My Body, My Life, My Death, My Choice: Mine!

 

Perpetuating Moral Childhood and the Decline of the West

The West is losing its religion, and, perhaps, there’s no greater indication of it than the clamor for “my rights!”

“My right” to off my offspring.

“My right” to off myself.

“My right” to marry whomever (and how many, coming soon) I want, no matter how it violates the natural order of family and marriage.

“My right” to protest the flag and anthem of the country that made my abundantly privileged American life possible.

The rights-ethic western civilization has developed is the photo-negative of the Christian Gospel (with a loving hat-tip to our Jewish brothers), which is briefly summarized in St. Paul’s letter to the Philippians (2:5-8):

…Jesus Christ, who, though he was in the form of God, did not regard equality with God something to be grasped. Rather, he emptied himself, taking the form of a slave, coming in human likeness; and found human in appearance, he humbled himself becoming obedient to the point of death, even death on a cross.

What is being conveyed here? The highest form of being (God Himself – the Great I Am) is one of self-donation in service to the good of others. It is self-abnegation – the very opposite of grubby humans grasping at “rights” or anything else.

This post was inspired by a recent series of articles I’ve read recounting and explaining the moral and cultural degradation of the West, which was affirmed in a homily given by Bishop Robert Barron, titled, “You Are Not Your Own.” In it, Bishop Barron refers to the work of Fr. Richard Rohr on the initiation rituals of primitive peoples, and how their aim is to introduce adolescents to adulthood by making apparent the adult facts of life, and, ultimately, by bringing the youngsters into contact with the sacred:

  1. Life is hard,
  2. You are not that important,
  3. You are not in control,
  4. You’re going to die,
  5. Your life is not about you.

Nearly every child not already living in hardship and dysfunction believes the complete opposite of these things. All her needs are met and then some. Her helicopter parents lead her to believe she is the center of the universe. She controls everyone around her with the slightest frown or wrinkle of her nose indicating her disappointment. Dying is what old people do. And, by all appearances, her life is completely and utterly about her desires being met and any suffering (or natural consequences) being avoided. This might be reasonable thinking in a six-year-old. But, lately, we’re seeing it in 20-, 30-, and 46-year-olds. What gives?

I believe it is a worthwhile effort to connect the dots between this series of articles on complex issues about which I have only a superficial understanding. Bear with me.

Let’s begin in late 18th-century Germany (it’s always the Germans, isn’t it? I’m allowed to say that given my extensive German ancestry) via Robert Curry’s brief and excellent article explaining “What’s the Matter with Germany.” Curry’s article helped me understand our inclusion of Germany as part of “the West” is in error. Germany is the ideological home of the counter-Enlightenment (Romanticism) and the postmodernism which afflicts the West, most profoundly and with genocidal effects in the two world wars of the 20th century. Curry cites the work of Gertrude Himmelfarb (The Roads to Modernity: The British, French, and American Enlightenments), Stephen Hicks (Explaining Postmodernism: Skepticism and Socialism from Rousseau to Foucault), and quotes directly Isaiah Berlin (The Roots of Romanticism):

…common sense, moderation, was very far from their thoughts … there was a great turning towards emotionalism … an outbreak of craving for the infinite … admiration of wild genius, outlaws, heroes, aestheticism, self-destruction.

Sound familiar? Berlin again:

This is the beginning of … the Nietzschean figure who wishes to raze to the ground a society whose system of values is such that a superior person … cannot operate in terms of it, and therefore prefers to destroy it … [who] prefers self-destruction, suicide…

Curry uses this to explain Angela Merkel’s apparent death-wish-by-Islamists. She stubbornly insists on accepting Muslim “refugees” despite the objective harm they are causing her people and their culture. It’s irrational, but it suits her romantic ideals.

But, wait. It gets worse. Even prior to Germans attempting to destroy other nations (WWI and WWII) and destroying themselves (under Merkel), one of them discovered perhaps the most insidious and humanly irresistible ways to the self-destruction of any human society ever conceived: the sexual revolution.

It was through J. Douglas Johnson’s article, “An Explanation for the Bewildered,” I was introduced to Wilhelm Reich, Sigmund Freud’s colleague, a self-described Freudo-Marxist, and the man who coined the term, “sexual revolution.” But, despite our contemporary notion of the sexual revolution as simply sexual liberality, Reich conceived the idea with malice aforethought. From Johnson’s article:

Karl Marx taught that the “first requisite for the happiness of the people is the abolition of religion,” which in Europe and Russia meant Judaism and Christianity. Reich believed that his sexual revolution would eradicate the Jewish and Christian faith. Pay attention closely now, it is necessary to connect the dots.

