Tag Archives: conservatives

August 28, 2020 · 5:55 am

The Fall (And Hypocrisy) Of Jerry Falwell Jr. And Why It’s Both Fitting And Infuriating

I don’t like talking about religion. I think I’ve made my opinion on organized religion and the extremists it enables very clear. Then, a story comes along that I find so distressing and infuriating that I just can’t in good conscious ignore it. That tends to happen when the same ugly religious extremism is mixed with outright hypocrisy. It’s happened before. It will happen again. That’s just the nature of organized religion.

This time, it involves Jerry Falwell Jr.

Now, if anyone follows religious hypocrisy as closely as I do, the name Falwell should be painfully familiar. Between this guy, and his grifting, theocracy-loving, power-hungry snob of a father, that name is associated with the worst parts of the religious right.

Think of the most regressive religious doctrines you can imagine. From killing homosexuals to subjugating women to racial discrimination to promoting creationism to draconian abortion restrictions, these people are for it. They see the repressive government in “The Handmaid’s Tale” with envy. There is really no difference between them and the Taliban.

They see religion and religious values as a means of gaining power and influence. They use it to the utmost and dare to claim they represent truth, virtue, and order. They are hypocrites and frauds of the highest order. I cannot belabor that enough.

If you are a Christian who sincerely believes in the values it preaches, you should be disgusted by the Falwells. They embody a form of Christianity that’s both perverse and backwards. They don’t value the poor. They don’t value truth. They don’t even believe in loving they neighbor if they don’t live, vote, and believe as they do. They couldn’t be more antithetical to Jesus’ teachings.

Now, Jerry Falwell Jr. is embroiled in a lurid sex scandal that forced him to resign from his position at the indoctrination center/college that his father founded, Liberty University. In terms of sex scandals, this is hardly the kinkiest. This doesn’t involve sex with gay prostitutes while on meth. It mostly involves extra-marital affairs with Jr. and his wife, along with some light voyeurism.

In terms of juiciness, this is pretty tame. That doesn’t make it any less hypocritical. Remember, this is a man who once ran a university that had strict rules against any kind of pre-marital or extra-marital activities. It was so repressive that they even had rules against extended hugging, R-rated movies, and dancing. Again, these aren’t that different from the rules the once Taliban enforced.

Falwell Jr. and his supporters all imposed these rules and enforced them, justifying their draconian nature with their religious dogma. It wasn’t just for show, either. I actually been to the Lynchburg area. I’ve met people who have attended the poorly-named Liberty University. These rules are taken seriously. They’re enforced, too. The only way to avoid them is to never get caught.

Well, Falwell Jr. couldn’t handle that last part. He committed the most egregious sin of the religious right, which is to get caught and exposed as a hypocrite. By day, he preached fire and brimstone for anyone who dared to have sex with anyone who wasn’t their Christian spouse, but put in the minimum effort to live by that same doctrine.

I want to say it’s fitting. This scandal did cost Falwell Jr. his job and his credibility among his theocracy-loving cohorts in the religious right. However, it’s hard to take much satisfaction in his downfall.

For one, he will not suffer significant consequences from this scandal. He won’t go to jail. He won’t pay any fines. In fact, by resigning from his indoctrination center/university, he received $10.5 million severance package. That’s right, this wannabe theocrat who protested and condemned any sexual relation outside a 1950s sitcom is getting $10 million to step away from his job.

Even if you consider yourself religious and a bible-believing Christian, how is this justified? How does anyone justify being rewarded for resigning from their job because they engaged in the same sexual relations they so gleefully condemned? Seriously, what kind of mental gymnastics does someone have to do in order to say that’s right on any level?

Now, if Falwell Jr. sincerely sought forgiveness, and I don’t think for a nanosecond he will, he’d donate every penny to charity. There are plenty of charities, both religious and secular, who could do plenty of good with that money. It would be the most Christian thing you can do, given how much Jesus himself preached helping the poor.

However, there’s no way Falwell Jr. will ever do something that virtuous. It’s just not his style, nor was it his father’s. He’s going to keep preaching the same dogma, pretending he was “sick with sin” and now he’s healed. He’ll probably fight even harder to promote a repressive worldview that would see homosexuals murdered, promiscuity punished, and abortion outlawed.

If that weren’t bad enough, the same people who made him resign will probably still embrace him. There will even be a large contingent of right-wing Christians who will eagerly overlook his transgressions because his name is so closely associated with their movement. He might not have the same authority he once did, but he’ll keep fighting for the same repressive world that is so antithetical to American values.

On top of all of that, he’ll do all of this while living comfortably and luxuriously on his $10.5 million nest egg. Keep that in mind if you have even a sliver of sympathy for the man. Jerry Falwell Jr. offers absolutely nothing of the sort. He’s still a perverse manifestation of the kind of people who use religion to seek power, influence, and authority. He’s just a hypocrite on top of all that.

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August 21, 2020 · 8:29 am

Jack’s World: Why Conservatives Make Better Villains (For Now)

The following is a video I made for my YouTube channel, Jack’s World. It’s a video version of an article I wrote a while back. I added and removed a few details to the video. If necessary, I’ll do a follow-up. Enjoy!

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August 6, 2020 · 5:58 am

Why Conservatives Make Better Villains (For Now)

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We currently live in a golden age of villains. Between Thanos, Erik Killmonger, the Joker, and Walter White, there has been a veritable surge of complex characters who also happen to be compelling villains. While there’s still a place for the kind of pure evil that Disney villains have relied on for years, this trend in a more refined brand of villainy feels both refreshing and overdue.

I’ve written extensively on villains before. As a lifelong fan of superhero comics and movies, I’ve consumed, contemplated, and scrutinized hero/villain dynamics more than most. In doing so, I’ve noticed plenty of trends. Like most aspects of popular culture, it’s always evolving. Very few themes and details remain constant, especially when it comes to antagonists.

That said, there’s one trend in villains that has remained somewhat constant over the course of my lifetime. It’s also a trend that I see as intensifying, albeit in a subtle way. Some of it coincides with the growing complexity of villains in popular culture, but most of the trend precedes the current era of superhero-dominated media. If anything, superhero media helped accelerate it.

While most villains and heroes rarely identify with a certain political affiliation, it’s usually not hard to discern how most would vote in a contemporary election. I would even argue that it’s easier to surmise what a villain’s political leanings are compared to that of heroes. Take any villain from the past 10 years of movies, be they superhero or otherwise. Chances are a vast majority of them would identify as conservative.

Now, I understand conservatism is an exceedingly broad term. It has a dictionary definition, but as a political philosophy, there are many sub-sets, divisions, and variations. From fiscal conservatives to social conservative to neoconservatives, there are many wildly different ideologies that still identify as conservative. A few actively clash with one another.

Those complexities aside, there are some core tenants associated with conservatism and it’s those very tenants that make it such an effective basis for villains. Chief among conservative values is the idea that traditional norms, institutions, and values be maintained. Change isn’t actively dissuaded, but it is viewed with caution and suspicion. To be conservative is to affirm the status quo, to some extent.

