Take the Ten Commandments controversy. Quick recap: Alabama judge Roy Moore, who once supported a decision to deny a lesbian custody of her child (and giving it to the abusive father) because he thought her lifestyle was despicable, was ordered in 2002 to remove a large statue of the Ten Commandments from in front of his court. He refused, and a media circus ensued until the state removed it for him. My home state of Idaho has an analogous situation; in 2004 a similar statue, donated years previously by Cecil B. DeMille to promote his film about the commandments, was removed from a public park in Boise, and now the zombie horse is getting kicked. Some folks got an initiative put on the November ballot to decide whether or not to reinstall it. People in both cases say the statues should stay because our nation’s laws are founded on the Ten Commandments. Are they serious? For those of you who aren’t keeping score…

1. No gods before God - I know people with no gods, period. Not a law.
2. No false idols -… such as Ten Commandments statues. Not a law.
3. No taking God's name in vain - while there are obscenity laws, I don't know of any place that outlaws "God!" as a swear word. Not a law.
4. Keep the Sabbath day holy - many places close early on Sunday, but that's a matter of custom and about the extent of this commandment’s application. Not a law.
5. Honor your father and your mother – (sigh) Not a law.
6. No murdering – except in instances of Crusade. Score one point for the commandments crowd.
7. No adultery – the definition of adultery has changed over the years, and I can’t imagine anyone being prosecuted for it outside of a vendetta. Half a point.
8. No stealing – Yes, stealing is illegal. One point.
9. No lying – to the public; your acquaintances are fair game, however. Half a point.
10. No coveting – As George Carlin said, “Coveting your neighbor’s goods is what keeps the economy going!” Not a law.

Picture taken from AP Photo, doctored by yours truly

Three points out of a possible ten. That’s pretty poor performance for the basis of our code of law. “But, but,” they say, “it’s a guide for model behavior!” Maybe it is, outside of the first three or four commandments being a vanity project for God, but I and most other (non-Christian) people don’t need a written reminder not to murder, lie, steal, or be a general douche bag. Our parents beat it into us pretty well; they didn’t kill us, so apparently there was nothing wrong with it.

Ah yes, child murder. The abortion debate, a fixture of American discourse since even before Roe vs. Wade, took a jackboot step to the far right this past March in South Dakota, where governor Mike Rounds signed into law a bill that outlaws any and all abortions, unless the mother’s life is in danger, even in pregnancy resultant of incest or rape. Maybe he’s just playing to his base and hoping that the all those rape victims will just miscarry out of, you know, shame and disgust so that they won’t have to have the abortion.

An abortion is a terrible, ugly thing, as the Pro-Life demonstrators will gladly show you, but at this point it’s a rather necessary step. The human population has doubled over the past four decades to some 6.5 billion, and simply put, we don’t need anymore people. Sorry! There’s lots of needy children here and around the world already; let’s try to get them fed before we invite more to the table. Then again, as Congress’ abhorrent intervention in the Terri Schiavo case showed, the quality of life doesn’t really matter. As long as you have a pulse, that’s good enough for them.

I would empathize more with the Pro-Life stance if it wasn’t so single-minded about procreation. Abortions should be a last resort, but what do you expect when there are so many people who are out to ban birth control pills and discredit condoms? Seriously, the politicians trying to outlaw abortions think the morning-after pill is a convenient abortion, the condom a body bag, masturbation pre-emptive murder, and gay men an abomination. They try to spread the (patently false) message that condoms don’t work so don’t bother, so is it any wonder that so many teenagers forgo abstinence (a lofty, but mostly unrealistic ideal) and end up pregnant and then unable stop it early? The Pro-Life movement seems less about protecting the children than it is trying to keep people from having sex for purposes other than propagating seed.

But whatever, live and let live, right? Dead fetuses and stem cells (or abortion doctors and Alzheimer’s patients, take your pick) notwithstanding, yes… unless you’re doing something that offends the sensibilities of one of these fundamentalists; then you’re “infringing on their right to freedom of religion.” Don’t believe me? That’s exactly how the gay marriage debate is being reframed. It’s how pharmacists get out of filling out contraceptive prescriptions for people whose lifestyle they don’t agree with. It’s how such a national ruckus is raised about teaching a (nonexistent) controversy over Evolution and Intelligent Design that our own Bob Fields felt compelled to give some time in his Biology class to a Christian pastor, mayhap in order to head off any potential protestations made by overzealous students of faith who think a continually refined and tested body of empirical knowledge has the same (scientific) validity as a 3,000 year-old book that says a guy and his family were able to fit two of every animal on Earth onto a boat to avoid drowning in a worldwide flood. And don’t even me get started on the “War on Christmas”…

A recent New York Times article details the advantage Christians (and other religious groups) receive over secular organizations (day cares, soup kitchens, and the like) thanks to their faith-based status. We’ve got God’s name on our currency, we swear on the Bible in court, and the country shuts down on December 25th. So please, spare us this talk of discrimination. We’ve built up a tolerance for PCP; let’s get rid of it before it becomes a dependence.