{"id":4049,"date":"2017-03-22T16:20:58","date_gmt":"2017-03-22T21:20:58","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/skepticink.com\/backgroundprobability\/?p=4049"},"modified":"2017-03-22T14:01:04","modified_gmt":"2017-03-22T19:01:04","slug":"heavens-sake-not-near-church","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/skepticink.com\/backgroundprobability\/2017\/03\/22\/heavens-sake-not-near-church\/","title":{"rendered":"For Heaven\u2019s Sake, Not Near A Church"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Earlier today,\u00a0a leading Tulsa paper issued a stern condemnation of State Senator Ralph Shortey:<\/p>\n<blockquote class=\"twitter-tweet\" data-width=\"500\" data-dnt=\"true\">\n<p lang=\"en\" dir=\"ltr\">Editorial: Ralph Shortey should resign <a href=\"https:\/\/t.co\/utdSSOTUgd\">https:\/\/t.co\/utdSSOTUgd<\/a> <a href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/hashtag\/okgov?src=hash&amp;ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw\">#okgov<\/a> <a href=\"https:\/\/t.co\/EgixVQxIzl\">pic.twitter.com\/EgixVQxIzl<\/a><\/p>\n<p>&mdash; Tulsa World Opinion (@TWOpinion) <a href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/TWOpinion\/status\/844548239034585089?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw\">March 22, 2017<\/a><\/p><\/blockquote>\n<p><script async src=\"https:\/\/platform.twitter.com\/widgets.js\" charset=\"utf-8\"><\/script><\/p>\n<p>Shortly thereafter,\u00a0Mr.\u00a0Shortey resigned as State Senator:<\/p>\n<p>https:\/\/twitter.com\/carrollpub\/status\/844558416475574273<\/p>\n<p>And to think, some people say the mainstream\u00a0press doesn&#8217;t really matter anymore.<\/p>\n<p>In all seriousness, though,\u00a0Ralph Shortey remains\u00a0in <a href=\"https:\/\/www.nytimes.com\/2017\/03\/17\/us\/oklahoma-state-senator-faces-charges-and-condemnation.html\">a spot of legal trouble<\/a>\u00a0over an encounter allegedly arranged on Kik, which took place at a Super 8 motel in Moore, supposedly <a href=\"http:\/\/bloximages.newyork1.vip.townnews.com\/tulsaworld.com\/content\/tncms\/assets\/v3\/editorial\/8\/4b\/84b2d14a-093f-5479-b21a-9f44d9c7d514\/58cac14b523a6.pdf.pdf\">only\u00a0936 feet away<\/a> from First Christian Church\u2014as the crow flies (actually a <a href=\"https:\/\/www.google.com\/maps\/dir\/Super+8+Moore+Oklahoma+City+Area\/First+Christian+Church,+629+NW+12th+St,+Moore,+OK+73160\/@35.3496319,-97.4991678,17z\/data=!4m13!4m12!1m5!1m1!1s0x0:0xf4cfeef95baaff6d!2m2!1d-97.4939589!2d35.350175!1m5!1m1!1s0x87b214c41b0bfa17:0xeb007fcad7da001b!2m2!1d-97.4969791!2d35.3496319\">half mile walk<\/a>). Why does the distance to church even matter? Presumably this is because sexual predators are thought\u00a0to turn hover around\u00a0schools and churches looking for children to victimize. Hence, Oklahoma \u00a721-1031(D):<\/p>\n<blockquote><p>Any person violating any of the provisions of Section <a href=\"http:\/\/law.justia.com\/codes\/oklahoma\/2014\/title-21\/section-21-1028\">1028<\/a>, <a href=\"http:\/\/law.justia.com\/codes\/oklahoma\/2014\/title-21\/section-21-1029\">1029<\/a>\u00a0or <a href=\"http:\/\/law.justia.com\/codes\/oklahoma\/2014\/title-21\/section-21-1030\">1030<\/a> of this title within one thousand (1,000) feet of a school or church shall be guilty of a felony and, upon conviction, shall be punished by imprisonment in the custody of the Department of Corrections for not more than five (5) years or by fines&#8230;<\/p><\/blockquote>\n<p>Given that churches and schools excel at\u00a0compelling compliance with adult authority, it makes a certain sort of sense to target those facilities for\u00a0enhanced legal protection, though it is rather hard to imagine anyone bent upon sex crime taking the trouble to check\u00a0their maps app for all the\u00a0churches and schools which might be lurking nearby. Even a state lawmaker\u2014presumably someone familiar with state law\u2014might well forget to do so.<\/p>\n<p>Less easily explained is an <a href=\"http:\/\/law.justia.com\/codes\/oklahoma\/2014\/title-21\/section-21-842.3\">obscure Oklahoma law<\/a> prohibiting <em>tattooing<\/em> near a church:<\/p>\n<blockquote><p>The State Department of Health shall not grant or issue a license to a body piercing or tattoo operator if the place of business of the body piercing or tattoo operator is within one thousand (1,000) feet of a church, school, or playground&#8230;<\/p><\/blockquote>\n<p>Try as I may, no plausibly\u00a0rational basis springs to mind here. My best guess is that churches, schools, and playgrounds are apt to have one particular feature in common, a certain sort of\u00a0busybody inclined towards moral panic:<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/skepticink.com\/backgroundprobability\/files\/2017\/03\/Think-of-the-children.jpg\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"aligncenter size-full wp-image-4050\" src=\"https:\/\/skepticink.com\/backgroundprobability\/files\/2017\/03\/Think-of-the-children.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"578\" height=\"392\" srcset=\"https:\/\/skepticink.com\/backgroundprobability\/files\/2017\/03\/Think-of-the-children.jpg 578w, https:\/\/skepticink.com\/backgroundprobability\/files\/2017\/03\/Think-of-the-children-300x203.jpg 300w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 578px) 100vw, 578px\" \/><\/a><\/p>\n<p>These are, incidentally, just\u00a0the sort of people who helped put Ralph Shortey&#8217;s <a href=\"https:\/\/www.donaldjtrump.com\/press-releases\/donald-j.-trump-announces-statewide-leadership-team-in-oklahoma\">preferred presidential candidate<\/a> over the top. At this\u00a0point, I could crudely grab for\u00a0an opening, groping my way to the subject\u00a0of\u00a0how so many men with formal power and social influence seem to believe they can get away with sex crimes because of\u00a0said power and influence, but\u00a0that\u00a0might be too much of an\u00a0unwarranted\u00a0reach. Better\u00a0to just let it go.<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Earlier today,\u00a0a leading Tulsa paper issued a stern condemnation of State Senator Ralph Shortey: Editorial: Ralph Shortey should resign https:\/\/t.co\/utdSSOTUgd&hellip;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":23,"featured_media":3223,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[43,10],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-4049","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-current-events","category-politics"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/skepticink.com\/backgroundprobability\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4049","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/skepticink.com\/backgroundprobability\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/skepticink.com\/backgroundprobability\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/skepticink.com\/backgroundprobability\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/23"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/skepticink.com\/backgroundprobability\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=4049"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/skepticink.com\/backgroundprobability\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4049\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/skepticink.com\/backgroundprobability\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/3223"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/skepticink.com\/backgroundprobability\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=4049"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/skepticink.com\/backgroundprobability\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=4049"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/skepticink.com\/backgroundprobability\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=4049"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}