An update on the situation with Unapologetic Atheist

I have confirmed through someone who wishes only to be known as a reliable source that most of the allegations against Richardson as reported by the Lawrence Journal-World are true. (See my previous post for my initial reactions.)

My source has confirmed that Richardson was well aware of his HIV+ status. He has had it since 1995 and has most likely known since about 1998.

My source also confirmed that he was arrested in Louisiana, and that the arrest resulted in dropped charges. Richardson left the state as a direct result.

Finally, my source also says that there will probably be more charges against him, and explained to my satisfaction how the first woman to press charges found out about his HIV+ status.

There is no doubt left in my mind that he is guilty. I am very hopeful that he will be nailed on these charges, and I think that barring any stupidity with the judge or jury or whatever, such as people thinking that women who contract HIV just get what is coming to them, there is an excellent chance that he will be convicted.

Just, whoa.

If you bother to examine my blogroll closely, you might notice that the entry for The Unapologetic Atheist is gone. There are several reasons for that. One of the reasons is because, well, he deleted his blog.

Another important reason is because he has been charged with two counts of knowingly exposing another to HIV.

It would be an understatement to say that I'm stunned. And furious. It's probably important to note that in our legal system, people are presumed innocent until proven guilty. But it's also true that I never expected anyone on my blogroll to even be accused of anything like this. And I can't help but notice that his blog has been deleted, which doesn't make him look particularly innocent. His Yahoo profile is gone, too.

So perhaps Rob Richardson is innocent, and perhaps he isn't. Either way, I can't help but notice that at least one anonymous commenter associates my site with his. It therefore seems appropriate that I should address the situation.

It should go without saying that knowingly and intentionally exposing someone to HIV isn't ever, ever okay. I'm not saying that HIV+ people should never have sex. I'm saying that they have a moral obligation to inform their partners of the additional risk that HIV presents. A woman who doesn't know that her partner is HIV+ certainly wasn't consenting to what she thought she was. If her partner didn't know, it's a tragedy. But if he did, it's sexual assault.

Frankly, despite my desires to remain neutral about Richardson's particular case, I must admit that it's hard given the facts of the case. His HIV+ status is apparently not contested, or his accusers would have no case. Likewise, there would be no case if he could prove that he received the diagnosis after the sexual encounters, so I have to think that he must've known. And I find it extremely unlikely that two different women would both report the a nearly identical story. Take all that together with what many of the comments on the Lawrence Journal-World article that imply some very dodgy behavior on Richardson's part, and... Well, like I said, it's hard to remain neutral.

If the facts are what they appear to be, Richardson deserves strong condemnation. The damage that would be done to his causes -- to my causes -- is considerable. His actions, if the allegations are true, confirm all the worst stereotypes about atheists. He gives feminists a bad name. He gives liberals a bad name. Most of all, he provides fodder for the lie that atheists are incapable of being moral.

The worst part is that Richardson should have known better. About a year ago, he blogrolled Shades Of Grey. In a fit of morbid curiosity, I discovered that you can still see that post courtesy Google's cache, at the very bottom of the page. One post above that, he wrote this:

It really gets my goat when people who are notorious for their hard-line, unflinching hatred of those who are different (uh, I meant, those going against God's will) are coming off looking like the paragons of virtue, and the people who are supposed to be the progressives are lashing out like toddlers who didn't get their candy.

We're better than this. We're better than people like Coulter, Kristol, and Buchanan. Now start freaking acting like it, goddamnit!

...

What this boils down to is: stop getting mad and lashing out blindly. Start fighting rationally and thoughtfully.

Yes! I agree! It is sad when someone who should know better makes the far right seem like paragons of virtue. So it seems absurd that I should ever have to say something like "Don't knowingly expose others to HIV."

UPDATE: I fixed the link to the Lawrence Journal-World article. Also, I have an update regarding the status of the allegations. You can read it here.

And now for something completely different

Have you been wondering how you could destroy the Earth? I don't mean with patriarchy or George W. Bush or nuclear weapons (and please, I'm begging a god I don't believe in, let those last two things remain unrelated). I mean actually destroying the Earth. Well, wonder no more!

It's true, I'm hard on teachers

I want to pull out a recent comment that Angel left me on this post about an article in USA Today titled For once, blame the student. Angel thinks I'm too hard on teachers and don't give enough credit to students. (Her comment also touches on this recent post about picking up my kids from preschool.)

Angel writes:

OMG! I am so sick of this. Charlie, you get some kudos from me for your obvious thoughtfulness on women's issues, but you have a serious blindspot when it comes to teachers. What gives?

In one of your posts, you are unhappy with a teacher because she is not "acting like she wants to fix the problem" of your son's behavior. She shouldn't be expected to fix the problem. Your son is your problem. The way other people have raised their sons is their problem. Now the divergent views have collided and you blame the TEACHER? Out of anyone, she's the only one who is NOT responsible.

Also, you posted up an article written in USA Today about how kids do not have a strong work ethic. You comment that it's "teachers" who should "inspire a strong work ethic in the kids". WHAT??? You've got to be kidding. First of all, with that attitude, you pretty much prove what the author of the article is saying about how parents are enabling their kids to get out of doing work. If it's all the teacher's fault, then that lets both parents and students off the hook.

Second, these are high school kids the author is discussing. The Jesuits said, "Give me the boy until he is seven and I'll give you the man." The implication is that a person's character is pretty much set by the age of seven. Establishing character is clearly the PARENTS' responsibility not the teachers', especially not in high school. A high school class should be: kids come in, teacher teaches subject, kids walk out. Work Ethic 101 is not offered in school for a reason-- that's the parents' job.

