Legalize Condoms: Providing Simple Birth Control

Greetings all!

This post comes in the middle of harsh winter conditions for portions of the country amid several tough political debates. In this piece of commentary, I intend to address a topic not so covered by current media. Namely, I will write my opinion on the provision of Obamacare which requires that all employers provide birth control in their employee health plans. This is not to say the issue has not resurfaced; many religious groups have lobbed legal battles against the provision. I have planned to write something specifically about this for some time, and I feel now is as good a time as any. This week’s quote comes from Carl Sagan, a man who contributed more to the popularization of science and intelligent skepticism than most people on the planet, and for that I am forever grateful to him.

Moving on, the Affordable Care Act does provide an exemption from the birth control provision for religious institutions. However, in order for any employer to be considered a religious institution, it must meet four qualifying standards. These employers’ purposes must be to instill religious values in people, they must employ and serve people whom share said religious values, and they must be nonprofit groups. Unfortunately for them, most of the institutions challenging Obamacare in court do not meet these four standards, and therefore cannot opt out of the controversial coverage. While I respect that the owners and leaders of these institutions feel their freedoms are being infringed upon, there are a few things which prevent them from opting out without meeting the legal requirements already established by Obamacare.

First, I shall argue why these employers cannot deny birth control to their employees without meeting legal requirements. The first requirement in the Affordable Care Act states that the employer must be one which exists to instill religion. Therefore, a Pizza Hut cannot deny birth control because the owner is Catholic (I do not know if this is true; this is only an example). However, business owners have argued that providing said birth control infringes upon their freedom of religion, so they should not have to provide it under the freedoms guaranteed to them by the first amendment. The problem with this argument is that their religious freedoms are not the freedoms at stake here; the owners of these businesses do not have to use birth control themselves. And because they are not a religious institution, they cannot claim that the law infringes on the rights of said institution. The rights at stake here are the employees’ rights to healthcare as provided by their employers as guaranteed by Obamacare. To challenge that right given by this law is to challenge the law itself, which has already been ruled constitutional by the Supreme Court. Essentially, the argument becomes moot because it circles to no useful end in the legal system; because there are no reasonable legal objections that can be made, the fight to remove the provision for birth control in this case cannot happen anyway.

The second and third provisions are typically tied together: the institution must employ and serve people of similar religious beliefs. To serve my points here, I’ll be using a Catholic church as my example. Let’s say you are the priest at a Catholic church; you own that church, you employ its workers, and you give sermons to your Catholic congregants. For now, we’re going to ignore all the other people a Catholic church may serve, i.e. by giving to the poor. The new law requires you to provide birth control to your employees, but you reject this. However, you cannot do this without confirming that every person you employ is a Catholic. If even one employee is not a Catholic, you cannot withhold birth control because you do not meet the legal requirements to be considered a religious institution. You may say that it infringes on your personal religious beliefs, but in truth withholding that birth control infringes on the healthcare rights of any employee of yours that is not Catholic. In fact, denying that birth control may infringe on the personal religious beliefs of your employees, in which case you cannot say that your higher position in the church means you can swing your religious weight around. The rights of your employees are equal to your rights, and the more there are of them the more ridiculous your case is.

And now comes the final requirement under the law, which states that the religious institution in question must be a nonprofit group as is codified under federal tax law. This one rarely comes under much scrutiny in America; most religious institutions like churches do fit the legal requirements to be considered a nonprofit, mostly because churches do not typically conduct commercial activities for profit. For the ones that do (say, selling candied almonds from within the building to people whether they are church members or not), they should not be considered wholly nonprofit institutions, and therefore should not be able to opt out of birth control coverage as a result. This is simpler to understand and argue for; if a religious institution is making profits off of its work, it should be able to handle providing birth control as a caveat even if the personal beliefs of the leaders at that institution conflict with providing such coverage.

My last point is one which is especially more contentious to make, in that I believe that no religious institution should be able to opt out of the birth control coverage even if it meets all four legal requirements under Obamacare. While at first glance this is because I oppose the continuous gifting of loopholes to religion in American law, there is a deeper piece to it. By giving an option to opt out to the leaders of religious institutions instead of the employees, we place greater power towards religious freedoms than we do to healthcare rights. And while the United States does not have a tradition of universal healthcare, I still hold this as a right all Americans deserve. By giving the ability to refuse this healthcare, we only obstruct the process towards providing this long overdue right to the American public. And while some may disagree on whether healthcare is a right or not, it is my firm belief that everyone has the right to a life once they've got it. Healthcare is necessary to that life, in my eyes.

