Introducing ‘The American Dream’: Liberty is My Cinematic Mission Statement
by Tad LumpkinIs there a cosmic rule that says to make film and entertainment that is interesting and well received you have to be a liberal? It seems that way sometimes, but it doesn’t need to be the case.
I think everyone is pretty aware of the overwhelming liberal bias of Hollywood in general but it’s bigger than that, most creative people, period, tend to be heavily on the left. Why is that, and what can be done to get the true message of conservatism into films and entertainment?
The American Dream Trailer from American Dream on Vimeo.
Let’s first take a look at what makes good media. Regardless of the format, whether narrative or documentary, the first and foremost thing people want is a good story. Telling a good story and crafting interesting characters is a talent. Film-making is not something that everyone is going to be able to do well. I say this not to discourage anyone but more to identify what the real issue is. The biggest strength of the liberal voice is that they use the elements of story-telling far better. They know that stories of struggle and triumph are far more engaging than messages of statistics and fear. I am convinced a lot of liberals would like the story of free markets and small government a lot better if we did a better job telling it.
Think about the following: Is the problem that we need more people on the right making films, or is it that we need more good filmmakers thinking right?
I would propose it is the latter.
If that is the case how do we get those good filmmakers to think right? Well what is being on the right anyway?
I think we have a real identity crisis as to what “conservatism” is. Trying to identify true conservatism based on party affiliation is a big mistake. The republican leadership is no more truly conservative than the democratic leadership. This taking sides based on party is alienating and divisive. It also makes for an all or nothing proposition.
What we should be doing instead, as storytellers and conservatives, is uniting on issues that we can all agree on and working together to advance those through media.
I recently made a film that I think does this. It’s called “The American Dream” and you can check out the trailer and purchase the DVD from our website THEAMERICANDREAMFILM.COM. It’s best if you just check it out for yourself to see what makes it different. It celebrates at least what I consider to be true conservative values. I have shown this to people across the political spectrum, and what you realize is that people think far more similar than you would have believed. The message of conservatism is uniting, but it has been hijacked by wolves in sheep’s clothing. They now use it to advance an agenda of control and government expansion.
I am hopeful that all the film-makers out there will check out what we did and have the same reaction. It’s not the Democrats versus the Republicans, that is but a distraction. The real debate is liberty, freedom and prosperity vs. control and poverty. Once you get that its no longer about party we can put that “US” Vs “THEM” aside and start making films that convey the message of liberty being the greatest mission statement a nation has ever had.
The Michael Moore’s of the world tell good stories about bad ideas. We need to start telling good stories about good ideas, and the results will be truly amazing.
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71 Comments
I love it. 1010% Absolutely positively love this.
Jon Favreau is a perfect example. Call me obsessed, but I couldn't believe how much I enjoyed Iron Man. I wasn't expecting much, so that always helps, but how much I truly enjoyed just the entire narrative by itself surprised me.
Perhaps I identify with the eccentric, lonesome, realistic billionaire (minus the billionaire part unfortunately) or maybe I just liked the story where Tony Stark unapologetically kicks a lot of ass where bureaucrats just won't go–and it doesn't devolve into a conspiratorial plot to kill presidents, senators, or evil capitalists…well it does, but it's an evil capitalist everyone can agree is evil–wanting to sell weapons to terrorists, not wanting to achieve self-realization.
Democrats vs Republicans is hardly a distraction. The Democratic leadership right now is attempting to pass or prevent repeal of legislation that would permanently orient this country in a leftist statist direction, rendering all our argumentation moot.
And even if Republican leadership isn't authentically conservative; they are not fundamentally hostile to the tenets of conservatism and working to render them impotent right now as are the Demoncrats. One MUST take a side against the democrats and the only side that can be taken is the Republican party. And if this is divisive so be it.
Whatever you do, don't get stuck in a rut with the same production team. One of the, "problems" with libertarian-conservative artists is that they tend to find a niche and then keep a relatively low profile. As a result, you might have to do some looking to find them, and then drag them kicking and screaming out of their comfort zones to get them in on a project. If you don't, you'll end up with the best self-promoters, who are invariably not the highest quality artists… unless you consider BS an art.
All right… I'm down — Tad, I want to see this!
Here's how I define the political right and left in America.