I think Angel is right that I'm often too hard on teachers, especially teachers of primary and secondary education. It's a dirty secret of mine -- though considering Angel's comment, perhaps it isn't much of a secret. I try to be very aware of it and usually I tend to avoid writing about education issues because of it. She caught me on a week when I happened to blog twice about it without realizing it.

It's not that I'm unsympathetic to the difficult job teachers are tasked with. My wife teaches piano at Omaha South High School. I watch her constantly brainstorm about ways to improve her lesson plans. I see her agonize over her students almost every day. When she has students with who could be so good if they would just try, I'm the one who hears the too familiar refrain about them not living up to their potential.

I'm sure a large reason that it sounds so familiar is because I was that student in high school. I should've had A's, but I didn't work as hard as I might have, so I mostly got C's instead. It certainly wasn't that I was incapable. You'd think that would only increase my understanding of what teachers have to deal with, but apparently it isn't so. (It does, however, increase my embarrassment. The same lazy attitude continued for the one year of college I managed to complete, and truthfully that's being generous -- I'm can't remember my grades for that second semester, though honestly I'm pretty sure I don't want to. Sometime between now and then I realized that I should take every opportunity to learn as much as I can from every situation. Just imagine what I'd learn from an environment designed specifically to help me learn things.)

So perhaps it's bad form, but I'm going to call for a mulligan on the USA Today article that caused Angel to call me out. When I first commented that perhaps it is teachers who should work harder to inspire the students, I was thinking of my high school chemistry teacher, Mr. Davidson. He was excited about chemistry and knew how to inspire students to try. I'll never forget his look of disappointment when we didn’t understand a concept. I remember him teaching us a particular way to line up electron shells using the periodic table. When we finally understood it, he laughed and told us that they didn't teach that until Chemistry II at Kansas State University. And a few years later, at KSU myself, I passed Chem I without cracking open a book.

In my mind, Mr. Davidson is the gold standard of teachers, and there are a number of reasons that that probably isn't fair. For one thing, I believe to this day that he had a gift for teaching that probably isn't very common. Also, science is one of my favorite subjects. He had an automatic head start with me that, say, my English teachers didn't have*.

But back to Patrick Welsh's USA Today op/ed. I think, having reread the article with Angel's criticism in mind, I can get behind a lot of what Welsh is saying. As I've tried to make clear here, I'm the poster child for failed work ethic in high school students. I wish desperately that something had managed to unlock the desire to learn that was finally unleashed a few years too late. A lot of my original criticism probably comes from that thought.

Having said that, I want to add a major caveat, or perhaps it's more of a word of caution. I firmly believe that to get good results, teachers must be allowed to hold students to high standards. One of the major problems with the No Child Left Behind legislation is that instead of encouraging students to learn, it encourages teachers to pass students -- at any cost. Even without NCLB, there is an enormous amount of pressure from administrations and parents for teachers to lower their standards to help students pass. So I am all for holding students responsible for their failures. But it does not good to "blame the students" without also making damn sure we are supporting the teachers. It seems to me that instead of looking for somewhere to lay the blame, we should work to create a supportive environment in which we identify problems and then try to solve them.

About the story of picking up my kids and hearing that Evan was fighting, I stand behind what I wrote. But when you think about it, it's a different situation for a number of reasons. For one thing, they're preschoolers. The teachers don't have a lot to work with as far as actually teaching goes. For another thing, perhaps I didn't make it clear enough in that post, but I'm trying desperately to be on the teacher's side on this one. It's just that I don't feel like they're really letting me. I need their help to be able to help them. And what is going to help me is to give me more complete information about the problems Evan is experiencing before they expect me to get upset with him.

Regardless, Angel's comment is still valid. I am very hard on teachers, often too hard. I will continue to try to keep a leash on that tendency. But it's nice to know that if I slip up, there are people out there who aren't afraid to point out my shortcomings.


* A story to illustrate just how pathetic I was in high school: In my senior year, I took Mrs. Stratton's newspaper class. She was another great teacher, one of my favorites, in fact. But for some reason, perhaps because it wasn't a science class, I didn't try especially hard for her. When my wife worries about students not performing up to their potential, I think back to newspaper class with Mrs. Stratton. I think I wrote three articles all year, and I'm pretty sure that caused her the same grief that my wife experiences. For the most part I completed my assignments, and I did a lot of other things for the newspaper, like layout work. But I did everything in my ability to avoid actually writing articles for the paper. Instead of, you know, using my ability to actually write. Ten years later, I write a blog and wish that I'd taken advantage of the opportunities that Mrs. Stratton tried to provide for me. I try not to think about what my writing would look like if I had approached my classes with the idea that I was going to make an actual effort to improve myself.

This is what eBay was made for

Might I interest you in a new timepiece? (Be sure to check out the description.)

Anatomy blogging

Evan: Mommy, do I have a spine?
Rosana: (answering Evan) Nope!

Watch as David Brooks stars in "Backhanded Attacks on Feminism"

If you have a New York Times Select account, you can read David Brooks' latest, an article titled All Politics Is Thymotic. In it, Brooks makes a guise of arguing that the main driving motivation of politicians is Plato's thymos, the hunger for recognition. But much like John Tierney's promise to enlighten us about the desires of women, I'm suspicious of any article that opens with a promise to tell you "what men want." Brooks doesn't disappoint.

He writes ten paragraphs that say a lot of things that I can mostly agree with. I think he's right that men want recognition. (I'd argue that that holds true for women as well, but that's because I'm me and he's David Brooks.) Brooks says things like:

If I had the attention of the world's politicians for one afternoon, I'd lead a discussion on the nature of the thymotic urge. I'd point out that if politicians weren't consumed by a hunger for recognition, none of them would agree to lead the miserable lives they do. I'd point out that in the thymotic urge, selfishness and selflessness are intertwined. Men compete for personal glory. But thymos also induces them to sacrifice for causes larger than themselves.

