The Sickness of Christian Politics & Christian Nationalism

[LFC]

This author makes the case that Republicans, at the behest of Christianists and with help from partisan hack SCOTUS, are gunning for WAY more than just Roe.

It's not just Roe v. Wade and abortion rights they're gunning for. All the blather about "religious rights" and "states rights" is about a fundamental opposition to the concept of human rights. Republicans were very much using this hearing as an opportunity to let their religious right base know that now that they have six members on the court, they aren't going to just stop at overturning Roe. They're coming for everything.

Over the weekend, Sen. Marsha Blackburn of Tennessee released a video asserting, falsely, that Griswold v. Connecticut is "constitutionally unsound." That's the 1965 court ruling that legalized contraception and has been quietly opposed by the same Republican activists that have spent decades trying to overturn Roe. Part of the reason they hate Griswold is it established the right to privacy, which was later employed to legalize abortion, end bans on gay sex, and legalize same-sex marriage — all decisions the religious right opposes. But the religious right also just hates contraception and wants to make that harder to get.

That may sound preposterous in a nation where over 99% of sexually active women have used birth control. But Republicans have been quietly waging war on contraception for over a decade now, and have even secured at least one decision at the Supreme Court to strip women of birth control coverage in their insurance plans. The Trump administration repeatedly tried to take away people's birth control, by attacking both insurance coverage for birth control and terminating federal funding programs to provide it to lower-income patients. (President Joe Biden has fixed a lot of the damage.) While they mostly try to keep it out of mainstream headlines, the religious right has long argued that the "contraceptive mentality" makes women sexually loose and prone to abortion, and the only way to stop it is to end legal access to contraception.

And, just like every other decision that flowed from Griswold, Republicans are also coming for Obergefell v. Hodges, the 2015 decision that legalized same-sex marriage.

While his fellow Texas senator Cruz was raving about "racist babies," Sen. John Cornyn used his time during Jackson's hearing to quietly signal the legal approach Republicans are drafting to end marriage equality. He claimed legal same-sex marriage is "a dramatic departure from previous laws" and complained that same-sex couples have "a new right" (heaven forbid!). He then compared Obergefell to Dred Scott, the infamous 1857 Supreme Court decision that affirmed legal slavery. He argued that those who "hold traditional beliefs on something as important as marriage" are being oppressed by having to live in the same communities as same-sex couples. Other Republican senators, such as Ben Sasse of Nebraska and Sen. John Kennedy of Louisiana, picked up the baton, using legalese-drenched arguments about "substantive due process" and "new rights" to covertly argue that Obergefell should be overturned.

Cornyn felt safe enough that he was evading mainstream attention that he wasn't even particularly coy about it. He literally told Jackson the Constitution doesn't protect the right to marry. As legal expert Mark Joseph Stern of Slate noted, once the Supreme Court overturns Roe, as it's expected to do in June, it "will leave Obergefell hanging by a thread." And not just Obergefell, either. "A number of major decisions protecting reproductive rights, including access to contraception, will be imperiled" by the legal reasoning that Cornyn was alluding to, including, Stern notes, the right to interracial marriage.

Indeed, as legal expert Jessica Mason Pieklo of Rewire News noted on Twitter, Cornyn also insisted that marriage is "religious," hinting at a longstanding religious right dream of ending the concept of secular marriage altogether. It's not just interracial couples and same-sex couples, but anyone who didn't get married in a church is now the target.

Republicans speak of these plans in pseudo-legal jargon and elliptical phrases because they know their agenda is radical and unpopular, often even with a good chunk of their own voters. But the anticipated overturn of Roe in June has clearly got the GOP leadership giddy about how much more of the past 70 years of progress they can undo with their 6-3 majority at the Supreme Court. After all, banning abortion is also very unpopular, but Republicans reasonably believe they can get it done without losing power.

