The Book of Gomorrah

Oh, boy, this is a good one.

"The "cancer" of sodomy among priests threatens to bring down the wrath of God upon the Church, according to a Catholic saint and doctor who addressed a similar crisis in the priesthood over 900 years ago."

Priest banging each other 900 years ago? You don't say! Hopefully it was all adult and consensual and less like the molestation that's the real scandal today.

This Saint Damien wrote the Book of Gomorrah because of this dreaded scourge and a new translation is out.

"Following Scripture and the Tradition of the Church, Damian sees homosexuality as a “diabolical” corruption of God’s beautiful plan for sexuality between a man and a woman. It is a direct assault against God. Not only must it not be tolerated, but it must be condemned and stamped out, he writes. Homosexuality is a “lethal wound festering in the very body of the holy Church” that must first be recognized as a wound before any treatment and healing can take place."

Um, ok. You'd think if it was such a slap in God's face, he would have made it impossible or something,

“This vice [of same-sex activity] is the death of bodies, the destruction of souls, pollutes the flesh, extinguishes the light of the intellect, expels the Holy Spirit from the temple of the human heart, introduces the diabolical inciter of lust, throws into confusion, and removes the truth completely from the deceived mind.”

Wow. "Extinguishes the light of  the intellect?" I didn't know that taking it in the ass could ERASE YOUR BRAIN.

"“It prepares snares for the one who walks, and for him who falls into the pit, it obstructs the escape. It opens up hell and closes the door of paradise. It makes the citizen of the heavenly Jerusalem into an heir of the Babylonian underworld. From the star of heaven, it produces the kindling of eternal fire. It cuts off a member of the Church and casts him into the voracious conflagration of raging Gehenna.”

May I just say that "heir of the Babylonian underworld" sounds awesome!

“For it is this which violates sobriety, kills modesty, slays chastity. It butchers virginity with the sword of a most filthy contagion. It befouls everything, it stains everything, it pollutes everything, and for itself it permits nothing pure, nothing foreign to filth, nothing clean,” he states."

"Slayer of Chastity" is also an awesome title. Also, dude, if there's that much santorum, clean up beforehand, you know?

" Damian is clear that homosexual activity cuts off the life of God in the soul and makes one “unworthy of receiving in his mouth the heavenly offering of the Eucharist.”

BWHAHAHAHAHA!

 “Arise, arise, I implore you! Wake up O man who sinks in the sleep of wretched pleasure! Revive at last, you who have fallen by the lethal sword before the face of your enemies!…Enter into a constant struggle with the flesh, and always stand armed against the importunate fury of lust. If the flame of wantonness burns in your bones, the recollection of perpetual fire should immediately extinguish it,” he said."

This part is a bit more sad and serious. This is where people are to live a life full of constant struggle and fear because of their natural desires that hurt no one.

The second part of the Liesitenews article is an interview with the translator of the book.

" Damian reminded Pope Leo IX of the traditional law that was to be applied to priests who were caught in any kind of lascivious behavior with minors: they were to be publicly humiliated, their heads shorn of their tonsure, spittle rubbed in their faces, imprisoned in a monastic cell for six months and forced to fast on barley bread while they engaged in penance, and then to be held under the guard of two other monks for the rest of their lives. This very rigorous punishment reflected an understanding of the gravity of such evil that was diminished dramatically in recent decades."

Ok, that reflects a very punishment and vengeance oriented view of dealing with child sex abusers, but I can't say that I blame them.

" The tough penances imposed by the Church for sodomy helped to maintain a sense of the gravity of the deed. Such penances could last for decades. Even clerics who might be readmitted to the clerical state would have to do those penances and would in fact be subject to harsher ones than those imposed on the laity.

Although the Church continues to teach that any sexual act outside of marriage is gravely sinful, its system of punishment for clerics who commit acts of sodomy and child sex abuse was relaxed very substantially following the Second Vatican Council. We reaped the fruit of that laxity in the form of a very large number of tragic sexual abuse cases that could easily have been prevented if the Church’s clerical leadership had adhered to traditional doctrine."

Um, WHAT? Did he just conflate abuse and consensual sex? Yes he did. And he implied that being lax on one correlates with being lax on the other.

" Damian writes that those who are given over to sodomy are provoked to fight “impious wars against God,” and are consumed by guilt and shame. "

Yes, because it's not like being told you're evil and defiled does anything to you...

 "He also anticipates modern critiques of homosexual attraction by noting that no authentic complementarity exists between people of the same sex. “What do you seek in a man, that you are unable to find in yourself—what difference of sexes, what diverse features of members ...?” he asks. "

They want the SAME sex, that's kind of the point.

" He assures those who have fallen into the sin of sodomy that they can rise to even greater spiritual heights than those from which they fell, although he is also clear in his view that those guilty of the worst kinds of sodomy cannot be permitted to return to the clerical state."

Rape would NOT be a "worst kind of sodomy" it's an entirely different thing. Christians just can't grasp consent, can they?

" Damian does not regard the condemnation of sodomy as a mere technical matter of Church doctrine, as many prelates in the Church appear to do today. He sees it as “the worst of sins,” and even evidence of demonic possession. This is in keeping with the Scriptures that regard sodomy as one of the four sins that cries out for the revenge of God. His perspective on this matter is also clearly affirmed by Pope St. Leo IX, who wrote to Damian that “everything that this little book contains has been pleasing to our judgment, being as opposed to diabolical fire as is water.” It is also consistent with the Holy Office’s 1962 decree on priest sex abusers that called sodomy and child sex abuse “the worst crime.”