That’s all well and good if the status quo is beneficial to everyone. It’s not so preferable for those who either fail to benefit or are actively screwed over by that same status quo. Since there has never been a society in history that has achieved perfect prosperity for everyone, regardless of their minority status, there’s bound to be people who get left behind.

In our own real-world history, we’ve seen people from those disaffected groups organize and fight the status quo to better their lives. That struggle has played out in the Civil Rights movement of the 1960s, the movement for women’s rights, and the LGBT rights movement that’s still going on today. Those who oppose these movements tend to have, broadly speaking, conservative leanings.

Look at the groups that opposed the Civil Rights movement.

Look at those who actively oppose LGBT rights, women’s rights, and immigrants.

They all espouse rhetoric that would put them at odds with Superman, Captain America, and most other superheroes who value justice, truth, and peace. For some, their talking points sound like ideas that only villains in the mold of Lex Luthor would agree with. While not all of them identify as overtly conservative, the standard principles are there.

Anything too different from the status quo must be wrong or evil.

Anybody too different from the people everyone else in a society must be bad, evil, or devious.

Any idea, trend, or movement that is disruptive or deviant in any way is something to be opposed.

It doesn’t just manifest in superhero movies or underdog stories, either. Look at a movie like “Footloose.” In this story, the people who ban dancing are uptight, dogmatic, religious zealots who likely voted for Ronald Reagan in 1984 when this movie came out. They were the antagonists of that story and the kids, while not overtly liberal, dared to defy them.

It can even manifest subtly in other media. In kids shows like “Recess,” “Hey Arnold,” and “Rocko’s Modern Life,” the most common antagonists are uptight authority figures who have no tolerance for new ideas, big changes, or anything remotely fun. It’s hard to imagine any of these characters voting for someone who builds their slogan around change, reform, and reinvention.

They like things the way they are. Most of them benefit from the current system and will naturally seek to preserve their place in that system. While they won’t always see themselves as villains, it’s difficult for them to come off as heroes. You can only be so heroic when your side is closely aligned with predatory business practices, fun-hating religious zealots, and unabashed war-mongers.

That’s not to say it’s impossible for liberals to be villains too. It does happen and it can be done very well when done right. I would argue that Erik Killmonger in “Black Panther” was more in line with an extreme liberal revolutionary who didn’t just want to pursue change. I would make a similar argument for Ra’s Al Ghul in “Batman Begins.”

These characters didn’t just seek to change society from its current unjust state. They sought to violently destroy it and rebuild it from the ground up. That kind of liberalism exists in the real world and it can make for compelling villains.

However, the number of villains who align with the politics of Killmonger are far fewer than those who would align with the politics of Lex Luthor. In general, it’s easier to resist change rather than embrace it. It’s also necessary to some extent for those to resist change to be uptight authority figures who are okay with coercing others to maintain traditions. Logistically, the villains in many conflicts must be conservative.

Now, that’s not to say that villains will always lean conservative in popular media. What it means to be conservative changes over time. If you were to listen to conservative rhetoric 50 years ago, they would sound very different. They might even sound liberal by today’s standards.

The same goes for liberalism of previous eras. It hasn’t always been closely aligned with the politics surrounding minority rights, income inequality, or political correctness. The liberals of the 1920s would likely clash with the liberals of today. That’s just part of the ever-evolving nature of politics.

 

For the time being, though, being a villain in popular culture usually means being conservative to a certain extent. Conservatives are more likely to be the rich, greedy business people who would gladly burn down a rain forest or exploit slave labor to raise profits. Conservatives are more likely to be the rule-loving, fun-hating, curfew-enforcing religious zealots who wouldn’t mind electing theocrats with every election.

These types of individuals are far more likely to be villains in a story. At the very least, they’ll side or tolerate the villain. It’s easy to believe that those who side with the religious right and well-connected rich people will generally oppose a selfless, likable protagonist. From a narrative perspective, these kinds of villains are better in that we tend to root for heroes who oppose authoritarian bullies like that.

Again, it’s guaranteed that political and cultural trends will likely change what it means to be conservative, liberal, and everything in between. For the time being, if you were to bet on the political leanings of an antagonist, the odds are mostly in favor of that antagonist being conservative.

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December 14, 2018 · 6:02 am

How Self-Driving Cars Will Change Sex Work (For The Better)

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When it comes to emerging technology, there’s one inescapable byproduct that I’m sure confounds plenty of inventors and innovators. If said technology can be used to enhance and/or accommodate sex, it will. It’s like taxes, gravity, or traffic during rush hour. It’s inescapable.

While I’m sure the inventor of the back massager knew on some levels that it was going to be used for lurid purposes, there are plenty of others who had no idea how horny people would use their creations. I suspect that those developing self-driving cars know that at some point, a horny couple will have sex in a self-driving car. It’s just a matter of relegating it to a secondary concern, at most.

Even if you don’t closely follow to ongoing trends of the auto industry, it’s hard to overlook the recent news surrounding self-driving cars. This is not some far-off technology like smart blood, artificial wombs, or warp drives. This is a rapidly-maturing technology that is happening. As we speak, big companies like Uber, Apple, and Tesla are testing this technology.

I can even personally attest to the potential of this technology. Earlier this summer, I got a chance to ride in a Tesla Model S with a self-driving feature. It was quite an experience and I can verify that the technology worked. The car drove itself on a busy highway in the middle of the day. The driver still kept his hands close to the wheel, but the results exceeded my expectations.

While riding in that car, I wondered for a brief moment how this would lead to more sex on the road. Being an aspiring erotica/romance writer, those kinds of thoughts come to me fairly often. With this, it was easy to envision.

The car drives itself.

The driver and the passenger get bored.

As they combat the boredom, they get horny.

Since the car is taking care of itself, they decide to have sex and make their road trip memorable.

I think it’s inevitable. I bet that on the same day self-driving cars enter the market, some adventurous couple will celebrate by having sex in one. It might be so expected that it won’t even make the news. People already have sex in cars, even while they’re moving. Self-driving cars will just make it easier.

This is where sex work enters the equation. It’s another, less common byproduct of technology. Whenever something comes along to change the sexual landscape, it often finds its way into sex work. It happened with the internet. It happened with smartphones. It’s going to happen with self-driving cars.

The impact won’t be direct. It might not even be immediate. However, self-driving cars are bound to affect everything from urban planning to job markets to personal finances. It’s not too great a stretch to believe that it’ll effect sex work.

I’m not the only one who has speculated on this issue. One academic from the University of Surrey and Oxford stated that self-driving cars could be the brothels of the future. Instead of hotel rooms, apartments, massage parlors, or street corners, a self-driving car could act as a mobile red light district, bringing sex workers to clients with greater ease than ever before.

Considering the recent legal upheavals to the world of sex work, self-driving cars may arrive in a chaotic market that is rapidly adapting to new circumstances. Today, it’s a lot harder for sex workers to operate online. It’s also increasingly difficult for them to organize and find support on any area of the political spectrum beyond standard libertarians.

Conservatives see prostitution as immoral and deviant, favoring prosecution and punishment of providers and clients alike.

