Lex Anteinternet: Easter Sunday, 2024. The Day Joe Biden lost the 2024 Election by choosing to lose it by lurching to the Progressive Left & Hurling Invectives.

Lex Anteinternet: Easter Sunday, 2024. The Day Joe Biden lost the 20...: 

Easter Sunday, 2024. The Day Joe Biden lost the 2024 Election by choosing to lose it by lurching to the Progressive Left.

Just below this post, is this one:

Hurling invectives.

That post isn't limited to the left or the right, although right now, invectives are coming more loudly from the Populist right.  They do come from the Progressive left as well.

I note that, as people may misinterpret the post below as being solely aimed at Populists.  Indeed, Populists are likely to look at it that way, as they tend to be very shallow in their political analysis. All their opponents are members of "the Radical Left", they believe. Even Conservatives who oppose them are members of the "Radical Left".

Not hardly.

The actual Radical Left is in the news today through its capture of much of the Democratic Party, which started before the Populists became as influential as they currently are in the GOP.  Indeed, as we discussed last week, the Progressives, which are not the same as the Liberals, have roots in the Democratic Party that go back at least as far as the collapse of the Progressive Party in 1912-1914.

I've often said here that Democrats don't lose elections, they throw them away.

When future historians go back and find the point at which Conservatives who were teetering on the edge of supporting Joe Biden determined to reluctantly give their votes to Donald Trump, they'll cite the issuance of this proclamation:

A Proclamation on Transgender Day of Visibility, 2024

On Transgender Day of Visibility, we honor the extraordinary courage and contributions of transgender Americans and reaffirm our Nation’s commitment to forming a more perfect Union — where all people are created equal and treated equally throughout their lives.  

I am proud that my Administration has stood for justice from the start, working to ensure that the LGBTQI+ community can live openly, in safety, with dignity and respect.  I am proud to have appointed transgender leaders to my Administration and to have ended the ban on transgender Americans serving openly in our military.  I am proud to have signed historic Executive Orders that strengthen civil rights protections in housing, employment, health care, education, the justice system, and more.  I am proud to have signed the Respect for Marriage Act into law, ensuring that every American can marry the person they love. 

Transgender Americans are part of the fabric of our Nation.  Whether serving their communities or in the military, raising families or running businesses, they help America thrive.  They deserve, and are entitled to, the same rights and freedoms as every other American, including the most fundamental freedom to be their true selves.  But extremists are proposing hundreds of hateful laws that target and terrify transgender kids and their families — silencing teachers; banning books; and even threatening parents, doctors, and nurses with prison for helping parents get care for their children.  These bills attack our most basic American values:  the freedom to be yourself, the freedom to make your own health care decisions, and even the right to raise your own child.  It is no surprise that the bullying and discrimination that transgender Americans face is worsening our Nation’s mental health crisis, leading half of transgender youth to consider suicide in the past year.  At the same time, an epidemic of violence against transgender women and girls, especially women and girls of color, continues to take too many lives.  Let me be clear:  All of these attacks are un-American and must end.  No one should have to be brave just to be themselves.  

At the same time, my Administration is working to stop the bullying and harassment of transgender children and their families.  The Department of Justice has taken action to push back against extreme and un-American State laws targeting transgender youth and their families and the Department of Justice is partnering with law enforcement and community groups to combat hate and violence.  My Administration is also providing dedicated emergency mental health support through our nationwide suicide and crisis lifeline — any LGBTQI+ young person in need can call “988” and press “3” to speak with a counselor trained to support them.  We are making public services more accessible for transgender Americans, including with more inclusive passports and easier access to Social Security benefits.  There is much more to do.  I continue to call on the Congress to pass the Equality Act, to codify civil rights protections for all LGBTQI+ Americans.

Today, we send a message to all transgender Americans:  You are loved.  You are heard.  You are understood.  You belong.  You are America, and my entire Administration and I have your back.

NOW, THEREFORE, I, JOSEPH R. BIDEN JR., President of the United States of America, by virtue of the authority vested in me by the Constitution and the laws of the United States, do hereby proclaim March 31, 2024, as Transgender Day of Visibility.  I call upon all Americans to join us in lifting up the lives and voices of transgender people throughout our Nation and to work toward eliminating violence and discrimination based on gender identity.

IN WITNESS WHEREOF, I have hereunto set my hand this twenty-ninth day of March, in the year of our Lord two thousand twenty-four, and of the Independence of the United States of America the two hundred and forty-eighth.

JOSEPH R. BIDEN JR.

Defenders of this will no doubt state that Joe is just honoring the "right to be yourself".  Maybe he thinks of it that way.  Indeed, the statement is sufficiently bland enought to nearly be calculated to attempt not to really offend.

This isn't how many will take it.  Many will take it as "you are forcing me to accept a radical fraud about yourself and pretend it's okay".

And frankly, they're right.  Words actually do have meaning, and not only the spoken ones, but what they suggest.

This comes down, in a way, to the essential difference between how conservatives, liberals and progressives see the world (yes I've left populists out of this intentionally).  Only Progressives believe in the Existential Me, or the Isolated Absolute. Everyone else believes that you are part of a community.  Indeed, Progressivism is, ironically, the ultimate extension of a belief that Progressives claim to hate, that being American Individualism written large.  You can' be just what you want to be, and ignore everyone else.  

In reality, Homo sapiens are a community animal with a fixed nature, and you can't.

I'd normally be reluctant to cite Jordan Peterson, the right wing Canadian pundit, but he is a psychologist and he and a reporter have an interesting podcast episode entitled The Biggest Medical Scandal Of Our Time.  I'm not going to link it in, people can simply look it up, but it does a good job of pointing out the degree to which the entire transgender thing is simply a fraud.  Peterson spends much of the podcast being outraged, as he's a very poor interviewer, but what you'd basically learn is that in the extraordinary rare instances in which gender confusion arises, it's confusion and nothing else.  The basic proper course for minors is not to treat it, with most who are generally afflicted, according to Peterson, coming into adulthood comfortable with their genders, but being homosexuals.

I'm no doubt more radical yet, as I don't believe that transgenderism actually even exists, but is rather a psychological affliction that is limited to the Western world and expresses something else going on in our culture.  It's deeply contrary to nature, as much of our society is in general.  It's a reaction to some sort of unnatural stress, not an expression of nature.

There's utterly no reason whatsoever for the Federal Government to recognize transgenderism and the fact that it does, and that it's even crept into surgeries being allowed within the Armed Forces, is in fact evidence of how deeply woke some elements of our society have become.  There's no reason to oppress people who express this, but going the next 100 miles and pretending everything about it is okay about it is frankly going a bridge too far, and most people instinctively know this.

People have become used to various months being declared to represent the history of one group of people or another.  Originally, it was a few definable groups who deserved to have their history brought forward.  Black History Month was a good example.  March is National Women's History Month, which was as well. 

November has become Transgender Awareness Month according to some, or there's a month in November that's been declared Transgender Awareness Week.  Now we're all learning that March 31, the last day of National Women's History Month, is Transgender Day of Visibility.

Some time ago I heard a podcast by somebody, I can't recall who, who discussed how transgender mutilation of men into women goes an extra level in being an existential insult to women.  That it's a fraud is self-evident.  You cannot change your gender, you can only surgically and chemically attempt to partially mask your actual gender.  

But what hadn't occured to me is that actual women go through, due to their natures, something that men can barely understand.  To experience in your youthful prime an event in which your young healthy body suddenly starts bleeding monthly and your hormonal system subjects you to a raging hormonal cyclonic storm is something men do not experience and cannot grasp.  To take pills and subject yourself to surgical butchery doesn't mimic that in any fashion.  Women's entire bodies, after a certain point in their teens, remind them of our species elemental genetic roles.  Boys have things turn on, but not in a way that can result in them bearing another human being, and in fact monthly demanding that they do so.

