Posted on 01/13/2009 6:28:35 AM PST by Graybeard58
To the cheers of social scientists, Britain has been named the most promiscuous major industrial nation based on the "international sociosexuality index," which measures attitudes toward one-night stands, casual sex and numbers of partners. (The United States finished sixth.)
Researchers say Britain's ranking is empowering for women because it means they now are as able as men to engage in no-strings sex. "Historically we have repressed women's short-term mating and there are all sorts of double standards out there where men's short-term mating was sort of acceptable but women's wasn't," said lead researcher David Schmitt, a psychology professor at Bradley University in Illinois. They attributed Britain's ranking to the decline of religious scruples, the highly sexualized culture and other factors. All good things, apparently.
Missing from the study and the fawning news coverage were the collateral-damage data:
The Health Protection Agency says sexually transmitted diseases in Britain have never been higher. STDs in 2006, the last year full data were available, were up 6 percent over 2005; of the 380,000 new cases, 200,000 occurred among 16- to 24-year-olds.
Britain is fast becoming the abortion capital of the world. Government statistics show abortions in 2007 increased by 2.5 percent; the number performed on girls under 16 jumped 10 percent. Its abortion rate is No. 1 in Europe and No. 3 in the world, behind only the United States and Australia, where rates have been falling steadily for years.
The teen-pregnancy rate is soaring and is the second highest in the world behind the United States, a UNICEF study found. The spike is occurring even though the government has spent more than $100 million in the last three years to cut the rate in half by 2010.
The most recent report on social trends by the Office for National Statistics found a record 1 in 4 children in Britain live in households headed by a single parents — overwhelmingly single mothers. That's three times the proportion of 1972, while the rate of two-parent families has fallen from 52 percent to 37 percent, a new low. The Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development says Britain's welfare system is second only to Ireland's in making it more lucrative for single mothers to stay on the government dole. And predictably, single mothers and their children continue to suffer from some of the worst social and cultural pathologies.
How exactly is any of this empowering for women?
I would counter that a moral compass that can be shattered in the affairs of men (wars, etc.) is not a true thing and has a weak basis.
In the end, all morality must become personal. Human nature is a constant and something we often forget in our search for answers. Religion or the State alone cannot lead men to morality, but there must be something of the positive inherent in any philosophy to sustain it as such.
In a sense, true morality seeks perfection, and yet once again we must accept that human nature will seek the lowest, most comfortable level. That said, we all know the difference between right and wrong, and that understanding did not arrive with human thought.
It is a human failing that the strenght and leadership that are required to set things right often is the first victim of upheaval. Morality, or the moral compass if you will, is one of the easier things in any civilization to abandon, it's the easiest thing to rebel against. For this we have paid the price and will continue to pay.
What we see in our world today, and especially in civilized Europe is a pendulum swing. What will it take to start the swing to the other direction? History teaches us that lesson. Watch for it, expect it to happen. This century is young, but looking at the last one, what is past is prologue.
This is my opinion, take it for what it is worth.
Regards,
AR
I believe that sex has biochemical not to mention spiritual consequences beyond the obvious pro-creative and epidemiological aspects that we are only beginning to understand. I believe that the pill and other hormonal interventions, for instance, are in many cases destructive of the female sex drive.
1 Corinthians 6:18
Flee fornication. Every sin that a man doeth is without the body; but he that committeth fornication sinneth against his own body.
I repeat - disgusted. Find a dictionary if you need one.
I’ll be danged. That COULD be Jane Leeves. Her IMDB.com filmography says she started as one of “Hill’s Angels” in the early to mid-eighties.
You might be thinking that engaging in *extremely* personal activities with just any skank with a pulse is a pretty gross concept. My husband and I were discussing this concept just recently, and we agree.
Btw, how’s the recruit doing, bless his heart?
Recruit may now be addressed as Marine! He received the title on Saturday upon completion of The Crucible. We’re off to P.I. tomorrow for Thursday Family Day then the Graduation on Friday!
Wonderful! Congratulations to the Marine and his parents!
I guess you won’t pass through the Charlotte area; too bad. It’s supposed to reasonably pleasant in these parts over the weekend, though, although very cold in the mountains where my boys will be camping.
Agreed, but it has never been an absolute preventive measure for desire and the cheating to act on that desire. If it were not for adultery, country music would pretty much just be about crop failure.
I was just thinking about the lyrics to the Leonard Cohen song Hallelujah, which was written some 20+ years ago but in the news recently because it was both the #1 and the #2 song in Britain, simulaneously, in different releases. Oh, looks like there's thousands of versions of it on YouTube, so I think I'm justified in saying it --- well, struck a chord.
My thought is that it's a good song, actually, and speaks about the profound human contact --- contact --- and transcendance that can be the inner experience of intercourse. It evokes love, loyalty, wonder, gratitude; it's a privileged metaphor for the touch and embrace of Divine love, a metaphor found in the Scriptures of many civilization-generating faiths, as well, of course, as in Leonard Cohen.
The sense is, that this is what it is supposed to be; this is what ennobles persons, what is solidly deep-down right---
and what falls short of this is, in Cohen's words, "cold," "broken," "it all went wrong," -- sad and disappointing.
That's what we sense where our intellect and our affect and what-we've-always-been-longing-for come together. A fucking shame, you might say.
Others have written well about the depressing spectacle of disease and dead babies and all that as a result of truncated sex, junk sex--- yes, it's true --- but there's also the cancer of loneliness and the callousing of souls.
In the light of which, the decline of your civilization seems an afterthought, something you hardly notice.
Thanks, I’m sure Don-o find some way of posting pictures of him, handsome, in his Dress Blues.
Theodore Dalrymple has written extensively on the underclass in Britain. See the list of his books:
http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/search-handle-url/ref=ntt_athr_dp_sr_1?%5Fencoding=UTF8&search-type=ss&index=books&field-author=Theodore%20Dalrymple
While I agree with your post, I wonder if it’s not too late for us. And if it isn’t too late, what event or events could God use that would bring us back into the fold or would it be easier for Him to simply wipe the slate clean and start over? Are we worth it?
Perhaps it is not the compass that failed, but the failure of the user to follow the compass.
Trains, trucks, gettin’ drunk. And for bluegrass topics, there’s the Civil War.
I’ll look forward to seeing pictures of the stalwart young man in uniform. (And will recommend them to Anoreth, nice Catholic girl ;-). Der Prinz wore his Mess Dress when we were married, and looked just like a young Heinrich Himmler.
The young women who have the kids then drop them on Grandma for babysitting.
Malachi 2
13 And this have ye done again, covering the altar of the LORD with tears, with weeping, and with crying out, insomuch that he regardeth not the offering any more, or receiveth it with good will at your hand.
14 Yet ye say, Wherefore? Because the LORD hath been witness between thee and the wife of thy youth, against whom thou hast dealt treacherously: yet is she thy companion, and the wife of thy covenant.
15 And did not he make one? Yet had he the residue of the spirit. And wherefore one? That he might seek a godly seed. Therefore take heed to your spirit, and let none deal treacherously against the wife of his youth.
Certainly not, but his love for us is not based on our merit but is established in it's own merit and hence it is irrevocable and imperishable and brings glory to Himself either in harmony with our actions or in spite of our actions.
Great Scripture! I had never red Malachi in the light of Leonard Cohen before.
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