OMFG STOP CONFLATING CONSENSUAL SEX AND ABUSE!!!!

This is sickening. Why is homosexuality so constantly conflated with abuse? Why is it held with more contempt than virtually anything else? And again, why the erasure of lesbians? Why are the ravings of an old monk held to be important today? How can God be so offended by a thing he made? WTF?

Sexy Girls Chapter 3 and 4

Chapter 3: Is Your Closet Too Hot?

This chapter starts out by attempting to gross out teen girls by telling them that if they dress immodestly, it is not only young men that will lust after them, but creepy old dudes, including the preacher.

"If you walk down the street and see a bench lined with 70-year-old men, they are looking at your breasts and smacking their lips....Just think about the poor pastor who has to stand in front of his congregation and talk about God while trying to avoid seeing your breasts popping out from your baby doll top"

I think it's rather telling that this woman feels like she has to say this. It's quite a bit of privilege to assume that her readers have never been street-harassed before.

Dimarco expands on the "menu"and "advertising" framing more and more. Bare midriffs apparently advertise that you are ready to have your belly touched and you're a "tease" if you're not up for it. Also, any advances or harassment you get is deserved because

"Don't blame them for your PR campaign...they're just hoping to get a chance to purchase or steal a piece of you."

This ideology dehumanizes males as predators and females as prey and objects. The use of "steal" in this line tells us what Dimarco would think of rape victim-blaming.

"We can't get mad at guys for being guys. We can't blame them for following us down the path of objectification when that's the package we've put together."

Holy Hell!!! Does this woman think dudes have ANY responsibility for anything? If what she said was true, we would need to lock up all the men! This is the kind of shit that MRAs put in the mouths of feminists.


After a suitable round of shaming and blaming, Dimarco brings up Ephesians 5:3 and how there shouldn't be "even a hint of sexual immorality" among us. She also opines on how self-esteem is fleeting, but "god-esteem" is the foundation of a healthy self-image.


Chapter 4: The Art of the Body

This chapter is about tattoos and piercings. Interestingly, she is not wholly against them as a matter of biblical principle, but her restrictions on how you shouldn't show your navel piercing or lower back tattoo pretty act as blanket prohibitions. Her menu metaphor is stretched as she likens these piercings and tattoos to the "best-seller" icons on a menu.

Her worst ire is reserved for the blatantly sexual tongue ring, though she stops short of saying oral sex, using the euphemism of guys imagining how it will feel "on their body."

Girls who get tongue rings:

"Don't expect your romantic dreams to come true...to make yourself a sexual object is to kill a part of you that was created expressly for relationship."

Yes, tongue rings will make you into a spinster or some sort of loveless robot!

"God didn't create you to be some boy's toy. He didn't create you to meet the sexual needs of random guys...he made you for one man and one man only, and that man won't be too happy to know that you shared yourself with other men just to get the feeling of being loved." 

How dare you act as a sex object for multiple men, you're a sex object for  just for ONE MAN! Because that's so much better. And again, complete erasure of female sexual desire, because women trade sex for love...

The Tragedy of NFP

In case you didn't know, Actual Catholic Doctrine is that no contraception can be used by anyone at any time. Even if you will die from another pregnancy, the only measures you can take are complete abstinence or scheduling sex around your cycle using Natural Family Planning (this is not the same as the rhythm method, which I will expand on at some later time). Obviously, many people fail at NFP, since it has to block off large portions of your cycle to be effective.

In trolling around on the internet, I came across this heartbreaking comment in a Catholic forum.

"I've had 3 kids in the 4 years I've been married. I've never been able to relax and enjoy anything in my marriage. Not once. 

It's too much. I could get pregnant at anytime..except when I'm already pregnant.

I stopped being able to have sex whenever the day I got married.

I'm literally in am impossible situation. Completely impossible.

It's awful. I hate it. I love my husband very much...but not enough to open myself up to another pregnancy.

I hate being pregnant more then anything. The constant physical pain and feeling sick followed by months and months of psychological issues is too much.

Sex leads to pregnancy. Since I'm completely terrified of pregnancy...I'm all set with it.

Maybe Marquette will work. Maybe it will give me a clearer picture and allow me more then 4 or 5 green light days a month.

I don't know. Right now I'm way too terrified to find out."

What does the Catholic Church have to say to this woman? SUFFER. That's basically all it can say. Don't have sex with your husband, unless you're willing to have more and more babies. A piece of latex, a little pill or implant could have given her these 4 years to grow and learn with her husband, they could have planned 1 or 2 babies in these years. But no, because of "natural law" this woman has to suffer this. The reference to Marquette in her comment is a type of NFP using an actual hormone monitor, which has proven worthwhile in more difficult cases, but still, why? We have safe and effective 99.99% contraception she can use.

God is a lie. The naturalistic fallacy the church teaches about contraception is a lie. She and others like her suffer and even die for a lie. It's a tragedy.

Yoga pants are not a reward

After a good article on yoga pants at work, some snooty person wrote in to say this:

"AS A 21-year-old about to take off into the workforce, I have to disagree that yoga pants should be considered business casual (Good Life, Oct. 31). Yes, they have become a leisure staple in just about every woman’s wardrobe, but I do believe that they should be left out of the workplace.