To have the Oval Office recognize something that, at this point, is basically hurled in everyone's face, and which all humans know at an elemental level to be existentially wrong, is insulting.

Do declare it on Easter Sunday is an insult beyond that.

That Biden did this is tone-deaf beyond belief.  His defenders are pointing out that this day is "always Transgender Day of Visibility", which is absurd on its face, as it hasn't "always" existed.  It's new, and it's misdirected.  Noting those who fall into this self-declared group is worthwhile, but to sympathize with their plight and seek to address it honestly, rather than to verify that their condition is a dandy one. But this is what we do now since the Progressive Left has become so inserted in our society.  We honor the afflicted in their affliction rather than seek to help.

Recently, an insulting event occured at St. Patrick's Cathedral in New York, in which a funeral that openly insulted conservative beliefs in general and the beliefs of the Catholic Church occured.  The tone-deaf appearance by those whose duty it is to protect the beliefs of the Church were widely discussed on the Catholic Blogosphere.  This, however, is wider yet.

No matter how imperfectly understood, a major element fueling Populist rage (and there are multiple ones, not just one) and horrifying genuine conservatives is the forced demand of acceptance of certain things that actually are part of somebody's "radical left agenda".  While much of the invectives that cite that are baloney, this much is in fact true.  When Justice Kennedy and his fellow robbed travelers insisted that Obergell didn't mean the onset of a societal revolution, they were obviously wrong at the time, and they set off the inevitable counter revolution.  We noted then:

These justices have perhaps assumed too much if they've assumed that they can now act so far that Marshall would be horrified, and I'd be surprised if, long term, this decision doesn't either mark the beginning of a Cesarian court and a retreat of American democracy, or the point at which the roles of the Court began to massively erode in favor of a more Athenian democracy.

Either result is really scary.

Well here we are.

So, with Joe Biden, who supposedly is an adherent Catholic (which based on his public positions, he obviously is not), having signed a proclamation that places a day honoring something that repels conservatives and enrages Populists, and which actually does offer insult to Christian tenants in general, and which places the honoring on Easter Sunday in an election year, he's sealed his doom in the Fall.  Those defending him that this "always" occurs on this day are essentially noting that Joe was too distracted to take note, which only fuels the fire that he doesn't know what he is doing.  Never mind that Trump either doesn't know what he is doing either, his adherents already know that the Führerprinzip means he'll follow their lead, as it gets him attention. And indeed, they are already.

And this points out once again the tragedy of a moronic "two party system". There's no reason that real conservatives, or real liberals, should have to vote for these two fallen parties and their ancient, unappealing candidates.  

Indeed, there's a good argument that thinking people shouldn't.

Related threads:

A Primer, Part I. Populists ain't Conservatives, and LIberals ain't Progressives. How inaccurate terminology is warping our political perceptions.

Conservatism, Democratic Party, Economics, Liberalism, National Conservatism, People's Party, Politics, Populism, Populist Party, Progressive Party, Progressivism, Republican Party

We like everything to be all natural. . . . except for us.

Agrarianism, Agriculture, An hoc pertinet ad naturam?, Commentary, Daily Living, Food, Friday Farming, Medicine, Men, nature, The roles of men and women, transgenderism, trends, Women

Hurling invectives.

This may seem like a strange thing to put up for Easter Morning, but maybe it isn't.

One of our major elected office holders in this state is a Catholic.  And yet, in spite of that, he makes vile accusations against entire classes of people constantly.  Other members of the "Freedom Caucus" claim to be Christian, but their speech sure doesn't indicate it.  One, the session before last, who claimed in her native state of Illinois that Muslims worship a different God than Christians (they don't, Allah is simply the Arabic word for "God", and while they may understand God's nature differently than we do, they worship the same God) claimed that "we are not our brother's keeper".  The hard populist right around here frequently cites to religion, even if they are not all the same religion.  

Christ could be angry, as his chasing the money changers out of the Temple indicates.  We have to wonder what will occur to a Presidential candidate, whose connection with Christianity is paper thin, will receive in the next life for hawking Bibles as part of his campaign. But for now, we can wonder how a group of people who claim to be the representatives of the culture can behave so badly.

People who do this routinely are not speaking intelligently, and in fact are attempting to distract from intelligent debate.

You should consider that when listening to public figures.

We live in an age in which intelligent debate has declined to an all-time low.  In its place, we have now what the Nazis and the Communist had, insulters who scream, while saying very little that's intelligent or worth considering. Their goal is to inspire hatred, as if love for an idea won't be forthcoming, hatred of a demonized class will do.

Politicians and figures who routinely insert words like "radical", "leftist", "fascist", "Marxist", and "Communist" into their speech are not arguing points, they're trying to inspire hatred and avoiding thought.   

For days, I've been getting emails from a figure I at least somewhat respected, and have voted for in the past, accusing the current administration of being "radical", sometimes in the most absurd ways.  One such missive asserts the Democrats are intentionally out to make things worse for Americans, which is flat out absurd.  It's constant.  The contest locally, right now, is in the GOP itself, and given that, as I'm still reluctantly registered as a Republican, I'll be struggling in regard to my vote in the primary, with the question being whether I should cast a vote at all.  I likely will, but come the general election, I'm going to weigh this behavior.

A current state office holder who is a co religious cannot speak without speaking of his opponents as "Radical leftists and liberal elites", whipping up ire towards imagined categories that simply really aren't here.  There are no Red bands roaming the prairies around Cheyenne.

For that matter, being an "elite" is a good thing.  In this context, "elite" implies highly educated and successful.  If the highly educated and successful think your position is dimwitted, it probably is.

More than one Populist, who are not Conservatives, now run around constantly accusing Governor Gordon of being a Democrat, by which they mean not a Populist. We're teetering on the brink of RINO meaning "not a fascist".  It already darned near means that the speaker is a Southern Populist with ideas that are not native to this state, and which are being spouted in an unthinking manner.

Taking it nationally, the former President, who apparently has so little grasp of political categories that he doesn't understand the difference between communism and fascism (Wharton School of Business. . . why are you respected?) recently stated “We pledge to you that we will root out the communists, Marxists, fascists and the radical left thugs that live like vermin within the confines of our country that lie and steal and cheat on elections”.

A person who links all those categories together is, frankly, is either ignorant or bizarrely deluded.  People who swallow this up, are really ignorant.

Now, let's be honest.  At one time, particularly in the 60s and 70s, the far left did the same thing.  Everyone who opposed them or who wasn't with them was a "fascist".  And in more modern times, the far left progressives have done the same, often with really bizarro accusations that everyone who isn't with them is part of a widespread "white" and "male" conspiracy.  

But that's the point.  To a large degree, nobody really take the far left in the United States seriously, usually, because they are clowns.  Recently they have been successful, however, in a gender bending effort, which is helping to give rise to the Populist far right.

But both sides are anti-natural, anti-scientific, swimming in the toddler section movements.  They're unthinking.

And as we have real problems, we need real thought, now.

And at any rate, running around that your opponent must be a Communist, Marxist, Monarchist, Anarchist, Pedophile, Audiophile, Anglophile, RINO is not dignified. 

And for those who claim to be Christian, well you should reconsider your presentation. 

You might want to reconsider your personal lives also, particularly if you are one of the numerous members of the Christian Nationalist camp whom St. Paul might have a few things to address them about.