Wilhelm Reich understood that religious faith is sustained and passed down through the natural family. And so he concluded that the natural family must be dethroned, disrupted, and ultimately redefined to cut off this contagion of faith. Fatherless homes aren’t church-going homes, which is why the officially atheist Soviet Union abolished the term “illegitimate children” as one of its first decrees, followed by the streamlining of Russian divorce laws.

But Reich knew the brute forces of the Soviet government would never work in Europe and America. There, he said, the family would have to destroy itself from within. And so he formulated a plan to do just that. And once his plan was underway, Reich said, no power on earth would be able to stop it.

Reich correctly surmised that the way to knock the props out from underneath the American family would be to condition Western man to see contraception, fornication, adultery, pornography, sodomy, etc. as perfectly normal and not unhealthy things. And he saw sex education in schools as the best way to “divest parents of their moral authority.” The late Italian philosopher Augusto Del Noce described Reich’s book The Sexual Revolution as “the Mein Kampf of permissivism.”

“The Mein Kampf of permissivism” seems worth repeating. It’s only a short step from “that which is not prohibited is permitted” to “that which is permitted is my right.” This is especially true in a society which has come to believe (term used ironically) that rights descend from government (its laws and their enforcement) rather than Nature (natural rights) and Nature’s God, a la Chuck Todd.

Where does that leave us? I’ll get back to the destructive sexual consequences shortly, but first, let’s revisit the NFL protest. Bill Kilgore (a pseudonym for a writer currently serving in the US military) deftly weaves together the problem of rights versus obligations and right versus wrong in “Trump, Football, and Natural Right(s).” It isn’t that NFL players don’t have a “right” to exercise the First Amendment on the field during the national anthem. It’s that they’re wrong to do it. They may think they’re signaling their social justice virtue, but what they’re really showing us is their ignorance of and ingratitude for their cultural heritage (thanks, postmodern public school system!).

If you look at the present state of children in any society, we will see the future that our world can expect tomorrow. Show me your civic lessons of today and I will show you your civic leaders of tomorrow. Show me your history lessons of today and I will show you your political leaders of tomorrow. Show me the loving bonds between your families today and I will show you the patriotism and moral clarity of your nation tomorrow. Our choices on how we raise and educate our children will in fact provide the blueprint for the next generation.

These words were spoken by Melania Trump in a little-publicized speech to the United Nations (surprise!). She is speaking the language of Lincoln’s civic religion (“the solemn pride … to have laid so costly a sacrifice upon the altar of freedom”), which has been virtually eliminated in this country’s schools, with the exception of little outposts of western civilization in small towns and a couple colleges unreachable by the leftist-infected government. It isn’t just Judaism and Christianity the West is losing … I’d like to see the NFL players protest the loss of patriotism!

Finally, the destructive rights-ethics, postmodern concepts originating in Germany and spreading like syphilis in a whorehouse throughout the West aren’t just destroying society and families; they’re destroying individuals. Jennifer Roback Morse makes the case that Harvey Weinstein’s victims are the fallout from the sexual revolution and the feminist sexual entitlement mentality in her article, “Toxic Ideas Enabled Harvey Weinstein’s Enablers.” I believe it. And Ben Shapiro argues that the next step down the slope is the normalization of pedophilia in “Hollywood Star Embraces Incest.” I’ll believe that, too, as soon as we learn Kevin Spacey’s fate.

There’s an answer to this. It’s in the authentic virtues inculcated and reinforced every weekend in your local church and synagogue. It’s summarized in Christ’s answer to the question, “Which is the greatest commandment?”

‘Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind.’ This is the first and greatest commandment. And the second is like it: ‘Love your neighbor as yourself.’ All the Law and the Prophets hang on these two commandments.

And also in his words, “There is no greater love than to lay down one’s life for one’s friends.” It’s not about what you’re owed – it’s about what you owe. It starts with parents forming their own consciences and then doing their part to raise their children to be virtuous adults and good citizens.

If you wish to save western civilization, you’ll get thy rear ends back in the pew this weekend and stop sending thy kids to public schools and paying university leftists’ salaries.

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  1. Western Chauvinist Member
    Western Chauvinist
    @WesternChauvinist

    Now, don’t say anything interesting. I have to go carve pumpkins!