[goldenvalley]

Mar 24, 2022 21:32:46 GMT LFC said:

This author makes the case that Republicans, at the behest of Christianists and with help from partisan hack SCOTUS, are gunning for WAY more than just Roe.

1900 here we come!  The Gilded Age is already here for the uber-wealthy. They'll be living on their super yachts and private islands. The rest of us will be toiling in unregulated work places, eating unregulated food, drinking unregulated water, gasping for oxygen in the superheated pollution with no way to pay for medical bills when we are injured by those things or dying from the latest plague. The good ol' days....it's God's will.

[LFC]

They never fail to disappoint.

A member of the Florida Governor’s Faith and Community-Based Initiative was recently dismissed from his role as a deacon of Clearwater’s Calvary Church after it was revealed he had a history of sexual misconduct when he was a teacher.

Rev. Willy Rice told his congregation in a video that the deacon was stepping down over a past that involved “sexual sin that could also be described as abusive,” Religion News Service reports.

“It did not involve criminal charges, and he has never been identified by law as a sexual offender,” Rice also said.

“Religion News Service has confirmed that the former deacon is Jeff Ford, the executive director of Man Up and Go, a Christian nonprofit in the U.S. and overseas whose Authentic Masculinity Program ‘teaches men how to be protectors of and providers for their families,’ according to the biography of Ford posted on the website of Florida Governor Ron DeSantis. According to that website, Ford is a member of the state’s Faith-Based and Community-Based Advisory Council.”

In 2005, the Tampa Bay Times newspaper reported that Jeffrey Charles Ford, a 27-year-old coach and teacher at J.W. Mitchell High School, resigned after admitting to having sex with an 18-year-old student.

At least he's not a pedophile ... but barely.

[goldenvalley]

I'll just leave this article here for your consideration.   My first reaction was "if only these people spent their religious fervor supporting policies that helped lift people from poverty and homelessness" instead of for the people arrested for being involved in 1/6. 

[LFC]

Apr 6, 2022 21:04:41 GMT goldenvalley said:

I'll just leave this article here for your consideration.   My first reaction was "if only these people spent their religious fervor supporting policies that helped lift people from poverty and homelessness" instead of for the people arrested for being involved in 1/6. 

That whole helping the poor was for Pussy Jesus, not 'Murican Jesus.

[pnwguy]

Apr 6, 2022 21:24:34 GMT LFC said:

Apr 6, 2022 21:04:41 GMT goldenvalley said:

I'll just leave this article here for your consideration.   My first reaction was "if only these people spent their religious fervor supporting policies that helped lift people from poverty and homelessness" instead of for the people arrested for being involved in 1/6. 

That whole helping the poor was for Pussy Jesus, not 'Murican Rambo Jesus.

FIFY.  And in that version, Jesus proclaims "Blessed are the White poor in spirit, for they shall have Guns".  

[LFC]

Apr 6, 2022 21:36:27 GMT pnwguy said:

FIFY.  And in that version, Jesus proclaims "Blessed are the White poor in spirit, for they shall have Guns".  

Clearly you've been reading the New 'Murican Bible. Don't forget this uplifting miracle.

“We have here only five rounds of ammo and two guns,” they answered.

“Bring them here to me,” he said. And he directed the people to sit down on the grass. Taking the five rounds and the two guns and looking up to heaven, he gave thanks and loaded the guns. Then he gave them to the disciples, and the disciples gave them to the people. They all packed heat and were satisfied, and the disciples picked up twelve basketfuls of ammo that were left over. The number of those who armed themselves was about five thousand men, besides women and children.

[pnwguy]

Apr 7, 2022 14:10:14 GMT LFC said:

Clearly you've been reading the New 'Murican Bible. Don't forget this uplifting miracle.

“We have here only five rounds of ammo and two guns,” they answered.

