Commentor KW:
The Sanger racism smear is totally irrelevant unless you’re suggesting that there is an ongoing eugenics conspiracy being perpetrated by some shadowy operatives at the highest levels of PP, which is of course exactly what the right wants you to believe. The entire “You think conservatives are racist, well the liberals are secretly trying to exterminate black people” bullshit conspiracy theory relies on dubious quotes by one woman some 70 or 80 years ago. That’s it, That’s all they’ve got.
This is perplexing: why are Planned Parenthood defenders so passionate about discounting Margaret Sanger's obvious eugenic ideology and racism?
After all, if modern contraceptive and abortive ideology shared nothing in common with Sanger and her eugenic/racist ideology, one would expect that modern defenders of PP would merely assert "Sanger was a eugenic racist who we utterly repudiate. PP has nothing to do with her or her ideas, except for a regrettable organizational continuity."
Yet the defense of Sanger by defenders of PP is emphatic. It understandably leads many people in the pro-life movement to conclude that many of Sanger's precepts still inform Planned Parenthood. Why else would they be so solicitous of Sanger?
The siting of Planned Parenthood clinics in minority neighborhoods and the overtly racist response of Planned Parenthood employees to telephone stings would certainly support the pro-life view that Sanger's odious ideology still permeates the pro-choice movement.
Consider this 1992 letter by Roe v. Wade co-counsel Ron Weddington, who wrote President Clinton to urge the president to rush RU-486 (the morning-after pill) to market as soon as possible:
"[Y]ou can start immediately to eliminate the barely educated, unhealthy and poor segment of our country. No, I’m not advocating some sort of mass extinction of these unfortunate people. Crime, drugs and disease are already doing that. The problem is that their numbers are not only replaced but increased by the birth of millions of babies to people who can’t afford to have babies. There, I’ve said it. It’s what we all know is true, but we only whisper it, because as liberals who believe in individual rights, we view any program which might treat the disadvantaged as discriminatory, mean-spirited and… well… so Republican.
[G]overnment is also going to have to provide vasectomies, tubal ligations and abortions. . , . There have been about 30 million abortions in this country since Roe v. Wade. Think of all the poverty, crime and misery . . . and then add 30 million unwanted babies to the scenario. We lost a lot of ground during the Reagan-Bush religious orgy. We don’t have a lot of time left."Cliff note version:
'Think how many human weeds we have exterminated, and think how much dead weight of human waste we still need to prevent'
Pure Sanger.
Faulkner understood. The past is never dead. It's not even past.
The fundamental question is: Should every act of sexual intercourse have the potential to create a baby, with all chance left to nature?
ReplyDeleteIf you believe "yes", like you apparently do, Michael, then even a family like mine, with ample financial resources, will ultimately be impoverished by the weight of our own progeny. Women will be baby machines, like the Catholic family in our neighborhood with 9 children. We're in a very different world than when the Church laid down its rules - babies now survive.
If you answer "no", women are not purely baby-making machines, and have the right to healthy sexual relationships without generating children (in other words, if YOU or your WIFE has EVER used contraception) then Planned Parenthood has a valid and worthy mission.
I'm not inviting Margaret Sanger to dinner any time soon, and I don't appreciate her racist views. However, her first clinics were not in black neighborhoods. She and her organization gave women the education and means to have a choice, regardless of race.
If you have ever used contraception, if the women in your life have ever used contraception, then you made the choice Planned Parenthood offers. So while you may wish to deny that choice to others, your actions demonstrate your support for Planned Parenthood's mission.
So how about it, Michael. Have you or your family ever encountered birth control pills? A condom? A diaphram? If so, you've made a choice that you cannot deny to others.
"The fundamental question is: Should every act of sexual intercourse have the potential to create a baby, with all chance left to nature?"
DeleteThat is the core of the theological and philosophical debate about contraception.
To answer this from the Natural Law side one must consider our sexual instincts and why they exist.
