Many self-identifying Republicans have no understanding of the term “conservatism.” Case in point, the recent kerfuffle that ensued when conservative leaders of the Turning Point USA organization rightfully revoked an invitation to porn star “Brandi Love” to attend the Student Action Summit as a VIP. Love was asked to leave the event intended for high school and college students after attendees found out what she does for a living. To be clear, Love, who self-identifies as “conservative,” is not a former porn star. She is a current porn star who heartily affirms pornography.

Anyone who celebrates, voluntarily performs in, and profits from pornography or any other “sex work” is, by those acts, not conservative. A conservative who engages in or approves of “sex work,” porn use, legalized human slaughter, cross-sex impersonation, or homosexual acts or relationships is not conservative. The Republican big tent should no more include affirmation of pornography (or same-sex faux-marriage, abortion, or cross-sex identification) than it should include climate hysteria, China-collaboration, or open border fanaticism.

Suffering from a case of unrighteous indignation, the judgmental Love huffed and puffed that TPUSA felt “like a religious cult” because of the presence of conservative Christians. That makes three subjects about which she knows little:  religious cults, Christianity, and conservatism.

Love asked rhetorically, “How can conservatives expect to grow as a movement when they don’t seem to respect professions?” Seriously? What principle demands conservatives hold “sex work” in esteem?

And if the growth of the conservative movement does require inclusion of the porn industry, then it deserves to die.

Love continued in her criticism of TPUSA’s decision to disinvite her: “It’s stupid to persecute people who have a different lifestyle than you.” She sounds remarkably like run-of-the-mill leftists who see dissent from their moral and political views as persecution, bigotry, and hatred.

Her “lifestyle” emerges from and is justified by her moral and political beliefs—beliefs that are antithetical to conservative moral and political beliefs. Disinviting a public figure who affirms and celebrates acts that grossly violate conservative principles does not constitute persecution.

At least as troubling as Love being invited in the first place to the event at which teens as young as 15 were present are the responses from purported conservatives like Federalist co-founder Ben Domenech who tweeted, “The right has an opportunity to be the big tent party. Don’t be a bunch of prudes.”

Calling conservatives who oppose pornography, which degrades women and destroys families, “a bunch of prudes” exposes Domenech’s ignorance and unfitness for a leadership role in any conservative movement. Sexual continence and boundaries are essential for the welfare and prosperity of any society. Reining in the prodigious and profligate sexual impulses of humans—especially male humans—is a first order, necessary business of any healthy society—far more important than business regulations or tax rates.

That Domenech sanctimoniously dismisses opposition to body-, soul-, family-, and culture-destroying pornography as prudery, designating it an obstacle to the GOP quest for power is a sure sign that the decline of America will continue. Domenech and his collaborators don’t really want a big tent. They want porn stars and homosexuals in the tent and theologically orthodox Christians out, or at least silenced and neutered.

Love strained to use conservative principles to defend her position:

TPUSA literally opened the show talking about how we need to fight back against big tech censorship, cancel culture, the deterioration of our 1^st Amendment. … and then they expelled me. … It’s a worst case example of cancel culture.

Nope, big tech didn’t censor her. Her First Amendment rights were not denied. And being asked to leave the event was not an example of cancel culture, no matter how many times she and her creepy fans assert it was.

Love’s obscene twitter feed is filled with comments from supporters who self-identify as “conservative” and apparently believe that private conservative organizations that adhere to their own principles—which include opposition to sexual deviance—are card-carrying members of the cancel culture. For the woefully ill-informed, here’s the difference between cancel culture and disinviting a porn star from a private conservative event:

Cancel culture seeks to ban the expression of ideas from the public square, for example, from open social media platforms, college campuses, and the opinion pages of newspapers. Cancel culture seeks to get people fired from their jobs for expressing ideas leftists hate.

TPUSA is a private organization hosting an event to promote conservative ideas. Disinviting a public figure who not only opposes some of TPUSA’s beliefs—especially fundamental ideas about sexuality—but also actively works against them in ways that TPUSA views as destructive is not an act of cancellation.

A brief word about the size of government: While conservatives want smaller government—much smaller government—they do not desire the abolition of government. Conservatives want a smaller government that governs wisely and judiciously. And conservatives believe in absolute, perduring, objective moral truths upon which proper governing depends and without which governing becomes an exercise in raw power. Conservatives seek to conserve something.

Russell Kirk, author of the hugely influential book, The Conservative Mind, wrote that conservatism has some essential constituent features that should shape laws and policies, including a

Belief that a divine intent rules society as well as conscience, forging an eternal chain of right and duty which links great and obscure, living and dead. Political problems, at bottom, are religious and moral problems. … Politics is the art of apprehending and applying the Justice which is above nature. … Man must put a control upon his will and his appetite, for conservatives know man to be governed more by emotion than by reason.  Tradition and sound prejudice provide checks upon man’s anarchic impulse.