“Bring them here to me,” he said. And he directed the people to sit down on the grass. Taking the five rounds and the two guns and looking up to heaven, he gave thanks and loaded the guns. Then he gave them to the disciples, and the disciples gave them to the people. They all packed heat and were satisfied, and the disciples picked up twelve basketfuls of ammo that were left over. The number of those who armed themselves was about five thousand men, besides women and children.

Good thing all of them were white.

[LFC]

Christianist Republicans in Tennessee make an empty, gay bashing gesture and wrap it in religion because of course they do. The funny part is how they missed the whole part about an age requirement. Clearly the party that is obsessed with pedophilia and has multiple members in office who stalked child brides didn't have protection of female children in mind. (They've apparently plugged this hole since.)

A controversial Tennessee bill wouldn't require a marriage license with the state, and it also doesn't have an explicit age requirement.

The bill is something some lawmakers and women's advocates say opens the door for child marriages and abuse.

The bill amendment would delete statutes on marriage licensing and ceremonies, limiting the jurisdiction of circuit courts and chancery courts in cases involving the definition of common law marriage.

A common law marriage is a legally recognized marriage between two people who have not purchased a marriage license or had their marriage solemnized by a ceremony, according to the National Conference of State Legislatures.

The bill’s sponsor, Republican state Rep. Tom Leatherwood said the law being considered would add a new marriage option for Tennesseans.

“So, all this bill does is give an alternative form of marriage for those pastors and other individuals who have a conscientious objection to the current pathway to marriage in our law," Leatherwood said.

He said this bill was inspired by the deeply-held religious beliefs of himself and others in the state. He says it wouldn't require the marriage to be filed with the state afterwards, but the couple could file it if they choose to.

[LFC]

Cruelty truly is the point. Nothing gives these sickos a boner quite like using their power to bully and humiliate other human beings, including children. They're sadists.

A member of Louisiana’s state GOP governing board—who’s also the headmaster of a Christian school—was arrested Thursday on child cruelty charges after he allegedly taped his students’ mouths shut for talking too much. Rev. John Raymond was taken to jail Thursday after he allegedly kept the tape around the students’ heads and mouths for 45 minutes, which they said made it hard to breathe. The tape was only removed after another administrator became uncomfortable about the punishment and cut the tape off the students, which they said hurt. The state Republican Party said it did not know enough about the situation to comment, according to the Louisiana Daily Advertiser. Raymond—whose school promises a “dedicated” and “nurturing” environment as students “are encouraged to walk daily with Christ”—previously served as a Survivor contestant in 2002.

[andydp]

I came across this beauty so I thought I would share it here:

If I do not return to the pulpit this weekend, millions of people will go to hell. **
Jimmy Swaggart


** But first a mother daughter act...

[LFC]

CRT? How about Christianist indoctrination at schools which may soon be greenlit by partisan hack SCOTUS?

Six decades ago, in Engel v. Vitale (1962), the Supreme Court held that the state may not pressure schoolchildren to pray in a particular way. “One of the greatest dangers to the freedom of the individual to worship in his own way,” Justice Hugo Black wrote for the Court, “lay in the Government’s placing its official stamp of approval upon one particular kind of prayer or one particular form of religious services.”

This basic premise — that government employees should not elevate one kind of faith or religious practice over another — is at stake in Kennedy v. Bremerton School District, which the Supreme Court will hear in late April.

The case involves Joseph Kennedy, a former football coach in Bremerton, Washington. For years, Kennedy incorporated “motivational” prayers into his coaching. Eventually, these prayers culminated in public sessions after games, where players from both teams would kneel around Kennedy as he held up helmets from both teams and led students in prayer.

Kennedy also engaged in other overt performances of his religion while he was coaching public school students. After each game, while players and spectators were still present, Kennedy would walk out to the 50-yard line, kneel, and pray. Initially, he did this alone, but after a few games students started to join him — until eventually a majority of his players joined him as well.

