Libertarian vs. Libertines
July 18th, 2008 by Peter
Teen motherhood is rising for the first time in 15 years and the Courant’s sole libertarian columnist has had enough. Larry Cohen today stepped away from his usual fiscal concerns to speak some indelicate truths about virtue in Connecticut:
The “abstinence” movement in its current form has somehow been transformed into something President Bush and a cadre of conservative Christians invented in a conspiracy against being cool. Thus, mainline churches and cool parents and “progressive” school systems are more inclined to buy bananas to facilitate the condom lessons — and send the kids off to birth-control clinics and abortion mills that don’t ask too many questions.
At the very least, cranky politicians might stand up on the steps of the state Capitol and vow to charge the “boyfriends” of pregnant young girls with statutory rape — and really mean it. That doesn’t happen, either…
We in the Northeast seem especially paralyzed when it comes to speaking out against premarital sex — or at least suggesting that sexual restraint isn’t abnormal. We are apparently much too cool for such stuff, when it is so much easier to transform abortion into an unofficial sacrament, hand out condoms like candy on Halloween and celebrate sexual irresponsibility with an enthusiasm that encourages more of it.
Cohen’s column is sure to resonate with FIC members who helped to defeat the sex-ed bills, create the task force to study the causes of fatherlessness in Connecticut and attended Hartford police chief Daryll Roberts’ stirring National Day of Prayer speech. You can read the whole column here.