So This is What Happened to the Country I Love?

Rachel Allison

The nation I love and honor seems to be disintegrating into a place I hardly recognize: The dress standards, the language, the disrespect, the lack of motivation and self-reliance, the “what’s in it for me” mentality, the blatant political partisanship on any and every subject…and in the most recent years the purposeful destruction of innocent lives.  How can we in just five decades evolve from a nation focused on family, God, self-reliance, and a strong moral compass, to a society that is focusing it’s efforts on destroying the family, a government that encourages free handouts, right is called wrong, wrong is called right, and religion is looked at as a crutch for the weak?

I recently read a review of Ross Douthat’s book “Bad Religion: How We Became a Nation of Heretics.”   Obviously Douthat has more insight and understanding on the subject than I do.  I found his explanation fascinating.

Douthat, now a New York Times columnist contends, “America doesn’t suffer from excessive or insufficient religion, but from bad religion that exacerbates rather than heals our sociopolitical ills.” Douthat writes that the “slow-motion collapse of traditional Christianity and the rise of a variety of destructive pseudo-Christianities” have been disastrous for the nation.

Where Religious conviction used to include commitment to the Trinity…, the Ten Commandments, a “rejection of violence,” a “deep suspicion of worldly wealth and power,” and a “stress on chastity,” many in our society have found that heresy is simpler and much easier to live. If it feels right to the individual, then it is right. Moral demands are irrelevant.

Douthat writes about the years following World War II and the horror of the Holocaust.  These historical events exposed the weaknesses of secular humanism. True humanism, the nation saw, “needed to be grounded in something higher than a purely material account of the universe, and in something more compelling than the hope of a secular utopia.”  Only religious premises could adequately support and give understanding to “basic liberal concepts like equality and human rights.” As a result, there was at mid-century a revival of robust Christianity. Church attendance was up, clergy were held in high esteem, religious schools, hospitals and churches were constructed at record paces. Even popular culture was onboard, with movies like Ben Hur and The Ten Commandments.

Douthat focuses on four key figures who embody this spirit—Reinhold Niebuhr, Billy Graham, Fulton Sheen, and Martin Luther King, Jr.—”a Protestant intellectual, an Evangelical preacher, a Catholic bishop, and an African-American prophet.” Each leader had both a distinct community and the nationally respected authority to promote models of Christian orthodoxy for the modern world. The result, Douthat argues, is that “both institutionally and intellectually, American Christianity at midcentury offered believers a relatively secure position from which to engage with society as a whole.”

All of that fell apart in the 1960s and ’70s. Church membership peaked, and then rapidly declined. Douthat identifies five causes for the institutional collapse:

“1.  Political polarization (first Vietnam, then abortion, now everything),

2.  The sexual revolution (“a large swath of America decided that two millennia of Christian teaching on marriage and sexuality were simply out of date”),

3. An increasingly global perspective (multiculturalism leading to relativism and then indifference),

4. Ever-growing wealth (a prosperous people rely less on God, and religious vocations become less appealing),

5. A new class divide (elites showering scorn on traditional religion).”

Churches tried their best to accommodate this new trend of thinking by making Christianity relevant by eliminating its unfashionable ethics and values. Predictably, churches accommodating the world had less to offer it, and people stopped seeing the point of attending.

Douthat explains that one influence that the “modern thinker” bought into was Elizabeth Gilbert’s beliefs published in her book Eat, Pray, Love.  Her book peddles the “God Within” theology: “God dwells within you as you yourself, exactly the way you are.”  Douthat notes, “trying to remake ourselves “in the image of God” this is not. Why search for God in ancient texts when he is really inside each of us?”

Ironically, this search for happiness from within ends up leaving us “more isolated, lonelier, and more depressed.” Americans pay hundreds of thousands of therapists to listen to us whine about “everyday life problems.”

The God Within certainly doesn’t confine our behavior. The “promptings of one’s inner self aren’t necessarily identical to the promptings of the Holy Spirit,” Douthat writes. “Sometimes the God Within isn’t God at all, but just the ego or the libido, using spirituality as a convenient gloss for its own desires and impulses.” How sad when a society thinks that the only commandment we should adhere to is “Don’t be a jerk.”

The end result:

“A nation of narcissists turns out to be a nation of gamblers and speculators, gluttons and gym obsessives, pornographers and Ponzi schemers, in which household debt rises alongside public debt, and bankers and pensioners and automakers and unions all compete to empty the public trough.”

Douthat suggests four reasons for hope:

“1. The rootlessness of our postmodern age will finally motivate a return to Christian orthodoxy’s satisfying account of human origins and destiny;

2. Our culture’s corruption will accelerate the growth of communities of virtue;

3. The flame of faith will fan out from the increasingly Christian global South;

4. The new millennium’s various crises may well revive faith, as the ravages of war did before.”

All this, Ross Douthat insists, will require a faith that is “political without being partisan,” “ecumenical but also confessional,” “moralistic but also holistic,” and “oriented toward sanctity and beauty.” As Douthat pleads, “only sanctity can justify Christianity’s existence; only sanctity can make the case for faith; only sanctity, or the hope thereof, can ultimately redeem the world.”

