On Gabrielle Petito’s Tragic Death: An Important Lesson

In our culture where “live your own truth” is the worldview of a seemingly ever-increasing number of Americans, women and children in the U.S. are especially in danger. This is because, as pop-culture “philosopher” Cameron Diaz put in 2013, on marriage and sex, tens of millions of Americans have decided it’s best to “make our own rules.” As Americans have shunned marriage at a record pace, co-habitation among U.S. couples has exploded.

In 2019, Pew Research reported that in the U.S., among people age 18 to 44, a significantly larger share “have cohabitated at some point than have been married (59% to 50%).” Feminism and family expert Suzanne Venker notes that, “cohabitation, or ‘shacking up,’ has skyrocketed in the U.S. Specifically, it has increased over the past half-century by more than 1,500 percent. ‘Living in sin’ is in vogue.” 

Tragically, this is the situation in which Gabrielle Petito found herself just prior to her widely publicized death. As Fox News reported in early September,

Gabby Petito, 22, set out on a road trip with her boyfriend in a converted camper van in early July to tour National Parks, according to her family, but she disappeared in late August and they haven’t heard from her in more than two weeks…Nicole Schmidt, Petito's mother, told Fox News that the last conversation she had with her daughter was on Aug. 25…

Schmidt said that Petito and her boyfriend started their road trip in early July, traveling first from Florida to New York. They then left New York and eventually got to Salt Lake City, Utah, in August, but were leaving the city amid heavy wildfire smoke.

As mountains of data have long revealed, one of the most dangerous places in the world for a woman is in a cohabitating (unmarried) relationship. In addition to its emotional, financial, and sexual disadvantages, cohabitating women are far more likely to suffer domestic violence than are married women. Research by University of Chicago sociologist Linda Waite in the late 1990s and early 2000s found that cohabitating women were more than three times more likely to suffer domestic violence than were married women.

Additionally, Waite reported that those in cohabitating relationships were much more likely to be unfaithful (despite the expectation of faithfulness) than those in marital relationships. Cohabitating women were five times more likely to report “secondary sex partners” than were married women. No doubt this contributes to more conflict in cohabitating relationships.

In 2006, researchers Catherine T. Kenney and Sara S. McLanahan noted that,

One of the more consistent (and potentially alarming) findings in the emerging literature is the higher rate of intimate-partner violence and intimate-partner homicide among cohabitating couples than among married couples (Anderson 1997; Brownridge and Halli 2002; Stets 1991; Stets and Straus 1989; Wilson, Daly, and Wright 1993; Wilson, Johnson, and Daly 1995; Yllo and Straus 1981).

In 2016, researchers Wendy D. Manning, Monica A. Longmore, and Peggy C. Giordano reported:

In recent years, a majority of young adults experience cohabitation. Nevertheless, cohabitation is a risk factor for intimate partner violence (IPV)…Serial cohabitors along with cohabitors who experienced both low commitment and high relational constraints experienced the greatest risk of IPV.

In 2017, research professors Scott M. Stanley (Univ. of Denver) and Galena K. Rhodes (Univ. of Denver) noted that “asymmetrical commitment”—where one member of a couple is significantly less committed “to the future” of “being a couple” than the other member—“is more likely to exist in cohabiting than dating relationships, and, among marrieds, to be more likely to exist when couples lived together prior to engagement or marriage.”

Additionally, Stanley and Rhodes reported,

Asymmetrical commitment may turn out to be one ingredient in the way cohabitation and aggression are linked. We have found that asymmetrically committed relationships are more prone to aggression and generally have low relationship quality. Many asymmetrically committed relationships contain one partner who is not committed enough to inhibit negative behaviors and another who, while relatively highly committed, will be massively frustrated by a growing awareness of their partner’s lower commitment. That sounds like a recipe for highly destructive conflict.

On violence during cohabitation, Marripedia reveals, “Women in cohabiting relationships are more likely than married or dating women to be the victims of violence or to perpetrate violence. Domestic violence in cohabiting unions tends to increase as the duration of the union increases.”

