The Baptist 10: Or, We’re Going to Make Sure You Get the Lord’s Protection Even If It Means Stealing You from Your Families and Kidnapping You from Your Homeland

Hey, they meant well! Anyone who wants to help any poor starving orphan get food, shelter, and religion (well, the right religion) should be praised, right? Well, it kind of depends on who that anyone is, what agenda they have, and whether the orphan is actually an orphan.  Like, if the kid has parents, she’s not an orphan, and you don’t really have any right to swoop in like a Christian White Knight and tell the kid’s family and village that you can raise the child so much better, give the child so much more, that it is only right and decent that you should take the child away.  Nothing like guilting a poor family into handing over their children to the Better People.  Kind of reminiscent of how Madonna got herself her very own black baby from Africa (because, what the hell, Angelina was getting all the attention!!!).

What is it with rich people from the West swooping down upon these sad countries  like vultures and plucking up whatever morsels tickle their fancy? The Christian missionaries are the worst and always have been.  The deal has always been do what we say, live the way we think you should live, worship our god, and we’ll give you food, medicine, and written language.

I’m not saying these poor, messed up countries aren’t poor and messed up.  They are.  And I’m not saying the people of these places are some kind of noble savages that we should admire from afar.  They’re not.  But are the only choices glorification of primitivism or  18^th- and 19^th-century—style imperialistic religious and moral evangelism?

Not to mention kidnapping? Ok, ok, alleged kidnapping.  And, right, the Baptist 10 weren’t really trafficking in children the way “trafficking in children” is usually understood.  They weren’t going to sell them into slavery or sex services, or cook and eat them.  They probably did intend to feed, clothe, and shelter them.  And teach them the Righteous ways of the Lord.  The Baptist’s concept of the Lord, that is.  Maybe three squares a day is worth being kidnapped and indoctrinated by missionaries.  Maybe the proper paperwork shouldn’t matter when a country has experienced catastrophe and children are dying and much worse villains than moralistic do-gooders are lying in wait to get a piece of the pie.

But written permission to remove children, any children, from their country, any country, after a disaster, any disaster, is the law, and no one, not even righteous, altruistic, evangelical, imperialistic, religious packs should be allowed to function above the law.  No one, especially not righteous, altruistic, evangelical, imperialistic, religious wolves, should be allowed to roam poor countries luring children away from their families and villages with promises of better food and shelter. 

In the service of doing right, you don’t get to do wrong.  In the service of charity, you don’t get to steal.  In the service of God, you don’t get to become God.  In the service of saving lives, you don’t get to design those lives in your own image.   At least you shouldn’t get to.

Secret Service: “The More the Merrier!! Come One, Come All!!”

It would be an understatement to say that I am no big fan of President Obama or his policies.  I find him imperious (in fairness, I find most politicians imperious), I’m not convinced his motivations are what I think they should be, and I’d like my country to remain free-market based with as little government interference as possible, and it’s pretty clear he’s going to do everything he can to change that.  So, not a big fan.

However, I am a huge fan of keeping the President of the United States safe.  Michaele and Tareq Salai, the gate crashers at the White House, are yet another example of how off the rails our society has flown.  These people want to grab themselves a reality tv gig.  What better start than to crash the President’s first State dinner? Well, they looked fabulous strolling in, she attired in a gorgeous red beaded sari, long blond hair flowing gracefully down her back, and he in an elegant tailored suit, all smiles and fabulousness.

Which is I guess what influenced the Secret Service to give them a pass to go on in and hang with the president, even though their names were not on any admittance list, and, yes, I’m going to say it, despite the fact that Mr. Salai has a, um, Middle Eastern˗seeming name.  Obviously, not everyone with a Middle Eastern/Arab/Muslim name is, or should be considered, suspicious.  Obviously.  But, uh, when someone pops by the White House when the President and the Vice President are hosting an official State event, and this, um, gentleman’s name is not on the list, and he is insisting on being allowed inside, and his name is Middle Eastern, or close enough that it might as well be, then I think that maybe the Secret Service ought to do its damn job and not give this unknown person free access to the leader of the free world.

These people walked right up to our President.  They touched him.  They touched our Vice President.  Luckily, these two low-lifes were just out to diddle themselves and to grab their 15 minutes of fame.  But what about all the other people who are out to wage Jihad, to destroy America, to turn the free world into a medieval Gulag? What about them? Well, now they know that all they have to do is put on a snazzy suit, toss a blond into a pretty dress and attach her to their arm, and then play the role of imperious upper class socialite who simply cannot believe their name isn’t on The List, and in they go.  To do whatever they want to the President of the United States.  To harm him.  To hold him and his second in command hostage while they make whatever demands they want of America. 

Absolutely wonderful.  How safe do you feel? Our President is NOT secure.  He is vulnerable and exposed because our Secret Service is so penetrable that STRANGERS were allowed access to our leader simply by showing up groomed and well dressed and insisting on admittance.  That is all it takes.  I’m safer than the President because I don’t let strangers into my parties.  My friends know not to let strangers in.  I’m safer than the President, than the Vice President, and all I have is a baseball bat. 