That is the end of my argument, and I hope I’ve provided sound reasoning for my cause. As always, I encourage constructive criticism in the comments section. I am also open for my contact at my email of zerospintop@live.com, my Facebook, Twitter, Google+, Steam, Tumblr, and DeviantArt. Good night, and this is KnoFear signing off. 

Public Genocide: The Right and Responsibilities of Guns

Greetings all!

This post comes on a holiday for Americans, notably Martin Luther King, Jr. Day. The holiday also coincides with the presidential inauguration ceremonies. Today, we as Americans are intended to celebrate a man and what he did to bring us together and fight against a system which divided us so unjustly. And while the spirit of his fight lives on today, perfection is far from being realized. In particular, a debate over restrictions on firearms has reopened as of late, and it starkly points towards how separate we view things as basic as the Constitution on which we base our nation. As such, I felt it prudent to address the topic in the most useful manner: as a constitutional argument. In light of the points made by both sides of this debate, I see it necessary to present why some points are definitely wrong and some are definitely right. I will not be addressing small points of hypocrisy on either side, as I intend to avoid small issues. This week’s quote is from Mohammad Mosaddegh, one of very few democratically elected Iranian prime ministers prior to the institution of the Shah or the theocratic government we are familiar with now.

Moving on, much of the gun rights debate centers on the Second Amendment to the Constitution. The original text of the amendment is as follows: “A well regulated militia, being necessary to the security of a free state, the right of the people to keep and bear arms, shall not be infringed.” While brief, the basic intention of the amendment is clear; that all Americans should have the general right to firearms as part of the Constitutional Republic we have created. The issue in contention is how liberal or restricted these rights should be. There are some cut and dry things that absolutely any sane person can agree on. First, that our gun laws should not be completely unrestricted, nor should the opposite case be true. People should not be able to have fully functioning tanks and nuclear weapons, yet people should also be able to hunt with something other than a toy water gun.

To begin, I’d like to remind all those people shouting that the Second Amendment absolutely guarantees them the right to any gun they reasonably want. Yes, the Constitution does guarantee certain rights to all people in America. You have the right to free speech, the right to a speedy trial by jury, and the freedom from cruel and unusual punishment. However, something we seem to have forgotten is that attached to each right is a responsibility. While you have a right to free speech, you have the responsibility to ensure that speech does not directly endanger others or infringe on others’ rights in any way. You have the right to a trial by jury, but you have the responsibility to show up in time and to participate in said trial in a legal manner. These responsibilities are a part of life, a part of the Constitution, and are necessary to maintain a peaceful, civil society.

This connection between rights and responsibilities exists for the use of firearms as well. You have the right to own and possess firearms, this is absolutely true. You also have the responsibility to not endanger others with those firearms, and the responsibility to not infringe on other people’s rights with those firearms. This is a key element of the right to firearms that seems to have been removed from the entire debate; the responsibilities attached to every single bullet. You may be able to hold onto a gun in public, but you cannot take it out and point it at people whenever you like. This directly endangers them, even if you do not intend to shoot them. You have the right to own a hunting rifle, but the responsibility to use it only for hunting. You have the right to own a weapon for self-defense if you feel it necessary, but you have the responsibility to prevent those weapons from being used for anything but self-defense. You must also prevent your firearms from infringing upon the rights of others. You cannot keep a person from speaking or expressing their religion with your weapons, in any way. This applies to all of society, and we must remember that.

At the center of our gun debate is how far restrictions on the right to bear arms should go. Before I get into the specifics of how far regulations should go, let me explain why there should be regulations in the first place. Most of us can quite honestly say that humanity is imperfect. We do not treat others in the purest of ways. We envy those with something we want, and when we get it we only want more. We wish horrible things upon others in vengeance, and rarely give to those who truly need or deserve it. My point is that we are unpredictable, and that given a chance one of us always does something wrong, no matter what group we are part of. Therefore, we must be willing to provide basic rules to society to prevent humanity as a group from performing actions which damage us. This is why there are laws against driving drunk, laws against killing people, etc. Laws exist because we are imperfect and we must limit ourselves to prevent awful things from happening as best we can. True, criminals will always break laws. But that is no reason to abolish those laws.

