My over-arching point, probably a little too ham-handedly presented (sorry about that, I feel maybe too strongly about this issue), was to pose general questions into the ether. Stuff for us all to think about. Not accusations. These are complex times filled with complex issues. One of my particular favorites at the moment is the one where the US and Iran are fighting on the same side against one enemy, ISIS. Okay, THERE'S a dilemma for you! And I think whatever side we might favor, we still have to ask these questions. Aloud. To ourselves. To each other. To others who might be listening in or otherwise lurking.
Meh, that stupid drumbeat again. It just seems to me that with these advance-level problems we need some very careful and considered thinking and questioning about it. We need to drill down into - "okay, what am I REALLY upset about, here?" Which I think is when you start exploring the whole idea of - how sacrosanct are religious rights? Whose religion, anyway? So are we saying religious rights trump civil rights and equal rights and economic rights and so forth? Then we're saying Judaism-centered or Buddhism-centered or Mormonism-centered or Islam-centered rights ALSO trump all those same civil rights and equal rights and economic rights and so forth, are we not? Try THAT ONE on, CONservatives! And hey, we Catholics aren't quite the same as the various kinds of Classification-Protestant Christians, so can we split hairs that far, then, too?
I'm really glad to see businesses inside and outside Indiana reacting to this as I hope they do. ESPECIALLY the home-town ones. That way we can exert pressure from the inside as well as the outside. Sometimes the locals speak louder and more pointedly anyway. We need every one of them we can get. There has to be a big fat stop sign gouged into the ground in front of them. And I say this as a Catholic. Conflicted but still a Catholic. I don't think ANY religion trumps this. NO religion should trump this. Because whose religion gets that privilege? Who's to judge?
SHEESH - does it always have to boil down to a bunch of unruly spoiled toddlers fighting over a single large cookie? Criminy. If everybody wants some, then they all have to share, dammit! They all have to make room. They all have to be okay with not having the whole thing to themselves when all the other kids in the room probably want the exact same thing! There's just no other option here. Everybody has to share. Take some, and leave enough for everybody else to have some too.
I think the under-theme and under-message here, if you will, is rigidity. Insisting on this kind of entitlement - of "I don't have to do such and such because my religion says I don't have to," thereby imposing YOUR distinct and specialized view on everybody else who has to deal with you - is the REAL meanie here. THAT is what has to go, seems to me. If we can't flat-out get rid of it in one fell swoop, then it has to be pushed back against, has to be resisted, has to be chipped away and steadily weakened and otherwise compromised. (Think termites.)
Maybe political and social and economic erosion is what gets this job done. I'm glad there are Indiana businesses thinking with more objective heads.
BUT AT THE SAME TIME, you have to look at who's legislating this stuff, who's introducing it in the legislature, who's supporting it there and pushing it toward the governor's desk, who the governor is, and how they got into those jobs to begin with. They don't just stroll on in. They win elections, in one way or other, by getting the biggest vote counts. So it's the voters. It's the voters. Those who are really in the statistical minority in large parts of the country, but who get out and vote on Election Day without fail (if they haven't already early-voted), always wind up shouting really loudly.
And they REALLY wanna win this next time. They've lost twice. They don't like that. Their dearest dream was to make President Barack Obama a one-termer. They failed. They don't like facing and admitting that they failed. Besides, THEY want all the power. And judging from the bombast we're hearing already, they want back in - BADLY, so they can do what they weren't able to do for the last six years, which is to tear down everything President Obama built, and in effect, completely negate and nullify his Presidency. They'd bulldoze his eventual Presidential Library and try to excise every mention of his name if they could. Kinda like the nutcases in the Middle East who tried to wipe the land free of false idols, including a priceless, irreplaceable historic Buddha statue rendered into the side of a mountain. ERASE his very EXISTENCE! As one teabagger lamented - "I want Obama GONE."
On our side, on the other hand, some of us find it awfully easy to throw in the towel and just go home and stay there. We get discouraged a lot quicker and more deeply than they do. Stop and think for a moment what the irrational "right" did after the Supreme Court handed down its Roe v Wade decision. Did they allow themselves to become inconsolable and just throw up their hands and stay home? Any "it's no use" types there? Well, maybe a tiny few, but the rest of 'em armed up and got militant and in-yer-face and started acting out a LOT and thundering across the airwaves and throwing loud nasty temper tantrums in public wherever and whenever they could. AND THEY NEVER TOOK "NO" FOR AN ANSWER. They never gave up. If one way was shut down for them, they came back around the side or from behind somewhere, or tried to chip a hole in the roof, or smuggle themselves in, disguised as a waiter or something. ANY loophole. ANY crack in the wall. Find it! And find it they have. Many of 'em, including candidates for office and for judicial appointments have talked all nice and such about how Roe v Wade is "settled law" but not for a minute did they mean it. I'm surprised nobody sat with one arm hidden behind their backs so you couldn't see their fingers crossed, through the years that I've watched coverage of this stuff.
I wish WE did that.
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Dan Savage ✔ @fakedansavage
