Tom Monaghan is two things: a nutcase Catholic fundamentalist, and the founder of Domino's Pizza. Who knew that two terrible things so different from one another would go together so well? On one hand, you have religious fundamentalism, which is based solely on nostalgia for a "more innocent time" which never really existed. On the other hand, you have Domino's Pizza, which is based on the idea that people will consume absolutely anything as long as you advertise it often enough.
Both items are utterly stupid, but also widely embraced by a public that just doesn't know any better.
Monaghan has decided he's fed up with "loose Catholic morals". He's going to build his own town, and put a university in the middle of it. This town will allow no pornography, no booze, restricted cable TV channels, and pharmacies that are forbidden to sell condoms or other methods of birth control. Monaghan and another group control all the lots of land, and will therefore control who they sell it to.
Seriously, you want to know how foo-foo-nutty this place is going to be? The artist's conception drawing shows the place as being surrounded by a freaking moat.
Oh, and the university will sport a 250-foot crucifix holding a 40-foot Jesus.
Why would I care about Monaghan or Ave Maria, this silly town he's building in southwest Florida? Why on earth would I, an agnostic who views America's organized religions as sad failures, care the least bit about a place that forbids everything I enjoy? One word, reader: profit.
As a wise cliche once stated, every time a door closes, a window of opportunity opens. Monaghan's city - which will either fail and become another Bob Jones University, or succeed and eventually try to become the country's first seceded state - is the perfect place for scoundrels like you and I. What did Americans do when liquor was banned during prohibition? They took the business underground and provided it for major profits. What did Americans do when most hard drugs were banned shortly after gaining popularity in the 1950s and '60s? Sale of the substances went underground and are still the source of huge profits.
Think of the opportunity, the wealth that will come from selling perfectly legal items like condoms and porn at double or triple the price. Here's the plan. We apply to open a small shop in Ave Maria. We will sell bicycle pumps shaped like the holy cross. But in the basement, unbeknownst to city leaders, we will house a moonshine bootlegging operation, homemade condom manufacturing plant, and midget/granny porn distribution center.
Then comes the tunnel system. Like prison inmates, we will use primitive, quiet tools to dig a series of underground tunnels throughout the city. These tunnels will lead to larger, reinforced underground rooms that will house bars, drug lounges, strip clubs, casinos, and Turkish baths. Then we will wait. When the moon is full on the Halloween of 2014, our large underground community of mobsters will rise up through the manhole covers and chase the fundies out of their own town.
We will rename the city "Super Drunky Fun Happyland". It will be absolute chaos. Booze and hallucinogens will be readily consumed in the streets, drunken bicycle riding will be a widespread form of travel and entertainment, and monkeys wearing small hats will act as servants for all.
Would this caliber of ridiculousness be legal? Of course not, but neither is Monaghan's plan of creating an entire city strictly for orthodox Catholics, complete with its own Catholic police force and hospital. You can't force a potential homeowner to be Catholic, and you can't force a business to only sell what you want it to sell. It's discriminatory and illegal. Of course, such legal restrictions have been skirted in the past. In the 1970s and earlier, it was quite common for realtors to not show houses in certain neighborhoods to blacks, or for homeowners to refuse to sell to minorities. Right now, city laws restricting where adult shops can set up are spreading across the nation, barring such businesses from many small towns.
Both incidences still happen today, but not often. Black home buyers can easily find a non-racist realtor, and adult shops can survive just fine in a certain part of town, but all those clever biases in one small area? This country must stand against exclusive communities. I shouldn't be allowed to take over an area and designate it as a hellbound drunkard town, just like wealthy soggy pizza entrepreneurs shouldn't be allowed to build Catholic Town USA. Can't we all just focus a little more on how to live happily together, rather than how to segregate ourselves from any and all differences?
