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You are here: Home / Politics / Republican Stupidity / South Carolina: You Can’t Be a Republican if You’ve Had Premarital Sex

South Carolina: You Can’t Be a Republican if You’ve Had Premarital Sex

by Imani Gandy (ABL)|  March 6, 20121:37 am| 64 Comments

This post is in: Republican Stupidity

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SCOFF.

 Here’s a nugget of ridiculous for you.

The Laurens County Republican Party in South Carolina is chastening it up, requiring aspiring party members to pledge that they’ve never had premarital sex, and that they will never look at porn again.

No, seriously:

Before you can join the Laurens County Republican Party in South Carolina and get on the primary ballot, they ask that you pledge that you’ve never ever had pre-marital sex — and that you will never ever look at porn again.

Last Tuesday, the LCGOP unanimously adopted a resolution that would ask all candidates who want to get on the primary ballot to sign a pledge with 28 principles, because the party “does not want to associate with candidates who do not act and speak in a manner that is consistent with the SC Republican Party Platform.”

Among the principles, according to Vic MacDonald & Larry Franklin of the Clinton Chronicle, is standard fare like opposition to abortion and upholding gun rights, as well as “a compassionate and moral approach to Teen Pregnancy” and “a high regard for United States Sovereignty.”

But then they get even more specific. From the Chronicle:

You must favor, and live up to, abstinence before marriage.

You must be faithful to your spouse. Your spouse cannot be a person of the same gender, and you are not allowed to favor any government action that would allow for civil unions of people of the same sex.

You cannot now, from the moment you sign this pledge, look at pornography.

Taking a swipe at gays, adulterers, and premarital sex offenders?  Classic.

Please let the LCGOP force potential candidates to submit to a lie detector test. Please oh please oh please.

[via TPM]

[cross-posted at ABLC]
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Reader Interactions

64Comments

  1. 1.

    Cacti

    March 6, 2012 at 1:47 am

    Was SC primary winner Gnewt Gingrich available for comment?

  2. 2.

    Martin

    March 6, 2012 at 1:51 am

    You cannot now, from the moment you sign this pledge, look at pornography.

    They just mean tits and hoo-ha’s right? Because if that’s the case, I think it’ll work out fine for the GOP.

  3. 3.

    YellowJournalism

    March 6, 2012 at 1:52 am

    I’d be interested in know what their definition of pornography is. I mean, beyond the hard core XXX. Do the nude scenes in an R-rated movie count? What about context? Or do members have to rent movies from those companies that take the nudity out of movies like Schindler’s List?

  4. 4.

    YellowJournalism

    March 6, 2012 at 1:54 am

    And can born-again virgins join? Or just the real virgins and V-to-M couples?

  5. 5.

    TooManyJens

    March 6, 2012 at 1:55 am

    @YellowJournalism: Is listening to last weeks Rush Limbaugh shows pornography? I’ve seen actual porn films that didn’t discuss sex so salaciously.

  6. 6.

    Mark S.

    March 6, 2012 at 1:56 am

    Though at first the resolution would have required candidates to sign the pledge, Smith clarified in a statement Monday that “due to various legal issues” the LCGOP cannot require that the candidates sign the pledge if they meet all of the other qualifications for a run

    I was wondering. That certainly didn’t sound legal.

  7. 7.

    Yutsano

    March 6, 2012 at 1:59 am

    They do realize by this standard they have to throw their sitting governor out of the party amirite?

  8. 8.

    YellowJournalism

    March 6, 2012 at 2:01 am

    Don’t know if it’s pornography, but I need brain bleach just the same.

  9. 9.

    Grover Gardner

    March 6, 2012 at 2:01 am

    This just in:

    “COLUMBIA, SC – The South Carolina Republican Party has cancelled this year’s primary, due to the fact that no qualified candidates were available to run for office.”

  10. 10.

    Suffern ACE

    March 6, 2012 at 2:02 am

    @yutsano – that is probably the point. I like how the porn pledge is only from “this point forward.” otherwise they probably wouldn’t be able to find any honest candidates.

  11. 11.

    YellowJournalism

    March 6, 2012 at 2:05 am

    Also, too, do anal and oral count as premarital sex? I mean, after abstinence class, I heard from my best friend that her sister’s lab partner’s older brother said that their cousin told her it didn’t count. Plus, I hear there was a debate over whether or not oral counted when this one guy in a high-ranking position in the government got caught some years back…

  12. 12.

    dean r

    March 6, 2012 at 2:05 am

    But what about lust in your heart or undressing people in your mind?

  13. 13.

    pseudonymous in nc

    March 6, 2012 at 2:10 am

    “South Carolina: making North Carolina feel good about itself since 1788.”

  14. 14.