Labels: 2020s, 2024, 2024 Election, Christian Nationalism, Christianity, Democratic Party, Donald Trump, Easter, Islam, Populism, Progressivism, Republican Party, Southern Populism, Standards, the spoken word

Lex Anteinternet: Cliffnotes of the Zeitgeist, 61st Edition. Illiberal Democracy. . . coming soon to a republic near you and boosting the birth rate.

Lex Anteinternet: Cliffnotes of the Zeitgeist, 61st Edition. Illiber...:   

Cliffnotes of the Zeitgeist, 61st Edition. Illiberal Democracy. . . coming soon to a republic near you and boosting the birth rate.

 

"Mothers, fight for your children". World War Two German posters.  Prior to the war you can find quite a few posers of fawning mothers with babies, including the ever popular large breasted young woman breastfeeding babies.  The Nazi Party was freakishly pro natalist, even though the country was very densely populated.  While I can't find it, a Nazi informational cartoon even exists lamenting a woman's increasing first childbirth age, taking it back to a point at which it was in the early teens.

There’s nobody that’s better, smarter or a better leader than Viktor Orban. He’s fantastic…He’s a non-controversial figure because he says, ‘This is the way it’s going to be,’ and that’s the end of it. Right? He’s the boss. No, he’s a great leader.

Donald Trump on Viktor Orbán, yesterday.

What the crap? 

Right wing fawning over Viktor Orbán is really getting over the top.  Why?

Well, I know why, it's because of his philosophy of "Illiberal Democracy", which will be coming soon to a large North American republic near you.

And while you are enjoying being told how exactly to think, you can get back to work on birthin' dem babies.

Eh?

Ah yes, has any notices that there's growing far right obsession on increasing the birth rate.  It's one thing to support families, but that's not what I mean.  If you listen carefully, there's suddenly a genuine "we need more babies" movement going on in the far right.

This has long been the case in Russia, which has crashing demographics, so it probably makes sense.  If they don't arrest this trend, irrespective of how much Vlad Putin expands the borders of the country, sooner or later China is going to help itself to a large portion of Siberia.  So its been going on there for a while, but appears to be picking up.

Vlad delivered a message on this in Russia yesterday, for International Women's Day, something that actually isn't about babies.

President of Russia Vladimir Putin: Dear women,

From the bottom of my heart, I wish you all the best on International Women’s Day.

We always look forward to this wonderful spring day with pleasure and excitement, preparing for it well in advance. Today, in every home and every family, Russians are expressing their most tender and loving wishes for their mothers, wives, daughters, grandmothers and girlfriends.

Dear women, you certainly have the power to improve this world with your beauty, wisdom and generosity, but above all, thanks to the greatest gift that nature has endowed you with – the bearing of children. Motherhood is a glorious mission for women. A difficult and critically important mission, but also a source of so much joy and happiness.

Family remains the most important thing for any woman, no matter what career path she chooses or what professional heights she attains. Her family, relatives, friends, her tireless concern for her children, their health and education, teaching them what is right and making sure they grow up to be decent and successful people is what matters most.

This year is dedicated to the family in Russia. The meaning, the essence of the family is primarily about the continuation of life, the continuation of the lineage, of the story of each family and our entire country. The family is the bond that has ensured continuity from generation to generation, and consideration and respect for women and motherhood are an integral part of our traditions.

The family, its interests and needs are in the spotlight and an absolute priority in Russia today. We will certainly do everything we can to ensure that families with children, including large and young families, young mothers, feel supported and assisted by the state.

I would like to specifically address the women who are serving in the special military operation now, carrying out combat missions, as well as to others who are now separated from their family members, waiting for our heroes to come home, inspiring them with their love, cheer and support, worrying about every soldier, helping them on the front line, in hospitals, and in numerous volunteer organisations. Again and again, you prove that a woman’s heart is truly an irresistible force, providing an example of perseverance and confidence that good and truth are on our side.

Dear women!

You take on extremely difficult challenges, achieving success and impressive results in a variety of fields. We, men, often feel amazed at your ability to get things done quickly and efficiently, yet thoroughly, seeing to every detail. You handle an endless succession of problems and burdens without losing your charm and allure. It is impossible not to admire you.

I would like to wish you genuine mutual understanding with those you hold dear, as many truly happy moments in your lives as possible, and success in everything that is important to you.

All the best to you. Happy International Women’s Day!

Tsar Vlad has spoken.  Get to work on those babies.

Tim Scott, who recently sold his dignity to fawn over Don Trump, said a line like this just the other day in an interview where it wasn't subtle.  It doesn't seem to have been picked up in the press, which doesn't seem to have picked up on this at all, but he said something like "we need more babies".  I can't, however, recall the context.

This has really started to appear now that the topic of IVF has come up.  I'm a Catholic, and frankly I fully agree with the Church's position that IVF is immoral, in part because it creates people to be wasted.  That this has turned into a controversy, however, was predictable.  Interestingly, however, some of the language that now appears is along these lines. Republicans are declaring that they're in support of IVF as we need more babies.

This showed up a bit in some odd way in the State of the Union address rebuttal by Sen. Katie Britt.  Frankly, State of the Union addresses have become almost completely pointless since the introduction of television for the most part.  Joe Biden's was a bit of an exception, and there are others, but usually the President declares the State of the Union to be great, hands out kittens, and leaves.  In the rebuttal, the opposing party comes in and declares puppies to be great, but kittens to be a menace.

This year Sen. Britt, a youngish Alabaman Senator, delivered the rebuttal from her kitchen. Some thought the scene of a woman delivering a message from a kitchen to be an ironic accident.  

I doubt it.

I think the message was intentional.  Women's primary duties are in the kitchen. . . and maybe the bedroom.

Her speech

Good evening, America. My name is Katie Britt, and I have the honor of serving the people of the great state of Alabama in the United States Senate. However, that’s not the job that matters most. I am a proud wife and mom of two school age kids. My daughter Bennett and my son Ridgeway are why I ran for the Senate.

I’m worried about their future and the future of children in every corner of our nation, and that’s why I invited you into our home tonight. Like so many families across America, my husband Wesley and I just watched President Biden’s State of the Union address from our living room. And what we saw was the performance of a permanent politician who has actually been in office for longer than I’ve been alive.

One thing was quite clear, though. President Biden just doesn’t get it. He’s out of touch. Under his administration, families are worse off, our communities are less safe, and our country is less secure. I just wish he understood what real families are facing around kitchen tables just like this one. You know, this is where our family has tough conversations.

It’s where we make hard decisions. It’s where we share the good, the bad, and the ugly of our days. It’s where we laugh together, and it’s where we hold each other’s hands and pray for God’s guidance. And many nights, to be honest, it’s where Wesley and I worry. I know we’re not alone. And so tonight, the American family needs to have a tough conversation, because the truth is we’re all worried about the future of our nation.

The country we know and love seems to be slipping away, and it feels like the next generation will have fewer opportunities and less freedoms than we did. I worry my own children may not even get a shot at living their American dreams. My American dream allowed me, the daughter of two small business owners from rural Enterprise, Alabama, to be elected to the United States Senate at the age of 40. Growing up sweeping the floor at my dad’s hardware store and cleaning the bathroom at my mom’s dance studio, I never could have imagined what my story would entail.

To think about what the American Dream can do across just one generation in just one lifetime, it’s truly breathtaking. But right now, the American dream has turned into a nightmare for so many families. The true unvarnished state of our union begins and ends with this. Our families are hurting. Our country can do better.

And you don’t have to look any further than the crisis at our southern border to see it. President Biden inherited the most secure border of all time. But minutes after taking office, he suspended all deportations, he halted construction of the border wall, and he announced a plan to give amnesty to millions.

