www.thornwalker.com/ditch/nowicki_contracept.htm


 Notes from Underground

 

So this is what the liberals mean by “choice” and “tolerance.”

The Obama contraception tyranny
 

By ANDY NOWICKI

 

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Editor's note. On February 10, the day after I received this essay from Mr. Nowicki, Obama announced a "compromise" on the contraception mandate. Under this latest ukase, as I understand it, it is now the insurance companies that will be forced to provide contraception; and they will be forced to provide it free of charge.

To be clear, that includes any insurance company that Catholic institutions can choose to do business with. Some "compromise."

It is also worth noting that TANSTAAFP — i.e., There ain't no such thing as a free pill. The Obama "compromise" represents only a tactical change in the first victim of his tyranny. Moreover, it is noteworthy that the "compromise" represents yet another example of rule by decree. (But no! the statists will tell us. All of Obama's decrees have been authorized by Congress! Well, that's all right, then.)

Nicholas Strakon
 

Tyranny is a promiscuously used term, one frequently flung about during heated and confrontational exchanges, but it is seldom, if ever, defined. Instead, those who assail "tyrants" hold the violation of liberty to be an easily recognizable, even self-evident, phenomenon. As with pornography, a similarly ill-defined concept, we may not be able to explain what tyranny is, but presumably we all know it when we see it.

Unfortunately, we happen to live in a morally degenerate, culturally vacuous, and intellectually retarded era — in short, a democratized age — and that fact gives the would-be tyrants among us a clear edge. It is easier for nefariously inclined narcissistic sociopaths to come to power, buoyed by the sycophantic support of "the people," debauched, deluded, brain-dead, and easily cowed as "the people" tend to be under the corrupting influence of an age hostile to hierarchies and possessed of the conviction that majority opinion is somehow sacrosanct. By such "democratic" means did Julius Cæsar seize control of Rome, turning what had been a republic into an empire and fixing the template for nearly all conniving, power-mad dictators of the past 2,000 years.

Contrary to the belief of the vast majority (achieved, needless to say, through careful and deliberate indoctrination by the entrenched upholders of the Zeitgeist, our true rulers), the democratic mindset doesn't carry within itself an antitoxin to tyranny, but in fact clears the way for tyranny's sure, eventual ascendancy. For this reason, it is especially crucial to know just what we are talking about when we refer to "tyranny." It isn't simply an issue of semantics, or of annoying pedantry, to comprehend what is at stake; instead, everything depends on coming up with a clear, fixed, and precise definition.
 

To be sure, a tyrant needn't be a coarse and repugnant bully. Even if he "means well," by some widely recognized standard, his edicts still remain unlawful. One needn't have any kind of personal animus against President Obama in order to discern that his administration is out of line in attempting to force Catholic organizations to provide contraception to their employees. In fact, however, it is hard to see how such an edict isn't, in fact, motivated by sheer spite and hard-hearted cruelty. Hence, what we have here isn't mere tyranny, but aggravated tyranny, tyranny with extreme prejudice.

For the Health and Human Services arm of the D.C. bureaucracy to dictate that Catholic charities, hospitals, and schools must violate a crucial tenet of the Catholic faith isn't just a case of the government's overstepping its lawful authority in an earnest effort to promote the common good. Instead, it seems to spring from a wish to rub mud into the face of ideological heretics who dare to oppose the post-sexual-revolution Zeitgeist. It bespeaks a patently monstrous and criminal mindset on the part of our federal overseers and regulators, in which they resemble little more than a lawless gang of sadistic, armed marauders who entertain themselves by forcing their captives to do unspeakable things to one another.

The crux of the matter here isn't contraception, abortion, or Catholicism. One can reasonably argue the merits and the drawbacks of practicing artificial birth control. And there seems to be a wide-ranging debate among medical experts concerning whether or not "the pill" can actually cause early-term abortions. But whichever side one takes, it should be self-evident that neither side possesses the legitimate authority to demand that those on the other side act in a manner that directly contradicts their deeply held beliefs. For to be forced to violate one's conscience under penalty of law is, in fact, the very essence of tyranny.

It is a matter of some irony that the cultural forces most on board with the idea of forcing Catholics to violate their conscience are the very ones who are prone to sanctimonious knee-jerk retorts such as, "Keep your laws off my body!" in response to pro-life arguments. "Against abortion? Don't have one!" their bumper stickers smarmily advise, implying that pro-life conservatives are the true aggressors in the "culture war," while pro-choice liberals are the truly tolerant, live-and-let-live types. It is almost too much to think that the spurious liberal notion of "tolerance" now means that those who dissent from the Zeitgeist have no legal right to opt out of funding a practice they find morally abhorrent.
 

The Obama contraception edict via Health and Human Services is, quite simply, an act of naked aggression; it constitutes a vicious, malevolent, all-out assault by the government against faithful Catholics within the borders of the United States. To be sure, the number of American Catholics who actually abide by the Church's teaching is no doubt quite low; many "Catholics," perhaps a decided majority, probably have no problems with the mandate, or even actively favor it. Such is only to be expected in an age of "democratic" values, in which "acceptable" beliefs are prepackaged and dispensed by our betters, to be digested and finally embraced by a docile population of meek, conforming clones, be they nominally Catholics, Protestant, Jewish, or otherwise.

But the Church, far too much of a Zeitgeist-lapdog in the four decades since Vatican II, seems to have some fight left in her, at least on this issue. Historically speaking, she has always fared best in times of hardship and persecution. Don't count her out yet. I suspect she'll ultimately win this staredown with Cæsar.  Ω
 

February 12, 2012

Published in 2012 by WTM Enterprises.


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