In other words: Is the sex act pleasurable, and why?
It is. And the obvious answer to the second (why) is that it results in LOTS of babies.
So now PURPOSE enters the game.
For adherents of the concept of natural law, reproduction is a purposeful action. It MEANS something beyond our grasp - in addition to the wonders we do see. So to prevent the teleological function of the Universe (or to prevent/slow it) can be viewed as objectively 'wrong'.
I think this neatly fits the argument for abortion or contraception.
My own view?
Abortion: PERFECT FIT. Like all pointless killing, the blocked potential of a an unborn child is murder.
Contraception, on the other hand, can be used as a means for loving couples to control WHEN they have children. To control the Z axis of the potential, provided they are intent on allowing that potential (life) to actualize. That is their 'duty' to natural law. That is the reason they have the instinct and urge.
Beyond that, as a means to 'protect' illicit unions and to allow (even promote) promiscuity in social circles is inheritly morally wrong.
A strange personal side note, that I often speculate may correlate: Most of the folks I know who have engaged in an extra marital affair are involved in CHILDLESS unions. The (almost instinctive) reaction of many these women who have been cheated on is to attempt to become pregnant by that very man.
Why is that? Perhaps because once you have children with a woman, you are cheating on THEM too? At least that is the visceral hope of these women.
I know, I know.... some cads will not care - but there does seem to be an interesting mix of facts in those observations...
@RickK:
DeleteSo how about it, Michael. Have you or your family ever encountered birth control pills? A condom? A diaphram? If so, you've made a choice that you cannot deny to others.
A few observations:
(1) I don't think Michael is trying to deny anybody's choice to use artificial birth control (prevention of conception). He (in keeping with his Roman Catholic faith) may not agree with it, but (unless I missed something) he has not argued that artificial birth control should be prohibited by civil legislation.
(2) Michael is arguing, I believe, that no one should be coerced by the state to pay for his neighbor's birth control, even under the pretext of providing "health care". Even if Michael did support an individual's choice to artificially prevent conception (which he doesn't), why should he (or his employer) be forced to pay for another person's birth control? Personally, I believe in my neighbor's constitutional right to keep and bear arms, but I am not thereby obligated to provide guns and ammo for him (or her), nor should I be obligated.
(3) The form of your argument is suspect. I could similarly argue, "Have you or your family ever robbed a bank? Tortured a puppy? If so, you've made choices that you cannot (with or without state coercion) deny to others." This seems like a rather odd ethical test or basis for legislation. It's basically asserting, "You've done it -- so it's OK for anybody to do it." Hmmmmm...
"Personally, I believe in my neighbor's constitutional right to keep and bear arms, but I am not thereby obligated to provide guns and ammo for him (or her), nor should I be obligated."
DeleteThat is a good metaphor.
Maybe trigger locks and rifle lockers may be more in line than actual the gun or ammo itself, but your point stands firm.
Why should your neighbour rights come at personal expense to you?
Crus, let's look more closely at your concern. I'd be interested in the statics, if they could be gathered, about which costs me more: funding birth control and associated education, or supporting children from unwanted pregnancies. If a person can participate in unprotected sex with the full knowledge that me and my fellow tax payers will fund her child's basic needs, isn't that also breaking the rule you implied? Isn't that also an example of me paying for my neighbor's rights?
DeleteIf I'm going to pay for one or the other, I'd rather pay for the birth control. Which would you prefer to fund?
RickK,
DeleteSorry it took so long to reply. Busy day.
"I'd be interested in the statics, if they could be gathered, about which costs me more: funding birth control and associated education, or supporting children from unwanted pregnancies. "
I do not think this is even comparable.
Paying (or allowing tax breaks) for child's life or a free contraceptive program?
Well lets consider the 'pay off'.
The rubber will always be a a rubber. A used and discarded landfill rubber, but always a rubber. Nothing more or less will come of that condom.
