Posted on 12/04/2003 7:03:00 PM PST by The Unnamed Chick
Responsible lust is healthy, normal
By ROGER LIBBY GUEST COLUMNIST
Iraq is not the only war the Bush administration has been conducting. For some time, right-wing politicians have been using lies as bullets to fight an ugly war against lust. Sexual motives and meanings that are lustful and/or explicit, especially if they are not limited to monogamous, reproductive marriage, are openly scorned. Condoms, women's reproductive choices, objective sex education, sexually explicit depictions and gay and lesbian expression are all under vicious attack.
In a futile attempt to eradicate non-marital sex, the federal government is trying to make erotic pleasure frightening by denying accurate information about condoms and other ways to prevent AIDS and other sexually transmitted diseases (STDS). This misguided, mean-spirited effort includes disinformation and restrictions to access to birth control and abortion. Unbeknownst to most computer users, the Bush administration has been distorting existing government Web sites to push abstinence, mostly by playing down the empirically proven effectiveness of condoms.
Politicians supporting repressive laws affecting sex and sex education have yet to learn that no one can legislate sexual morality. Fueled by the lack of separation of church and state, Congress continues to fund dangerously inaccurate, misleading abstinence-only "education" at the expense of accurate, comprehensive sex education. So far, California is the only state that has refused to accept federal funds tied to sexual disinformation.
As the Sexuality Information and Research Council of the United States repeatedly has argued, research indicates that comprehensive sexuality education helps teenagers put off the age of first intercourse and sexual activity is more likely to be safer sex with condoms being used. Abstinence-only programs may scare a few teenagers to wait for pleasure, but most won't wait until marriage, and fear is a poor and unhealthy motivator for responsible behavior. Many will acquire STDS and/or be involved with unwanted pregnancies. Must this be the price to pay for pleasure?
It makes sense for teenagers to wait until they are out of high school to have intercourse, but most of them aren't waiting. Failing to teach them the facts about birth control and STDS only adds to their misery -- and to government expenditures. For economic and humanitarian reasons, we have no business supporting inaccurate indoctrination about sex in the schools and on government Web sites.
Our schools and government should be honest about sex. Abstinence programs lie about sexual pleasure and dangers. They cause even more social and sexual problems by failing to prepare teenagers for sexual dangers or for a necessary understanding of their sexual health. What right do politicians have to cause serious problems for those who do not abstain from sexual activity?
Comprehensive sex education is discouraged by Congress, which has already spent more than $135 million on abstinence-only programs, with a more expansive budget planned. My own research, as well as that of others, clearly shows that most parents want honest, factual comprehensive sex education. Why are legislators so unsupportive of objective, thorough sexuality education? What are they afraid of? The truth?
Washington state has had pending legislation (HB1178) to assure that any sex education is factual, rather than hysterical distortions of the truth aimed at promoting abstinence until marriage. Unfortunately, this appropriate bill has been tabled. If this needed law ever passes, abstinence programs no longer will be able to lie about condom effectiveness and birth control issues. They will not have the right to exaggerate the dangers of sex.
Research would be a far better basis for any education about sex-including gay and lesbian issues. We know from research that homosexuality is largely a genetic predisposition, certainly not a choice. In spite of this truth, Sen. Rick Santorum, R-Penn., and other right-wing politicians are bent on falsely aligning gay sexual acts with incest, adultery and polygamy. As long as sexual acts are consensual, responsible and not incestuous or otherwise harmful, how can any politician justify interference with private sexual choices?
Responsible lust is healthy and normal, providing the driving force for passionate love and joy. Rather than labeling lust a sin, or something to fear, we can benefit by encouraging this wonderful energy as a positive contribution to playful intimacy.
It is time to once again "make love, not war." A majority of Americans are not in step with politicians who would distort the truth, take control of our bodies and our privacy and censor sexually explicit media that can enhance marital and non-marital intimacy. Let's end the war against lust by telling politicians to mind their own business or risk losing their jobs at the voting booth.
I searched to see if this was posted anywhere else and I couldn't find it, used all kinda of keywords that should fit. So if it was already posted... SORRY! : )
Except, of course, for SJC judges in Massachusetts.
Oh no not the infamous vicous 'verbal' attack?..... I imagine ABORTION is the so called reproductive choice?
I have three dogs; a papa dog, a mama dog and one of their puppies.
When the mama dog first came to live here she was a stray that had wandered onto a friend's property and he could not keep her so we brought her home.
When she met Patch (the papa dog) it was lust at first sight, for unbeknownst to us she was just going into heat.
We kept her in diapers and kept them apart for almost the whole time, but alas one day a man came to my door to talk business and Aussie (the mama, AKA Hussy) took advantage of my preoccupation and pushed through the latched but unbolted door and seduced Patch with a passion the likes of which I've never seen since (she's "fixed" now); he gallantly rose to the occasion and she had the audacity to yelp as love had it's way; try as I might I could not separate them, so engrossed were they in their pleasure and the eternal mission to bring forth..., shrugging my shoulders, I turned to my visitor and said, "Aren't they just like us?"
The Gay Gene: Going.. going... gone"
Liars at the S-PI? Who woulda thunk it?
This makes absolutely no sense at all. (1) The federal government isn't denying information to anyone, it simply isn't subsidizing its transmission as much as it used to; (2) accurate information about all of those items is frightening, and should be. There is no such thing as "safe" sex, the act is intimate, unifying, and inherently risky because of that. There's nothing wrong with this, but its hazards are what courtship and marriage were designed to protect against long before the advent of antibiotics and effective (more or less) prophylactics.
It is a disservice to the young to pretend otherwise for political purposes. There are physical and emotional risks over and above pregnancy that are not met by condoms, diaphrams, and dosing growing bodies with endocrine system modifiers. Telling them "go ahead and do it, we'll take the pregnancy problem away and you can deal with the rest" is a copout, not a program.
Leave it to liberals to make passion and "lust" into just another calculation involving health and well being.
These people are about as inspiring as prison guards.
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