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This post is not about my political standing nor will I share my political beliefs on this blog. This post, instead, is about the way that politicians insult people like me, in various forms, over and over and the country stands by and allows it to happen.
Perhaps you missed a recent quote by Presidential candidate Barack Obama. Let me share it with you.
Look, I got two daughters — 9 years old and 6 years old,” he said. “I am going to teach them first about values and morals, but if they make a mistake, I don’t want them punished with a baby.
Nice.
For decades and decades (centuries?), mothers were told that their pregnancy was a punishment for their sin of sexual “promiscuity” and that they had to redeem themselves by relinquishing their children. I thought we had gotten away from that line of thinking. I thought we had recognized pregnancy as the result of an action but not as a punishment for sin. This line of thinking, even in the Christian realm of thought, is flawed when you combine it with the fact that all children are gifts.
For the record, I, as a birth mother, have values and morals. I think this is a load of bull-pucky from someone who admitted to trying drugs. Who is he to judge me? Why are his values and morals “better” than mine because I had sex out of wedlock? Who made him the judge who gets to rank which wrongs are worse than others? Talk about ticking me off!
This quote is annoying at best and harmful at worst. I’m not even particularly worried about the mothers who have experienced unplanned pregnancies being hurt or offended. (But, yes, I took offense as you can tell by my short rant on morals and values.) My main thought jumped to my daughter, my beautiful and precious daughter. As a result of an unplanned pregnancy, I do not ever, ever want her to think that she was my “punishment.” My heart breaks at the thought. And then it gets angry. I work so hard to make sure my daughter feels loved and wanted by me and politicians spout of at the mouth and undo all the work I have done.
When are politicians going to wake up and realize how their words are ostracizing many potential voters? When are they going to realize how their words are angering and upsetting their constituents? When are the issues of unplanned pregnancy, adoption and abortion going to be looked at with more than disdain, a general disinterest or complete misunderstanding? When will these people start considering that their insensitive comments can hurt the very children that they’re supposedly trying to life up?
And so, for the record, I do not view my pregnancy with my daughter as a punishment for anything. It was a consequence to an action, yes, but never a punishment. My daughter was a beautiful, beautiful blessing to my life and to the lives of everyone she touches.
Don’t you dare tell her otherwise.
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For more on society and placement, read these posts.
Ugh! I hadn’t seen/heard that statement.
The whole promiscuity thing is bugging me lately. I just had an incident with the whole “birthmoms are promiscuios” sterotype and have a post about that coming up.
Okay, I’m going to preface this with the fact that I am an Obama supporter.
One of the things that you have to remember is that he was answering a “pro-lifer” who wanted him to “stop these abortions.” So definitely my first thought is that he’s countering the anti-abortion front. He’s laying out his pro-choice line. Which includes comprehensive education. Now, I do think his word choice was poor (and I’m sure if someone calls him on it he will say that as well).
He goes on to say that he doesn’t want them “punished with an STD at 16″ either. Which kind of reinforces the whole punishment for sex loop, which isn’t good. (Word choice, word choice is so important.)
I think what he was trying to say is that he didn’t want his daughters to face burdens that they might not be able to carry (such as raising a child at that point, in some views) or an STD, because they had sex.
As for the morals and values, I don’t think that it’s him saying that his morals and values are better at all. Also I think he was speaking to a semi-conservative crowd, so he was tailoring his answer to them. It doesn’t make it all hunky-dory, but I tend to try and look at the situation as well as the statement.
It does make me a little queasy to hear the words “make adoption a viable option” but yet again I think some of it is situational. I hope. Because really, I like him in several ways, and the other front runner candidates make me feel nauseous on a regular basis.
Of course that’s my spin on it, and it’s certainly not the end all be all of truth in this. By the way, if I come across offensive, it’s not my intention. I’m not sure I was entirely clear, but I thought I’d chime in with another view.
I agree with Jenna on the second half of the quote. A baby is not a punishment, nor should he or she be made to feel like one.
However, I don’t have a problem with the first half of the sentence: “I am going to teach them first about values and morals, but if they make a mistake”
The “mistake” may simply be having unprotected sex with someone. It doesn’t necessarily refer to having sex in general.
The blog that this quote comes from reads, “The exchange appeared to be prompted by Obama’s earlier comments that he does not favor abstinence-only education, but rather comprehensive sexual education that includes information on abstinence and birth control.”
I think that upholds the argument that sex isn’t the problem, but lack of birth control or protection is the problem.
Mistake is an acceptable term. But people with values and morals ALSO make mistakes.
Or am I just a skeezy girl who had no semblance of right or wrong?
You’re reading it differently than me, Jenna. I don’t see him as saying “I’ll teach them values and morals, but if they turn out to not have any and make a mistake…”
I read him as saying, “I’ll teach them values and morals, but even people with values and morals make mistakes, and if they do…”
It can be read both ways, but just having watched a million of his speeches and read about him and so on, I do not in any way think he’s saying that moral people are perfect.
Hmm. Okay. I get what you’re saying and can view it from that angle.
But…
As with anything we say, if it can be misunderstood like this, doesn’t that negate its effectiveness? Shouldn’t he have been more clear? I’m sure I’m not the only one on the planet who felt ostracized by such a comment. Just saying. It’s another example of how little thought is put into how unplanned pregnancy is addressed by politicians and the media. Then again, if you haven’t experienced it, you either have no CLUE how it feels to be judged or portrayed in such a manner and may not be careful with your words OR you just don’t care.
But thanks for shedding some light on it, commenters. I feel a little better now that we’ve discussed it but know that there are others out there who will either feel like I do OR think, “Yeah! Those skeezy single moms!”
Oh absolutely, it’s a horrid soundbite. It’s terribly ineffective… in fact I personally think it’s potentially harmful. Because while I don’t believe for a single second that any piece of it came across the way BARACK meant it, I can imagine single expectant mothers hearing that and just hearing judgment. I would have, while pregnant.
So even though I don’t think he meant to judge, and even though I don’t think he meant to make babies sound like nothing more than dead weight…. his words could still have that EFFECT on some women. Which is really yucky.
I hate the whole “pregnancy, STDs, abortion blah blah blah” debates in politics, because invariably not one single candidate has any CLUE about single motherhood, unwed pregnancy stigma, or adoption. The pro-lifers scream for outlawing abortion and trot out adoption as near cure-all; the pro-choicers, in an attempt to appease potential conservative cross-over voters and independents, disagree about outlawing abortion but go on to agree with the conservatives that adoption is a lovely answer to all of it. How bipartisan! How lovely! Look we CAN be unified on this issue! (Barf.)
It all makes me want to scream.
I don’t buy that sex= a mistake or having it outside of marriage equals a moral issue, but if he’s speaking to a mostly conservative crowd, as the person a few posts above me said, he’s trying to speak in a way they understand.
But, babies are not punishments or mistakes though, but awesome miracles.
Still, despite that poor choice of words I can’t help but support him over the other candidates.
I just wish conservative types would come up with a better solution than adoption or abstinence ONLY with nothing about birth control.
It’s such a complicated issue. Especially since people are designed to have sex. Villifying it isn’t a good solution at all.