As years go by, our society has lost the art of dressing up. We have become so dependent on leisure wear that even the most fashionable outfits include yoga pants. I cannot say I do not wear yoga pants, since I am still in college, but I would not wear them to work with a formal top and a blazer."

Yes, I am DEPENDENT on clothes to actually fit me, which means soft pants. That's so arbitrary that soft pants aren't professional, but ill-fitting hard ones are?

There should be a line between business and casual wear. Yoga pants should be a reward after work, not a uniform."

No, FIT and COMFORT are basic, not a reward.

10 "reasons" women should be anti-choice according to Lie Action News

I sort of love going through anti-choice listicles like this one. I especially love it when they purport to  be feminist.

1. "Abortion is an insult to all women.

Telling a woman she needs to have an abortion is belittling. Anyone who says a woman is too young or that she can’t handle going to school and having a child, or working and having a child is telling her that she isn’t good enough, smart enough, or strong enough."

You know who I think is qualified to determine if they're "strong enough" to go through pregnancy and parenting? The person who is pregnant!!! Pro-choicers aren't telling women they can't or shouldn't do these things if they want to. It is anti-choicers who are minimizing pregnancy and parenting instead of treating them like serious choices. Society can do a lot to make pregnancy and parenting less burdensome, but not all of the issues of those things are societally imposed, some are just inherent. There is nothing wrong with deciding that you aren't up to the task of dealing with it, and it does not mean you are weak. They think you should be FORCED to go through it, and oh, well, you'll just buck up. It's just what women are for, they do it every day, and you should be able to handle it.

 "Pregnancy is empowering, abortion is not.

Carrying your baby and giving birth while you’re going to school or working at your job or furthering your career is a feminist move. It’s also empowering to succeed when people are telling you that you can’t. You can love and care for your baby while you pursue other goals. Your children don’t have to suffer or die in order for you to succeed in other areas of your life."

How is this not just a restatement of 1? Being FORCED is not empowering. Succeeding through hardship is admirable, but there is no virtue in imposing unnecessary hardship and gaslighting people that they just need to be "strong".

"3. Women are not sexual objects.

This is one of the main issues true feminism works to overcome. But abortion allows more women than ever to be treated as sex objects.

“Abortion is misogyny in action. Nothing helps men use women, and helps women (sadly) participate in their own objectification, like abortion,” says Hatten. “It’s men who treat women as objects – be they rapists, pedophiles, or just run-of-the-mill douchebags – who benefit the most from abortion. Nothing allows a woman to be used for sex and thrown away like convincing her that subjugating her fertility to someone else’s desires is liberating. That killing her own child is liberating. Women don’t get abortions because they are liberated, but because they are the opposite of liberated: coerced, trapped, ill-equipped, frightened, ashamed.”

COMPLETE ERASURE OF WOMEN'S SEXUAL DESIRE!!!!

" 4. The first feminists were pro-life.

Take a look at the first days of the feminist movement, and you’ll see that true feminists are anti-abortion. From Susan B. Anthony to Elizabeth Cady Stanton, the first feminists wanted women to be treated equally, while still remaining who they are."

First of all, I don't care. I'm not bound to their opinions.

Second, I'm not sure that their opinions would extend to modern abortion rights. Abortion was far more dangerous at that time and routinely used to control women by men. They also may have simply lied in public statements in order to seem more respectable. Who knows?

5. "Abortion is an act of discrimination.

Women have spent decades fighting against inequality and in many ways we still are. So why would we allow the same discrimination to happen to our children? Preborn humans are equal to all other humans, whether they are male, female, completely healthy, or diagnosed prenatally with a health condition. The pro-life movement doesn’t say that fetuses are more important than women. It says that fetuses are people, too, and that since they are human beings, they deserve to be treated as such. To be pro-life means to fight for the rights of all of our children like the women of yesterday fought for equal rights for us."

If you FORCE women to carry fetuses, you are giving fetuses MORE rights than pregnant people or anyone else. It is a zero-sum game.  Apparently equal rights means commandeering people's bodies.

"6. Women are independent, and we worked hard to gain that independence.

Planned Parenthood wants women to believe that we can’t be successful without them and their abortion services. But women are far more capable than Planned Parenthood wants us to believe."

 Lie Action is now just throwing buzzwords around. Women can be independent as hell, they still require actual medical care.

" Abortion is linked to mental illness.

Countless women suffer from post-abortion syndrome after they’ve had an abortion. It’s a form of post-traumatic stress disorder and includes symptoms such as feelings of guilt, anxiety, depression, and even thoughts of suicide."

ACOG and the APA say that there is no post-abortion syndrome or major effects of abortion on mental health. Poor mental health after abortion is either associated with other issues going on in the patients' lives or with abortion stigma.

"8. Pro-life organizations provide true support.

"Did you know that Planned Parenthood offers no support if you choose life for your baby? They don’t have any programs in place to help women who are in tough circumstances but who want to choose life. That’s because Planned Parenthood isn’t in the business of giving things away for free – they made a profit of $127 million in 2014 alone. If you have your baby, they don’t stand to make a profit since they do not deliver babies and they do not provide adoption services.

Pro-life centers, on the other hand, not only help women get a plan in action, they reward them for working hard, for taking parenting classes, and for bettering themselves. Some even help them get out of debt, finish earning their degrees, and start new lives away from the troubles that had consumed them previously, so that they can move forward as independent, self-sufficient women who aren’t dependent on anyone else ever again."

