Posted on 12/04/2012 7:32:46 AM PST by SeekAndFind
If you want to understand leftism — and everyone needs to, because it has been the most dynamic religion of the past one hundred years — one good place to start is with San Francisco.
Or, perhaps more precisely, with nudity.
Or, even more precisely, with public nudity.
Last month, the San Francisco Board of Supervisors voted by the barest (pun not intended) margin, 6 to 5, to ban public nudity. By “public nudity,” the law means only displaying one’s genitals in public. San Francisco women are still free to walk around topless. But that is not unique to San Francisco. Years ago, the highest court in New York State ruled that since it sees no difference between a man’s chest and a woman’s, women should be free to walk around topless, just as men do.
Now why is all this significant?
Leftism seeks to undo most of the values that are distinct to Judeo-Christian religion. The Left has always been anti-religious, and especially anti-Christian. Karl Marx understood that a vibrant leftism and a vibrant Christianity could not coexist. He was right.
Two of the many areas of conflict between Judeo-Christian values and leftism concern the separation between the holy and the profane and the separation between humans and animals.
The essence of the Hebrew Bible, transmitted by Christianity, is separation: between life and death, nature and God, good and evil, man and woman, and the holy and the profane.
The reasons to oppose public nudity emanate from this Judeo-Christian list of separations.
When human beings walk around with their genitals uncovered, they are behaving in a manner indistinguishable from that of animals. A major difference between humans and animals is clothing; clothing separates us from — and in the biblical view, elevates us above — the animal kingdom.
Seeing any animal’s genitals is normal. Anyone who demanded that animals’ genitals be covered would be regarded as a nut by the most religious Jew or Christian.
But one of our human tasks is to elevate ourselves above the animal. And covering our genitals is one important way to do that.
The world of the Left generally finds this animal–human distinction unnecessary. For years now, I have been reading article after article in major liberal newspapers and magazines about how much more alike humans and animals are than we ever thought. The theme of these articles is how narrow the differences really are between humans and animals.
Public nudity certainly forwards that theme.
The second reason to oppose public nudity also comes from the list of separations: the concept of the holy, or sacred.
For the Left, little is sacred — certainly little in the ways that Jewish and Christian civilization has usually understood the term.
That is why an “artist” achieved cult-like status in the left-wing cultural world with a depiction of a crucifix in a jar of his urine. The crucifix is sacred to hundreds of millions of people — I will pee on it. Whatever Judeo-Christian convention holds sacred, true believing Leftists have sought to desacralize.
The San Francisco Examiner reported about one of the protesters at the San Francisco supervisors vote:
“As he pulled his pants up, a nudist named Stardust said the legislation sent the wrong message. ‘It’s telling people they should be ashamed to be naked, and that’s totally wrong,’ he said.”
But to those who believe in Judeo-Christian values, telling people to be ashamed about being naked in public is not totally wrong. It’s the whole point.
The first thing Adam and Eve discovered after eating from the Tree of Knowledge of Good and Evil was that they were naked. And the first emotion they ever experienced was shame over their nudity.
San Francisco and America and the West are going to have to choose whether Stardust or the Bible is right. By one vote San Francisco decided in favor of the Bible. But a judge, who may well have Stardust’s values, is yet to rule.
And it’s hard to see why a liberal judge would not rule the law unconstitutional. Because the fact is that there is no secular reason to ban public nudity.
— Dennis Prager is a nationally syndicated radio talk-show host and columnist. His most recent book is Still the Best Hope: Why the World Needs American Values to Triumph. He is the founder of PragerUniversity
Equality is sacred because lots of evil people then get to play god.
uhhgh...now I’m seeing someone purveying little undies for dog...
The ONLY good thing that came out of the “Fall of Man” in the Garden of Eden is mankind learned to cover up.
Serious, can you imagine if we lived in a world where Michael Moore or Rosie O’Donnell, walked around nude?
Which is why a few of us realize that we need a Constitutional fix.
The Constitution should be explicitly based on the Bible, making America explicitly, legally a Christian nation.
In it’s present state it has glaring ambiguities and is not explicitly Christian, and the results are all around us.
