Book Review: The Pill Knocked Up

CHAPTER EIGHT

INSERT GRAPHIC: FLYING STORK, 37456708M

THE OPTIMISTS’ CLIFF NOTES FOR BOLD AGENDAS, BRAVE ACTIONS

This book, WHY KNOCKED UP?, began with a mission to unravel the Knocked Up Paradox: Despite more than 50 years of The Pill, a healthy dose of sexual freedom, a dazzling array of contraceptives, and historically low birth rates, about 50 percent of all pregnancies--some 3.4 million a year--are accidental, unplanned. Along the way, I described the forces driving that paradox, the far-reaching consequences resulting from so many Knocked Up pregnancies, and why we need to create the ways and means to stem that tide. So, we are here, on the route to this book’s exit. True enough--for pages and pages, I focused on the problems--but

come “from a higher power.” For example, Alabama Supreme Court Chief Justice Roy Moore, who claimed that despite the fact of a federal judge's ruling declaring the state's ban on same-sex marriages was unconstitutional--he did not have to honor it as it lacked the authority of a “higher power.” In a CNN interview with Chris Cuomo, he said, “Our rights, contained in the Bill of Rights, do not come from the Constitution, they come from God.” A good example of how the media (and we) might respond, Cuomo said, “Our laws do not come from God, your honor, and you know that. They come from man.” Adding to those remarks, Frank Bruni, in his New York Times’ essay “Too Much Prayer in Politics,” offered insights into how the far right flunks civics and why their so-called “facts” should be challenged and exposed. He pointed out that the Alabama example is a good illustration of how the far right “opponents of gay marriage aren’t merely asserting that it runs counter to what Alabamians want. They’re declaring that it perverts God’s will, which was the position that some racists took about integration.” Going one step further, Bruni asserts, “We should be even warier of politicians and other leaders who wrap policy in dogma, claiming holy guidance. That’s a dangerous road to take. At that far, bitter end of it lie theocracies and brutal experiments.” (February 14,