Of course, all of this research only reaffirms what Christianity has long taught: the only time men and women should be living together, the only rightful place for sex, is within a marital relationship. When men and women ignore this, they are ignoring one of the oldest and most important truths revealed by God. Thus, it should come as little surprise that those who rebel against the truths of marriage and sex place themselves in great danger.

Additionally, cohabitation, and other such rebellion, often results in children. As dangerous as cohabitation is for women, it is even more dangerous for children. This is especially the case when women with children live with men who are not the father of their children. According to Marripedia,

Children raised in cohabiting families are particularly vulnerable to abuse. According to the Fourth Incidence Study of Child Abuse and Neglect, children raised by their cohabiting biological parents are 4.3 times more likely to suffer from physical abuse and 5 times more likely to experience sexual abuse as compared to children raised by their married, biological parents.

The most dangerous family structure for a child is a cohabiting family in which one of the partners is not a biological parent. The same survey stated that children raised with one biological parent and their non-biological cohabiting partner are 10.3 times more likely to suffer from physical abuse and 19.8 times more likely to experience sexual abuse, as compared to children raised by their married, biological parents.

Ladies, if he won’t marry you, if he won’t commit to you in the way that God says he should, he is not the man for you! Have nothing to do with him!

(See this column at American Thinker.)

Copyright 2021, Trevor Grant Thomas
At the Intersection of Politics, Science, Faith, and Reason.
www.trevorgrantthomas.com
Trevor is the author of the The Miracle and Magnificence of America
tthomas@trevorgrantthomas.com  

The Data Are (STILL!) Clear: STOP Quarantining Healthy Kids!

Thankfully, more and more right-minded Americans are standing up against foolish and useless Wuhan Virus mask mandates across the U.S. Here’s another great example, this time from the Fulton County, GA—one of the largest and most liberal school districts in Georgia—school district:

Epic takedown of the #MaskMandate at @FultonCoSchools - this student lets the entire school board know how #masks are ruining school pic.twitter.com/88hb4DNxI6

— Philip Holloway ⚖️ ✈️ 😁 (@PhilHollowayEsq) October 12, 2021

As encouraging as it is to see this, too many Americans are still ignoring the foolish and unnecessary “contact tracing” and subsequent quarantining of healthy students across the U.S. Tragically, millions of U.S. students have missed significant in-person schooling because of the ignorant quarantining policies across numerous U.S. school districts. A recent Yahoo News/YouGov poll found that 23 percent of U.S. parents reported that their children had been sent home from school as a result of Wuhan Virus quarantining policies.

There are approximately 56 million k-12 students in U.S. public and private schools. Thus, the number of students forced to quarantine is almost certainly well into the millions. In most of these cases, the students are not sick. They have merely been deemed to have been “in close contact” with “COVID-positive” person.

Additionally, the “COVID-positive” individual is often not sick. They have merely been the victim of a positive Wuhan Virus test result. This is especially the case with k-12 students. Even if otherwise healthy k-12 students are sick, often their symptoms are quite minor and they are back to normal within a few days.

As I, and many others like-minded, have frequently pointed out these past 18 months: when it comes to young, healthy individuals, the data have long made clear that the Wuhan Virus presents virtually zero danger. Recently, it was reported that Los Angeles County—home to the second largest school district in the U.S.—health officials announced that school districts now have the option to change their close-contact quarantine policies. This is because,

In total, nearly 2% of all staff and students countywide have been identified as a close contact of a case since the school year began. Data to date indicates that very few of the identified close contacts have subsequently tested positive, according to [public health Director Barbara] Ferrer.

As of last week, among the almost 30,000 people that ended up quarantined, 63 tested positive. [Emphasis mine.]

“This amounts to what we call a secondary attack rate of 0.2%,” Ferrer said, calling the figure “extraordinarily low.”

Of course, given that we’re talking about Los Angeles County, even this modified policy is filled ignorant, anti-science nonsense. (For example, students in “modified quarantine” need to “continue to always wear a mask indoors, outdoors and on the school bus, except for when they’re eating and drinking.”) However, it is telling that one of the most liberal places in the U.S. would publicly (and finally) admit what is really happening with kids and COVID, and subsequently change its Wuhan Virus quarantine policy.