I’d have to assume that in San Francisco, not every nude person’s body is clean and smelling fresh all day and for that reason, public nudity should be banned.
1st Amendment. Re-read it.
As for public nudity... Everyone is naked under their clothes. Leave it up to each community and vote with your dollars.
Personally, I wouldn't visit such places. Nothing there I want to see.
They should invite these people to come and publicly walk nude in Anchorage, between the months of December and February...
They can have a parade if they want :)
I want to vacation in the world where Jessica Biel and Angie Everheart are walking around nude.
That's just me though... Not sure my Wife would agree.
RE: Nothing there I want to see.
Not even if the Victoria’s Secret ladies decide to go on parade? :)
I wanted the first few sentences to tell me why public nudity is wrong. No such luck. Finally the author says it’s because it distinguishes us from animals who wear no clothes, and therefore seeing an animal’s genitals is normal and seeing ours is not. Hey - I seldom see animials’ genitals. They are mostly hidden by fur and their location between the legs.
I don’t believe in public nudity but the article was a waste of my time. Perhaps my expectations were too high.
Can the highest court in New York state really see no difference between a man’s chest and a woman’s? I certainly can, and I ain’t no damned judge!
Of course, it is, at times, rather entertaining to judge wimmins’ chests ....
Besides, I'd rather just let my Wife shop at Vicky's Secret... ;-)
And I was hoping that the author would elaborate on his equating, in the first paragraph: human genitals, men's chests, and women's chests; and maybe indicate whether I (as a man) am wrong to go about topless when performing yardwork on hot summer days, but no luck!
I'm not sure, but I get the impression that he thinks that's wrong, too. (Maybe I could get a "National Geographic Exemption"?)
Regards,
!
Reading this article, the song “Bounce Your Boobies” by Rusty Warren popped into my head :)
It was the Fall that makes Michael and Rosie look like they do. If we had not Fallen, we’d all look much better.
True, but even if someone looked great, there would still be problems. Some people will sometimes have errr racing streaks in their underpants because of hygiene habits.
Would you want them to come butt naked and have a seat at your restaurant?
The Bible does not force anything but the moral law on unbelievers.
It works the same way ancient Israel was commanded to treat “strangers”.
Our laws against murder, theft, etc., are based on the Old Testament moral law. Pre-American European law - the idea of what’s right and what’s wrong - was based on the Bible. This is why sodomy laws were called sodomy laws, because that’s the word the King James Bible uses. The founders did NOT discuss what the moral law of America would be, i.e., should we make a crime and what we should not make a crime from a secular standpoint. In that day in Europe and America the Bible was the generally accepted root source for understanding what is right and wrong.
The guys who wrote the Constitution corporately came up with this open-ended idea on religion which only worked until the selection of elected leaders started to go into the toilet, which was very early on.
1st Amendment is too vague and allows Christianity to be attacked. So it is being attacked.
Post-WWII we started to pick and choose to legalize some acts, such as sodomy, and murder of unborn children.
Just because a majority wants to make something legal, that does not nullify the effect of the moral law given in God’s Law Word the Bible.
There is no middle ground on religion even though secular humanists maintain that there is. This is being demonstrated now as the secular humanist government turns on Christianity - and Jews who are practicing - in favor of what self-serving politicians see as an up-and-coming group, islam. A nation is either Christian or it’s not. Jewish or it’s not. Muslim or it’s not. Secular humanist or it’s not. If it doesn’t say what it bases it’s law on, it’s secular humanist; it bases it on what the power struggles between people result in. Dems in charge, abortion is legal. Repubs in charge, abortion frowned upon. Believers in charge, abortion illegal.
This is why, IMHO, the real battle is for hearts and minds of the population.
IMHO, it’s the truth that sets us free, and lying to ourselves that sins of the flesh and other sins are acceptable does not set us free, it makes us a slave to those sins.
The Bible tells us that civil government has “the power of the sword” to restrain evil. If it doesn’t use it righteously evil is not restrained.
From the “Knockers Up” album? I recall covertly listening with several friends to that album that belonged to a friends dad when I was about 14.
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