“One of the mandates is they require free prenatal testing in every insurance policy in America,” Santorum said during a campaign stop in Ohio Saturday. “Why? Because it saves money in health care. Why? Because free prenatal testing ends up in more abortions and therefore less care that has to be done, because we cull the ranks of the disabled in our society.”

So that’s what it’s all about: apparently the Nazis only appeared to be defeated in WWII when actually they went underground with their eugenics program to “cull the ranks of the disabled” using the Islamo-fascist and covert jehadist operative President Obama to spearhead the program.  Captain (Rick) America will save us from this dastardly plot.

“Amniocentesis does, in fact, result more often than not in this country in abortions,” Santorum said. “That is a fact.”  He said that people have the right to have prenatal testing done, “but to have the government force people to provide it free, to me, is a bit loaded.”  When asked by host Bob Schieffer whether he believes President Obama “looks down” on people with disabilities, Santorum cited Obama’s support for legal late-term abortions.

“Well, the president supported partial-birth abortion, and partial-birth abortion is a procedure used almost exclusively to kill children late in pregnancy when they’ve been found out to be disabled,” Santorum said.  “The president has a very bad record on the issue of abortion and children who are disabled who are in the womb. I think this simply is a continuation of that idea.”

The issue has more nuance for bioethicists than Santorum likes to acknowledge.  But even for those who are strongly ethically and emotionally committed to the anti-abortion position there remains an inconvenient fact at least equally, if not more disturbing: outlawing abortion ultimately leads to forcing women (about a million per year in the US) to bear children against their will, perhaps in some dystopian future actually strapping down screaming women to prepare them for birth.  Is anyone out there actually prepared to do that?  Maybe, there could be a few Nazi docs left from the old days.  Come, reason with us.

ThinkProgress has a site that lists a number of voiced threats from gay marriage, but since they debunk each one with reason and facts, who can trust them?  So Sexual Futurist went to the cyber-heartland, that citadel of Christian marriage, The Family Research Council, to get the latest intel on the Queer Nation’s plans for world domination.  There, all the “marriage equality” nonsense was debunked in their cyber-brochure, The Slippery Slope of Same-Sex Marriage.  A section right near the beginning outlined in the clearest possible terms wherein lies the danger to traditional breeder marriages:

The Threat to Marriage

“…[with] homosexual “marriage” proponents [rejecting] the definition of marriage as the union of a man and a woman…the sole criterion for marriage becomes the presence of “love” and “mutual commitment.” But once marriage is no longer confined to a man and a woman, it is impossible to exclude virtually any relationship between two or more partners of either sex–even non-human “partners.”

To those who object to comparing gay marriage to widely-rejected sexual preferences, it should be pointed out that until very recent times the very suggestion that two men or two women could “marry” was itself greeted with scorn.

Of course, media stories on same-sex marriage rarely address the fact that redefining marriage logically leads to the Missouri man and his mare. Instead, media reports typically focus instead on homosexual couples who resemble the stereotypical ideal of a married couple. Ignored in such reports is social science research indicating that such idealized “families” are utterly atypical among homosexuals.  In this pamphlet we will show the following:

1. Gay marriage threatens the institutions of marriage and the family.

2. Same-sex relationships are not the equivalent of traditional marriage

3. Gay marriage is not a civil rights issue

4. Americans overwhelmingly reject gay marriage

5. Gay marriage is not a moral alternative to traditional marriage.

6. Homosexuality is rightly viewed as unnatural.

If you missed the explanation of how this gay marriage business threatens my heterosexual marriage…mmm, so did I.  Apparently the brochure found the best argument for their point to consist of simply repeating the accusations whether they are true or not.  Because they’re not, I guess I can put my guns away.  Apparently,at the bottom of the slippery slope, you might meet someone nice.  Come, reason with us.

“…is not about you.  It’s not about your quality of life.  It’s not about your jobs.  It’s about some phony ideal.  Some phony theology.  Not a theology based on the Bible.  A different theology.”

And when Mr Santorum says, “phony ideal”, “phony theology”, “not Bible-based”, and “different” he means…sex.  He’s not talking about the many other theological issues that have united and divided Christians through the millenia like how to treat the poor, the Holy Trinity, gnosticism and so on.  He’s talkin’ sex.  That the discussion is couched so far in religious terms is because we are very uncomfortable with talking about sex.

