News from the Plains: All this RED can make you BLUE
The (latest) worst law in Oklahoma
by Barry Friedman
Here it is.
An Act relating to social services; creating a public service announcement campaign to promote marriage as a tool against poverty; providing for codification; and providing an effective date.
There shall be created a statewide public service announcement campaign, under the Oklahoma Marriage Initiative, promoting marriage as a tool against poverty and targeting all members of the public.
So, on November 1, Oklahoma legislators will start spending state funds on PSAs that will extoll the benefits of marriage as a means of climbing out of the economic doldrums.
(Psst: Jobs might do the trick, too.)
We continue.
Saying that the old state program--a marriage initiative introduced in the 90s that encouraged counseling--"only reaches those who seek its services" (and, sure, why would we want a program that just does that?), the co-sponsor of this new bill, Sen. David Holt, R-Oklahoma City (There's that "R-" after the name again. Damnedest thing), says it will reach even those not looking.
"The PSAs reach a much broader audience."
The spots, no doubt, will encourage the union of a man and woman, the need for strong families, and remind us of the positive effect such structure has always had on our state and the nation.
(Optional musical accompaniment)
I digress.
As Kate Richey of the Oklahoma Policy Institute points out, the funds to pay for this ludicrous idea come from money that would have gone to other things like (Lewis Black delivery here) actually helping the poor!
HB 1908 authorized the use of ‘welfare’ or Temporary Assistance for Needy Families (TANF) funds to be spent on an ad campaign promoting marriage.
Oh, that's a good idea. Give a man a fish, he'll eat for a day, but show a man in a PSA with a fish that he gives to a woman who then cooks it for him and watch your state marriage rates explode.
What is it with the GOP mindset? It decries government regulations and expenditures on things like how much toxins cement manufacturers can release into the air, but then can't wait to use taxpayer money to produce christianmingle.com-type ads so the po' folk can experience the joy of a filing a joint return.
The bill, though, forbids prohibits state officers from appearing in the public service announcements, which makes a good deal of sense.
"Hi, I'm Governor Mary Fallin and, today, I'm joined by my second husband, Wade, who's also been married before, and together we'd like to talk to you about the importance and sanctity of marriage. We thought it was so important, we tried it again."
And what about gay marriage, you ask? (How can you ask such a question?)
Before we overdose on snark, keep in mind, this bill is not only insulting; it won't work.
There’s no evidence that they can. Despite talk in the early 2000s about a handful of states and jurisdictions (e.g. Virginia, Louisiana, Washington, Grand Rapids and Chattanooga) developing marriage promotion PSAs, there’s scant evidence that most of them ever actually aired campaigns. And among those that did, no summary reports or independent evaluations of their performance were ever produced.
No, duh, as the kids like to say. Of course there were no independent evaluations ever produced, because such independent evaluations would be fu*cking impossible to produce.
Show of hands? How many got married because of the PSA they saw during the season-ending Beverly Hills Pawn and how many would have anyway?
As Richie points out
Commercials aren’t even consistently effective at selling fruit rollups – why would we expect them to effectively sell a life-long commitment? And even if the PSAs did ‘work’, you can’t run out and get married unless you’re already in a healthy relationship.
(Ed. Note: Now you tell me)