Still, if anyone in the Occupy Wall Street movement wants an intellectually honest explanation for why they can’t find a job, they might start by considering what happens to an economy when the White House decides to make pinatas out of the financial-services industry (roughly 6%, or $828 billion, of U.S. GDP), the energy industry (about 7.5% of GDP, or $1 trillion), and millionaires and billionaires (who paid 20.4% of all federal income taxes in 2009). And don’t forget the Administration’s rhetorical volleys against individual companies like Anthem Blue Cross, AIG and Bank of America, or against Chrysler’s bondholders, or various other alleged malefactors of wealth.
Now move from words to actions. Want a shovel-ready job? The Administration has spent three years sitting on the Keystone XL pipeline project that promises to create 13,000 union jobs and 118,000 “spin-off” jobs. A State Department environmental review says the project poses no threat to the environment, but the Administration’s eco-friends are screaming lest it go ahead.
Then there are the jobs the Administration and its allies in Congress are actively killing. In June, American Electric Power announced it would have to shutter five coal-fired power plants, at a cost of 600 jobs, in order to comply with new EPA rules. Those same rules may soon force the utility to shutter another 25 plants. Bank of America’s decision last month to lay off 30,000 employees is a direct consequence of various Congressional edicts limiting how much the bank can charge merchants or how it can handle delinquent borrowers.
These visible crags of the Obama jobs iceberg are nothing next to the damage done below the waterline by the D.C. regulations factory, which last year added 81,405 pages of new rules to the Federal Register, bringing the total cost to the U.S. economy of regulatory compliance to an estimated $1.7 trillion a year.
Less easy to quantify, but no less harmful, are the long-term uncertainties employers face in trying to price in the costs of ObamaCare, Dodd-Frank, the potential expiration next year of the Bush tax cuts, the possible millionaire surcharge, the value of the dollar and so on. No wonder businesses are so reluctant to hire: When you don’t know how steep the trail ahead of you is, it’s usually better to travel light.
If you want to know who is really to blame for poverty, try looking at the Obama administration.
More than 40 years after feminists tossed their bras and high heels into a trash can at the 1968 Miss America pageant — kicking off the bra-burning myth that will never die — some young women are taking to the streets to protest sexual assault, wearing not much more than what their foremothers once dubbed “objects of female oppression” in marches called SlutWalks.
It’s a controversial name, which is in part why the organizers picked it. It’s also why many of the SlutWalk protesters are wearing so little (though some are sweatpants-clad, too). Thousands of women — and men — are demonstrating to fight the idea that what women wear, what they drink or how they behave can make them a target for rape. SlutWalks started with a local march organized by five women in Toronto and have gone viral, with events planned in more than 75 cities in countries from the United States and Canada to Sweden and South Africa. In just a few months, SlutWalks have become the most successful feminist action of the past 20 years.
In a feminist movement that is often fighting simply to hold ground, SlutWalks stand out as a reminder of feminism’s more grass-roots past and point to what the future could look like.
The marches are mostly organized by younger women who don’t apologize for their in-your-face tactics, making the events much more effective in garnering media attention and participant interest than the actions of well-established (and better funded) feminist organizations. And while not every feminist may agree with the messaging of SlutWalks, the protests have translated online enthusiasm into in-person action in a way that hasn’t been done before in feminism on this scale.
[…]Nineteen year-old Miranda Mammen, who participated in SlutWalk at Stanford University, says the idea of “sluttiness” resonates with younger women in part because they are more likely than their older counterparts to be called sluts. “It’s also loud, angry, sexy in a way that going to a community activist meeting often isn’t,” she says.
Emily May, the 30-year-old executive director of Hollaback, an organization that battles street harassment, plans to participate in SlutWalk in New York City in August. “Nonprofit mainstays like conferences, funding and strategic planning are essential to maintaining change — but they don’t ignite change,” she says. “It’s easy to forget that change starts with anger, and that history has always been made by badasses.”
Unlike protests put on by mainstream national women’s organizations, which are carefully planned and fundraised for — even the signs are bulk-printed ahead of time — SlutWalks have cropped up organically, in city after city, fueled by the raw emotional and political energy of young women. And that’s the real reason SlutWalks have struck me as the future of feminism. Not because an entire generation of women will organize under the word “slut” or because these marches will completely eradicate the damaging tendency of law enforcement and the media to blame sexual assault victims (though I think they’ll certainly put a dent in it). But the success of SlutWalks does herald a new day in feminist organizing. One when women’s anger begins online but takes to the street, when a local step makes global waves and when one feminist action can spark debate, controversy and activism that will have lasting effects on the movement.
I am not sure that slut walks are the right way for women to prepare themselves for marriage and children. It seems natural to me that women should aspire to life-long love and commitment – being protected and provided for by a man who is enchanted by them and values them as a helper and companion. To me, slut-walks are not a step on the way to lifelong love and parenting, because behaving selfishly and immodestly doesn’t attract marriage-minded men. Men don’t want wives who are irresponsible and immodest – they want wives who can assess risks, respect others and to take responsibility for their own decisions.
Dressing provocatively doesn’t excuse evil predatorial men if they take that as an offer to commit crimes. But dressing immodestly does say to a good marriage-minded man that he should avoid that woman as a candidate spouse. That’s why people dress professionally and conservatively at work, too – to set the tone for respectful interactions about things that matter, and to not distract the other person or lower the level of discussion. It’s a courtesy to others that helps them to focus on work-related things instead of being distracted by non-work-related things.