Planned Parenthood is a NON-PROFIT organization. It is true that they don't do a lot of prenatal care, but that would be because prenatal care is performed by all the other OBs in the area. They also refer for adoption.

As for Crisis Pregnancy Centers, they usually don't provide medical services, have been caught lying to women, and their help is usually limited to some baby items and help signing up for WIC and other programs.

"9. Abortion is linked to breast cancer.

The American College of Pediatricians recently spoke out about a 2013 study linking breast cancer to abortions. The more abortions a woman has, the greater her risk of developing breast cancer."

ACAP is a sham conservative organization. ACOG says there is no link.

"10. Abortion is dangerous to women’s health.

Women who walk into an abortion clinic have no idea what the true risks are because, just as with the breast cancer risk, no one tells them. Since abortion became legal, hundreds of women have been killed by the procedure."

ACOG says abortion is very safe.

"Women don’t need abortion. Women in abusive relationships, women in college, women in the workforce, women struggling financially, women who have been raped, women who are facing a health crisis – abortion is not the answer for any of them"

Abortion is the answer to not wanting to be pregnant.

" It’s a way to cover up the real issues that women and couples face and it’s a way for businesses like Planned Parenthood to make money off of those struggles. Instead of providing practical resources to help new mothers, abortion advocates would rather abort the baby, which opens the door to an entirely new group of troubles for women and does nothing to improve her previous struggles."

Abortion is the answer to not wanting to be pregnant. That is all it does. It is not a panacea.

" “We need to liberate ourselves from the very idea that we need abortion,” said Hatten. “It’s difficult for me to understand how people who call themselves feminists actually believe that without taking our little pink pill from our condescending little pink compact and having our babies vacuumed out of us, we can’t be truly free.”

So we're "truly free" if we can't control our wombs, the very thing that is the reason we've been historically oppressed?

No, Women and everyone should be PRO-CHOICE.

Overprotective dads and Patriarchy

A certain set of pictures has gone viral showing a father posing with his daughter's date, with overtones (playful as they might be) of the overprotective father trope. Feminists have then commented on this issue, and Patrice Lewis of WND has decided to lambaste them.

The very idea of a father threatening his daughter's date for consensual sex is a manifestation of patriarchy. It denies the sexuality and agency of the daughter, and unfairly characterizes boys as predatory. It reinforces these things, even done playfully.

Patrice says:

"You see, only a feminist would view this scenario with suspicion and disgust. How dare a father protect his minor daughter living under his roof? How dare he step in to “police” his daughter’s “private life”?"...

"Criminey, this borders on sick. What Ms. Williams carelessly ignores in her screed is the operative word GIRL. This is a minor child. This is a minor child raised and supported entirely by her parents. At this point, she doesn’t really have a “private” life. Minor children who are still entirely dependent on their parents are not autonomous, nor are they capable of full adult understanding of taking “ownership of their choices and actions.”

Yes, only a feminist would see that his daughter has agency and doesn't need to be "protected" from a boy who we have no evidence is going to assault her. And minors have sexuality, they do not belong to their parents. You don't get to threaten their partners like they don't have a hand in it. And if you think your child is being abused or assaulted, take action on that.

"You see, for liberal permissive parents like Williams, when it comes to “empowering” girls, it always comes down to one thing: SEX. Girls are encouraged to view sex through the exact same lens as boys."

Why shouldn't girls view sex like boys? And I see far more liberal parents pushing for empowerment through education. It seems like conservative parents push for disempowerment through having no sexual autonomy.

"Let’s face it: Boys are “inherently predatory.” It’s the nature of testosterone, which is why it takes a man to teach a boy to control himself and not be predatory toward girls and women."

WOW! That's more "misandrist" a statement than I've ever seen from any mainstream feminist. 

"As much as feminists try to deny it, girls pin a great deal more emotion on sex than boys do. Sex is biologically linked (through the hormone oxytocin) with nurturing, emotion, love."

Oxytocin is present in males and females at orgasm. There is no evidence that girls are more emotional than boys outside of our social context.

"You see, I have this little pet theory. I have a theory that girls who learn self-control do better in life than girls who don’t."

Having sex does not meaningfully correspond to "self-control." Sex does not automatically ruin your life.

"I theorize that girls who learn to value their bodies do better than girls who slut around with an endless succession of random hookups and have three abortions by the time they reach their majority. I theorize that the best way to “empower” girls is to cultivate what’s between their ears, not what’s between their legs."

Having sex does not devalue your body. Slinging slurs doesn't help your case. Multiple abortions are rare, and would be a sign of many other issues in a teen's life. Sex and education are not mutually exclusive.

"But Ms. Williams apparently finds ANY degree of female sexual self-control weird, freaky and unrealistic. The sad thing is, she has a 15-year-old daughter."

I thought we were talking about threatening boys to not have sex with your daughter. What would that have to do with her self-control? 

"Mr. Schock’s fatherly protection of his daughter is, in the eyes of Ms. Williams, a bad thing. It’s understandable feminists would object to paternal concern. After all, if more dads behaved like Mr. Schock, their daughters would be far less likely to grow up to be feminists.

And we can’t have that, can we?"

I seriously doubt that being treated like a disempowered object correlates much with feminism. Quite a few feminists come out of extremely patriarchal contexts. 

So, all Ms.Lewis has is slut-shaming to sling at people who think girls should be autonomous. Typical.

Sin Wears Short Shorts

Oh, I love Antichoice365, it is a damn gold mine...