Sexual Futurist does not exist to forward liberal causes or political causes of any kind.  Our mission is to help the world learn to think and to talk comfortably about human sexuality so that we can learn to manage sexuality intelligently.   This is not possible if we are unable to even so much as look at sexual issues.  Judging only from the way that Mr Santorum talks, one might conclude that the US was a theocracy (Hello Iran!) where religious doctrinal orthodoxy was a divisive (and deciding) issue.  That would, by itself, be weird enough.  But, as is so often the case, the words of the politician serve to obscure rather than illuminate.  Mr Santorum does not mean Mr Obama fails to think of the poor as Christ might.  He doesn’t mean Mr Obama may not believe in the Holy Trinity, or that he’s a gnostic, or even that he is the secret follower of a demonic, that is Muslim, sect determined to take over the US.  Unless voters believe that Mr Obama is one or more of those demon-loving Muslims, which would be OK, in a certain sort of way, when you think about it, if it won Mr Santorum the vote.

Mr Santorum means that Mr Obama holds the belief that the Defense of Marriage Act, federally outlawing gay marriage is unconstitutional.  He means that Mr Obama shouldn’t support gays in the military.  That Mr Obama should support states that want to outlaw oral contraceptives (as Mr Santorum does).  That all women, once impregnated, should in all cases be forced to bear children no matter how they feel about the matter.  That women who want an abortion should be forced to undergo rape by a foreign object.  That marriage is threatened, not by a plague of Kardashians, but by Bob and Ted gettin’ hitched.  That all of us should have our sex lives regulated by the government…and Rick Santorum’s understanding of the Bible.  This is the sort of phony anti-Biblical idealistic theology and even worse, “different from us fundamentalists thinking” that Mr Obama is accused of.  Take a look at this modern sex cult called the Republican Party and then, come reason with us.

• A US Air Force Academy instructor is being honored for rushing to the aid of injured spectators after a plane crash killed 11 at the Reno National Air Races.
• Two local young men are being sought by police for having nearly beat to death a 15-year-old boy.
• Donald Verrilli (above),US Solicitor General, left behind his success in the private practice of law in his 50s because, “If ever there was a time for public service, this [troubled time]was it.”
• Syrian troops continued to kill civilians in their own country.
• At age 76 and with no financial gain, a local man collects firewood in the middle of winter for single mothers, their children and the elderly.
• US gangs export violence to Honduras.

If we fail to intentionally teach our boys to grow up to become heroes, by default they become predators.  It is not enough that our boys are “nice” or that we love them.  Boys become predators by default, not through any evil design, but like the loose cannons aboard wooden warships from old, they can thoughtlessly use their superior strength for harm rather than good.  The cannon, having once been loosed from its restraints, became an engine of mindless destruction.  Victor Hugo used the image in a novel from 1874, Ninety Three,

“The carronade, hurled forward by the pitching, dashed into this knot of men, and crushed four at the first blow; then, flung back and shot out anew by the rolling, it cut in two a fifth poor fellow… The enormous cannon was left alone.  She was given up to herself.  She was her own mistress, and mistress of the vessel.  She could do what she willed with both.”

Coined in English 1387, the word hero comes from the Greek “ἥρως” (heros), “hero, warrior”,literally “protector” or “defender.”  The notion exists in cultures in the midst of warlike cultures from around the world.  In Japan, the martial art of Aikido was based on this concept “of extending love and compassion especially to those who seek to harm others.  Aikido emphasizes mastering martial arts so that one may receive an attack and harmlessly redirect it. In an ideal resolution, not only is the receiver unharmed, but so is the attacker.”  In this way the hero protects and defends not only potential victims but even those seeking to do harm.

How shall we raise our boys then?  We must begin by accepting that our boys and girls have some different needs and that, with each boy’s act of kindness, needed or not, we appreciate it.  This is just a beginning, but if we fail in this we fail our sons and our daughters; our children have the right to this part of their sexual education.  Come reason with us.

As reported,

Former Liberian first lady Jewel Howard Taylor (below, laying down some killer hand jive) has introduced a bill making homosexuality liable to a death sentence, amid a raging debate over gay rights in the country, a lawmaker said Wednesday.  The bill submitted by former president Charles Taylor’s ex-wife, now a senator, also seeks to amend laws to prohibit gay marriage.  “No two persons of the same sex shall have sexual relations. A violation of this prohibition [can result in] punishment…from 10 years to life imprisonment to the death sentence, on the discretion of the judge.