Mr. President, it’s time to get a baseball bat.  It’ll be much more reliable than the Secret Service, and you can keep your safety in your own hands, while the Secret Service turns what should be secure private events into public open houses.

Kevin Jennings, Harry Hay, and the Slippery Slope of Expanding Sexual Boundaries

What two consenting adults, heterosexual or homosexual, do in the privacy of their own home is absolutely their private business.  No one, no individual, no government, has any right whatsoever to interfere with a person’s sexual preference as long as that preference does not extend to children. 

By “children” I most certainly mean teenagers as well as “little children.” In our society anyone under the age of 18 is a child.  I understand that the age of consent is lower in many states.  For example, in Hawaii and Idaho, the age of consent is 14 years.  That is horrific and wrong, not to mention twisted and perverse.

The desire for sex with children is either a severe mental disorder or it is an indication of pure evil residing in anyone with that desire.  Either way, it is untreatable.  It is a fatal disorder, unique in that it does not kill the disordered person, just his victims.

All sexual acts perpetrated by an adult upon a child are rape.  All sexual acts perpetrated by an adult upon a child are acts of unutterable perversion.  All sexual acts perpetrated by an adult upon a child are acts of murder.

Children violated by adults die a thousand deaths every day.  Yet it is rare that child rapists ever get much punishment for their murderous violations of the only innocent people in the world.  These sexually perverted, morally corrupt, foul soul-murderers should be executed upon their first offense, and swiftly.  The death penalty could not be more appropriately applied than to the most heinous villains walking this earth: the violators of children.

The age of consent should be 18, in all states, and this should be federally mandated, as, clearly, some states are not capable of making an appropriate determination of when adulthood begins (it most absolutely certainly does NOT begin at age 14).  Violation of children should be a federal crime, tried by federal court, and punished on a federal level. Protection of children is too important to be left to the whim of the states, most of which have proven, time and again, that they do not take violation of children seriously, that they do not consider child rape a serious crime, and that they do not even care about the rape of children.

So, Kevin Jennings.  Harry Hay.  NAMBLA (North American Man-Boy Love Association).  I cannot wrap my mind around how NAMBLA is even legal.  They openly advocate for the legalization of child molestation.  Pardon my French, but WTF?

In my high school, which ranked well within the top 15 public schools in the Philadelphia metropolitan area (according to Philadelphia Magazine) this year, there was a teacher, a much older man, who committed sexual acts upon a close male friend of mine.  My friend thought he might be gay, and went along with the sexual acts because he thought that’s what he was supposed to do.  That’s what the teacher told him: that he had to try it to see if he liked it, if it was who he was.  My friend was confused about the acts with the teacher.  He felt uncomfortable.  None of us, his friends in whom he confided, did a damn thing about it because we were all confused, too.  Because we didn’t know if it was ok to have sex with a teacher, especially when the teacher said it was ok.  Because we were easily influenced teenagers, desperate to please the adults, desperate to fit in with the adult world.

Teenagers are CHILDREN.  They need to be educated and protected by responsible adults, moral adults, adults who recognize a difference between adult and child, who respect sexual boundaries and guard all children against those who do NOT respect those boundaries.  They need to be taught that it is NOT ok to have sex with a teacher, that if a teacher tells them it is ok, the teacher is WRONG and committing a CRIME, a crime that must be reported to a parent or directly to the police.

If there were an organization of men who wanted to de-criminalize wife-beating (of wives who believe they deserve it, of course – must be consensual!!), we’d rise up in protest and horror, get treatment for those poor women who think they should be beaten up, and arrest any man who perpetrates violence against women (well, I hope we would).  But men who like to perform sexual acts upon babies, toddlers, boys and teenagers? Hey, that’s ok! They like it, we’re making those babies and kids feel good! It’s natural! It’s love! All love is good! If it feels good, it IS good!

Harry Hay is dead, died in 2002.   Although not a member of NAMBLA, as far as we know, he did support them (what do we think of people who weren’t registered Nazis, but sure liked what they were doing to the Jews?), so good riddance to him.  Unfortunately, there are many others just like him and much, much worse.  Kevin Jennings is one of them, and of course he’s one of Obama’s Czars.  Of course he is.  Now, let’s be clear, Kevin Jennings is not, as far as we know, a member of NAMBLA either, but he is a self-professed admirer of Harry Hay, a man who, clearly, did not respect or even acknowledge moral sexual boundaries.  If he did, he would not have advocated for NAMBLA, not ever, not under any circumstances.  Because it is never, not ever, not under any circumstances, acceptable for an adult to have sex with a child.

And to put some rock salt down on the slippery slope so we don’t all slide right down it, it is not ok to admire someone who admires an organization that advocates for legal boffing of children.  And it is thoroughly inappropriate to have a man like Kevin Jennings, who, as an “admirer” of Harry Hay, has boundaries that are all together too moveable, as Assistant Deputy Secretary for the Office of Safe and Drug-Free Schools.  Unless we don’t really care about children being safe, protected, and unmolested.