"It has gotten to the point where, in times of warm weather, the women who wear short shorts in public outnumber those who don’t. Does anyone else feel this same way?"

First of all, I don't know why you're writing this in late October, where it's not even shorts weather in Texas anymore, much less most other areas. And no, I see far more pants and skirts than shorts of any kind most of the time. And how short is short? Is he cool with culottes?

"In charity, we must assume those who wear short shorts, bikinis, spaghetti straps, and other immodest clothing were never told not to. If that’s the case for you, after reading this you can no longer claim ignorance."

He calls it charity, I call it infantilizing and giving women no agency to assume that we haven't heard these bullshit lectures before. I do not claim ignorance, I claim agency.

" The problem with wearing immodest clothing lies in the beauty of the female body. It is so attractive that it must be kept veiled, lest it lead men to sin."

That's a very...Muslim...viewpoint, don't you think?

" As we shall see, each woman bears a responsibility toward men to help them not to fall into sin"

Sin isn't real. NO, we have no responsibility for you.

" This is not to say women bear the entire responsibility. Men still ought to divert their eyes. But, still, it would be better that men not be provided n opportunities to lust, can’t we all agree?"

There's nothing wrong with lust. Thoughtcrime is bullshit.


Now he'll give some quotes from some saints:

" You have prepared the abominable cup, you have given the death dealing drink, and you are more criminal than are those who poison the body; you murder not the body but the soul."

Dude sounds seriously messed up and misogynistic. Women are worse than murderers!

" “More souls go to hell because of sins of the flesh than for any other reason.”

Sex is basically the ONLY sin in all religion.

"One of the seers, Jacinta tells us Our Lady of Fatima also told her this: “Unless My message is heeded, Satan will introduce certain fashions that will offend My Son very much.”

Pretty sure I don't care if my outfits offend Jesus. I'm also sure that Satan is a great stylist.

 “Everyone who looks at a woman lustfully has already committed adultery with her in his heart” (Mt 5.28). That is how seriously the Son of God takes this matter."

That is thoughtcrime and is one of the most abominable and damaging things in all Christianity. Those who praise Jesus can fucking stop just based on this one verse.

Where does this end? Men can lust after a burka-clad figure, it doesn't matter. They blame the existence of women for the damnation of their very souls.

Sexy Girls: Chapter 1 and 2

I have a habit of picking up terrible Christian books in thrift stores, and that's how I came across Sexy Girls: How Hot is Too Hot?

It's truly an abomination of slut-shaming, made worse by being written in a "hip" and "cool" slang-loaded fashion. The book itself also has weird thick, glossy pages and layout, with far more pictures than content. The spine is also weak, the pages started falling out when I simply flattened the book for pictures. Many of the pages are single-quote pages, often from youth pastors like this first one:

"It's hard to speak to your hearts when all I see is your parts."

That's one of those glorious preacher quotes with a rhyme that ultimately means nothing.


Dimarco opens chapter 1 with an anecdote about being turned away from 1st grade because of a crop top and shorts. She obviously internalized this message of shame and went on to perpetuate it in a big way.

Dimarco then brings in the concepts of advertising yourself, your image, and marketing. She even has little self-tests for you to take:

Chapter 2:Your Target Market

She has little quizzes here too:

I didn't even try to take this quiz because all these answers are crap.

Chapter 2 wants is to consider our "target audience", guys. 

"Don't get all feminazi on me now and start saying you aren't looking for a guy, because if you picked up this book, then you must be concerned about your sex appeal, and sex appeal is for one purpose and one purpose only: to get guys."

I like the unironic use of feminazi and the complete erasure of queerness. That's pretty par for the course. She goes on to talk about how girls just want to dress cute, but we just have to think about those "hormone-crazed" guys. It is here that she first uses the objectifying term "menu" to talk about what women show.

"It might seem gross, juvenile, or impossible that a guy would want to touch your breast just because he can see a part of it, but trust me, it's true."

Newsflash! He probably wants to touch it even if he can't see it! And why would it necessarily seem gross unless you're assuming that women don't have sexual desire?

She then goes on to construct scenarios where showing a bit of breast leads to more and more fantasy, how showing belly leads to more, and how you need to cover up so that boys won't fantasize about you. The fact is that you can't stop anyone from fantasizing about you no matter what you wear, and I don't believe in the Christian "stumbling block" rhetoric.

She then goes on to spend a whole page on underwear. She says that if a boy sees part of your underwear, he'll think that you'll be willing to show him all of it, and then you'll be "sexual" to him and garner no respect:

"Guys don't take sexual girls seriously. They just don't. They think about using them until their next conquest."

Really? Men can't have real relationships with women they have sex with? That's news to pretty much everyone. And if dudes are this awful, why do you want them? That is the eternal question, unanswered in the first 2 chapters.

The Bible Does Not Support Feminist Abortion Rights

Because of the prevalence of religious rhetoric among anti-choicers, pro-choicers have sometimes taken to the bible as well. I think this is misguided, and not just because we shouldn't care what the bible says for our laws and morals.

Let's look at some scripture:

Anti-choice Verses

Psalm 139:13-15
"You did form my inward parts, you knit me together in my mother's womb...you knew me right well; my frame was not hidden from you, when I was being made in secret..."

So god specially knits fetuses with love...he might not want you to kill them willy-nilly. Of course, one could say that he created everything, including animals and such we can kill so this one is kind of a wash.

 Jeremiah1:4-5

"Now the word of the Lord came to me, saying, Before I formed you in the womb, I knew you, and before you were born I consecrated you."