    • #1
  2. Majestyk Member
    Majestyk
    @Majestyk

    What are these “pews” you speak of?

    • #2
  3. DocJay Inactive
    DocJay
    @DocJay

    Hard to maintain the values best in life when the world shoves the glorification of selfishness down our throats.

    • #3
  4. Western Chauvinist Member
    Western Chauvinist
    @WesternChauvinist

    Majestyk (View Comment):
    What are these “pews” you speak of?

    Not that kind!

    Besides, isn’t that, “SHOO, SHOO, SHOO?” Or is that young one pretending to have a gun? Must be a male.

    • #4
  5. Nick H Coolidge
    Nick H
    @NickH

    Western Chauvinist: If you wish to save western civilization, you’ll get thy rear ends back in the pew this weekend and stop sending thy kids to public schools

    I agree 100% with the first part of this statement but not as much the second. If every right-thinking parent took their kids out of public schools, they’d be taking away what little influence we have with the institutions that are teaching the next generation. We are not of this world, but we must live in this world. We’re not called to separate ourselves from everyone headed down the wrong path, but to be with them to help lead the way to righteousness. It’s a lot more work to raise children when you have to counter the negative influences that the world brings into their lives, but no one said we’d have it easy doing it right.

    • #5
  6. Western Chauvinist Member
    Western Chauvinist
    @WesternChauvinist

    Nick H (View Comment):

    Western Chauvinist: If you wish to save western civilization, you’ll get thy rear ends back in the pew this weekend and stop sending thy kids to public schools

    I agree 100% with the first part of this statement but not as much the second. If every right-thinking parent took their kids out of public schools, they’d be taking away what little influence we have with the institutions that are teaching the next generation. We are not of this world, but we must live in this world. We’re not called to separate ourselves from everyone headed down the wrong path, but to be with them to help lead the way to righteousness. It’s a lot more work to raise children when you have to counter the negative influences that the world brings into their lives, but no one said we’d have it easy doing it right.

    Well, I have (have had) my kids in public schools — but as soon as I found out what was going down, I put them in Core Knowledge charter public schools. Excellence speaks for itself and attracts all kinds.

    I’m convinced the regular public schools aren’t salvageable, despite Betsy DeVos. We’d have to start by burning down the education departments in 99% of universities. The Left has won that battle.

    • #6
  7. Tom Meyer, Common Citizen Member
    Tom Meyer, Common Citizen
    @tommeyer

    Lot of food for thought here (and that’s without reading the pieces you cited) but it seems to me that a great deal of the problem comes down to our general inability to talk about our rights’ corresponding responsibilities, whether to ourselves or to others.

    That is, we’re blathering endlessly about all one side of the ledger and sticking our head in the sand about the other. Using the religious analogy, it’s like focusing entirely on how we’re created in God’s image and of infinite moral worth, while ignoring our sinfulness and insignificance.

    A healthy society (or religion) counts both.

    • #7
  8. Western Chauvinist Member
    Western Chauvinist
    @WesternChauvinist

    Tom Meyer, Common Citizen (View Comment):
    Lot of food for thought here (and that’s without reading the pieces you cited) but it seems to me that a great deal of the problem comes down to our general inability to talk about our rights’ corresponding responsibilities, whether to ourselves or to others.

    That is, we’re blathering endlessly about all one side of the ledger and sticking our head in the sand about the other. Using the religious analogy, it’s like focusing entirely on how we’re created in God’s image and of infinite moral worth, while ignoring our sinfulness and insignificance.

    A healthy society (or religion) counts both.

    Concur.

    • #8
  9. Tom Meyer, Common Citizen Member
    Tom Meyer, Common Citizen
    @tommeyer

    Western Chauvinist:Even prior to Germans attempting to destroy other nations (WWI and WWII) and destroying themselves (under Merkel), one of them discovered perhaps the most insidious and humanly irresistible ways to the self-destruction of any human society ever conceived: the Sexual Revolution.

    My history isn’t very strong on this, but my strong impression is that this was less a conspiracy than something that was inevitably going to happen. At some point, we were going to discover the means to control reproduction (largely) independent of sex in a way that was reasonably reliable and inexpensive. That was going to have massive social outcomes, as indeed it has. But it was going to happen, in much the same way that rails and aircraft were eventually going to happen.

    It’s a separate question, to my mind, whether some people were trying to exploit that eventually for bad and/or unwise purposes.

