When my daughter, Delusional Precious, was a teenager, barely of high school age, she climbed out of her bedroom window in the middle of night. Repeatedly. Only she and God know how many times this occurred. She was off to meet winsome Video Store Guy (herein known as VSG), a cute, popular 21-year-old punk rocker and precocious son of a shrink, with a PUNK ROCK ACADEMY ("where all of the students are diagnosed with ADD") bumper sticker on his car. This went on awhile before I caught on, since they also carried on a semi-respectable, knock-on-the-door (Hi Mr and Mrs Daisy! Hi kitties!), leave-for-the-movie dating relationship, which was pretty smart of them. Anima and animus, I figure.As the bikers say, I was born at night, but I wasn't born last night, and I emotionally (ha!) interrogated Delusional Precious at length after discovering her absence. If I'd known about water-boarding then, I might have given it a try. I asked her point blank, and she answered, also point-blank. (Ah, the honesty of Aries!)
And so, I made a Ob/Gyn appointment the next day. I may even have attempted to make the appointment at 4 in the morning, right after our conversation, or something unreasonable like that.
Backstory: At this time in my life, I really was trying to be a good Catholic, or as good as I could muster (which okay, probably wasn't so good). But at no time, did I think my religious choices applied to the fertility of Delusional Precious, and certainly, I knew it didn't have any bearing on VSG (also from a Good Catholic Family, or at least as good as a Catholic Shrink family could be). Images of squalling infants dancing in my head, I trotted DP off to the doctor to have her cervix probed and examined, and the coveted Rx for you-know-what, duly given. Whew!
Now, we can breathe, and the extended torture session can begin! (Insert Vincent Price cackle here) Of course, I would never torture a pregnant teenager. I was a good Catholic, after all!
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I am puzzled by commentary like this, in which adults hyperventilate over the kids using birth control. Do they want children to get knocked up? Because, you know, those are the choices, people. DEAL.Kids cannot be controlled 24 hours a day, 7 days a week. It is simply NOT POSSIBLE.
And who is getting the attention here? Girls. Girls get pregnant, girls take the risk, and girls have babies. Girls will be uneducated single mothers. Girls will be broke. Girls will be on AFDC. Girls, not boys. Therefore, this is all about GIRLS, and PENALIZING GIRLS FOR HAVING SEX. NOT BOYS. (Are we really having this conversation in 2007?)
I understand the desire to penalize one's daughter for having sex... but is it the SEX, really, or is it the disobedience that this symbolizes? I can honestly tell you, the risk upset me far more than the sex itself; the idea of DP having a baby with VSG sent me into a panic far beyond the panic I felt when I discovered her absence and thought she had been abducted by aliens (which would have explained plenty!). Having a baby with VSG: NOT AN OPTION. I didn't even consider this worth discussion. I (rather loudly) INFORMED HER that she would be taking the Pill, as of last month!!!! She shrugged and rolled her eyes, in the taciturn and defiant language of teenagers all over the world, but she DID take the pills when they were given to her. She did NOT have a baby with VSG, which proves that novenas and pharmaceuticals, taken together, are far more powerful than either by themselves.
Why would anyone deny this to their child? The logic escapes me. Do they WANT babies having babies in high school?
Bill O'Reilly, weirdly obsessed with sexuality of all kinds, has made major political hay by attacking the school board in Portland, Maine, for doing the Lord's Work, and making sure girls can finish school and have real lives without being weighed down by children:
The school board in Portland voted 7-2 to make that happen. The rationale is that some kids will have sex and the school must try to reduce pregnancies. Also, parents must sign a waiver allowing their children to receive medical care at the school.Dear Bill: fuck you.
However, that medical care is kept secret from the parents, in the birth control area.
Now giving sixth grade girls the pill is dumb. It doesn't protect them from disease and tacitly says that sex at that young age is understandable.
This is foolish, ridiculous, and irresponsible. But in the secular progressive world. The SP doctrine is to quote, "empower children" and downgrade parental authority because some parents are bad.
Okay, let's say that I am a bad parent. Should my daughter suffer for that? Should a NEW PERSON be brought into the world, simply because I am?
And this new person who is born, will they be supported by---who? You? Rudy Giuliani or Mitt Romney? Pro-life Republicans? Ha! I hardly think so. No, a child born to my minor child would obviously be financially supported by ME. Where do you get off telling ME what to do? Because it takes a village, yada yada. You are telling all of us what to do; the school board, the teachers, the parents--by implication. You are saying: suck it up and get ready for grandchildren.
Who do you think you are?
If I write any more about this topic, I will degenerate into more "fuck you's" and that leads nowhere. Suffice to say, Bill O'Reilly (herein known as BO) pisses me the fuck off! He has millions of dollars to support plenty of grandchildren! LET THEM EAT CAKE, huh BO? Can the new grandparents in Maine drop the babies off at your door? I'm sure you have enough money to start several Sisters-of-Mercy style orphanages, all by yourself...so how about it? You are critical of abortion (although you notably and significantly hedge about whether abortion should be illegal), so what exactly are you counseling parents to do? Put leashes on the kids? Put them in maximum security lockdown?
How about you put your money where your arrogant mouth is?
How many babies are you promising to support, as the result of your self-righteous, ignorant meddling?
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Listening to: The View - Superstar Tradesman
via FoxyTunes