The typical pro-choice response to this is that god doesn't specially consecrate all fetuses as prophets, but the evangelical Christian response would be that god has a plan for everyone's life. It sure seems easy to thwart god's plan with a little medical procedure, though...

Luke1:41-44
"And when Elizabeth heard the greeting of Mary, the babe leaped in her womb; and Elizabeth was filled with the Holy Spirit and she exclaimed with a loud cry, "Blessed are you among women, and blessed is the fruit of your womb. And why is this granted me, that the mother of my Lord should come to me? For behold, when the voice of your greeting came to my ears, the babe in my womb leaped for joy." 

This is the same word (brephos) Luke uses in Luke 2:12,16 "You will find a baby lying in a manger." Luke 18:15,16 meaning infants and 1 Peter 2:2 "newborn babes."

So here we have a fetus showing reactions to the world around it, at about 6 months gestation, which would be viable today, if not back then. Supposedly, we also have the same word being used to refer to fetuses and babies. One could argue, though, that this isn't meaningful for much earlier fetuses or embryos.


"Pro-choice" Verses

And the Lord God formed man of the dust of the ground, and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life; and man became a living soul.

-- Genesis 2:7 (KJV)

The Spirit of God hath made me, and the breath of the Almighty hath given me life.

-- Job 33:4 (KJV)

One argument is that breath is synonymous with life, ensoulment, and human personhood in many places in the bible. Jewish abortion positions, which are quite interesting, derive from this principle even though it seems contradicted by the verses above from Jeremiah and Psalms (obviously Jews wouldn't care about the verses in Luke).

"The Babylonian Talmud Yevamot 69b states that:

"the embryo is considered to be mere water until the fortieth day [after conception]."

Afterwards, it is considered subhuman until it is born. 

"Rashi, the great 12th century commentator on the Bible and Talmud, states clearly of the fetus 'lav nefesh hu--it is not a person.'

The Talmud contains the expression 'ubar yerech imo--the fetus is as the thigh of its mother,' i.e., the fetus is deemed to be part and parcel of the pregnant woman's body." _1"

Obviously, none of that is going to matter to Christians, so the breath argument is not very convincing.

Numbers 3:15

" 15 “List the sons of Levi, by fathers' houses and by clans; every male from a month old and upward you shall list.” 

 This is just a BAD argument. The fact that babies under a month old aren't counted due to infant mortality doesn't mean they aren't persons. Look, it only counts males, that doesn't mean that females aren't persons. That doesn't mean you could kill them willy-nilly.

Exodus 21:22

 22 If men strive, and hurt a woman with child, so that her fruit depart from her, and yet no mischief follow: he shall be surely punished, according as the woman's husband will lay upon him; and he shall pay as the judges determine.

The major contention here is what happened when her fruit departed? Is this a miscarriage or a premature birth? If mere payment suffices for a miscarriage, this would be a sign that in this part of  the biblical context that fetuses were not seen as persons.

"The key Hebrew word "yatsa" literally means to "lose her offspring."  According to religioustolerance.org, some liberal theologians see this law as another ripoff of the Code of Hammurabi and Hittite laws where miscarriage is clear Code of Hammurabi (209, 210) which reads: "If a seignior struck a[nother] seignior's daughter and has caused her to have a miscarriage [literally, caused her to drop that of her womb], he shall pay ten shekels of silver for her fetus. If that woman had died, they shall put his daughter to death." Hittite Laws, (1.17): "If anyone causes a free woman to miscarry [literally, drives out the embryo]-if (it is) the 10th month, he shall give 10 shekels of silver, if (it is) the 5th month, he shall give 5 shekels of silver..." The phrase "drives out the embryo" appears to relate to a miscarriage rather than to a premature birth. Now, your average evangelical is NOT going to be impressed by any comparisons to ancient laws. They're more likely to go running to an apologetic like this from John Piper: "1. There is a Hebrew verb for miscarry or lose by abortion or be bereaved of the fruit of the womb, namely, shakal. It is used near by in Exodus 23:26, "None shall miscarry (meshakelah) or be barren in your land." But this word is NOT used here in Exodus 21:22-25. 2. Rather the word for birth here is "go forth" (ytsa'). "And if her children go forth . . ." This verb never refers to a miscarriage or abortion. When it refers to a birth it refers to live children "going forth" or "coming out" from the womb. For example, Genesis 25:25, "And the first came out (wyetse') red, all of him like a hairy robe; and they called his name Esau." (See also v. 26 and Genesis 38:28-30.) So the word for miscarry is not used but a word is used that elsewhere does not mean miscarry but ordinary live birth. 3. There are words in the Old Testament that designate the embryo (golem, Psalm 139:16) or the untimely birth that dies (nephel, Job 3:16; Psalm 58:8; Isaiah 33:3). But these words are not used here. 4. Rather an ordinary word for children is used in Exodus 21:22 (yeladeyha). It regularly refers to children who are born and never to one miscarried. "Yeled only denotes a child, as a fully developed human being, and not the fruit of the womb before it has assumed a human form" (Keil and Delitzsch, Pentateuch, vol. 2, p. 135)." Since I don't know Hebrew, I don't know if these are correct translations, but he seems to make good points. Even if we took the most pro-choice interpretation of this passage, the fact that an accidental miscarriage was not seen as deserving of death would not mean that intentional abortion is not forbidden.

