Amazing fact: Forbes calculates profits of the big four sports (I guess that’s baseball, football, basketball, and tiddlywinks?) at $1.6 billion, but these industries receive taxpayer subsidies totaling more than $2 billion a year. That is, taxpayers provide the entire profits of sports. Explains a lot, doesn’t it?
I’ve always had a deep resentment of sports analogies, the continued job security of sports writers even as investigative reporters become an endangered species, and sports films with “universal appeal,” not to mention taxpayer-funded stadiums. Why am I supposed to take overgrown boys’ games any more seriously than I would expect anyone to take pedicures, eye-brow-plucking technique, or the collection of Beanie Babies?
Now I know what I've always suspected: the whole sports business really is parasitism, pure and simple.
The above revelation comes from a terrific article in the current issue of Mother Jones laying out how we can get the economy back on track. Check it out.
Another fact to ponder in a different article in the same issue of MoJo: Tax cuts and credits for corporations and wealthy individuals have a negative return on investment—less than 37 cents on the dollar—while every dollar spent on food stamp benefits returns $1.73 to the economy. I’d like to see what the return on investment in childcare or paid family leave might be. Something tells me it’d be better than sports stadiums.
Tuesday, January 6, 2009
Friday, December 26, 2008
Notes on Christmas
Thoughts on Christmas, now we’ve survived it.
1. I Heart Doctor Seuss: On Christmas eve, my (Jewish) partner and I found ourselves reading “How the Grinch Stole Christmas.” I was newly aware that what makes this story so great is its moral complexity. Unlike George “you’re either with us or against us” Bush, Dr. Seuss presents his central character as both villain and hero. Dr. Seuss may be laughing at his grinch, but he also seems to identify with him; who hasn’t sometimes felt their stomach turn and their heart shrink when witnessing this saccharine celebration of purchasing piles of cheaply made crap? The over-indulgence in tinsel, toys, and gorging that grosses out the Grinch is repugnant. His theft of all the ticky tack in Whoville is mean, but it is also a gift, clearing out room for the Whos to remember the real spirit of Christmas.
2. Down with White Christmas, Up with Herald Angels and Satan’s Grasp: When I listen to the Bing-era Christmas songs, I hear the jingle of cash registers. I can’t separate these modern secular songs from malls and mobs of bargain hunters. On the other hand, I’m no Christian, but I get choked up when I hear “Joy to the World,” “Hark the Herald Angels,” “We Three Kings, and “Holy Night” (way, way better than the sentimental pap of “Silent Night”). These songs are serious and sometimes dark. (Note the minor key of “God Rest Ye Merry Gentlemen” and the reference to freeing us from “Satan’s grasp when we had gone astray.” Not for nothing is this song, and that very line, the background of the ominous last scene in “Three Days of the Condor.”) The joy is therefore earned and real. What they celebrate is the possibility of the redemption of the world through the birth of a child. This is the miracle we all participate in with every birth.
Bah humbug and happy Boxing Day (don't forget the presents for the servants). On to Three Kings Day.
1. I Heart Doctor Seuss: On Christmas eve, my (Jewish) partner and I found ourselves reading “How the Grinch Stole Christmas.” I was newly aware that what makes this story so great is its moral complexity. Unlike George “you’re either with us or against us” Bush, Dr. Seuss presents his central character as both villain and hero. Dr. Seuss may be laughing at his grinch, but he also seems to identify with him; who hasn’t sometimes felt their stomach turn and their heart shrink when witnessing this saccharine celebration of purchasing piles of cheaply made crap? The over-indulgence in tinsel, toys, and gorging that grosses out the Grinch is repugnant. His theft of all the ticky tack in Whoville is mean, but it is also a gift, clearing out room for the Whos to remember the real spirit of Christmas.
2. Down with White Christmas, Up with Herald Angels and Satan’s Grasp: When I listen to the Bing-era Christmas songs, I hear the jingle of cash registers. I can’t separate these modern secular songs from malls and mobs of bargain hunters. On the other hand, I’m no Christian, but I get choked up when I hear “Joy to the World,” “Hark the Herald Angels,” “We Three Kings, and “Holy Night” (way, way better than the sentimental pap of “Silent Night”). These songs are serious and sometimes dark. (Note the minor key of “God Rest Ye Merry Gentlemen” and the reference to freeing us from “Satan’s grasp when we had gone astray.” Not for nothing is this song, and that very line, the background of the ominous last scene in “Three Days of the Condor.”) The joy is therefore earned and real. What they celebrate is the possibility of the redemption of the world through the birth of a child. This is the miracle we all participate in with every birth.