    Spaghetti Lee

    March 6, 2012 at 2:16 am

    Also, no one who has consumed the flesh of an unclean animal or has unclean marks on the skin larger than-oh, crap, wait a minute, need to check that part.

  15. 15.

    Villago Delenda Est

    March 6, 2012 at 2:18 am

    @YellowJournalism:

    Sports Illustrated annual swimsuit issue.

    Hard Core pr0n.

    These people will need surgery to get the broomsticks removed from their asses.

  16. 16.

    Bago

    March 6, 2012 at 2:23 am

    The internal investigations units inspecting the tracking cookies will be fun.

  17. 17.

    Citizen Alan

    March 6, 2012 at 2:24 am

    The next time SC threatens to secede FOR GOD’S SAKE LET THEM GO!!!

  18. 18.

    Warren Terra

    March 6, 2012 at 2:27 am

    Please let the LCGOP force potential candidates to submit to a lie detector test.

    Sorry, no. I really, really hate “lie detector tests” (see Bob Park on the subject) and don’t want them accorded any credibility. Not even if the whole show involved offers the potential to pierce these cretins’ veneers of prudery.

  19. 19.

    burnspbesq

    March 6, 2012 at 2:27 am

    Too small to be a state, too big to be an insane asylum.

  20. 20.

    The prophet Nostradumbass

    March 6, 2012 at 2:30 am

    @Warren Terra: You’re right about that. Practiced liars can beat them, and scared people telling the truth can “fail” them.

  21. 21.

    AA+ Bonds

    March 6, 2012 at 2:36 am

    I don’t understand how one more lie on this count would trouble any of them; pair up the religious identification numbers with pretty much any numbers on reported sexual activity, STDs, pregnancy, etc, and then consider what these folks have had to claim about their thoughts and deeds during religious assemblies since they were children – and without a Sacrament of Reconciliation

    If they weren’t capable of signing this pledge and a dozen like it and maintaining the contradiction in their minds, they’d all tear each other limb from limb

    The human self-image is surprisingly resilient and contradiction is its foundation

  22. 22.

    AA+ Bonds

    March 6, 2012 at 2:36 am

    @pseudonymous in nc:

    Also this

  23. 23.

    AA+ Bonds

    March 6, 2012 at 2:39 am

    @Yutsano:

    They do realize by this standard they have to throw their sitting governor out of the party amirite?

    It’s my belief that a lot of extremely repressed people really, truly thought that one benefit of the Christian Coalition seizing the Party back in the 1980s would be the practical elimination of sex scandals in the GOP

    These folks believe in magic and this pledge is exactly the sort of magic I mean, “if we make them sign this, then that will never happen again, or if it does, we won’t be harmed by it”

  24. 24.

    MattF

    March 6, 2012 at 2:41 am

    So much for the big tent. In fact, so much for the itsy-bitsy tent. In fact… um… “Hello?”… “Any body home?”… (echo)

  25. 25.

    Dr. Loveless

    March 6, 2012 at 2:46 am

    Fortunately for them, shame-filled blow jobs in public men’s rooms don’t count as sex.

  26. 26.

    tjproudamerican

    March 6, 2012 at 2:47 am

    Alas! This news rules out Fatso, the Family Values career hedonist, drug addict, and half billionaire, four-times married, no children, not even an adopted one because having children might require him to do something besides eat, smoke, and take sex tourist-like viagra fueled vacations to Third World Sex Tourism Hot Spots.

    Limbaugh has admitted he is a jerk-off, who cannot wait for more hot Coed law School porn to reach over his pathetic gut, grab himself and jerk off to internet porn.

    I feel sorry for Limbaugh’s fourth wife. Most men would fight if you called them a jerk off, Limbaugh wears his masturbatory ways proudly.

    Sorry about South Carolina ditto turd! In case Fatso’s defenders wonder about what is wrong with being a hedonist devoted to one’s penis, ala Hugh Hefner. Nothing. But at least Hefner had the commitment to life to have children. We know Limbaugh’s mysterious war wound, boils on his ass, kept him from battle, and it is easy to imagine him not getting it up, but a half billion dollars he could have adopted a kid, but he is that selfish and devoted to pleasing Rush Limbaugh.

  27. 27.

    amk

    March 6, 2012 at 2:50 am

    peak wingnut yet ?

    No ?

    Ok.

  28. 28.

    AA+ Bonds

    March 6, 2012 at 2:50 am

    @Dr. Loveless:

    Fortunately for them, shame-filled blow jobs in public men’s rooms don’t count as sex.