Numbers 5:12-31

 So this is one of the weirdest passages in the entire bible. It's a long and involved how-to for a procedure to do when a husband is jealous, yet has no hard evidence of his wife committing adultery. A man takes his wife to the priest, he makes a small offering, and the priest harangues the wife, unbinds her hair (this is considered shameful, and some commentaries say she is stripped topless as well), then she is forced to drink a concoction of holy water and dirt from the temple floor. If she is innocent, nothing will happen, but if she is guilty:

27 And when he hath made her to drink the water, then it shall come to pass, that, if she be defiled, and have done trespass against her husband, that the water that causeth the curse shall enter into her, and become bitter, and her belly shall swell, and her thigh shall rot: and the woman shall be a curse among her people.

28 And if the woman be not defiled, but be clean; then she shall be free, and shall conceive seed.

So in the KJV, it says belly will swell and thigh will rot. What does that mean? I did frequently come across the idea that "thigh" is often used for genitals in Hebrew, meaning that something will happen to her vagina or womb. Here's the NIV

27 If she has made herself impure and been unfaithful to her husband, this will be the result: When she is made to drink the water that brings a curse and causes bitter suffering, it will enter her, her abdomen will swell and her womb will miscarry, and she will become a curse. 28 If, however, the woman has not made herself impure, but is clean, she will be cleared of guilt and will be able to have children.

 The NIV is the only translation that seems to use womb and miscarry. I looked all over for a decent explanation of the Hebrew from either a pro-choice or an anti-choice perspective. Nobody seems to know what the fuck is happening in these verses. Most people seem to think that the curse of the thigh and belly is barrenness, which would be a huge deal for a woman at the time. There is no other indication in the text that the woman in question is pregnant.

Even if we interpret it as an abortion or potentially abortifacient, it would be God performing the abortion, at the behest of the husband. It is not an example of a woman's choice.

So we've looked at some of these verses relating to Personhood of the fetus, now let's look at general principles and women.

Children are a Blessing

So after dealing with the explicit passages about fetuses, let us look at the general principles of the bible

Psalm 127:3-5
"Lo, children are an heritage of the Lord: and the fruit of the womb is His reward.Like arrows in the hand of a warrior are the children of one's youth. Blessed is the man who fills his quiver with them! He shall not be put to shame when he speaks with his enemies in the gate."

This verse is the Quiverfull standard verse from which the name we call them comes from. There are many other verses praising children and saying that barrenness is a curse. There are no indications in the bible that refusing children in any way is allowable.

Deuteronomy 7:14

 You shall be blessed above all peoples. There shall not be male or female barren among you or among your livestock.

Genesis 1:28

 And God blessed them. And God said to them, “Be fruitful and multiply and fill the earth and subdue it and have dominion over the fish of the sea and over the birds of the heavens and over every living thing that moves on the earth.”

Status of Women

And now we get to what I consider the crux of the matter. Maybe the bible doesn't value fetuses like people or maybe it only values some fetuses. Maybe god will kill your fetus on demand. That is all unclear. What is not unclear is that women and women's sexuality is NOT valued in the bible.

Genesis 3:16

 Unto the woman he said, I will greatly multiply thy sorrow and thy conception; in sorrow thou shalt bring forth children; and thy desire shall be to thy husband, and he shall rule over thee.

Here we have God cursing women with many children, pain in labor, and patriarchy. The idea of women escaping this curse with anesthetic was considered sinful even in the 1800s. To escape this curse with abortion seems even worse.

Leviticus 12:2-5

 2 “Say to the Israelites: ‘A woman who becomes pregnant and gives birth to a son will be ceremonially unclean for seven days, just as she is unclean during her monthly period. 3 On the eighth day the boy is to be circumcised. 4 Then the woman must wait thirty-three days to be purified from her bleeding. She must not touch anything sacred or go to the sanctuary until the days of her purification are over. 5 If she gives birth to a daughter, for two weeks the woman will be unclean, as during her period. Then she must wait sixty-six days to be purified from her bleeding.

The birth of a female is twice as ceremonially unclean as the birth of a son.

1 Corinthians 11

 3 But I want you to realize that the head of every man is Christ, and the head of the woman is man,[a] and the head of Christ is God.

 8 For man did not come from woman, but woman from man; 9 neither was man created for woman, but woman for man.10 It is for this reason that a woman ought to have authority over her own[c]head, because of the angels. 

And here we have some New Testament stuff (in case anyone wants to say this is all Old Testament). Clearly women are lesser.

1 Timothy 2:11-15

 11 A woman[a] should learn in quietness and full submission. 12 I do not permit a woman to teach or to assume authority over a man;[b] she must be quiet. 13 For Adam was formed first, then Eve. 14 And Adam was not the one deceived; it was the woman who was deceived and became a sinner. 15 But women[c] will be saved through childbearing—if they continue in faith, love and holiness with propriety.

So here we have explicit commands to shut up and be submissive, that we can't have authority, and that we are saved by childbearing. Obviously women choosing abortion is a direct rejection of this.

