TheBanyanTree: <POLITICAL> Re: Obama Reigns It In: “My mother was 18”

[LaLinda]

>  But it is now, and I can't understand why our government, pushed 
> by conservative religious groups, continues to spend millions on 
> abstinence-only based programs in our schools, and not help those 
> 17 year olds, who will do what they have done for millenia, get 
> access to contraception.


In short, we don't have that, here. All manner of birth control and 
education is available, even in our Catholic schools. REAL health and 
sex education.

>I can't understand why some religious groups overlook "sins" when it 
>is convenient for them to do so, and still push to legislate 
>punishments and limitations for other "sins", such has homosexuality 
>and teen pregnancies among poor minorities.  If you come from a 
>family that can help support a pregnant teen and her baby, the "sin" 
>is overlooked, taken care of.  It happens to everyone.  We should 
>rally around and support them.  And we should.  But if you are a 
>teen who happens to be a poor minority, you were wrong to get 
>pregnant, you are a social ill, and you'd better get out and get a 
>job and find somewhere to leave your baby because your AFDC, Aid to 
>Families with Dependent Children, (now called TANF, or Temporary 
>Assistance for Needy Families) will be cut off after a certain 
>number of months.  For them, it is nothing but social stigma and 
>struggle.  For gays, another "sin" we try to legislate against, it 
>is nothing but social stigma and struggle.


Since you don't mention which sins they overlook, I can't answer the 
question, but the uber-conservatives have a different mind set.

Regarding the sin pf pregnancy being overlooked if you come from a 
good family, that has not been my observation, having known a lot of 
fundamentalists and evangelicals and having worked at the Crisis 
Pregnancy Center. It's a family by family issue. I'm not familiar 
with the attitude for poor people who get pregnant, since my job was 
to help them get services and housing, so I can't relate to how they 
might do things in Indiana.

I don't see any headway being made with legislating against gays, 
since so many are so open and in many places, allowed to adopt and 
have families. Many of our Catholic priests are gay and no, they are 
not pedophiles. In any case, if someone is being labeled with an H, I 
guess that's in the eye of the beholder. Acceptance is a grassroots 
thing and as more people feel free to be open regarding their 
sexuality, if they do, their Christian parents are going to be 
confronted with having to remain judgmental or love them anyway.

I liked Obama and now I like Sarah Palin, as well and I don't hold 
her responsible for the actions of her daughter.






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