I'd point out that if you see politics as a competition for recognition, many things become clear. The economic and literary backwardness of the Arab world has set off a thymotic crisis, as Arab men lash out to make the world pay attention to them. The Israeli-Palestinian dispute is not only a squabble over land; it's intractable because each side wants the other to recognize its moral superiority. Democracy still has good long-term prospects in that region because it's the only system that meets rising expectations about individual dignity.

There is something here that could be the foundation of a good point. Much like the idea of Richard Dawkins' memes, there are probably situations where it would be helpful to consider political situations as a series of interactions centered on thymos. And yet, much like Dawkins' memes, it doesn't really tell the whole story. Certainly a large part of politics is the hunt for personal recognition, but there are also times when politicians act according to their principles, whether that makes them popular or not. (See George W. Bush's entire second term as an example.)

But despite the title, all of Brooks' talk about the politics of thymos is really just a fancy way to tell feminists to shut up. In his last three paragraphs, Brooks writes:

If I had those politicians for an afternoon, I'd point out that even though the thymotic urge drives so much of public life, we really don't talk about thymos anymore. I'd add that when you read the ancient political philosophers on thymos, they treat it as a male trait. But over the past century women have been expressing their thymotic urges more and more, and people over 40 have a complex about female thymos that people under 40 generally don't have.

I'd ask them to read Harvey Mansfield's new book, "Manliness," which is two books in one. First, it's a subtle exploration about the virtues and vices of the thymotic urge. It's also a series of troublemaking generalizations about the differences between men and women.

Over the next few weeks, Mansfield and his feminist critics are going to brawl — thymotically — over his assertions. I'm not as impressed by Mansfield's generalizations as he is, but he'll have one advantage: he understands the nature of thymos, which shapes this fight, and so much of our political life.

Brooks first tries to cover himself by saying that he isn't impressed by Mansfield's "troubling" book and pointing out that popular support for women's rights has come a long way in the last 40 years. But the entire essay up to this point has been nothing but a defense of Mansfield's ideas. When it finally comes down to it, Brooks admits that half the book is worthless. But instead of resoundingly condemning the worthless parts, he excuses them and makes a preemptive strike against the feminists for daring to speak up.

I can't help but notice the irony that an essay about the destructive nature of the hunger for recognition is replete with stories of how much better the world would be if only Brooks had the ear of the politicians for a day. But when Brooks has an opportunity to do some real good by denouncing sexism on a national stage, instead he chooses to imply that any criticism of leveled at the theory can only be explained by the feminists' desire for individual accolades. In Brooks' world, there are no principled arguments against sexism to be found, only the thymotic pursuit of glory.

Brooks' essay would have benefited from a more nuanced discussion that admitted that sometimes the concept of thymos just doesn't apply. But of course he couldn't afford to make that admission. It would have destroyed his backhanded attack against feminism.

Thanks to Orange for passing on the article.

What's a little fighting among friends?

Thursday night, Caren had parent-teacher conferences, so I had the rare opportunity to pick up Evan and Rosana from their preschool daycare. It's always a special treat. Usually Caren does the picking up, so when I walk through their classroom door instead, they are about as excited to see me as they ever get. Unfortunately, my enjoyment of Thursday's childcare transfer experience was marred by a report from Evan's teacher.

"Evan had a rough afternoon," she said in an oddly happy voice as I walked through the door. I sighed.
"Uh oh. What happened?"
"He started a fight. And he also threw some things." I sighed again. Caren gets reports like this at least once a week. Sometimes more.
"Why?" I asked. His teacher paused.
"Well, I think maybe some other kids were egging him on." I hesitated.
"Well, which is it?" I asked. "Did he start the fight, or did other kids egg him on?" She paused again.
"I'm not sure," she said finally. "I didn't really see it. But he was definitely throwing things. I saw that."
"Uh, okay. Thanks." Yeah. Thanks for nothing.

It doesn't help that I'm especially irritated by her tone of voice. She seemed all too happy to report that Evan had been acting up. Instead of acting like she wants to fix the problem, she seemed to be relish the act of telling me that my son was acting up. But when pressed for details, she had no idea what was actually going on. How is it that she admits that she's not really sure what happened, and yet she is very sure that it was my son who started the fight?

I can appreciate that she wants me to talk to him about not fighting. And I really want to be on her side and help make her job easier. But what I say to him is going to be different depending on the situation that led up to the fighting. If Evan hit someone with little to no provocation, that's one thing. But if kids were teasing him for ten minutes before he finally lashes out in frustration, that's quite another. The idea that the circumstances made a difference has obviously not occurred to anyone.

This is very frustrating. I suspect this is another case of "boys will be boys," and after all the time I've spent trying to get that idea out of my children's heads, well, I hope you'll understand when I say that it's pissing me off. I suspect that the teachers are letting the boys say and do whatever they want short of actually throwing punches. In fact, I know this is the case, because Evan tells me that one of their favorite games is "fighting." From his descriptions, it sounds more like it would be more accurate to call it roughhousing. But as anyone who has ever had little kids knows, roughhousing among a group of three- and four-year-olds can escalate into a brawl rather quickly.

The teachers are creating a no-win situation by allowing the roughhousing to happen. For one thing, the kids call it fighting. While I am in full agreement that roughhousing isn't actually fighting per se, I still find it hard to understand why you'd want to send kids the message that it's okay to "fight." The other problem is that when I've asked Evan to not participate in these "fights," the result is that he's singled out as the only boy who doesn't do it. He was starting to be teased by his classmates for being different. As a person who found it very difficult to make friends when I was little, that seemed to be leading down a path that I didn't want to see him go down, so I relented and told him it was okay to roughhouse as long as he made sure to stop if anyone was getting mad or sad.