The left supports the supremacy of the state at the expense of the individual. There fore the right must be the supremacy of the individual at the expense of the state.
That does not mean anarchy. It means severely limited government, properly restrained by a clear and concise constitution. It means We The People are in charge, not the other way around.
I'm not a conservative, I'm a libertarian. Which puts me slightly to the right of Attila the Hun.
I like the way most conservatives talk, they have a good sales pitch. But – as we used to say at IBM – when the rubber meets the road, they have tendency to see big government forcing others to live by their morals as a pretty good thing.
Legislating morality is not only wrong, it does not work. Remember the war on poverty? Poverty won. Guess who's winning the war on drugs? Let me give you a hint, it ain't legislated morality.
I consider myself right wing in that I am against anyone, any group, or any thing forcing their morality upon me, using force or the implied threat of government's monopoly on the use of violence.
If you're a true liberal in the classic sense (the good kind as my Dad would say) who believes in free markets, small government, negative liberties, and tenets put forth by John Locke, JS Mill, etc. then you should rest assured that such values are portrayed in a small but visible minority of past and present Hollywood films. The stories of the underdog, or the outsider who chooses to go his own way, or the self-reliant heroes, these are stories that strike a chord with the American people in general and therefore might not seem overtly political. Still they reinforce our liberal foundation that stresses a paradigm where the individual is the fundamental unit of society rather than the family, or community.
If you're a conservative who believes in a large and powerful central government that rejects efficiency and equality in order to instill a superior morality in the masses based on religion, nationalism, and other influences, then Hollywood might appear unsympathetic. Americans will never accept these movies as they come off as tacky, contrived, staged and void of relationship to our evolving, socially liberalizing society. Ignoring this and trying to make movies about family values, the importance of religion, US military supremacy is a bad idea because as soon as the public recognizes the intent behind such works, they'll dismiss it as propaganda. The American people might not be the sharpest tools in the shed but they certainly watch enough visual entertainment to know when they're being preached to.
As a libertarian, I'm going to call you on this one.
President George W. Bush increased entitlement spending more than any president since LBJ's Great Society. And he tripled government regulation.
Honestly I don't see a whole lot of difference between garden variety republicans and democrats. Granted, the current administration is much further left, but that's because its the fringe of the demcoratic party.
Please explain to me again why I should vote for republicans after the last 8 years of the Bush administration, after Bush 41's 'No New Taxes' lie. (Incidentally I'm old enough to remember when he first trotted out that line, and it was 'No Taxes'. Got changed fairly quickly as I recall.)
Not only that, but the democrat leadership, namely Obama, has repeatedly called Republicans the enemy and stated that Republicans need to sit in the back.
The "Great Uniter" my arse….
The problem is that social and religious conservatives are antithetical to true warts and all self expression especially when it depicts what they see as moral failures. This is why so many artists identify as liberal. Yeah there are a few right leaning artists like Vincent Gallo but when he made Brown Bunny the social conservatives went crazy over a billboard that depicted a sex act which they found objectionable and then went on to scream about liberal Hollywoods depravity even though the filmmaker isnt a liberal.
Wasn't able to buy the movie at your website. You may want to check that out.
"Most creative people, period, tend to be heavily on the left." Cmon Tad. Give me a break. What a TOTAL CROCK.
Only creativity exists in the "art world." Only creativity exists in "film making." The creative people attend Cooper & CalArts.
I can make a case that "creative people" are those who can't handle the truth. Reality BITES. And we live in reality. And those "brilliant" and "creative" lefties hate the reality so they lose themselves in fantasy. And then it's not enough. They need for everyone else to live in their fantastic world.
And if you need a case study on how well living in a "fantastic world" works TAKE A LOOK AROUND THE GLOBE. Rackets & Riots. Fraud & Deception. Anarchy & Chaos. Failed nations.
The small business man and woman are pretty sick and tired of you artists and your perpetrated myth on having on monopoly on creativity. The luxury you artists have is that failure doesn't exist in your world. Art is creative. It's a win-win for you.
Our creativity in the business world is challenged in the real world. We are proven right or wrong.
Calm down Drrt. He's just talking about the art world which is predominantly liberal.
Of course there are creative conservative people in business and the like coming up with new products and technologies. That goes without saying.
I don't know EdSki. You don't profess to be an artist. I don't profess to be an artist.
