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Date:         Sat, 12 Dec 1992 12:29:31 -0500
From:         Matthew Beams <BEAMSMATT@URVAX.URICH.EDU>
Subject:      An unbelievable article.
Comments: To: words-l%uga.bitnet@uga.cc.uga.edu

Wordslers,

While waiting for Academic Computing to open I sat in the lounge reading this
magazine that was on the table.  "Chronicles" it is called, and it purports to
be "A Magazine of American Culture".  Well, let me tell you something, that is
pure hogwash.  It is, in fact, a magazine of ultra-right-wing Christian
Fundamentalism.  I was immediatedly taken aback by the fact that they were
trying to dupe me into thinking this was some sort of entertainment or artistic
kind of thing.  I stumble upon this article which so thoroughly appalled me
that I had to share some parts of it with you.

"Cultural Revolutions", by Llewellyn H. Rockwell, Jr. in the December 1992
issue of "Chronicles:  A Magazine of American Culture".

        What do you get if you cross six Catholic Bishops with five "Christian
        feminists"?  The answer:  economic ignorance and cultural lunacy. . . .

(The article goes on to talk about the meeting between American Catholic
Bishops and women's organisations WRT the document "Called To Be One in Christ
Jesus:  A Pastoral Response to the Concerns of Women for Church and Society.")

        . . . Not acting immorally, unjustly, or uncharitably toward women;
        that has always been a sin.  It is rather the political iniquity of
        seeing men and women as different.  Surely we are not called to be
        identical in Christ, but to these bishops and their feminist comrades,
        the ACLU offenses are the real ones.

        Women, the authors tell us with horror, "earn approximately 65 cents
        for every dollar paid to men."  This must be corrected through
        government-mandated "equality."  As even a liberal bishop should be
        able to see, the Creator made each of us different.  There is no
        equality in the talents we receive from God or the use we make of them.
        In fact, it is our radical inequality that makes the economy possible.
        If we were identical there would be no division of labor.

(Pretty fantastic, huh?  Not only does it degrade women, but blasts the
Catholic Church.  I just have to quote one more paragraph for you.  This is the
best reading I've done in ages!!)

        At the risk of shocking moderns:  only women are equipped physically,
        psychologically, and spiritually to bear and raise children.  (That
        seems a truism and it is, but no form of truth is popular today.)
        Because of this, women do not have the same drive for power as men, or
        therefore the same role in the division of labor.  As sociologist
        Steven Goldberg has shown, men have dominated the high-paying, high-
        prestige positions in every society in history.  To the extent that
        women come to dominate a formerly male profession - medicine in Russia,
        for example - it loses status.


So, has anyone else overheated yet?  Can you even believe that there are not
only still believe who believe things like this, but who publish their thoughts
on it?  I'm not saying that people are not entitled to their own beliefs, I
just can't believe someone hasn't stoned this guy yet.  :-)

Well, I'm off to read and write two book reviews.  (Isn't it funny how all
through middle school and high school we write "book reports" but suddenly
when we get to college they become "book *reviews*"?)

Matthew

beamsmatt@urvax.bitnet
beamsmatt@urvax.urich.edu

prescriptivist and proud