Frankly, I'm having a hard time believing that Evan could really be giving them such a hard time. He's a sweet little boy, and it usually takes very little effort to get him to fall into line. I'm one of the lucky few parents who have a kid who you can simply ask not to do something. If you explain why, most of the time he'll agree with you and you'll see a noticeable change in his behavior going forward. When I asked him not to participate in the fights, I suggested that if the boys decided to fight he could say "C'mon guys, someone is going to get hurt. Let's do something else instead." Two days later, he came back to me and told me that when he'd tried it, they just ignored him and fought anyway. When I asked him what he said, he repeated what I'd told him almost word for word, and perfectly mirroring my pleading tone of voice. The fact that teachers are having so many problems with him leads me to suspect that they aren't trying very hard.

Though it's frustrating, I'm trying to keep in mind that he only has about two more months of preschool to go before we get to summer break. Over the summer, we're moving, and then Evan will start kindergarten and we will find a different preschool for Rosana. I'm hopeful that the greater structure of a kindergarten classroom will eliminate most of the free time the kids currently fill with roughhousing, and the problem will solve itself.

In the mean time, I guess boys will be boys, just as preschool teachers will be unwitting tools of the patriarchy. Whether I like it or not.

Call it anything but rape

Yesterday there was a story in the Omaha World Herald titled Omahan accused of sexual trickery. Because the World Herald doesn't keep their stories online for more than a few days, I'm going to reproduce it here in its entirety:

A 21-year-old Omaha man was arrested Tuesday after being accused of tricking a woman into having sex with another man.

The investigation began after 1 a.m. at Bergan Mercy Medical Center, where the 31-year-old woman sought treatment.

She told officers that she was in the dark basement of a northwest Omaha home having sex with a man whom she knew, said Omaha Police Sgt. Teresa Negron.

The 21-year-old man left the room and told a different man to return to the woman and pretend to be him, Negron said.

The woman had sex with the second man, not knowing that he wasn't her original partner, Negron said.

The woman came to realize that she was having sex with a different man, said something to him about it, and he ran away, Negron said.

The first man was arrested on suspicion of being an accessory to a sexual assault. The other man fled before police arrived.

Who the hell do these men think they are? This makes me so angry that I can't even write a coherent sentence. When a woman gives you permission to sleep with her, you don’t become the owner of her pussy. She doesn't become your property, some sort of fucktoy to share with your friends.

And since we're talking about it, what the hell, Omaha World Herald? "Sexual trickery?" No, these men are accused of rape. I'm beside myself with rage that you could write an entire article about two men who plot to sleep with a woman without her consent and fail to call it rape. If you want to know why rape is so common, look no further than this yourselves. You portray rape as some kind of practical joke, as though the two men should be patting each other on the back. "We sure pulled a good trick on her, didn't we? Too bad the old bitch doesn't have a sense of humor."

I'm tired of it. I'm so tired of feeling shocked and stunned every time I find out that one of the women close to me has been raped. I've lost track of the number of times it has happened, and every single time it is emotionally exhausting. Not a week goes by that I don't learn another friend was raped. I'm sick of everyone who enables it. I'm fed up with anyone who promotes this rape culture and then pretends that they aren't part of the problem. I'm tired of supposedly respectable organizations like the Omaha World Herald refusing to call rape what it is.

Rape is an ugly word. But it's an even uglier act. These men don't deserve to be branded with anything less.

Wherein I prod facetiously at Blogger

Orange Tangerine must be extra spicy hot today, because everytime I try to go there, Blogger tells me that it's Forbidden.

An open letter to Shawn

Dear Shawn,

I've been meaning to write this letter for quite a long time -- it's been many years now. You see, I owe you a long overdue apology for the way I treated you when I first found out you were gay.

I'm sure you remember being outted in high school. Michael was just getting comfortable with his sexuality as a normal part of himself. He was basking in the glow of being out of the closet for the first time in his life. He was so excited, in fact, that he dragged several of his friends out of the closet with him. And you were among them.

Looking back, I have mixed feelings about my memories of Michael. On the one hand, I completely understand his desire to bring people out of the closet with him. I bet he was excited. He was feeling how great it was to accept himself for the first time in his life. He knew how good it felt, and wanted his friends to feel it, too. He wanted you to be able to experience that excitement with him.

On the other hand, it was certainly not his place to make those kinds of potentially life altering decisions for you. We were living in Wamego, Kansas -- need I say more? The place was so conservative that I didn't believe that racism still existed -- seriously, I didn't believe it. But how would I know? There were no black people worth speaking of in our town. There were no atheists or gays or Muslims or hispanics or anyone except white Christians, really. Those words didn't describe real people. They were just abstractions. And it's easy to hate an abstraction when it doesn't represent a real person.

But for purely personal reasons, I'm also grateful that Michael let your secret slip. You see, Shawn, you were the first gay man I ever knew. Now, looking back, I realize that that probably isn't true. I probably knew lots of gay people without ever knowing anything about their sexuality. But you were the first person who was real to me. You were the first real person I knew who was gay.

I must confess that the intervening ten years have caused me to forget what it was that we said to you, exactly. But I'll never forget your reaction. I'll never forget the note you wrote to us; the one you wrote from your room shaking and in tears. I can imagine the kinds of things we had said. I think we wanted you to get checked for HIV or some stupid shit like that. I wouldn't be surprised to find out that we told you that homosexuality was wrong in the eyes of the Lord. I remember that a couple of us acted particularly shitty, as though it was scandalous to have to change into our choir tuxedos in front of you. And I remember that when you heard us saying that, you spat back a stinging retort: "Do you think I'm going to rape you or something?"