And now we come to the grueling part: how far gun restrictions should go. Guns are incredibly dangerous, and that is why it is very easy to suggest large restrictions on them. At the same time, these restrictions must not infringe on the personal right to use a gun for reasonable purposes. There are only two reasonable purposes towards owning a firearm: hunting for sport or sustenance, and self-defense. It is obvious that we must be willing to increase our support for better mental health in this nation; that is clear. What matters even more when restricting guns is keeping them out of the hands of those that can cause damage without having these issues. Any person can make mistakes, and with guns those mistakes turn deadly very quickly. And in either of the purposes for owning a gun, I will suggest that no form of semi-automatic weapon is necessary.

In hunting, semi-automatic weapons are absolutely pointless. Remember that the deer can’t shoot you back, and has no idea what a gun even is. If you can’t hit a target without multiple rounds that fire at unimaginable rates, chances are that you’re just a bad shot. Instead of forcing people to live in a world with dangerous weaponry intended to kill, in this instance it is better to learn to accept your level of skill or try to improve. Either way, the semi-automatic weapon you’ve got is just not reasonable for hunting, unless you plan on hunting down people.

Self-defense is typically considered a less clear area on semi-automatic weapons, but I cannot see why. It is reasonable to have a gun for self-defense, this I can see. If absolutely necessary, I cannot object to someone arming themselves just in case the worst happens. However, semi-automatic weapons are not meant for defense, they are intended for offense. If thirty people assault you, a semi-automatic weapon would be a great thing to have. But if you honestly expect huge groups of people to assault you, you’re just being paranoid. We do not live in a nation where huge gangs exist in every city, suburb, and rural town, just waiting for someone to walk down the street without powerful weaponry in their possession. True, crime does exist in America. However, it is not so prolific as to warrant use of weapons intended for military-style offense. I’m fairly certain most people can survive any typical assault just by owning a .44 magnum revolver.

This is all I propose for now, outside of more extensive background checks and limits on the sale and purchase of weaponry. However, I firmly believe that the elimination of semi-automatic weaponry should be our top priority, as these weapons are not intended for anything wholesome. They are intended for death.

That is the end of this, and I hope I’ve provided clear reasoning for my wishes. I am always open for contact through the comments and my email of zerospintop@live.com. I am also open for contact on my Facebook, Twitter, Google+, Steam, and DeviantArt accounts if necessary. Good night, and this is KnoFear, signing off. 

A Lengthy Imagination: Debt and All of its Shackles

Greetings all!

This post concerns a topic I seem to have ignored as a singular topic; I have addressed it in a general sense, yet never directly as its own issue. Namely, debt, both on the parts of debt possessed by individuals and by nations. It seems to be something we talk about a lot, so it’s a great time to address it. This week’s quote comes from Julia Gillard, the current Prime Minister of Australia and head of the Australian Labor Party.

Moving on, debt is an omnipresent topic in both American and European political debates. The U.S. has racked up over 16 trillion dollars in debt, and many other developed nations are currently struggling with unfavorable debt-to-GDP ratios as well. This can become a huge problem on international markets because it scares off investors and buyers; having lots of debt makes people think these countries won’t be able to pay off that debt. Logically, this is sound given the current system of money changing hands in our global economy. If you can’t trust someone with money, you don’t give them money. Unfortunately, just like the “live within your means” adage, you can’t apply these principles to nations. It’s more complex than that.

This is because, as always, governments do not operate on the same levels as individuals. A person works solely for the benefit of him or herself, or a family if they so choose to. However, a government works in cycles solely for the benefit of its constituents (or at least, such is the purpose of government). Government depends on public sector workers to keep it running, and taxes to keep itself paid for. It then uses this money and work force to improve the lives of others; such is the goal of a society that is mutualistic. If a person functioned in the same manner, he or she would probably fall into deep poverty trying to provide for everyone in a matter of weeks.