Women should also welcome men who say to them “that behavior is unwise and self-destructive”, because giving a woman constructive guidance in a gentle way is a form of caring – just like telling someone that not exercising may be bad for their health. Telling someone the truth about something dangerous that they should avoid is a way of caring for them. When I talk to fatherless women, they tell me that they did stupid things they regret because “no one cared what I did”. So if a man says “don’t do that, it’s wrong”, it is a way of showing that he does care. “Don’t drink alcohol when you’re driving, it’s wrong”.
If a woman wants to communicate to a man that she is worth marrying, then she should try to try to get him to focus on her personality and her intelligence – the things that last after getting old and wrinkly. Just like if she were going to a job interview and wanted to talk about her academic qualifications and her work experience. Women should say to a man “I am strong and dependable and caring” not “look at me! I’m fun and easy!”. Marriage-minded men want an intelligent and encouraging helper, not fun. Marriage isn’t about fun – it’s a lot of work. If either person says “It’s my body, I’ll do what I want” then that is a red flag that shows they are not ready for the conflict resolution and compromising that marriage requires. It would not be good, for example, if a husband just decided to stop working one day and said “it’s my body, I’ll do what I want”. Marriage isn’t like that – the whole point of it is to do what’s best for others.
I am a man who has very definite ideas about what I want from a woman. I have things that I need her to do if we were to get married. I need her to be able to raise children who know that God exists, and know what he is like. I need her to be able to steer them into fields that are important for the Christian life. I need her to be able to make them excel in those fields. I need her to be able to debate with them and make sure that they are able to withstand intellectual challenges and moral challenges that they will face. I need her to understand men, and male responsibilities, and to help me to flourish in my roles as protector, provider and moral/spiritual leader. And I need her to have an influence on the people in our church and the people we invite into our home. Are young women ready to handle the moral obligations that are central to relationships with men and children? Are young women ready to encourage men and children to be more virtuous? Are young women ready to accept men as the moral and spiritual leader in the home?
When I read these prominent feminists, and how much of an influence they have on young women, I do not think that feminism as it is expressed today is helping to develop the kind of woman who is equal to challenges of marriage and parenting. I have made excellent decisions in my life around my education and finances. I am chaste and have a well-developed defensible Christian worldview – a worldview that my wife could count on. I am offering life-long married love, and I’ve got the references and the accomplishments to prove that I can do what is expected of me. What I am asking in return is for women to be mindful of the moral and spiritual needs of men and children, and to prepare their character for life-long married love and parenting. Marriage and parenting requires self-sacrifice, restraint and discipline. Where is self-sacrifice, restraint and discipline in these slut-walks? Can a woman “do what she wants” in a marriage when there are men and children who are depending on her to meet their needs?
Disclaimer: Men who are convicted of rape should receive the death penalty, in my opinion. Nothing in this post should be taken as excusing men who rape.
This is why I am pro-life. I am not willing to act irresponsibly and selfishly, then kill another human being to escape the consequences of my own selfish choices. I prefer not to engage in recreational premarital sex, because I don’t want to be a party to a murder.
Isn’t it funny how people now think that chastity is weird, but murder is not weird? It used to be that society recognized chastity as a virtue, because we knew that abortions were immoral and expensive, and that premarital promiscuity made people less suitable for marriage. But now chastity has become immoral, and being marriage-minded is frowned upon.
I am beginning to see that children are basically not being planned for at all by adults. In socialist countries, feminists spend their 20s and early 30s partying, then at 40 they get taxpayer-funded IVF, conceive a baby, throw her into taxpayer-funded day care, collect taxpayer-funded single mother benefits, and then put the child into taxpayer-funded government-schools. Who pays for all of this? The high-earning, marriage-minded, morally judgmental, spiritually discerning men. Those “no fun” men are passed over by the feminists, because the government performs all the traditional male duties now – with their money. There is no need to choose men who can handle a wife and children. That’s the government’s job, now.
It needs to be pointed out that their attitude towards sex as a sterile, recreational activity unconnected with any biological consequences combined with their view of children as parasites are not unique. These are the predominant views of our society, pushed in all facets from politics to education to entertainment.
The future looks very bleak for any children produced and raised in the homes the people above will provide (when they choose to provide it, of course). One protester even had a sign “would you trust me with a child?”
What the above video shows is how it is socially acceptable, indeed fashionable, to spurn our biological design in pursuit of unbridled hedonism.
For me the worst protester was the one who calmly explained that she would not allow a baby to derail her education and career. She is willing to have recreational sex, and she is resolved to murder an innocent child who would cost her money. When I look at young single feminists today, that’s what I see. And 77% of young unmarried women vote for abortion. Sex is fun, but babies aren’t fun. They talk about “corporate greed”, but they are the greediest ones of all. Corporations don’t murder you to get your money, they just sell you stuff you want to buy. It’s the feminists who murder you for money.
It’s a mess. And those kids who are born from these self-centered, promiscuous, unstable adults are starting out with a 14 trillion dollar deficit on their heads, that is growing by 1.65 trillion this year. No one cares about children any more. They don’t care what children need, and they don’t make sacrifices to provide for them.
WINTERY KNIGHT 