You and I have been out of touch for quite some time. So I guess I can't be sure, but I know that if our positions had been reversed, I would have harbored a lot of resentment towards you and the other people who forced such a negative experience on me. It has occurred to me that I might have been a part of the first real hate that was ever directed at you because of your sexuality. The thought makes me sick.

Shawn, words cannot convey the shame I feel at these memories.

I want you to know that there is nothing you can say that will ever lessen my shame. Don't think I'm writing this to get your acceptance so that I can stop feeling bad about it. Your acceptance would be welcome, but it won't change what I did. Frankly, I don't ever want to lose that shame. It makes me a better person.

I'm writing because I want you to know that you made a difference in my life. I wanted you to know that the pain you experienced at my hands didn't amount to nothing. I can't speak for everyone else who participated in that nasty bout of bigotry, but for myself, I want you to know that you contributed to a sense of cognative dissonance that eventually helped me to realize how big of an asshole I'd been. You helped me see gay people as human beings instead of abstractions for the very first time. You helped me realize that the narrative that I'd been taught -- the nauseating story that gay people chose to live a life of sin because, I dunno, they preferred to be evil, or something -- was stupendously wrong.

So again, I'm sorry I reacted the way I did. I was a stupid little 16 year old who didn't have enough life experience under his belt to even know what he was doing. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I'm ashamed, and I'm sorry.

It took a long time, but I'm happy to be able to say that I'm a different person now. Perhaps one you'd even like to get to know. A guy can never have enough friends, especially friends who accept you for who you are, and who know your secrets -- if indeed it even is still a secret.

With all my friendship (if you want it),

Charlie

It doesn't stop with abortion

On Friday, Orange wrote a great post on South Dakota's attempt to ban abortion which inspired me to write this rather emphatic comment. I thought I'd repost a slightly revised version here.

Orange detailed several medical reasons why South Dakota's law would impact her were she living there, and then ended with this:

I know most of my readers are pro-choice, but there may be a few of you who don’t object to South Dakota’s abortion ban and its lack of an exception for preserving the woman’s health. Such a law sends the message that my life isn’t worth it, that my life and health don’t matter, that an embryo has more right to a full lifespan than I do. I beg to differ. If you don’t support a woman’s right to choose abortion, if you think preserving a woman’s health isn’t a good enough reason for abortion—tell me why you'd want me to die early.

Orange's conclusion got me thinking about the recent history of the women's rights movement. Women's rights in this country have generally been on a downward slide since Phyllis Schlafly and her cronies helped kill the Equal Rights Amendment, which read:

SECTION 1. Equality of rights under the law shall not be denied or abridged by the United States or by any State on account of sex.
SEC. 2. The Congress shall have the power to enforce, by appropriate legislation, the provisions of this article.
SEC. 3. This amendment shall take effect two years after the date of ratification.

It boggles my mind to think that standing in opposition to equality is a tenable political strategy, but there you have it.

We've probably all read state senator Bill Napoli's (R-SD) repugnant statement on just what it would take to warrant an abortion. If there is anyone reading this who is still anti-choice, here's another choice quote of his, this time in support of shotgun weddings:

When I was growing up here in the wild west, if a young man got a girl pregnant out of wedlock, they got married, and the whole darned neighborhood was involved in that wedding. I mean, you just didn't allow that sort of thing to happen, you know? I mean, they wanted that child to be brought up in a home with two parents, you know, that whole story. And so I happen to believe that can happen again.

You see, these people aren't content to outlaw a woman's ability to control her own body. They want to force your daughter to marry her rapist. They want to make sure she stays at home with her rapist's child. They want to take away her right to control how many children she has. Eventually, they'll go after her right to vote, and after that they'll clamor for the good ol' days when women were property owned by men. And if at any point you decide enough is enough, any more would be going too far, they'll call you a liberal and a traitor and say that you aren't a real Christian and quote 1 Timothy 2:11-12 and Deuteronomy 22:28-29.

And when they've got women's rights under their thumb, they'll go after science education: first biology, of course, but also astronomy and geology and physics. And next up after science will be founding cities and even entire states on their particular conceptions of morality.

But you know what? That's not quite right. They won't go after these one at a time. There's no point in waiting when you can attack all at once. Which is exactly what we're seeing.

So you don't support a woman's right to choose? Well, first they came for women's rights...

Hilarious

It would appear that South Park's parodies of scientology have upset the delicate Isaac Hayes:

NEW YORK - Isaac Hayes has quit "South Park," where he voices Chef, saying he can no longer stomach its take on religion.

Hayes, who has played the ladies' man/school cook in the animated Comedy Central satire since 1997, said in a statement Monday that he feels a line has been crossed.

"There is a place in this world for satire, but there is a time when satire ends and intolerance and bigotry towards religious beliefs of others begins," the 63-year-old soul singer and outspoken Scientologist said.

"Religious beliefs are sacred to people, and at all times should be respected and honored," he continued.

And what do the creators of South Park have to say about this?

"South Park" co-creator Matt Stone responded sharply in an interview with The Associated Press Monday, saying, "This is 100 percent having to do with his faith of Scientology... He has no problem — and he's cashed plenty of checks — with our show making fun of Christians."

...

Stone told The AP he and co-creator Trey Parker "never heard a peep out of Isaac in any way until we did Scientology. He wants a different standard for religions other than his own, and to me, that is where intolerance and bigotry begin."

I look forward to a future episode explaining how Chef is the latest victim of Chuck Cunningham syndrome.