All contact tracing and quarantining of healthy students in all U.S. schools should end immediately. The data demands it.

(See this post at American Thinker.)

Copyright 2021, Trevor Grant Thomas
At the Intersection of Politics, Science, Faith, and Reason.
www.trevorgrantthomas.com
Trevor is the author of the The Miracle and Magnificence of America
tthomas@trevorgrantthomas.com

The Folly of “You Are Only as Good as Your Last COVID Test”

Just prior to the Georgia (UGA) vs. Clemson showdown on the first full weekend of the college football season, you could just sense that media leftists were aching to (AGAIN!) make the Wuhan Virus an issue. The last thing the residents of Covidstan want to see is tens-of-thousands of rabid college football doing what football fans are supposed to do:

VIRGINIA TECH.
ENTER SANDMAN.

ABSOLUTE CHILLS. @HokiesFB pic.twitter.com/jRnd97Xs1R

— ACC Network (@accnetwork) September 3, 2021

Three days prior to the game, the Atlanta Journal-Constitution reported that UGA’s head athletic trainer—Ron Courson— “has been diagnosed with COVID-19.” Most other outlets reported that the trainer had “tested positive.” As the UGA coaching staff was hounded with questions about how this would impact the team, UGA head coach Kirby Smart stated that, “We are above 90% [vaccinations]. Ron and his staff have done a tremendous job making sure that guys feel comfortable getting the vaccination. We feel really comfortable with where we are.”

Coach Smart continued, “My goal is always to be 100 percent, because I think that it is the safest thing for our players .... but you are only as good as your last COVID test.” There are numerous issues with Coach Smart’s statements here, not the least of which is his position on the Wuhan Virus “vaccines,” but I think everything wrong in this story can be summed up with the foolishness that leads one to conclude “You are only as good as your last COVID test.”

The full blame for that statement does not lie with Kirby Smart. Most of the blame for such a foolish conclusion lies with school administrators and health officials who have put coaches—and the like—into the position where they can only properly do their jobs if Wuhan Virus test results are what such officials want them to be.

For over a year and a half now we’ve had to endure the rampant fear porn of those who simply refuse to acknowledge that viruses are simply going to virus, and that, in spite of this, young people the world over are in little to no danger from the Wuhan Virus. This is especially the case among the physical specimens that inhabit football programs at the collegiate and professional levels. This begs the question: Why are schools and athletic programs continuing to administer Wuhan Virus tests to healthy, asymptomatic students and athletes?!

Of course, this does not mean no one should be getting tested for the Wuhan Virus, but given what we now well know about the Wuhan Virus, for schools to rampantly test the young and healthy is folly rooted in foolish fear. As healthcare expert Kevin Roche put it in February of this year “Massive [COVID] Testing is Pointless and Worthless.” He added,

How much you test has nothing to do with how many deaths you end up with. One of the biggest myths is that if we only tested more we would have gotten this under control. Just nonsense that overwhelmed contact tracing efforts and resulted in lots of false and low positives.

As Mr. Roche alludes, once an individual has a “positive” test—which by no means indicates they are actually sick—the infamous and unnecessary “contact tracing” begins. I’ve heard from numerous parents whose healthy children have been sent home from school simply because they were deemed “in close contact” with someone who “tested positive” for the Wuhan Virus.

All of this ignorant and foolish nonsense is due to the false notion that young, healthy people are in danger from the Wuhan Virus. As Joy Pullmann at The Federalist recently put it,

Continuing to keep kids locked into masks and out of normal life is a mass hysteria based on conspiracy theories far worse than QAnon. It has no basis in science, data, or reality. It is entirely a psychotic power play that sane people must refuse to allow to control our lives, because it’s hurting kids and destroying our nation’s future.

