Endless this “war”

Culture wars are getting out of hand.

Especially the rhetoric. It used to be that the phrase was “the culture war.” Lately it has been so expanded that there is no longer any “it” to it. I mean, it used to be that the “war” (itself an overused word meaning almost anything these days) involved arduous debates over lifestyle choices which were personal in nature. My view is simply keep the government out of people’s private lives; what you do with your genitals and what you put in your body is your own business as long as you aren’t hurting other people — that sort of stuff.

But the old “culture war” had nothing to do with making people pay for your health care, regardless of whether that included abortion, contraception, and hence we are talking about culture “wars.” If you talk to a leftist hack, these days they’ll even claim there’s a “war” against “women.” The “war” is said to be waged by Republicans! How can such foolish logic be taken seriously by anyone? Sarah has several excellent posts on the subject (if you haven’t read them I suggest doing so), and what I think really puts the lie to the claim of a “Republican war on women” is the fact that the Tea Party movement is heavily female, and the Tea Party movement would overwhelmingly be against the government forcing person A to pay for the contraception of person B. Moreover, many Tea Party women (and many Republican women) are anti-abortion. In fact, many women are anti-abortion. Now, if we use simple logic (and without getting mired in the abortion issue) how can it be that opposition to abortion is a “war on women” if so many women oppose abortion?  Unless these women are waging “war” on themselves (which is absurd), I for one simply Do Not Get It. It is extremely condescending to disregard the opinions of so many women in this way.

While I’m on the lack of logic, the way they talk about contraception, you might also get the idea that it is something only women do, and thus, any criticism of it (or even a failure to insist that everyone pay for everyone else’s contraception) is part of a war on women. Contraception is not only the Pill; it also takes the form of condoms, and even vasectomies. Moreover, when a woman takes oral contraceptives in order to prevent pregnancy, who benefits? Both partners, right?

It takes two.

Which that means men whose sex partners take contraceptives benefit every bit as much as do the women, and if we consider the very high cost to men of paternity (whether married or single), men benefit more in purely economic terms.

So, even if there were an actual “war” on contraceptives (which there is not), or let’s say you’re deluded enough to think that not requiring insurance companies for pay for contraceptives constitutes “war” — by what stretch of the imagination can this be said to be a war on women?

I would argue that if it is a war against women (which it is not), it is also a war against men.

BTW, I don’t know whether the Obamacare bureaucrats are requiring insurance companies to cover Viagra, but if they allowed a religious “loophole” for that, would anyone be screaming about a “war against men”? I doubt it. Similarly, no one would call threatening a crackdown on pornography a “war against men, but are not porn consumers overwhelmingly male? By any reasonable standard, porn is far more of a guy thing than contraception is a girl thing, and even though no one has threatened to limit contraception in any way, not making companies cover it is portrayed as a war on women, while an actual criminal crackdown on porn would never be seen as directed at men. Logic has nothing to do with it.

Anyway, I have seen few wars as phony as this one. It is cheap demagoguery, and does not rise to the level of culture war.


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6 responses to “Endless this “war””

  1. Sigivald Avatar
    Sigivald

    Unless these women are waging “war” on themselves (which is absurd), I for one simply Do Not Get It.

    The first resort of the other side is the false-consciousness or class-traitor claim, I find – or in even its weakest sense, a No True Scotsman fallacy, where “woman” is remade as “Correct Sort Of Woman”.

    The idea of “women’s rights/equality/etc.” being identical to abortion rights or subsidized contraception is simply assumed as a basic fact – and therefore impossible to profitably contend against.

    Makes one despair of the Republic, if one pays too much attention to it.

  2. Frank Avatar
    Frank

    The culture war must be coming to an end. Ann Coulter just defended Robert DeNiro’s un-PC joke. Actually, the joke wasn’t half-bad, as he pointed out that our country has progressed beyond the stereotypes of race in national elections.

    http://www.nydailynews.com/news/election-2012/ann-coulter-defends-robert-de-niro-joking-gop-candidates-wives-obama-fundraiser-article-1.1048043

    Coulter herself often qualifies as a joke. I’ve followed her career from nondescript lawyer/Freeper to wannabee drag queen. She’s guest extraordinaire at the Anselmo Winery in northern California on March 23rd, day after tomorrow. A dear friend is trying his best to entice me to crash the affair with him. The winery is just over the hill from my place. My friend is quite the drag queen himself. We joined forces last year when the San Francisco Gay Men’s Chorus came to town. He and I attended the affair at the Cascade Theater, a fully restored Art Deco masterpiece in Redding, California. She was decked out as Hyacinth Bucket from the British sit-com Keeping Up Appearances. We made a dashing pair, with me as Richard.

    The tickets for the Coulter-fest/wine-tasting are a little pricey. I’ve told my friend that we would get bounced anyway, and I’m not going to waste the money. Besides, Coulter is now Family!

  3. Brett Avatar
    Brett

    Sorry. Dr. James, there are no moral equivalents to war.

    Thank goodness.

  4. […] What I used to call “the Culture War” has been compounded by pluralization. I suspect the idea is to render “it” hopelessly […]

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