What all Girls Should Know before Having Sex

Rachel Allison

Dr. Miriam Grossman, M.D. worked at a campus counseling center for more than 10 years.  The young women who came to her were in crisis. They were “working hard to fulfill their dreams:  a college education, maybe grad school, a great career, and—at some point—a home, husband, and kids.”  But they come to her office in tears because of struggles and setbacks caused by decisions and regrets. “She’s already involved with the wrong guy, or infected with genital warts or herpes.  She’s already lost a great relationship, missed an opportunity, or failed a midterm.  I’m her doctor, but all I can do is sit there, listen, and hand her tissues.”

Dr. Grossman’s book “Unprotected” should be a must read for every teenager in the United States, Canada, England, France…ok, the world. But until parents and youth leaders can get them their must read copy, here are a few things Dr. Grossman has prepared for young women to read before the regrets begin …information young girls should know before sexual intimacy.

1.  Intimacy promotes attachment and trust.

Intimate behavior floods your brain with a chemical that fuels attachment. Cuddling, kissing, and sexual contact release oxytocin, a hormone that announces: “I’m with someone special now. Time to switch love on, and caution off.  When oxytocin levels are high, you’re more likely to overlook your partner’s faults and take risks you otherwise wouldn’t…

When it comes to sex, oxytocin, like alcohol, turns red lights green.  It plays a major role in what’s called “the biochemistry of attachment.”  Because of it, you could develop feelings for a guy whose last intention is to bond with you. You might think of him all day, but he can’t remember your name.

2.  Science confirms:  alcohol makes him hot…when he’s not.

Science has confirmed the existence of “beer goggles”—when a person seems more attractive to you after you’ve had a few drinks….Drinking affects the nucleus accumbens, the area of the brain used to determine facial attractiveness.  It’s probably one of several reasons that casual, high-risk sex is often preceded by alcohol consumption.

3.  A hook-up usually leads to regret.

A recent study of  the hook-up culture at Princeton University reveals:  Before the hook-up, girls expect emotional involvement almost twice as often as guys; 34% hope “a relationship might evolve.”  Guys, more than girls, are in part motivated by hopes of improving their social reputation, or of bragging about their exploits to friends the next day.

After the hook-up: 91% of girls admit to having feelings of regret, at least occasionally.  Guilt and ‘feeling used’ are commonly cited, and overall, 80% of girls wish the hook-up hadn’t happened. Other studies have shown: 84% of women said that after having sex a few times, …they begin to feel vulnerable and would at least like to know if the other person cares about them.

As the number of casual sex partners increased, so did signs of depression in college women.  49% of students whose hook-up included intercourse never see one another again, and less than 10% of “friends with benefits” develop into romances.

4.  A younger cervix is more vulnerable to infection.

Your cervix, the entrance to your uterus, has a vulnerable area one cell thick, called the transformation zone. It’s easy for HPV (the human papillomavirus, which can cause genital warts, and even cervical cancer) to settle there. That’s why most teen girls are infected from one of their first sexual partners.  By adulthood the transformation zone is replaced with a thicker, tougher surface.  So it’s wise to delay sexual activity, or, if you’ve already started, to stop.

Even though these infections are common, and usually disappear with time, learning you have one can be devastating. Natural reactions are shock, anger, and confusion. “Who did I get this from, and when? Was he unfaithful? Who should I tell?” and hardest of all: “Who will want me now?”

These concerns can affect your mood, concentration, and sleep.  They can deal a serious blow to your self-esteem…and to your GPA.

The HPV vaccine is a major achievement, but the protection it provides is limited.  You are still vulnerable to other infections like herpes, Chlamydia, HIV, and non-covered strains of HPV.  And of course no vaccine prevents a broken heart.

5.  He may not know he has HPV or herpes.

Most guys who have a sexually transmitted infection don’t know it….it’s easiest to transmit herpes or HPV when warts or sores are present, but it can also happen at other times, when everything looks OK. Condoms only reduce the risk by 60-70%.

6.  The rectum is an exit, not an entrance.

And about those other sexual activities…

Having more than five oral-sex partners has been associated with throat cancer. Turns out that HPV can cause malignant tumors in the throat, just like it does in the cervix.

In a study of sexually active college men, HPV was found both where you’d expect—the genital area—and where you wouldn’t: under fingernails.  Yes, you read that right.  Researchers now speculate whether the virus can be shared during activities considered “safe,” like mutual masturbation.

According to the Centers for disease Control, approximately 30% of all women will have had anal intercourse by the age of 24.  Even with condoms, this behavior places them at increased risk of infection with HIV and other STDs.  For example, the risk of HIV transmission during anal intercourse is at least 20 times higher than with vaginal intercourse.

The government website, www.fda.gov, provides no-nonsense advise about avoiding HIV:  “Condoms provide some protection, but anal intercourse is simply too dangerous to practice.”

The rectum is an exit, not an entrance.  Anal penetration is hazardous.  Don’t do it.

“Young women are bombarded with the message: “Exploring and experimenting—as long as you’re “protected”—can be safe, satisfying, and beneficial.”

