it’s fucking insane that a moderator had to say “there is no state where you can kill a baby after it’s born” at a presidential debate.

Should be fucking obvious---after birth, there's no pregnancy to abort.

But one half of the argument keeps insisting on the pretense that the goal is killing babies rather than ending unwanted/dangerous pregnancies, so here we are, occupying a world where that allegation makes sense to some people.

Also, while late-term abortions can happen (as in: the pregnancy is aborted at 8-9 months along) it's not happening for reasons of "just decided they didn't want to have a baby after all". It happens for reasons like "the fetus is dead or dying or has a 0% chance to survive birth and letting the pregnancy continue at this point would just cause more physical and/or mental trauma to the person carrying it". If the fetus is viable outside the womb and pregnancy needs to be ended for medical reasons, what they do is induce labor early because at that point induced labor is not significantly harder on the pregnant person's body than an abortion procedure would be, and damn near everyone who's carried a pregnancy nearly to full term has done so because they WANT to have a child.

Banning these abortions results in no more living babies but plenty more women dying of sepsis because they weren't allowed to have a dead and rotting fetus removed from their wombs, plenty more traumatized families who lost a wife and mother or had to go through an ordeal of thinking she would die as they begged a judge to allow an exemption so that the doctors can legally save her life.

Conservatism is a misogynistic death cult, and "pro-life" is nothing but gaslighting.

I told @mistresskabooms over and over again that she could come to me about anything, and I’d still love her tomorrow.

So… she did.

She asked me about what the words “wage gap” meant when she heard them on the news. She told me when her friends in elementary school were “pretending to be mean to their imaginary girlfriends,” and she asked me if she’d done the right thing by leaving “and taking their girlfriends with me.” She told me when the kids on the bus started calling her a faggot. She talked to me when she read Night in school.

And she told me she’s a girl.

If kids don’t feel safe coming to you about everything, they won’t come to you about anything. Not anything that matters, anyway, because they won’t be sure that the thing they’re coming to you about won’t get them into trouble.

But, of course, that’s exactly the point here. These things - we know this, right? - aren’t about “keeping kids safe.” They’re about control, and they’re about keeping kids ignorant and - most of all - afraid.

If you are afraid of being contaminated mentally, of being accidentally ruined, of seeing something Bad and becoming Bad yourself, you become easier to control. If you understand that reading about something doesn’t mean you agree with it, and that words and ideas may be scary but that simply knowing that an idea exists, or reading about a thing, does not make you that thing, you become much harder to control. You become harder to control because you become more able to test the things you think that you know against new ideas, things like “are gay people Bad, actually?” and “what if a pregnant person could have more legal rights than a corpse?” and “what did the water and sky look like before the EPA?” or “wouldn’t ranked choice voting be neat?”

Just for starters.

The idea of “mental contamination” is big in Evangelical circles, but that ain’t the only place, not by far. If you’re thinking, “Man, that idea sounds like a concept that shows up a lot in leftist spaces and on Tumblr,” you are correct.

This concept is a concept of control. It does not exist to make you stronger. It exists to make you afraid and to keep you from questioning yourself and the world around you. This lack of questioning becomes like wearing a cast around your leg forever. Technically, yes, it keeps your ankle safe, but in the process, the lack of exercise withers your calf muscle.

This leaves you with a worldview that cannot stand up to any kind of meaningful stress or challenge. Things are right because they’re right, not because you can defend why they’re right. These kind of default beliefs are fragile, soft, and easily shattered or shredded.

This shit doesn’t protect kids. It makes them fragile and weak, unable to formulate worldviews they understand well enough to defend and worldviews strong enough to hold up to the rigors and stresses of life.

Jews aren’t involved in a widespread conspiracy to control American society, but you know who is?

Rich white evangelical christians.

Some books about the subject:

The Family by Jeff Sharlet

Dark Money by Jane Mayer

American Crusade by Andrew L. Seidel

Takeover by Noah Feldman

Also look up Seven Mountains Ideology, the idea that the Church should control the “seven mountains” of society, those being:

What’s weird is that anyone who grew up in an evangelical household knows this isn’t even a secret. It’s very loudly and openly the agenda.

I didn’t say it was a secret conspiracy. There’s no need for secrecy when nobody (so far) is trying to stop you or hold you accountable.

More books on the subject:

Jesus and John Wayne by Kristin Kobes Du Mez

The Power Worshippers by Katherine Stewart

Taking America Back For God by Andrew L. Whitehead and Samuel L. Perry

The Founding Myth, Seidel’s first book, is specifically about how Christian Nationalists lie about American history and founding principles to justify their religious takeover.

I also recommend the Youtube channel Belief It Or Not for videos and podcasts about evangelical christianity and christian nationalism.

Right Wing Watch is a watchdog and news group that actively keeps tabs on the far-right’s efforts at social control, including the Evangelicals; they’re worth following as a source for timely news on the subject.

Shadow Network by Anne Nelson is another good book on this topic

The number one cause of death in pregnant women is murder. Think About That.