We know that President Biden didn’t just create this border crisis. He invited it with 94 executive actions in his first 100 days. When I took office, I took a different approach. I traveled to the Del Rio sector of Texas. That’s where I spoke to a woman who shared her story with me. She had been sex trafficked by the cartels starting at the age of 12. She told me not just that she was raped every day, but how many times a day she was raped.

The cartels put her on a mattress in a shoebox of a room, and they sent men through that door over and over again for hours and hours on end. We wouldn’t be ok with this happening in a third world country. This is the United States of America, and it is past time, in my opinion, that we start acting like it. President Biden’s border policies are a disgrace.

This crisis is despicable, and the truth is it is almost entirely preventable. From fentanyl poisonings to horrific murders, there are empty chairs tonight at kitchen tables just like this one because of President Biden’s senseless border policies. Just think about Laken Riley. In my neighboring state of Georgia, this beautiful 22 year old nursing student went out on a jog one morning, but she never got the opportunity to return home.

She was brutally murdered by one of the millions of illegal border crossers President Biden chose to release into our homeland. Y’all, as a mom, I can’t quit thinking about this. I mean, this could have been my daughter. This could have been yours. And tonight, President Biden finally said her name, but he refused to take responsibility for his own actions.

Mr. president, enough is enough. Innocent Americans are dying, and you only have yourself to blame. Fulfill your oath of office, reverse your policies, end this crisis, and stop the suffering. Sadly, we know that President Biden’s failures don’t stop there. His reckless spending dug our economy into a hole and sent the cost of living through the roof.

We have the worst inflation in 40 years and the highest credit card debt in our nation’s history. Let that sink in. Hard working families are struggling to make ends meet today. And with soaring mortgage rates and sky high childcare costs, they’re also struggling to how to plan for tomorrow. The American people are scraping by while President Biden proudly proclaims that Bidenomics is working.

Goodness, y’all. Bless his heart. We know better. I’ll never forget stopping at a gas station in Chilton County one evening. The gentleman working the counter told me that after retiring he had to pick up a job in his 70s so that he didn’t have to choose between going hungry or going without his medication.

He said I did everything right. I did everything I was told to do. I worked hard. I saved. I was responsible. He’s not alone. I hear similar concerns from fellow parents, whether I am walking with my friends or whether I’m at my kid’s games. But let’s be honest, it’s been a minute since Joe Biden pumped gas, ran a carpool, or even pushed a grocery cart.

Meanwhile, the rest of us see our dollar, and we know it doesn’t go as far. We see it every day. And despite what he tells you, our communities are not safer. For years, the left has coddled criminals and defunded the police, all while letting repeat offenders walk free. The result is tragic but foreseeable.

From our small towns to America’s most iconic city streets, life is getting more and more dangerous. And unfortunately, President Biden’s weakness isn’t just hurting families here at home. He is making us a punchline on the world stage. Look, where I’m from, your word is your bond. But for three years, the president has demonstrated that America’s word doesn’t mean what it used to. From abandoning our allies in his disastrous withdrawal from Afghanistan to desperately pushing another dangerous deal with Iran, President Biden has failed.

We’ve become a nation in retreat. And the enemies of freedom, they see an opportunity. Putin’s brutal aggression in Europe has put our allies on the brink. Iran’s terrorist proxies have slaughtered Israeli Jews and American citizens. They’ve targeted commercial shipping and they’ve attacked our troops nearly 200 times since October, killing three US soldiers and two Navy Seals. Meanwhile, the Chinese Communist Party is undercutting America’s workers. China is buying up our farmland, spying on our military installations and spreading propaganda through the likes of TikTok. You see, the CCP knows that if it conquers the minds of our next generation, it conquers America.

And what does President Biden do? Well, he bans TikTok for government employees, but creates an account for his own campaign. Y’all, you can’t make this stuff up. Look, we all recall when presidents faced national security threats with strength and resolve; that seems like ancient history. Right now, our commander in chief is not in command.

The free world deserves better than a dithering and diminished leader. America deserves leaders who recognize that secure borders, stable prices, safe streets, and a strong defense are actually the cornerstones of a great nation. Just ask yourself, are you better off now than you were three years ago? There’s no doubt we’re at a crossroads and it doesn’t have to be this way.

We all feel it. But here’s the good news. We the people are still in the driver’s seat. We get to decide whether our future will grow brighter or whether we’ll settle for an America in decline. Well, I know which choice our children deserve and I know the choice the Republican Party is fighting for. We are the party of hard working parents and families and we want to give you and your children the opportunities to thrive and we want families to grow.

It’s why we strongly support continued nationwide access to in-vitro fertilization. We want to help loving moms and dads bring precious life into this world. Wesley and I believe there is no greater blessing in life than our children. And that’s why tonight I want to make a direct appeal to the parents out there and in particular to my fellow moms, many of whom I know will be up tossing and turning at 2:00 am wondering how you’re going to be in three places at once and then somehow still get dinner on the table?

First of all, we see you, we hear you, and we stand with you. I know you’re frustrated. I know you’re probably disgusted by most of what you see going on in Washington. And I’ll be really honest with you, you’re not wrong for feeling that way. Look, I get it. The task in front of us isn’t an easy one, but I can promise you one thing.

It is worth it. So I am asking you for the sake of your kids and your grandkids, get into the arena. Every generation has been called to do hard things. American greatness rests in the fact that we always answer that call. It’s who we are. Never forget we are steeped in the blood of patriots who overthrew the most powerful empire in the world.

We walk in the footsteps of pioneers who tamed the wild. We now carry forward the same flame of freedom as the liberators of an oppressed Europe. We continue to draw courage from those who bent the moral arc of the universe. And when we gaze upon the heavens, never forget that our DNA contains the same ingenuity that put man on the moon.

America has been tested before and every single time we’ve emerged unbowed and unbroken. Our history has been written with the grit of men and women who got knocked down, but we know their stories because they did not stay down. We are here because they stood back up. So now it’s our turn our moment to stand up and prove ourselves worthy of protecting the American Dream.

Together, we can reawaken the heroic spirit of a great nation because America, we don’t just have a rendezvous with destiny, we take destiny’s hand and we lead it. Our future starts around kitchen tables just like this, with moms and dads just like you. And you are why I believe with every fiber of my being that despite the current state of our union, our best days are still ahead.

May God bless you, and may God continue to bless the United States of America.

Okay, this speech wasn't Vlad's "how's that baby making going?" speech, but there's some interesting subtle messages in it.  Delivered from a kitchen, with lots of references to kiddo's.  You know, y'all? 

As an aside, this was just about the most affected Southern style of speech ever by somebody who is really Southern.  I can't recall a political speech with so many "y'all's".  And the "Bless his heart" line. Do Southerners realize that other Americans either don't know why Southerners say this, or find it weird?  No wonder this speech has been so widely lampooned.

Anyhow, I want to be very careful here as I'm certainly not against married couples having children, (note I inserted married in there) and I'm a proponent, perhaps a radical one, of traditional values, but neo pro natalism is a little weird.

Pro natalism?

Yes.

Consider Pronatalist.org.

There's a movement going on and the founders of Pronatalist.org, Simone and Malcolm Collins, are sort of at the point of the spear of it.  And in a way, while I'm not accusing them of anything, the message is pretty clear.  Populations are collapsing, they argue, and having babies is the counter to it.

Well, if that's correct, that's an obvious solution, but the added subtly to it is that the right kind of people aren't having babies.

All the other problems before us in this country, important though they may be, are as nothing compared with the problem of the diminishing birth rate and all that it implies.

Theodore Roosevelt.

Hardly remembered now, a big concern of the early 20th Century, in some quarters, was "race suicide".  Basically, whites had a declining birth rate, even before pharmaceutical birth control, and African Americans didn't.