Nevertheless, the hysteria and conspiracy theories persist. As I was running errands this past Saturday, just past noon (EST), I turned on the radio to listen to a broadcast of one of the first Saturday games (Wisconsin vs. Penn State) from college football’s week one. Just prior to kickoff, one of the radio announcers began discussing each teams’ “COVID issues.” He ignorantly declared that COVID was “still a major threat to these student athletes.” Of course, the Wuhan Virus never was a “major threat” to student athletes, and it is still not a “threat” any more than a cold or the flu is a “threat!”

Foolish testing, masking, contact tracing, and the like, is also based on the false notion that the asymptomatic are significant spreaders of the Wuhan Virus. They are not. This is certainly the case on a football field! (As the CDC and the NFL revealed to be the case near the beginning of 2021.)

“You are only as good as your last COVID test” has taken on even more significance for UGA football. During his Monday (9/6) press conference, two days after defeating Clemson, Kirby Smart told reporters,

I’ll be honest with you, I’m as concerned as I’ve ever been, because we have three or four guys out with COVID and we have a couple staff members that have been out with COVID here recently. For us, we’re at our highest spike. And people are talking about vaccinations, well these are people that are vaccinated.

There is no mention if anyone is actually sick. If foolish contact tracing is employed in this situation, UGA could be down multiple players for its game this coming Saturday. For a team with national championship aspirations, and players who will never get this time back, that is no small matter. When reporting on this matter, Bleacher Report declared,

While Smart explained the players experienced breakthrough cases, they are statistically safer because they were vaccinated. A recent study from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention revealed that those who are vaccinated are 29 times less likely to be hospitalized or killed as a result of the virus (h/t Katia Hetter of CNN).

Of course there was no mention of how “statistically safer” are young, healthy athletes, or how many times “less likely” a college athlete is to be “hospitalized or killed” as a result of the Wuhan Virus.

If you don’t want to worry about the outcome of the “last COVID test” of an athlete or student, fed-up parents and like-minded and influential school and athletic officials—especially coaches and athletic directors of powerful programs—need to demand most all “COVID protocols” cease! We don’t need to be testing anyone who lacks Wuhan Virus symptoms, and we certainly don’t need to be sidelining or quarantining the young and healthy.

(See this piece at American Thinker.)

Copyright 2021, Trevor Grant Thomas
At the Intersection of Politics, Science, Faith, and Reason.
www.trevorgrantthomas.com
Trevor is the author of the The Miracle and Magnificence of America
tthomas@trevorgrantthomas.com

"Team Reality Knows That Mostly the Virus is Gonna Virus"

A GREAT summary of where we stand with the Wuhan Virus. Courtesy of "TheBigFish," this is taken completely from the top comment on Charles C. W. Cooke's recent column at National Review, "The Bitter Truth: There’s Still No Rhyme or Reason to COVID-19."

1. We know that lockdown severity does not correlate with C19 mortality but leaves extra ACM ["all cause mortality"] for most countries. So lock downs are a net harm.

2. Mask mandates do not correlate with cases, hospitalizations, or deaths. The best quality studies prior to the issue being politicized showed little to no effect in curbing transmission. Both the CDC and WHO made that conclusion. The only papers/studies that support mask efficacy are lab experiments/simulations.

3. Kids less than about 17 have very low risk [from] C19, so low that vaccines for them carry more risk of hospitalization (per the CDC). There is no need at all to vaccinate them.

4. Elderly and high risk folks seem to be benefiting from the vaccines. It would be in their best interest to get vaccinated.

5. Ignoring natural immunity is one of the greatest sins by the public health institutions. NI is objectively better in every metric than immunity acquired by vaccination. Attempting to force this part of the population (~130m Americans) to vaccinate is madness. It wastes vaccine doses and adds a small amount of extra risk.

6. Seasonality is constantly being ignored by the "experts" but is one of the primary drivers of the timing of each surge.

7. Schools in Europe typically do not require kids to mask while at the same time the school systems have very low transmission rates. In Sweden, teachers had the lowest infection rate (last summer) of any identifiable profession in Sweden.

8. Sweden did it right. Their ACM for 20/21 is lower than their running 5 year average.

1-8 are undeniable true. Yet Team Apocalypse continues to engage stupid unproductive virtue signaling and abject superstition. The whole thing is crazy.