These tenets are as indispensable to conservatism as respect for private property and opposition to efforts to eradicate class distinctions. These tenets are as fundamental to conservatism as is a preference for slow change over “innovation” that “is a devouring conflagration more often than it is a torch of progress.”

Rather than expending so much energy trying to transform or deform the GOP’s position on sexual matters—matters that are essential to a well-ordered society conducive to human flourishing—maybe Love should join the Democrat Party and try to change its position on borders, China, and tax rates.

Listen to this article read by Laurie:

https://staging.illinoisfamily.org/wp-content/uploads/2021/07/Porn-Star-Rightly-Kicked-Out-of-Conservative-Political-Event.mp3

Written by Dr. Everett Piper

On Thursday, Sept. 17, President Donald Trump signed a proclamation extolling our country’s virtues and praising our Founding Fathers for their courage, wisdom, insight and sacrifice as they crafted a Constitution that would guard and guarantee life and liberty for all United States citizens.

In his corresponding speech, the president announced his intention to establish a “1776 Commission” aimed at encouraging our nation’s public schools to teach the historical facts of our nation’s founding.

Within seconds the progressive establishment completely lost its mind and went apoplectic.

American Federation of Teachers President Randi Weingarten bewailed, “It’s disgusting. The president has no right …!”

White House correspondent and NBC and MSNBC contributor Yamiche Alcindor mocked the “loud applause” the president received for his educational priorities.

And New York Times journalist Nikole Hannah-Jones lamented, “The efforts by the president of the United States to use his powers to … dictate what schools can and cannot teach … should be deeply alarming … .”

Now one might wonder what exactly the president said about his priorities for this new commission that has the left so up in arms.

What did the president suggest that was so offensive?

Was it when he said he wanted to “encourage our educators to teach our children about the miracle of American history?”

Or maybe it was his admonition that “the only path to national unity is through our shared identity as Americans?”

Or perhaps it was when he suggested that “our youth [should] be taught to love America with all of their heart and all of their soul” and that “we [must] save this cherished inheritance for our children, for their children and for every generation to come?”

Or could it have been when he declared that he and the commission “embraced the vision of Martin Luther King where children are not judged by the color of their skin but by the content of their character?”

Or maybe it was when he contended that, “[We cannot] divide Americans by race in the service of political power?”

Or it might have been his invocation that, “we are here today to declare that we will never submit to tyranny. We will reclaim our history, and our country, for citizens of every race, color, religion, and creed?”

Or perchance it was his condemnation of those who seek to “silence dissent, to scare [others from] speaking the truth, and [who] bully [our children] into the abandonment of their values, their heritage and [our] very way of life?”

Or maybe it was his charge that “America’s founding set in motion the unstoppable chain of events that abolished slavery, secured civil rights, defeated communism and fascism and built the most fair, equal and prosperous nation in human history?”

Or possibly it was when he implored that teaching our youth “concepts such as hard work, rational thinking, the importance of the nuclear family, and belief in God” are good things and not racially pejorative values?”

Yes, one does wonder what the Democrats find to be so outrageous in the president’s call for our public schools to teach these simple truths.

Could it be that the answer is obvious?

Could it be that when one wants to “fundamentally transform” a culture and a country that the first step is to disparage its history?

Could it be that you must first deconstruct a nation’s principles when your goal is to “redistribute” a nation’s “power”?

Could it be that if your end game is “death to America,” as the Democrats’ favorite child, Black Lives Matter is now chanting in the streets, you must first kill the American dream in the minds of America’s youth?

Russell Kirk once wrote, “Ignorance is a dangerous luxury.” He went further,

“Many Americans are badly prepared for their task of defending their own convictions and interests and institutions … The propaganda of radical ideologues sometimes confuses and weakens the will and well intentions of Americans who lack any clear understanding of their nation’s first principles. And in our age, good-natured ignorance is a luxury none of us can afford … We need to urgently recall to our minds the sound convictions that have sustained our civilization and our nation … If we ourselves are ignorant of those ideas and institutions which nurture our culture and our public liberty, then we will fall … .”

Could it be that the reason for the left’s angst is that they understand Kirk’s warning quite well?

Could it be that our president just struck at the very heart of their cause — the Democrats’ desire for an “ideology of ignorance” and, thus, they are furious?

History tells us that Demosthenes pleaded, “In God’s name, I beg you to think!” as he tried to awaken the confused and divided people of Athens to stand against the looming tyranny of Macedonia.

An “ideology of ignorance” or an educated, aware and “thinking” citizenry. Something to think about as you prepare for Nov. 3.

