Retreat of the Religous Right?

Following a lead from Liberal Values, I read an article in the Washington Post written by Kathleen Parker entitled “Is a New Generation of Christians Finished with Politics?” Partly because I hope the answer is a resounding ‘YES!’ I am interested in what Parker describes as a “generational shift” in the Christian Right’s attitude towards political activism to advance ‘Christian values.’

According to Parker, younger Christian fundamentalists believe their elders have compromised those values for a place in the political limelight – specifically within the Republican Party. These younger folks, and some older ones such as Cal Thomas, argue that “the heart of Christianity is in the home, not the halls of Congress or even the courts. And the route to a more moral America is through good works — service, prayer and education — not political lobbying.”

Indeed, Parker notes that James Dobson, former head of Focus on the Family, recently acknowledged that the cultural battles near and dear to the hearts of his followers have been lost. Thus, the compromise of principles has been for naught, in the eyes of many. She quotes Thomas as saying, “If people who call themselves Christians want to see any influence in the culture, then they ought to start following the commands of Jesus[,] and people will be so amazed that they will be attracted to Him. The problem isn’t political. The problem is moral and spiritual.”

I want to be honest, here: I am glad to hear this news largely because I am tired of the culture wars and particularly of the Christian Right’s prominent place in U.S. politics in recent years. While having a conversation with students after a class this past week, I realized that they cannot remember a time when politics, especially at the national level, was not permeated with religious language and religious ‘issues.’ The possibility of someone’s running for the Presidency and not flaunting his/her religious bona fides is utterly foreign to my students. That Americans have not always been politically preoccupied with school prayer, creationism, abortion, and same-sex marriage fascinates them. I, myself, can hardly remember what we used to discuss and dispute. Guns and butter, I guess.

Yes, I would like to get this stuff off the main page of our public life. And I would be very happy if our state and national coffers were no longer tapped to adjudicate the newest effort to undermine science education or to slip prayer-by-another-name into every school and public event. I would be thrilled to never again see Republican politicians and elected officials cravenly pander to the Christian Right; we might have a two-party system which offers us a choice worthy of serious reflection. Holy cow, we might hear no more of the Palin Family Circus!

But, I have other reasons for hoping this reported retreat from politics by the Religious Right is accurate.

One is based on a certain –brace yourselves – respect for religious faith. I’m a complete non-theist and not even vaguely ‘spiritual;’ nonetheless, I recognize that faith plays a profound role in the lives of many people. Further, for all the historical horrors we can trace to religious fervor, faith has also played a moderating role – even a civilizing one. Our increasingly secular world [parts of it] is an historical anomaly, and we have yet to see how it will all work out. My own guess is that it will be an improvement, but I still appreciate the place of faith in individual lives.

Thus, I have been sorry to see people of faith in this country falling over backwards to de-exceptionalize religiosity. I do not mean [here] what I regard as the vulgar tendency towards bumper-sticker religion. Rather, I have in mind the desperate efforts to substitute ‘moments of silence’ for prayer, to have religious monuments approved for public display on the grounds that they are merely historical artifacts or pretty decorations, and in general to deny that religious views are different in kind from non-religious comprehensive views. For whatever’s-sake, if you want to pray, then pray and be happy to do it where it is appropriate. If you want to keep the deep meaning of your monuments, let them be removed from public parks and playgrounds. And if you live in this country and feel you are excluded from public discourse because of your faith, do not argue for entry by claiming that evolutionary theory and atheism are just other religions.

My other reason for hoping that religion will gracefully back away from the public stage is personal, but equally grounded in respect for perspectives other than my own. I am afraid that I am becoming what I have previously derided as militantly atheistic, even anti-religionist. I’m going to be blunt: the ugliness, intolerance, and prejudice that have been prominently displayed by many on the Christian Right in recent years is turning me into an intolerant and prejudiced person; ugliness may yet be lurking in the depths of my psyche. I do not want to become such a person.

That I find myself resenting those whose discourse and political influence ‘make’ me feel intolerant is not helping. It has been a cumulative effect, and I have only recently become aware of it. No doubt, the rise of militant Islam is a factor, as I watch the world become infected with the same kind of religious antipathies that characterized – and haunted - Europe for centuries. But it is what has been happening here, in my country, that has most affected me.

So, please, young Christian fundamentalists, keep your faith and let us share our nation – if not for the sake of my soul, then for your own.

Photograph from The Reading Eagle

Still Angry, After All These Years

This probably falls into the 'I'll be sorry for this' category, but what the heck.

COURT REQUIRES FDA TO REVISIT ‘PLAN B’

Tummino v. Torti, (ED NY, March 29, 2009). A NY Federal District court ruled that the FDA must revisit its current ruling on the ‘morning after pill,’ Plan B. Under well-evidenced political pressure from the Bush administration, the FDA dillied and dallied between 2001 and 2006, when it [finally] ruled that Plan B – first approved in 1998 – would be available over the counter only to women 18 years of age and older, with proof of age for the pharmacist. Moreover, the OTC drug had to be kept behind the pharmacy counter. Any woman under the age of 18 needed a doctor’s prescription, which effectively made the ‘morning after’ use of the drug unavailable to the vast majority of women less than 18 years of age.