One thing I would correct: the "whole thing" isn't "crazy," it's EVIL! 

Trevor Grant Thomas
At the Intersection of Politics, Science, Faith, and Reason.
www.trevorgrantthomas.com
Trevor is the author of the The Miracle and Magnificence of America
tthomas@trevorgrantthomas.com

The Whole Truth on the Barnstable County, Massachusetts COVID-19 “Outbreak”

Near the end of July, the CDC reversed course and again told Americans to put on their face diapers. The renewed call for masks included even those who were vaccinated. Part of the justification for this was, as the Washington Post put it at the time, “new data showing vaccinated people can spread infections caused by delta variant.” The Post also noted that, “health officials also call for all teachers, staffers and students in schools to wear masks, regardless of their vaccination status.”

The “new data” was reported by other media outlets as well. As NPR put it at the time,

When revising its mask guidance this week to urge even vaccinated people to wear masks indoors in much of the country, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention was criticized for not citing data in making that move.

Now it has — and the data is sobering.

The study details a COVID-19 outbreak that started July 3 in Provincetown, Mass., involving 469 cases. It found that three-quarters of cases occurred in fully vaccinated people…

The CDC said the finding that fully vaccinated people could spread the virus was behind its move to change its mask guidance.

At least NPR mentioned that it was “Provincetown” that was responsible for this “disturbing” outbreak. The CDC study referenced did not, though it had numerous opportunities to do so it its four-page report on the incident. When reporting on the numerous “breakthrough infections” that occurred, the CDC study only vaguely mentions “Barnstable County, Massachusetts.” There’s a reason for this.

As Ryan Bomberger at The Christian Post recently put it,

[Provincetown is] considered a gay Mecca to tens of thousands of homosexual men and women. In fact, the town’s Chamber of Commerce confirms such a description, stating on its website: “LGBTQA+ visitors are a major component of Provincetown’s tourism economy and continue to make Provincetown one of top GLBT destinations in the world.”

The CDC also never mentions that the “summer event” in Barnstable County at the center of the COVID-19 spread was “Bear Week.” As Mr. Bomberger describes it,

“Bear Week” is celebrated by Provincetown Tourism as “the largest gathering of bears [hairy and often overweight gay men] in the world” where “tens of thousands come to Provincetown during this annual [July] event.” The website proudly proclaims: “You know what you’re getting into when you attend.” By “getting into,” they mean a weeklong orgy among thousands of strangers. 

As they gleefully reported that Americans were now again under another mask-up edict from the CDC, leftists in the media also failed to report these important facts. As Mr. Bomberger rightly concludes, from an “epidemiological standpoint,” what happened in Provincetown is not at all representative of the general U.S. population. In other words, there can be little doubt that orgiastic homosexual behavior greatly contributed to the COVID-19 outbreak in Barnstable County, yet this is never reported by the CDC or its media allies.

Of course, none of this is surprising. Like the left-wing media in the U.S., the CDC has long been a nefarious agent in the evil LGBT agenda, and thus long ignored or glossed over the tremendous dangers of homosexual behavior. When warning others about putting trust in the CDC on all matters concerning COVID-19, I’ve often said, “They can’t even rightly tell us who is a male and who is a female. Thus, why should we trust them on any matter concerning the health of America?!”

Even if they weren’t apologists for the evil LGBT agenda, the CDC has proven wrong numerous times since COVID-19 entered the U.S. This is certainly true when it comes to the widespread masking of school children. And now many schools across America are again foolishly placing children (and teachers) in masks largely because of a homosexual orgy in Barnstable County, Massachusetts! The data from Provincetown again proves the CDC is a highly politicized organization that simply cannot be trusted when making policy on COVID-19 or any other healthcare issue.

Copyright 2021, Trevor Grant Thomas
At the Intersection of Politics, Science, Faith, and Reason.
www.trevorgrantthomas.com
Trevor is the author of the The Miracle and Magnificence of America
tthomas@trevorgrantthomas.com