The child? This is the potential of which we speak. That child is a living person who could grow up to be the policeman or doctor that saves your child's life. Obviously, it could be the reverse. He could grow up to be a drug dealer that sells your child the poison that eventually kills them.
But let's face the facts, only a very small percent of people raised within a relatively moral and prosperous system actually DO become monsters. Most of us are just normal folks. So it will be with most of the poor, working class, and ethnic minority kids that could possibly be prevented by the use of birth control.
The rubber is simply a matter or resources, the child is a metaphysical and moral question.
"If a person can participate in unprotected sex with the full knowledge that me and my fellow tax payers will fund her child's basic needs, isn't that also breaking the rule you implied?"
No that is simply nature taking it's course. Whether you put it down to biology, teleology, or God - people will copulate and procreate. They are not born with a natural sheath or flap that they are refusing. They simply follow instinct.
"Isn't that also an example of me paying for my neighbor's rights?"
Yes, in a sense.
You may very well sacrifice for the rights of the new child (brother, neighbour, citizen etc) if you live in a country that has such social networks available. Your taxes can pay for landfill or for a new generation.
So in short, while I see the money spent on 'free birth control' for the most part to be wasted (or worse), I see the money spent on helping children become productive, educated, and engaged members of our society an investment.
Also there is the whole aspect of promiscuity. The child may in fact reduce that - by making the mother or father more cautious, or serving as an example to younger siblings. MAY, but probably wont in current conditions.
The Condom? The opposite.
'Safe sex' often means MORE sex. Not better sex, not meaningful lovemaking just more. Fast food sex.
More sex (even 'protected') means more children born from flings, illicit affairs, and most horribly MORE abortions.
My two cents.
Sorry it took forever.
'[W]hy are Planned Parenthood defenders so passionate about discounting Margaret Sanger's obvious eugenic ideology and racism?'
ReplyDeleteVery good question, Doctor.
I eagerly await an honest response!
[The fundamental question is: Should every act of sexual intercourse have the potential to create a baby, with all chance left to nature?]
ReplyDeleteThat is indeed the Catholic view. I agree with it.
[If you believe "yes", like you apparently do, Michael, then even a family like mine, with ample financial resources, will ultimately be impoverished by the weight of our own progeny.]
Contraception in pill form has only been available since 1960. Families before that time were not impoverished by the "weight" (what an odious term) of their own children. Kids are expensive (I know-- I putting mine through college), but they are treasures in innumerable ways, some of the ways financial. Kids care for parents in old age. Kids can help enrich life in all sorts of ways.
[Women will be baby machines, like the Catholic family in our neighborhood with 9 children. We're in a very different world than when the Church laid down its rules - babies now survive.]
Women who don't contracept aren't "baby machines". What a nasty thing to say. Your neighbor is a mother who loves her kids.
[If you answer "no", women are not purely baby-making machines, and have the right to healthy sexual relationships without generating children (in other words, if YOU or your WIFE has EVER used contraception) then Planned Parenthood has a valid and worthy mission.]
Chastity and attention to natural cycles are very effective ways of regulating fertility.
[I'm not inviting Margaret Sanger to dinner any time soon, and I don't appreciate her racist views. However, her first clinics were not in black neighborhoods. She and her organization gave women the education and means to have a choice, regardless of race.]
In what way has women's sexual health improved as a result of contraception? Since the pill (1960), STD's, abortion, out-of wedlock births, infidelity, divorce, rape, child molestation have sky-rocketed. The actual consequence of contraception has been the opposite of what proponents claimed for it, and exactly what the Church said would happen.
Contraception allows women to be used by men.
Duh.
Egnor: In what way has women's sexual health improved as a result of contraception? Since the pill (1960), STD's, abortion, out-of wedlock births, infidelity, divorce, rape, child molestation have sky-rocketed. The actual consequence of contraception has been the opposite of what proponents claimed for it, and exactly what the Church said would happen.
