Former Florida Governor and soon to be Presidential candidate Jeb has consistently made his personal definition of “character” central to his political stances and decisions. This definition is expounded upon in length in his 1995 book Profiles in Character, where in a chapter titled “The Restoration of Shame”, he advocates for, as the title implies, restoring America to a time when unwed mothers and poor people receiving welfare were stigmatized and shamed for their situations. In effect, Jeb is doing what no other Republican in the current era has done; promote abortion. Not only is Bush effectively promoting abortion, but as will be revealed further below, he has compounded this atypical position further by advocating for public humiliation of those who would seek to avoid abortion by choosing adoption, and he did so in his capacity as governor in more than one way. First let’s look at the telling passage from his book:
One of the reasons more young women are giving birth out of wedlock and more young men are walking away from their paternal obligations is that there is no longer a stigma attached to this behavior, no reason to feel shame. Many of these young women and young men look around and see their friends engaged in the same irresponsible conduct. Their parents and neighbors have become ineffective at attaching some sense of ridicule to this behavior. There was a time when neighbors and communities would frown on out of wedlock births and when public condemnation was enough of a stimulus for one to be careful
It’s important to note that while young men are mentioned in the comment, when a young man walks away from a pregnant female, she is still pregnant, left with the decision-making as well as visible signs of pregnancy, signs that the man has abandoned. Strangers or even small community folks can’t shame him because they are unlikely to know that he has impregnated a girl and dumped her for getting pregnant. The young man might even be given accolades and earn prestige among his peers while the girl is left visibly pregnant and then with a child. People in smaller communities all across the nation still frown upon out-of-wedlock births, but it is inevitably the young woman who must forfeit college and career plans to raise the child. Most often the young man is able to go on with his life without life altering complications.
The smaller and more religion-oriented the community, the more shaming is likely to occur. Those double standards guarantee that he will be far less stigmatized than the young woman. It is unlikely that Mr. Bush is unaware of this cultural prejudice, so his inclusion of young men in that paragraph seems disingenuous.
Still, there do exist communities small enough and/or religious enough to be able to shame girls and young women who have chosen to keep their child rather than abort it. It then follows that these girls and young women would have to make a choice between being shamed and having an abortion. If Mr. Bush has his way, more communities will be shaming these young people. That means more of these young people will be having to choose between abortion and suffering “public condemnation”, as Mr. Bush phrases it in his book. A tough decision becomes exponentially more difficult under that reality. In other words, Mr. Bush is effectively promoting abortion in the name of a return to “the Scarlet Letter” era. Yes, Bush actually stated , “Infamous shotgun weddings and Nathaniel Hawthorne’s Scarlet Letter (written in 1850) are reminders that public condemnation of irresponsible sexual behavior has strong historical roots,” (Source).
Further, Bush refused to veto legislation dubbed the “Scarlet Letter Law” in 2003 that required single mothers who did not know the identity of the father to publish their sexual histories in a newspaper before they could legally put their babies up for adoption. The law was successfully challenged in court before he decided to repeal it.
Mr. Bush’s use of the term “Out-of wedlock” in modern society clearly projects a religious judgmental premise. In a society where more couples are satisfied with cohabitation instead of marriage (which has a more than 50% chance of failure), except in the smallest of communities, it sounds archaic. In typical Republican form, Mr. Bush has revealed how out-of-touch Republicans are with current society and norms, and suggesting that we return to some imaginary time when all was right with the world that doesn’t exist. People have sex. We don’t want our young children to have sex prematurely. But study after study has shown that sex education and accessibility to birth control prevents unwanted pregnancies while abstinence only education creates more pregnancies.
Out-of-wedlock mother is a judgmental term that discriminates against women, containing a double standard wherein women bear the brunt of undesired pregnancy. If they keep their child or if they want to give it up for adoption without disclosing the name of the father, in Jeb Bush’s world they are scarlet women who should be publicly condemned. Of course he also wants to make it harder for women to have abortions, while making birth control more expensive and less accessible with fewer option
Jeb Bush is equally judgmental against the poor, targeting single women with children. The man who is all about character and virtue has targeted the most vulnerable in our society, wanting them shamed for needing assistance in a patriarchal society where men are free to walk with little or no repercussions for their lusts and infidelities. Bush would have women shamed for getting pregnant, shamed for keeping the baby to raise or to adopt out, and shamed if she keeps the child and struggles to raise it as a single mother.
It would seem that while Jeb Bush is all about public shaming of women and the poor, he can’t quite distance himself from the public shame he deserves by association with a war-criminal brother and fiscally irresponsible father and brother whose war-mongering and policies created more poor people than America has ever experienced.
It’s a patriarchal society and Jeb Bush wants to make sure women are without resources to prevent an unplanned pregnancy, and if an unplanned pregnancy occurs, she is shamed. Patriarchal societies can’t have women being empowered with choices about their own bodies, no matter what that choice may be.
Sovereign Voice
Sovereign Voice is a strong Independent writer and activist who lives in the Mohave Desert of Arizona, currently writing a futuristic novel and supporting balanced journalism where ever it is found.
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