"Rubber meets the road" has no place in art. And Lumkin's assertions mean we are void of creativity too.
Creativity at IBM. Noooooooo. If it doesn't pass the CalArts smell test than we are chit out of luck? Truth be known. The Black Hole of creativity to me exists in the world of the Hollywoodist. Pumping chicks full of silicon and water-implants is a batton they won't put down.
At IBM they had a culture so set in concrete with it's own terms, they actually had an unofficial dictionary for them. Care to take a stab at “open kimono”?
I particularly enjoyed the part when he talked about how boring the liberal agenda is.
Also, when demands for transparency come from within the arms industry, it will come from conservatives.
This is where a more vibrant debate on what conservatism is comes into play.
So you didn't like Bush's big state "me-too" conservatism. You'd better make sure you're active in conservative politics to make sure your favoured alternative is stronger.
He may aspire to such lofty goals, but he still has to please his base, who despise anyone who MIGHT disagree with them.
I'm much less preoccupied with getting the conservative message into movies, and more interested in defining conservative ideas amongst the ideas that are already there.
There are some great conservative films, even if they may be uninentionally so. In the last few years alone we've had films like Serenity, Harry Brown, Iron Man, Law Abiding Citizen and going back a little further than that we've had films like Equilibrium.
The conservative message is there. Too many people are too busy fretting to recognize it.
Storytelling is a tough craft. The trailer shows a creative documentary, not a narrative film. It's main purpose is to inform, not entertain. That means it will reach a small subset of the general public, while a "pure entertainment" movie like Avatar that promotes a falsely idyllic tribalism and anti-capitalist sentiment reaches everyone.
Unfortunately, liberalism lends itself to narrative film better because it's driven by emotion, rather than reason. What conservative filmmakers need to do is develop stories that show blind emotion as false, that the true choice for a protagonist is not "follow your heart" or "let the evil capitalist win" but "follow your heart" or "do the right thing." The right answer doesn't come with swelling music and fireworks, but it must prove that the blind emotional response, the big government solution, the "eat-the-rich" knee-jerk response, is not only less caring then they say, but are in fact impersonal, enslaving and destructive. Therefore: unAmerican.
See that's my problem. From where I'm sitting on the political spectrum, conservative politicians don't look a whole lot better than that modern liberals.
The way I look at it, the only thing right wing about republicans is they are slightly to the right of the far left modern liberals.
As active as I'm going to be in conservative politics is to remind them every time I see them contradict their own rhetoric. I'll do what I can to pull conservatives back over towards the political right.
"I know of no safe repository of the ultimate power of society but the people. And if we think them not enlightened enough, the remedy is not to take power from them, but to inform them by education." – Thomas Jefferson
I agree. Save the preaching for sermons and documentaries.
I've been saying for a few years that the "artists" of the world tend to be those people who couldn't hold down a real job. It actually makes sense. You get some spoiled brat of some millionaire, who never had to do anything growing up, and then goes to college to major in "art", and proceeds to pump out clone work of whoever his "art" professors were, because no real employer would hire him/her to do anything, because they don't really have marketable skills. This is especially true for "modern artists" whose goal seems to try to produce things with no aesthetics, minimal creativity, and the only originality involves coming up with a new way to shock the masses with their fantastic "art" that only they, and their art school comrades, understand and appreciate.
I wavered between majoring in art, and pursuing a science when entering college back in the late '70s; I chose a science because I couldn't see making a living at art (it seemed you had to be an artist for a very long time before you made any money, unless someone promotes you to the masses as "the next great artist".
"The Incredibles" had an amazing conservative message considering it was a Disney/Pixar film (the same people who made Pocahontas, right?)
How about just making movies that are fun to watch, without a political message?
Here is a nice little animated video somebody has on youtube that summarizes a lot of what the movie above talks about:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PTUY16CkS-k
So what's the difference between a classical liberal and a libertarian? Can you be for social safety nets instituted by the government and not be a libertarian? The idea of a smaller government is pragmatic and optimum for freedom but I still can't help but feel the elderly need a hand financially when they can't work so I support medicare and social security. As I see those two things, they extend beyond any kind of government mandate because helping your elders goes back to tribal societies and was a sign of respect and appreciation for those who came before and their efforts.
