“With the exception of fringe movements like Christian Reconstruction, what’s noteworthy about social conservatism is how rear-guard a movement it is. When Fleming was young and I was younger, conservatism opposed married women working outside the home — it meant your husband was a failure either as a provider, or at keeping you in line. While there was no shortage of the Bristol Palin Maneuver, quickly marrying off your pregnant daughter was something done hush-hush, not something you trumpeted as a victory for ‘Life,’ for which you could reasonably expect applause. Divorce? A mark of defeat, whose product was a fallen woman. As for single mothers? Jezebels to be driven from the Valley. Nowadays ’social conservatism’ means opposition to legal abortion (as it did back then) and gay marriage, but as the Word Publishing spinner rack in your drug store will make clear, working-motherhood, divorce, single-momitude and teenage pregnancy are ‘issues” and “challenges’ for evangelical families to work through — prayerfully of course. As long as there’s no faggotry or pregnancy termination, it’s all good.” (09/06/08)