Liberals see prostitution as exploitative and oppressive, favoring policies that prosecute pimps and treat sex workers as victims.

As a result, operating as a sex worker is very difficult. Even if you live in an area that doesn’t criminalize sex work, as done by the increasingly popular Nordic Model, the logistics of having a place to operate and getting to customers is still fraught with complications. It’s here where self-driving cars could be a potential game-changer.

The most obvious and immediate impact has to do with mobility. As it stands, sex workers have to either operate on the streets or advertise online. Both have only become more dangerous in recent years. A self-driving car is akin to a Taxi that doesn’t ask questions or judge a sex worker on what they may or may not be wearing.

With self-driving cars, sex workers have a cheaper, more anonymous method for getting to clients and expanding their reach. They don’t have to stand on dirty street corners or stay in seedy hotels with questionable laundry service. They can get to where they need to go and not have to rely on a pimp or partner, which is critical in terms of limiting exploitation.

That’s one of the key factors in what makes sex work so dangerous in places where it’s illegal. Sex workers can’t rely on the police or standard legal services for protection. Pimps, including the violent kind, provide that service in a black market environment where workers have to surrender their autonomy in exchange for safety. Self-driving cars could make those services less necessary.

That means sex workers will be able to operate more independently. In terms of limiting the potential for abuse, that’s critical. While the operations of sex work are difficult to study, most research has shown that independent sex workers are better able to avoid the abuse and exploitation that often follows the illegal sex trade. Self-driving cars could make that easier for more sex workers.

Beyond the logistics, self-driving cars could actually become a life-saving tool for sex workers. One of the greatest dangers they face is escaping a violent client. In the past, a sex worker had to rely on a pimp or a fellow worker to get out of those situations. Even calling a cab was risky because, for all they knew, the driver could refuse to help them or report them to the police.

A self-driving car is less prone to ask questions. In addition to being cheaper, it could get them farther away from a bad situation and allow them to operate far from their where they reside. They don’t need to be confined to certain areas or districts. They can move around more freely and expand their reach while keeping more of the money they make.

That’s just the initial impact, though. There are plenty more potential benefits that self-driving cars could bring to the world of sex work. That concern about mobile brothels is probably not an exaggeration. The current laws prohibiting brothels in many jurisdictions assume that domain of sex workers isn’t moving. That wouldn’t apply to a self-driving vehicle.

Even in places where prostitution is legal, establishing a brothel is riddled with all sorts of red tape and regulations. A self-driving car that operates as a brothel isn’t constrained by zoning laws or specified districts. It literally goes to wherever the demand is. Considering how expensive apartments and hotel rooms are in some areas, a self-driving car/brothel may actually be the most cost-effective way for a sex worker to operate.

Given these potential benefits, it’s very likely that plenty of areas would seek to prohibit or regulate this kind of prostitution. However, I suspect that enforcing those laws would be even more difficult than the existing statutes. If a self-driving car operating as a brothel is always moving and the sex workers are discrete, then how would the public or the authorities even know?

There’s also the possibility that self-driving cars could make some aspects of the sex industry even worse. A self-driving car could make activities like human trafficking easier by giving traffickers a cheap new way to move people around. It could also set up some tricky legal battles, especially if sex workers regularly move between areas where prostitution is legal and illegal.

One way or another, self-driving cars are going to affect the world of prostitution in ways that neither an academic from the University of Surrey and Oxford nor an aspiring erotica/romance writer can contemplate. Given how prevalent prostitution has been in every society, no matter hard religion and government tries to suppress it, enterprising sex workers will find a way make the most of it.

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March 29, 2018 · 6:05 am

Generation Z, The March For Our Lives, And The Nihilism Turning Point

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Last year, I wrote a couple of posts about the mentality of Millennials and the possible quirks they may inspire in Generation Z, which are just starting to emerge. While I’m neither the spokesperson for Millennials, nor am I an expert on the generation they’re creating. Being a Millennial myself, though, I like to think I have more insight than most. I’ve watched their story play out and I’ve even lived part of it.

However, this particular topic isn’t about Millennials. This is about the emerging generation after them, Generation Z. While Millennials are still subject to any number of trends and criticisms, Generation Z hasn’t had much time to establish themselves or have a defining moment. That may be changing in wake of the Parkland shooting.

To understand why, it’s important to provide a bit of context about Generation Z. First and foremost, we need to identify just who they are, relative to Millennials, Generation X, and the Baby Boomers. While there’s no official cut-off point, most reputable sources identify anyone born after the year 2000 as members of Generation Z.

Those who lived through the Parkland shooting are mostly in their mid-to-late teens so they fit into this category. That matters a great deal because it’s happening at a point where Generation Z is on the cusp of adulthood. To understand why that matters, it’s important to note the context of this generation.

These kids, and they are still kids for the most part, were born into a world where they didn’t witness the horrors of Columbine or the experience the collective trauma of the September 11th attacks. Generation Z has always lived in a world where school shootings are a thing and the War on Terror has always been ongoing.

Beyond that, they’re also a generation that has been even more well-connected than their Millennial predecessors. Most never had to endure the hardships of dial-up internet or cell phones that did not have a camera. Their entire lives have been connected, so to speak. That’s part of what has fueled their reaction to the Parkland shooting.

The kids in Generation Z have been watching all their lives as horrible mass shootings from Virginia Tech, Sandy Hook, and Las Vegas happen with distressing regularity. At the same time, they’ve watched as efforts by Millennials, Generation X, and the Baby Boomers amount to very little change. The fact that the internet and social media documents all these failures leaves quite an impression.

Being young, idealistic, and not totally jaded, the members of Generation Z are finally at an age where they have a chance to make an effort of their own. They’re still not old enough to drink or vote in many instances, but they’re now in a position to make their voices heard. That was the idea behind the March For Our Lives that occurred last week.

It marks a potentially defining moment for Generation Z, one that may have far-reaching consequences for years to come. They’ve seen how many have tried and failed to use the horrors of mass shootings to promote gun control reforms. They’re also informed and educated enough to know how egregious the gun violence disparity is in the United States compared to other developed countries.

While I applaud the passion of these remarkable young people, I also worry that this event may become a turning point, of sorts. By that, I mean these noble and sincere efforts of these kids could be the catalyst that instills a sense of nihilism that may very well define their generation.

This is something I speculated on when I made my predictions on the collective mindset of Generation Z last year, going so far as to identify Rick Sanchez from “Rick And Morty” as their first icon. I stated that Generation Z would likely be the most nihilistic generation of all time. Now, the success or failure of the March For Our Lives could be the turning point that cements that nihilism within Generation Z.

As I said before, it won’t be the same kind of nihilism we associate with the Friedrich Nietzsches of the world. It’s the kind of nihilism that is the byproduct of being surrounded by so much information and seeing how little it truly matters in the long run.

Like Millennials, Generation Z is very educated. They’ve grown up in a world where they have access to nearly all the world’s relevant information through their smartphones. They’re smart enough and tech-savvy enough to see world events unfolding before their eyes. They’re also informed enough to know how hard it is for any event to make for meaningful change.