Quick hits

• On Tuesday, USA Today published an opinion article by Patrick Welsh titled For once, blame the students in which Welsh writes:
  

  Failure in the classroom is often tied to lack of funding, poor teachers or other ills. Here's a thought: Maybe it's the failed work ethic of todays kids. That's what I'm seeing in my school. Until reformers see this reality, little will change.

  
  Here's a thought: the kids are with their teachers for a large part of the day. Until the teachers know how to inspire a strong work ethic in the kids, little will change.



• It turns out that Kansas is not, in fact, as flat as a pancake. It's actually flatter.



• This is by far my favorite post of any that I first discovered though the Koufax awards. It came about during one of the regular three month flair ups of where-are-all-the-women-in-politics, and it is perhaps the single best article I've ever seen written on the subject.



• At The Dark Wraith Forums, I ran across this gem from MSN Money that explains that our economy isn't as rosy as the Bush administration would like you to think. Money quote*:
  

  In fact, reading this article, you will conclude that there's no way out, short of running the printing presses.

  
  Now that is a scary thought.



• Until recently I was against a la carte cable. I fear that people generally won't want to pay for the channels I like, such as the various Discovery Channels, the Science Channel, and NASA TV. But then Digby pointed out that Pat Robertson and Jerry Falwell don't like a la carte either, a fact that quickly changed my mind. The televangelists are worried that they will go out of business because nobody will buy their TV programs. That sounds pretty good to me.
  
  Frankly, I don't watch TV that much anyway -- not even the channels I listed above. While I'd hate to see them go, I wouldn't mind sacrificing them for the greater good.
  
  Here's something else that occurred to me. A la carte can't be good for the 24 hour news networks in the long run, either. The networks ratings often fluctuate. Under an a la carte system, when one network's ratings start declining and another's starts rising, it only makes sense that people will jump ship from the dying network to its stronger competitors. As that happens, the inevitable result will be consolidation, which means there will be less pressure to compete with each other and more time to vet their stories. If I'm right, in ten years there will be only one giant news networks instead of the proliferation of smaller ones we have now.
  
  Hey, a guy can dream.



• If you haven't heard it already, go grab Willie Nelson's Cowboys Are Secretly, Frequently (Fond of Each Other) off of iTunes. It's a great song.

* Yes, that was a pun. Please forgive a poor blogger his vices.

Missouri: Show me the Christianity

Notice to atheists, agnostics, Muslims, Buddhists, and all other non-Christian citizens of Missouri: though all religious beliefs and disbeliefs are equal under the Constitution of the United States, some are more equal than others. Missouri is about to pass House Concurrent Resolution No. 13 to officially recognize Christianity. The text of the resolution reads:

Whereas, our forefathers of this great nation of the United States recognized a Christian God and used the principles afforded to us by Him as the founding principles of our nation; and

Whereas, as citizens of this great nation, we the majority also wish to exercise our constitutional right to acknowledge our Creator and give thanks for the many gifts provided by Him; and

Whereas, as elected officials we should protect the majority's right to express their religious beliefs while showing respect for those who object; and

Whereas, we wish to continue the wisdom imparted in the Constitution of the United States of America by the founding fathers; and

Whereas, we as elected officials recognize that a Greater Power exists above and beyond the institutions of mankind:

Now, therefore, be it resolved by the members of the House of Representatives of the Ninety-third General Assembly, Second Regular Session, the Senate concurring therein, that we stand with the majority of our constituents and exercise the common sense that voluntary prayer in public schools and religious displays on public property are not a coalition of church and state, but rather the justified recognition of the positive role that Christianity has played in this great nation of ours, the United States of America.

I'm pretty sure this doesn't legally qualify as a law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof, but that's only because a resolution isn't a law. Though it's technically legal, it certainly violates the spirit of the First Amendment.

If I'm laughing, it's only to keep from crying. That the elected officials of Missouri believe it is necessary to protect a religious majority's rights is just laughable. Thanks to their larger numbers, the majority can look out for themselves. It's the minority who really needs your help. You want to be helpful? Pass a resolution condemning religious intolerance against atheists. Now that would be useful.

Not only is Resolution 13 stunning in its unnecessity, it's also factually inaccurate. Far from recognizing a Christian God, the forefathers of our nation specifically amended the constitution to ensure that the people's right to believe in whatever they want was protected. Furthermore, they most assuredly did not use the principles of Christianity as the guiding principles of our nation. This should be obvious to anyone who bothers to think about it even for a moment: the First Amendment specifically protects the rights of the people to violate the First and Second Commandments. Insulting your parents, though rude, is not a crime. Adultery is not a crime. Not only is coveting not criminal, it is the very basis of capitalism. The only commandments that actually have a corresponding law are the commandments against murdering and theft, and possibly bearing false witness, if you count perjury. Almost every civilization in history has had similar laws.

The resolution purports to claim that Missouri is only following in the traditions of our nation's forefathers. But a perusal of the writings of the founders of this country suggests otherwise:

Whilst we assert for ourselves a freedom to embrace, to profess and to observe the Religion which we believe to be of divine origin, we cannot deny an equal freedom to those whose minds have not yet yielded to the evidence which has convinced us. - James Madison, A Memorial and Remonstrance

...the Government of the United States of America is not, in any sense, founded on the Christian religion. - The Treaty with Tripoli, signed by President John Adams and ratified by the senate without objection

Believing with you that religion is a matter which lies solely between Man & his God, that he owes account to none other for his faith or his worship, that the legitimate powers of government reach actions only, & not opinions, I contemplate with sovereign reverence that act of the whole American people which declared that their legislature should "make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof," thus building a wall of separation between Church & State. - Thomas Jefferson, Letter to the Danbury Baptists

I could write about this for hours. Instead, I'll finish with some brief points.