The school initially tried to work with Kennedy to find ways to accommodate his religious convictions, but eventually placed him on leave after he stopped cooperating — and after one of his prayer sessions inspired a crowd of people to rush the field, knocking over members of the marching band and potentially endangering students.

The Supreme Court’s decisions interpreting the First Amendment ban on “an establishment of religion” have, at times, relied on different frameworks to determine if this ban is violated. Legal scholars refer to these competing frameworks by names such as the “endorsement test” or the “coercion test.”

There are important differences among these frameworks. The endorsement test, for example, disfavors many governmental displays of religious symbols that are permitted under the coercion test. But Kennedy’s actions violate any of these competing legal tests. He endorsed a religious viewpoint while acting as a representative of the school district. His actions pressured students into joining him in a religious activity. And he appears to have actively stoked religious divisions.

Kennedy should not be a hard case. It is well established that school officials cannot use their official government position to pressure students into religious exercise.

Or, at least, it is well established for now that school officials cannot do this. Three years ago, during an earlier phase of the Kennedy litigation, a total of four justices joined an opinion by Justice Samuel Alito, which suggested that the school district violated Kennedy’s constitutional rights by denying him the free speech right to pray while at work.

The Court has only grown more conservative since then, and it has treated “religious liberty” cases brought by conservative Christian litigants as its highest priority since Republicans gained a supermajority on the Court in 2020.

There is a very real risk, in other words, that the Court could use this case to upend 60 years of established law.

[goldenvalley]

Apr 12, 2022 22:20:41 GMT LFC said:

CRT? How about Christianist indoctrination at schools which may soon be greenlit by partisan hack SCOTUS?

Six decades ago, in Engel v. Vitale (1962), the Supreme Court held that the state may not pressure schoolchildren to pray in a particular way. “One of the greatest dangers to the freedom of the individual to worship in his own way,” Justice Hugo Black wrote for the Court, “lay in the Government’s placing its official stamp of approval upon one particular kind of prayer or one particular form of religious services.”

This basic premise — that government employees should not elevate one kind of faith or religious practice over another — is at stake in Kennedy v. Bremerton School District, which the Supreme Court will hear in late April.

The case involves Joseph Kennedy, a former football coach in Bremerton, Washington. For years, Kennedy incorporated “motivational” prayers into his coaching. Eventually, these prayers culminated in public sessions after games, where players from both teams would kneel around Kennedy as he held up helmets from both teams and led students in prayer.

Kennedy also engaged in other overt performances of his religion while he was coaching public school students. After each game, while players and spectators were still present, Kennedy would walk out to the 50-yard line, kneel, and pray. Initially, he did this alone, but after a few games students started to join him — until eventually a majority of his players joined him as well.

The school initially tried to work with Kennedy to find ways to accommodate his religious convictions, but eventually placed him on leave after he stopped cooperating — and after one of his prayer sessions inspired a crowd of people to rush the field, knocking over members of the marching band and potentially endangering students.

The Supreme Court’s decisions interpreting the First Amendment ban on “an establishment of religion” have, at times, relied on different frameworks to determine if this ban is violated. Legal scholars refer to these competing frameworks by names such as the “endorsement test” or the “coercion test.”

There are important differences among these frameworks. The endorsement test, for example, disfavors many governmental displays of religious symbols that are permitted under the coercion test. But Kennedy’s actions violate any of these competing legal tests. He endorsed a religious viewpoint while acting as a representative of the school district. His actions pressured students into joining him in a religious activity. And he appears to have actively stoked religious divisions.

Kennedy should not be a hard case. It is well established that school officials cannot use their official government position to pressure students into religious exercise.

Or, at least, it is well established for now that school officials cannot do this. Three years ago, during an earlier phase of the Kennedy litigation, a total of four justices joined an opinion by Justice Samuel Alito, which suggested that the school district violated Kennedy’s constitutional rights by denying him the free speech right to pray while at work.