Now, here they are, having experienced one of their first traumas as an up-and-coming generation. They’ve seen all those terrible mass shootings inspire nothing but empty thoughts and prayers. They feel inspired enough and bold enough to make an effort, hoping they’ll succeed where so many others have failed.

While many are rooting for them, the odds are stacked against them. Even major news outlets are starting to spoil the outcome, applauding the kids while brushing off their ideals as youthful day-dreaming. I don’t think they realize just what kind of impression they’ll have on their generation as a whole.

Let’s say, for a moment, that the most likely scenario happens and the March For Our Lives leads to no meaningful change in gun control laws or in efforts to curb mass shootings. What kind of message does that send to the survivors of Parkland and the entire generation emerging behind it?

Firstly, it establishes that their lives, their pain, and their ideals don’t matter. It doesn’t matter how passionate they are. It doesn’t matter how traumatized they are. What they went through and how they reacted in response doesn’t matter. In such a crowded, diverse, and complicated world, their lives are trivial.

That’s almost a textbook definition of existential nihilism. Their hopes, their dreams, and their very place in the universe is insignificant. It wouldn’t have mattered if ten times more kids died at Parkland. It still wouldn’t have changed anything. There would still be no gun control. There would still be more mass shootings. All that time, effort, energy, and pain amounted to nothing.

In previous generations, it was almost beneficial to live in a world that wasn’t so connected. They could see horrible events on the news, but find a way to compartmentalize it in their minds so they could go on with their lives. With Generation Z, being so connected and informed, that’s just not feasible anymore.

They don’t just see that their efforts at Parkland were meaningless. They also see how many other mass shootings have occurred throughout history and how utterly inane such violence is in the grand scheme of things. In a sense, their ability to connect and inform themselves could render them numb to any greater sense of purpose.

That’s not to say that the kids behind March For Our Lives or the whole of Generation Z will be a bunch of dispassionate, misanthropic naysayers who are so emotionally flat that they don’t respond to stories of human suffering anymore. It just means that they’ll be a lot more calculated with their perspective.

Keep in mind, a world of regular school shootings and a never-ending war on terrorism is not some major upheaval to Generation Z. That’s their concept of normal. They’ve always lived in a world where terror attacks can happen at any time, when mass shootings can happen just as frequently, and no meaningful change ever comes of it.

For them, all the yelling, protesting, and outrage that generations of the past have voiced will just seem like background noise. If all the suffering and trauma led to nothing, then why should they bother? That may very well be a question that the Parkland survivors start asking themselves after the March For Our Lives accomplishes nothing.

Now, that’s not to say Generation Z won’t react differently. That’s not even to say that the March For Our Lives won’t accomplish something meaningful in the end. It’s impossible to predict major trends that go onto define an entire generation, but it’s still possible to note the vulnerabilities.

For Generation Z, nihilism might end up being less a reaction and more a necessity. They’re coming into a world where all the news is fake, facts battle alternative facts, and dead kids only evoke empty thoughts and prayers. Once this fact settles in, it’ll be interesting to see how they seek to define themselves moving forward.

Being the optimist I am, I believe that the kind of nihilism that Generation Z embraces could help inoculate them from some of the detrimental effects of identity politics, fake news, and outrage culture. I think that’s critical, given how these forces have corrupted debates and empowered professional trolls.

In any case, Generation Z faces an uphill battle in an effort to set themselves apart from their Millennial peers. A greater sense of nihilism may make them difficult to deal, but that’s exactly what will help define them as they seek purpose within a seemingly purposeless world.

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February 26, 2018 · 5:42 am

No, Porn Is NOT A Public Health Crisis (But Our Attitudes About It Are)

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In his book, “Sex and God,” which I highly recommend, author Darrel Ray tells a brief, but revealing story about the topic of porn addition. It goes something like this:

One day, an anxious and distressed man walks into a therapist’s office. He tells the therapist he’s addicted to porn. He spends no less than six hours a day watching, masturbating at least three times in the process. Needless to say, this habit has completely disrupted his life.

He struggles to hold down a job. He struggles to maintain a relationship. His porn consumption is so all-encompassing that it is a serious detriment to his day-to-day living. He desperately seeks help and the therapist listens intently, hoping to help this man overcome this issue and forge a healthier life.

The next day, another anxious and distressed man walks into the same therapist’s office. He also tells the therapist he’s addicted to porn. However, when the therapist asks how much porn he consumes, the man says he watches only a few hours every week. He does masturbates, but not every day and never more than twice.

He holds down a steady job. He has a wife and kids that he loves dearly. He also comes from a deeply religious community where he’s widely respected. He’s terrified that someone will find out that he watches porn or masturbates. The guilt he feels is so serious and he desperately seeks help.

The therapist still listens intently, but has to find a way to explain to the man that the porn itself is not the problem. It’s the undue guilt he feels that’s causing all these issues.

It’s a basic story, but one that reflects the strange, eccentric nature of our attitudes towards porn. It exists. It’s legal. It’s a multi-billion dollar industry, complete with some of the most heavily trafficked websites on the internet. There have been efforts to ban it in the past, but those efforts rarely succeed. Even in non-democratic countries, porn finds a way to feed the human libido.

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Despite this, there are still efforts by regressive people on both sides of the political spectrum who see porn the same way others see crystal meth. It’s not just an addictive drug. It’s one that has seriously detrimental side effects on those who use it and society as a whole. It’s one of those strange sentiments that both radical feminists and right-wing conservatives share for different reasons.

I don’t want to focus too much on the reasons for those sentiments, nor do I want to break down all the reasons why I believe they’re misguided. That’s not the reason I’m writing this article. In general, I try avoid talking about these sorts of moral crusades because, like other notable crusades, they tend to be more spectacle than substance.

That said, I have noticed the anti-porn crowd shifting their tactics in their quest to temper human desire. Rather than push for outright censorship, which is rarely popular in democratic societies, this crowd is attempting to label porn a public health crisis.

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The government of Utah, the current title holder for most porn subscriptions by state, was the first to declare porn a public health crisis back in 2016. Other states have followed, but the most notable is Florida, who managed to declare it a public health crisis after denying a ban on assault rifles.

Let that sink in for a moment. Florida says that porn is a crisis that warrants greater scrutiny than assault weapons, which actually kill people. If that doesn’t show just how flawed our attitudes are about porn and guns, then I don’t know what does.

Bear in mind that just declaring porn a health crisis has limited effect beyond bad PR for the business. A government cannot censor porn any more than they can shut down another multi-billion dollar industry with massive global reach. As CNN reported, it’s more a symbolic gesture, which is just a fancy way of saying it’s one huge act of virtue signaling. It’s as empty and worthless as any declaration can possibly be.

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While this crowd will eagerly cite studies that claim porn leads to all sorts of negative behaviors that destroy families and relationships, they’re just as eager to ignore the many flaws in those studies. They’ll also ignore data that suggests an increase in porn consumption actually decreases instances of sex crimes.

As I’ve noted before, human beings are complex, multi-layered creatures. Porn is just one of those few things that impacts a wider range of those complexities than most. It strikes at our moral values, our understanding of intimacy, our insights into sex, and our concept of love.