“Don’t fall for it.  It’s easy to forget, but the characters on Grey’s Anatomy and Sex in the City are not real.  In real life, Meredith and Carrie would have warts or herpes.  They’d likely be on Prozac or Zoloft.  Today a woman cannot have so many partners with paying a price….We’re fighting a horde of bugs, and the bugs are winning.  It’s no longer enough to communicate with your “partners,” get tested, and use condoms.”

“Any genital contact with another person is a serious matter. A single encounter can have life-long consequences, especially for a woman. That’s not sexist, that’s biology—your biology. Ignorance or denial of this fact will only increase your vulnerability.”

“You’re in control, it’s all in your hands.  The distress that often follows casual sex is 100% preventable.  Life may throw you some curve balls, but STDs, and encounters you’d rather forget, are burdens that you can avoid.”

“Listen to the lesson of hard science:  It’s wise to be very, very careful about who you allow to get intimately close to you.”

Dr. Grossman concludes:  “I believe in you.  And I don’t want to see you in my office.  Now go pursue your dreams.”

This information was taken from the booklet, Sense & Sexuality, prepared by Dr. Miriam Grossman for college coeds.

Free Birth Control: There may be Pros but don’t Discount the Cons

Rachel Allison

This week I received an email from a good friend. Among other news, she wrote that she had gone to pick up her birth control pills and was told, “No Charge.”

My first thought? “It has begun! Unrestricted sex for everyone!

With her email she sent a link to an article  entitled  “Free Birth Control Means Drastic Drops in Unplanned Pregnancies.” The article triumphantly touts that  “the number of unplanned pregnancies and abortions didn’t just go down, they plummeted.” This was the result of a study that was done between 2007 and 2011.

“Birth control was offered to more than 9,000 St. Louis teens and adults who were also educated about their options. The study subjects were aged 14 to 45…. All were considered at risk of unplanned pregnancies and were willing to try a new birth control method.”

Results?…”Drum roll: The free birth control program reduced unplanned pregnancies substantially and cut the abortion rate by 62  to 78 percent over the national rate…

The results were published online recently in the journal Obstetrics & Gynecology. They found that from 2008 to 2010, the abortion rate ranged from 4.4 to 7.5 for every 1,000 women. For 2008 (the last year calculated) the national abortion rate was 19.6 per 1,000 women.”

“The birth rate among the girls aged 15 to 19 in the study was 6.3 per 1,000. That’s far below the U.S. rate of 34.3 for every 1,000 girls of that age range.”

The article was a “feel good” read.  We should cheer the results and expect no less from Obamacare’s free birth control mandate.

However, I hit reply to my friend’s email and sent her an article of my own that I’m sure dashed her jubilation to pieces. It’s title, “24,000 U.S. Women Become Infertile Every Year From Undiagnosed STIs”  tells in part the disheartening results of unabated sexual freedom.

 “Many tend to think of HIV or maybe syphilis as the serious one. But gonorrhea and chlamydia can and do cause a lot of infertility. Twenty-four thousand women in the U.S. become infertile every year as a result of undiagnosed STIs according to the same CDC data. Most women who have chlamydia or gonorrhea have no symptoms, which make awareness and access to screening especially important. We’re still catching so few of the cases. Among 15-24 year-olds infected with Gonorrhea only 200,000 of the estimated 570,000 who have the infection are diagnosed and treated.

Chlamydia:  Only 1 million of the  estimated 1.8 million are diagnosed and treated.

After I sent the email I remembered an interview I read recently touting a book written by Ms. Donna Freitas entitled, “The End of Sex: How Hookup Culture is Leaving a Generation Unhappy, Sexually Unfulfilled, and Confused About Intimacy.” According to the author students have come to realize that even though “hook ups” are supposed to symbolize the modern mind set,  “Don’t get attached,” many students are finding that it is almost impossible to “walk away emotionally unscathed and not caring.”  They’re just not good at it.  I haven’t read the book, but Ms. Freitas claims that it is the males who are being hurt.  I will have to read her book to figure out her reasoning.

Dr. Miriam Grossman’s book entitled “Unprotected” which I have read sights the opposite.  It is the young women whose lives are being robbed of the normalcy that accompanies healthy, loving, and loyal relationships.

After reading “Unprotected” I had a knot in my stomach that made me physically sick.

This sexual freedom that is supposedly liberating both male and female from “all consequences” is a big lie.  The men involved may be dealing with concern and regret, but it is the women who are being hurt…wounded…damaged…injured…I can’t find a strong enough word that describes the consequences to a woman having sex with multiple partners.  Over time the giving of herself, and then the rejection that follows will destroy a woman…if not physically, then emotionally.

Katie Collins, Research Assistant to Dr. Grossman wrote, “Our culture does not properly honor sexual intimacy, and the cost is the health and hearts of countless young people.”

Sex without consequences is one of the biggest lies being disseminated across this country.  Free contraceptives may reduce unwanted babies from becoming the victims of this sex-crazed society, but young women of caliber are being broken, confused, misled and defeated.  That is a travesty in this world of “caring” and “compassion” and so called “women’s rights.”