Because governments function in a manner fundamentally different from the way that individuals function with money, the way that national debt is treated must be different than the way we treat personal debt. Namely, being more forgiving towards debt is an absolute necessity. Allow me to break this down further: governments are not businesses, in any sense of the word. The central difference is that a business holds its first loyalty to its executives and its shareholders; the consumers come second. Such is the nature of private companies; they seek to serve themselves and keep themselves buoyant. A government holds its first loyalty to absolutely everyone in the country; that is why holding a job for the government is considered public sector work. The government holds a direct interest in providing for the interests of the public; if it fails in this regard, the result is often protests, which if not addressed lead to revolutions and sometimes violent civil wars, for example the current Syrian Civil War. While in essence the government still serves to protect its interests of peace and security, these interests are reflected by citizens; it is rare for any populace to be hoping for war.

As such, governments do not focus solely on profits like businesses do. The sole interest of a business is to function so that profits are maximized without directly endangering the stability of the business itself. If that means firing employees and cutting benefits, so be it. If that means creating newer and better products, so be it; a business is directly tied to its own success in a monetary sense alone. Governments, however, focus on giving to citizens rather than to politicians. True, public sector workers up to legislators have salaries, but that is out of necessity; these people cannot work for free in a capitalist society. In the end, the government runs on a model which is purely intended as generous to all, and that is why debt on the part of that government must be treated differently.

I’ll present my example as Greece. Greece is a nation hobbled by the sheer act of paying off its debts; the country recently passed new tax laws in order to service its payments, even though said taxes will unreasonably punish just about everyone in the country that isn’t already in poverty. The EU and Germany have been particularly harsh on Greece, and world markets seem to shift on a dime each time a law is passed there. I’ve heard countless times that we can’t count on Greece to repay its debts, that the situation is so unstable and that is why the Eurozone is in crisis. But let’s be honest; is there anyone out there that honestly believes Greece is poor and unsustainable enough to actually not pay its debts? Does anyone actually think that Greece, a country at the center of world trade for decades, will default and fall into shambles during peacetime? The logical response is a resounding no; we should not be so ready to doubt Greece, a nation which had done fairly well for itself up until the 2008 financial crisis. However, our unreasonable fears over Greece’s ability to pay these debts leads us to shake up international markets and demand austerity from a people that grows increasingly restless over the harsh measures lorded over their heads. If we could learn to forgive these debts or extend the payments to a reasonable timeframe, we likely would not have such an enormous problem over solvency of the Euro. The same is true of Portugal, Spain, Italy, and Ireland, all nations that have either been bailed out or are considered at risk of needing a bailout. If we don’t let our fiscal fears rule our judgments of these nations, we would see that we are causing our own distress. By exercising extra pressure on these economies, we put undue stress on nations that cannot handle it. If we ease up just a bit, I’m sure we wouldn’t be mired in such a mess.

The secondary topic of debt which I wish to address is individual debt. In this part, I wish solely to focus on Americans, so a brief apology to those international readers for not being too global on this. Anyway, we as Americans seem to have an addiction to debt, or rather an addiction to spending which puts us in debt. We consume pointless products using credit cards that we probably shouldn't have in the first place. We rack up student loan debt for colleges we weren’t prepared for and certainly couldn’t afford, even with aid. We obviously have trouble giving and receiving loans from others as a nation; we are compulsive, and rarely consider the ramifications of what we’re doing with our money. However, as with governments, forgiveness and loosening the stranglehold of debt is a viable solution.

Let me ask another question. How many of us know a person who is an absolute mooch. They take your money but never pay it back, mooch dinner off of you and friends and say they’ll “get you later,” etc. Most of us know at least one person like this, especially if you hate them (or are them). Most people would say that because people like this exist, debt should not be so easily forgiven; because there will always be moochers that need to learn a lesson about the value of money. But the thing is, for every moocher friend you have, chances are the rest of your friends are the opposite. They pay off loans quickly, they’re not routinely late on bills, etc. And the most important thing about those moochers is that they will not learn that lesson which debt is intended to teach. At that point, that lazy attitude is typically ingrained, and it’s not something that will change without serious time in jail (and anyone that suggests someone who can’t pay off their debts go to jail for years is far too harsh on soft crime). By keeping the boot of debt on people that honestly don’t deserve such treatment, we suppress the flow of money in our economy. Every payment that comes with interest is damaging our masses of consumers, and under a capitalist system it’s unsustainable.