• The resolution expresses a desire to continue the wisdom imparted in the Constitution. But the Constitution does not mention God at all except to forbid laws respecting the establishment of a religion. While this resolution does not go quite that far, it leaves me with the uneasy impression that the Missouri House would consider it if they could.


• Elected officials who, in their official capacity, recognize one religion to the exclusion of all others are most assuredly not showing respect for those who do not share their religion. This resolution is an act designed to affirm one religion while excluding all others. It serves no purpose but to divide the people.


• If I were living in Missouri, I'd be writing letters to my representative to ask what gifts, exactly, have been provided by their god. I'd want to know why they feel it necessary to go against Madison's advice and deny an equal privilege -- in this case, the affirmation of one's religious beliefs by the legislative body -- to the people whose minds have not yet yielded to the evidence they believe they've found for the existence of their god and his gifts.


• Though it doubtlessly provides many positives, Christianity also comes with many negatives. This resolution ignores them while claiming that it is only common sense that one should do so. This only serves to reinforce the too prevalent idea that Christianity should be off limits for criticism.

Hat tip to The Green Knight for bringing this to my attention.

DJNME

(Hi, it's a nut from Welcome to the Nut House. Like last Friday, Charlie and I are switching for the day in order to celebrate our blogiversaries and today it's mine. Don't forget to check out his great post on Tierney, too.)

I’ve been a single mom since Peanut was 6 months old. I tell people that I was actually a single mom as soon as the kid was born and sometimes they get it, sometimes not so much.

To steal a clichéd line: I never knew you could love someone so much within just 5 minutes of meeting.

Peanut slept on my chest for the first 3 weeks of his life because I couldn’t get up fast enough (and sometimes at all) when he cried. I kept everything right next to the couch for easy access* because no amount of crying could wake the Ex up, seriously.

I believe that led to Peanut very quickly becoming a mama’s boy, refusing to let me out of his sight for long periods of time. Whenever the Ex got up with him at night, Peanut refused to go back to sleep and instead would keep the Ex awake. I would go out with friends some Saturday’s and Peanut would wake up almost as soon as I left the house, keeping the Ex up until I returned. When I would get home, I could pick that little man right up and we’d both fall fast asleep.

Having said that, it’s no surprise he’s a mama’s boy now, but it can be so tiring.

Yet I digress.

Peanut’s birth is when the real problems began for me and my Ex. Peanut was born in August, I officially told my Ex I wanted a divorce in November and in February of 2000, I moved in with my parents just 45 minutes north of Richmond.

Being a single mom is perhaps the hardest job I’ll ever have to do in my lifetime. To have someone completely dependent on you for everything; that little person causes you to panic when your car doesn't work or keeps you from quitting your job when your boss is a complete jerk and you can't take it anymore.

There are some days when this kid is lucky to be alive, especially as he gets older. I once knew a woman who would tell her son, “I brought you into this world and I can take you right back out of it.” I never realized how true that was ‘til Peanut was born.

You see, when you’re a single mom, there is no one to relieve you of the 2 hour feedings, the crankiness, the sick baby. There is no relief when you are at your wits end and you think you’re going to throw the kid against the wall either. I had to learn to step away pretty fast because, given my mom’s history, I was afraid of what would happen if I picked him up while angry. There is no one to take shifts with or whose wages you can lean on when you have to take yet another day off work because the baby has yet another ear infection and can’t go back to daycare until he’s been on the meds for 24 hours.

Oh, I’ve had boyfriends. I’ve made the mistake of letting Peanut call someone else daddy.** I’ve had experiences that let me know what it must be like to have a partner who’s willing to be the dad in the true sense of the word.

Yet none of them have stuck. Two years after leaving my husband I decided to go back to school at the ripe ‘ol age of 26. I took a part-time job on VCU’s campus so I could easily go to school full-time during they day, allowing some semblance of a normal schedule and routine for us both.

Perhaps not a day went by wondering if I could handle school, work, a toddler and commuting. I remember sitting on the bed, before Peanut was born, asking myself if I knew what I was doing. It was too late by then of course. Many times I considered giving Peanut to his dad while I finished school but I usually smacked that thought right out of my head considering how horrible a “father” my Ex was to begin with.

Many days I woke up not wanting to be a mom. I wanted to be back to my carefree life, sitting on the beach all day eating grapes or cantaloupe while reading a really good book. Now we can’t get near water without Peanut diving in, scaring the shit out of me with his lack of fear for something so much bigger and powerful than him and my fear of water doesn't matter because I would rather Peanut be safe and enjoy himself rather than be denied his greatest joy.

These days I think horrible thoughts less and cringe more, mostly because we're in a routine now. Also, Peanut is getting older and more autonomous everyday, fighting his way into independence much to my chagrin. Don't get me wrong, there are still many days when I want to knock the kid back into last week or "take him out," sometimes there are days when I just don't want to be a mom anymore. Then there are days when I dream about moving wherever I want, traveling the world and how much easier life in general would be if I didn't have this leech attached to me, sucking on my life.

When people found out I was going to school while raising the little munchkin, they'd start fawning over me, showering me with, "Oh Nut, I don't know how you do it. You must be a strong woman." "Congratulations! I'm glad to hear you're doing it because I couldn't." "I don't know how you do it Nut, I couldn't." One of my favorite professors, who now has 2 girls and still has her husband, told me on more than one occasion she didn't know how I could do it because it was hard enough and she had a husband (both are professors here).

I also wonder about Peanut because his father does not take an active parenting role in his life whatsoever. He didn't come up for the spelling bee, he doesn't ever come up for Parent Teacher Conferences, he didn't even come up for the assessment meeting last year, when I was worried Peanut had ADD or an emotional/behavioral disorder (which he kind of does but it's getting better). Lately, R. has been into playing Halo2 online more than calling his son nightly like he used to.