“Lioness at the Gate”

Rachel Allison

As major conferences are held at the United Nations, men and women from all over the world come to New York City to support a particular cause or share their grievances with those who will listen.  Many plan what are called “side events” and these side events are calendared and publicized with the hopes that conference participants will attend.

In 2007 I was attending The Conference, Commission on the Status of Women, and I attended one such side event that was taking place.

Five beautiful women, all from Sweden, had traveled to New York City to ask that their roles as “mother” and their desire to be a “stay-at-home mother” be acknowledged as a meaningful, respectable and even crucial role in society.

Their grievance was that unless Swedish women are working outside the home they are looked down upon as non-contributors of society…even parasites of those willing to work for the betterment of Sweden and its economy.

One woman shared with us the statistics of Sweden’s growth and envied economy.  But she said that the statistics that are not so commonly shared are the statistics of child suicide and the rampant depression in the women who are told that they can and should “do it all.”  …Be a contributing member of society and a woman who can keep a household and family running in organized and top order.   She said that government call centers have been provided for children who are home and feeling depressed.  But these call centers are not statistically diminishing the suicide rate.

As these five young women spoke out about their frustrations and their desire to be considered contributing members of society as they stay home to care for their children, my heart ached for them and the children of such a culture.

In more recent years I spoke with a Swedish woman who did not have the same impression of her country.  She felt that her government did encourage women to stay at home at least during the first years of their children’s lives.  She was an older woman, more a grandmother’s age.  And I wondered where the truth actually lies.

I recently read an article by Julie B. Beck where she referred to a mother’s role as being compared with a “Lioness at the gate of the home….she guards that gate, and things matter to that family if they matter to her.”  I have thought about that analogy numberless times, and as I have reflected upon the years when my five active children were in the home, I can see that her comparison is extremely insightful.  My thoughts have turned to the numerous times with each of my children when if I had not been available or vigilant or willing to “snarl and claw” my children could have been “carried away” by the influences that exist to destroy their productive lives.  Anyone having had teenage children will know exactly what I’m talking about…. teenagers living in our society need I lioness standing guard, not a pussy cat, or worse yet a distracted pussy cat.

Those who attended the UN side event were as frustrated with the situation as the five women living it in their home country. The debate and conversation was spirited and supportive of their plight.

At one point I spoke saying, “We can have it all…and we can do it all.  After all, we are women.  However, there is a time and a season to all things.  There is a season for us to get our education and develop talents and skills.  And there is a season to have children and love and support and teach and guide them until they can travel through life on their own.  And there is a time and season for a career and self-indulgence.  But these seasons of our lives do not run concurrently.  Most of the time they come in consequential order and spacing.  That is the only way we can have it all and take care of that which is most important for the season of our lives we are in.  It’s when we try to do things out of season that our efforts are frustrated and we experience failure.”  Neither my thoughts nor words were  original. I do not take credit for them.   They are found in Ecclesiastes Chapter 3.  And the entire room erupted in applause and a standing ovation.  The truth rings true to those that “hear.”

 

 

Five Reasons to be a Single Parent? Give me a Break!

Rachel Allison

My children are pretty savvy…at least their mother thinks so.  However, periodically one or another will surprise me with a statement that proves that he’s not as “in the know” as he should be.  By sighting a few statistics or studies, my child has learned to verbally back off the issue until further investigation.

Where is Kerry Zane’s mother? Kerry Zane is an Emmy Award-winning television producer who wrote an article in the Huffington Post entitled “5 Reasons It’s Better to be a Single Parent.”  Unbelievably the Huffington Post published it.  Why unbelievably?  Because any reader who has studied family issues knows that Ms. Zane’s article is totally self serving and full of error. The HP is now the “clock that struck 13,”  casting doubt over all previous and future articles.

Ms. Zane’s reasons?

1.  “I no longer have to negotiate with a husband. “ I now get to make all the decisions “which in the long run is better for [my] offspring’s well-being.”

2.  “Stellar Independent Role Model:” (check out her #4 reason to see if #2 makes any sense at all.) Her daughters can see that she is a “completely whole and independent adult, and they will emulate her healthy behaviors.”  (Again, check out her #4.)

3. “Since society is shifting away from bonds of matrimony,” her children will be “enlightened and possibly relieved that they are no longer tied to that traditional lifestyle…Long-term relationships without wedding bands can be stronger.” (LOL)

4.  “Bed sharing not required:  Married couples may have more sex, but it isn’t nearly as much fun.  While they constantly have to “spice it up” in the bedroom, the nature of being single and switching partners does all the cooking for us.  We tease, experiment, and explore the bawdy awareness of every new lover.  Men and women, make the sex hotter during the first two years of a relationship. “ (Uh, is that a two year long-term relationship without wedding bands that can be stronger?  Why did she limit the “hot sex” to two years?  Is that when the guy or gal move on?)