    It is funny I admit but what is not particularly funny is that when you are a woman who is not wealthy within that belief system, you are told by the moral leadership in your community that you are not allowed to leave your husband if he is gay and in fact are 50% responsible for making the marriage work anyway

    Add the current economic climate where those women may already be dependent on their churches to feed and clothe their children and you have the full picture of what that means

  29. 29.

    piratedan

    March 6, 2012 at 2:56 am

    well, now that this is so in vogue, I expect aspirin sales to increase as they’ll now be dual purpose products for headache remedies and birth control devices inserted between knees. Do ministers get back into the game confirming a woman’s virginity prior to marriage too?

  30. 30.

    sagesource

    March 6, 2012 at 2:57 am

    @Citizen Alan: “Too small for a country, and too large for a lunatic asylum,” as someone just before the Civil War said….

  31. 31.

    gex

    March 6, 2012 at 2:57 am

    @Suffern ACE: That’s standard conservative fare. Shut the door behind you. It’s okay for you but not for anyone else.

    @YellowJournalism: Abstinence only standards have led to a lot of Saddlebacking amongst Christian youth, so I’m guessing those things are okay.

  32. 32.

    AA+ Bonds

    March 6, 2012 at 3:01 am

    I guess I’d just like to point out the uncomfortable fact behind the bathroom-blowjob jokes: not every man who likes to have sex with men comes out or becomes liberal on any level or is prevented from becoming extremely poorly adjusted and taking it out on people around him

    If you are a wealthy Protestant Christian woman, you can just leave him and sue him and take up with your aerobics instructor or something

    If you are a poor Protestant Christian woman with children whose choice is either social support from your church through accepting your husband back into your home or social punishment as long as you refuse to “reconcile”, you are choosing with a gun to your head, and sometimes that becomes more than figurative

  33. 33.

    R Johnston

    March 6, 2012 at 3:04 am

    @Warren Terra:

    Sorry, no. I really, really hate “lie detector tests” (see Bob Park on the subject) and don’t want them accorded any credibility. Not even if the whole show involved offers the potential to pierce these cretins’ veneers of prudery.

    Agreed that lie detector tests are about as useful as the Republican National Committee ethics advisor, but you’re missing the good here. Laurens County Republican Party people will take the lie detector tests, pass, then have the truth come to light. This will cause them no embarrassment as they’re Republicans, but it will discredit lie detector tests.

  34. 34.

    gex

    March 6, 2012 at 3:07 am

    @R Johnston: So naive. What will happen is that the phrase “depends on what the definition of ‘is’ is” will suddenly be a very pertinent and interesting question the answer to which has been stumping us since the dawn of mankind.

    You, sir, have forgotten the first rule of Blight Club. IOKIYAR.

  35. 35.

    AA+ Bonds

    March 6, 2012 at 3:18 am

    One also must realize that in the shotgun theology of many New Evangelical and fundamentalist sects, if you have accepted Christ as Savior, you can sign this pledge believing that you will follow it in your heart, and then sin and violate it a couple months down the line, and then “get right” with God in your heart and perhaps through public blubbering, and then go sin again, etc. and what keeps you from damnation is that personal acceptance of Christ in what I would describe as a weird, faint echo of Calvinism

    They wouldn’t read this assessment and agree with it, but practically, that’s what it looks like

    It’s like pre-Counter-Reformation Catholicism, minus shame/guilt mechanisms like any sort of controlling authority, mortal sin, Sacrament of Penance, etc.

  36. 36.

    asiangrrlMN

    March 6, 2012 at 3:18 am

    @YellowJournalism: Saddlebacking. Brought to you by Dan Savage, of course.

    ETA: In this case, the winner of his reader-submission contest.

    This resolution makes me larf and larf and larf.

  37. 37.

    AA+ Bonds

    March 6, 2012 at 3:25 am

    @amk:

    I think we’ve been holding pretty steady since Pat Robertson’s run at the Oval Office

  38. 38.

    asiangrrlMN

    March 6, 2012 at 3:26 am

    Since I’m the only one around, this song seems appropriate for this thread.

  39. 39.

    AA+ Bonds

    March 6, 2012 at 3:29 am

    People don’t think about the 1980s a lot beyond the big names but when I look at Harry Reid I see a man defined by his Kampf against Paul Laxalt.

    Who?

    Exactly. And that’s the sort of bullshit that determines how our politicians behave nowadays

  40. 40.

    Jewish Steel

    March 6, 2012 at 3:31 am

    A youtube video posted by one of the wingnuts I surreptitiously follow on FB.

    Is it just me, or does the title evoke not necessarily the mental image they’re going for?

    http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GUKR8kXlhUQ

  41. 41.

    asiangrrlMN

    March 6, 2012 at 3:34 am

    @gex: Damn you for getting there before I did! ::shakes fist in a southward direction::

    @Jewish Steel: I think subconsciously, it’s EXACTLY what they were going for! How you be, JS?