Bah humbug and happy Boxing Day (don't forget the presents for the servants). On to Three Kings Day.
Wednesday, December 17, 2008
Build windmills and wipe babies' bottoms
A number of critics have begun to note the macho slant of Obama’s job plan, as it’s being outlined so far. Katha Pollitt, for one, has done so, but then she would, wouldn’t she? (I mean that very much as compliment.) More noteworthy are columns in The New York Times, the Boston Globe, and, believe it or not, Forbes.
The economist Randy Albelda writes in the Boston Globe that although we certainly need bridges, roads, windmills, and efficient cars and the jobs that go with them, those jobs will overwhelmingly go to men. Albelda notes that “almost one-quarter of families with children under the age of 18 are headed and supported by women as are the majority of single-adult households without children.” You wouldn’t think that you’d have to point out that leaving out women leaves out most of the country, and the majority of its breadwinners, but you do.
Writes Linda Hirshman in the New York Times, “Mr. Obama compared his infrastructure plan to the Eisenhower-era construction of the Interstate System of highways. It brings back the Eisenhower era in a less appealing way as well: there are almost no women on this road to recovery.” This column is almost enough to make me forgive her for her earlier polemics.
Neither Albelda nor Hirshman include in their criticism the demand that Obama’s jobs plan should include aggressive affirmative action and efforts to pull women into apprenticeship programs in the construction trades. In Forbes, Ruthie Ackerman makes this point. “The answer is not, as Hirshman suggests, to create more low-paying jobs "in fields like social work and teaching, where large numbers of women work." The solution is redefine what we consider women's work.”
I can’t help feeling that Hirshman and Ackerman both have it half wrong, and both carry some misogyny around, Hirshman in assuming that women will always do “women’s work” in social work and teaching, and Ackerman in rejecting that work as unimportant. Ackerman would do well to read her fellow Forbes columnist Thomas Cooley arguing for investment in education as part of the stimulus package, not because it helps women, but because it will have the biggest long-term payoff.
Ackerman describes the trades as unsexy. Not to me. A person who knows how to build something—that’s pretty sexy. When my sweetie puts on a pair of Carharts, I go a little mushy. That kind of apparel puts me in mind of the men who worked as part of the original stimulus plan, in the Civilian Conservation Corps, building the trails, bridges, picnic tables, and other amenities I enjoyed throughout my childhood and that my children still enjoy. My daughters ought to get a chance to build such things and say proudly to their daughters, “I built that.”
If I had sons, I would want them to be proud of jobs they'd had caring for children, to point to flourishing people and tell their sons, "I helped raise that." If such work were better paid, such a thing would be far more likely.
How about both and? Get people (including women) building trails, daycare centers, and windmills, and give people (including men) well-paid jobs caring for our elders and children. I want it all. We can do it.
The economist Randy Albelda writes in the Boston Globe that although we certainly need bridges, roads, windmills, and efficient cars and the jobs that go with them, those jobs will overwhelmingly go to men. Albelda notes that “almost one-quarter of families with children under the age of 18 are headed and supported by women as are the majority of single-adult households without children.” You wouldn’t think that you’d have to point out that leaving out women leaves out most of the country, and the majority of its breadwinners, but you do.
Writes Linda Hirshman in the New York Times, “Mr. Obama compared his infrastructure plan to the Eisenhower-era construction of the Interstate System of highways. It brings back the Eisenhower era in a less appealing way as well: there are almost no women on this road to recovery.” This column is almost enough to make me forgive her for her earlier polemics.
Neither Albelda nor Hirshman include in their criticism the demand that Obama’s jobs plan should include aggressive affirmative action and efforts to pull women into apprenticeship programs in the construction trades. In Forbes, Ruthie Ackerman makes this point. “The answer is not, as Hirshman suggests, to create more low-paying jobs "in fields like social work and teaching, where large numbers of women work." The solution is redefine what we consider women's work.”
I can’t help feeling that Hirshman and Ackerman both have it half wrong, and both carry some misogyny around, Hirshman in assuming that women will always do “women’s work” in social work and teaching, and Ackerman in rejecting that work as unimportant. Ackerman would do well to read her fellow Forbes columnist Thomas Cooley arguing for investment in education as part of the stimulus package, not because it helps women, but because it will have the biggest long-term payoff.