5.  “Building a better body:  Marriages are like your freshman year in college.  You have the tendency to pack on the pounds.  One study found that women could gain five to eight pounds in the first few years of their wedded bliss and a whopping 54 pounds by the ten-year mark, while their single counterparts stay slim.  Most of us have an overriding desire to want to be attractive to prospective mates of the opposite sex.  The result of a divorce?  A slimmer, trimmer you—aka the divorce Diet.”  (It’s still all about #4)

Statistics from SingleParentSuccess.org

• In 1995, nearly six of 10 children living with mothers only were near the poverty line. About 45 percent of children raised by divorced mothers and 69 percent by never-married mothers lived in or near poverty, which was $13,003 for a family of three in 1998. Census Brief CENBR/97-1, Bureau of the Census www.census.gov, September 1997.
• 75% of children/adolescents in chemical dependency hospitals are from single-parent families. (Center for Disease Control, Atlanta, GA)
• 63% of suicides are individuals from single parent families (FBI Law Enforcement Bulletin – Investigative Aid)
• 75% of teenage pregnancies are adolescents from single parent homes (Children in need: Investment Strategies…Committee for Economic Development)
• Based on the National Health and Social Life Survey (NHSLS) results of married couples’ sexual activities, women generally seem happier with their sex lives than we would think; Although married women have sex less frequently, they are more likely to derive physical and emotional satisfaction from sex, than women in dating relationships.

I’m a 60 years old  wife, mother and grandmother. I certainly don’t pretend to be all knowing, but I can see Ms. Zane’s article for what it is… narcissistic, selfish, un-researched nonsense.  What upsets me most is that the HP’s younger readers may actually fall for all her worthless baloney.  Does anyone know Kerry Zane’s mother?

The Best and the Worst of Feminism: A comparison of UN Events

Editor’s note:  Another in a series of articles describing the various “parallel events” at the UN Commission on the Status of Women (CSW) 2013.

Ethan Foster

Friends of the UN believe international government is too good to be true and desire the most effective institutions. Opponents fear the UN is too true to be good and hope for an ineffective global power structure. However, both groups should consider the effect that feminism has on the UN, where numerous viewpoints are exchanged by nearly two-hundred nations. Currently, feminism is a philosophy for the empowerment of women and the absolute, leveling equality of political standing, gender roles, and societal function. If one attends different Side-Events at the Commission on the Status of Women, one realizes the advantages and disadvantages of the feminist voice.

Feminism at its Best: an Ineffective Servant

A Side-Event devoted to the “Safety of Women Journalists” reveals the feminist perspective at its best. The opening remarks from Austrian minister Martin Sajdik introduced the subject of violence against journalists as especially pertinent to women. The attending minister from Costa- Rica concurred, adding that the past year marked a 33% increase in journalist killings, reaching a historical all-time high. Recorded violence against women was especially prevalent, and the report highlighted increased instances of intimidation, threats, detainment, torture, rape, and killing.

The subject of women became a hangnail in a larger discussion about violence against journalists. The first panel speaker, Lauren Wolfe, stressed that this is not a women’s issue but a journalists’ issue. Men and women are targeted and attacked in different ways. Females are frequently raped in mobs, but males are often detained by authorities and imprisoned in foreign countries. Another journalist claimed that violence against women is not significantly worse, but different. Of the four panelists, one of the journalists insisted that women were especially under siege, while the other three identified a larger problem and exhorted governments to rescue journalists from a growing international danger.

Violence against journalists is a growing threat, but the tools of feminism are too narrow and specific to assist in a legitimate international problem. When a good question demands a feminist answer, the result is unhelpful because feminism provides an incomplete cross-section of society, packaged with a distorted philosophy. At its best, the feminist solutions for empowerment and equality prove ineffective in the face of important global concerns.

Opponents of the United Nations should recognize that feminism provides a skewed worldview for addressing questions far outside its reach. It paralyzes legitimate discussion on important issues by seeking to fulfill a specialized agenda. Lovers of the United Nations should recognize that feminism is not a holistic philosophy, but an incomplete methodology. If anything, feminism should restrain itself to the questions it is designed to answer.

 Feminism at its Worst: a Terrible Master

When the feminist agenda leads discussions at the United Nations, it becomes worse than unhelpful. The movement defines all inequality as “Violence against Women.”  Anything short of equality is violent. Thus, contemporary feminists focus on social development, re-engineering, and re-education. For example, Norway hosted a Side Event titled, “Gender-Based Violence Prevention as a Human Right and a Legally Binding State Obligation.”

The minister from Norway opened with an exhortation for leveling gender roles and power imbalances between the sexes. Norway had already achieved policies that encouraged men to become “caregivers,” thereby making them more empathetic, docile, and nonviolent. The minister also promoted new scientific developments such as “electronic tagging,” setting apart violent male threats from the rest of society.

In addition, Norway boasts feminist- operated rehabilitation clinics for aggressive men. The “state” has taken the feminine gender and the role of the nanny. Inequality is violence against women, which in turn is violence against children, and violence against children is violence against society and the future. Therefore, it is in the best interest of society for the state to provide caregivers for children who experience violence in the home, whether physical or psychological. To do so, however, the state must first deconstruct existing power structures, namely, the traditional family.

The minister from South Africa added that one out of every three women is raped in her lifetime. She argued that the state must develop methods of intervention, protection, empowerment, and prosecution. Society must intervene by redefining masculinity, protecting victims, and empowering women. In addition, South Africa is testing new court-systems that are exclusively devoted to sexual crimes, based on the idea that men cannot be trusted alone with the court system.

