Those who have fallen by the wayside...

My High School Fellow's sheer Moronity... 

If that's even a word. 

(if not, it should be)

Recently, a teacher from my high school that I keep in contact with posted something on facebook about why people were or were not voting for Trump in the upcoming election, and for people to please not drag Hillary into the discussion. There were some simple responses of I will not vote for him, and some I will vote for him's. There were of course the quintessential posts about "he'll make america great again" and all that claptrap. And then there was a post by someone stating that she was definitely not going to vote for Trump because...

Person #1: "He is a greedy racist narcissistic ignorant asshole who cares about no one but himself. He doesn't give a shit about our country, he just wants the attention and is pandering to fear"

Pretty solid stuff right? Nothing we haven't all heard before as a viable reason not to vote for Trump in the 2016 election. Nothing too unreasonable here. I continued this sensible discourse with a comment of my own, showing my support and appreciation for her beliefs with...

Me: "Agree with everything you said! He's got a media deal going for when he loses... He's so good at drawing attention it's the perfect business for him to go into next." 

Also a pretty solid reply. Not too "nasty" or anything. Just the belief that he has found his true calling and that is "media whore", but said much nicer than that. Unfortunately, as is common on Facebook, someone replied to my simple comment with an inflammatory statement.

Person #2: "What would you say Hillary is best at? Protecting our troops? Ha! Not a chance"

I was somewhat taken aback at this, as we had been talking about Trump's true gift as media central, nothing to do with the military, his position on protecting troops abroad, foreign policy, or anything relating to those. We were simply commenting on him ability to grab attention and draw people in. As I am not the greatest lover of the military in the US or the purposes to which it is used, I found myself unable to not answer such an off-the-wall inflammatory comment. Just too good an opportunity to pass up.

Me: "(teacher's name) did kindly ask people not to bring Hillary into this as it is a discussion about Trump's shortcomings, not "who is worse at ____"... But to answer your question even though it probably wasn't directed at me... Well, as I really don't think american troops should be occupying other countries because the US government destabilized those regions in the first place, no I really don't give a shit about that. And I would say Hillary is less likely to start a nuclear war, so in that scenario she is the better option for not only protecting troops, but everyone in the damn world."

In retrospect, I can see how my statement, when read by an individual who's brain runs on a very different wavelength than my own, might be construed differently than the intended meaning. When typing my response, I was thinking how I have never heard Trump say a single thing about protecting any Troops, just about how he thinks it's okay to blow up the family members of terrorists, and how waterboarding is totally fine if it gets results, and even if it doesn't, they probably deserved it. (For those not aware, the killing of innocent family members and waterboarding are considered hate crimes and torture). I was also thinking about how the last republican president sent our troops into dangerous situations in order to cause chaos and gain control over crude oil natural resources for the US to make a profit off of. So, when I was saying that american troops shouldn't be occupying other countries I was thinking that it is immoral to invade another sovereign nation for the express purpose of stealing something that belongs to them to then make a profit ourselves. A side effect of that initial action by our great president Bush was the destabilization we now see in the Middle East, the rise of multiple different terror groups - usually initially funded in part by the US government for some legitimate purpose, or supplied with weapons for something that would have benefitted us... probably. So my comment about the destabilization was just mentioning that I recognized why there were troops there to begin with, even though I don't think they should have ever been placed there. It was my way of saying that I don't support our invasion of other countries, but I kinda get why we haven't pulled out completely just yet. And then my wonderful and lyrical comment about how Hillary might just have the mental capacity to avoid WWIII, whereas I'm not so sure if Trump is sentient enough to manage that.

I then had the very great pleasure of this response:

Person #2: "youre a god damn idiot" (yes, the punctuation was missing, not an error on my part)

Now at this point I was genuinely curious as to who this person insulting me was. He had written other rude comments on other people's voting choices, and I had a vague feeling I recognized the name. Now remember, the person who started the post was a teacher that I had in high school, so I did not discount the possibility that this rude individual calling me an idiot might be someone that I had met while in high school in Bend, OR. So, as the logical solution to being curious about who someone is, I stalked him on facebook. And to alleviate any confusion that statement might incur, I mean that I clicked on his profile and started rummaging through pictures. To my not-entirely-great astonishment, I not only recognized the person's face, but I actually remembered who they were, and that we had come into contact before while in school together. Not personally as friends or even acquaintances, but interacting with friends of friends of friends... I did remember his face, his speech pattern, even the time he accidentally smacked his friend in the balls.