Ackerman describes the trades as unsexy. Not to me. A person who knows how to build something—that’s pretty sexy. When my sweetie puts on a pair of Carharts, I go a little mushy. That kind of apparel puts me in mind of the men who worked as part of the original stimulus plan, in the Civilian Conservation Corps, building the trails, bridges, picnic tables, and other amenities I enjoyed throughout my childhood and that my children still enjoy. My daughters ought to get a chance to build such things and say proudly to their daughters, “I built that.”
If I had sons, I would want them to be proud of jobs they'd had caring for children, to point to flourishing people and tell their sons, "I helped raise that." If such work were better paid, such a thing would be far more likely.
How about both and? Get people (including women) building trails, daycare centers, and windmills, and give people (including men) well-paid jobs caring for our elders and children. I want it all. We can do it.
Thursday, December 11, 2008
What kills children?
What poses the biggest threat of death to children? You might think infectious diseases, and that’s true for infants. But if a child survives infancy the single biggest cause of fatal injury is cars. Cars are the single biggest killer of children ages 10 to 19.
That’s true around the world and across cultures.
This has implications for President-elect Obama’s jobs and infrastructure program: better make sure all that road building includes plenty of sidewalks, in short supply across much of the U.S. And how about bike paths, traffic-calming intersections, crosswalks, and stoplights?
Yet again that old socialist bogeyman Sweden comes out well on this issue, with much safer streets than other countries. Obama should be studying Sweden for lessons on infrastructure projects, as well as how to rescue a banking system.
That’s true around the world and across cultures.
This has implications for President-elect Obama’s jobs and infrastructure program: better make sure all that road building includes plenty of sidewalks, in short supply across much of the U.S. And how about bike paths, traffic-calming intersections, crosswalks, and stoplights?
Yet again that old socialist bogeyman Sweden comes out well on this issue, with much safer streets than other countries. Obama should be studying Sweden for lessons on infrastructure projects, as well as how to rescue a banking system.
Sunday, November 30, 2008
Our bodies, our ignorance
The New York Times today was a bonanza: not one but two stories relating to reproductive science and Crazy Things Americans Do. Especially when they have a) too much privilege and b) too little accurate scientific knowledge.
Exhibit A, page A1: “Born to Run? Little Ones Get Test for Sports Gene,” about a genetic test designed to “determine which sports suit the talents” of a toddler. One parent of a toddler aiming to sign up for the test thought “it’s good to match them with the right activity.” The test analyzes one gene in the 20,000-strong human genome. Supposedly, the reporter tells us on A1, “a 2003 study discovered the link between ACTN3 and those athletic abilities” for speed or endurance. But gentle readers who make it past the jump find that a scientist says the test may actually be “snake oil,” and that the genes merely “have a role in athletic performance.” A role, as in one role among many, as in a link, not the link.
Always keep an eye on the verbs in sensational stories about genetics: there’s nearly always some very flabby words flapping around in there taking up the slack where clarity and rigor ought to be. “Has a role in” and “link” tell you nothing about what causes what or exactly how it does it.
The problem goes deeper than the usual sensationalism necessary to sell newspapers. To think that any complex human trait or behavior could be controlled by a single gene is terrible science (a scientist quoted in the article said that at least 200 genes affect athletic performance) is to have a totally wrongheaded understanding of genetics. Nor do genes alone determine athletic performance or height or weight or … Never mind the broader environment, like, oh, say, how much encouragement to play baseball a child is given; current genetic science suggests that the precise choreography of hormones and growth that happens in the womb is crucial to the expression of any trait.
Which brings me to Exhibit B, cover of the New York Times Magazine: “Her Body, My Baby,” reads the title, next to an astonishing photo of two women. One, very pregnant, is dressed in slightly rumpled khakis and functional shirt that could have come from Wal-Mart or Sears. The other is slim, taut, hair perfectly upswept, black spike heels tall, jewelry exquisitely understated, and black dress little and perfect.
The small smile on the slim author in the little black dress looks smug. How could it look anything but? Iew, iew, iew. I don’t think I can take anymore of these posts from the New York Times’ bubble of privileged women.
Anyway, it turns out that nowadays most surrogacies involve the surrogate woman carrying a baby that is genetically unrelated to her, created through IVF using the sperm and egg of what the article calls “the intended parents.” (Let’s call it like it is: the paying parents.)