Jody Williams, a Nobel Prize winner and activist since Vietnam, argued that the patriarchal system is inherently evil. She advocated a dismantling effort at the grassroots level. Gary Barker, another panelist, countered that men have deep-seated empathy and nonviolence that needs reawakening. Governments must pass laws promoting equality, but campaigns should cater to men in nuanced media approaches that offer positive messages on the proper treatment of women while promoting empathy and the virtues of caregiving. Men need to participate in this process.

When the floor opened for questions, a woman stood and introduced herself as Thomas. She declared that feminists should give up on men and focus entirely on controlling the education of the young. Thomas voiced the disgust of the female audience and panelists. For them it seemed obvious that men were to blame for societal ills, and they were the heroes who would liberate society from itself.

With the entire feminist agenda in view, it’s devastating implications are clear. Equality means the dismantling of the family, the leveling of the military, and the destruction of any institution with gender-specific roles. The state becomes the coercive equalizer by redefining gender roles and engineering a new concept of masculinity. Men and children must be controlled by the state; only such a society could satisfy the insatiable libertine desires of the feminist agenda.

 Final Thoughts

 Evidently, the feminist perspective is most useful when it is limited to a supportive role and unique perspective in a larger analysis. It exacerbates problems when it maintains a radical agenda and narrow worldview. It is inimical to stable governing bodies because it swears allegiance to social-leveling politics by promising a common purpose and injecting viral ideologies into the bloodstream of slow-moving politics.

Ethan Foster is a student of Political Theory at Patrick Henry College. His interests include reading, writing, debating, playing the piano, and beekeeping. Ethan plans on going to law school and hopes to become a political activist on behalf of family values.

 

“We Believe What We Wish to Believe” Analysis of the Session “In Our Right Minds”

Editor’s note:  Another in a series of articles describing the various “parallel events” at the UN Commission on the Status of Women (CSW) 2013.

By Joshua Schow

“A woman uses her intelligence to find reasons to support her intuition” – G.K. Chesterton

From the back of a captive crowd, former actress and current feminist activist Dale Allen reverently approaches the front of the room garbed in a black robe while she clutches a large book. As she solemnly steps through the aisle, she loudly recites quotations from works such as the Hammurabi Code, Aristotelian treatises, Jewish Prayers, Koran passages, Biblical passages, and Fredric Nietzsche’s writings. The theme is clear: men have subjugated women in the most viciously misogynistic ways.

But women need not succumb to this oppression, Allen jubilantly proclaims. With a grand gesture and a dramatic flourish, she closes her prop book while calling upon her sisters to close the book on masculine domination and usher in a New Age of Femininity. Not another word is spoken of these quotations as she folds a black hood over her head, raises her arms in the shape of a crucifix and exuberantly chants “Our Mother who art with us / Each breath brings us to you. / Thy wisdom come, / Thy will be done / as we honor your presence within us.”

The theatrics hardly ceased there, but brevity compels me to forego dramatic description. Allen’s thesis is formulated on the premise of right/left brain thinking. The right brain is the creative, feminine element of the psyche and the left-brain is associated with the logical, masculine elements of thinking. (Note first that most cognitive psychologists reject this dichotomization as simplistic and overly-generalized.) She argued that society has been largely dominated by the left-brain thinking for the better part of the centuries. This left-brain dominance, she suggests is the primary reason for masculine patriarchy.

Her exploration of her thesis covered religious thought and mythology, anthropology, and epistemology indirectly. Regarding religion, she argued that originally humans conceptualized god as a female. Early religions, she claimed championed the cycle of birth, compassion, and nurturing values. It was not until the past 2,500 years that humans moved from matriarchal religions to patriarchal religions. (This theory, while popular among second-wave feminists, has largely been dismissed in the scholarly community.) She argues that text-based religions are characteristically masculine because they rely on left-brain hierarchical thinking.

Her understanding of Christianity is particularly troublesome. First, she suggested that scholars have determined that the original “Trinity” was actual the Holy Father, the Holy Mother, and the Holy Child. Only more recent religious teachings redacted the Creation myth to suggest only masculine identity. Additionally, her historical claims that Constantine’s canonization of the Bible discredited the Gnostic right-brain thinking and led to the left-brain dominance of Christianity is entirely false. First, Constantine did not canonize scripture. Rather it was a much more organic process. Second, canonization had nothing to do with the repudiation of Gnosticism. It was rejected because it was a heresy. Third, Christians had long since based their religious teaching on textual material, whether an informal canon or a reliance on Rabbinic texts. Thus, Christianity must have already been left-brain dominant before the Gnostics even existed. Finally, this entirely ignores the symbolic significance of many of the religious ceremonies in Christianity (i.e. the sacraments). Feminist theorists have targeted biblical scholarship for some time now. However, their arguments have all failed to match the historical and literary robustness of more traditional theories.

Perhaps it is unhelpful to document the scholastic errors here. Unfortunately, the theories of cultural feminism have been pervasive even in the early 1960s with the advent of second-wave feminism. These ideas have gained some popularity among modern feminists. Such thinking is embraced at the Commission on the Status of Women. There is much to be said about engaging the cultural feminist in an academic context. However, it is better to engage them on a deeper, existential level that will speak to their souls. The cultural feminists are not seeking the inner goddess because they have a sound theory to support their search. Instead they are rationalizing their deep spiritual needs by pursuing empty ideology that cannot withstand scrutiny.