I'm not stating that this is exactly what the neo pro natalists are concerned about. Rather, what I think some are concerned about is that the declining birth rate in Western and Westernized nations is falling.  Actually, the birth rate (and, FWIW, sperm count in males) is falling all over the globe.  But like a lot of issues, once it's notice, the actual nature of the problem, if there is a problem, is usually past its peak, although certainly isn't always the case.

There are some things here which are real problems, as well.  The decline in Western nations is a symptom of something, and that something isn't good, whatever it is.

But the added problem here is that it's easy to cross from concern into being creepy, and far right and far left movements do that, and have done that on this very issue in the past.

Consider the efforts in the 2023 legislature to oppose banning child marriages, which we posted on at the time. Some of our comments.:

I've been waiting for the opposition to happen.

This bill sailed through the house and is in the Senate, and I'm frankly surprised that the opposition didn't appear before now. Not because the bill is a bad idea.  It's a good one, and it should pass.  Marriages lower than 16 years old are a hideous idea, and frankly marriage below 18 sure a good one.  Nonetheless, a similar attempt at banning such marriages failed last year.

The reason I thought it would fail is that there's some silent opposition from at least the members of one religion in the state, and I thought it might arise there.  But, it didn't.  The objections to have a religious tinge to them, but not from the expected quarter.

But it's also taken on a rather creepy tone.

Apparently the email, which wasn't published in full by the press, stated the following:

This bill may seem harmless, but there are concerns about constitutional rights that you need to form your own opinions about

And then it linked to a blog post which it endorses, stating that it's a succinct analysis..

The blog post is easy to find.  And it provides, in its entirety, the following (complete with photo):

HB0007 - Underage marriage-amendments

HB0007 - Underage marriage-amendments

Sponsored By: Representative(s) Zwonitzer, Dn and Oakley and Senator(s) Case and Furphy

ESSENCE: "No person shall marry who is under the age of sixteen (16) years." PERIOD. END OF STORY. AND "Marriages contracted in Wyoming are void without any decree of divorce:... When either party is under sixteen (16) years of age at the time of contracting the marriage."

ACTION:

Write the members of the Senate and ask them to vote "NO" when HB 7 comes up on Monday's 2nd Reading.

Jim.Anderson@wyoleg.gov; Fred.Baldwin@wyoleg.gov; Eric.Barlow@wyoleg.gov; Bo.Biteman@wyoleg.gov; Brian.Boner@wyoleg.gov; Anthony.Bouchard@wyoleg.gov; Evie.Brennan@wyoleg.gov; Cale.Case@wyoleg.gov; Ed.Cooper@wyoleg.gov; Dan.Dockstader@wyoleg.gov; Ogden.Driskill@wyoleg.gov; Affie.Ellis@wyoleg.gov; Tim.French@wyoleg.gov; Dan.Furphy@wyoleg.gov; Larry.Hicks@wyoleg.gov; Lynn.Hutchings@wyoleg.gov; Bob.Ide@wyoleg.gov; Stacy.Jones@wyoleg.gov; Dave.Kinskey@wyoleg.gov; John.Kolb@wyoleg.gov; Bill.Landen@wyoleg.gov; Dan.Laursen@wyoleg.gov; Troy.McKeown@wyoleg.gov; Tara.Nethercott@wyoleg.gov; Stephan.Pappas@wyoleg.gov; Tim.Salazar@wyoleg.gov; Wendy.Schuler@wyoleg.gov; Charles.Scott@wyoleg.gov; Cheri.Steinmetz@wyoleg.gov

CONCERNS:

HB 7 denies the fundamental purpose of marriage:

Marriage is the only institution in Wyoming Statute designed to keep a child's father and mother living under the same roof and cooperating in the raising of any children that they, together, conceive. This is the NATURAL RIGHT of every child. As such, it is protected in the Wyoming Constitution (see. Art. 1, Sec. 3 and 23). Since young men and women may be physically capable of begetting and bearing children prior to the age of 16, marriage MUST remain open to them for the sake of those children. 

The sad fact that physical maturity often does not match emotional and intellectual maturity is an indictment of our modern educational system. That is a problem that should be addressed. But we should not use it as an excuse to instantiate bad law.

HB 7 denies parental rights.

Parents, by virtue of their right to conceive children, have the pre-political (i.e. God-given) responsibility to raise their own children. This right and responsibility includes guiding their own maturing children into the estate of Holy Matrimony. HB 7 strips parents of their right to consent to properly desired and well-ordered marriages when they are below an arbitrary age. Moreover, this arbitrary age limit is demonstrably lower than the historical norm of millennia of human existence. 

It is true that some perverse religions and cultures COERCE children to marry young, against their wishes. Sometimes, as in the case of human trafficking, this coercion comes from outside the family. Sometimes, it comes from the parents themselves. The Constitutional rights of children require that side-boards be in place to prevent such perversions. But those side-boards already exist in the form of written parental consent and judicial review of that consent. HB 7 removes those side-boards and replaces them with an arbitrary number that has no organic or essential impetus behind it. 

Comparison with other states:

Nearly all (49 out of 50 states) set the minimum age of legal consent at 18--just exactly as Wyoming does. Also like Wyoming, 46 of 50 allow people to get married below the minimum age if their parents give permission. Of these, 37 set the lowest age of marriage with parental consent at 16, while four (IN, NE, OR, WA) set it at 17, two set it at 15 (HI and MO), one (NH) sets it at 13, and two (CA and MS) have no minimum age for parental consent. 

In addition to CA and MS, 12 other states (AK, GA, HI, KS, MD, MA, NM, NC, OK, RI, UT, WV, WY) have judicial mechanisms that allow exceptions to the minimum age with parental consent. Some of these exceptions specifically name pregnancy, some prohibit age-differentials between the bride and groom more than four years. The sponsor testified that "Wyoming is one of eight states remaining, I believe, that do not have a minimum marriage age in statute" (AK, CA, MA, NM, NC, OK, RI, WV, WY and Puerto Rico). (Only California has both NO minimum age, and NO judicial mechanism.) The remaining 42 states set the absolute minimum age at 13 (NH), 15 (HI and MO), 17 (IN, NE, OR, WA) and 18 (KY and LA) and 16. HB 7 wipes away Wyoming's current mechanism for taking into account ANY special circumstances.

Testimony: 

Additionally, the bringers of HB 7 offer no evidence that Wyoming is facing any statistical uptick of coerced marriages. In the House committee, there was no testimony weighing the trade-off of parental rights over against any “significant issue” with child marriage in Wyoming. To the contrary, the sponsor of the bill openly admitted that “it is not what we would call a problem in this state.” On average 20 marriages per year under 18 and under in Wyoming. There was no testimony about the factual number under 16. Nor was there any testimony about why under 16 years old there should be no judicial exceptions.

Rather, the sponsor openly testified that the reason for bringing the bill is to “keep up with the Jones’” (i.e. 42 other states have put arbitrary age restrictions on marriage. After this dubious motivation, the testimony given in committee was fraught with hypothetical harms. For instance: “if a minor wants a divorce, she can’t hire of lawyer.” Or, “Minors might be coerced into marriage.” Or, “Minors, are not mature enough to marry.” All these cautions are already covered by current law that requires a judge to investigate whether or not the person is being coerced into marriage if that person is mature enough to legally consent. It is rather insulting to say that Wyoming judges are not up to the task that has been given them by law. But, that could be remedied by giving them legislative guidance or additional help. The responsibility does not need to be taken away altogether.

HB 7 violates the right of Wyoming citizens to marry.