His pictures on the endlessly useful facebook showed an very muscled young man, who appears to be on a fire fighting crew, spends time firing guns in the wilderness, hunts, fishes, and is pretty much the usual suspect of all around country-boy conservative that I have grown to despise with almost every fiber of my being. (Not every fiber, as I reserve at least 20% of my being for the ownership of my dog, haha).

I of course could not let the challenge to my intellect go unanswered, so I responded thus:

Me: "If having an opinion that differs from your backwards notions makes me an idiot, then I will wear that title proudly. Just because I do not support invading other countries to take control of their natural resources for US profit does not make me an idiot. Similarly, thinking that Hillary is the safer option for maintaining some sort of "world peace", also does not make me an idiot. 
And you are a budding war monger as far as I can see... Do you really want to start in on personal insults? I can come up with plenty, but I really don't see the point."

Now, I was really on my high horse, greatly enjoying being on the high moral ground for not being the first to issue a personal insult. And I was really looking forward to what he would respond with, because I had already pigeon-holed him into the type of person who gets so upset when he cannot understand one's argument or see their point of view that they resort to aggression tactics and attempts to either upset or intimidate their opponent so that they win. That kind of thing doesn't really work on me as the more aggressive they get trying to intimidate me, the more riled up and aggressive I get in return. I'm that unusual type of female that doesn't cower when a man yells at her, but instead puts on steel toed boots, grabs the nearest weapon, and prepares for battle. Unfortunately, the original poster of the discussion decided that it was time to put an end to the brewing storm, and removed my old high school "buddy" from the conversation because personal insults are not nice...

So I will never know what he would have said in response to me. I do know that he was later invited back into the conversation, probably with a warning to behave, and he promptly proceeded to confirm my worst fears about republicans and rural conservatives. Not only did he rail against Hillary or use every attempt to malign her, but he also vehemently supported everything about Donald Trump, his policies, his "beliefs", his speeches, and the fact that he wore an american flag pin about the size of a penny, was apparently a great sign of support for our wonderful military. The fact that Hillary does not accessorize similarly appeared to be a great personal insult to this male from my past.

On the same FB post, another person (person #3) extensively listed why they were not partial to Trump's political stances...

Person #3:

To which that asshole person #2 just had to respond...

Person #2:



I could have summarized all that, but I really didn't feel like tainting my own soul by typing any of that utter shit from person #2. I always knew that there were backwards people out there that could not only justify Trump's skewed world view and principles, but actually agree with them. I just never realized that I might have actually come into contact with them. And now i'm struggling to reconcile this new world view, and the fact that whenever I visit home I may come into contact with this person. If I do, i'm going to really struggle not to give him the ultimate glare of death that I was notorious for in high school. If looks could kill there would be a glorious line of bodies trailing behind me, mainly of assholes like this.

I know that there's this whole "freedom of speech" thing that conservatives and liberals alike enjoy protecting their speech. And sure, I'll respect your right to say and believe whatever you want, but hell to the no will I respect what this guy believes... As far as i'm concerned, people like this do nothing to enhance their community. They sit around, drinking beer and complaining about how the liberals are making their lives shitty. Instead of working hard, educating themselves, contributing to their community and the world, they just complain about their lot in life and vote in fuckers that will only make things worse for people like them. And if things do get worse, they continue to blame the liberals, not the republicans that are actually in charge.

These people are so obsessed with military glory, with our "brave troops", with the idea that America is the "greatest and most powerful country in the world", when in reality the whole world both laughs their asses off at our backwards-ness and inability to make a smart choice whenever it is presented to us. While also being freaking terrified that we'll let someone like Trump actually rule over us, because that will have world-wide consequences for them as well. When people like this exist in the world, its really hard to look past this and see the somewhat-sensible republicans out there that are just trying to make the best out of a shitty situation in their party. I cannot respect them for voting for Trump, even if he is their party nominee, but I can somewhat see where they're coming from in that they don't like him, but are voting for their party to have control of government for the next 4 years.

But those who not only vote for Trump but espouse everything he touts from his podium on high... those people scare the shit right out of me. Those people are the ones who give the rest a bad name, who go to rallies and scream that Obama is a muslim, those are the ones whose FB profile pics show them holding big assault rifles, sipping a can of beer, sitting in their big-ass jacked up truck, with a huge american flag hanging out the window, wearing camo, and possibly even taking a selfie with a dead deer, all at the same time. These are the guys that make me scared to walk down a street at night, that make me nervous of daring to voice my opinion in a public space, who would beat up someone just because they have a different opinion, who would go down to a voter station deliberately to intimidate minorities out of voting... Those are the guys that allowed Trump to be the republican nominee, and those guys are the ones who will riot when Trump isn't elected in 7 days...