The Court has only grown more conservative since then, and it has treated “religious liberty” cases brought by conservative Christian litigants as its highest priority since Republicans gained a supermajority on the Court in 2020.

There is a very real risk, in other words, that the Court could use this case to upend 60 years of established law.

Remember the saying that "your liberty to swing your fist ends before you hit someone's nose".  Apparently religious freedom doesn't abide by anything analogous to that.  Religious freedom is now the freedom to impose one's religious views and practices no matter who else is around.

[Bact PhD]

Apr 12, 2022 23:09:51 GMT goldenvalley said:

Apr 12, 2022 22:20:41 GMT LFC said:

CRT? How about Christianist indoctrination at schools which may soon be greenlit by partisan hack SCOTUS?

Remember the saying that "your liberty to swing your fist ends before you hit someone's nose".  Apparently religious freedom doesn't abide by anything analogous to that.  Religious freedom is now the freedom to impose one's religious views and practices no matter who else is around.

Yup. Got a taste of this FIRST HAND just over a week ago. The baseball team was visiting an opponent in a rural burg. Now, this is not the first time we've been the visiting team out in the boonies and won't be the last. However, this was the FIRST time I heard a PA announcer at a baseball game hosted by a PUBLIC school¹ give an out-and-out Christian invocation (Baptist/Evangelical-style) right before the playing of the National Anthem. I have to admit to being dumbfounded, as was Chem PhD.


¹We even play sectarian schools regularly, including Catholic and other assorted Baptist/Evangelical institutions. I can think of maybe two schools that engage in the practice of offering an invocation over the PA.

[goldenvalley]

Apr 13, 2022 1:51:44 GMT Bact PhD said:

Apr 12, 2022 23:09:51 GMT goldenvalley said:

Remember the saying that "your liberty to swing your fist ends before you hit someone's nose".  Apparently religious freedom doesn't abide by anything analogous to that.  Religious freedom is now the freedom to impose one's religious views and practices no matter who else is around.

Yup. Got a taste of this FIRST HAND just over a week ago. The baseball team was visiting an opponent in a rural burg. Now, this is not the first time we've been the visiting team out in the boonies and won't be the last. However, this was the FIRST time I heard a PA announcer at a baseball game hosted by a PUBLIC school¹ give an out-and-out Christian invocation (Baptist/Evangelical-style) right before the playing of the National Anthem. I have to admit to being dumbfounded, as was Chem PhD.


¹We even play sectarian schools regularly, including Catholic and other assorted Baptist/Evangelical institutions. I can think of maybe two schools that engage in the practice of offering an invocation over the PA.

In my life in Tennessee in the late '70's, early '80's I went to public high school and covered football games in public high schools in my part time college job.  A prayer was routine and it wasn't ecumenical..."in Christ's name we pray..." was always the end. And I went to a University of Tenn football game and heard a priest not only say that but also ask that the rain hold off until the game was over.

I didn't hear that at basketball games either high school or college, at least I don't remember hearing it. I guess football is more a religion in Tennessee or it was then.

[LFC]

Rick Scott, who launched his fortune and career on the ill gotten gains of the largest Medicare fraud case up to that point, is going full metal God(tm) and 'Murica. This article susses out just how corrupt he really is but you have to go to this link to see his actual plan which reads like it was written by The Onion or a child ... or a child at The Onion.

Why do I consider Sen. Rick Scott of Florida, the wealthiest person in the U.S. Senate, so thoroughly dreadful? Is it his background in defrauding the American taxpayer? His penchant for spreading disinformation? His smarmy habit of getting all Jesus-y, even in the face of a public health crisis?

It was indeed very Christian of Scott to release his new plan to "save" America — but I don't mean that as praise. At least he's honest: The gentleman from the Sunshine State openly advocates for dismantling the federal government, undoing all federal laws and regulations and effectively transforming our democracy into a white male Christian theocracy.