For some people, it has no effect. For some, it has a positive effect. For others, it has a negative effect. You could say the same thing for everything from fast food to video games to stamp collecting. When it comes to the effect, it depends on the attitude of the individual and how they’re wired.

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The republican party in America has made no secret of their attitudes towards porn. That attitude is not unlike the one of the second man who walked into the therapists office that I described earlier. It’s not the porn that made him feel so damaged. It was his attitude and overbearing guilt, which is often religiously motivated.

It’s for this reason that organizations like the American Psychological Association don’t put porn addiction in the same category they do with substance abuse. They’ve noted that the vast majority of porn consumers rarely suffer ill-effects. For some, it even provides significant benefits.

There is, however, a small subset of the population that struggles with it. By small, I mean less than 10 percent. These people are, in their own minds, hopelessly addicted to porn. However, when compared to the prevalence of alcoholism or prescription drugs, porn is hardly a fair comparison. That’s not to take away from the suffering of those people, but there is a context to it.

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Porn is not like a chemical you inject into your brain to directly evoke a particular effect. It’s not sort of mental conditioning, either. For those addicted to it, as with other addictions, there are other factors involved. It’s not the porn itself as much as it is the mentality behind it.

Maybe someone is using it because they’re just a lot hornier than the average person. Maybe it’s because they’re not getting enough sex from their current personal life. Maybe it’s because there’s a particular aspect of their sexuality that they cannot otherwise explore. Whatever their reason, the damage only gets worse when they’re racked with guilt about it.

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Everyone’s experience with porn, sex, and everything in between is different. Actor Terry Crews claimed he battled porn addiction, but absent any larger context, it’s hard to know whether porn was actually the problem or whether it was an effect of something else.

That’s the ultimate irony of calling porn a public health crisis. It attempts to label an effect as a cause, which isn’t just asinine. It’s utterly backwards and detracts from other, more substantive issues. By calling porn a crisis, it creates the sentiment that there’s this one, simple target that’s the source of all these complex troubles.

I can already spoil the outcome of that effort right now. Even if porn disappeared tomorrow, those troubles would remain. Those attitudes would continue hurting those who were addicted. It won’t solve any problems. It’ll just redirect those issues, waste time, needlessly spend taxpayer money, and further undermine our ability to be comfortable with our sexuality.

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January 23, 2018 · 5:50 am

Pro Life, The Sanctity Of Life, And The (Literal) Value Of Life

People participate in the annual March for Life rally on the National Mall in Washington

As a general principle, I limit my discussions on abortion to a maximum of three per year with zero still being the preferred amount. Last year, I wrote a couple articles about it, but that was it. I tried to make clear on both occasions that while I don’t deny the seriousness of this issue, I generally have little to contribute.

It’s not just because I’m a man and will never need an abortion. Pretty much all the arguments surrounding abortion are intractable. Like debating creationism, there’s no way to convince someone who is set in their opinions to change them. You’d have a better chance convincing someone the sky is green, Mars is made of cheese, and “The Emoji Movie” wasn’t terrible.

All that said, abortion is still a serious issue that is evolving before our eyes both culturally and legally. This is one of those issues that affects everybody, either directly or indirectly. Regardless of whether you’re a baby, an old man, or an aspiring erotica/romance writer, abortion’s reach is vast because it involves life, sex, family, and the propagation of our species. The stakes can’t get much higher than that.

Even with those stakes, the only reason I’m talking about it now is because I live less than two hours away from Washington DC. When there’s a major protest, I generally know about it before it starts trending on social media. The latest gathering was the annual March For Life protest, a demonstration dedicated to decrying the ills of abortion and supporting “pro-life” legislation.

Now, I put “pro-life” in quotes for a reason that I hope will make sense in a bit. I’ve already criticized that term because there are those who use it to hide the fact that they care more about maintaining consequences for those who have more sex than churches, mosques, and synagogues prefer. I don’t intend to belabor that argument, but it is somewhat related to the point I want to make.

Having seen plenty of these protests, I notice a common theme that is at the forefront of the “pro-life” movement, but is rarely scrutinized. That’s the whole concept of the “sanctity of life.” I put that in quotes too for the same reasons I hope are obvious by the end of this article. Unlike the anti-sex crowd, this concept is central to the overall movement.

Beyond the intractable belief that life begins at conception and abortion is the taking of a life, the idea that there’s an inherent value to all life, regardless of what stage it’s at or how it affects the life of the mother bearing it. Without there being substantial value, then the whole arguments about when life even begins becomes meaningless.

I’m not going to make the argument that life has no value or that life, in general, should be devalued. I’m of the belief that we only get one life to live and that makes it valuable to some extent. However, I do want to take a minute to try and quantify that value, if only to provide some context to the “pro-life” movement.

I’m not first one to try this. The late, great George Carlin dug into this issue with more candor and brilliance than I or anyone else ever could in 1996. He dared to ask this question in a way that still came off as funny, yet insightful.

“Only living people care about it, so the whole thing grows out of a completely biased point of view. It’s a self-serving, man-made bullshit story. It’s one of these things we tell ourselves so we’ll feel noble. Life is sacred, makes you feel noble.

Well let me ask you this, if everything that ever lived is dead, and everything alive is going to die, where does the sacred part come in? I’m having trouble with that. Because even with the stuff we preach about the sanctity of life, we don’t practice it.”

It may sound cynical, but it’s relevant if the “pro-life” movement is to have any logical and moral validity to it. If it’s going to ascribe a high value to life, then that value can’t be too vague. There has to be some part of it that translates into real, tangible value. Without that, “pro-life” arguments are just empty rhetoric wrapped in inflamed emotions.

So in order to give that value to life, I want to pose a couple questions to the “pro-life” crowd. I don’t expect anyone to answer, but I think it’s important to put this question out there to put context into the anti-abortion arguments that seem so intractable.

“If you truly believe abortion is murder and want to save the lives of unborn children, are you willing to pay women to carry their unwanted children to term?”

That’s a simple yes/no question that shouldn’t be too hard to answer. I have a feeling many answers will be quick and brash, as most are in highly emotional debates. I expect the phrase “personal responsibility” to get thrown around a lot. That seems to be a catch-all word that conveniently provides an excuse to not help someone in a bad situation.

I’ll set aside the issues with that concept for now and ask the second question. This is where it gets more specific.

“How much are you willing to pay someone to not get an abortion and carry a child to term?”

I expect more variation with this question. I also expect more vitriol because I’m basically asking someone to put a price on a human life. I understand that very thought makes a lot of people uncomfortable. Nobody likes to think of themselves, a loved one, or a child as having some sort of number attached to it.

Then again, we don’t seem to mind that when we get our social security numbers, our addresses, or our paychecks. Like it or not, we’re all ascribed some amount of numeric value at some point in our lives. That doesn’t mean some lives are inherently more valuable than others, but it highlights the fact that we can and do link life to numbers.

Now, in order to help out those who may struggle with this question, allow me to do some simple math that should help make this question more palatable.