    • #9
  10. Majestyk Member
    Majestyk
    @Majestyk

    Tom Meyer, Common Citizen (View Comment):
    At some point, we were going to discover the means to control reproduction (largely) independent of sex in a way that was reasonably reliable and inexpensive.

    Right – one of its natural consequences was that it gave us the opportunity to massively improve upon our human capital because we weren’t consumed with constantly caring for newborn children or toiling in the mud for our daily sustenance.

    Saying that artificial birth control is somehow bad is like blaming guns for crime under the heading that inexpensive and reliable firearms are somehow immoral because some people use them to commit murders.

    • #10
  11. Ralphie Inactive
    Ralphie
    @Ralphie

    The Bible doesn’t talk about rights like women’s rights, children’s rights, gay rights, etc.

    I like to think of Christ’s answer as a synopsis of the ten commandments. The first pertain to God, the last to our interactions with each other.

    Tom Meyer is right that we need both the Law and the Gospel.

    I am all for getting butts in pews, but in my own church it is so lame, I think it could actually be accelerating the crap that is going on.

    Ministers can be a lot like your congressman, trying to keep the constituents happy means doing what you  know isn’t good.

     

    • #11
  12. Bob Thompson Member
    Bob Thompson
    @BobThompson

    Nick H (View Comment):

    Western Chauvinist: If you wish to save western civilization, you’ll get thy rear ends back in the pew this weekend and stop sending thy kids to public schools

    I agree 100% with the first part of this statement but not as much the second. If every right-thinking parent took their kids out of public schools, they’d be taking away what little influence we have with the institutions that are teaching the next generation. We are not of this world, but we must live in this world. We’re not called to separate ourselves from everyone headed down the wrong path, but to be with them to help lead the way to righteousness. It’s a lot more work to raise children when you have to counter the negative influences that the world brings into their lives, but no one said we’d have it easy doing it right.

    I see no reason today that there should be ‘public’ schools as institutions administered through government wherein we must find ways to participate so that we can have some influence. This does not mean there should not be a requirement for educating children.

    • #12
  13. Trink Coolidge
    Trink
    @Trink

    Western Chauvinist: If you wish to save western civilization, you’ll get thy rear ends back in the pew this weekend and stop sending thy kids to public schools and paying university leftists’ salaries.

    Amen Sister.  Amen!

    • #13
  14. Trink Coolidge
    Trink
    @Trink

    Western Chauvinist (View Comment):
    Now, don’t say anything interesting . . . .

    Love it :)   Happy Pumpkin Carving.   Pictures please.

    • #14
  15. Stina Inactive
    Stina
    @CM

    Majestyk (View Comment):

    Tom Meyer, Common Citizen (View Comment):
    At some point, we were going to discover the means to control reproduction (largely) independent of sex in a way that was reasonably reliable and inexpensive.

    Right – one of its natural consequences was that it gave us the opportunity to massively improve upon our human capital because we weren’t consumed with constantly caring for newborn children or toiling in the mud for our daily sustenance.

    Saying that artificial birth control is somehow bad is like blaming guns for crime under the heading that inexpensive and reliable firearms are somehow immoral because some people use them to commit murders.

    I think you both missed it.

    Sure, technology can give us a bit of reprieve on birthing babies, but that need not go hand in hand with a destructive proclivity for sexual immorality and perverse selfishness.

    People can use birth control responsibly, typically those who have rejected the sexual revolution in their own lives.

    Even with birth control, without this “conspiracy” (why are we surprised by this, but not Nietzche’s, Freud’s, or Marx’s impact on society?), it is not a given that sexual permissiveness would have reached the heights at which it did.

    In other words, you are underestimating the effect of stigma and the effect Reich’s revolution had on doing away with stigma.

    • #15
  16. Tom Meyer, Common Citizen Member
    Tom Meyer, Common Citizen
    @tommeyer

    Stina (View Comment):
    Sure, technology can give us a bit of reprieve on birthing babies, but that need not go hand in hand with a destructive proclivity for sexual immorality and perverse selfishness.

    People can use birth control responsibly, typically those who have rejected the sexual revolution in their own lives.

    No disagreement.

    In my experience, however, a lot of folks equate the technology with the immorality and reject the notion that there are such things as responsible uses of it.

    • #16
  17. Joseph Eagar Member
    Joseph Eagar
    @JosephEagar

    Interesting point about Germany.  I’m a big believer in the idea that America is divided between a Germanic/Scandinavian culture and a Celtic/Southern-European one.  You have the English, Germans, Swedes, Danes, etc on one side, and on the other Scots-Irish, Irish Catholics, Italians, Poles, Greeks and (culturally speaking, not politically) black people.