OK, not in so many words, but that's the idea. For some reason Scott dispensed with a hyphen in the title of his "11 Point Plan to Rescue America" — is punctuation "woke" now? It's so hard to keep up — which might better be described as a Christian-right reboot of the Ten Commandments (plus one).

[LFC]

I know I shouldn't judge a book by its cover but this chick looks crazy. She clearly wants to brainwash children with her superstitious beliefs.

In a widely-watched video on TikTok an elementary school teacher says she should be allowed to teach her students about Jesus and her personal Christian beliefs because some states have approved curriculums that include teaching about gender identity.

"If schools are allowed to teach gender identity to elemenary [sic] children then I, as a elemenary [sic] educator should also have the freedom to teach them about how God was not confused when he designed them," says the person in the video, which says it was created by Kristan Whann.

"We must protect our children," the title reads.

"I should be able to teach them about Jesus and how God created them a boy or a girl on purpose and for a purpose. If you have the freedom to teach my child that they might be confused about their gender, then I should also have the liberty to teach your child that God did not make a mistake when he created them. I think it's time we even out the playing ground."

The TikTok video includes the hashtag "christianteacher" and "parentalrights." In the comments section, Whann says it is her "hearts desire" in response to a user who said: "bring back Jesus in schools!!!!"

[LFC]

This sick and twisted creature is running to be Secretary of State in Michigan, which means they'll be in charge of running the elections. Fascism and organized religion are more comfortable bedfellows than democracy and organized religion.

Rolling Stone cited a podcast exposed by Media Matters by Michigan Republican candidate for Secretary of State, Kristina Karamo. The Michigan GOP has given her their endorsement, despite her connections to QAnon and some of her more bizarre opinions.

In Aug. 2020, Karamo explained that Ariana Grande and Billie Eilish were putting children "under a satanic delusion." Three years ago at the MTV Video Music Awards, Grande performed a version of "God Is a Woman," with women reenacting the Leonardo da Vinci painting of The Last Supper. A panel of women sat at a table holding hands as Grande sang, "Baby, lay me down and let's pray."

Karamo called it nothing more than a "lesbian orgy."

In Billie Eilish's video for the song “Good Girls Go to Hell," the singer sprouts wings from her back and appears to fall from the sky and into a vat of a black tar substance. Her lyrics include the idea that St. Peter is on vacation from the pearly gates. She goes on to sing, "all the good girls go to hell; 'Cause even God herself has enemies; And once the water starts to rise; And heaven's out of sight; She'll want the devil on her team." The song is her nod to the "belief that moral acts are futile, because in the end she believes they will all fall," wrote the PopSong Professor.

In the same podcast, Karamo named Beyoncé for her “working overtime to pull more and more Black Americans into paganism and calling it American spirituality." Many conspiracy theories involving Beyoncé falsely claim she's some kind of Illuminati cult leader. Paganism is apparently close to Satan, Karamo believes, mixing it up with the worship of Satan. Either way, she believes Jay-Z is a Satanist but acknowledges there is no “hard proof.”

She then went off on Cardi B as "a tool of Lucifer," presumably the Biblical fallen angel and not the television show. Cardi B wrote the song "WAP" which Karamo believes is "very obscene" and is part of the "filth and sexual degeneracy in our culture."

She then goes off on a rant about people doing yoga as actually practicing "a satanic ritual."

Karamo is also a believer in the idea that the Jan. 6 attacks on the U.S. Capitol were actually left-wing activists.

[andydp]

[AnBr]

Reminds me of the root for the Hebrew word for charity is the same as justice and righteousness.

Tzedakah or Ṣedaqah (Hebrew: צדקה [ts(e)daˈka]) is a Hebrew word meaning "righteousness", but commonly used to signify charity.[1] This concept of "charity" differs from the modern Western understanding of "charity." The latter is typically understood as a spontaneous act of goodwill and a marker of generosity; tzedakah is an ethical obligation.