And If there is any god(s) out there that I haven't recognized as a thing yet, please intervene in this madness for the whole world's sake. If you really did make the world, surely you don't want to see everything in it burn because Trump felt insulted by a something Putin said about his hair... There are much better reasons to watch the world burn than that, I'm sure...

Who Really Owns the Media?

Bernie's Revolution... A new age of politics

We live in a country that prides itself on having freedom of speech and press, but how free is it really? Can we say what we like in the media? Yes, legally we can, but what does freedom of press really mean in this country? To me, it means that whoever has the most money and will give newspapers the biggest headlines can buy the attention of the media. That sounds like having a significant other with incredibly loose morals who will spend time with anyone who can pay for it... You can see where I'm going with this I hope.

For instance, Oregon had it's primaries this week, and as we drew closer to the 17th, the media was pushing more and more heavily the idea that Hillary Clinton actually is the favored candidate in this incredibly liberal state. All I saw on the politics pages of every major news network was how Bernie didn't really have a chance here, how his following was really just a very small (if loud) group of radical democrats, and how Clinton was obviously going to win by a landslide. But that didn't actually happen. Bernie won the primary 55% to Clinton's 44%, which is a pretty big margin. By contrast, Kentucky had such a close primary that Clinton's reported win margin so far is 0.5%. The more the media continues to claim that Bernie doesn't have a shot at this, that Bernie supporters should get with the program and switch to Clinton Camp, the less likely we are to want to compromise.

There's something about being lied to by the media that just pisses me off. I hate how impossible they find it to be impartial, or at least give due credit to the other democratic candidate running for president. They focus in on Clinton and barely even give mention to Bernie, despite the fact that for the first time in what is probably several decades, people between the ages of 18-30 actually give a fuck about primaries and are showing up in huge numbers to vote. That's a big deal, and it's not because of Clinton. The fact that mainstream media gives almost no credence to Bernie's campaign, that they reluctantly even mention it, and that even popular shows like Trevor Noah's Tonight Show fail to even mention that Bernie is running against Hillary is a problem. Bernie is running a social media campaign because the real media won't give him the coverage he needs to reach people, and they don't give him the time because they know he's not going to give them anything for it. He doesn't have the funding to buy them, so we are instead given an unequal view of the candidates. And We Don't Want Clinton. 

She does not appeal to the younger age group in this country. She doesn't show any interest in supporting our issues, or even listening to our concerns. The younger generation is increasingly concerned about developing a less toxic energy source, with harnessing the power of wind, water, and sun instead of catering to big oil companies. The younger generation wants someone to recognize that the system of continually rising education costs, the devaluation of a college degree, and the never-ending student debt that will follow us around forever doesn't work. Clinton has been in the system so long and gotten so used to dealing with the "real adults" in the world... the baby boomers, our parents generation, the immovable people who were more concerned about lowering taxes and getting out of the recession than in improving on the political system, and in looking forward towards the future.

It's not Clinton's turn. I know she's waited a long time. She thought she had it in the bag in the 2004 election, but then Obama won. Then he had a second term. How in 2016 people claim that it's her turn, that it's time to have a woman president, that she has the political experience and knows how to work the system... That's exactly what we (the millennial generation) don't want. We don't want a conformist who's going to follow the system that we consider broken. We don't want someone who is comfortable caving into and being supported by big oil companies. We don't want Hillary Clinton to be our first female president. We want someone like Elizabeth Warren someday. Someone who stands for the things we believe in, someone who is moving with the times and who is not beholden to any one corrupt entity. We want someone who remembers what it's like to be with the little people, who argues for us and our issues. We want someone we can trust, and unfortunately that person is just not Hillary Clinton. There's too much uncertainty and mistrust associated with her. She lies through her teeth almost incessantly, and that's not a quality we want in the person making our decisions for us. 

Now I don't discount the many contributions that Hillary has made to the cause of gender equality in this country. She has a place in history that cannot and should not be disputed. She is an iconic figure in the rise of women from homemakers and wives to strong people with high-powered careers just as valid as their husband's jobs. But I'm sorry to say its still not her turn and likely never will be. 