This is a strategy to get around the legal implications of the Baby M case and ensure that the surrogate mother’s legal claim to the baby is as weak as possible. Somebody, however, should call a genetic biologist to the stand to talk about the role of the womb in creating a mammal’s essential nature. (For more on this, see for example my review of The Century of the Gene.) The woman whose womb created the baby may not be the “genetic parent” of the child, but she most certainly is biologically related to it.
If I can make it through this article without gagging so hard I rip the magazine, I’ll have more to say…
Exhibit A, page A1: “Born to Run? Little Ones Get Test for Sports Gene,” about a genetic test designed to “determine which sports suit the talents” of a toddler. One parent of a toddler aiming to sign up for the test thought “it’s good to match them with the right activity.” The test analyzes one gene in the 20,000-strong human genome. Supposedly, the reporter tells us on A1, “a 2003 study discovered the link between ACTN3 and those athletic abilities” for speed or endurance. But gentle readers who make it past the jump find that a scientist says the test may actually be “snake oil,” and that the genes merely “have a role in athletic performance.” A role, as in one role among many, as in a link, not the link.
Always keep an eye on the verbs in sensational stories about genetics: there’s nearly always some very flabby words flapping around in there taking up the slack where clarity and rigor ought to be. “Has a role in” and “link” tell you nothing about what causes what or exactly how it does it.
The problem goes deeper than the usual sensationalism necessary to sell newspapers. To think that any complex human trait or behavior could be controlled by a single gene is terrible science (a scientist quoted in the article said that at least 200 genes affect athletic performance) is to have a totally wrongheaded understanding of genetics. Nor do genes alone determine athletic performance or height or weight or … Never mind the broader environment, like, oh, say, how much encouragement to play baseball a child is given; current genetic science suggests that the precise choreography of hormones and growth that happens in the womb is crucial to the expression of any trait.
Which brings me to Exhibit B, cover of the New York Times Magazine: “Her Body, My Baby,” reads the title, next to an astonishing photo of two women. One, very pregnant, is dressed in slightly rumpled khakis and functional shirt that could have come from Wal-Mart or Sears. The other is slim, taut, hair perfectly upswept, black spike heels tall, jewelry exquisitely understated, and black dress little and perfect.
The small smile on the slim author in the little black dress looks smug. How could it look anything but? Iew, iew, iew. I don’t think I can take anymore of these posts from the New York Times’ bubble of privileged women.
Anyway, it turns out that nowadays most surrogacies involve the surrogate woman carrying a baby that is genetically unrelated to her, created through IVF using the sperm and egg of what the article calls “the intended parents.” (Let’s call it like it is: the paying parents.)
This is a strategy to get around the legal implications of the Baby M case and ensure that the surrogate mother’s legal claim to the baby is as weak as possible. Somebody, however, should call a genetic biologist to the stand to talk about the role of the womb in creating a mammal’s essential nature. (For more on this, see for example my review of The Century of the Gene.) The woman whose womb created the baby may not be the “genetic parent” of the child, but she most certainly is biologically related to it.
If I can make it through this article without gagging so hard I rip the magazine, I’ll have more to say…
Saturday, November 22, 2008
Walker on Michelle O., or the stupid job of First Lady
It’s hard not to read a major Oedipal* subtext to Rebecca Walker’s work. It ain’t hard to link the distancing from feminism in her writing to her struggles with her mother, Alice. This dynamic was obvious in a recent column for The Root about Michelle Obama.
I don’t know what Michelle Obama’s so embodying feminist goals that she surpasses them is supposed to mean, especially given the quote at the end of the article: "The cause of freedom is not the cause of a race or a sect, a party or a class—it is the cause of humankind, the very birthright of humanity." I don’t know what feminism is if it isn’t the cause of freedom, and I don’t know how you surpass that.
Too, Walker’s criticism of feminism’s “monopoly by women over 50” would have been a say wha? moment for me if I didn’t know who her mother was or that she’s has had a very public falling out with her.
In most senses of the words “feminism” and “monopoly”, the claim is totally false. If feminism means the broad movement for women’s equality, I’m counterexample number one, being a feminist and still many years shy of 50. And I know I’m not the only one. What Walker has to mean is that her mother monopolized for her what feminism is, and she’s got issues with her, so she’s got issues with feminism. I can’t think of a nicer way to make sense of her blather on the subject.
