This was another great editorial by Charles M. Blow. I took the liberty of inserting my two cents' worth regarding Santorum's outrageous comments about women, gynecology, evolution, and homosexuality.
Santorum and the Sexual Revolution
By CHARLES M. BLOW
Published: March 2, 2012
...
Santorum seems to have an unhealthy fixation with, and passionate disdain for, the 1960s and the sexual freedoms that followed... It’s instructive to recall a speech and question-and-answer session he gave in 2008 to a course on religion and politics at the Oxford Center for Religion and Public Life in Washington.... Santorum ventured off onto sex:
Next a commenter falsely claimed that my colleague Maureen Dowd “said that the Republican Party is trying to repeal Woodstock.” It was a misrepresentation of a 1998 column she had written about the Clinton-Lewinsky scandal. What she actually wrote was:
But let’s not let facts slow us down. Santorum, predictably, deflected back to sex:
While explaining what he saw as a shift in the Democratic Party away from “blue-collar working-class folks with traditional values” Santorum said:
The questions finally got around to asking about sex directly, much to Santorum’s delight, I’m sure. To one of those questions Santorum answered in part:
Santorum may now cloak his current views in Catholic fundamentalism and Constitutional literalism, but, at their root, they are his reaction to, and revulsion for, the social-sexual liberation that began in the 1960s.
In fact, Santorum’s distaste for the sexual revolution of the 1960s leaks over into a deep dislike of everything that the 1960s represents. Santorum continued in the question-and-answer session:
Maybe that’s why he has such a dyspeptic reaction to the 1960 speech by John F. Kennedy, in which he said that “I believe in an America where the separation of church and state is absolute.”
Santorum said that the speech made him want to throw up because it was an “an absolutist doctrine that was abhorrent at the time of 1960.”
Nothing could be more absurd. James Madison, “Father of the Constitution” and fourth president of the United States, wrote in 1822 that:
... The kind of conservatism that Santorum represents has been described as a war on women, but ... it’s [really] a war on sex beyond the confines of traditional marriage and strict heterosexuality in which women, particularly poor ones, and gays, particularly open ones, are likely to suffer the greatest casualties.
Endnotes (my response):
[1] I am not sure this is true; the last time I looked at these numbers, people in the lowest quintile by income tended to vote disproportionately Republican, as did many of those in the upper quintile; in terms of voters, those who tend to vote Republican 55:45 are in the middle socioeconomically, but when you get the very top 1% of 1%, they tend disproportionately to vote (and support with their unlimited corporate donations) Republican. What Santorum completely misses here is that education and income remain highly correlated, and as your educational level rises, you tend to vote Democrat more than Republican. The typical Republican voter has some college, but did not complete a 4-year-degree. But even this correlation is not fool-proof because those who did not complete college tend to vote Democratic even more strongly than those with doctorates. At any rate, Santorum seems to view this as a.) all about sex; or b.) all about money. He completely ignores the fact that he should find troubling that as people become more educated, they tend to find his worldview unpalatable. The impoverished (who disproportionately include people whose education was interrupted) have a different kind of direct experience with the sorts of social issues Santorum and his party tend to ignore or mock. I doubt very much a single mother who supports Head Start and nutritional assistance for her family is thinking all that much about "sex" or even abstract ideas of "freedom." She is thinking about not being hungry and maybe whether her child will have a better shot at completing school than she did.
[2] This point would make sense if an abortion were much more expensive than giving birth and raising a child. Of course it isn't; the medical costs and potential risks of childbirth are exponentially greater than those associated with an early abortion, where the vast majority of abortions occur. Santorum, who in other spheres believes in the wonderful wisdom of the free market's invisible hand to solve all problems, is almost socialist in his desire for the government to take an intrusive, anti-free-market stand. Morality aside, abortion is the ultimate free market solution: for a small up front investment, it eliminates a potential future liability to taxpayers Santorum tells us are already too burdened by social services he would like to slash (poverty is a huge predictor of abortion, and a disproportionate number of unintended pregnancies if carried to term would grow up in poverty). This is not an argument for it (contraception, used properly, which Santorum also opposes, is the Occam's razor in this Malthusian cycle), but Santorum is not arguing what is most economical, but what is most in line with what his church - for reasons having nothing to do with economics - teaches. He has to choose between which argument he will use, but he can't have it both ways. Empowering the government to force a woman to have a child she cannot afford or is not ready to raise means by definition that someone must pay for that child's education, nutrition, healthcare, shelter, etc. Yet Santorum is clearly on record as saying he opposes all of these things (to be fair, he does not want the government to be paying for these things, but since private charities and food kitchens are swamped, and no other entity has the resources and economy of scale to efficiently oversee or deliver these services, to cut off government funding for the poor is the economic and moral equivalent of cutting off funding for the poor, period). So it's a very strange and self-contradictory moral and economic view of the world he has that focuses exclusively on poor pregnant women during their period of gestation (post-natally, he is unconcerned, even hostile to the poor).