DeleteI could understand how a layman might say such things. But when an MD spouts such nonsense, one can't help wondering whether he is a competent doctor. There is this organization called CDC, right? Among other things it does, it publishes medical statistics. It doesn't take much effort to find the stats for STDs. Lessssee...
In 1960, the annual incidence rate for syphilis was 68.8 people per 100,000 persons. In 2010, it was 14.9. Okay. Let's look at gonorrhea. In 1960, 145.4; in 2010, 100.8. That isn't called "skyrocketed," it's called "went down."
"Contraception allows women to be used by men"
DeleteYes of course! How silly of me. I'd forgotten that prostitution and sexual slavery began in the 1960s.
"Women who don't contracept aren't "baby machines". What a nasty thing to say. Your neighbor is a mother who loves her kids."
Yes, she does! And those of us paying for the social services and financial aid that they require like them too. But if I had 9 kids, I wouldn't be contributing nearly as much to the tax base and charities that assist them.
"Families before that time were not impoverished by the "weight" (what an odious term) of their own children."
Medical insurance, college, car seats - it's a different world. Thanks to science, babies don't die. But thanks to modern society, each baby takes a LOT more resource than even in the 1960s. A couple living on $50,000 / year in Ohio will have a dramatically different life with 8 children than with 2.
Of course, if the U.S. birth rate increased by a factor of 3 or 4, perhaps the infant mortality rate would creep back up and we could get back to the good old days, eh Michael?
"Chastity and attention to natural cycles are very effective ways of regulating fertility."
Riiiiiight. I know my neighbors were using rhythm for at least the last 4 of their kids.
"In what way has women's sexual health improved as a result of contraception? Since the pill (1960), STD's, abortion, out-of wedlock births, infidelity, divorce, rape, child molestation have sky-rocketed."
The reporting of rape has increased, not the incidence. Ditto child molestation. Both crimes are well documented in historical times - just refer to the holy scripture of the major monotheistic religions.
Without contraception, women bear the vast majority of risk in a sexual relationship.
How do you feel about women having equal access to professional and educational resources in our society, Michael?
There are societies in the world where infidelity is rare, where contraception is unavailable, where every act of intercourse is left to nature, where divorce is unheard of. I believe Crusader was recently being shot at by people from such societies. Would you like us all to meet those moral standards, Michael?
But we're right back to the original challenge - if you or any of the women in your life have ever used contraception, Michael, then by your actions you support the mission of Planned Parenthood. If YOU have taken advantage of technology to plan your parenthood, then how can you deny that right to others?
It’s easy to see how a religion that wants to maximize its influence and prevalence would want to maximize their birthrate. What’s less clear is why Christians and Muslims have become so obsessed with maximizing everyone else’s birth rate.
ReplyDeleteTake the number 70 and divide by the annual population growth rate percentage to see how many years it will take the population to double. For instance, at a 5% annual growth rate the population will double in 14 years, at a .1% rate the population will double in 700 years. At the current population growth rate of 1.1% the population of the world would double every 63.6 years, and in 891 years every person on earth will have 1 square meter of land.
Technological advancements have allowed the human population to reach huge numbers while increasing quality of life, but as certainly as 70 divided by %annual growth = doubling time, unlimited population growth can not and will not happen. The question is how do you want to handle it, by lowering the birth rate or increasing the death rate? Unless you’ve got the design of a superluminal star drive those are your only two choices.
Dr. Egnor and his Christian philosophy are arguing to always maximize the birth rate which will inevitably lead to a dramatic increase in human suffering. This is because unintelligent species don’t simply reach an equilibrium population just shy of the maximum carrying capacity of the environment; they invariably cause a degradation of their environment that leads to a rapid population collapse. Babies, babies and more babies is a recipe for suffering on an unimaginable scale.
For Christians and Muslims an individuals quality of life and the amount of suffering the individual must endure are purely secondary considerations to their God’s raw appetite for fresh lemming souls, some of which to cherish, most just to torture.