...oh.

about project 2025

to all americans: project 2025 is a plan created by an association of republicans for what they will do if they win office in the next presidential election. within 180 days of victory, they plan to turn the country around. they've written a book called mandate for leadership: the conservative promise detailing their plan. it is 900+ pages long. you can download a pdf online (i tried putting the link here but it won't work. just look up mandate for leadership pdf)

what they want: their republican president to do a deep clean of the government and, in essence, turn it into a conservative stronghold. they want to flood the government with republicans. (source) (source) what they will do with this power includes:

why this matters: a couple months ago, i would've thought they could never pull it off. but now, anti-lgbtq+ legislation has only been growing. and if you think you're safe in a blue state,

you're not

Basically the plan is they're going to outlaw pornography, name anyone who is involved in creating it a criminal, make educators and librarians registered sex offenders for "distributing it", and ban ISP that might be involved in "trading it around". They've explicitly labeled all transgender content as pornography and implicitly labeled all queer content as "sexualizing children". While the stated aim to outlaw all pornography will certainly fail, the sneakier aim is to legally label any queer content as pornography and therefore unfit for public life.

Remember to vote for your judges, because they will the be ones blocking this nonsense. Even if Trump doesn't get elected, this is the stated aim of the Republican party and any Republican that gets elected will be trying to follow it.

This is the Republican playbook for the next 50 years, if not longer. They cannot be allowed to take all three branches of the federal government again. Ever.

What she says: I’m fine

What she means: Why isn’t it taught that abortion was perfectly legal in the US in early 1870s and it wasn’t until a Jewish doctor, who was being framed, was put on trial for manslaughter (a trial, as well as the press covering it, which was greatly tinged with antisemitism) that opened the floodgates for antiabortion crusaders which eventually led to its criminalization?

I did not know this!

Me neither, until I read this book.

Look at the notes for the name of the book if anyone else is interested.

The book is called Bad Rabbi: And Other Strange but True Stories from the Yiddish Press. By Eddy Portnoy

Other recommended books in the notes that talk about this are:

The Moral Property of Sex by Linda Gordon

Rereading Sex by Helen Horowitz

Killing For Life: The Apocalyptic Narrative of Pro-Life Politics by Carol Mason goes into some detail on this.

The more militant elements of the anti-choice movement have their roots in white nationalism. It’s white babies they wanted to save. It was Jewish doctors they blamed. The Holocaust baiting was basically a dogwhistle for white genocide.

It’s literally blood libel.

I’m sorry, if you are an anti-choicer and you call a fetus a “pre-born child” I am just straight up going to laugh at you

I myself am a “pre death corpse” which is why I should not have to pay any bills you see

"there are minors on this website and you're posting these inappropriate drawings" this sounds familiar where have I heard this kind of moral panic before, and why is it always queer artists getting singled out,,,,,,,

Telling this to parents next "there are CHILDREN in your house and you still have sex in it that's so irresponsible and disgusting"

"you mean you get naked every day and spray yourself with warm water and slather yourself with foamy slime??? Is this some kind of a fetish, you do know that children can hear you through that door right, so disgusting, I only care about the safety of CHILDREN".

This is how you sound when you say this type of shit, you sensationalize queer sexuality and make it sound like a disgusting thing to be feared, you are a transphobic piece of shit.

Last example reminded me of that one comics that english part of internet would really benefit from tbh

Translation:

"what are you doing, you damned soul! In front of children no less!"

"why did you bring children in my shower?"

LOL

i think a weird. . . not counterpoint, but parallel argument for normalizing bodies is that finland post

My hand slipped

yall take a look at the twitter handle, this is q anon bullshit. it’s referring to The Storm, an event that supposedly will determine the fate of the world by beginning a war between good (MAGA/Trump/Christianity) and evil (made up leftist pedophile cabal).

they believed Jan 6 was supposed to kick things off, but it didn’t. its funny that they’re trying to find the trigger in a million little things, but it’s also really sad there’s still people that live like this in 2024…

Antisemitism Required Reading

I get a lot of ignorant comments & tags on my posts about antisemitism, and I’ve already spent way too much time & energy engaging with them. So to preserve my sanity, I’ve made the decision not to engage too deeply with any commenters who haven’t at least read all of these in their entirety:

If you’re not Jewish, please read all of this literature before adding anything to my posts about antisemitism.

Jews, please add any books you think should be on the list!

List updated!

Jews aren't involved in a widespread conspiracy to control American society, but you know who is?

Rich white evangelical christians.

Some books about the subject:

The Family by Jeff Sharlet

Dark Money by Jane Mayer

American Crusade by Andrew L. Seidel

Takeover by Noah Feldman

Also look up Seven Mountains Ideology, the idea that the Church should control the "seven mountains" of society, those being:

What’s weird is that anyone who grew up in an evangelical household knows this isn’t even a secret. It’s very loudly and openly the agenda.

I didn't say it was a secret conspiracy. There's no need for secrecy when nobody (so far) is trying to stop you or hold you accountable.

More books on the subject:

Jesus and John Wayne by Kristin Kobes Du Mez

The Power Worshippers by Katherine Stewart

Taking America Back For God by Andrew L. Whitehead and Samuel L. Perry

The Founding Myth, Seidel's first book, is specifically about how Christian Nationalists lie about American history and founding principles to justify their religious takeover.

I also recommend the Youtube channel Belief It Or Not for videos and podcasts about evangelical christianity and christian nationalism.