[3] I actually agreed with these first two statements until I realized he left out some critical words. What he apparently wanted to say was, "[Acknowledgement of the reality of extra-marital] sex is a means. [The teaching of] evolution is a means." I disagree with those statements, as amended. We have a duty to teach our children the truth. It is irresponsible to allow religious or other ideology to withhold or distort scientific data and consensus in science class. Perhaps on Sunday or in a religious history class, one could teach the opposition a minority of modern fundamentalists have with teaching these particular scientific topics, but to be fair, one should also include in such a course the long-term track record of the church when it has waded into the scientific arena, from teaching that men had fewer ribs than women (because Genesis said Adam's rib was used to created Eve) to teaching that the sun revolves around the earth. It's possible they were wrong then and right now, but their long-term track record is far from fallible, to put it kindly. I did not know that Santorum opposed geologists and paleontologists as much as he opposes physicians, women, and stem cell researchers. Opposition to the teaching of accurate earth science is no longer a Vatican position, by the way; this idiosyncratic deviation is peculiar to American protestant fundamentalists.
[4] I believe Santorum, like Rush Limbaugh last week when he called Sandra Fluke a "slut" for advocating for the right of all women to access a class of medications for whatever indication, is confusing cause and effect, smoke and fire. Individuals make individual sexual decisions. They always have and always will, sometimes with guidance from their church, but there is very little correlation between church affiliation and private sexual practice. Governments and insurance companies and health care providers must concern themselves with what people in a group really do versus what Santorum believes they individually should do. There is a huge difference obviously. It seems difficult for the Limbaughs and Santorums of the world to grasp, but individuals may think beyond their immediate interests and needs. Most morally developed adults understand that there is a huge difference between not making a choice for yourself (to smoke, to have sex, to have unprotected sex) and forcing all citizens all the time to make that same choice. One person's reasonable regulation (in gun control for example) might be another person's tyrannical government overreach. Furthermore, I might on principle support policies built to address behaviors that I personally think are bad, immoral, or even dangerous, since I am able to wrap my mind around the idea that failure to do so harms us all and does nothing to make the behavior less likely. Those who support needle exchange programs are neither heroin addicts nor advocates of IV drug use. Those who support safe, legal abortion or contraception access that makes abortion less likely are neither "pro abortion" nor "pro promiscuity" anymore than they are "pro unintended pregnancy."
[5] "Sex … is anti-American." Very strange, especially considering that if none of our ancestors or immigrants' ancestors had sex, there is no way we would have exponentially grown to 310 million people. Considering that his church bemoaned the "culture of death" that widespread use of contraception in Italy must mean (their population growth is negative), how much more of a "genocide" the population effects of a sexless America iterated generation-after-generation would create!
Santorum and the Sexual Revolution
By CHARLES M. BLOW
Published: March 2, 2012
...
Santorum seems to have an unhealthy fixation with, and passionate disdain for, the 1960s and the sexual freedoms that followed... It’s instructive to recall a speech and question-and-answer session he gave in 2008 to a course on religion and politics at the Oxford Center for Religion and Public Life in Washington.... Santorum ventured off onto sex:
“It comes down to sex. That’s what it’s all about. It comes down to freedom, and it comes down to sex. If you have anything to do with any of the sexual issues, and if you are on the wrong side of being able to do all of the sexual freedoms you want [sic], you are a bad guy. And you’re dangerous because you are going to limit my freedom in an area that’s the most central to me. And that’s the way it’s looked at.”
Next a commenter falsely claimed that my colleague Maureen Dowd “said that the Republican Party is trying to repeal Woodstock.” It was a misrepresentation of a 1998 column she had written about the Clinton-Lewinsky scandal. What she actually wrote was:
“Since Watergate, there has been a pendulum of partisan revenge. And, right now, Republicans want their payback for Watergate, for Bork, for Iran-contra, even for Woodstock. Like Kenneth Starr, the Republicans are attempting to repeal the 1960s.”