I've always found the idea of legislated morality repugnant, tyrannical, and worst of all futile hence why the GOP and a lot of conservatives really turn me off. It's even worse when they talk about individualism but out of the other side of their mouth say "thou shall not" do such and such. Obviously we need laws against violent crimes and theft but vice, particulary drugs, and sex in the form of prostitution to me seem like an individual choice and not something that should be decided for me by my government.
I didn't buy his "uniter" act for a second. When he says things like that, I am reminded that he is a petty, sometimes childish person that has never had to work a day in his life.
He IS part of his own base. He despises anyone that disagrees with him and the image that the media has made of him.
In my opinion, libertarianism is simply short hand for classical liberalism.
My own opinion is I don't really have a problem with a social safety net, but I have a real problem with a social safety hammock.
I agree there are members of society who simply are incapable of adequately caring for themselves, and it is our duty to take care of them, the entitlement mentality has reached the point where so many believe they are owed a job, a house, basically a life.
How ever, the problem with that is it means as a society we decide that some one is more worthy than another, therefore we will seize their private property and give it to others. It's easy to see with issues like the war on drugs government is attempting to legislate morality. But welfare is the exact same thing. It just illicites different feelings.
It's still comes down to the basic premise that I am more moral than you, so I will decide how your private property will be confiscated and redistributed. And any way you cut it, its still legislating morality. I think you have more than you deserve and therefore I'm going to use government to take it from you.
In my opinion the only solution to the question of who's morality shall be law, is no one's morality shall be law.
Now don't get me wrong. I'm a firm believer in property and contract rights. I believe we should have police and courts to protect those. It's when government steps over those limits that things tend to go horribly wrong. Therefore the solution is to not allow government to step over those limits.
And that means getting rid of things you don't like, as well as things you do. I see it as the only fair system.
What you said, Ed. Well said. Very well said.
The problem with the social safety net is that it always becomes a hammock and then a nice comfy bed with a goose-down comforter and fuzzy slippers. There is no way to manage it, at least at the gov'tl level.
That is what private charity is for.
As a former liberal (as you know) I "what if'd" everything to death – well if we don't do this, what if this happens.
And then I realized that if I kept doing that, in my mind, I was creating a totalitarian society based on the simple fact that I wanted everyone to be taken care of.
And I did the same thing in my personal life – blaming my career missteps on everybody but me. I made choices and I have to live with them and do the best I can.
Just out of curiousity, Ed – I know you've said you've kind of gotten back to the Catholic Church, but you are also a libertarian. How do you square the 2 when it comes to abortion?
Mind you, this is not a gotcha moment at all. Your answer is your answer and I make no judgment.
Just curious.
Yeah, but the so-called liberals do it to. They feel they are morally superior when it comes to taking care of women, blacks, minorities in general, children, the poor, the elderly, the environment.
They may not want to control morality, but they want to control everything else – what we eat, what we watch, what we listen to, what kind of products we use, etc. etc.
Plus, they may not want to control morality, but they also want the rest of us to pay for other's mistakes (high taxes to pay for programs that use my money to pay people who keep making bad decision after bad decision).
For that reason, libertarians are the most honest when it comes to that kind of thing – they don't want to legislate your morality, but they also want you to pay for your own mistakes.
That's the way it ought to be.
I'm an engineer, so I look at things from a technical perspective. What works and what doesn't.
Stop doing what doesn't work, and concentrate on what does work.
And one of the things that appeals to me most about libertarianism is the emphasis on personal responsibility. It's scary a first, that you will suffer the consequences of your actions. But upon deeper reflection, I have more faith in myself than I do empty promises from politicians to make everything alright.
They can't, I know it, so regardless of their claims, I'm going to do myself anyway.
Understood, we've been chatting back and forth for some time, I may not know you personally, but I still know you a bit.
I believe government should have no say what so ever when it comes to the issue of abortion. If government seizes the authority to prohibit it, that means they've also seized the authority to force it. Take a look at China with their one child policy. It's not that uncommon for regional politicians in China to have their thugs grab pregnant women off the streets – or even out of their beds – and force abortions on them.
Get government entirely out of the issue completely. And then as pro life Catholics we reach out to women in need one on one and we convince them that the choice of life is the right choice.
Trying to force people to follow you usually ends up horribly. Convincing them its in their best interest, then you get things done.