George Tengbeh, a senator supporting the bill, said he hoped it would put an end to months of acrimonious public debate on gay rights.  [The bill] aims “to prevent the parliament from talking about such an issue that is against our tradition and culture.”

Gay rights in Africa have been in the spotlight since the United States and Britain threatened to make aid conditional on enhanced rights for homosexuals. “The first time we heard about it was at the African Union summit when the UN secretary general…appealed to African leaders to endorse gay rights.  We came up to say that it’s not suitable for us because our tradition does not allow such things to happen,” Senator Tengbeh said.

A bill imposing further criminal penalties on homosexuality, whose passage was deterred last year due to world outcry, has been reintroduced.  Yes, if you know about homosexuals but don’t report them, you still will be imprisoned.  But (joy!) the death penalty for consensual sex has been taken off the table.  Now, the proposed punishment is only life in prison.  Only life, as in, the rest of your life must be spent in prison for the crime of having been born sexually attracted to the same gender.  There are some who would say, “Not at all, Sexual Futurist, we simply don’t want them to behave in this way, they can be homosexual but all we’re asking for is that they not do their horrible deeds.”  But can anyone really say this is a significant difference?  To know what a sham this is, simply ask your own body if, when they pass a law against your liking those of the opposite sex, if you could enjoy the freedom of living without the freedom to ever ever be sexually intimate with another…ever.  From Fox News:

Anyone who “aids, abets, counsels or procures another to engage of acts of homo- sexuality” would face seven years in prison.  Landlords who rent rooms or homes to gays also could get seven years.

Bizarrely, without the death penalty on the table, the rest of the world slumbers on.  Current Ugandan law states homosexuals must spend 14 years in prison for a first offense.  That in itself is a violation of human rights of the most egregious sort.  Strangely, some African news sources tend to place this story on the Art & Life tab rather than putting it front and center under world news, religion or politics.  Hours ago, Liberia joined the “Kill the Gays” crusade.

Those of us who support human rights need to come out of our denial.  Even without the passage of these new bills the status quo is unacceptable.  We can vote with our money.  We can talk to our legislators.  We can treat Uganda and Liberia like we do Iran and Syria.  C’mon and reason with us.  Hurry.

“When fascism comes to America, it will be wrapped in the flag and carrying the cross.” — Sinclair Lewis

Of course Republicans are the party of “small government.”  They would need to be in favor of a very small government indeed in order to get it up in a woman’s vagina against both her will and that of her physician.  In the very midst of celebrating the good news out of the state of Washington where they’ve seen that there is NO threat to straight marriage from allowing gays to marry, the state of Virginia is on a totally different vibe.  There, the Republicans have just passed the “personhood” bill that declares life begins at conception.  Democrats called it an attack on women’s rights.  But that’s not all folks!  From the NY Daily News

“Stronger than reason, stronger than cloister teaching, stronger than all that might hold him back, was that old, old tyrant who will brook no rival in the kingdom of youth.” 

In other words, there is a knowingness in our bodies that is older and more powerful than clear thinking, older by far than our religions, a force of nature that “will brook no rival” and not just in the kingdom of youth, but at any age.  The sexual futurist idea here is that we cannot rely on repressing sexuality through religion or common sense.  The remedy then would be to intelligently manage this force, allowing it to exist, looking at it as the gift that it is, honoring its presence, and finally, finally, directing it intentionally.  Not wanting to have an affair?  Proclaiming, at least to myself, that you DO want to have an affair is the first step–then you can intelligently make plans to say, avoid being alone, or “turn off” the flirt switch, or confide in those you trust, or admit your marriage has failed and will always be a failure.  But what you cannot do is expect the nonsexual parts of your brain to have any control over the sexual parts without the two parts having a conversation.  The spiritual (and yes atheists still have a spirituality) and the sexual.

Doyle (left) has another example for us, this time from his most domestic and most controversial novel, A Duet with an Occasional Chorus.  In this “winsome and witty” book Maude compels her husband Frank to admit he had cared for other women before he met her (still something most lovers find troublesome).  But the most serious threat to the marriage was Frank’s getting a letter from a former mistress who insisted that they meet at their old restaurant.  Dirda writes,

Violet, it turns out, wants to restart the affair, and when Frank protests, she dryly tells him, “You speak as if a man ceased to live because he is married.” 

