War, War, War

SCENE:  Mitch BERG is having breakfast at the River Oasis Cafe in Stillwater. 

Avery LIBRELLE’s car, belching oily smoke, coasts to a halt outside the cafe.  LIBRELLE walks in, sees BERG, and sits down next to him.

LIBRELLE: Hey, Merg!  The War on Women is a real thing!

BERG:  Oh, hey, Avery.  Huh.   You don’t say.

LIBRELLE:  I do say.  It’s a fact.  Republicans want to shut down women’s access to Reproductive Health services and products.

BERG:  For starters, “reproductive health services” means “abortion”, which to about half the country means “killing babies”.  Say what you will about whether it’s a right, but there’s a legitimate discussion to be had about its morality and whether society should be condoning, much less paying for, it.  And evading that discussion by calling it “war!” is just intellectually craven. 

As to “goods”, the discussion is about whether business owners should be required to pay for goods and services that morally repel them.  Again, there’s a discussion to be had – and calling the discussion a “war” is intelletually cowardly.

So your “War on Women” is really a systematic avoidance of an adult conversation about two serious topics. 

LIBRELLE:  Hah!  The War on Women is a fact! 

BERG:  Well, lots of Democrats might want to leave the room before agreeing with you.   What we do have, on the one hand, is a “war” involving “representatives” of half the population objecting to being questioned about the moral implications of infanticide and the overrunning of other peoples’ religious freedom, and on the other hand half the population feminizing the education system to systematically oppress boys – even trying to turn boyhood itself into a pathology – or something to be un-selected in the reproductive process, a line of systematic oppression that has made the education system from kintergarten through college so hostile to boys that they only represent 40% of college students, which will have the long term effect of undercutting traditional male roles?   And of those boys who do go on to college being considered guilty until proven innocent of sexual assault on college campuses and other alleged sex crimes, along with the erosion of due process “protecting” people in such cases – no, even more due process, such as being presumed a rapist until you prove otherwise, being denied even the right to claim one’s innocence in front of campus “courts” that even kangaroos would disavow – and even being branded as a criminal even sooner , since college is apparently too late, in a system-wide series of policies and to bizarre double standards  that a cynic might say is designed to make (male) heterosexuality itself a crime.  And then going on into the work force, to be treated as guilty until proven innocent in employment sexual harassment cases, while it’s difficult for women to even be accused. And then going on, after all that, to maybe become a father, in a system that legally defrauds men “accused” of paternity and even those who disprove paternity, giving rise to an industry defrauding men and courts, or maybe even getting married, finding that divorce is much easier and more palatable to women because men are systematically denied rights in child custory litigation, and going on to see that the system ignores crimes committed against boys (remember the Nigerian schoolgirls?  How many celebrities did selfies with hashtags protesting the hundreds of Nigerian boys that have been not kidnapped but murdered by Boko Haram), and being abused for suggesting that maybe men’s rights need some attention, or even saying the war on men exists, then I need to ask you – who’s the actual war against?

LIBRELLE: …  [Slowly stands up, walks out, and drives away in a cloud of blue smoke]

[And SCENE]