Hillary may have the media in her back pocket paving the way for her to the presidency, or at least to the presidential candidacy, but if she thought it would be an easy time of it, we've shown her that she has another thing coming. Bernie's movement is not something that will just go away if she wins the primaries. We're here to stay and if she wants our support she's going to need to change up some things, and definitely improve on her lack of interest in the younger generations. We've been woken up to our political reality and we're going to fight tooth and nail to make sure our issues and concerns are addressed. The time when college students and young adults didn't pay attention to politics is over, and if Clinton does win and doesn't change her attitude towards us, and show some interest in hearing our voice, then she'll lose herself the presidency.

Of course, I myself will vote for her if she wins the primaries, but I know plenty of democrats and Bernie supporters so disgusted by the media's lack of coverage and the DNC's lack of support for Bernie that they refuse to support Clinton in any way. They will not vote at all if it means voting between her and Trump, and that's a problem. The party is so heavily divided right now that if she is the candidate, she's going to have to put herself out there to bring in the Bernie supporters. We're not just going to concede gracefully and join her side. She's going to need to extend the proverbial olive branch or she'll go down in history as the candidate who willingly lost to Donald Trump. Unfortunately, I can really only see a few choices for Clinton here... choose Bernie as her VP running mate, choose Elizabeth Warren as her VP running mate, or some other senator that appeals to the younger generation. Unfortunately, Warren is probably out because there will be the need to balance Clinton's womanhood with a man or people will get pissy. But if Clinton rejects Bernie out of hand, then she's going to have a democratic revolution on her hands that she probably won't survive.

The Republican Lineup of Candidates for Presidency

The terrifyingly insane people that might just become president...

So this country is facing a big change in 2016... A new president. Now this isn't like the usual race by each party to get a member of their side elected as leader of the USA. No, this race has transcended sanity and is now becoming a bloodbath for the people of this country. In the past whichever party won the election would change some policies and make things cushy for their party, but they wouldn't alter the very structure of the country and throw us all into war. But all that changed when the republicans elected George Bush instead of Al Gore in 2001.

Republican Candidates for 2016 Election

1. Jeb Bush, Former Governor of Florida 
2. Ben Carson, Former Neurosurgeon at Johns Hopkins Hospital
3. Chris Christie, Governor of New Jersey
4. Ted Cruz, United States Senator from Texas
5. Carly Fiorina, Former CEO of Hewlett-Packard
6. Jim Gilmore, Former Governor of Virginia
7. Lindsey Graham, United States Senator from South Carolina
8. Mike Huckabee, Former Governor of Arkansas
9. Bobby Jindal, Governor of Louisiana
10. John Kasich, Governor of Ohio
11. George Pataki, Former Governor of New York
12. Rand Paul, United States Senator from Kentucky
13. Marco Rubio, United States Senator from Florida
14. Rick Santorum, Former United States Senator from Pennsylvania
15. Donald Trump, CEO of The Trump Organization

Now I'm not going to go into what each candidate stands for, because that would take forever and be fairly repetitive. I may do a later post about that for the frontrunners, however this time I want to talk about the grand picture of what these people represent...

The Republican Platform in 2016

The main things that seem to be the foot this party is standing on is as follows (in no particular order of importance):

• Religious "freedoms"
• allowing homophobia in the workplace and elsewhere
• Islamaphobic policies and preaching
• Seeding fear of immigrants, particularly hispanics from Mexico
• Demonizing Planned Parenthood and repealing the right to abortions
• Cutting taxes for the top 1% even more
• Destroying public healthcare
• Cutting public funding for infrastructure like roads, bridges, damns etc...
• Halting trade relations with other countries
• Destroying cooperation btw the US and Iran, possibly starting another war
• Defunding and cutting budgets for education
• Bring back big oil and forget about climate change because it's not real
• Lower the minimum wage

Just to name a few...

Now, let us discuss these issues because they scare the hell out of any sane american, scare the world because if one of these people gets into power we're likely to start WWIII with nukes, scare women because they're going to become objects and property again, scare anyone who is not a white, heterosexual man...

Religious "freedoms" & Homophobia

What is a religious freedom? Well, to most people it would be the definition in the constitution of this country which specifies a separation of church and state. 

The exact wording of the First Amendment is:

"Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or of the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances."