  42. 42.

    AA+ Bonds

    March 6, 2012 at 3:34 am

    @Jewish Steel:

    ^ post of the century

  43. 43.

    AA+ Bonds

    March 6, 2012 at 3:37 am

    One Preacher Takes On 1000 Homo DJs

  44. 44.

    Jewish Steel

    March 6, 2012 at 3:39 am

    @asiangrrlMN: I’m splendid. Good to see you here, old chum!

    @AA+ Bonds: 1 preacher, 3000 Oz homosexuals and a tub of Vegemite.

  45. 45.

    asiangrrlMN

    March 6, 2012 at 3:40 am

    @Jewish Steel: I wax and I wane like the tides. Fucking magnets – how do they work?!?

  46. 46.

    Jewish Steel

    March 6, 2012 at 3:42 am

    @asiangrrlMN: Ha!

    @AA+ Bonds: Ha!

    Both of you: Ha! Cut it out. I’ve got to go to bed.

  47. 47.

    gex

    March 6, 2012 at 3:55 am

    @asiangrrlMN: Are you giving away the location to the bunker?!?!?! It’s an undisclosed location for a reason!

  48. 48.

    gex

    March 6, 2012 at 4:08 am

    To be fair, they’ve said absolutely nothing about serial marriage. Quick marriage, quickie, quick divorce and you’re still GOP material!

  49. 49.

    r€nato

    March 6, 2012 at 4:41 am

    @AA+ Bonds: like

  50. 50.

    Egg Berry

    March 6, 2012 at 4:46 am

    MC 3000 Homo Jesus

  51. 51.

    Sarah Proud and Tall

    March 6, 2012 at 5:28 am

    Jesus. I can’t even write parody that far out.

  52. 52.

    THE

    March 6, 2012 at 5:42 am

    You must favor, and live up to, abstinence before marriage……You cannot now, from the moment you sign this pledge, look at pornography.

    Wow. I’ll bet the queue to sign up must have stretched… All the way around the writing pad at least.

  53. 53.

    JPL

    March 6, 2012 at 6:33 am

    The pledge is 28 pages long and contains your standard repub concerns. Unless it specifically says something about lying, I wouldn’t worry about it.

  54. 54.

    Patricia Kayden

    March 6, 2012 at 8:01 am

    How then did Gingrich win SC?

  55. 55.

    J

    March 6, 2012 at 10:06 am

    Not that we needed the extras assurance, but this ensure that they are all liars

  56. 56.

    Rathskeller

    March 6, 2012 at 10:10 am

    @Patricia Kayden: That’s the thing! How?! How?! How?!

    I’m an atheist, and I work in San Francisco. Not only have I never cheated on my wife, I feel guilty when I look at the barista’s tits. But I have “San Francisco values”, what with my being ok with porn, gay marriage, and I dunno, contraception.

    How can Newt have had a six year affair and get a free pass? I keep coming back to that and the cold-bloodedness of that affair, combined with the complete forgiveness from the GOP body politic, just doesn’t make any sense to me.

  57. 57.

    Origuy

    March 6, 2012 at 10:49 am

    @Sarah Proud and Tall:

    Jesus. I can’t even write parody that far out.

    You write parody? Can you post some?

  58. 58.

    gex

    March 6, 2012 at 11:46 am

    @Rathskeller: Another person who’s forgotten IOKIYAR. Is there nerve gas in this thread?

  59. 59.

    Hob

    March 6, 2012 at 12:08 pm

    @Rathskeller: I feel guilty when I look at the barista’s tits.

    Don’t stress yourself – I’ll keep an eye on them for you.

  60. 60.

    IrishGirl

    March 6, 2012 at 12:31 pm

    @YellowJournalism: LOL You know the sad thing is, once they started teaching Abstinence in the schools, a lot of teenagers started doing oral and anal because ‘you know, technically, it’s not sex’ and the STD rate skyrocketed. Go figure…..

    If that doesn’t prove to them that Abstinence education doesn’t work, then nothing will.

  61. 61.

    Surly Duff

    March 6, 2012 at 1:35 pm

    I look forward to seeing the increase in 6 year-old Republican candidates on Laurens Co. ballots.

  62. 62.

    Delia

    March 6, 2012 at 3:01 pm

    My great fear is that news items like this will put the Onion out of business.

  63. 63.

    Lolcat Liberation Front

    March 6, 2012 at 6:19 pm

    That Chronicle article is a hoot. I love that the SC GOP Chairman finds a way to blame all this madness on… Bill Clinton’s penis. Obsessed, they are.

  64. 64.

    anna

    March 6, 2012 at 6:42 pm

    In related story, Ugly Third Grader elected as county commissioner.

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