According to the Centers for Disease Control, there were 652,639 legal induced abortions in the year 2014. In addition, the average total cost for pre-natal care according to the Kaiser Family Foundation is approximately $2,000. Since that’s only for healthy babies, let’s make it $2,500 to account for complications.

Now, multiply 652,693 by $2,500 and we get $1,631,732,500. For the sake of redundancy and accounting for other possible complications, let’s round that up to a total of $1.7 billion. So for $1.7 billion, you could conceivably cover the cost of pre-natal care to every woman seeking an abortion. For that price, there could’ve been zero abortions in 2014.

With that number in mind, would you be willing to pay that price? I know $1.7 billion seems like a lot, but in terms of the US economy, it’s pennies. The size of the US economy is measured in trillions these days. Even with respect to government spending, the defense budget alone in 2014 was $614 billion. A sum of $1.7 billion barely would’ve registered.

Even if you’re against the idea of the government spending money, on principle, that kind of money is out there in the private sector. According to OpenSecrets.org, the pharmaceutical companies alone spent over $3.7 billion in lobbying over a 10-year span.

Even religious organizations have money to spend on this issue. Back in 2015, CNN reported that the vehemently anti-abortion Vatican had over $8 billion in assets. That’s just one denomination, too. According to the Giving USA Foundation, churches received over $114 billion in tax-free charitable donations in 2014. Given that sum, is $1.7 billion really that much?

It gets even better than that, though. Abortion, as a whole, is on the decline. That means it would be even cheaper to pay the price to stop all abortions in 2018. Abortion still happens, though, and if you genuinely think abortion is murder, then there’s just one more question.

“If you’re NOT willing to pay any price to stop all abortion, then how can you say life is sacred and has intrinsic value?”

I understand that sounds like a loaded question after overly simplifying the issue. I concede that if stopping all abortions were as easy as writing a check for $1.7 billion, somebody would’ve done it by now. It’s not that easy an issue. Abortion wouldn’t be such a hot-button issue if it were.

What I’m trying to get at here is that a general unwillingness to put any tangible value on life essentially undermines the arguments of the “pro-life” movement. We’re willing to pay hundreds of dollars for a smart phone and more than five bucks for a latte. What does it say about someone’s stance on abortion if they say life is sacred, but won’t put up any actual money for the lives they’re trying to preserve?

The March For Life demonstration, as well as most anti-abortion demonstrations, didn’t stress measures like encouraging women to carry a child to term, lowering the cost of pre-natal care, or improving contraception access so that abortions aren’t necessary. Most of it centered on favoring legislation that would make abortion more difficult to obtain.

Never mind the fact that such legislation often has some fairly detrimental effects on women’s health, as John Oliver highlighted a couple years ago. That effort doesn’t vindicate the arguments of the “pro-life” movement, nor does it even accomplish their stated goals. It’s basically a way to claim they’re winning the debate and, as I’ve pointed out before, winning a debate isn’t the same as being right.

I feel like I’ve already talked enough about abortion for one day/month/year. If I want to make one point with this article on abortion and the March For Life protest, as a whole, it’s being “pro-life” and promoting the inherent value of life is a great emotional argument. However, if there’s no substance behind that argument, then it’s not a movement that can logically sustain itself in the long run.

Now, do you understand why I put “pro-life” in quotes?

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December 29, 2017 · 9:13 am

Why We SHOULDN’T Judge People For The (Stupid) Things They Say In Their Youth

We all say dumb things when we’re young. That’s not an opinion. That’s an inescapable fact, right up there with gravity, taxes, and the inherent sex appeal of Jennifer Lopez. I doubt anyone would argue that young, inexperienced people say foolish things that they later regret. Despite that, why do we belabor that foolishness later in life?

This is an increasingly relevant question in the era of social media. For much of human history, you could usually get away with saying the dumbest, crudest, most ill-informed shit anyone could possibly say at any age. That’s because peoples’ memories are exceedingly fallible, so much so that even the courts recognize that.

Then, the internet came along and, on top of all the free porn and cat videos, some of that filthy, misguided rhetoric ended up in the digital coffers that are frustratingly robust. It’s become a popular meme that “The internet never forgets.” However, I think it has graduated from meme to a fundamental law of the digital universe.

Like most things, there are benefits and drawbacks to having a system that can remember how foolish and pig-headed we all were in our youth. A little perspective in terms of who we once were and how far we’ve come can actually be healthy. That said, it can also undermine our ability to function as adults who once were pig-headed youth.

This brings me to Cenk Uygur, a media personality that I mentioned earlier this year in a post about winning arguments versus being right. He’s a member of an internet media group called The Young Turks and, for a time, they were at the cutting edge of a new kind of news media.

They were unapologetically progressive in their message, often poking fun at extreme right-wing personalities who probably said less foolish things in their youth. They also provided genuine insight that didn’t always make it into the cable news networks, which was part of why I found them appealing for a while.

Then, the 2016 election happened and The Young Turks began getting more extreme. They became less about covering the news that cable news networks ignored and more about bemoaning the fact that some of their politics were falling out of favor. Cenk Uygur, being one of the most outspoken of the bunch, became one of the loudest voices.

Now, I didn’t care for his exceedingly vocal tactics and have since unsubscribed to the Young Turks network. However, I couldn’t help but feel bad for Mr. Uygur when the laws of the digital universe caught up with him and revealed an old blog post that could only have been written by someone young, uniformed, inexperienced, and in this case, horny.

I won’t get into all the details of the post, since others have already done so. Even by the standards of an aspiring erotica/romance writer who has said more than his share of stupid things on the internet, it’s still pretty crude. Here is just a clip of what Mr. Uygur said.

“Obviously, the genes of women are flawed. They are poorly designed creatures who do not want to have sex nearly as often as needed for the human race to get along peaceably and fruitfully.”

I don’t deny that the rhetoric is crass and offensive. I certainly wouldn’t blame any woman who felt offended reading it. However, and I know this is probably one of those things I’ll end up belaboring again at some point, people say stupid things when they’re young and/or misinformed.

Mr. Uygur may have been in his 30s when he wrote those, but I would still put it under the kind of ill-informed foolishness that we all experience in our youth and even as adults. It’s also worth noting that these blog posts occurred in the early 2000s before YouTube, FaceBook, social media, and cat memes. The internet was a very different place back then is what I’m saying.

Now, because of this crap that he wrote over a decade ago when he was in a different time, place, and mindset, Mr. Uygur is getting all sorts of criticism about this. Just this past week, he got kicked off the board of the Justice Democrats, a group he helped found, no less. Again, it’s not because of crime he committed in the present. It was because of something he wrote over a decade ago.

Think about that, for a moment. Imagine that your boss, parents, or enemies suddenly had access to records for all the stupid, profane, and flat out wrong things you’ve ever dared to say. Most of us, if we’re being honest with ourselves, would be sweating bullets at the prospect. I certainly would. I know there are things I’ve written and said that I would prefer not become public. Who else can claim otherwise?