Tzedakah refers to the religious obligation to do what is right and just, which Judaism emphasizes as an important part of living a spiritual life. Unlike voluntary philanthropy, tzedakah is seen as a religious obligation that must be performed regardless of one's financial standing, and so is mandatory even for those of limited financial means. Tzedakah is considered to be one of the three main acts that can positively influence an unfavorable heavenly decree.

[LFC]

These people are so f***ed up. And nothing says masculinity quite like Josh Hawley except maybe mega-metrosexual Tuckums Carlson or doughy whiner Rafael Cruz.

Good news: there’s an annual Christian men’s conference, which means you can now start going every year! For 2022, the location for all this religious bro-ery is Missouri, and things are getting off to a very hot start. On Friday night, the weekend was kicked off with an exhibition of what we’ve all dreamed of seeing when feel our most masc—a monster truck driving off a giant ramp through columns of flames while electric guitars wail and the lights flash. Confusion and over-stimulation is the theme of the weekend because that’s what being a guy is all about.

The video of the big moment is on Twitter, of course, and it’s worth a watch. I almost get why this is so fun and exciting, but I do think the truck just landing after edging up there on the platform for forever is a bit of a letdown. The driver should get ejected through the roof and then the whole thing should catch fire, in my opinion.

Tickets for this event are $119 per the official website and there are several other needlessly performative events to do there with the other Christian fellas, including ninja warrior competitions, and professional bull riding. The conference “exists to empower and motivate men to live out God’s view of manhood and be the best husbands, fathers, and leaders God has called them to be.”

[pg]

Mar 24, 2022 21:32:46 GMT LFC said:

Over the weekend, Sen. Marsha Blackburn of Tennessee released a video asserting, falsely, that Griswold v. Connecticut is "constitutionally unsound." That's the 1965 court ruling that legalized contraception and has been quietly opposed by the same Republican activists that have spent decades trying to overturn Roe. Part of the reason they hate Griswold is it established the right to privacy, which was later employed to legalize abortion, end bans on gay sex, and legalize same-sex marriage — all decisions the religious right opposes. But the religious right also just hates contraception and wants to make that harder to get.

"Gunning for Griswold" is so Orwellian that it chills me to the bone. As to the senator: "Marsha, Marsha Marsha!" 

Apparently, she's in complete denial of what actually happens with many young TN women (even girls) who end up pregnant because they've been taught that birth control is a sin but go right on having sex. They cross state borders. Flights as well as the roads to the Virginia border are a vey hot ticket when one is trying to obtain a hasty safe abortion. Especially when said young lady is trying to hide it from family, friends and boyfriend OR has let it go until the second trimester, while trying to find options and save a bit of money up to go. Some head to Illinois, sometimes taking a bus. 

And of course- many hospitals will check a young woman in "trouble" in, classify an abortion as a D&C. That's such an open secret in TN that nearly everybody- rich or poor- knows it. It's not going to go away, unless the state decides to target big hospitals like those in the Vanderbilt network. That'll be the day, since those places are chock-full of supporters and potential donors who will drop politicians like a stone if livelihoods are threatened. Hey- sometimes, capitalism can be a great stabilizer.  

I've done my time in TN. For the most part, the people are kind but strange. And very talkative. They speak openly about the sin of abortion, at the same time mumbling under their breaths that sometimes it's the best option. Backwards is the way forward in the South. 

[jackd]

Probably more likely to go after gay marriage than birth control or interracial marriage although they could go after all of them.

[AnBr]

Perhaps they should project that photo of Hawley (in women's lingerie at his orgy) overhead at that Christian men’s conference where everyone can see.

[LFC]

May 4, 2022 11:29:39 GMT AnBr said:

Perhaps they should project that photo of Hawley (in women's lingerie at his orgy) overhead at that Christian men’s conference where everyone can see.

Love the sentiment but that was Cawthorn.