Peanut regresses greatly when he visits R., becoming a whiney mumbling little shit. He does this because R. coddles him. R. dresses him, feeds him, lets Peanut still sleep in the same bed with him and Peanut is now 6 1/2. Once, R. told me that he didn't set any rules for Peanut because I was too strict and he lets Peanut "be free" and "be a kid." Once and only once R. tried telling me he knew what it was like to be me, single parents extraordinaire. When Peanut is around R., he becomes extremely disrespectful to everyone and everything, rude and generally a kid no one wants to be around; everything that I rail against during the 2 weeks at a time Peanut is with me (when he comes back he tries it with me for all of 2 seconds. In the summer it's even worse).

I say this because there are studies galore out there that say single moms need to find good male role models for their sons. I personally think I'm doing just find without a positive male*** in our lives mainly because I don't want my son to grow up to be like his father and so far I think I'm winning but the truth will be told once Peanut's Jr. High years get here.

This June Peanut and I will move out completely on our own for the first time ever and, if I thought being a single mom was hard before, I'm sure I'll be in for a real surprise then.****

Btw, when I finished reading Operating Instructions by Anne Lamott, I felt so much better.

---

* I had an emergency c-section and the bed was way too stiff for my very sore belly. The couch conformed to my body and was much more comfortable. R. would even sleep on the floor next to me, Peanut in a bassinet, and still not hear the kid cry.

** Yeah, that was really stupid. It took me realizing that I'd kick some other woman ass if Peanut ever called her mommy to stop that real quick.

*** My dad lives in this same house but I wouldn't count him as one considering he wasn't much of a dad to my sister and me. Sure he paid the bills, but we don't really have any kind of relationship with him which has become increasingly more evident as I get older. An example would be when he suggests I do things like look up the rights of Afghan women on the internet to prove that he was right, they wear the burqa because it's their religion, not state law. Or when he looks up from the newspaper and says, "Hey Nut, did you know women in Saudi Arabia can't drive?" This was just 3 or 4 weeks ago.

**** And just so you all know, my parents were not live-in babysitters, they only help me out with clothes/groceries when I absolutely need it, I'm in charge of procuring all of our food/toiletry/clothing needs, etc. Every once in a while my mom is super nice and pays for a knitting class for me or helps me get yarn for my new obsession. I just get to live there rent free while I attend school and wait to move out.

More talk about abortion

If anything good can be said to have come from South Dakota's attempt to challenge Roe v. Wade, it's that the blogosphere is once again talking about abortion. It would seem that most of the time bloggers are as keen as anyone to avoid the topic. Perhaps that is merely a reflection of the blogosphere's tendency to chase after the popular story of the hour en masse, but I suspect it is also because most people tend to think that abortion as an issue has been talked out. People seem to think that pro-lifers have said everything they have to say, and pro-choicers have said everything they have to say, and it's pretty much all been said for at least 20 years now. With a situation like that, what's the point in bringing it up?

The problem is that I don't agree that everything has been said. There are some very persuasive arguments being made in favor of keeping abortion legal that to the best of my knowledge have only come up fairly recently. Granted, I really don't know the history of these arguments. Perhaps it is the case that these arguments have been making the rounds for 20+ years. But if that's the case, then it's even more imperative that we talk about them even louder, because I can tell you this much for sure: I hadn't heard them until recently. If these arguments have been around for years, the right people haven't been making them.

Which brings us to Lance Mannion's post from last Friday that argues that the main problem with abortion laws is that we really can't decided when life begins. Lance's post is basically a rerun of the same old pro- and anti-abortion arguments that have been making the rounds for the last 20 years.

Lance writes,

No argument for unrestricted abortion holds water unless it includes the argument that at no point is a fetus anything more than a parasitical accumulation of tissues taking up space in a woman's body.

When this is your starting point, you've already conceded a large portion of the battle. In fact, Lance is wrong when he says that any argument for unrestricted abortion must include this argument. For example, I could point out that even if I concede that a fetus is a person, it still isn't right to force the woman carrying a fetus to donate her body to care for it. Just like you can't force someone to give blood to save a dying person, you can't force a woman to carry a pregnancy to term against her will.

Lance goes on to argue that it is morally wrong to abort a pregnancy once the fetus can feel, think, and respond in kind outside the womb. He points out that we don't really know when that happens, then continues,

And that's the pro-choice argument's basic premise. We don't know. Not exactly. All we know is that at some point around here (gesturing toward a calender) it's a baby. Anything we do or say about it before then is just guessing.

The question is, who should make the guess?

For thirty-five years, as a nation, we've agreed that the guess should be left up to the woman who has to live with the outcome of the guess.

...

At some point, yes, [abortion is murder]. But when? You don't know. You're guessing. So am I. Your guess is as good as mine and our guess is no better than the woman who is actually pregnant. Since we're all just guessing, but it's her body and her life depending on whose guess wins, shouldn't she have the first and final guess?

So far I don't think I've said anything that isn't obvious to most pro-choice people.

Here's where I go off the reservation.

What if the mother is guessing wrong?

What if the fetus becomes a person earlier than she supposes?

This is why Lance's original assumption that arguments for legal abortion must address the issue of personhood is such a big mistake. The entire conversation gets derailed from the start, and all we end up with is the same tired stalemate that we've all grown tired of over the last several decades.

I wonder if Lance would call someone's refusal to donate blood an act of murder. Think about all the people on dialysis machines who die every year. Am I a murderer because I have two kidneys? Obviously, I am not. We don't consider it a murder when someone refuses to donate his body toward the support of another person. So why should abortion be any different? The question of when a new life "starts" is nothing more than a red herring that does nothing to advance the discussion.