This article was originally published by The Washington Times. Dr. Everett Piper (dreverettpiper.com, @dreverettpiper) is a former university president and radio host. He is the author of “Not a Daycare: The Devastating Consequences of Abandoning Truth” (Regnery).

Written by Taylor Lewis

Back in college, I participated in one of those summer-long, Koch-funded libertarian internship programs. During the final week of the program, clusters of us interns, fresh off working in the “real world” for two total months, were tasked with arguing an esoteric philosophical point of our choosing.

One group of impish participants decided to argue against having children.  The argument was fiendishly simple: the very act of existing invites pain, so it’s morally questionable to bring young ones into a world guaranteed to harm them.  With toothy grins, wrinkled slacks, and tousled hair, these students made their nihilistic argument, finely exercising their ability to, as F. Scott Fitzgerald said, “hold two opposed ideas in the mind at the same time, and still retain the ability to function.”

At the time, the arguers didn’t believe their own position.  The no-harm logic, while sound on the surface, meant human extinction when taken to its logical conclusion.

A mélange of college students hopped up on Leonard Read essays and overpriced beer understood the implications of eschewing childbirth.  But what’s Democrats’ excuse?

It turns out my puckish colleagues may have been prophets for the most visible newcomer in America’s liberal party.  Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, the socialist and de facto Democratic leader, questions the wisdom of having kids.  During an Instagram livestream, the 29-year-old congresswoman explains, in her termagant, ditzo manner, that Millennials like her don’t want to bring children into a world where China and India are pushing the global temperature a jot or tittle higher.

“There’s scientific consensus that the lives of children are going to be very difficult.  And it does lead young people to have a legitimate question: Is it OK to still have children?” she asked her legions of followers from her kitchen, wearing a beige turtleneck sweater to warm her body against one of the coldest winters in years.

Rep. Ocasio-Cortez posits the same ethical challenge my fellow interns did years ago: is it morally kosher to have children if they will, someday, possibly suffer harm?

If you apply Ocasio-Cortez’s thinking to any time in human history absent the short time period of post-World War II to the present, it doesn’t stand up.  Until the mid-twentieth century, many children had to contend with high infant mortality rates, slavery, sexual exploitation, hard labor, and a myriad of untreatable diseases like polio and hemophilia.  What we think of as the relatively harmless lifestyle fit for children today — mandatory schooling through 18 years of age, widespread immunizations, Sesame Street — is so new to human existence that some grandparents alive today never experienced it.

You wouldn’t be reading this column in the year 2019 had earlier generations become conditioned to Ocasio-Cortez’s paralyzing fear.  Yet the longue durée of human survival is increasingly forgotten by liberals who share a skeptical view of the future.  A duo of fretting Cassandras recently appeared on a BBC program touting something called “Birthstrike,” a movement to withhold the gift of life in service to apocalyptic prediction.

“The natural world is collapsing around us, and that’s actually happening right now.  And I’m so disappointed by the response by authorities to this crisis, and so freaked out by everything I’ve read that I’ve — I’ve basically last year I came to the decision that I couldn’t bring a child into that,” Blythe Pepino, founder of Birthstrike, explained to an audience currently experiencing a record-low birth rate.  Her partner in petrification, Alice Brown, concurs, ratcheting up the fear a notch: “We are destroying biodiversity so quickly that it threatens our food … the U.N. have said that can lead to the risk of our own extinction.”  Brown explains that her decision not to have children “has come from not wanting to pass that fear on to someone else.”

Petrifying everyone else with world-ending divinations is perfectly fine, apparently.

There’s a name for this swearing off procreation: anti-natalism.  The philosophy — if self-imposed genocide can be called a philosophy — is, at its core, a deadening of everything it means to be human.  It is both anti-life and misanthropic.  “Homo sapiens is the most destructive species, and vast amounts of this destruction are wreaked on other humans,” writes anti-natalist philosopher David Benatar.

How Benatar maintains the will to live with such a bleak view of himself isn’t addressed.  Like climate alarmists who pay thousands of dollars to travel around in carbon-emitting machines, Benatar doesn’t seem to take his own philosophy seriously.

The divide between anti-natalist liberals and conservatives is, as Russell Kirk said of all political problems, spiritual at heart.  Conservatives view life as intrinsically valuable — that all children are formed in the image of a loving God.  Even if a baby will one day grow to harm someone else, he is still not denied his inner worth.

Along with neoliberal types concerned that Africa’s high birth rate puts too much of a strain on economic resources, anti-natalists commit the dangerous fallacy of putting sublunary concerns above higher values.  The road to despotism is paved with such intentions.

Then again, maybe that was the point all along.

This article was originally published at AmericanThinker.com