That is all for this week, and I hope I’ve provided sound reasoning for all of my points. I can still be contacted directly through the comments here, and my email at zerospintop@live.com is always open. I am also available for contact through Facebook, Google+, DeviantArt, and Steam, so ask away as necessary. Good night, and this is KnoFear, signing off. 

Aggressive Apathy: The Problem of Fatalism

Greetings all!

This post comes as the first of 2013 for my blog, which has finally achieved the URL and name change I desired. While the actual name we have is temporary, the URL is final, and reflects who I am on this site best. This post will be short, but addresses an important point of politics I’ve noticed fairly often these days: apathy. People seem to have given up on politics and on governments in general, saying there is no use trying or arguing because nothing can be changed. This is a dangerous trend in my eyes.

At the core of the issue is fatalism. Many have decided that because there is so much to fight against, that no fight can ever be successful. That because societal norms haven’t changed yet, there is no use pursuing that change. This is exemplified by the people that say all politicians are corrupt, that all political parties are awful. People who denounce politics in general as a dirty business and decide to stay out of the entire process because of the negative blanket they lay over such subjects.

Initially, this would not seem like such a big problem. If some people want to opt out of it all in disgust, why make them stay, right? The problem is not when a few people do this; the problem emerges when this belief of absolute corruption and negativity spreads far enough to convince significant amounts of people to just give up on things. At that point, fewer people care to educate themselves or to participate in democracy, and the fewer participants a republic has the less success it will reap.

But how to argue against this attitude? Other than noting how inherently lazy it is, there are few ways to convince someone with such a belief set that it is worth becoming reinvested. However, there are a few things that can be said for having a little faith in government, politicians, and politics in general.

First, not all politicians are corrupt. This is such an easy thing to see. If it were true, we would be in an even greater mess than we are today. So would the rest of the planet; I seriously doubt we’d be in anything but a severe depression if all politicians were out for money and power. If entire governments were devoting themselves to such pesky inner squabbles, we would have absolutely nothing to show for ourselves in the way of progress. It can be argued that some politicians are indeed corrupt; this is obvious, and it will always inevitably occur. But deciding that because some are corrupt we should quit is just pathetic.

Second, many people seem to have lost faith in governments in general. I have encountered some that say all governments on Earth right now are corrupt and inefficient structurally, and that fighting systems so laden down already is pointless. The problem with this is that, even if it were true, giving up would mean agreeing with the corrupt systems. By rolling over and allowing such evils, these people accede to exactly that which they abhor. Any person who declares all governments corrupt or something along those lines therefore must fight against it; otherwise, they are being hypocrites in the most passive way possible. However, in the end, not all governments are corrupt in the same way that not all politicians are corrupt. Once again, if this were true, it would be more than apparent in our societies and economies by now.

The last point is the most important one, and that is the point of being apathetic politically. I have heard people say that all political viewpoints are awful, that political debate is poisonous, and that there is no point in challenging the status quo. This was exemplified when a friend of mine debated religion with me, and we got into why bad things happen to good people. He, being religious, suggested that because we cannot change god’s will there is no point in trying to change the way things are. He stated that tragedies will occur, and the best thing we can learn to do is accept them and move on with our lives. And while this philosophy is good within reason, it can be extended too far. We should be able to accept that sometimes houses will catch on fire for no good reason and people will die. We should learn to mourn the loss in these families, and then move on from things like this.

Yet we must be willing to try to change the things we have the power to change. If gender inequality persists, we must be willing to fight for the equal rights and treatment of both genders, even if it seems like societal barriers have been set up all around us. If educational inequality persists, we must be willing to make tertiary schooling easily accessible for those that deserve it rather than just those that can afford it. If economic inequality persists, we must be willing to do more to ensure that those getting the short end of the stick can make do while those with more give up a little to make things more tolerable for the rest of us. There are many things we can change if we put some effort into it; we can’t give in. We can’t stop fighting because we’re surrounded. Never lay down your principles; you lose the instant you do. As long as we fight, we don’t lose until we die.

That is all for this week, and all of my old contact sites are still intact. I encourage commenting here, or you can send emails to me at zerospintop@live.com. My Facebook, Google+, Twitter, DeviantArt, and Steam profiles are all also available for contact if necessary. Good night, and this is KnoFear, signing off.