Tag Archives: Jennifer Roback Morse

Podcasts featuring Dr. Jennifer Roback Morse

Dr. J integrates fiscal conservatism with social conservatism
Dr. J integrates fiscal conservatism with social conservatism

I have become increasingly impressed with Dr. Jennifer Roback Morse, so imagine my joy when I saw that she is being regularly featured on the Lutheran radio show “Issues, Etc”, with Todd Wilken. Check out these short podcasts on your lunch break, I listened to them TWICE.

Is Marriage Worth It? (MP3 file, 10 minutes)

This is a very good primer on marriage, and whether narcissistic men and women have what it takes to be married. Dr. J also explains what the purpose of marriage is.

Are Fathers Necessary? (MP3 file, 21 minutes)

One of the best things about Dr. J is that she understands men and values men. She talks about same-sex marriage in this podcast, as well.

The Future of Marriage (Mp3 file, 10 minutes)

She explains how the secular left would like to be the ones raising your children, so they would love to break up the family unit. You can really see her libertarian economics streak coming out in this one.

I once e-mailed her to get her thoughts on no-fault divorce, and she mailed me a hardcover book featuring a book chapter where she argued against no-fault divorce. It was a great chapter because she understands men and defends us capably. She’s brilliant and she’s a stay-at-home mom! I just ordered her “Smart Sex” book last week. When you e-mail her, she takes time to talk with you back-and-forth.

My previous post on Dr. J featured a lecture on love and economic policy and a great paper on feminism that she presented to university students.

By the way, there was a pretty good fight on the blog about marriage and sex between me and theobromophile, a pro-life feminist. Leave a comment! The wonderful Andrew and Jen, as well as Madeleine from MandM in New Zealand all left comments.

About the speaker

Dr. Jennifer Roback Morse, Senior Fellow in Economics at the Acton Institute and regular contributor to National Review Online and The National Catholic Register, received her Ph.D. in economics from the University of Rochester. Until recently, she was a Research Fellow at the Hoover Institution. She has been on the faculty of Yale University and George Mason University, and is the author of Love and Economics: Why the Laissez-Faire Family doesn’t work.

Understanding the effect of sex on your brain chemistry

This article was sent to me by my friend Andrew. It’s by Marcia Segelstein.

Marcia is trying to make the same point about sex that Miriam Grossmann made in her book “Unprotected”. The point is that although bureaucrats and educrats love to tell people about the riskiness of behaviors like smoking and obesity, they don’t tell people the truth about the dangers of casual sex, because they don’t want to antagonize special interest groups like feminists and gay activists.

In the article, Marcia talks about the mental effects of casual sex. She talks about dopamine first, but the one I want to tell you about is called oxytocin. It is very important that you parents of young ladies understand this and present this evidence to your daughters. (The male version of this phenomenon is also explained in the article, it’s called vasopressin).

Excerpt:

Oxytocin is another important brain chemical we are now learning more about.  Oxytocin helps females, in particular, bond with other people.  When a new mother breastfeeds her infant, for example, oxytocin floods her brain.  The effect is powerful.  She feels a strong desire to be with her baby, and is willing to suffer the sleepless nights and inconveniences that come with having a baby.

Oxytocin also helps females bond with men.  When a woman and man touch each other in a loving way, oxytocin is released in her brain.  It makes her want more of that loving touch, and she begins to feel a bond with her partner.  Sexual intercourse leads to the release of even more oxytocin, a desire to repeat the contact, and even stronger bonding.  But, like dopamine, oxytocin is values-neutral.  It’s a chemical reaction, or, as the authors write: “[I]t is an involuntary process that cannot distinguish between a one-night stand and a lifelong soul mate.  Oxytocin can cause a woman to bond to a man even during what was expected to be a short-term sexual relationship.”  So when that short-term relationship ends, the emotional fallout can be devastating, thanks to oxytocin.

Another significant finding about oxytocin is that it produces feelings of trust.  That can be good or bad, depending on the situation.  “While the hormonal effect of oxytocin is ideal for marriage, it can cause problems for the unmarried woman or girl who is approached by a man desiring sex….[T]he warning is that a woman’s brain can cause her to be blindsided by a bad relationship that she thought was good because of the physical contact and the oxytocin response it generates.”

This is why Dr. Jennifer Roback Morse says that the only smart sex is married sex. Otherwise you are just coarsening your own self. Neil Simpson calls this the duct tape theory of sex. He explains why sex is like duct tape here. Don’t order your children around – give them the data so they understand the why of chastity.

Featured blog: Pursuing Holiness

I’ve been featuring a lot of conservative women lately, and not just Marsha Blackburn and Michele Bachmann. Earlier this week I featured Dawn Eden, who is a champion of chastity, and Dr. Jennifer Roback Morse who champions parenting, men and the family. (I found a very frank, funny podcast by Dr. J where she is speaking to a Catholic church about chastity, marriage and parenting – her podcast feed is here)

How are women different than men?

Here are some ways that women are different than men:

  1. women tend to favor gun control, because guns are loud and scary
  2. women tend to emphasize having their needs met by Christianity over theology and apologetics
  3. women tend to favor compassion and forgiveness over responsibility and moral obligations

Well, let’s just see what Laura over the Pursuing Holiness blog thinks about all of that!

1. Laura likes guns

She writes:

Consider, for example, the New Bethel Church in Louisville, KY. Pastor Ken Pagano has decided to have a Gun Day at church. The Gun Day will include patriotic music and gun safety information. After all, recent shootings at churches have illustrated the need for responsible, defensive gun ownership.

I thought to myself, Sweet, maybe I should convert to the Assemblies of God and be a part of this.

Read the rest here.

2. Laura likes God

She writes:

What if church was about worshiping and learning about a holy and sovereign God?  A radical idea, I know.

…What’s the point of filling a church with benchwarmers, or in turning a church into a community organization where people perform service in order to fulfill their own moral code instead of for the glory of God?  We have a country full of people and groups intent on self-gratification.  If the church is no different, people may as well sleep in on Sundays.

Read the rest here.

3. Laura likes moral obligations

She writes:

Is there something morally wrong about being required to pay for [medical] services we willingly received? It’s far more morally wrong to have people throw in the towel and just refuse to pay, but even that is an option that society chooses to accept via bankruptcy laws.

I really don’t understand why people are buying into the idea that it’s some massive, morally unsound, unfair burden to pay for the medical services that they willingly received.  It’s entirely fair.  You asked for those services, you accepted them, and now you need to quit whingeing and pay up.

Read the rest here.

Laura’s blog is called Pursuing Holiness.