The remarkable history of Plan B’s wanderings through the Bush FDA is recounted at the

Center for Reproductive Rights website. The CRP was among the petitioners seeking to force the FDA to, first, arrive at a ruling and, secondly, to change its politically determined ruling, once made. Among the highlights of this strange history, as revealed in depositions and testimony noted by the CRP, are these:

“Late Dec. 2003/Jan. 2004: After a panel of FDA experts recommends approval of the Plan B application, Dr. Steven Galson, the head of the office responsible for making the final decision, informs his staff that regular procedures won’t be followed this time, and that they won’t make the final decision. (Jenkins deposition)”
“Dec-Jan 17, 2004: Galson confesses to a co-worker that he has to reject the Plan B application because he’s afraid he’ll lose his job. (Jenkins deposition) Dr. Janet Woodcock, the second in command at the FDA(??), tells a colleague that the agency has to reject the application, then approve the drug later with an age restriction in order to ‘appease the administration's constituents.’ (Houn deposition)”

The full decision is more than worth reading, both for its detailed analysis of the intrusion of political and religion-based intrusions into the drug approval process and for the clarity of Judge Korman’s opinion.

Some highlights of the opinion:

“Plan B is an emergency contraceptive that can be used to reduce the risk of unwanted pregnancy after sexual intercourse. When used as directed, it can reduce the risk of pregnancy by up to 89 percent. Plan B acts mainly by stopping the release of an egg from an ovary. It may also prevent sperm from fertilizing an egg that has been released or, if fertilization has already occurred, block implantation of the resulting embryo in the uterus. Plan B does not have any known serious or long-term side effects, though it may have some mild and short-term side effects, such as nausea or abdominal pain, in some users.” (emphasis added)

Compare this with comments from the Christian News Wire:

“Ignoring patient safety and the damage high dose steroids have on developing female bodies, Korman petulantly insisted the FDA revisit the controversial previous ruling on the abortion drug. Hundreds of women have had serious side effects from Plan B as it has killed millions of preborn babies.”

Sure, because, as we all know, Federal judges are frequently ‘petulant’ in their decisions and far-right Christian news sources are the authority on women’s health matters – more authoritative than the FDA’s medical scientists who recommended that Plan B be more widely available:

“The FDA rejected that application too despite nearly uniform agreement among FDA scientific review staff that women of all ages could use Plan B without a prescription safely and effectively.” (from Tummino v. Torti ; emphasis added)

Admittedly, Judge Korman does seem to have been angered by the Bushies’ shenanigans in interfering with the FDA process (all emphases added):

“…the gravamen of plaintiffs’ claims is that the FDA’s decisions regarding Plan B – on the Citizen Petition and the SNDAs – were arbitrary and capricious because they were not the result of reasoned and good faith agency decision-making. Plaintiffs are right. The FDA repeatedly and unreasonably delayed issuing a decision on Plan B for suspect reasons and, on two occasions, only took action on Plan B to facilitate confirmation of Acting FDA Commissioners, whose confirmation hearings had been held up due to these repeated delays.”

“These political considerations, delays, and implausible justifications for decision-making are not the only evidence of a lack of good faith and reasoned agency decision-making. Indeed, the record is clear that the FDA’s course of conduct regarding Plan B departed in significant ways from the agency’s normal procedures.”

“FDA upper management, including the Commissioner, wrested control over the decision-making on Plan B from staff that normally would issue the final decision on an over-the-counter switch application; the FDA’s denial of non-prescription access without age restriction went against the recommendation of a committee of experts it had empanelled to advise it on Plan B; and the Commissioner – at the behest of political actors – decided to deny non-prescription access to women 16 and younger before FDA scientific review staff had completed their reviews.”

Now, there is much that could be said here, from this being yet another instance of the Bush administration’s obsession with courting the religious right to its indifference to science to its eagerness to corrupt any process for political purposes. But, what intrigues me is the persistence with which self-proclaimed ‘pro-life’ advocates claim to be concerned with the health of women. You know, the already-born and old enough to be indisputably full persons kind. ( Remember when good old C. Everett Koop infuriated the same group of folks by announcing that – despite his expectations to the contrary – there was no evidence that having abortions seriously harmed the psychological well-being of most women who had gone through the experience? )

I don’t buy it. Never have, never will. In the case of Plan B, the façade is especially thin. There is no evidence that there are any serious side effects for any notable number of women who use the medication to prevent pregnancy. Put another way, Plan B is as ‘harmful’ to most women as, maybe, aspirin is to most people. (Just the facts, Ma’am.) And, if we were to think about the ‘side-effects’ of pregnancy – particularly unwanted pregnancy – the possible ill effects of Plan B pale by comparison.

Opponents of Plan B and other contraceptives are not genuinely concerned with the health of women or girls. This is a dodge to cover the on-going effort to impose on the rest of us the rather odd notion that fertilized eggs are '[pre-born] babies' . Since the imposition has not succeeded epistemically, those who adhere to this notion of personhood try to achieve their conception [pun intended] by coercing others in practice.

The falseness of this dodge is offensive enough to those of us into that whole reality-based thing. The hypocrisy is worse. I recognize that ‘hypocrisy’ is now a much devalued accusation. But think about it: these are the same people who claim that anyone who has an abortion or uses an abortifacient is a murderer, that women/girls who become pregnant outside of marriage are sinners [‘sluts,’ in the vernacular], and that pregnant women/girls should be forced to carry every pregnancy to term – their mental and physical health be damned.

So, thanks for the crocodile tears, but I would prefer if these people kept their private religious views, their peculiar biological notions, and their choices for themselves out of our government, our law, and other people’s lives.

Yup, still angry after all these years.