-KW
"Chastity and attention to natural cycles are very effective ways of regulating fertility. "
ReplyDeleteThis approach also often has the effect of intensifying said relations. Absence makes the heart grow stronger.
I smoky analogy for a steamy subject?
I am ashamed to admit, I used to smoke, Doctor. A lot.
A pack a day of cigarettes (or more) for 12 or so years. I would often smoke cigars when at the pub or out with friends at the bar. They were okay. Fun. I thought they made me look pretty cool.
I quit smoking well over a decade ago, now. Cold turkey.
Glad I did in SO many ways, I could not begin to outline them here.
But here's my point: I can now have a cigar once in a while, for a treat.
But now.... WOW.... that cigar is not 'okay', despite being the same brand as all those years back! Now the cigar is DELICIOUS and I enjoy every puff. Now it SATISFIES! Once I am done - I AM DONE for a long, long time.
Now I smoke the cigar - and it no longer smokes me
No before someone yells 'FREUD!' , or jumps on me complaining that sex is natural or what-not.... it's just a personal analogy folks.
With potent and sensual acts it is often true that they are more fully appreciated when savoured as a rarity than gorged down with regularity. Chastity intensifies desire, and desire heightens the experience.
There is more than simply a spiritual or moral reward for the path you advocate, Doctor. There is also a sensual one. A reward for patience, morality, and Godliness.
"For Christians and Muslims an individuals quality of life and the amount of suffering the individual must endure are purely secondary considerations to their God’s raw appetite for fresh lemming souls,
ReplyDeleteOne can almost picture the foam dripping from the mouth and the twitch. The scuffed rubber padding, and the ever so tight straight-jacket.
Let's analyse this Crowleyesque comment shall we?
"For Christians and Muslims an individuals quality of life and the amount of suffering the individual must endure are purely secondary considerations..."
Christians and Muslims are singled out in this. Why?
There are Islamic sects and regions that world notorious for infanticide and various forms of population control, and there are entire denominations of Christianity that condone birth control. This segment is a very weak foundation on which the build a premise!
"their God’s raw appetite for fresh lemming souls"
This is insightful. Here we see humans portrayed as lemmings. The imagery, of course, is not of happy lemmings eating berries (or drinking lemming cola), but of them rushing to their deaths over the craggy edge of a Scandinavian fjord. This is all we can hope to be, even WITH a God or purpose? One is left to wonder how we are seen in light of KW's 'truth'?
"some of which to cherish, most just to torture.""
Cherished lemming souls? If the soul or essence of a lemming is somehow immortal, and it may well be, of course God would cherish it. There is no hell for lemmings, so far as I know.
The only 'tortured lemming' around here is KW.
Maybe he just needs a swim?
KW ?
Delete[KentD] (1) I don't think Michael is trying to deny anybody's choice to use artificial birth control (prevention of conception). He (in keeping with his Roman Catholic faith) may not agree with it, but (unless I missed something) he has not argued that artificial birth control should be prohibited by civil legislation.]
ReplyDeleteI'm of two minds on legislating birth control. I strongly support freedom, but I believe that BC is a great public harm. Contraception has done massive damage to our society, and one can justify banning it in the same way that one can justify banning illegal drugs.
But I don't support banning it, for two reasons:
1) I believe that people should be free to make such decisions for themselves, over a broad range of options.
2) Banning it wouldn't work anyway. There would be a massive black market and massive defiance of the law.
Contraception is one of those things that is very bad but cannot be regulated by law. Law is in fact a very crude instrument, and to defeat contraceptive morality-- a task that will be very difficult-- we need to change hearts, not laws.
"Contraception is one of those things that is very bad but cannot be regulated by law."
