Pew Research Council poll may be the proverbial canary in the mine: an early indicator that deep in the heart of America, a sense of the fundamental inappropriateness of an unelected body potentially striking down a law which was passed by democratically elected representatives of the people is beginning to reassert itself.

David Frum had an interesting take on the role of the Supreme Court in the election (!) last week on the Daily Beast.  Frum believes that, this time, even a high court stocked with hand-picked conservative ideologues might not bow to partisan pressure to use its unelected power to influence a hugely important matter of public governance - not even to bolster the flagging fortunes of the current crop of Republican primary contenders.  The nine justices may actually perform their constitutionally-defined duty, and nothing more, to the frustration of the conservatives who expect obedience from them,  and to the relief of progressives everywhere.  It is the American people who hold the right to decide in November whether they are satisfied with the work of the current congress.

Out of an apparent "going for broke" recklessness, virtually all of the Republican leadership has openly joined in this intensely partisan and miserably destructive strategy to polarize the American public in order to eke out political victories by small but sufficient margins to retain power. I suppose there may be a cleverly hidden strategy behind this latest spectacle.  What appears to be the disintegration of the GOP might in fact be the birth pangs of yet another well-orchestrated power play, but from where I sit it looks like a nuclear, if temporary, implosion.  They did their worst,  but the extreme right-wing could not completely win over the great American middle. The Pew poll seems to suggest that any attempt by the Supreme Court to interfere politically on behalf of the Republican agenda will be viewed with disapproval by the American public, particularly by progressives and independents.

And that is very good news to me.

* Update: Maureen Dowd's column Men in Black on this topic is a must read.