We convince expectant mothers, one at a time, that life is a precious gift from God and should be treated as such.
Yeah, pretty much what you said.
That's why I use the term modern liberal, to differentiate the current incarnation from what true classical liberalism is.
The founding fathers do not deserve to have their memories tarred by the current crop of politicians and activists who falsely claim the title liberal.
Yeah, what you said.
Yes, that's the thing – personal responsibility is scary. At the time of our founding I think we would have a hard time counting the number of people who actually LIKED personal responsibility and although it could be scary, faced their fear and overcame it, all for the love of liberty.
For 100 years the Progs have coddled us and now we are afraid. We are like kids in college, afraid to graduate, afraid to get that first job, first apartment, etc.
Yes, it's scary, but once you face that fear and feel the freedom, it's so beautiful, you never want to go back.
I'm not Cypher from The Matrix – I'm glad I took the red pill and I never want to go back.
The problem with the "social safety net" is that it makes us far less social with one another. It gives people an out for not taking care of folks around them. It cheapens the sense of community that we used to have in this country.
Churches and charities will always be the best way to take care of those who are less fortunate, and the primary reason is the same one for why local government is always better than a centralized bureaucracy: Churches and charities are directly accountable to the people, and they respond better to local issues.
A centralized bureaucracy ensures that all people, regardless of situation, are treated the same. This allows folks to game the system — and more importantly, it leads to a culture that views the less fortunate as the government's responsibility. People think they've "done enough" simply because Medicare and Social Security are funded with their tax dollars.
The social safety net destroys the idea that we should work together to take care of each other.
I had a feeling you might say that . . . and I agree with you! I've tried every which way to think of a way to make abortion illegal so that it would actually work and not cause more problems, and I just can't. If you make the rule and then add exceptions, women will lie in order to get it (I was raped; my life is in danger). However, I do believe that it's not a RIGHT. And I believe it's a state not federal issue, but even at the state level, I think what you are saying is correct.
I've posted a lot elsewhere about my feelings regarding ORGANIC change. I know it sounds Hippie-like, but it's not. It's like you said – convincing people to make better decisions. Our youth is all about getting a piece of @ss, getting their entitlements, etc.
We need to teach them RESPONSIBILITY. What is more important – getting a piece, or getting an education and/or job and supporting yourself? Delayed gratification is what it's all about. I'm not even talking about no pre-marital sex, just a more RESPONSIBLE attitude towards sex, acknowleding that there are serious consequences and not doing it unless you are ready to face those consequences. If we can manage that (and it will take a while to do of course), then whether abortion is illegal or not doesn't matter – people are making more informed and responsible decisions and abortions become less and less necessary.
And yes, reaching out. So many liberals think that those of us who don't think abortion is right just abandon the mother and child but this is one of those false things that I finally discovered – it's just not true. There are plenty of groups out there that are there to help. They just don't get advertised that much. They don't get talked about as much.
Thanks for sharing.
Yep.
The way I look at it, I didn't choose the red pill, life pretty much shoved it down my throat.
I poked around for the red pill, just like Neo did. I got curious and researched, and it was offered to me and I took it.
And I'm glad I did.
Almost all legislation is about morality and the left is behind the vast bulk of it. All forms of income redistribution represent the left imposing its morality on us.
From the war on poverty to carbon tax to affimative action to Obamacare…its one morality play after another.
"most creative people, period, tend to be heavily on the left"
I get and agree with the point you're making but don't care for the use of the word "creative". Pursuit of a career in the arts does not equal creative. Most people in the arts today have all the creativity of a sponge and leftism is a big part of why.
tell it to the leftist in the hollywood studios
I with Ed on this one. The Republicnas only seem to be interested in Constitutional conservatism when an election is coming up. With some excpetions that I could count on one hand, I don't think any of the Republicans elected at the federal level believe in the principles that made this nation great.
This is rare Tad, for you to be a contributor who makes films and can promote your film on Big Hollywood. This could be a first. Maybe there is some hope for me after all
There is only one unknown independent filmmaker who is conservative and makes 35mm feature narrative films with a story that shows Americans as heroes. Hollywood blacklisted the film after multiple screenings from every studio. My film is Forgotten Heroes the movie
Conservatives are NOT allow to drink from the Hollywood well of production. I don't care how good your script. They turned down the Passion, it doesn't matter if you don't like it or you love it. The film grossed 600,000 in the marketplace.
