Tuesday, September 2, 2008
News / Chicagoland Oh, no, the Internets!
Posted by Whet Moser on Tue, Sep 2, 2008 at 1:22 PM
John Kass is right to criticize a DKos diarist playing up Palin pregnancy rumors (though he ignores that the site was at war over whether to discuss the rumors--for the one diarist's irresponsibility, there was plenty of reasoned and quite angry dissent). But does the fact that the rumors in question weren't true make it worse than the Trib starring the different but true story of the same Palin daughter being pregnant on today's home page?
Based on the argument that Kass makes, which emphasizes her youth, right to privacy, and the irrelevance of her free will to her mother's political career over the truth of the rumors, I'd say the obvious answer is no. Which makes me wonder if he'll go after his employer and all the other media outlets that are playing the story up over all the other rich, relevant Palin dirt that's been spreading from the unvetted candidate.
For the record, there seem to be two generally proffered reasons to discuss the Palin pregnancy. First, the candidate supports abstinence-only education, so this is some small bit of proof that abstinence-only sex ed doesn't work. I think it's proof that I need to get "correlation is not causation" (read it, it's a hell of a post) tattooed to my forehead (indicative of something? bzzt). Second, and more broadly, it's about policy. But it was about policy before, too, and reading crystal balls about other people's families ("Anyone who watched coverage of the Bush twins' barroom exploits knew that the avert-your-eyes stance toward candidates' children has its limits"--what the fuck, Washington Post) is not just poor form, it distracts from the meat of policy discussion with emotional pornography.
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There's no question that spreading rumors you haven't even tried to confirm is worse than printing stuff that is true but "irrelevant." Which means what, anyway? Irrelevancy is subjective. You never know when something seemingly irrelevant will become relevant, possibly by dint of being analyzed alongside some other seemingly irrelevant factoid. This, among other things, is why truth is an absolute defense against libel. Besides, if you're savvy enough to be VP, you're savvy enough to know the adults among your friends and family--including "children" who are old enough to drive drunk or get pregnant--are fair game for reportage. And that reportage is fair game for analysis. The public can decide whether and how the actions of your people reflect on you. In this case, you've already shown how Bristol Palin's pregnancy could be considered "relevant": the candidate supports a form of sex ed (or rather a lack thereof) that wasn't even effective in her own home.
"The candidate supports a form of sex ed (or rather a lack thereof) that wasn't even effective in her own home." I'm really awful at math. Should I be blaming my school or then-Governor Jim Thompson for that?
"There's no question that spreading rumors you haven't even tried to confirm is worse than printing stuff that is true but 'irrelevant.'" Yes. But that's not the argument that Kass is making.
I thought it was an argument you were making!
"How about your parents?" My parents weren't the ones teaching me math. And even though they helped me as much as they could, it was ultimately up to me whether or not I wanted to keep up my skills in math once I left the classroom. Here's the thing: You're talking about expecting kids to apply what they learn in school to the real world and always keep it with them and use it as their guide, no matter what. And that just doesn't happen (hence my math analogy) as evidenced in the Jezebel post. Kids will have sex despite abstinence-only and despite comprehensive sex ed and often in spite of their parents. And while CSEd and parents may reduce the likelihood of pregnancy, STDs and the like, whether or not it prevents the pregnancy or STDs in one kid is not solely a referendum on the parent. It's ultimately about the decisions made by the kid. What's relevant here isn't whether her kid is having a kid, it's that Palin went ahead as a VP candidate knowing her kid was having a kid and knowing the scrutiny it would bring.
I'm not actually talking about expecting kids to apply everything they learn in school. I'm talking about parents who misguide their own kids being in a position to legislate that schoolteachers misguide my (hypothetical) kids. Sure, if Palin had bought the kid a copy of Our Bodies Ourselves when she turned 13, she might still have gotten pregnant. But bringing her up to be ashamed or scared of birth control increased her chances.
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