This gives people the right to believe in whatever religion (or lack thereof) they wish, and it allows them to practice their religion providing it does not harm another person. This last bit is what seems to be forgotten by the religious right in this country. They are allowed to pray wherever and whenever they please, they can wear crosses, they can carry their bible around with them, they can converse about their religion, they can do whatever they want to show their beliefs as long as it does not harm another person. But they do harm other people. There is rampant homophobia in this country. They don't want to employ a person if they happen to like people of the same sex, they don't want to provide services or speak or have anything to do with them. They are outraged that same-sex marriage is legal now, they are outraged that they have to hand out marriage licenses and "participate" in such a sinful celebration, even though they really don't have to. The term "religious freedom" is now used to persecute same-sex couples, homosexual people, LGBTQ groups and people, and more... 

I don't quite understand where these people get off thinking they can push their religion down our throats. I don't understand how they think it's okay to be rude, say cruel and unkind things, deny basic services, and treat them as lesser human or even animals simply because they choose to like people of the same sex as themselves. I cannot understand how they justify their vicious behaviour saying that it's the "will of god". Are they god? Do they know exactly what god thinks about these people? Are they themselves the omniscient creator of the world they worship so stridently? No. Their book of "morals" tells them first and foremost to "love thy neighbor as thyself", and "let he who is without sin throw the first stone", and yet this is forgotten in the storm of hatred hurled at anyone who is different to them. They feel so entitled to "practice their religion" that they don't see why it is wrong to use their religion to persecute and profile and attack other people. 

This is what we are in for if a republican wins this election. We are in for blatant homophobia and that whole "separation of  church and state" will go right out the window faster than you can blink. Anyone who isn't a blessed christian is going to be fodder for all sorts of hatred and hate crimes and no one will do a thing about it. 

Islamaphobic Policies and Preaching

Ever since 9/11 there has beed an outpouring of hate and mistrust against anyone who even looks a little bit middle-eastern. If they are muslim and practice islam, it seems to be generally accepted in this country that they are definitely a terrorist in the making. Doesn't matter if they are actually a greek catholic, to the uninformed and overly-suspicious republican, they are a bomber waiting to happen. 

There are entire rallies specifically to sow distrust and hatred towards muslim people that practice the religion of Islam. The truth is that there is a very small portion of muslims that make up the dangerous group of extremists, and sadly those few give the entire religion a bad reputation. It would be like looking at just the Popes and Cardinals of olden-times and claiming that every single catholic was a child molester. Happily, that is not the case with either catholics or muslims. Most of them are wonderful people who live simple lives and just want to be left in peace and safety to raise children and live out their lives doing jobs that they love. 

But ever since 9/11 people, and republicans in particular, have been claiming that Islam is a dangerous religion and condones mass murder and terrorist attacks when it does no such thing. Christianity condoned mass murder when it came to the crusades. Catholicism condoned mass murder and genocide when their explorers "found" the New World and "claimed" the uncivilized continent for their rulers, killing all the native people as they spread across the land like a plague of locusts. These are religions that have condoned such violence and actions as being "the will of god". Not by fringe-groups of extremists, but by the leaders of those nations, the Kings and Queens that ruled them, the Pope's that were their religious leaders, their priests and missionaries and preachers. No religions have inflicted such widespread harm and murder as Christianity and Catholicism, and yet those same people choose to spend most of their time telling everyone how Islam is the most potent danger to the future of this country and the world. 

The republican candidates are no exception. Claiming to be all virtuous and perfect, they push all the evils in the world on Muslims and the religion of Islam and have a hate and smear campaign that is specifically designed to make people fearful of foreigners, fearful of non-white people, fearful or people who talk in a different language or practice a different religion, or wear different clothes. And these are the people who might one day lead this country... 

I ask you, what is more scary than that?

The Fear of Immigration

Something that I find very interesting about this election and what the republicans seem to be running on is the fear of illegal immigrants. Now we've heard for years about how terrible the Mexicans are, how they constantly just hop over the border with no problem and spread diseases that we US citizens are just not equipped to handle.

It's like they are trying to re-invent history and make themselves the Native Americans dealing with the Spanish Conquests... Not only is that offensive to the peoples that actually did have to suffer through that, but it's also highly inaccurate. Whatever diseases we have here in Texas, they probably have down in Mexico too, and vice versa. Why that is even mentioned in the debate to restrict illegal immigration is a mystery to me.

What I really don't understand is how, the moment Donald Trump said that all Mexican immigrants are rapists and thieves, the whole republican party jumped on board and started saying we need to build a wall. Then, smart guy that he is, Scott Walker (republican Senator of New Hampshire) suggested that what we really need is a wall (a really big one) dividing us from Canada, and protecting us from all the terrorists that come into the US from there. Now, I think a wall between the US and Mexico is insane enough in itself. But blocking out Canada because of "terrorists" is not just stupid and irrational, I personally do not understand how this guy hasn't been committed to a secure insane asylum yet. Not only that, but he actually has a place in government and the rules that we must all live by. If you don't find that scary then I have nothing more to say to you.