I’ve often asked this question to some of my older friends and family. I try to get them to seriously contemplate how different their lives would’ve panned out if the internet, cell phones, and social media existed in its current form when they were young. Most don’t really give me a straight answer. A few honest people flat out tell me they would be screwed.

That’s an important perspective to have because our propensity to say and think stupid things goes beyond the internet’s ability to never forget. Youth, inexperience, and an overall limited understanding of the world are unavoidable . We don’t come out of the womb with a sense of context to the complexities of the world. We’re basically limited minds with limited perspectives trying to make sense of an unlimited world.

Have you ever heard a kid, teenager, or horny twenty-something pitch a fit about how the world hates them? Never mind the fact that they live in one of the most prosperous periods in human history and have access to more information than any generation before it. From their perspective, they might as well be a real-life Charlie Brown.

Most people, observing from the outside, would rightly roll their eyes at that sentiment. Even I don’t deny that I’ve engaged in that kind of whining in the past. At the time, though, that’s how it really felt. My perspectives and my understandings of the world were just too limited to convince me otherwise. It wasn’t a flaw in my thinking. It was just a lack of information.

That’s not to say there aren’t truly despicable people in the world who say and think these things, despite having no excuses for seeing the bigger picture. However, I would not put someone like Cenk Uygur, or most people for that matter, in that category.

He said something stupid and offensive years ago. He has since apologized for it and, as I’ve espoused before, we should make an effort to forgive him. People say stupid things when they’re young, dumb, and misinformed. No matter how powerful or robust the internet gets, people will continue saying stupid things. Until we can upgrade our caveman brains, that’s just the nature of who we are.

Accepting that also means understanding that, despite all the stupid things people say, there is a context to consider. Even in a world where the internet never lets us forget any of the stupid things we say or do, we shouldn’t judge someone solely on the basis of the dumbest things they’ve said.

That’s not to say writings like Mr. Uygur’s should be completely overlooked, but it shouldn’t take away from the man he is now and the man he’s trying to be. If we’re not willing to let people learn and grow from the dumb things they say, then nobody will be able to gain the perspective they need to stop saying dumb things in the first place.

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September 21, 2017 · 7:00 am

Ted Cruz, Twitter Porn, And Why We Shouldn’t Make A Big Deal Of It

As a general principle, I don’t like mentioning certain politicians by name. That’s because to mention them is to give them more attention than they deserve and, as I’ve pointed out before, attention is the life blood of both the internet and the trolls that make it awful.

I only ever get specific once their propensity for bullshit reaches a level of absurdity and hilarity that both sides of the political spectrum can laugh out. That’s why I’ll drop names like Rick Santorum and Bernie Sanders. If they didn’t exist in real life, they’d probably exist as cartoon characters that Seth MacFarlane made up.

With that in mind, I have to say I’m shocked that I can add Ted Cruz to that list. In terms of politicians, there’s not much about him that makes him deserving of attention. He’s a cut-and-paste conservative republican who espouses everything you’d expect a guy who once called same-sex marriage a threat to liberty and makes one too many Nazi comparisons when he talks about health care.

It’s for that reason why nobody should be surprised that he’s as sex-negative as they come. While he was the solicitor general in Texas, he ardently defended a state ban on sex toy sales. He even went so far as to make this unsexy statement.

“There is no substantive-due-process right to stimulate one’s genitals for non-medical purposes unrelated to procreation or outside of an interpersonal relationship.”

Try to read that without cringing. I dare you. This is a man who honestly sided with people who believed in using taxpayer money and policing power to discourage people from touching their own bodies in ways they might enjoy. It’s enough to make the Ron Swanson in all of us fume.

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It’s also for that very reason that nobody should be surprised that Ted Cruz just got himself into trouble by “accidentally” liking a porn video on Twitter. I put the word “accidentally” in quotes because it’s a loaded word in a situation where any word can turn into the dirtiest kind of innuendo. Since I prefer to save that sort of rhetoric for my novels, I don’t want to overdo it here.

Naturally, the idea of an uptight conservative republican who once argued for prohibitions on masturbation liking a porn video was like catnip for social media. Cruz is now the butt of a lot of crude humor and understandably so. It’s like catching a priest with a prostitute. It’s just inherently funny.

Now, as funny as this is and as detestable as Ted Cruz may be to anyone who enjoys stimulating their genitals, there’s a good chance the man may be completely innocent here. He has already gone on record as saying that a staffer managing his social media account liked the video and not him. Given how common that practice is among politicians, that’s the most likely scenario.

That doesn’t make situation any less hilarious, nor will it stop the onslaught of reactions from people calling Ted Cruz a hypocrite and a fraud. Given how much we, as a society, detest hypocrites, even from those from the non-political class, that’s understandable. Hypocrites are the epitome of everything that makes a human being unlikable.

However, in this case, I think the reactions to the hilarity may do more harm than good. Please don’t take that to mean I’m defending Ted Cruz, nor am I making excuses for him. I am not a big Ted Cruz fan. I would not vote for him to be my local dog catcher, let alone a politician of any standing.

That said, I’ve never met the man. I don’t know what he’s like outside of these ridiculous stories about the ridiculous things he says on the record. He might very well be a nice guy who only says what he says because his party’s platform involves decrying porn as a public health crisis. When the cameras go off, he may not really care much about the kinky stuff people do in the privacy of their bedrooms.

You could probably say the same about a lot of ardent conservatives like him, whose party gets a boatload of money from anti-sex, anti-porn, anti-fun organizations like the Family Research Council. What they say in public doesn’t always reflect what they believe in private.

Let’s not get too high and mighty here. If someone paid us enough money, then we would probably say all sorts of horribly unsexy things as well. I don’t deny that if someone gave me millions of dollars to only write novels that would appeal to Mormon clown enthusiasts, I would do it in a heartbeat.

Short of reading Ted Cruz’s mind or getting some private audio recordings that has him going on a Mel Gibson style rant about the evils of porn and masturbation, we have no way of knowing how he really feels about porn and sex. However, social media is still going to mock him as the ultimate hypocrite, right up there with Ted Haggard.

That, I feel, is a mistake because Ted Cruz is not Ted Haggard. Haggard got caught red-handed in a way he could not blame on a lazy staffer. In Cruz’s case, it’s very likely that this was just some staffer with too much free time, not enough coffee, and badly in need of a good orgasm. Attacking him for something he probably didn’t do makes us the assholes and not him.

There’s another more important reason why we shouldn’t make too big a deal about Cruz’s possible porn tastes and it goes beyond simply not being an asshole, an effort we should all value. There’s a time for mocking and a time for pointing out the hilarity of a situation, of which there are many. However, let’s not mistake mockery for an actual argument against the idea we find so abhorrent in the first place.

Mocking Ted Cruz does not make an effective argument against his regressive attitudes towards sex, porn, and all things fun in this world. Mockery outside of a “South Park” or “Rick and Morty” rerun never adds any kind of meaningful insight to an issue. Sure, it’s funny, but that’s the extent of the contribution.

For someone like Ted Cruz, who still wields real power and has real influence over public policy, mocking him isn’t going to change his mind about anything. If anything, it may make him that much more eager to send police into peoples’ houses to make sure they’re not pleasuring themselves. People get unreasonable when they’re mocked, especially when it’s not warranted.