DeleteLike nonbrutal, "gentle" rape? Which comes down to: "she says; he says." Should a man be pilloried in the news, or worse, sent to prison based on a bare unsupported accusation? Men are commonly destroyed by false accusations of rape. Many more have their lives thrown into turmoil by unfounded accusations and unsubstantiated accusations of rape. And these three categories of rape accusations don't cover the many men who spend months, years, decades in prison or being compelled on pain of prison to falsely claim to be "sex offenders," having to register wherever they live. Many have been exonerated by the accusing woman's conscience finally speaking long and loudly enough to come forth and admit that the alleged rape never happened. Others have been exonerated by DNA analytical technology that proves beyond a reasonable doubt that no sexual intercourse or bodily contact with the accusing woman ever took place.
Rape is a social problem that is not amenable by the criminal justice system. Horror stories of frightfully brutal rapes and rape-murders are dutifully trundled out by those who think that rape is a problem best addressed by the criminal justice system. But isn't each act of brutality a serious crime in itself when rape or attempted rape is not in the picture? Charges of rape too often muddy the waters, bringing about dismissals and acquittals due to failure to prove rape beyond a reasonable doubt, when prosecuting for the other crimes committed by a brutal rapist was provable and if pursued would have resulted in a substantial punishment?
I also thought that KW's rebuttal was a little weak.
ReplyDeleteThe entire “You think conservatives are racist, well the liberals are secretly trying to exterminate black people” bullshit conspiracy theory relies on dubious quotes by one woman some 70 or 80 years ago. That’s it, That’s all they’ve got.
Well, they aren't dubious. At least not most of them. Ever hear of the Birth Control Review? That was Sanger's publication. She routinely wrote about her racist eugenics fantasies in the pages of that magazine at a time when there was little shame involved in bearing such inner thoughts to the world.
But the crux of his argument appears to be that her quotes are "old news". She said those seventy or eighty years ago! Keep in mind that she's been dead since 1966. In other words, she hasn't said a word at all in 46 years. What he means when he says that she said those things seventy years ago is that she said them when she was alive and walking this earth, a full grown adult, and a leader in the birth control movement. So pay no mind to those statements. Move along, move along.
And from what I can see, Planned Parenthood has changed very little. The (racist) dream lives on. What makes you think they have changed?
So, if I might sum up KW's feeble objections:
1) Those quotes were made up!
2) She said those quotes (that she didn't say) a long time ago.
3) Those quotes that she never said a long time ago don't reflect the reality of Planned Parenthood today.
You're wrong on all three points.
The Torch
@oleg:
ReplyDelete[I could understand how a layman might say such things. But when an MD spouts such nonsense, one can't help wondering whether he is a competent doctor. There is this organization called CDC, right? Among other things it does, it publishes medical statistics. It doesn't take much effort to find the stats for STDs. Lessssee...
In 1960, the annual incidence rate for syphilis was 68.8 people per 100,000 persons. In 2010, it was 14.9. Okay. Let's look at gonorrhea. In 1960, 145.4; in 2010, 100.8. That isn't called "skyrocketed," it's called "went down."]
"All stages of syphilis" is a poor method to gauge new cases, as it can include old tertiary syphilis recently diagnosed.
Look at the rate of primary and secondary syphilis between 1959 and 1961-- it doubled from 5.6 to 11.0 in 2 years.
The massive jump in gonorrhea didn't happen until the later 60's. It was 138 in 1959, up to 233 in 1968, and 460 in 1974.
The astonishing change was in the new std's that were seen in the years following the beginning of the sexual revolution. There are now 25 or so that are routinely diagnosed.
And of course, would you care to compare the rate of AIDS in 1959 with the rate in 2012?
Good try, oleg. But you aren't going to be able to make a case that the sexual revolution that began in 1960 with the pill has decreased std's.
Your effort is funny, though.
Egnor: Good try, oleg. But you aren't going to be able to make a case that the sexual revolution that began in 1960 with the pill has decreased std's.
DeleteBut of course I have already shown that. Today's incidence rates of syphilis and gonorrhea are lower than they were in 1960. Your complaint about pollution of the data by tertiary syphilis is silly because the CDC table also shows separate stats for primary and secondary syphilis. Guess what? Those cases went down, too, from 9.1 per 100,000 people annually in 1960 to 4.5 in 2010.