Ah!  How to find life and sexual contentment after marriage!  Where do I put these temptations, married or not?  Come Watson, come!  The game is afoot!  Calling all sexual sleuths: come reason with us.

The old cannot believe how the young flaunt their disrespect of all that is good and right while the young impatiently wait for death to claim the elderly so that they might have a better and saner world.  Women know for a fact that men are the most selfish, self-serving beings to ever exist and that they will only have equality when they have clawed over a sufficient number of male bodies to get it, while men understand that sexuality would be far more fun and exciting if those women could just relax.  The rich and the poor, the educated elite and the underclass, whites and blacks, children and adults, the law-abiding versus the sex offenders, the religious versus those without faith.  We all blame the other, most personally when it comes to sexual oppression or destructive sexual licentiousness.

What a number of bizarre coincidences: no matter to what group I belong the problems of sexual equality, reproductive rights, and just enjoying my life as a sexual being all seem to be the stymied by someone else.  The person in the mirror seems to be the only one who really understands.  It’s always: the culture wars, the gender wars, Christians versus Muslims, women’s rights, men’s rights, gay rights, lesbian rights, black lesbian rights, and so on.  We have allowed our desire to simply be as we are and to enjoy our sexuality to become hopelessly splintered into pieces.

The remedy: I must begin to see myself as part of the same human sexual group as everyone else, even those I hate.  I have to begin to understand that although I may be like you in many ways we will always be different..  I have to remember that though I am different, we are all alike in that we are sexual beings, including our asexual friends.  We must begin to allow one another to be the same in having desires, dreams, fantasies and sexual failures–even if the other is utterly different from what I like.  We must start allowing ourselves to simply be, without criticism for who we are.  We must stand up for one another: staights for gays, women for men, old for young and conservatives and liberals and believers and atheists.  Join us and then, come reason with us.

Often enough parents feel a compelling need to talk to their children about sex and yet we’re often stuck, wondering how to begin.  Perhaps beginning the conversation with our parents might be a good place to practice.  We could hardly do them more harm than life itself already has. 

The above title does no justice to the lovely, tender prose of Hilma Wolitzer’s new and funny novel An Available Man.  NPR‘s Maureen Corrigan pens her own take on the story, so like that of her brother-in-law after her sister-in-law died.

 It’s a cruel fact of life that nobody plies widows with months of home-cooked meals and baked goods; as Jonathan Swift might have modestly proposed, widows might as well eat each other — there’s a surplus supply of them, anyway.

For Corrigan, one of the most affecting scenes recounts how the main character Edward, a 62-year-old science teacher who’s recently lost his beloved wife, goes on a blind date with with a woman named Sylvia. They meet for dinner at a busy New York bistro and to him, she looks shockingly young–the result of some “serious work” by a masterful nip & tuck professional.  Sylvia clues Edward into how women are experiencing sex in the second half of the game:

“I have a friend who reads the obituaries looking for fresh widowers before someone else gets to them. And all she requires is a penis and a pulse.”

A gardener and a birder (hence the cover), Edward fumbles his way through what one of his would-be suitors calls, “dating after death.”  The experience, rather than feeling so much like going on with his life, is a like a bucket thrown down a well of loneliness, pulling up memories, one after the other, of his great and lasting love for his departed wife.  Thankfully, there is an end to grief and Edward is truthfully, as his adult stepchildren describe him in their personal ad, “Erudite and kind, balding but handsome. Our widowed dad is the real thing for the right woman.”

This novel, given as a gift, could help initiate conversation with an older person as Wolitzer (at left) has a great deal to say about sexuality and sex.  Reminded that we were born and will always remain sexual beings, perhaps the end of our lives offers the best vantage point over the very beginning of life.  As Edward remembered the beginning of his life with Bee, his wife:

Her face was glowing and her hair smelled damp and earthily sweet, like geraniums, he thought, or as if she’d just come in out of the rain.  That was the beginning, with no apparent end in view: a needy young girl, a churlish boy [his future stepkids], and a woman whose generous, swaying hips would soon cradle Edward in bed.

Enjoy this read for the old and those who might get old, and then, come reason with us.