Bristol Palin Now Aboard Abstinence Bandwagon – E! Online
I wish I had the chance to interview Ms Bristol Palin. As a newly crowned abstinence spokesperson, I’d love to ask her “So, are you saying that you wish you had waited to have sex and that having your baby was a mistake?”
Faced with this question, she has two outs: “No, it was right for me, but it’s wrong for you” or “Yes, I wish my kid was never born.” It’s lose/lose, isn’t it?
Someone from my work thinks she’d play the religious right card and explain that “the Lord” put the challenge to her so that she would be able to share her experience and prevent further problems. In short, according to him, “she’d find a way to blame God for it.” By that rationale, is it fair for me to say “How about I smoke all the weed and then tell you all how bad it is?”
Being religious myself, here’s my view:
I don’t really know who this Palin girl is, but either she’s being a complete hypocrite because it’s profitable in some way for her to be or she truly now feels that abstinence is a good thing; her experience may have taught her that she should have waited– a person can change his or her mind about things if he or she truly believes whatever it is.
I’d never say the Lord put this upon her so that she could share her experience and prevent further problems. Whether one believes in God or not, she made the choice that led to having the child, not God or the Universe or Google any sort of higher power. I think that any girl with proper sense would be happy for the life created but then would wish that she would have waited until the right time (after marriage, at least in my and many others’ opinion). If this girl’s being sincere, I think that she’s happy for the life created but would tell you that she wishes she would have waited to have the child until the right time. If she’s not being sincere, then I don’t know what she’d say– she may play that religious card you talked about.
Jordan, I try very hard (not always successfully, but try hard nonetheless) to not pass judgments about people’s belief system. I feel strongly that your own beliefs are up to you, as I believe very strongly in my own spiritual construction. But I do think that *many* Christians in this country, at least, believe that they are not only right, but that they should forcefully push their beliefs onto others. Because her mother pandered to the religious right, and because I can’t imagine why Bristol Palin has ANY reason to be in the national spotlight, I have to cynically conclude that she is here to further her mother’s (hopefully wildly unsuccessful) bid for president in 2012. That, and to further excite the far right, who grow increasingly wackier each month.
Oh, so she IS related to Sarah Palin? Ha. I connected the names, but I assumed they had nothing to do with one another. As you can see, I didn’t read the linked article, nor to I follow much of the goings-on of the social world at large. I have no idea what she’s said nor what sort of a person she is, so I was just making speculation.
It’s very true that there is a large percentage of people who push their religion upon others. People can get very zealous about it, and it gives religion a bad name. Even in my own church, there are those who profess to be a part of it but who really have no idea what it’s all about or who try to shove it down people’s throats, which is not the way to teach people… we try to teach people “the gospel” of our church, but if they don’t want to hear it, then we leave them alone and still treat them just as well as anyone else who is of the faith (that’s at least what we should do and are taught to do– again, there are always eccentrics, and even the non-eccentrics aren’t perfect).
Anyway. As a personal rule, I try my hardest not to judge anyone who is atheist or of another religion as well and to treat them all essentially the same. I, too, believe that a person’s beliefs is up to him/her.
Sorry to have encroached upon a subject I know very little about (this Palin situation). Just offering my two bits about people who get pregnant outside of marriage in general, really.