Only a generation ago, people were regularly ready for marriage by the age of 15, not 16, and still today many Wyoming couples are celebrating their 50th wedding anniversary after having been married prior to 15. Article 16 of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights is pertinent, here. "1. Men and women of full age, without any limitation due to race, nationality or religion, have the right to marry and to found a family. They are entitled to equal rights as to marriage, during marriage and at its dissolution. 2. Marriage shall be entered into only with the free and full consent of the intending spouses. 3. The family is the natural and fundamental group unit of society and is entitled to protection by society and the State." As evidenced by the wide differences between states, the age of 16 is an arbitrary limitation that may serve as a general rule, but cannot be absolutely enforced without violating the "full age" standard of Article 16. HB 7 would arbitrarily strip away that right from people who actually have a legitimate reason to marry, and who desire to give their child a stable and loving home. This is unjust both to child and parents. 

FOR FURTHER READING:

Cowboy State Daily, Bill Banning Teens Younger Than 16 To Marry Passes Unanimously Through Senate Committee

Jonathan Lange, UNICEF Comes to Wyoming: Ham-handed uniformity oppresses the human family

PROGRESS:

1/13/2023 H Introduced and Referred to H03 - Revenue

1/17/2023 H03 - Revenue:Recommend Do Pass 6-3-0-0-0

Ayes:  Representative(s) Byron, Harshman, Northrup, Oakley, Storer, Zwonitzer

Nays:  Representative(s) Bear, Locke, Strock

1/18/2023 H COW:Passed / 1/19/2023 H 2nd Reading:Passed

1/20/2023 H 3rd Reading:Passed 36-25-1-0-0

Ayes:  Representative(s) Andrew, Berger, Brown, Burkhart, Jr, Byron, Chadwick, Chestek, Clouston, Conrad, Crago, Eklund, Harshman, Henderson, Larsen, Lloyd, Larson, Jt, Lawley, Nicholas, Niemiec, Northrup, Oakley, Obermueller, O'hearn, Olsen, Provenza, Sherwood, Speaker Sommers, Stith, Storer, Trujillo, Walters, Washut, Western, Wylie, Yin, Zwonitzer, Dan, Zwonitzer, Dave

Nays:  Representative(s) Allemand, Allred, Angelos, Banks, Bear, Davis, Haroldson, Heiner, Hornok, Jennings, Knapp, Locke, Neiman, Ottman, Pendergraft, Penn, Rodriguez-Williams, Singh, Slagle, Smith, Strock, Styvar, Tarver, Ward, Winter

Excused:  Representative Newsome

2/2/2023 S Introduced and Referred to S07 - Corporations

2/9/2023 S07 - Corporations:Recommend Do Pass 4-0-1-0-0

Ayes:  Senator(s) Barlow, Boner, Case, Scott

Excused:  Senator Landen

2/9/2023 S COW: Passed 15-12 (standing vote)

Aye: Case, Cooper, Anderson, Boner, Scott, Jones, Pappas, Geireau, Ellis, Schuler, Barlow, Landen, Rothfuss, Furphy, Bouchard

Nay: Dockstader, Baldwin, Kinsky, Hicks, Steinmetz, Biteman, Salazar, Ide, French, Kolb, Hutchings, McKeown

Absent: Nethercott, Brennen (chair), Driskill, Laurson

Note the photograph, presumably representing a teenage girl, was in the original,  I didn't put it up there.

The gist of the argument is several fold as being presented here and elsewhere, which is.

1.  The bill will make it impossible for girls younger than 16 to get married if they get pregnant.

2.  In the past such marriages were common and its only through the operation of negative modern societal institutions that they aren't now.

3.  There are lots of examples of such marriages working out.

All of these are pretty bad arguments.

Which, in a lot of ways, defines the far right in general right now.  It's taking a genuine concern, and morphing it into something.

I.e., a concern over the loss of existential, and frankly Christian based, values and culture, doesn't need to morph into fawning over Viktor Orbán and imagining that Donald Trump is Cyrus the Great.

Last prior edition:

Cliffnotes of the Zeitgeist, 60th Edition. Catching some z's.

Lex Anteinternet: What if the Western World is the "special case"?

Lex Anteinternet: What if the Western World is the "special case"?: 

What if the Western World is the "special case"?

Pastoral scene, pre Soviet Ukrainian village.  Not a lot of homsexuality, transgenderism, etc. going on there.

Those who protest vehemently belong to small ideological groups," Francis told Italian newspaper La Stampa. "A special case are Africans: for them homosexuality is something 'bad' from a cultural point of view, they don't tolerate it".

"But in general, I trust that gradually everyone will be reassured by the spirit of the 'Fiducia Supplicans' declaration by the Dicastery for the Doctrine of the Faith: it aims to include, not divide," the pope said.

We all see things through thick lenses of our cultures, and the history of our cultures.  This was true even of the authors of the Gospels, which sometimes come through on certain items in their writings. 

I think Fiducia Supplicans demonstrates this.

For that matter, to use a bad secular example, I think Justice Kennedy's opinion in Obergefell v. Hodges did as well, which is not to say that the documents are analagous. They are not.

Supreme Court Justice Anthony Kennedy seems to have generally believed that the Obergefell decision overturning tens of thousands of years of understanding on the nature of marriage would be met with rapid universal acceptance, rather than turning out to be the metaphorical shot heard around the world that gave us Donald Trump in short order.¹

The Supreme Court, in Obergefells, and the Papacy, in Fiducia Supplicans, are reacting to the same development seem to have made the assumption of thinking that what happens in European cultures is what happens, or what even really is of major concern, all over the world.  That just isn't the case in this instance.

A pretty good case can be made that "homosexuality", as Western Society regards it, doesn't even exist, although certainly same sex attraction and sexual conduct does. They are not the same thing.  Therefore, when the Pope says "A special case are Africans: for them homosexuality is something 'bad' from a cultural point of view, they don't tolerate it" it might in fact be the case that the opposite is true.  That is, the "special case" is Western Europeans, for whom homosexuality exists, and is not a "something 'bad'", or at least a significant number of Western Europeans, of which North and South Americans are (once again) part, have now been schooled or accepted that it isn't bad.

In most, of the world, homosexuality is regarded as a European thing.  Again, the conduct occurs, but not the gender characterization.  And in no society, does it occur with the frequency it does in Western Society, which is also the society which as become the most libertine, albeit only in the last seventy years, particularly in regard to sex and manifestations of sex, including outward manifestations of sex.

We've dealt with that before, but now that It's come back up in this fashion, it's worth looking at again.  Pretty much everywhere this conduct occurs, it's strongly associated with a variety of factors, one of which, in its broad manifestation we now see, is a wealthy society that has lots of idle time.  Put another way, it's a factor of resources and availability to them.

This is true of a lot of human disorders that are closely related to elemental needs and what we tend to universally see is that when we have a society that is heavily deprived of an elemental needs, a disordered desire for it, combined with disorder conduct, pops up in a minority (never a majority) of the population.

Food is a good example.

Scarcity of food will result in a massively strong desire to eat.  In some people, that leads to desperate acts under desperate situations.  Cannibalism, for example, comes to mind in regard to the Donner Party, or the residents of Leningrad.  People took measures they normally wouldn't.

Not everyone did, however.

At least in the Soviet examples, which repeated in various fashions from 1917 through early 1944, most people didn't.  People would starve instead.

Conversely, in food situations where there's a surplus of food, the entire population will tend to gain weight, but not everyone tends to become excessively overweight.  Modern dieticians will yell in horror at this, but overweight, and truly grossly obese are not the same things.  Grossly obese happens for a number of reasons, including people having a makeup which is extremely efficient in order to avoid famine, but it's only in an unnatural situation of surplus calories that it manifest itself.  

As a scene in Sam Peckinpah's Major Dundee presents it:

Sergeant Chillum:  Don't look to me like them gut-eaters has been feeding them very good.

