It may be time to re-evaluate your wisdom if you’ve ever said that all’s fair in love and politics.
One good thing you can say about Michelle Obama is that she comes right out and says it. An Obama presidency would mean repeal of the Defence of Marriage Act and streamlining adoption for same-sex couples. A more sinister side of the policy debate involves where some of those children will come from – fit and loving natural parents who want to raise their own children. The idea is being pushed by people playing a conservative values game.
I often spend time in Internet discussions, because I like to discuss, and to get a sense of what other people think. Usually, it just serves help satisfy my argumentative urges and increases my knowledge. But this I have to report. Fake social conservatives have found their way into conservative discussion forums and they’re up to no good.
It’s actually pretty easy to do using the well-worked language of “personal responsibility†and feigned fiscal miserliness. If a guy can’t keep it in his pants than he doesn’t deserve rights. Fornication is wrong and it’s a burden on the state to track down unmarried fathers to let them know about their children. If these guys were married like they should be, they wouldn’t have caused the problem. They only have themselves to blame.
In the conservative values game, they’re not pushing abortion, so you add it up. They mean children can be put up for adoption without a father’s consent. The target is an increasingly vulnerable part of the American family population – the children of divorced and never-married parents – made more vulnerable by the systematic elimination of the rights of natural parents, spearheaded by the well-documented legal and social war against fathers. Part of the machinery is already in place in Virginia.
The Putative Father Registry law challenges men to register their non-marital sexual activities with the state. If a relationship results in a child, not having the activity that led to it registered means – to the state – that the father has waived his right to be notified that his parental rights are being terminated.
One year into operation, as any reasonable person would expect, the registry isn’t filled with stimulating sagas of sexual exploitations. “A grand total of 64 men in Virginia availed themselves of this splendid opportunity to create an official record of their sexual activities.†The Daily Press says that in the most recent year for which statistics are available, 33,681 non-marital births occurred in Virginia. The probability of being raised by a biological parent have been significantly reduced in a population of more than 33,000 children, in one year, in one state. The children at the edge of the herd can more easily be snatched by the hungry wolves.
The fake conservatives can seem fairly or even extremely stereotypical, including a great naivete in their knowledge of the current state of family politics. A first tip may be when encountering a persona that seems far too stereotypical – a rather standardized leftist conception of the mean-spirited intransigence of traditional moral convictions. If that isn’t enough, watch for signature intolerance and reliance on bigotry – attacking groups of people – especially men and fathers. If the person you’re dealing with cannot be reached through information and reason – you found one.
