Rod Dreher gets me thinking. Despite a number of events, including women's lib, decades of female empowerment in society and industry, and even the selection of a woman on the Republican ticket last year, many conservatives simply haven't abandoned regressive gender and sexual thinking. They might not be telling women to get back into the kitchen anymore, but that is the intent.
Why else would a pro-lifer oppose birth control? If the pro-life movement is about not killing babies, then oral contraception is fine, right? No babies are killed because none are created. Easy. Same deal with condoms. If no babies are made, then none can be killed. Same with Plan B. Rod notes that contraception has led to declining birth rates in the West. Well, duh. That's kind of the whole point: having, say, eight kids is extremely expensive, not only in terms of money but also in terms of natural resources they are going to use. Unless the human race is going to die out--and my information suggests it won't--it doesn't seem to be too much of an issue to me.
What I find interesting is that, if theocons somehow reach their goal of eliminating contraception, will they be satisfied? What if it were a narrow 5-4 decision by the Supreme Court and about half the country--actually it would be much more--were really upset by that? As every Sunday School teacher I ever had told me, good deeds don't really count if one is doing them with an angry and ungrateful heart. So, presumably, theocons would have to either persuade people to follow their dictates on reproduction, which would involve things like persuasion and outreach. My question is: why can't they just do that instead of trying to fuck with the laws? If the outcome is going to be the same? It's not even like lives are potentially at risk when we're talking about contraception--are we talking about potential lives?
Honestly, I can understand why pro-lifers want to ban abortion--they consider it murder, and it's a matter of opinion. They could be right. But contraception is in no way murder. In no way. It's only a threat to antiquated gender norms.
