Will Conservatives Ban Black Licorice

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I really don’t like licorice. I despise black licorice, for a perfectly rational reason. When I was in kindergarten, my teacher brought in a bag of black licorice and insisted each child have a piece. I didn’t want any, for some reason (I’d never had it before), and she forced me to eat it. To this day, I cannot stand anise, fennel, leeks, Pernod or anything that smells or tastes like black licorice.

However, it would never occur to me to say to another person “I don’t like black licorice, so you cannot eat black licorice. Furthermore, I will make laws that force you not to eat black licorice because I hate it.”

Conservatives do that constantly. As they bellow about smaller government, they seek to infringe their beliefs and hatred onto the rest of us. They hate the poor. Rather than just stew in their hate, they spread it around, cutting programs that help families living in poverty. Free lunch programs-gone. Low cost health care-gone. Welfare programs-slashed.

Conservatives hate the LGBT community, but again, rather than keeping that to themselves, they make it impossible for anyone in that community to get married, adopt children or receive the benefits heterosexual married couples receive. They make it easier and in some states, legal, for businesses to discriminate against the LGBT community, and lie about gays and lesbians, calling them “perverse” and “of Satan.”

They also hate porn. Rick Santorum bemoaned that President Obama was not focusing enough on porn. Quite frankly, if I were married to a man who was as focused on sex and porn as Rick Santorum, I would be calling a lawyer. But in the case of pornography, there’s a catch.

Let’s go back to the licorice analogy. I am a conservative who hates licorice and I am going to make it illegal for anyone to eat licorice. AND while I am beating my breast about the horrors of licorice, I am actually eating it in secret. Oops. Guess who’s eating a lot of licorice.

Harvard researcher Ben Edelman actually studied the demographics of pornography in America. The conclusions of this study are available online in PDF format. There is an index on the side of the page, and when I discovered the study, I clicked Subscription Patterns. Edelman’s study looked at zip codes from 2006-2008, and compiled information based on broadband access. And he made a map.

According to Edelman’s study, Utah ranked as number one on the list of the most prolific viewers of pornography, along with Alaska, Mississippi, Oklahoma, Arkansas, North Dakota, Louisiana, Florida and West Virginia. Hawaii is on the top ten list as well, the only blue state included. Hawaii placed fourth, after Utah, Alaska and Mississippi. Nine of the top ten porn viewing states in America are conservative states. The bible belt. Tea party governors, fundamentalist Christians and a deep hatred for all things sexual. Well, almost.

ERIN! That study is four years old! Certainly with the advent of the tea party and the rebirth of fundamentalist Christianity, those statistics are much different now! You’re correct. Men’s Health Magazine just released the results of their own study, and named the smuttiest cities in America. Number one is Orlando, Florida. The other nine cities are, in order, Las Vegas, NV (Duh), Wilmington, DE (Delaware? Seriously?), Raleigh, NC (Gay marriage BAD! Porn GOOD!), Charlotte, NC (hee hee), Minneapolis, MN (It gets really cold there?), Atlanta, GA (Another red state), Tampa, FL (Florida and the Carolinas make it twice!), Anchorage, AK (Sarah Palin must be really miffed about that one) and Austin, TX (Rick Perry may have been on to something when he invested in Movie Gallery). So many red states, so little broadband.

As Rachel Maddow once said, it’s okay if you’re a Republican. It’s okay to hate the poor as you collect your food stamps, because you would never vote for that Kenyan Muslim in the White House. It’s okay to hate gay people even though you have weird feelings in your stomach when you watch pro wrestling because dammit, you love Jesus. And it’s okay to watch porn because there isn’t anything in the bible about porn.

Enjoy your licorice.

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About Post Author

Erin Nanasi

Erin Nanasi is an avid underwater basket weaver, with a penchant for satire and the odd wombat reference.
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11 years ago

I love black licorice…

Thank you Erin for all you do…

Kevin

Francine
11 years ago

To understand how these people think read this book it’s free on the Internet. All your questions will be answered.

The authoritarians.com

Bill Formby
11 years ago

Good read Erin. As I have pointed out in the past the primary consistent trait of serial killers and rapists is that at their core they are sexually dysfunctional. This is almost always brought about by mothers and/or fathers who abuse their children in relation to their sexuality and in other ways when they are very young. What you have described above is part of their behavior in that they publicly romp and stomp about the evils of anything to do with sex but are secretly obsessed by it and their children often pay the price either by being targets of the obsession or targets of their insistence of the evil of sex. Either way the child loses and grows up with a warped perception of sex. Unfortunately, some are so damaged that an event will trigger something that they cannot stop and society then pays the price.

Mark Willis
11 years ago

I find the entire culture of the Right to be most frightening. They are marching almost in lockstep in the Congress and their followers are like sheep in the paddock with herders the likes of Grover Norquist and Rush Limbaugh. Despite this they represent a slice of America that may be only a small taste of days yet to come. My compliments to the author.

Rhonda
11 years ago

Does this mean no more Good and Plenty? All kidding aside this story is right on the mark. Well done. For the very life of my beating heart I barely can comprehend why anyone would vote conservative except for the ultra-rich.

Reply to  Rhonda
11 years ago

I agree 110%! I don’t get it either. It’s like they (conservative voters) have become the country’s most masochistic people.

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