Of course this hasn’t hurt Walker’s career, since the powers that be are always delighted to give an anti-feminist woman, better yet an anti-feminist black woman, plenty of airtime. It’s too bad, though, because there are interesting things to say about Michelle Obama. I think Michelle Obama is the bomb and I loved it that she was quoted immediately after the election saying she’d be working to raise awareness of the struggles of working moms. And damn is it something fine to see a gorgeous, regal black woman as First Lady of the United States of America.
But all that wonderfulness doesn’t change that fact that First Lady is a sucky thing for any self-respecting person to have to be. A pure decorative adjunct to a man in power—what could be more antithetical to feminism? Even as I glory at how Michelle Obama will raise the position to its highest function, and indeed to some extent by her very existence open new possibilities for black women and women in general, I’m sorry the position still exists and sorry for Michelle Obama. She’s putting her own career on hold to go sit on a pedestal and try to give her daughters as normal a life as possible while they’re on a pedestal.
Walker’s right that Obama’s response to a question about having to leave a “high-powered and highly compensated career” was graceful (though the bit about her kids coming first was straight from the necessary script of a First Lady). Quite so, one’s whole life defines who one is, with what this culture normally means by career (paid work in the market) being only one part of a meaningful life. But that doesn’t mean it’s right that in our system women married to men in very high positions of power are required to sacrifice their own ambitions.
Still, if Hillary Clinton shows anything, it’s that the crappy job of First Lady just might finally be transformed into a stepping stone to power in one’s own right. And that thought opens all kinds of avenues for fantasy about the future.
*Of course this is not the right word for struggles with one's mother and her legacy of power; not surprisingly, our language lacks such a word.
I don’t know what Michelle Obama’s so embodying feminist goals that she surpasses them is supposed to mean, especially given the quote at the end of the article: "The cause of freedom is not the cause of a race or a sect, a party or a class—it is the cause of humankind, the very birthright of humanity." I don’t know what feminism is if it isn’t the cause of freedom, and I don’t know how you surpass that.
Too, Walker’s criticism of feminism’s “monopoly by women over 50” would have been a say wha? moment for me if I didn’t know who her mother was or that she’s has had a very public falling out with her.
In most senses of the words “feminism” and “monopoly”, the claim is totally false. If feminism means the broad movement for women’s equality, I’m counterexample number one, being a feminist and still many years shy of 50. And I know I’m not the only one. What Walker has to mean is that her mother monopolized for her what feminism is, and she’s got issues with her, so she’s got issues with feminism. I can’t think of a nicer way to make sense of her blather on the subject.
Of course this hasn’t hurt Walker’s career, since the powers that be are always delighted to give an anti-feminist woman, better yet an anti-feminist black woman, plenty of airtime. It’s too bad, though, because there are interesting things to say about Michelle Obama. I think Michelle Obama is the bomb and I loved it that she was quoted immediately after the election saying she’d be working to raise awareness of the struggles of working moms. And damn is it something fine to see a gorgeous, regal black woman as First Lady of the United States of America.
But all that wonderfulness doesn’t change that fact that First Lady is a sucky thing for any self-respecting person to have to be. A pure decorative adjunct to a man in power—what could be more antithetical to feminism? Even as I glory at how Michelle Obama will raise the position to its highest function, and indeed to some extent by her very existence open new possibilities for black women and women in general, I’m sorry the position still exists and sorry for Michelle Obama. She’s putting her own career on hold to go sit on a pedestal and try to give her daughters as normal a life as possible while they’re on a pedestal.
Walker’s right that Obama’s response to a question about having to leave a “high-powered and highly compensated career” was graceful (though the bit about her kids coming first was straight from the necessary script of a First Lady). Quite so, one’s whole life defines who one is, with what this culture normally means by career (paid work in the market) being only one part of a meaningful life. But that doesn’t mean it’s right that in our system women married to men in very high positions of power are required to sacrifice their own ambitions.
Still, if Hillary Clinton shows anything, it’s that the crappy job of First Lady just might finally be transformed into a stepping stone to power in one’s own right. And that thought opens all kinds of avenues for fantasy about the future.
*Of course this is not the right word for struggles with one's mother and her legacy of power; not surprisingly, our language lacks such a word.
Thursday, November 6, 2008
Blue blind spots
Non-evangelical Americans were puzzled as to why Bristol Palin’s pregnancy caused so little distress among evangelicals, so it was only a matter of time until someone in the chattering classes tried to explain the matter. Margaret Talbot’s article on the subject in the New Yorker, “Red Sex, Blue Sex,” is an intriguing stab in the direction of an answer, but its brief, shallow treatment of the question left me dissatisfied.