Whether or not Ted Cruz genuinely believes his party’s platform on sex, porn, and minorities is beyond the point. At some point, just being an asshole to someone who likely didn’t have any role in an incident, other than having his name attached to it, helps nobody. It just gives Ted Cruz more reason to despise his opponents and not listen to them.

That’s the biggest reason why this whole ordeal with him liking a porn video on Twitter is already overblown and need not be an indictment on all things Ted Cruz. Instead of actually pointing out to Ted Cruz how regressive, harmful, and unproductive his attitudes are, people are taking the easier path and mocking him instead.

That approach is every bit as asinine as anything Ted Cruz has been part of. In fact, I dare you to find any person of power that ever changed their mind because of mockery. Men like Cruz should be challenged, but part of that process involves actually respecting them enough understand their situation. That’s harder for certain people, especially politicians who are beholden to donors.

It’s hard, frustrating, and not nearly as funny, but when our sex lives are at stake, I think it’s worth enduring. It might not be possible to persuade a man like Ted Cruz that his attitudes towards sex are wrong, but by being assholes about it, we’re doing a disservice to those who can be persuaded and for all the right reasons. In the end, that benefits both our sex lives and political discourse.

 

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February 2, 2017 · 6:42 am

My Reaction To The March For Life

When you live within a short drive of Washington DC, you tend be numb to all the demonstrations, protests, and what not. Talk to most folks who live in and around the DC area and they’ll tell you the same thing. Protests and detour signs are hard to distinguish.

That said, when protests are so big they enter the six or seven-figure range, it’s a lot harder to ignore. In fact, it’s a clear sign that it shouldn’t be ignored. This was the case with the Women’s March that took place last week. I’ve already reacted to that. However, there was another march right after that, namely the March For Life.

For those in the DC area, two big marches are like two all-night drinking benders. One alone is hard enough to handle. Two is really pushing it. At some point, you run out of energy and your body runs out of vomit to adequately process something. In the interest of fairness, though, I think I should react to this march as well because, like the Women’s March, it had a powerful message.

This means I have to talk about abortion again. I know. I don’t want to do it either. Nothing makes people less horny than talking about abortion, but it’s kind of hard to avoid when you’re reacting to a pro-life/anti-abortion march.

Again, even though it has come up before, I hate talking about this topic. I’m a man. I don’t get pregnant. I have nothing to contribute to this issue. This is one of those issues that affects women. Therefore, policies and decisions on abortion should be made by women. The fact that men make these laws is kind weird when you think about it.

I say all this with the hope that everybody uses this opportunity to brace themselves. I know this topic sucks and it riles people up in the worst possible way. Comedian Dennis Miller once commented that if America fights another civil war, it’ll likely be over abortion. Sadly, I think he’s right in the least funny way possible.

It’s controversial. It’s emotional. It literally deals in matters of life and death. It also deals with the most fundamental of freedoms in being able to make decisions on the most important issues affecting your life. This is not protests and outrage over the season finale of the Walking Dead last year. This is a powerful issue that affects women, children, and the most fundamental aspects of our society.

It’s for those very reasons that a major protest is entirely warranted. Abortion is an unresolved issue in this country, to say the very least. Some parts of the country are so vehemently anti-abortion that their state only has one functional abortion clinic. Overall, abortion clinics are being closed all over the country, sometimes directly and sometimes through shady TRAP laws.

In that context, the pro-life crowd is winning the war, even though Pew regularly reports that a majority of people are pro-choice. In some sense, the March For Life last week was a celebration of their recent victories and a push for more victories. For the pro-choice crowd, they are on the ropes. They are losing and, given the current regime in DC, those losses will continue.

Given this situation, it’s hard for someone like me to make sense of it. Again, I’m a man. I have next to nothing to contribute to this topic. However, being an erotica/romance writer, it does kind of affect me because abortion is linked to sex. For an abortion to occur, sex needs to occur. It’s just basic biology. Granted, it’s a sexy kind of biology that I love exploring, but it’s still biology.

So when I see these anti-abortion protests and the gains made by the pro-life movement, how do I react? How can I react? Well, I’ll let Steve Carell take convey the sentiment better than I ever could with words.

That, my friends, is a professional level blank stare. I’m only an amateur. My blank stare can only be so strong, but it’s enough to get the point across.

What exactly is that point? What sort of sentiment does a blank stare convey in the face of such a sensitive, emotionally charged issue like abortion? Well, allow me to explain.

A blank stare is not the same as being confused or ignorant. Think of Jenny McCarthy’s reaction to a quantum physics lecture. That is confusion. That is ignorance. A blank stare is the look we all give when we expect something more from a conversation.

It’s the natural response to something that we feel is incomplete. Someone ends a conversation mid-sentence, we’re going to be somewhat frozen in place, waiting for that final piece of the puzzle to come into place. It’s how our brains work. It makes connections and recognizes patterns.

With the abortion debate, which is very much incomplete, the pro-life side of the argument has a difficult oversight that’s hard to ignore. It’s easy to say you’re pro-life. It’s easy to say you’re against abortion. It’s easy to say you think abortion is murder and dead babies are wrong. These are all simple, basic sentiments that check every box of the Simpson Filter. It’s easy for everyone to understand and rally behind.

The problem that makes this issue so incomplete are the implications. These implications are reflected in the actual practice of abortion. In liberal states, there’s more abortion, but fewer unplanned pregnancies and fewer divorces. In conservative areas, it’s the reverse. There are fewer abortions, but the extra unplanned pregnancies create unstable family structures and are highly correlated with poverty.

In both cases, the people are subject to the same forces, namely the desire to have sex and procreate. This is the only unifying factor in the abortion debate. This force remains in place, regardless of whether abortion is punishable by death or available on every street corner. It’s also the factor that the pro-life movement cannot circumvent, although it sure as hell tries.

Their response to this issue is as simple as it is misguided. They just shrug it off by saying, “Then don’t have sex!” That approach might work for kids who eat paste, but not for one of the most fundamental drives in nature.

This best manifests in how many conservative, pro-life communities champion abstinence-only sex education, which has been proven time and again to not work. It turns out teenagers are very horny. For some reason, this is news to the pro-life crowd.

This is the reason why I have a hard time reacting to pro-life arguments and the overall spirit of the March for Life. I agree. Life is great. Life should be protected and cherished. However, this isn’t just about life. This is about abortion. There are two lives involved, the potential child and the mother. When you focus too much on one, you undermine the other.

I could process the rhetoric to some extent if the pro-life crowd was also the most vocal proponent of contraception and effective sex education, but that’s not part of their message. If anything, they make every effort to gloss over that part of the message, as though human sexuality can ever be truly glossed over.

Many have tried in that effort, attempting to circumvent human sexuality. All have failed. Human beings are wired for sex. They’re also wired to enjoy it, shockingly enough. Until the pro-life movement confronts this issue, then their current victories will not last. At some point, the human desire to just make love will overpower them. It won’t be sexy for them, but it will be for everyone else.

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