Liberal films are made for two reasons, first the studios are run by liberals and they have the outlet to sell their agenda. Two, they have ALL the money to make whatever crap they want, put more money into it and put it out for the public to see. The public will go out and see only what is coming out of the factory.
Now, if we conservatives had our own studio and can compete on an equal playing field they the liberals will change their agenda. However, the left runs Hollywood like a mafia and no one can get into with conservative stories unless you are all ready in the system. This is life here in Hollywood today
They may not want to control morality, but they want to control everything else – what we eat, what we watch, what we listen to, what kind of products we use, etc. etc.
In terms of food, pushing for legislation to cut the fat or salt content in certain products seems like common sense especially when it has been shown time and time again the actual matter that a mass produced food product consists of. What has happened though is the "right" has politicized this issue to such an extent that now people like you think it's a freedom issue. Do you really truly believe that curtailing the amount of chemicals, preservtives, and filler, that McDonalds put's in it's food deprives you of liberty?
Where does the left tell you what to watch? Does the left have groups like the Parents Televison Research Council pissing and moaning everytime some sexual content is part of a tv show? Does the left hem and haw about art-work they find objectionable? Raising a voice about the word "faggot" and the treatment of g..ays is not curtailing your freedom. It's protecting g..ays from being demonized which usually turns violent and ends in death. Do you consider it a major problem to not be able to use the word "faggot" or any other slur towards minority groups? if so the problem is yours, not the "left's".
What kind of products has the left stopped you from using?
What programs are those? be specific? Drug treatment? Actually drug treatment programs save money. Prison costs more money to feed, cloth, and house drug offenders than rehab. Not only that addicts that are sent to prison have higher recidivism rates and the individual leaves prison with a tarnished record making it harder to get a job so he winds up back in prison or on drugs and the cycle continues. Abortion? As far as I know people pay for their own abortions. And much like drug treatment it is pragmatic public policy. Legislating morality would be to send addicts to jail for long stretches and deny women an abortion. Legislating morality is simply one group seeking to punish another group.
That's great that libertarians want personal responsibility and I agree people should try their best to be responsible but for one reason or another they sometimes arent. So then what?
I can't say the most creative people are on the left. Only one or two of them have some good ideas, and everybody else copies them. Liberals have a tendency to be followers, after all that requires a lot less thinking.
Out of my experience, I've seen this same behavior over and over again.
Most welcome.
There's an old libertarian saying. Perfect is the enemy of better. We can't make it perfect, but we can make it better.
I do every time I don't buy a ticket to a movie.
There's a few of them, not many, but a few. http://paul.house.gov/Don't believe the lies the MSM or either political party tell you about Ron Paul. Read his reasons for his positions. They are a lot deeper than a sound byte. And they don't fit on bumper stickers.
Excellent saying. It is the TRUTH.
Perfect is the enemy of everything. In my personal life, that has manifested itself in one of the most devastating ways possible.
Imagine how devastating that is on a larger scale. Oh yeah, we have plenty of evidence of how devastating that is – millions of people killed in the pursuit of perfection.
Cutting fat or salt should be up to the person making the food and the person eating the food. In other words, people become aware that too much salt and fat are bad for you, so they stop buying things that have too much fat or salt. Therefore the producers of the food realize they aren't making any money and start to offer healthier alternatives.
The funny thing is that with store bought food, it will never be as healthy as when you make it on your own. But then you have to deal with reality – very few people have the time to be that self-sufficient. It can be done, but it takes time and it's not realistic. So we do our BEST.
And that's what pepole have been doing for a couple of decades now. I'm old enough to remember when they started selling low fat this and low salt that. And banning salt in cooking foods in restaurants! SERIOUSLY! Apparently you don't cook and neither does that dumb@ss Bloomberg.
It is a freedom issue – I have the freedom of choice to eat McDonald's or not eat McDonald's. If I eat at McDonald's and do it often enough, there are consequences. McDonald's doesn't advertise that Big Mac's are healthy for me, just that they taste good. So I make the decision. If suddenly a majority of people decided that just tasting good wasn't enough and they wanted to be more healthy, McDonald's (if they were smart) would sell other things. Oh, that's right, they do offer other things – ALL WITHOUT BEING TOLD TO BY THE GOV'T, BUT BEING URGED TO BY THE PUBLIC. WOW! And yet somehow people still like the Big Macs. So your proposal is to do what – ban Big Macs? And then that goes black market and people wind up in jail for selling, possessing and eating Big Macs. If you don't believe in the War on Drugs, then you shouldn't believe in a War on Fast Food.
