Of course you know this: The left freaks out on a regular basis over the idea that Christians will gain power in government and force everyone to practice Christianity. Of course, we Christians are interested in doing no such thing. Forced faith isn't faith at all. We want everyone to willingly give their hearts to Christ, but we have no interest in using the force of law to make you do so.
The left, on the other hand, is more than willing to force those who disagree with their secular leftism to practice it. Case in point: The ObamaCare mandate that employers pay for contraception benefits even if they have a moral objection to doing so. To the left, the law can make no room for your moral objections because access to contraception is really important and really good. And there are studies! Studies that say access to contraception reduces teen pregnancy! So your moral objections don't matter in the face of studies, and your freedom to do what you want with your own money must bow in the face of public good as defined by the secular left.
So it was when Barack Obama ran the executive branch of the government, anyway. Now it's run by Donald Trump, and among all the other things the left can't stand about Trump, he actually listens to Christians who think these contraception studies aren't all they're cracked up to be. He also thinks that if you don't want to supply someone with pills or condoms or IUDs or diaphrams or whatever, you shouldn't be forced to do so because someone published a study that says these are really good things.
Because it's your money, not theirs.
This has the left in a complete meltdown, and nothing has them more incensed that the fact that Trump is listening to people who listen to God:
The Trump administration’s proposed reversal of a requirement that health insurers cover contraception relies on the work of religious researchers who dispute a fundamental public health tenet — that easier access to birth control reduces the rate of unintended pregnancies.
The proposed change to the Obama-era mandate leans heavily on the philosophy that increasing access to contraception will encourage sexual activity, while discounting newer, highly reliable forms of long-acting contraception that have been credited for reducing teen pregnancy and abortion.
“This is an ‘alternative facts’ problem that they’re latching onto,” said Dr. Jennifer Childs-Roshak, president of the Planned Parenthood Advocacy Fund of Massachusetts. “There is longstanding excellent research and science behind the fact that birth control does work.”
Thirty-year-low rates of abortion, teen pregnancy, and unintended pregnancy have all been logged in recent years. But those trends started before the Affordable Care Act began requiring most insurance plans to cover contraception for free. The government doesn’t yet have data on the rate of unintended pregnancies during the five years since the mandate took effect on Aug. 1, 2012.
Absent clear data that could demonstrate its impact, the Trump administration is arguing that contraception doesn’t present an overwhelming enough public benefit to require coverage by employers who disagree with it. Contraceptive opponents often attribute the decreasing rates of teen pregnancy and abortion to abstinence, their own educational efforts, or new restrictions being imposed at the state levels.
“In the absence of a substantive health benefit, I don’t see strong a public health reason to kind of violate the conscience rights of employers that would prefer not to cover these contraceptives,” said Michael J. New, who works for the Charlotte Lozier Institute — the research arm of the antiabortion organization Susan B. Anthony List — and whose research is cited in the new draft rule.
If the regulation takes hold, it would represent a swift government turnaround on a public health issue. Where Obamacare treated birth control as a basic matter of preventive health, the Trump proposal considers it through the lens of morality, siding with employers who object to providing it to female employees.
Support Canada Free Press
The regulation includes language suggesting that a family’s health care coverage could encourage a teenager to be sexually active, even if she’s not in the “sexually active at-risk population.” That’s defined as low-income, minority women ages 18 to 24 who didn’t graduate from high school and aren’t married.
“It leaves me speechless,” said Childs-Roshak. “The paternalistic overtone — that suggests that somehow providing access to birth control will make people have more sex — is like saying providing access to diabetes medication means that people are going to eat more candy bars.”
She noted that Teresa Manning, Trump’s pick to oversee family planning nationwide, doesn’t believe contraception works, and once said family planning should take place “between a husband and a wife and God.” Trump’s Health and Human Services secretary, Tom Price, denied that any women are unable to afford birth control and called the mandate “a trampling on religious freedom and religious liberty in this country.”
Advocates for reproductive rights said the government’s proposed policy change is skewed by ideology.
“It’s not mainstream at all,” said Mara Gandal-Powers, senior counsel for the National Women’s Law Center. “It’s not mainstream science and it’s also not mainstream the way people think.”
Pay attention, by the way, to how often you hear people like Mara Gandal-Powers declare that certain ways of thinking - particularly biblical ways of thinking - are "not mainstream" or "not normal." This has become a very aggressive tactic of the left in recent times, essentially pointing their fingers at the people they don't agree with and saying, "You're weird!"
It's basically sixth grade all over again.
I included a fairly lengthy excerpt because there's a lot to unpack here. We'll start with the usual left-wing presumption that people can't get a certain thing unless government a) provides it to them; or b) forcees someone else to provide it to them. Birth control pills are not expensive. You can get them for as little as $9. If you're single and/or a teenager and sexually active and you don't want to have a baby - a scenario I don't recommend, needless to say - $9 doesn't seem like an unreasonable investment for you to have to make in your future.
And talk about paternalistic: If you don't want to have a baby, there's an option available to you that doesn't cost you a dime. Don't have sex. To those who call that "unrealistic," I say you're the ones who are being paternalistic. If you don't think people can be trusted to exercise the one option that's guaranteed to work, then what must you think about the judgment, discipline and self-control of these people? Don't want a DUI? Don't drink. Don't want to die in a skydiving accident? Don't jump out of a plane. Don't want to get pregnant? Don't screw.
I'm not even making a moral argument here. I'm making an argument about risks and outcomes. If a certain outcome is absolutely unacceptable to you, then eliminating a certain choice that risks that outcome is the most rational thing you can do. One might even say it's science! Liberals love science except when it argues for behavior that's consistent with biblical morality.
Also, why do liberals think that widespread sexual promiscuity is perfectly fine as long as it doesn't result in pregnancy? They usually argue, "It's none of your business!" But if you're forcing me to pay for someone's sexual activity, it becomes my business.
And yes, secular left, the fact that it's my money means my moral concerns matter. And should. Your opposition to all limits on people's moral behavior is not my problem
The fact is, employers don't want it to be. They don't want to tell people what to do or not to do with their private lives. They want no part of it. What the left wants is to say, "You have to pay for it but you have nothing to say about it."
And amidst all this, what scandalizes the liberals at the Boston Globe is that the perspective of Christians is playing a role in the administration's position, even as they offer us quotes from the likes of Planned Parenthood as if they are unbiased experts just presenting the facts.
Personally, I have no problem with contraception used by married couples, and I can find nothing in the Bible that forbids it (or I would also be against it). But I do have a moral objection to promiscuity among single people. So if I'm the employer, I simply want to pay people enough - cash, that is - to be able to afford their own choices. And I'll pray that they make good choices. You want me to buy your contraception for you? No. I pay you plenty. Make your own choices with the money you're paid and be responsible for those choices.
And yes, secular left, the fact that it's my money means my moral concerns matter. And should. Your opposition to all limits on people's moral behavior is not my problem.