     

    • #17
  18. Peter Meza Member
    Peter Meza
    @PeterMeza

    The Stephen Hicks book on postmodernism is a must read and explains a lot about the state we’re in.

    • #18
  19. Stina Inactive
    Stina
    @CM

    Joseph Eagar (View Comment):
    Interesting point about Germany. I’m a big believer in the idea that America is divided between a Germanic/Scandinavian culture and a Celtic/Southern-European one. You have the English, Germans, Swedes, Danes, etc on one side, and on the other Scots-Irish, Irish Catholics, Italians, Poles, Greeks and (culturally speaking, not politically) black people.

    English culture is rather distinct from German culture. Why combine them?

    England is the motherland of our constitutional government; Germany the founder of our public schooling system “to make good, compliant workers”.

    England united under one king before 1000 AD. Germany didn’t unite under one until 1871, and 50 years later, Socialism and Hitler.

    • #19
  20. Scott Wilmot Member
    Scott Wilmot
    @ScottWilmot

    Western Chauvinist: it’s always the Germans, isn’t it?

    You can add this tidbit to your reading list:

    Lutheranism and the Reformation in general are responsible for one of the gravest evils of our world: individualism, the primacy of the subject who centers himself on self-love, which is ‘radix omnis mali et peccati’, the root of all evil and sin, as Saint Augustine said and Meister Eckhart often repeated.

    Majestyk (View Comment):
    Saying that artificial birth control is somehow bad is like blaming guns for crime under the heading that inexpensive and reliable firearms are somehow immoral because some people use them to commit murders.

    The lie of contraception has robbed us of a precious part of our humanity.

    By creating the false expectation of sexual pleasure free from the natural consequences of sexual intercourse, it has primed mothers and fathers to greet the existence of their own children not with joy, but dark, murderous despair!

    And why in the world is Bishop Barron referencing Fr. Richard Rohr?

    • #20
  21. Majestyk Member
    Majestyk
    @Majestyk

    Scott Wilmot (View Comment):
    Lutheranism and the Reformation in general are responsible for one of the gravest evils of our world: individualism, the primacy of the subject who centers himself on self-love, which is ‘radix omnis mali et peccati’, the root of all evil and sin, as Saint Augustine said and Meister Eckhart often repeated.

    Happy Reformation day.

    Scott Wilmot (View Comment):
    The lie of contraception has robbed us of a precious part of our humanity.

    Sounds like an opportunity for moral suasion.  Again, I’m not sure how contraception gets the blame for people acting badly.  Contraception is after all a set of inanimate objects without agency.

    • #21
  22. Tom Meyer, Common Citizen Member
    Tom Meyer, Common Citizen
    @tommeyer

    Fr. Shenan J. Boquet (quoted by @scottwilmot)

    By creating the false expectation of sexual pleasure free from the natural consequences of sexual intercourse, it has primed mothers and fathers to greet the existence of their own children not with joy, but dark, murderous despair!

    This is true if your sample is women who were on contraceptives and are now seeking abortions. Is it really a surprise that women who so don’t want to be pregnant that they’re seeking an abortion find the idea worthy of despair?

    Boquet seems to find it genuinely unthinkable that people who use contraceptives might ever wish to have children or could even welcome an unnplanned pregnancy. And yet, this is contrary to the lived experiences of millions of people.

    • #22
  23. Western Chauvinist Member
    Western Chauvinist
    @WesternChauvinist

    Scott Wilmot (View Comment):
    And why in the world is Bishop Barron referencing Fr. Richard Rohr?

    Well, he was citing Rohr’s understanding of the purpose of rights of passage into adulthood. He certainly wasn’t defending everything else Rohr writes or says. Stopped clock and all that.

    I agree contraception promotes a lie about the meaning and purpose of sexual intimacy. But, I don’t want this thread to become focused on that.

    Also, I don’t wish to start another Protestant vs Catholic war. If we’re going to pull out of this nosedive, we’re going to have to work together against the Left. You’ve heard about the Vatican postage stamp featuring Luther? I don’t think we have to go that far.

    • #23
  24. Western Chauvinist Member
    Western Chauvinist
    @WesternChauvinist

    Oops. Too late.