And if you want to know why and why it doesn't work, I'll give you one word – PROHIBITION.
As for telling us what we can watch, read, surf, listen – Fairness Doctrine, Net Neutrality, the drawnout process for Comcast with demands that they set aside a quota of stations that they be black-owned, Al Sharpton saying that the FCC should pull licenses from stations like Fox.
Shall I go on? Those that want to censor on the "right" for "moral" reasons are just the same. Which I've already explained to you and which you have obviously ignored. There are Progs in both parties. If someone is a true conservative/libertarian, then they don't go for censorship. PERIOD. No matter the letter after their name.
"What kind of products has the left stopped you from using?" Incandescent light bulbs are going the way of the dodo. They are to be banned in the near future. Apparently, you don't keep up with the news. They are pushing to ban plastic bags. But they want to force me to buy health insurance.
Drug treatment programs – private charities can do that. A person who is an addict will either wake up and go for help or they'll die. Family members, fellow church goers, and friends can encourage a person to go for help. I don't even mind if a criminal is made to go as part of their punishment, but it should not be paid for by ME. Private programs are all around. And if it doesn't work, then we're just trimming the herd.
Abortion – I was 100% pro-choice at one time. Now I'm pro-life, but not for making abortion illegal. It's simply not possible. But I believe in trying to encourage young people not to engage in risky behavior when they are incapable of dealing with the consequences. Encourage and then let the choice be theirs. If you expect good behavior from people, you may actually get more of it. If you reward bad behavior, you'll get more bad behavior. You know, that moral hazard thing that the Left seems to just ignore.
And if people aren't responsible then they face their consequences, that's what. When enough people start facing enough negative consequences for their actions, they'll buck up and shape up. If not, then, like I said, trimming the herd.
Abortion ABSOLUTELY involves taking the lives of innocent humans! That is a scientific fact that has NO argument. None, zero. (I'm talking about typical abortions that involve a woman finding out she's pregnant at least a few weeks after conception) If you try to argue, that unborn children are hot human, you would just be trying to rationalize your support of the genocide that abortion is. So stating that you believe that the government can't legislate morality, and certainly the taking of human life is a moral issue, appears to be rationalizing your support for abortion. Do you also believe the government can't legislate stealing? Stealing is a moral issue. Almost all laws are based on moral issues, so saying the government can't legislate morality is a silly statement. Perhaps what you mean to say is that government can't force morality? A good example is hate-crime laws. Having laws based on prejudice isn't going to stop people from being prejudiced. However, having laws against lynching, with severe penalties if someone does it, WILL decrease the number of lynchings.
Congratulations on coming to accept the truth about abortion! However, I hope you will eventually come to realize that by having it legal, as a society, we are effectively condoning it. That would be like someone back in 1840 saying, " I used to believe in slavery, but don't anymore, however, I don't think slavery should be illegal". There are moral absolutes. It is ABSOLUTELY wrong to have legal abortions (except where the pregnancy would kill the mother, and therefore, kill two people).
I agree with your view on abortion as murder. I agree with your view that we are all created equal and endowed by our creator with certain inalienable rights, among them life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness.
But you know what, that doesn't change a thing. Women have been having abortions since the day they figured it out, and they will continue to do so. Government prohibition creates black markets. When something is outlawed, only law abiding people stop doing it. And criminals fill the economic vacuum.
That's why I believe the best way to tackle the problem is to get government out of the issue, and we deal with it as individual citizens. By that I mean financially supporting operations like Mom's House that provides free day care in return for volunteering single moms. Birth Rite. And taking care of our family, friends and neighbors who are struggling with the issue.
I have more faith in We The People helping each other than government "solving" the problem. We The People have a much better track record.
I direct you back to EdSki's response to you on this issue above – yes, it is absolutely a human life, to argue otherwise is to argue absurdity.
