So here is the problem:
first we have the attempts to take away the most basic of women's rights. (or earlier last century)
And secondly we have Ave Maria Town, the brain child of Dominos Pizza founder Tom Monaghan where, if Tom has his way, will be devoid of "the pill or the condoms or contraception." He owns the land where Ave Marie Town will sit (and he apparently owns Ave Marie University - it has a shitty law school) and therefore seems to believe that he can completely control the town.
I have no problem with religion. In fact, I think it is one of the greatest things we had to invent. I have no problem with disliking abortion. If I ever came to the conclusion that fetuses are alive, I would be anti-abortion as well. I assume that most would. Being anti-condom use is more difficult. The Vatican has some pretty arguments but ultimately it leads to the conclusion that all people should abstain until marriage whereby they produce babies! babies! babies!
My main problem with the South Dakota ruling and the Ave Maria Town Plan is that it is 'encouraging' moral behavior without understanding that moral behavior requires choice or free will (simplified I know, but the situation makes it simple.) These affected actors, if they cannot have an abortion or buy birth control, are not acting morally. So what is the point?
I have nothing to say on this that hasn't been said. It kinda frustrates me. It is an impossibly complex problem. Originality is the key. So we need original ideas for this problem.
I have one: All males will be made psuedo-sterile at puberty by use of something like one of these(I prefer SMA) (and look what I found. weird.) The sterility device can be removed and reapplied freely. Sex education will be taught aggressively from an early age on (very aggressively) to teach kids about STDs (because this is one of the Vatican's arguments: if you remove the 'kid' deterrent, then sex, and STDs, will be rampant. Damn vatican and their fear of non-abstinence sex education. I hate them so much.) If anyone wants to have kids, the sterility device will be removed. This act will have a legal name and will be like marriage, although people can still get married with the device on.
No wait, this doesn't work. What about women who change their mind after becoming pregnant?
Okay, new plan. Women will be informed of their pregnancy by way of a light somewhere inconspicuous on their body. The womb and egg will have been genetically engineered such that, after the egg is cracked open by the sperm, but before the egg is fertilized, they whole system goes into suspended animation. This is when the light goes on, the appropriate hormones are released and a kicking balloon starts to grow (the women has to be fooled into thinking that the baby is growing (even though she knows it is not) so that the end result is not a shock). At any point up to the nine months, the woman can abort the process. Since there was never a real baby, nobody died (in anyone's mind). If the woman decides to go through with it, then the suspended animation is removed, a period of rapid, but safe and healthy futuristic baby growth occurs (15 minutes or so) and, bang, we have a new kid.
perfect.
well, it doesn't really address the issue of religious folk's dislike of sex out of wedlock, but I can't fix everything.
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
9 comments:
Ave MariA.
you'll never win. NEVER!!
"My main problem with the South Dakota ruling and the Ave Marie Town Plan is that it is 'encouraging' moral behavior without understanding that moral behavior requires choice or free will (simplified I know, but the situation makes it simple.) These affected actors, if they cannot have an abortion or buy birth control, are not acting morally."
Sorry Matt, but you are getting ahead of yourself here. Like you mention earlier there are two reasons that these are being taken away: 1) Catholic Church does not support either. 2) Catholic Church is against pre-marital sex.
By removing items or rights that are seen to encourage perceived immorality you are not removing the individual's possibility for choice to engage in such acts. If any semblance of a choice remains, then so does the potential to act morally.
In other words: Just because you take away the kids' condoms it doesn't mean that they're going to stop fucking. If they are still choosing to fuck then they are still making choices that are perceived to be immoral.
okay, but that seems to be the whole point.
you say:
"By removing items or rights that are seen to encourage perceived immorality you are not removing the individual's possibility for choice to engage in such acts."
fine, but I think that the reason for removing access to said items and rights is to force a certain type of action. If you are afraid of having a baby, you will be less likely to engage in pre-marital sex. This is okay, society at large does the same basic thing with the threat of prison. But this rubs me the wrong way. It is akin to one having two paths to choose but their are all sorts of terible things along one path. Of course, one can choose whichever way they want.
If you believe that people don't have the ability to make their own decisions, take away their stuff (like they do with kids) but if you believe that humans are moral agents (which they need to be for religion to work), you have to let them have their condoms.
No, our points differ.
Matt, the key word you are using there is force. By taking away condoms, you are not forcing them not to have sex. I think my problem with your whole thing here is that you are using absolutes.
And yes, there are "all sorts of terrible things along one path." That's the way its always been. Before prophylactics were widely used having sex meant: a)getting syphilis and dying b)dying in childbirth or c)having too many months to feed. (this for 95% of the population)
I think what I'm saying here is that I see you saying that this removes the possibility for choice, whereas I see it as merely reducing the possibilty.
Darling, the key to stopping kids from having sex is fear. On that note, I will describe our sex education session at York House. It was reminiscent of that scene in "mean girls"...
If you have sex you WILL get chlamydia. And die. So have some condoms.
Then they brought a doctor in to show us a slide-show of people with suppurating boils on their penises (which, at that point, I had even seen a photo of a penis, and was quite scared by that alone) and people with cauliflower sized genital warts coming from their anuses. Ani? Anuses.
In any case, a little knowledge was enough to have most of us hold out until we were about 17-18. Which is higher than the national average. So fear works.
Fear is your friend.
Sam: yes fear is great. No arguments there. I was afraid of the sex-ed penis when I first saw it. It didn't (and as far as I can remember, doesn't) look like a normal penis. It was fucked right up.
Pat: I am arguing in absolutes purposely. Not doing so, which I attempted to do initially, led me to numerous quagmires. There are way too many shades of grey in this issue to make a complete argument.
My argument, in its barest simplicity, is that certain religious powers do not want premarital sex to occur, for an inconsequential-to-this-argument reason. They cannot ban it outright so they use fear (although usually the hell one and not the penis boil one) and they use removal of devices that would make sex safer (and therefore easier).
While neither the former or the latter truly removes choice (it would be almost impossible to completely remove choice - even in the most repressive of states one can act as one chooses. unfortunately, said choice may result in death) I feel that choice removal is the desired goal.
They want to coerce (which is not that far from force) a certain type of action.
I don't know God, but if I were He and I really didn't like premarital sex, I would prefer someone who wasn't committing that particular peccadillo because they thought it was wrong, rather than because they were afraid of penis boils.
of course, He did make penis boils, so perhaps this is all part of His beautiful design. Conniving Bastard.
Abortion is a difficult issue, especially if you believe that fertilization equals life.
But condoms and birth control? banning them is just mean.
dude, I totally agree with that. what I was arguing was whether or not they had lost the capacity to make a moral choice, which your use of absolutes confused.
But still, do you really think that taking away those things are gonna stop kids from fucking?
Nah.
Post a Comment