But let’s not let facts slow us down. Santorum, predictably, deflected back to sex:
“Woodstock is the great American orgy. This is who the Democratic Party has become. They have become the party of Woodstock. They prey upon our most basic primal lusts, and that’s sex. And the whole abortion culture, it’s not about life. It’s about sexual freedom. That’s what it’s about. Homosexuality. It’s about sexual freedom. All of the things are about sexual freedom, and they hate to be called on them. They try to somehow or other tie this to the founding fathers’ vision of liberty, which is bizarre. It’s ridiculous. That’s at the core of why you are attacked.”
While explaining what he saw as a shift in the Democratic Party away from “blue-collar working-class folks with traditional values” Santorum said:
“What changed was the ’60s. What changed was sex. What changed was the social and cultural issues that have huge amounts of money because if you look — I haven’t seen numbers on this, but I’m sure it’s true — if you go socioeconomic scale, the higher the income, the more socially liberal you are. [1] The more you know you can buy your way out of the problems that sexual libertinism causes you. [2] You have an abortion, well, I have the money to take care of it. If I want to live an extravagant life and get diseases, I can. ... You can always take care of everything. If you have money, you can get away with things that if you’re poor you can’t.” [3]
The questions finally got around to asking about sex directly, much to Santorum’s delight, I’m sure. To one of those questions Santorum answered in part:
“Sex is a means. Evolution is a means.# And the aim is a secular world. It’s a, in my opinion, a hedonistic, self-focused world# that is, in my opinion, anti-American.” [4]
Santorum may now cloak his current views in Catholic fundamentalism and Constitutional literalism, but, at their root, they are his reaction to, and revulsion for, the social-sexual liberation that began in the 1960s.
In fact, Santorum’s distaste for the sexual revolution of the 1960s leaks over into a deep dislike of everything that the 1960s represents. Santorum continued in the question-and-answer session:
“You’re a liberal or a conservative in America if you think the ’60s were a good thing or not. If the ’60s was a good thing, you’re left. If you think it was a bad thing, you’re right. And the confusing thing for a lot of people that gets a lot of Americans is, when they think of the ’60s, they don’t think of just the sexual revolution. But somehow or other — and they’ve been very, very, clever at doing this — they’ve been able to link, I think absolutely incorrectly, the sexual revolution with civil rights.”
Maybe that’s why he has such a dyspeptic reaction to the 1960 speech by John F. Kennedy, in which he said that “I believe in an America where the separation of church and state is absolute.”
Santorum said that the speech made him want to throw up because it was an “an absolutist doctrine that was abhorrent at the time of 1960.”
Nothing could be more absurd. James Madison, “Father of the Constitution” and fourth president of the United States, wrote in 1822 that:
“Every new and successful example, therefore, of a perfect separation between the ecclesiastical and civil matters, is of importance; and I have no doubt that every new example will succeed, as every past one has done, in showing that religion and government will both exist in greater purity the less they are mixed together.”
... The kind of conservatism that Santorum represents has been described as a war on women, but ... it’s [really] a war on sex beyond the confines of traditional marriage and strict heterosexuality in which women, particularly poor ones, and gays, particularly open ones, are likely to suffer the greatest casualties.
Endnotes (my response):
[1] I am not sure this is true; the last time I looked at these numbers, people in the lowest quintile by income tended to vote disproportionately Republican, as did many of those in the upper quintile; in terms of voters, those who tend to vote Republican 55:45 are in the middle socioeconomically, but when you get the very top 1% of 1%, they tend disproportionately to vote (and support with their unlimited corporate donations) Republican. What Santorum completely misses here is that education and income remain highly correlated, and as your educational level rises, you tend to vote Democrat more than Republican. The typical Republican voter has some college, but did not complete a 4-year-degree. But even this correlation is not fool-proof because those who did not complete college tend to vote Democratic even more strongly than those with doctorates. At any rate, Santorum seems to view this as a.) all about sex; or b.) all about money. He completely ignores the fact that he should find troubling that as people become more educated, they tend to find his worldview unpalatable. The impoverished (who disproportionately include people whose education was interrupted) have a different kind of direct experience with the sorts of social issues Santorum and his party tend to ignore or mock. I doubt very much a single mother who supports Head Start and nutritional assistance for her family is thinking all that much about "sex" or even abstract ideas of "freedom." She is thinking about not being hungry and maybe whether her child will have a better shot at completing school than she did.