The fear of immigrants to the US was ramped up the minute the attacks in Paris happened in late 2015. Before that people were scared, and talked about how we'd be letting in all the terrorists, but it wasn't until the Paris attacks that the situation really exploded (no pun intended). Suddenly people were saying how every single muslim was a terrorist and how even letting in orphaned children was a risk, because they would obviously grow up to be terrorists too...

The amount of hatred you must feel towards a culture in order to condemn orphaned children to death is pretty huge. There are so many people out there who are facing horrific circumstances, whose houses have been bombed, who have watched their loved ones - parents, life partners, children - be blown to bits, who have abandoned every worldly possession they own to escape real terror and find a safe place to live. That's what really baffles me. They are the ones who truly experience Terroism. Here in our safe little country bad things do sometimes happen. The Boston bombings were no small matter, and 9/11 was a pretty tragic event, but we know nothing of living in constant fear. Of seeing a stranger outside your house and wondering if your parents are going to dragged away and tortured, of nearly starving to death every day because there's not enough food... That is THEIR reality, what they have to face every single day. And here we sit in our nice and cozy homes, with our TV's and cars, and safety and the surety that we are not going to have our house explode around us.

And yet we are the ones talking about how we DESERVE to keep out people in need. Our government OWES it to us to close the borders and look out for itself. The whole Iraq War began because our government "supposedly" wanted to help the Iraqi people escape tyranny by their government and local terrorist groups... And yet when a group of people are ACTUALLY in danger and dying by the thousands every day, we decide to hide and leave them to their own devices...  That to me is so disgusting. And yet, that is happening right now. The combination of misinformation and hate speech by the republican party has got the conservative right of this country in fits of the vapors and demanding that we "test" the religion of anyone who wants to enter this country. If that doesn't violate the freedom of religion clause in the Constitution they supposedly hold so dear then I don't know what does...

Demonizing Planned Parenthood

I've already talked about this one in so many other blog posts, it might be a bit of a waste of time to reiterate everything i've already said, so I'll simply say this...

Planned Parenthood helps millions of women across the US remain safe and healthy. It provides a multitude of services:

• pre-natal vitamins to ensure babies are born healthy
• breast cancer exams
• STD testing
• colon cancer screenings
• ultrasounds for pregnant women
• birth control consultations and prescriptions
• condoms
• urinary tract infection treatments
• adoption agency referrals
• safe sex education
• HPV vaccines
• female & male sterilization
• abortion services.

In fact, 41% of all services provided to people in 2015 were related to Sexually Transmitted Disease screenings and treatments, 34% was contraception advice and prescriptions, and <3% were abortion related... <3%, and yet their facilities are heckled, bombed, and defaced because of uneducated, despicable domestic terrorists that hide behind the idea that they are "Good Christians" and pro-life...

A quote that stuck with me was this: "I do not believe that just because you're opposed to abortion, that that makes you pro-life. In fact, I think that in many cases, your morality is deeply lacking if all you want is a child born but not a child fed, not a child educated, not a child housed. And why would I think that you don't? Because you don't want any tax money to go there. That's not pro-live. That's pro-birth. We need a much broader conversation on what the morality of pro-life is." ~Sister Joan Chittister

That is exactly how I feel about it. These people don't even deserve the term "Pro-life" because they couldn't care less what happens to that tiny human after it's born. If it is so addicted to heroin because it's mother was a drug addict, even if it is adopted by a loving family, its going to have severe developmental and health defects, and even physical deformities, for the rest of it's life. How do I know this? Because my mother is a labour and delivery nurse, and she sees children born every single day to people who have so abused their bodies and their fetus that even when it is born it struggles to live beyond a few moments. She has to nurse preemies who die within hours of birth, or are sent off to a foster care home with little chance of a good life. She sees the horrific side of childbirth every day. You would think that as a nurse who delivers babies she would be pro-life too, but she knows the reality of these children's lives. She knows the struggle they face and she has to be the one to watch them die. She says that it is crueler to subject these poor little beings to hours of pain and suffering when they'll die shortly afterwards, or struggle their entire lives to find a place in society. Those people out there holding pickets outside abortion clinics have no idea what the reality is like, and yet they think they stand on the moral high-ground simply because they want to force women to give birth to lots of babies.