Children are the enemy, don't you know? Sen. Tammy Baldwin (D-Wis.) recounts how women began to take jobs outside the home during World War 2, and have remained in the workplace since then:
"And now, in very, very significant numbers, women are...a part of the workforce and have contributed greatly to allowing families to get ahead in the economy. What permits that is women being able to control when or whether they have children and how many. And it is so basic to our economic prosperity that women have that control."
With this sort of reasoning, one can then make the claim that limiting access to birth control will result in an economic downturn, except that it doesn't. A few random thoughts:
- there are more women than men in the workplace in many fields (not to mention college) which means that the high unemployment rate puts a lot of fathers out of work (and yes, I know many women are single mothers);
- the economy has grown to accommodate two-income families, which put single-income families behind at the outset;
- the economy has grown to accommodate two-income families, which means that the price of goods trends higher, adding to inflation for all;
- dual incomes within a family often adds to dual concerns, leading to arguments over each family's mission and priorities;
- acceptance of birth control was predicted to increase the rates of promiscuity, divorce, and abortion--all of which have come to pass;
- the promiscuity and out-of-wedlock births have put a social and financial strain on the country that threaten to collapse the economy if we don't regain our moral footing soon;
- at this point, to insist that more birth control will restimulate our failing economy is insulting madness.
If the ostriches still want to say that children are the enemy, motherhood undermines the economy, and broken families are simply the price we pay for marching stalwartly into this Brave New World, then that is their prorogative. Of course their key word for women is "control," but that doesn't translate to teaching either self-control or NFP--this approach side-steps a variety of virtues, and simply squelches the natural consequences of vice.
Thus, as ever, it remains to us to point out that there's a better way to order society, where marriages are more stable and children more secure. At this point, the choice is increasingly clear to those who heads aren't muddled by misunderstandings about the human person.
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