It’s always seemed to me that right-wing-appeasing liberals of the Hilary Clinton ilk, who think they can find common ground with anti-abortionists in the goal of reducing teen pregnancy, were not only wrong to concede that abortion is a “tragedy,” but also wrong in the assumption of common ground on teen pregnancy. (This showed, I think, the same tin ear for both effective politics and integrity that Hilary exhibited in thinking she could get universal healthcare if she just made enough compromises with the insurance industry, and that Bill showed in just about every issue he ever addressed.)
Here’s what I’ve always suspected: Reducing teen pregnancy isn’t a goal of the religious right. Their reaction to Bristol Palin’s pregnancy suggests I’m right. Religious conservatives aren’t horrified by sex before marriage or sex by teens (in fact, your mainstream liberals may be more uncomfortable with teenage sex). In fact, teen pregnancy is actually more good than bad, in the religious right worldview. More (white) babies is good, but, more important, girls having babies young, as long as they get married—and within a conservative social framework pregnancy can push women into marriage--helps keep women disempowered and under the control of men. The bedrock of religious right ideology is gender hierarchy. Sex, even teen sex, isn’t bad, as long as it’s controlled by men (or boys) and women pay the price for it. (For more evidence that this is so, check out The Girls Who Went Away and my review of it.)
All this makes sense of the various phenomena Talbot describes. Liberals may be as much—or even more—uncomfortable with teen sex as religious conservatives, but liberal culture has absorbed the assumption that women deserve independent lives and careers. Having babies young, in this you’re-on-your-ownership society that lacks either strong government supports for mothers or strong extended family supports, is an economic and personal disaster. These are such fundamental assumptions of liberal culture as to be invisible to most liberals and centrists, which is why they assume without evidence that the religious right must share their goal of reducing teen pregnancy. The liberal worldview on these matters is a muddle—motivated half by a moral impulse, namely feminism's call for the equality of half the world, which it can’t quite yet really own, and half by economic rationality. Whereas the conservative worldview is pure, principled, and coherent (though of course it runs counter both to economic reality in the 21st century and to the great arc of history in favor of the principle of equality).
It’s always seemed to me that right-wing-appeasing liberals of the Hilary Clinton ilk, who think they can find common ground with anti-abortionists in the goal of reducing teen pregnancy, were not only wrong to concede that abortion is a “tragedy,” but also wrong in the assumption of common ground on teen pregnancy. (This showed, I think, the same tin ear for both effective politics and integrity that Hilary exhibited in thinking she could get universal healthcare if she just made enough compromises with the insurance industry, and that Bill showed in just about every issue he ever addressed.)
Here’s what I’ve always suspected: Reducing teen pregnancy isn’t a goal of the religious right. Their reaction to Bristol Palin’s pregnancy suggests I’m right. Religious conservatives aren’t horrified by sex before marriage or sex by teens (in fact, your mainstream liberals may be more uncomfortable with teenage sex). In fact, teen pregnancy is actually more good than bad, in the religious right worldview. More (white) babies is good, but, more important, girls having babies young, as long as they get married—and within a conservative social framework pregnancy can push women into marriage--helps keep women disempowered and under the control of men. The bedrock of religious right ideology is gender hierarchy. Sex, even teen sex, isn’t bad, as long as it’s controlled by men (or boys) and women pay the price for it. (For more evidence that this is so, check out The Girls Who Went Away and my review of it.)
All this makes sense of the various phenomena Talbot describes. Liberals may be as much—or even more—uncomfortable with teen sex as religious conservatives, but liberal culture has absorbed the assumption that women deserve independent lives and careers. Having babies young, in this you’re-on-your-ownership society that lacks either strong government supports for mothers or strong extended family supports, is an economic and personal disaster. These are such fundamental assumptions of liberal culture as to be invisible to most liberals and centrists, which is why they assume without evidence that the religious right must share their goal of reducing teen pregnancy. The liberal worldview on these matters is a muddle—motivated half by a moral impulse, namely feminism's call for the equality of half the world, which it can’t quite yet really own, and half by economic rationality. Whereas the conservative worldview is pure, principled, and coherent (though of course it runs counter both to economic reality in the 21st century and to the great arc of history in favor of the principle of equality).
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