They do not trust their own urges,

their capacity for self-restraint or judgment

The Christian right forces its

followers to project evil outward,

a convenient escape for people unable to face

the darkness and psychological torments within them

The leaders of this movement understand that

the only emotion that cannot be

subsumed into communal life,

which they seek to dominate and control,

is lust. They fear its power

Sex, when not a utilitarian

form of procreation, is dangerous

The link between reactionary politics and sexual repression only became clear to me recently when I read Emma Goldman’s memoirs and discovered that the crime she and her colleagues were repeatedly sent to jail for in the '30s was distributing birth control information.

To most of us, it may be hard to understand why birth control is a political issue rather than a private choice and why Christian fundamentalists oppose it.

Is it because keeping people frustrated and miserable makes it easier to control them?

Because power and domination are increased by denying permission whenever possible with no regard for the consequences, and without consequences for the elite who are simply excused from such restrictions? Because sexual freedom and happiness may be a seed of hope for larger freedoms?

Or should it not be explained as a conscious strategy but rather as instinctive hypocrisy or blind obstructionism, opposing any kind of progress or change as an erosion of existing authority? Why would procreation be deemed natural and pleasure not?

Is it fear of sex? A means to control women, perhaps even to ensure their availability for sex?

The relentless drive against abortion by the Christian right -- the first salvo having been fired with the 5-to-4 Supreme Court decision last month to uphold the federal ban on the procedure known as "partial birth abortion" -- has nothing to do with the protection of life.

It is, rather, a cover for a wider and more pernicious assault against the ability of women to control their own bodies, the use of contraception and sexual pleasure.

The movement openly conflates contraceptives with devices or substances that cause abortion. It holds up as heroes of "conscience" those pharmacists who refuse to sell contraceptives.

It works to block over-the-counter sales of Plan B emergency contraceptive pills.

It peddles, with hundreds of millions in tax dollars handed to the movement by the Bush administration, abstinence-only sex-ed curricula and opposes a vaccine against the HPV virus, the major cause of cervical cancer, claiming it would promote promiscuity.

The denial of contraception, as is well documented, increases the number of unwanted pregnancies and abortions.

And abortion is never going to go away. If it again becomes illegal, the rich, as in the past, will find ways to provide abortions for their wives, mistresses and girlfriends, and the poor will die in unhygienic back rooms.

But since this is a war with a wider agenda, abortion statistics and facts do not count.

The Christian right fears pleasure, especially sexual pleasure, which it sees as degrading, corrupting and tainted.

For many, their own experiences with sex -- coupled with their descent into addictions and often sexual and domestic abuse before they found Christ -- have led them to build a movement that creates an external rigidity to cope with the chaos of human existence, a chaos that overwhelmed them.

They do not trust their own urges, their capacity for self-restraint or judgment. The Christian right permits its followers to project evil outward, a convenient escape for people unable to face the darkness and the psychological torments within them.

The leaders of this movement understand that the only emotion that cannot be subsumed into communal life, which they seek to dominate and control, is love.

They fear the power of love, especially when magnified and expressed through tender, sexual relationships, which remove couples from their control. Sex, when not a utilitarian form of procreation, is dangerous.

They seek to fashion a world where good and evil are clearly defined and upheld by the nation's judicial system.

The battle against abortion is a battle to build a society where pleasure and freedom, where the capacity of the individual and especially women to make choices, and indeed even love itself, are banished.

And this is why pro-life groups oppose contraception -- even for those who are married. The fight against abortion is the facade for a wider fight against the right of an individual in a democracy.

The war to "protect life," to crush "the culture of death," is a war against the open society.

It is a war to push back the gains in women's rights, in personal choice, in the power of the individual to form his or her own life.

It is a war that seeks to refashion America into a place where external forms of repression, imposed by the government, are used in a bid to contain the brokenness, desperation and emotional turmoil of those Americans whom we, as a society, betrayed.

It is, in short, a war of revenge. Chris Hedges @ Alternet