Wiley: Did you ever see a fat Apache?

Sergeant Chillum: I ain't yet.

This scene depicts the pick up cavalry formation taking the kidnapped children and feeding them, but the point raised, accidentally, is a good one.  Native Americans lived in a state of nature, and in that state, they were in good shape and not packing around extra weight.  No culture in a state of nature does.

When things become disordered, such as in famine, some people will do something that can be argued to be disordered, eat other people.  When there's too much food and no real need to work too hard, physically, to obtain calories, everyone puts on weight, but some will very much to their detriment.

So what's this have to do with homosexuality, let alone Fiducia Supplicans? Well, quite a lot, really.

Just as, in a balanced state of nature, or close to one, people don't get fat, and don't turn to cannibalism, in a balanced state of nature, they don't turn to the range of sexual deviations that they do in an unbalanced one.

Edgar Paxon's Custer's Last Stand.  While it might seem odd to see this posted here, the Cheyenne and Sioux warriors who won this battle, and one just days before it at Rosebud, were never more than a day's ride from their families.  Women were of course present in the Native camp at Little Big Horn, as the battle was brought on by the 7th Cavalry's attack on the village, but at least one native woman had been present at Rosebud as well.  Native raiding parties might separate from their families for a period of days, but not months.

In a state of nature, people live in pretty small communities and there's pretty much a 1 to 1 sex ratio.  Men would only be separated from women for very brief periods of time.  A war party, for example, might separate for several days, but not months. The Great Raid of 1840, for example, which is regarded as the largest Native American raid every conducted, just lasted two days.  Add in travel, and the warrior bands were gone longer, but it probably wasn't much more than a week, if that long.

Hunting parties are also often cited for periods of separation, but in a healthy native state, the separation was often just a matter of hours.  Women were usually close enough to a really large hunting party that they could partake in the processing of the game.  There were undoubtedly exceptions, but by and large, this was the rule.

Taking the war example again, consider this from Ethiopia's mobilization order of 1935 when Italy invaded:

Everyone will now be mobilized, and all boys old enough to carry a spear will be sent to Addis Ababa. Married men will take their wives to carry food and cook. Those without wives will take any woman without a husband. Anyone found at home after the receipt of this order will be hanged.

Emperor Haile Selassie

Married men, take your wives.  Not married?  Find a woman who isn't married and taker her.

It's only once you begin to mess with the basic human living patters that the opposite is true.  Industrialization, which we'll get to in a moment, really brought in a major disruption from the normal living patter, but there are preindustrial examples that are notable.  War provides a pretty good example again.

Major military campaigns in antiquity relied on theft of food, which is not ordered, and which is well known.  If the fighters were separated from women, they also rapidly descended to disorder.  Early military campaigns (and some recent ones) are famously associated with "rape and pillage", and by men who would not ordinarily do that.  

Another example of adjusting to desperate times might be taken in Muhammed authoring his troops, who were ready to go home as they were tired of being without their wives, to have sex with their female saves taken in war.  This is widely denied by Muslim scholars today, but it seems to be fairly well established and in fact the practice has been resumed by Islamic fundamentalist armed bands and its the origin of Muslim sex slave trading, which is an historical fact. That this is basically an example of licensed rape can't really be denied.

Conversely, in Christian societies the "marital debt" was taken very seriously up until recently, and it was taken so seriously in the Middle Ages that a wife of a man who wished to go on crusade could veto it simply by citing the marital debt.  That's fairly extraordinary, but telling, in that she could simply declare that if her husband departed her needs in this category might cause her to fall into sin, and therefore, he couldn't go.  Moderns like to look down on such things today, but in reality that was a very natural and realistic view of human sexuality.

Same gender attractions play in here too, but within bands of men kept away from women for long periods of time.  The most famous example of that may be the Spartans, who were fierce warriors trained from young adulthood, in the case of men, to be soldiers.  However, the warehousing of men, and boys, away from women brought about widespread homosexual conduct as the living conditions were, rather obviously, completely abnormal.

So too are much of our current living patters.

Industrialization separated men from women and parent from child in a major way, recreating the abnormality of living conditions noted above on a society wide level.

And that's deeply unnatural.

It wasn't until the Industrial Revolution that men left their homes every day, working long hours, and were separated from their wives and children for what amounts to well over half of their adult waking hours.  And this was not only true of industrial laborers, but also of their white collar bosses.  In many industrial societies, moreover, this was amplified by the fact that men further segregated themselves, or were segregated by society, even on off hours.

It was essayist Henry Fairlie who noted:

Work still gives meaning to rural life, the family and churches.  But in the city today, work and home, family and church, are seperated.  What the office workers do for a living is not part of thier home life.  AT the same time they maintain the pointless frenzy of hteir work hours on thier off hours.  They rush form the office to jog, to the gym or the YMCA pool to work at their play with the same joylessness.

Fairlie wrote this in 1986, well after the most aggressors conditions of the Industrial Revolution had slackened, but he did note in The Idiocy of Urban Life what that had been like.  Men left early in the morning and walked, on average, seven miles to work. They worked their all day, and then returned home after twelve hours of labor.  Well over half their day had been spent away from their family.

By the 20th Century that had, in many heavily industrial regions, created a new pattern of living he didn't address, and one which lasted well into the 1970s.  Men left for work in blue collar jobs, worked all day with other men, and at quitting time, they hit the bars.  Men in the American Rust Belt, for instance, commonly hit a bar every night on the way home, spending a couple of hours drinking beer in an all male company, save for the barmaids whose tips went up as the beer flowed.  Rough and tumble places, these were not the equivalent of charming English or Irish pubs of the same period.  The maleness, if you will, of their work was all the more amplified by the nearly universal membership of men in organizations that excluded women.

Not surprisingly, this all encouraged conventional sexual vice.  Some men, a minority but nonetheless an appreciable nature, took the jousting with bar maid and waitresses further, with some of the women reciprocating.  When Hank Thompson and Kitty Wells sang about the "wild side of life" it's easy to wonder why they were hanging out in bars, not really appreciating that a lot of men in particular simply did.  Indeed, the term "family man", conversely, had real meaning.

Not to dump this exclusively on blue collar workers by any means, philandering conduct was common in the white collar world as well, to such an extent that it became instantly recognizable to people who went to see 1960's The Apartment, the entire theme of which plays out through the vehicle of cheating married executives using their younger colleagues' apartment.

Indeed, when I was young, I can recall my parents openly talking about professionals in town who had affairs and mistresses.  This certainly didn't include anyone in my family, which was 100% Catholic and meant it.  That conduct was clearly not approved of, but my point is that it occured.  While never discussed in this fashion, in the context of what we're discussing here, the mistresses were sometimes targets of opportunity, so to speak.  Secretaries and assistants.  Indeed, I heard a lawyer of the generation prior to mine, once relate of the generation of lawyers two generations older than hers, that quite a few of the paralegals of that old, now largely dead or very old, were effectively mistresses.  One such assistant had mysteriously had a child out of wedlock when that was pretty rare, and it was widely known who teh employer father was.

There's a lot more that could be explored here, but the point is that the contra natural working conditions give rise to departures from morality and nature.  Even now, or particularly now, you'll hear a close female colleague of a male be referred to as his "work wife".  I've even heard a person refer to herself that way.  Work wives have no marital debt, but hidden by the statement is the vague suggestion or fear that they might be providing such a service, illicit thought it would be.

Homosexuality, in large part, comes about, I strongly suspect, due to something similar.

In an earlier thread, we noted that there are in fact cultures that not only have low incidents of homosexual conduct, but none.  As we earlier posted:

Somewhat related to this, interestingly enough, I also came upon an article by accident on the Aka and Ngandu people of central Africa, who are branches of the Bushmen, or what some people still call "pygmies".  They've been remarkably resilient in staying close to nature.