 

Joshua Schow is currently a student at Patrick Henry College studying Government. His research interests include international relations, social politics, and sociology.

What kind of person are you?

Kristi Kane

On August 31, 1997, Princess Diana of Wales was killed in a car accident. Six days later, on September 5, Mother Teresa died. It was curious to me that a woman of fame, fortune and title was splashed all over the pages of magazines and newspapers and even had her own special edition, while a poor nun who had given her entire life to the care of the poor had a caption the size of a recipe card.

This is typical of the magazines today. Some are about homes and gardens and recipes, but the majority are covered with beautiful women in beautiful clothes and the cover of the magazine promises to tell you how to look prettier, dress better, and how to have better sex. Others are all about the lives of public figures and their latest scandals. The theme rarely, if ever, varies. That is what sells. Out of curiosity, I regularly look to see if there’s a magazine that promises to tell you how to have a better marriage, a better family, or how to be a kinder person, but I never see it. I look for pictures of men and women who are noted for their good deeds or courageous acts, but I rarely see those either. I doubt I ever will.

Every Wednesday, I go to visit my 87-year-old grandma. She is outstanding in every way. She was a child during the Great Depression, sent a husband off to World War II, and together with my grandpa, raised eight children upon his return. I think of her as the Unsinkable Molly Brown. She’s got a kind of titanium steel in her spine that time has not worn away.

As I said, she’s 87. I doubt the world would line up to take her photograph or want her on the cover of their magazines, but she would be on the cover of every magazine if the topics were on kindness, wisdom, long-suffering, honesty, common sense, or love of God, family and country. To me, she is the most beautiful woman ever. Her inner core of all that is good and wholesome makes her beautiful. And each life she touches, she touches for good.

Time stops for no one. That’s just a fact. We will all age, some better or worse than others, but we all age. The worst thing I’ve ever seen is when someone is old but foolish, or old but unkind. I think what a waste it is that they’ve been on the earth this whole time but haven’t really learned anything of value. They don’t treat others well, they’re unkind to those around them. They’ve been on the earth a long time and haven’t learned a darn thing. Not anything of worth anyway.

For a date night some 20 years ago, my husband and I saw the movie Enchanted April. The ending we were expecting was not the ending we got, and I could not believe how pleasantly surprised and relieved I was. I won’t give the ending of the movie away because it is so worth seeing.  Lady Caroline Dester, (played by Polly Walker) plays a wealthy English woman who is enjoying her youth, her wealth, her parties, and her beauty. And yet there comes a time when she discovers that she is bored with it all and thinks there must be something more to life. On a whim, she joins three other women for a trip to a castle in Italy to enjoy, in solace, the month of April.

One day she is walking about the gardens and thinks, “I have wasted so much time being beautiful.” I have thought about that line many, many times over the years, and every time I look in the mirror, it makes more sense. Over the years, my looks have faded. I am not the same slender young woman I used to be. But when I chose the role of wife and mother I had a choice. I could either think of my husband and children first and learn the virtues of patience, kindness and love, or I could be resentful and bitter that having children crimped my once carefree lifestyle.  Now, instead of being thin, I have the abs of a marsupial. I made my choice, and I hope that just maybe, I will one day be as beautiful as my grandma.

Which Part of the Following Did you Buy/Are You Buying/Will You Buy?

Maddi Gillel

 “Lenin, and later Joseph Stalin, determined that in order to maintain control of the people it would be necessary to completely destroy the family and re-structure it. They passed a law that one could obtain a divorce simply by mailing or delivering a postcard to the local register without the necessity of even notifying the spouse being divorced. This state, along with the communist encouragement of sexual immorality during marriage, approval of abortion, and forcing women out of the home into the workforce, accomplished its purpose of destroying the Russian family.”  -Soviet expert Mikhail Heller

I graduated from high school and attended college during the 60’s.  High school was alright, but when I went to college, many of the attitudes of the 60’s were being adopted, and in one particular class, the teacher was buying it all and spreading it to us.  I was ridiculed one day in class for my religious activities – by the teacher, and followed up by a few of the students.  I did not like the 60’s.  I didn’t agree with anything that was going on.

You might have guessed that I am reading a book called “The Marketing of Evil” by David Kupelian.  It is excellent.  He states that there were some far-reaching happenings in the 60’s that began the downward spiral of the family in our culture:

1-    Governor Reagan signed the no-fault divorce law (which he later regretted). This traveled like wildfire to all 50 states within a few years.

2-    Kennedy’s assassination – a national shock which signaled the end of American’s innocence.

3-    The Vietnam War – This war was ideologically waged for a noble cause: to help the Vietnamese fight the communists who were invading their country, but the war was executed disastrously by incompetent leaders, so it became controversial and divided our nation.

4-    Rock music invasion from England (Beatles, Rolling Stones) exerted a powerful hold on America’s youth and soon introduced the psychedelic drug culture.