1 Corinthians 14:34-35

 34 Women[f] should remain silent in the churches. They are not allowed to speak, but must be in submission, as the law says. 35 If they want to inquire about something, they should ask their own husbands at home; for it is disgraceful for a woman to speak in the church.[g]

1 Peter 3:1-6

 Wives, in the same way submit yourselves to your own husbands so that, if any of them do not believe the word, they may be won over without words by the behavior of their wives, 2 when they see the purity and reverence of your lives. 3 Your beauty should not come from outward adornment, such as elaborate hairstyles and the wearing of gold jewelry or fine clothes. 4 Rather, it should be that of your inner self, the unfading beauty of a gentle and quiet spirit, which is of great worth in God’s sight. 5 For this is the way the holy women of the past who put their hope in God used to adorn themselves. They submitted themselves to their own husbands, 6 like Sarah, who obeyed Abraham and called him her lord. You are her daughters if you do what is right and do not give way to fear.

Ephesians 5:22-24

 22 Wives, submit yourselves to your own husbands as you do to the Lord. 23 For the husband is the head of the wife as Christ is the head of the church, his body, of which he is the Savior. 24 Now as the church submits to Christ, so also wives should submit to their husbands in everything.

As we see here, women are to submit to men. Women making decisions about their own bodies is anathema to the overarching theme of the bible. I believe that it is mainly this reason that Christians oppose modern feminist abortion rights.

Sexual Immorality

So while we have demonstrated that the bible is contradictory on the value of fetuses, and the bible denies women agency, we come to the issue of Sex. The bible is quite clear that sexual immorality is a big deal, and women's sexual immorality is even worse.

Over 80% of abortions are on unmarried women, thus assisting fornication. Even if Christians were unsure if God opposed it as murder, it would make sense to oppose it as a practice associated with helping women get away with fornication.

1 Corinthians 6:13-20

 The body, however, is not meant for sexual immorality but for the Lord, and the Lord for the body. 14 By his power God raised the Lord from the dead, and he will raise us also. 15 Do you not know that your bodies are members of Christ himself? Shall I then take the members of Christ and unite them with a prostitute? Never! 16 Do you not know that he who unites himself with a prostitute is one with her in body? For it is said, “The two will become one flesh.”[b] 17 But whoever is united with the Lord is one with him in spirit.[c]

18 Flee from sexual immorality. All other sins a person commits are outside the body, but whoever sins sexually, sins against their own body. 19 Do you not know that your bodies are temples of the Holy Spirit, who is in you, whom you have received from God? You are not your own; 20 you were bought at a price.Therefore honor God with your bodies.

If sexual immorality is a sin against your own body, why would you be allowed to then make a choice about your own body to assist in further sin? Also, see the EXPLICIT rejection of Bodily Rights!

Deuteronomy 22:20-21

20 If, however, the charge is true and no proof of the young woman’s virginity can be found, 21 she shall be brought to the door of her father’s house and there the men of her town shall stone her to death. She has done an outrageous thing in Israel by being promiscuous while still in her father’s house. You must purge the evil from among you.

Here we have the stoning of non-virgin brides.

The entirety of Proverbs 7 warns against the seductive woman who entices youths to commit adultery,

Proverbs 7New International Version (NIV)

Warning Against the Adulterous Woman

7 My son, keep my words
    and store up my commands within you.
2 Keep my commands and you will live;
    guard my teachings as the apple of your eye.
3 Bind them on your fingers;
    write them on the tablet of your heart.
4 Say to wisdom, “You are my sister,”
    and to insight, “You are my relative.”
5 They will keep you from the adulterous woman,
    from the wayward woman with her seductive words.

6 At the window of my house
    I looked down through the lattice.
7 I saw among the simple,
    I noticed among the young men,
    a youth who had no sense.
8 He was going down the street near her corner,
    walking along in the direction of her house
9 at twilight, as the day was fading,
    as the dark of night set in.

10 Then out came a woman to meet him,
    dressed like a prostitute and with crafty intent.
11 (She is unruly and defiant,
    her feet never stay at home;
12 now in the street, now in the squares,
    at every corner she lurks.)
13 She took hold of him and kissed him
    and with a brazen face she said:

14 “Today I fulfilled my vows,
    and I have food from my fellowship offering at home.
15 So I came out to meet you;
    I looked for you and have found you!
16 I have covered my bed
    with colored linens from Egypt.
17 I have perfumed my bed
    with myrrh, aloes and cinnamon.
18 Come, let’s drink deeply of love till morning;
    let’s enjoy ourselves with love!
19 My husband is not at home;
    he has gone on a long journey.
20 He took his purse filled with money
    and will not be home till full moon.”

21 With persuasive words she led him astray;
    she seduced him with her smooth talk.
22 All at once he followed her
    like an ox going to the slaughter,
like a deer[a] stepping into a noose[b]
23     till an arrow pierces his liver,
like a bird darting into a snare,
    little knowing it will cost him his life.

24 Now then, my sons, listen to me;
    pay attention to what I say.
25 Do not let your heart turn to her ways
    or stray into her paths.
26 Many are the victims she has brought down;
    her slain are a mighty throng.
27 Her house is a highway to the grave,
    leading down to the chambers of death.

There is FAR more I could post on warnings about sexual immorality.


Summary

If all that was a little TL:DR for you, remember what the 2 main issues in abortion are

Personhood and Bodily Rights

Does the bible make a case for the Personhood of fetuses? No. There are at least as many passages that seem to say that fetuses aren't persons as verses that do. This is all very unclear, and unless you know Hebrew and biblical scholarship, you probably shouldn't use any of these.

Does the bible support women's bodily autonomy? That is an emphatic NO. Women belong to men and sexual immorality among women is to be punished, not assisted. No Christian has bodily rights at all, according to Corinthians.

Therefore, modern Christians act in accordance with the bible when they do not support abortion on demand.