I scratched around for quite a while, looking for a title for this piece. The above is the best I’ve got, and not very good at that, so please bear with me.
This is “Respect Life” weekend at my parish. We have the annual drive for funding for the local crisis pregnancy center, the usual exhortations to pray for the unborn and their safe delivery into this world, and similar ideas. But respect for human life, a central pillar of Catholic thought, goes well beyond the subject of abortion. Consider the Church’s “five non-negotiables:”
- Abortion;
- Euthanasia;
- Human cloning;
- Same-sex marriage;
- Embryonic stem-cell research.
Four of the five are explicitly defenses of the sanctity of human life. The fifth, same-sex marriage, touches on a closely related subject. In witness to this, courtesy of Mike Hendrix, we have this bit of farce:
Corey Briskin and Nicholas Maggipinto met in law school in 2011, were engaged by 2014, and had their 2016 wedding announced in the New York Times. They moved to a waterfront apartment block in Williamsburg, Brooklyn, with a bright playroom for families on the ground floor.
“We got married and then we wanted all the trappings: house, children, 401K [retirement saving plan], etc,” Maggipinto, 37, tells me in their building’s shared meeting room, tapping the table in sequence with the progression of each idea.
Briskin, 30, grew up assuming he’d have children. He came out in college. “Once I had come out to myself and others, I don’t think my expectation of what my life would look like changed all that much.” With marriage equality won years ago, they expected to be able to have a conventional married life.
“Marriage equality” has produced a few thousand couples such as these. So far, no big deal, right? But wait: there’s more! You see, these two homosexuals figure that, as part of the “conventional married life” they expected, it’s their right to have children:
It takes 15 minutes for Maggipinto to run me through all the expenses they could incur if they tried to have a child genetically related to one of them. The bottom line? “Two hundred thousand dollars, minimum,” he says, tapping his index finger on the table with each word in disbelief….
They couldn’t afford it. Maggipinto earns a corporate lawyer’s salary but is saddled with student debt. Briskin used to work for the City of New York as an assistant district attorney, earning about $60,000 a year.
And the wailing commences! Because both spouses are male, neither of their employment benefits will pay for their whim. They have to finance it out of their own pockets – and that’s just not fair! Apparently, contracting an inherently sterile marriage “shouldn’t” be an impediment to procreation. (See why I strive to use the word should as seldom as possible?)
Here’s the meat of it:
“Gay men now want insurance companies to treat being born male as a disability or as a protected category, one which requires paid compensation,” [feminist writer Phyllis Chesler] wrote in an article for a feminist website published a few days after the men filed their complaint. “They are protesting the ‘unfairness’ of not having been born biologically female.”
For some time now, women have been complaining about the unfairness of being women. Now we have men complaining about the unfairness of being men. Truly, words fail me.
A point I’ve made several times before this is that intelligence is a tool, not a state of grace. Smart people, on average, are better at getting what they want. But he who “thinks with his desires” will often find that his intellect, however powerful, is simply irrelevant to what he wants.
The two homosexuals in the tale related above both seem fairly bright. So why didn’t it occur to them that they’d have a wee bit of a problem producing children? Why didn’t it occur to them that as men, they are not expected to gestate, and that no employer would make provisions for it? Because they’re “married?” Because they want to be “just like other married couples?”
Men cannot get pregnant. That’s inherent in the design. Some of us are men and some are women, and the reproductive functions are divided between us in a way we can do nothing about. Screaming that it’s not fair! can change nothing about it.
But the second part of this little sermonette is equally important: Trying to shift the responsibility for fulfilling your desires onto other people’s shoulders and wallets is an act of childishness and selfishness. Saying that “I can’t get what I want for myself, so you have to get it for me” proclaims both personal immaturity and personal irresponsibility. It’s the tantrum of a bratty toddler.
Each of us has a soul. Some never “grow into” theirs. Above is Exhibit One.
The argument rages over whether homosexuality is an individual’s choice or is encoded in his genes. As regards reproduction, it hardly matters. If you insist on having sex solely with persons of your own sex, you won’t be having any kids. To demand that it be otherwise – to demand that other people make it possible for you, by whatever means – is an indication that you are unfit for the society of others. No one is obliged to accommodate you.
Of course, the homosexual “community” doesn’t see it that way. Having helped to destroy freedom of association, why not press for a “right to reproduce” for which others must pay? Biological realities be damned! After all, aren’t they the same as anyone else? Don’t they have a right to know the happiness of families with children?
The relentless prattling about “equality” and “equity” has brought us to this. And we’re guaranteed to see more of it. It’s implicit in the transgender craze. Even though it’s a blatant defiance of the realities of human life.
Perhaps “learned soullessness” was the right title after all.
3 comments
A friends daughter 30 years ago ‘married’ her girlfriend. Wanted to have a baby. Daughter had a close male friend from grade school on who lives across the country and is gay. He furnished his sperm she got preggers and GF after 1 years of screaming, messy baby bails on ‘marriage’. Daughter moved for work, she has a PHD and finds the love of her life. They legally have married, raised the a wonderful young man who’s graduating college fall semester. She never expected any help from society or mom and dad. Sperm donor has meet the young man at various times but there is no I’m Dad. For young man it’s just the way it is.
Your example shows a complete lack of what to me is common sense. But that seems to be lacking in many younger people.
Lordy, I’m turning into my parents.
My Give A Fuck Meter is pegged at zero for homos. Blacks too. Whiners in general. I am so sick of the constant bitching, you can’t imagine.
I was in line the other day at Home Depot and started a conversation with a man who emigrated here from India when he was a teenager. He had a hat on that said 100 YEARS. I asked what that meant and off we went. Didn’t have a nickel, couldn’t speak English. You know what’s coming.
Took a menial repair job for Panasonic. Keep at it and worked up to supervising a crew. Got into development, designing TV monitors for airplanes. Than the military. Keep moving up the ladder. Keep in mind, no college.
He starts buying motels in his “spare time” He owns 5 now, just sold one to one of his sons who are also quite prosperous themselves. I’d say he was in his mid to late 70s and was so sad at what his adopted country has devolved into. I agreed. He says everyone still wants to come here not because there are so many freebies and yes, many do come for that reason, but most feel they have a fair shot at making something of themselves if they work hard.
Maybe all of this immigration isn’t such a bad thing, it’s just too bad they’re coming in illegally, that fucks up everything. I know one thing, so many of our young people aren’t worth the piss to put them out if they were on fire.
It’s not going to be reversed without a River of Blood.
Insurance company ant Gota pay lol
the government says men can get pregnant so problem solved for the insurance company and for us