If consumers spent a bit more time policing the politics of the global marketplace and buying accordingly we’d have a significantly more efficient and moral market and significantly less left wing objection to capitalism I imagine.

Since I believe in markets I also believe that they function best when consumers make informed choices about their buying habits. Since I support the right of women to reproductive freedom I will favor pharmacies that cater to that preference and disfavor pharmacies that do not. I would also think it perfectly fair for people who are morally opposed to birth control and abortion to behave in the opposite manner to mine.

I find this reaction interesting on a lot of fronts. When I lived in a city, the bodega down the street was run by very conservative Pakistanis. They were nice enough, but they had some pretty retrograde ideas concerning women. But it never occurred to me to not shop there for that reason. And certainly, had they gone out of business, I would not have cheered that outcome.

I suppose there could be some situation in which a merchant’s views were so repugnant that I would enact a boycott. But it would have to be really, really high-grade tomfoolery. And public tomfoolery. Disagreement with me about birth control, one way or another, would not even come close.

This works in both directions. A few years back, some people refused to buy American Girls dolls because of some alleged transgression concerning abortion. If the standard were really that low, I suspect I would spend most of my time policing the politics of the global marketplace. Meh.

It’s also annoying because I know it’s all over in about fifteen years, but I want to make it about seven, and what they do makes me sound like a crazy irrational mess. I don’t want to hate them, but they keep trying. Sigh.

Then there’s things like Dan Savage’s post about the 14 year old out gay kid who went on Halloween as Lady Gaga with is parents’ help. And that NYT Sunday Mag article from a while back–if Oklahoma City has gay middle schoolers that the school district and the PTA meetings have gotten over, it means that the Mormons and the Catholic Church have lost the argument.

I just feel badly that institutions that I was indifferent to before have done so much to earn indignation and distrust, and I don’t really know what to do about them.

“The Mormons did it in California, and they were an easy target for my ire, I have to admit. I’ve always had issues with Mormonism, whether that’s fair or not. But Catholics? I mean, here is an institution devoted to peace and justice!”

If the Catholic Church can be called an instrument of “peace and justice” so can the LDS Church.

Really, I think the only reason people aren’t quite so keen to rip into the Catholics they way they ripped into Mormons is because there are too many Catholics around to pull that kind of crap. But Mormons are a small minority, disliked by numerous groups for different reasons.

They’re an easy target.