But the problem is, making it illegal doesn't make it go away. Making it illegal with "exceptions" causes people to just lie in order to obtain one. It creates more gov't, more bureacracy and more gov't effort and money going into going after these people.
I like Ed's solution and think it works the best. Also because that kind of solution also has a habit of taking hold more strongly and lasts longer – organic change, teaching personal responsibility. Think about how much better children do in families that actually teach that, rather than those that try to be more authoritarian (as opposed to authoritative), or even those that try to be more permissive.
Teach the basics of Action —-> Consequence. That is what our children are missing because of decades of entitlements and "social safety nets" that try to help people from failing.
It simply doesn't work. But expecting better behavior and teaching personal responsibility creates more and more citizens that will make the right decisions, the best decisions.
Trust me I understand what you are saying but I think what Ed and I are saying is that think it's better to fight the battle a little differently because ultimately it becomes more effective, given human nature.
Think of it this way: Why do women have abortions?
Usually because they really can't afford it, think they can't afford it, really can't handle it due to age and maturity, or think that they can't handle it due to age or maturity, or perhaps they are in an abusive relationship. I think that is the reason for most women, young and older.
Yes, there are some that use it as a form of birth control and that was always my problem with it, even when I was pro-choice.
What we need to do is address the reasons WHY they do it, and give out information to show that carrying the baby to term and giving it up for adoption is a much better alternative for both her and the baby, as well as couples who can't have children, or perhaps showing that there is help out there (private charities and church charities) if the girl/woman wants to keep the baby. I believe Ed pointed some out in his post.
Right and that's the problem. The Republican Party has just as many big-government Progressives that want to use their status/power to tell other people how the world should be. They're just as bad as Democrats. Oh but it's for moral reasons? Who's morality? God's Morality? Christian morality? That sounds a little too much like a theocracy.
Legislating morality makes no sense to me either. The thing that brought me over to the right finally and completely was listening to Larry Elder out here in L.A. He calls himself a Republitarian, but I think Conservatarian fits better given the nature of the Republican Party.
I finally understood this very important thing – personal responsibility. But the thing I also learned was this: I don't think we need to LEGISLATE anything, but what the Left has done is also change our social mores.
Again, this is not about LEGISLATING, it's about what's ACCEPTED. Many of the things that people do in this country today was not acceptable, even if it was technically legal. That is what we have lost. We have stopped expecting people to behave cordially, civilly and with some DECORUM.
Remember that story about the girls in MA that had the pregnancy pact. I don't know in the end if it was proven that there was a pact or not, but one of the girls went on Good Morning America with her boyfriend and they were interviewed by Chris Cuomo. Yes, as a journalist, you should be impartial (**snort**) and I don't think he should have been outright judgmental, but his first questions to them were:
"Oh, are you excited about having this baby? Do you know what the sex is? Do you have a name picked out?"
WTF!? This girl was 16 years old! She barely knew how to wipe her own nose and she was bringing another baby into this world perhaps based on some stupid pact and you are treating her like she's a 30 year old married woman having her first baby!
His question should have at least been serious. I don't remember what he asked after that because I stopped watching it, that's how sickened I was.
We need to restore honor in this country. It doesn't mean we all have to be church goers, or synagogue goers or anything else. Just a MORAL people. Madison said that our Constitution was for a moral people and he was right. If we were moral people, then there would be no excuse for the Gov't to start saying it needed to step in. Just like with children – don't we always tell them that if they behave, there would be no need of getting disciplined?
We need to get back to that space. It doesn't mean that people won't or can't have premarital sex, or do drugs, etc. Of course they will. People have been doing that from time immemorial. The difference was we didn't celebrate 16 year girls and unmarried women having babies because we knew that it wasn't a good situation, even if they are rich celebrities. It doesn't mean we have to shun them or anything. It just means we don't blow it up out of proportion. And we wonder why the youth is the way it is nowadays. What example are we showing them.
And this goes back to personal responsibility, which is why on moral issues I think that libertarians have it right – do as you will, but face the consequences. Keep having babies without any support and no, you're not going to get taxpayers' money to keep doing that. It doesn't literally stop you or prevent you from doing that, just like laws outlawing murder don't stop people from doing it – they merely set forth the punishment if you do. With more moral issues the punishment is more of a consequence and it's not legislated – I made a boo boo and now I have to fix it and deal with the problem.
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