    • #24
  25. Mike H Inactive
    Mike H
    @MikeH

    Joseph Eagar (View Comment):
    Interesting point about Germany. I’m a big believer in the idea that America is divided between a Germanic/Scandinavian culture and a Celtic/Southern-European one. You have the English, Germans, Swedes, Danes, etc on one side, and on the other Scots-Irish, Irish Catholics, Italians, Poles, Greeks and (culturally speaking, not politically) black people.

    I’d like to hear much more about this. You up for it Joseph?

    • #25
  26. Genghis Inactive
    Genghis
    @Genghis

    Just wanted to point out what an awesome nome de plume Bill Kilgore is. That’s the name of Robert Duvall’s character in Apocalypse Now, for those who don’t know.

     

    • #26
  27. Stina Inactive
    Stina
    @CM

    Western Chauvinist (View Comment):
    I agree contraception promotes a lie about the meaning and purpose of sexual intimacy. But, I don’t want this thread to become focused on that.

    Back to topic… I’ve read about Reich before. I don’t know how much of this is “conspiracy”, but my belief in a heaven, hell, and forces of evil that seek to separate us from God, I’m not inclined to necessarily need a conspiracy.

    Reich got the ball rolling, and its not that hard to see why. No one needs much persuasion to do what one wants. What we lack is the rationalizations to justify it that convince others. Reich & co provided that. Its easy to see how the ideas spread from there (human nature and all that jazz).

    The prevalence of false rape on college campuses could also be a byproduct of this.

    When I was in high school, abstinence evangelists made the claim that illicit sex carries spiritual and emotional consequences with it… especially for young women. Sex was meant for intimacy as well as pleasure, and to divorce pleasure from those deeper needs left women hurting.

    Feminists cried BS. Fast-forward 20 years, women who are hurt after one night stands or being used for casual sex lament to counselors how much pain they are in. But that can’t be! Casual sex is supposed to be good! IF you didn’t like it, you must have been raped.

    • #27
  28. Henry Castaigne Member
    Henry Castaigne
    @HenryCastaigne

    I disagree with the assumption that Germany is not of the West. I think it is fair to say that much of German philosophy is a rebellion against the Enlightenment(s) of England and France. But as the baby-boomers are American (alas), Germany too is part of the West.

    • #28
  29. Henry Castaigne Member
    Henry Castaigne
    @HenryCastaigne

    Stina (View Comment):
    When I was in high school, abstinence evangelists made the claim that illicit sex carries spiritual and emotional consequences with it… especially for young women. Sex was meant for intimacy as well as pleasure, and to divorce pleasure from those deeper needs left women hurting.

    Feminists cried BS. Fast-forward 20 years, women who are hurt after one night stands or being used for casual sex lament to counselors how much pain they are in. But that can’t be! Casual sex is supposed to be good! IF you didn’t like it, you must have been raped.

    When government programs fail (cough cough Obamacare) then it shows that we needs more government. Whenever a permissive culture makes people lonely or unhappy it’s because it isn’t permissive enough.

    • #29
  30. Western Chauvinist Member
    Western Chauvinist
    @WesternChauvinist

    Stina (View Comment):

    Western Chauvinist (View Comment):
    I agree contraception promotes a lie about the meaning and purpose of sexual intimacy. But, I don’t want this thread to become focused on that.

    Back to topic… I’ve read about Reich before. I don’t know how much of this is “conspiracy”, but my belief in a heaven, hell, and forces of evil that seek to separate us from God, I’m not inclined to necessarily need a conspiracy.

    Reich got the ball rolling, and its not that hard to see why. No one needs much persuasion to do what one wants. What we lack is the rationalizations to justify it that convince others. Reich & co provided that. Its easy to see how the ideas spread from there (human nature and all that jazz).

    The prevalence of false rape on college campuses could also be a byproduct of this.

    When I was in high school, abstinence evangelists made the claim that illicit sex carries spiritual and emotional consequences with it… especially for young women. Sex was meant for intimacy as well as pleasure, and to divorce pleasure from those deeper needs left women hurting.

    Feminists cried BS. Fast-forward 20 years, women who are hurt after one night stands or being used for casual sex lament to counselors how much pain they are in. But that can’t be! Casual sex is supposed to be good! IF you didn’t like it, you must have been raped.

    Yes, and what are the virtues promoted by the absence of contraception (and abortion)? Self control, chastity, delayed gratification, personal responsibility… all through experiencing the natural consequences of sex. And all severely lacking in our society today.

    • #30
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