This is a beautifully written article by Heather Wilhelm. I truly admire this gals ability to communicate via the written word.
LaJolla - based on our discussion the other day, I would certainly like to hear your thoughts.
http://www.realclearpolitics.com/articles/2015/07/02/why_the_culture_wars_refuse_to_die_127215.html
For those that are link averse, here's the ending, but I have to tell you the beginning is damn funny - "Mount Make-Up-A-Law"...... priceless.
If you doubt the appropriateness of any of the above, well, you’re still going to pay for it. Which is fine, theoretically: We live in a diverse country, and not everyone is going to agree on everything under the sun. The problem, however, is that it’s getting increasingly difficult to opt out of “the program”—and it seems that certain unpopular groups aren’t allowed to disagree.
On Monday, for instance, the Colorado Supreme Court ruled against a local voucher program, which allowed parents to send their children to the presumably Magic Mike-free private school of their choice. Just hours after the Obergefell Supreme Court ruling, meanwhile, numerous commentators pushed to yank tax-exempt status from churches or schools that disagreed with same-sex marriage. “We’ll let you practice your bigotry,” Felix Salmon wrote at Fusion, a website affiliated with NBC Universal, “at least within the confines of your own church. But we’re not about to reward you for doing so.”
Note the imperial-sounding “we”? It’s kind of strange and authoritarian, right? Who does Felix Salmon think he is, a crabbier version of Justice Anthony Kennedy? Even if you favor gay marriage, isn’t this “we’ll let you do this or that” rhetoric just a bit creepy?
Welcome to the culture wars, which have little to do with actual culture, and everything to do with harnessing raw government power. In the wake of last week’s Supreme Court decision, numerous commentators called on conservative Christians and other same-sex marriage “dissenters” to call the whole thing off. Here’s the weird thing: I suspect that many of them would if they could, at least in the political arena. Many Americans, after all, just want to mind their own business.
It’s the ever-growing government, weirdly, that won’t drop the topic—and it’s the ever-growing government, ultimately, that won’t let the culture wars die. If current trends continue, we can expect more of the same.
LaJolla - based on our discussion the other day, I would certainly like to hear your thoughts.
http://www.realclearpolitics.com/articles/2015/07/02/why_the_culture_wars_refuse_to_die_127215.html
For those that are link averse, here's the ending, but I have to tell you the beginning is damn funny - "Mount Make-Up-A-Law"...... priceless.
If you doubt the appropriateness of any of the above, well, you’re still going to pay for it. Which is fine, theoretically: We live in a diverse country, and not everyone is going to agree on everything under the sun. The problem, however, is that it’s getting increasingly difficult to opt out of “the program”—and it seems that certain unpopular groups aren’t allowed to disagree.
On Monday, for instance, the Colorado Supreme Court ruled against a local voucher program, which allowed parents to send their children to the presumably Magic Mike-free private school of their choice. Just hours after the Obergefell Supreme Court ruling, meanwhile, numerous commentators pushed to yank tax-exempt status from churches or schools that disagreed with same-sex marriage. “We’ll let you practice your bigotry,” Felix Salmon wrote at Fusion, a website affiliated with NBC Universal, “at least within the confines of your own church. But we’re not about to reward you for doing so.”
Note the imperial-sounding “we”? It’s kind of strange and authoritarian, right? Who does Felix Salmon think he is, a crabbier version of Justice Anthony Kennedy? Even if you favor gay marriage, isn’t this “we’ll let you do this or that” rhetoric just a bit creepy?
Welcome to the culture wars, which have little to do with actual culture, and everything to do with harnessing raw government power. In the wake of last week’s Supreme Court decision, numerous commentators called on conservative Christians and other same-sex marriage “dissenters” to call the whole thing off. Here’s the weird thing: I suspect that many of them would if they could, at least in the political arena. Many Americans, after all, just want to mind their own business.
It’s the ever-growing government, weirdly, that won’t drop the topic—and it’s the ever-growing government, ultimately, that won’t let the culture wars die. If current trends continue, we can expect more of the same.