5-    Widespread confusion among America’s churches and churchgoers over God.  “IS GOD DEAD?” became THE question of the time. This caused anxiety and uncertainty which caused a vacuum into which all kinds of alien philosophies and beliefs flooded: occultism, paganism, channeling, and New Age practices of every conceivable sort.  This also opened up a torrent of “liberation” movements:  sexual, women’s, and gays.

There were other factors that helped roll this revolution along, but you get the idea.

I was too young to realize all this was happening, but I knew that our culture was becoming more and more unsettled and angry.  As I said before, I was sometimes alone in my beliefs and activities if they were contrary to the new belief system invading our world.  I didn’t like any of it.  I didn’t buy into any of it.

Where do we go from here?

• How about a serious return to family?– champion the family, defend it, make sure our family is as strong and healthy as possible.
• How about a return to religion? Let’s see what the scriptures say about how to live this life.  Let’s attend our church every Sunday. Let’s give service and kindness and patience to our friends and neighbors.  Learn how to pray.  Prayers are answered!
• How about a return to some serious development of our gray matter. Turn off the tv- which is written for 8^th grade minds.  Let’s put down some of the technology we’re addicted to.  How about reading a book by Victor Hugo, or Mark Twain, or Jack London, or Ayn Rand.
  
• How about a visit to the mountains, or beach, or desert and enjoy some of God’s creations.

There really are ways that we can either be at war with our soul, or at peace.  It all depends on what we buy into.

 

“Hooking Up”—Is it Really Worth it?

Rachel Allison

Last week I wrote about Hydeia Broadbent, a young woman’s crusade to stop HIV/AIDS.

This week I want to write about some of the “lesser” sexually-transmitted diseases and other problems that are caused by “hooking up.”

There are 19 million new infections of sexually transmitted gonorrhea, chlamydia, and syphilis yearly, which cost $17 billion to treat each year.  But there are others—human papillomavirus, herpes, genital warts, hepatitis, trichomoniasis, and scabies, to name just a few.  The World Health Organization says that there “are more than 30 different sexually transmissible bacteria, viruses and parasites.”  Treatment for those in the United States is also in the billions of dollars per year—that is when they’re treatable and not drug resistant.

Assuming that everyone who is having sex is aware of STDs,  I am quite sure that they don’t understand the consequences that those diseases will bring to their lives.  One woman tells her story when she learned she had Genital Herpes.  I can’t imagine the emotional trauma such a discovery would cause.  As a teenager my doctor told me I had athlete’s foot, and emotionally I felt “dirty” until the creams and ointments cleared up the fungus.

Unfortunately, casual sex is expected by too many, and practically revered by  leftists.  Enter Sandra Fluke publicly demanding that free contraception be given to all sexually-active women. I wonder why someone didn’t argue that the monetary cost of complimentary contraception is miniscule compared with the cost of treating the STD’s that will be transmitted during all that “free” sex.

The facts:

• According to a recent CDC (Center for Disease Control) survey only 60% of high-school students who have had sex used a condom the last time they had intercourse.

50% of HS students say they’ve had sex at least once. (This statistic may be low because many don’t consider oral sex as “sex.”)

• According to the AP article entitled “1 in 4 teen girls has a sexually transmitted disease” not only did 25 percent of teenage girls have an STD, “among those who admitted to having sex, the rate was even more disturbing—40 percent had an STD.”  Black girls suffered worst:  48 percent of them had an STD.

The National Cancer Institute at the National Institute of Health stated that the human papillomavirus, which is “spread through direct skin-to-skin contact during vaginal, anal, and oral sex, causes virtually all cervical cancers and most anal cancers and some vaginal, vulvar, penile, and oropharyngeal cancers (cancers in the middle part of the throat.)” And the risk isn’t limited to women. The title of a 2011 NBCNews.com article adequately sums up the situation:  “Cancer spike, mainly in men, tied to HPV from oral sex.”  The article added that “we can expect some 10,000 to 15,000 patients with the oropharyngeal cancers per year in the United States, with the great majority having HPV-positive (cancers.) “High risk HPV infections account for approximately 5 percent of cancers worldwide.”

According to the CDC, “Chlamydia and gonorrhea are important preventable causes of infertility,” even though “most women infected with Chlamydia or gonorrhea have no symptoms.  There are “an estimated 2.8 million cases of Chlamydia and 718,000 cases of gonorrhea that occur annually in the United States.” Each year untreated STDs cause 24,000 women in the US to become infertile.”  STD’s cause approximately one-fourth of all infertility in women, and treatment to rectify infertility can be very costly.

I won’t elaborate on how STD’s affect babies.  But babies can get the dread disease from their mothers causing stillbirths, low birth weight (less than five pounds), conjunctivitis (eye infection) pneumonia, neonatal sepsis (infection in the baby’s blood stream), neurologic damage, blindness, deafness, acute hepatitis, meningitis, chronic liver disease, and cirrhosis.

STD’s truly are “the gift that keep on giving.”

Again I will ask, “Where is the outcry?”  If there were enough voices outraged by the outright disregard of the issue that is bringing so much emotional and physical pain, death and monetary waste, maybe…just maybe we could help bring this deception to the forefront.