California Marriage Amendment and the Mormons

A little good news today, as it has been reported that the California Supreme Court has unanimously thrown out a suit to strike Proposition 8 from California's ballot in November.

At least now the future of marriage in California is up to the citizens, and not the courts!

Also, in related news, Mormon church leaders will ask its California members to join the amendment effort in California. According to AP:

A June 20 letter sent to Mormon congregation bishops and signed by
church president Thomas S. Monson and his two top counselors calls upon
Mormons to donate "means and time" to the ballot measure.

The church will work with a coalition of churches and other
conservative groups that put the California Marriage Protection Act on
the Nov. 4 ballot to assure its passage, the letter states.

"The church's teachings and position on this moral issue are
unequivocal. Marriage between a man and a woman is ordained of God and
the formation of families is central to the Creator's plan for His
children," the four paragraph letter states.

I may have some fundamental issues with the Mormon church, but this is good news that more people are banding together to preserve marriage.

Barnes and Noble to sell pornography? Maybe it already does!

After a recent trip to Barnes and Noble, and reading recent reports on the web, it seems that there is a growing problem with national booksellers Barnes and Noble.

Here is a summary of a recent excerpt from OneMillionMoms:

In
Collierville, Tennessee, recently, an 11 year-old boy named Landon
Howse was walking through the Barnes & Noble bookstore when he
noticed a book lying open on one of the reading area tables. His dad,
Brannon Howse, was right behind him. What Landon saw were graphic
pictures of two men engaged in sex. The book was titled "Ultimate Gay
Sex," and is one of the many sexually explicit books offered in Barnes
& Noble stores.

Mr. Howse
was obviously stunned and upset at what his young son had just been
exposed to just walking through a general bookstore. When Mr. Howse
complained to the store management that this kind of material should
not be on the bookshelves anywhere in the store, especially a store
children frequent, he was met with indifference. When he complained to
law enforcement that Barnes & Noble was in violation of the
Tennessee "harmful to minors" statute he was given the run around.

Now let's be clear. I have a problem with Barnes and Noble providing easy access to ANY adult material, not just adult gay material. Here's the letter that I sent to them:

Dear Chairman Riggio:

I am writing regarding an issue I have with your retail stores. It seems that there are dozens of books that contain graphic and explicit photos that can be accessed by just about anyone, even children and minors. As you know, many of your patrons like to take books off the shelves and browse them at the café or on nearby couches. Unfortunately, these books are often left there and can be picked up by just about anyone. I think your company needs to be more responsible with books of this nature. Either take them off the shelves completely or put them in special restricted areas where children cannot view them.

I would also ask that you be fair and honest in your evaluation of such books. I have seen and heard that books like "Ultimate Gay Sex," with graphic sexual pictures, have been easily found on your shelves. Is Barnes and Noble going into the gay and pornographic market? I hope not!

Please know that your response to my concern will determine if I will continue to patronize Barnes & Noble.

I shop at Barnes and Noble (alot) and I have seen this before. I never realized how bad it was and after a quick trip there now I see there is a real problem. Please take the time to contact them and tell them they need to be more responsible with their adult materials.

I understand that many books have adult material, even the classics, but those with graphic images need to be put off-limits to minors. Even rag shops that sell hard core pornographic magazines know this. Come on Barnes and Noble, make your stories family friendly!

Mr. Stephen Riggio, CEO sriggio@bn.com
Chris Troia, Chief Information Officer ctroia@bn.com
Mary Ellen Keating, Senior V.P. of Corporate Communications and Public Affairs mkeating@bn.com
Jaime Carey, Chief Merchandising Officer jcarey@bn.com
Carolyn Brown, Director of Corporate Communications e-mail: cbrown@bn.com

Jamie Lynn Spears: motherhood is "so much fun"

Like Rebecca says, being pregnant is the new black. I guess Jamie Lynn Spears agrees.

While I think the world needs more kids, I don't like the idea of kids having kids outside of marriage. The media wants to cover it as 'news', but really all they are doing is glorifying the fact that these young girls are having sex and children out of marriage.

For thousands of years before the twentieth century, young women have been having children at young ages. That's no big secret. However, those societies were different and operated under strict moral codes that said that young women should be married when they have children. I have no desire to relive the days when woman couldn't vote and were treated as property of their husbands, but in this case, God I miss the good old days!

The McDonald's Boycott

It's time to put your dollar where your faith is! The AFA has asked for a boycott of McDonald's for throwing their full corporate might into promoting the same sex marriage agenda. If you want your money to go into helping same sex couples gain legal marriage status, then keep on ordering those Big Macs. As for me and my house...we will go to Wendy's.

