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The Right to Life, Liberty,
and the Pursuit of Happiness
-- Or, More Specifically, "Nothing"

An Open Letter by Punkerslut to
the American Principles Project (APP)

From RadicalGraphics.org
Image: From RadicalGraphics.org

Start Date: January 25, 2011
Finish Date: January 25, 2011

     Greetings,

     You promote yourselves as an organization trying to promote the ideals of the Constitution and the Declaration of Independence. But, it's quite clear that you have a different agenda. In your quoting of the Declaration of Independence, for instance, you rewrote what the Founding Fathers had wrote. You said that they gave the right of life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness to "each and every member of the human family." It doesn't say that. It says "men."

     Of course, it's quite a Sexist document, but I doubt you rewrote it to get rid of its references to patriarchy and gender behavior roles. In trying to restore "our national commitment to" these ideals, you seemed to take this as a mission objective: "...in defense of political liberty and economic freedom, the sanctity of human life and the integrity of marriage and the family, and the sovereignty and security of our nation." Wait, the sanctity of human life as in abortion? I don't recall the Founding Fathers ever making explicit mention of how the Declaration of Independence ties in with abortion. Also, Euthanasia needs to be opposed, for some reason. Again, I don't recall that being in the Constitution.

     If you support the "sanctity of human life," then are you going to oppose the Death Penalty? Doesn't look like it from your website. The sanctity of human life seems to extend only toward the unborn. Thomas Paine, that great founder of America, was condemned to death for contributing to the American Revolution. Is it peculiar, or typical, that you have forgotten about the people you're trying to defend?

     What about the sanctity of human life of nations that our "national sovereignty" is murdering? Thirty thousand starve to death every day, in countries that were once opulent, but were raided and burned, reduced to impotence and servility, by dual conquest of the United States and Europe. Why does human life mean so much when it's just two or three cells without consciousness, but it suddenly means nothing when it's a full grown human being thousands of miles away?

     The War if Iraq and the War of Afghanistan, both of which are wars against powers the United States government set up. Those who vote and support our government are responsible for murdering human life. You went to the meeting, you saw the bodies, no bones were hidden from you, and you still voted, "Yeah, I'll go along with it." Preach your "sanctity of human morality" to the piles of dead, hundreds of thousands in Iraq, whether the Kurds who were gassed with American weapons, or the Iraqi civilians butchered by our own carpet-bombing. So-called "wars of prevention," while our own government supplies nuclear arms to Israel in violation of every international treaty known since 1500. But it's typical. In the words of Orwell, "a preventive war is a crime not easily committed by a country that retains any traces of democracy." ("Towards European Unity," 1947.)

     "Abortion, euthanasia, and other forms of death-dealing conduct have been promoted as constitutional and human rights." But not the death-dealing of corporations like Halliburton that invest corporate profits into political campaigns that allow them to make money off of murdering. No, that's not "death-dealing." To you, death-dealing is Planned Parenthood, one of the largest givers of healthcare to low-income women. You promote a document that begins and ends with giving liberties to men, you rewrite that to include the unborn, and then you attack healthcare institutes that treat women as a violation of this right.

     Dropping bombs on villages, killing hundreds of thousands, murdering men, women, and children, seeing videos of it, and still, at that point, you don't even have the courage to say what you believe: "sanctity of human life doesn't apply to those people who are too different from us nationally, ethnically, or culturally." Oh, I'm sure you would violently suppress gay freedom and queer liberty in those countries, if you were allowed to, but I don't think you'd ever have a concept of what human life could ever mean. You wash your hands in a political system that keeps more than a billion hungry, murders the innocent, and then lies about it.

     Of course your concept of "human life" means something when it miraculously is applied to the squirt in a condom. How could I be so stupid as to think that it applies to the village of children who are bombed so your company can finally do strip-mining there?

     Another line of "brilliance" about your ideals: "Now we see the promotion of fetal experimentation, human cloning, and animal-human hybridization. Similarly, the definition of marriage--the most fundamental unit of society--is under intense assault, and with it the historic understanding of sexual morality and virtue that has been the foundation of our civilization." What does 'animal-human hybridization' have to do with legalizing gay marriage? Oh, that's right, nothing. Nothing at all. Like the "right to life" doesn't mean the right of living, full-grown human beings to live. No, it means the right of a sperm to cling to the vaginal lining, and produce another unwanted child. Is a bullet in the head a violation of "human dignity"? No, because that makes you money, which is sacred. Is a the morning-after pill a violation of "human dignity"? Somehow, yes.

     But, I ought to back up a little further. "...the definition of marriage—the most fundamental unit of society..." is odd. Marriage, between a man and a woman, has only existed for the past one thousand years of Europe, and the Europeans, typically, have lived in polyfidelity, or equalitarian group marriages. Have you read David Hume's books on history? If you haven't, that's where you find multiple references to this practice.

     It should further be added that the Constitution and the Declaration of Independence mentions nothing about marriage. It does mention "the right to the pursuit of happiness." Doesn't it seem like a gay couple would produce infinitely more happiness by satisfying their love, than a million ignorant voters could produce by satisfying their hate? Isn't THIS what the Declaration of Independence meant? And if it didn't, why is the word "happiness" in there at all?

     Thank you for reading this far. I patiently await a response...

Sincerely,
Andy Carloff


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