A hunter-gatherer people, they naturally fascinate Western urbanites, and have been studied for many years by Barry and Bonnie Hewlett, a husband and wife anthropologist team.  Starting off with something else, after a period of time the Washington State University pair "decided to systematically study sexual behavior after several campfire discussions with married middle-aged Aka men who mentioned in passing that they had sex three or four times during the night. At first [they] thought it was just men telling their stories, but we talked to women, and they verified the men's assertions."

The study revealed some interesting things, besides that, which included that they regarded such interaction as a species of work, designed for procreation.  Perhaps more surprising to our genital focused society, they had no concept of homosexuality at all, no practice of that at all, and additional had no practice or concept of, um. . . well . . .self gratification.  You'll have to read between the lines on that one.

Perhaps the Synod on Synodality ought to take note of the reality of the monotheist Aka's and Ngandu's as that's exactly what the Catholic faith has always taught.¹ And so it turns out in a society that's actually focused that way, what Catholics theology traditionally has termed disordered, just doesn't occur.  It's also worth noting that the rise of homosexuality really comes about after men were dragged out of the household's on a daily basis by social and economic causes, and the rise of . . . um., well, anyhow, recently is heavily tied to the pornificaiton of the culture that was launched circa 1953.

In other words, those like Fr. James Martin who seek a broader acceptane of of sexual disorder, might actually be urging the acceptance of a byproduct of our overall economic and social disorder, which itself should be fixed.

But what would be the conditions that bring it about in our culture?

We're not even supposed to ask that now, but for most people who have same sex attraction, it's a pretty heavy cross to bear.  We should be looking at how it comes about.

Well, what we know is that if we separate men from women, particularly in their formative years, we'll get it at a higher rate than when that doesn't occur.

Going back to war, that fountain of all problematic things, we can look back as far as the Spartans to find this.  Spartans, faced with a constant threat of war, took up separating men from women large-scale and raising boys in barracks.  It also had a notable degree of homosexual conduct.

Hmmm. . . separate young men and keep them separates just as things begin, for lack of a better way to put it, turn on, and . . . .

The Spartans were a notable early example of this, which in turn tends to be exaggerated.  It's not likely that every single Spartan male was a homosexual.  It's also not the case, as is sometimes suggested, that Ancient Greece was wildly homosexual.  Indeed, Plato abhorred it and regarded it as contrary to nature and proposed the Athenian assembly ban homosexual acts, masturbation, and illegitimate sex in general.

Going forward in time, when we really start to see references to the acts (but not a claimed "homosexual" status) comes with the first semi modern navies.  It was a constant concern, for instance, of the Royal Navy, which perhaps might be regarded as the first modern navy.  A great navy, it was not necessarily recruited in the most charming way and many sailors were simply press-ganged, a type of conscription, into it against their will.  As press gangs favored hitting bars in ports, many of the men conscripted into the Royal Navy already lacked a strong attachment to home and family, and ports were notoriously associated with prostitution.  Anyhow, a lot of men away from sea for months, or years, at a time, and a lot of them being fairly young. . . well the problem rose again.

It replicated itself in large modern armies as well, interestingly often among the officer class.  In European armies where the officer class was made up of minor nobility as a rule, the men in it had entered as the only other real employment option, if they were not set to inherit the estate, was the clergy.  In some European armies officers were strongly discouraged from marrying, which in part reflected the fact that their pay was very bad, as their countries knew that they could rely on family money. While it didn't occur universally in every such army, in some, such as the pre World War One German Army, there was a strong streak of hidden homosexuality.

English private schools, which were widely used by the upper class, were notorious for homosexuality for the same reason.  Homosexual conduct became so common in them that homosexuality used to be referred to elsewhere as "the English Disease".  Private schools were segregated effectively by class, and very much by gender.  Unlike the charming portrayal in the Harry Potter series of works, boys went to boys schools and girls to girls school.  Quite often, over time, parents enrolled their children in the same schools they'd gone to.  Overtime, a closeted institutional homosexuality, or at least its common occurrence, crept in.

It could be legitimately asked how on earth any of this relates to our current era, but it does in more ways than we might imagine.

In most Western societies today, we make no effort, for the most part, to separate men and women in anything, formally.  But as we've already detailed, we do send men, and now women, out of their families and into an unnatural environment on a daily basis.  People often meet their future spouses in periods of time when young people are constantly together, such as in school or university, but as soon as they are established, we pull them apart.

Starting during World War Two, moreover, a false academia combined with the corruption and destruction of the war, gave rise to the Sexual Revolution.  We commonly think of that as arriving in the 60s, but in reality it probably really started in the 1940s with the publication of Kinsey's false academic narratives. That was the first shot, so to speak, and the publication of Playboy the second one.  While Playboy was opposed in some localities into the 1980s, by the 1950s it was so well established, in spite of completely rejecting conventional morality, and in spite, moreover, of publishing photos of women younger than 18, that the ground had been massively lost.  The pill followed in the early 60s, work patterns changed due to the introduction of domestic machinery, and sexual morality took a beating.  Once its natural purpose was obscured, and then lost, which really basically took all the way into the 1990s, the widespread acceptance of homosexual sex was inevitable.

None of which means that a large number of people will take it up.

But what does mean, that some people, in some circumstances, will. And the unnatural conditions that we live in, amplified by societal moorings having been cut by the Sexual Revolution, help bring that about.  And as society has chosen to simply embrace everything that deviates from the norm, and natural, as it applies to ourselves, those afflicted have almost no place to go, but deeper in, no matter how destructive that may be.

All of which is a good reason that people in this circumstance need blessings, if blessing are properly understood.

And which would, therefore, support Fiducia Supplicans.

But none of which suggests that the Church's view on sex is what is causing a decline in attendance in  Europe, and that a wider acceptance of homosexuality as normal, as some would urge, would actually do anything.  This all is a problem in the West, to be sure, but the underlying evolution of thought that some have, that this is all natural, is not supported by the evidence.

The evidence supports the contrary.

Which gets us back to our original point.  African and Asia, for all of their problems, have lived closer to nature, longer, than we have.  But that is rapidly changing, and in much of Asia in particular it already has. People who like to imagine that there is such a thing as broad progress, for which there is no good evidence, would argue that this is all progress, so that everything we have noted as a byproduct of the evolution of industry in the West will necessarily happen everywhere else. But that's not necessarily the case at all.

And indeed, in the West itself there seem to be an awakening of tradition, and a desire to return to a more rooted lifestyle.  Ironically, evolutions in technology may bring that about.  We know that populations are declining everywhere in the Western Northern Hemisphere, which is seen as a disaster but which in fact may emphasize this sort of return to the village.

Footnotes:

1.  Obergefell is an incredibly weak decision which, if it were to reappear in front of the United States Supreme Court today, would be reversed.  My prediction is that it will be within the next decade as it devoid of solid legal reasoning.

When it was handed down, it was my prediction here that it would cause massive social disruption and resistance, which in fact it has.  Pollsters like to point out that the views on same gender unions have moved greatly since it was handed down, which is true, but what they seem to miss is that it was basically the last straw on the part of traditional social conservatives, as well as (Southern type) populists on forced social change.  The latter group had long ago accommodated itself to divorce, to people shacking up, and begrudgingly to homosexual conduct but it wasn't about to be told that homosexual unions equated with marriage.  In very real terms, Anthony Kennedy, whether he realizes it or not, has always been Donald Trump's running mate.

Related Threads:

The Overly Long Thread. Gender Trends of the Past Century, Definitions, Society, Law, Culture and Their Odd Trends and Impacts.