If you have data on other STDs, go ahead and back up your assertions.
@oleg:
DeleteYou're missing the forest for the trees. The incidence of STD's in general obviously skyrocketed with the sexual revolution. There are of course fluctuations that have occurred with time-- efforts at prevention, treatment, etc.
But the general observation that the sexual revolution was associated with a marked increase in all manner of sexual pathology-- disease, crime, divorce, out of wedlock births, abortion, etc. is a matter of historical fact and is not debated by any honest observer.
You moved the goalposts, Mike. Initially, you blamed contraception for skyrocketing STD rates, now it's sexual revolution. The revolution has long ended, but the contraception is still with us. And the rates are down.
DeleteMaybe I can't see forest for the trees, you'll have to convince me of that. You, on the other hand, don't even see the trees as you have a preconceived notion that contraception is bad, so it must be responsible for all sorts of problems. Well, go ahead and look at some data first, then pontificate.
Michael,
ReplyDeleteNow I know you're crazy. You don't have the slightest idea of epidemiology (which one of my old obstetric professors once defined as 'the study of Man broken down by age and sex' ...)
There's lies, damned lies and statistics. Any statistic concerning the incidence of anything, including gonorrhea, has to be taken with a grain of salt. Reporting rates are variable, and an apparent increase in the reported incidence of a disease might just be due to an increased percentage of a constant number of cases being reported and recorded.
When you mention the increased rates of AIDS from 1957 to 2012 I know you're an idiot. We are in February 2012. We aren't going to know the incidence of new cases of HIV infection till well into 2013. I'd surmise that the incidence of full blown AIDS, at least in the developed world, will continue its decline.
AIDS wasn't even recognized as an entity till 1982. It's a new disease in the West and a rare disease in Africa till the early 20th century. It only got introduced into the West in epidemic proportions after Haitians went to the Congo to work as school teachers etc, a very small number picked up the HIV infection and when they returned to Haiti, after being paid as donors in plasma apharesis collection centers, with appalling safety standards and atrocious cross contamination, resulted in an explosive increase in HIV infection in otherwise healthy donors. And contamination of plasma products for America.
And the rest is history.
I'm aware of the epidemiological aspects of AIDS. When I was a med student in the early 1980's I treated quite a few patients with "GRID" as it was then called.
ReplyDeleteMy point is that the sexual revolution created an environment in which a disease like AIDS, and a score other previously virtually unknown STD's, could spread rapidly and with much morbidity and mortality.
There is a virtual absence of reflection on this obvious fact among cheerleaders for the sexual revolution. You tout the "liberation" and make no mention of the enormous human misery it has caused.
Michael,
ReplyDeleteYes, and I was pointing out that your argument regarding AIDS, starting your series in 1957, was incorrect.
Agreed. It's largely a sexually transmitted disease. But it started out in America as a result of also being a blood borne disease. There was inadequate state control of a single plasma apharesis collection centre in Haiti (partly funded by American investment) with abysmal cross contamination in order to make an even larger profit from a business that was extremely lucrative to begin with.
When have I ever touted the sexual revolution? Actually, it managed to pass me by completely.
@TheTorch
ReplyDelete"But the crux of his argument appears to be that her quotes are "old news". She said those seventy or eighty years ago! Keep in mind that she's been dead since 1966. In other words, she hasn't said a word at all in 46 years. What he means when he says that she said those things seventy years ago is that she said them when she was alive and walking this earth, a full grown adult, and a leader in the birth control movement. So pay no mind to those statements. Move along, move along. "
If you talked to most white people 70 years ago, I'd bet my bottom dollar that they'd sound pretty similar to what this woman sounded like in regard to race relations. It was a matter of fact of the era. Hell, my parents still casually refer to black people as 'colored'. Not out of hatred, but because of what was accepted in a society that they grew up in.