[2] This point would make sense if an abortion were much more expensive than giving birth and raising a child. Of course it isn't; the medical costs and potential risks of childbirth are exponentially greater than those associated with an early abortion, where the vast majority of abortions occur. Santorum, who in other spheres believes in the wonderful wisdom of the free market's invisible hand to solve all problems, is almost socialist in his desire for the government to take an intrusive, anti-free-market stand. Morality aside, abortion is the ultimate free market solution: for a small up front investment, it eliminates a potential future liability to taxpayers Santorum tells us are already too burdened by social services he would like to slash (poverty is a huge predictor of abortion, and a disproportionate number of unintended pregnancies if carried to term would grow up in poverty). This is not an argument for it (contraception, used properly, which Santorum also opposes, is the Occam's razor in this Malthusian cycle), but Santorum is not arguing what is most economical, but what is most in line with what his church - for reasons having nothing to do with economics - teaches. He has to choose between which argument he will use, but he can't have it both ways. Empowering the government to force a woman to have a child she cannot afford or is not ready to raise means by definition that someone must pay for that child's education, nutrition, healthcare, shelter, etc. Yet Santorum is clearly on record as saying he opposes all of these things (to be fair, he does not want the government to be paying for these things, but since private charities and food kitchens are swamped, and no other entity has the resources and economy of scale to efficiently oversee or deliver these services, to cut off government funding for the poor is the economic and moral equivalent of cutting off funding for the poor, period). So it's a very strange and self-contradictory moral and economic view of the world he has that focuses exclusively on poor pregnant women during their period of gestation (post-natally, he is unconcerned, even hostile to the poor).
[3] I actually agreed with these first two statements until I realized he left out some critical words. What he apparently wanted to say was, "[Acknowledgement of the reality of extra-marital] sex is a means. [The teaching of] evolution is a means." I disagree with those statements, as amended. We have a duty to teach our children the truth. It is irresponsible to allow religious or other ideology to withhold or distort scientific data and consensus in science class. Perhaps on Sunday or in a religious history class, one could teach the opposition a minority of modern fundamentalists have with teaching these particular scientific topics, but to be fair, one should also include in such a course the long-term track record of the church when it has waded into the scientific arena, from teaching that men had fewer ribs than women (because Genesis said Adam's rib was used to created Eve) to teaching that the sun revolves around the earth. It's possible they were wrong then and right now, but their long-term track record is far from fallible, to put it kindly. I did not know that Santorum opposed geologists and paleontologists as much as he opposes physicians, women, and stem cell researchers. Opposition to the teaching of accurate earth science is no longer a Vatican position, by the way; this idiosyncratic deviation is peculiar to American protestant fundamentalists.
[4] I believe Santorum, like Rush Limbaugh last week when he called Sandra Fluke a "slut" for advocating for the right of all women to access a class of medications for whatever indication, is confusing cause and effect, smoke and fire. Individuals make individual sexual decisions. They always have and always will, sometimes with guidance from their church, but there is very little correlation between church affiliation and private sexual practice. Governments and insurance companies and health care providers must concern themselves with what people in a group really do versus what Santorum believes they individually should do. There is a huge difference obviously. It seems difficult for the Limbaughs and Santorums of the world to grasp, but individuals may think beyond their immediate interests and needs. Most morally developed adults understand that there is a huge difference between not making a choice for yourself (to smoke, to have sex, to have unprotected sex) and forcing all citizens all the time to make that same choice. One person's reasonable regulation (in gun control for example) might be another person's tyrannical government overreach. Furthermore, I might on principle support policies built to address behaviors that I personally think are bad, immoral, or even dangerous, since I am able to wrap my mind around the idea that failure to do so harms us all and does nothing to make the behavior less likely. Those who support needle exchange programs are neither heroin addicts nor advocates of IV drug use. Those who support safe, legal abortion or contraception access that makes abortion less likely are neither "pro abortion" nor "pro promiscuity" anymore than they are "pro unintended pregnancy."
[5] "Sex … is anti-American." Very strange, especially considering that if none of our ancestors or immigrants' ancestors had sex, there is no way we would have exponentially grown to 310 million people. Considering that his church bemoaned the "culture of death" that widespread use of contraception in Italy must mean (their population growth is negative), how much more of a "genocide" the population effects of a sexless America iterated generation-after-generation would create!
