Wednesday, June 15, 2005

Wacky Extremist Liberal Checklist

Focus on the Family provides a nice checklist of nutty Leftist extremist views. I scored a five out of six, although the one I didn't answer "yes" to did made me laugh. How wacky extremist liberal are you?

7 comments:

  1. "The Boy Scouts and Girl Scouts, while ostensibly providing 'separate but equal' benefits to both sexes, perpetuate stereotyped sex roles to the extent that they carry out congressionally-mandated purposes."

    I don't get this. What congressionally-mandated purposes? I never got any further than Brownie Scouts, and we didn't do anything congressionally mandated, unless wearing odd little felt beanies and doing good deeds was congressionally mandated.

    A conservative ODer said in all seriousness that the reason why our youth are so degenerated is that boys and girls are educated the same way, and therefore the girls, who aren't taught to be ladylike and feminine, don't have an improving effect on the boys. If this is true, shouldn't we teach both boys and girls to be ladylike and feminine?

    -Savannah

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  2. I think I was about three out of six, but I feel like I need to know more context in order to know whether I agree. And I actually do think some of the views are kind of wacky, particularly the "Parents' Day" one. It's the classic liberal thing of getting far too worked up about sexism where there isn't really any. (To me, it's rather like getting worked up about how Valentine's Day is for couples, when in fact it's only for couples if you want to make it that way.) And like Savannah, I don't understand what the deal is with congressionally mandated purposes for the Scouts. I do think it's quite silly that the Boy and Girl Scouts have such different practices, but since it's just been ruled (I think) that it's OK for the Boy Scouts to discriminate on the basis of sexual orientation, I don't see how getting them to be less sexist is actually going to happen. They're private organizations; they can do whatever they want, within reason.

    I like how the guy doesn't bother to point out that generally speaking, wacky extremist liberals are advocating for equal rights instead of against them, and maybe therefore deserve the benefit of the doubt. Not that I expected him to -- this is the crazy family people after all.

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  3. I'm two for six.

    Prostitution is not always truly consensual, because money is used as a coersive factor. It's also a public health risk.

    Desegregating prisons would be a catastrophe of the highest order. Such a plan to use female prisoners as instruments for the rehabilitation of men would expose the women to assault, rape and pregnancy.

    It isn't illegal to cohabitate with multiple partners (that I'm aware of). Bigamy is only a problem if one person deceives another into believing that they are part of a registered union that provides common property and survivorship rights. And under such a definition, offenders shouldn't hold office. But I don't really know how the laws stand now.

    (As an aside, I don't think the government should care to whom a person decides to grant those singular rights of union. Let Mormons marry multiple people in the church, but only one person for legal purposes. Likewise, Baptists can refuse to marry gay couples, but courts shouldn't distinguish.)

    I don't see what the Boy Scouts offer that the Girl Scouts don't. My brother tied knots and launched model rockets. I went camping and canoeing. I didn't particularly need to be fettered at that age with social interaction between the sexes. School was awkward enough, thank you.

    I agree with the Parent's Day thing and that institutions of opportunity (such as public military academies) should be open to both genders.

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  4. Jen, I'm curious why you think that Mormons should only marry one person for legal purposes. I don't see anything wrong with multiple people getting married for legal purposes. Not that it's going to happen anytime soon
    .

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  5. With a single partner, there is a definitive authority for decisions involving the other person, and very clear division of common property.

    Say for instance that a man were in a coma and a medical decision needed to be made. What would happen if his two wives were of different minds regarding treatment?

    Say also that a man already married wished to take a second wife. Wife #1 owns 50 percent of the property that the husband wishes to cede to Wife #2. And how would divorce affect the equation?

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  6. Marriage is, perhaps among other things, a legal contract; as such, the parties entering into it should specify in advance how various complications involving relationships between multiple people would be resolved.

    I may enter into a business contract with multiple parties. This can be much more complicated than it would be if I only were in one contractual relationship; this is no reason to forbid me to do this.

    Likewise, of course, if I choose, I can enter into a contract with someone which requires, as a term of the contract, that I not enter into a similar contract with someone else.

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  7. Ah, but can you imagine the tax codes if we allowed such permutations? Or how about company health insurance policies?

    My objections are for reasons of clarity and legal sanity rather than morality.

    What I desire for civil unions means only a shift in terminology, not structure. But to allow the essential "incorporation" of multiple partners into a union would require a massive reconstruction of the current system, public and private, for no added social benefit.

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