From AFA:

"Throwing out any pretense of being neutral in the culture war, McDonald's has taken up the rhetoric of gay activists, suggesting those who oppose same sex marriage (SSM) are motivated by hate. AFA has asked for a boycott of McDonald's"

Visit http://www.boycottmcdonalds.com/ to get in on the action.

Economy and the Family Part 2: Adventures in the Mundane

Many of us take for granted that we can just hop in the car and go get anything we pretty much want. From electronics to food, for must of us, every possible distraction is just a few minutes away.

Now that the price of gas has skyrocketed, I think it's time to review the age-old pastime of walking. I'll give you an example from our own life.

Last night we decided to walk to Walgreens to pick up some...personal items, shall we say.

So we decide to make an evening out of it. First, I walked with my son and wife to Dairy Queen for some cold, smooth ice cream, where we had a nice chat about something that I can't remember and then we walked from Dairy Queen to Walgreens for the other stuff. Then we walked back, weaving through rush hour traffic, and ended the night by looking up through the telescope to watch the moon.

What made this little adventure so nice was that it was no adventure at all. Here we were, doing the most mundane of things, like eating ice cream and picking up toilet paper (yes, toilet paper, now you have it), and it was some of the best family bonding time we've had in a while. Why?

1. We spent over an hour together without a single electronic gadget. When was the last time the average family could say that?

2. Our conversations were about nothing significant. We reviewed our vacation and played walking games (like "red light, green light"). We sang songs from our son's favorite TV show, The Backyardigans. We tested his reading ability by picking out words on signs. We talked about cars. Families need lots of insignificant talk, not just morsels of meaningful dialogue. When it comes to family, quantity is better.

3. We sweated together. That may sound gross, but families who toil together (though a walk can hardly be considered work) stay together. That's my theory. Our walk was a shared experience. Each of had to look out for cars, we had to tell each other when it was safe to cross. We all saw the same ducks swimming across the canal. There's a certain simple beauty in walking up to your doorstep and seeing the same sweaty face on that of your family's.

If we were to write a movie in the fashion of Indiana Jones (the old ones, at least) about our family adventures, they would have titles like "The Plumey Family and the Curse of the Broken Walk Signal" or "The Plumey Family: Raiders of the Dairy Queen Bathroom".

Don't pass up the simple pleasure of spending what may seem to be meaningless time with your family. No matter what age your kids or your parents, these mundane adventures will be lasting memories in your family for years to come and you will be drawn closer in ways you never expected.

Economy and the Family Part 1: Strip clubs

This is the first post on the impact of a slow economy on family values. And I'll admit this is an interesting place to start: strip clubs.

I can't tell you how many fathers I have met in the course of my travels that actively go to strip clubs, with or without their spouse's awareness. For some it's just a distraction, but for others it's an addiction. Either way, husbands and fathers who go to strip clubs are putting into jeopardy their marriages and their families.

So it appears that the downturn in the US economy is also impacting strip clubs, at least here in South Florida where I live. This is from the Sun Sentinel:

Angelina Spencer is national executive director of the Association of
Club Executives, a group that represents adult entertainment clubs. She
says she fields calls every day from strip club owners around the
country feeling the pinch of a bad economy.

Spencer says entertainment is a luxury item and ``one of the first things people give up.''

Fathers and husbands spending less time at strip clubs is a good thing, even if the reasons for their absence have more to do with their wallet than their ideas of sexuality and respect for their wives.

On the flip side, a down economy also means that there are more women who are willing to try strip teasing as a form of income, which is why we should be helping groups like XXXChurch to reach out to men and women in the adult entertainment industry.

Not to turn this post into a discussion of this organization, but despite their lack of orthodox methodologies and teachings, they really are doing something really interesting to reach out to those afflicted by addictions to pornography and the "adult entertainment" lifestyle.

Bad Economy is good for family values

This is the first of a multi-part post in which I will discuss the impact of a soft economy on the family. A soft economy often means scaling back some extravagances in the family budget. Things like movies, dinners at restaurants, the buying of new toys and gadgets, etc. are often the first thing to go in a family budget. In many cases, this is a blessing in disguise. An attentive parent can see opportunities to spend more time with their kids and for their family to grow together.

Over the next few posts I will focus on opportunities that can be gained to help families to spend more time together and grow stronger during an economic slow down. I'll also focus on external things happening outside the family that are impacted by a sagging economy that can turn out to improving family values within the United States.

Stay tuned!