Tuesday, April 01, 2008

New Obama Flap

Senator Barak Obama probably thought that his problems were behind him now that he made his speech explaining his relationship with Reverend Jeremiah Wright and he could get on with his race to the White House.

Not so. Another flap is looming. Obama made a speech where he stated he wanted to teach his two daughters values and morals so that if they made a mistake they wouldn't be punished with a baby or an STD. Many pro-lifers and conservatives are up-in-arms at the idea that he would consider a baby, an innocent baby, a mistake. I think I understand what he meant and can explain.

Everyday daughters tell their parents that they are pregnant. This happens no matter how diligent the parents were in teaching values and morals. The daughter has made a mistake. It's not the baby that is the mistake, but the choice the young woman made to have sex outside marriage.

The pregnancy is the result of a mistake made when a woman consents to have sex with a man and, in the heat of the moment, she has forgotten or prefers not to even think about the fact that she could become pregnant, or indulges in the it-will-never-happen-to-me mindset. I'm not forgetting that there is another party involved here, far from it. It's my opinion that if women want to be responsible for their bodies, then they must take responsibility for what goes into it. You might notice that I bolded the word consents earlier in this paragraph. It's mean to separate consensual sex and an act of rape (non-consensual sex due to age, infirmary or force).

A woman (of any age) who consents to sex when she is not prepared to have a baby makes a mistake. We all know the only form of contraception that is 100% effective is abstinence. Ridiculous, you say? Not really. But I'm not here to discuss methods of contraception or to judge women who choose to have sex outside of marriage. That's their business, not mine.

One could argue however, that since the voter usually never gets a chance to meet the candidate, we have to make our decisions based on what the candidate says and does. I think Obama himself made a mistake when he seemingly referred to a baby as a mistake and that he meant the choice to have sex outside of marriage is the mistake.

I'm sure at some point Obama will explain what he meant and we'll see if I read him right. I hope he simply made a mistake in his choice of words and he doesn't really see babies as mistakes.

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