the facts of life & the culture of death (graphic content alert!)

Off The Record ^ | February 26, 2008 | Diogenes

[NYer]

"Papa loved Mama, so they got married and had babies." Thus does my earnest four-year-old summarize the mysteries of marital love. For scientific purposes that statement is terribly incomplete. For philosophical purposes, it hits the bull's eye.

With those words Phil Lawler began a Wall Street Journal op-ed in March of 1996. His child's perspective stands in instructive contrast to an article in today's New York Times titled, "Talking With Children About Sex and AIDS: At What Age to Start?" The answer suggested in the lede is "How about, oh, 4?" The reporter tells us this is the subject of a new educational video: "I saw it last month at a Gay Men's Health Crisis screening for AIDS counselors." -- i.e., in an environment where dispassionate scientific objectivity is of prime importance and politics never contaminates the search for truth. Get this:

In [the video], two incredibly sweet and precocious sisters -- Vineeta and Sevilla Hennessey, ages 6 and 4 -- accompany their parents, the filmmakers, to the 2006 International AIDS Conference in Toronto. They interview top AIDS experts, gay activists, condom distributors, a sex toy saleswoman, a cross-dresser playing Queen Elizabeth II and an Indian transgender hijra in a sari.

The startling aspect is that, as one childish question leads to the next, they ask things like: "How does AIDS get into your body?" and "How come they want to have sex with each other?"

Take a step back to consider what's going on here. When the "facts of life" (the euphemism is more than a euphemism) are communicated to a child, it's not simply an exchange of information that takes place. He learns some biology, true, but he's also taught how to respond to the mystery emotionally, morally, and spiritually by his teacher's attitude to it. I call it a mystery because the child's grasp of the biological facts will anticipate his experience of the libido for which those facts are pertinent. When the child's teacher is his own parent, and that parent has a positive experience of love, marriage, and family, the child is going to learn that sex is a good thing -- at once momentous, precious, interlocked with love, potentially comic, and oriented toward new healthy human life. Even the awkward adolescent years, in which the child hears about some ways in which sexual desire can go wrong, will not usually change the positive and pleasurable anticipation of sexual love he learned in the bosom of his family.

Now flip back to the New York Times and Gay Men's Health Crisis push for the advancement of sex-ed:

At one point, Vineeta draws for the camera a picture of two people in bed. "These are condoms," she explains of the bowl beside them, "that you put in the boy's penis, so they don't get AIDS with a woman or with a man. A man can do it with a man if you like it."

So what associations is this child going to attach to human sexuality when she turns eleven, twelve, thirteen, and beyond? She has come to learn "the facts of life" in a context of disease, death, anarchic carnal appetite, latex appliances, and an all-embracing moral nihilism. Her understanding of AIDS is naturally juvenile now, but we can expect her instruction to be supplemented with the details of chlamydia, herpes, gonorrhea, HPV, syphilis, along with non-judgmental coaching in the sexual antics by which these infections are transmitted. Pregnancy, abortion, and sterilization (both temporary and final) will be introduced to her in one and the same lesson, as aspects of a particularly unpleasant problem, under the common rubric of risk-avoidance. What are the chances, by the time this young woman is of marriageable age, that the words sex, love, babies, joy will be elements of a single privileged personal experience?

If the question was ever in doubt, it should be no longer: the great majority of sex-ed enthusiasts and AIDS educators are sexual misfits themselves, and their fervid interest in getting into the classroom with children -- other people's children -- stems not from a desire to protect those children from harm but from the need to vindicate their own sexual choices. Normal persons have an innate sense of the dignity of human sexuality that makes them reticent to broach the subject with children, and especially with the children of strangers. Normal persons believe human sexuality is governed by moral norms, even if they differ on where the lines are drawn. But the folks coaching little Vineeta in the use of condoms are using her health as a pretext. They know perfectly well they're more likely give to her nightmares than to protect her from an unanticipated danger. They see her six-year-old's innocence, as they see all innocence, as a rebuke to their depravity. Hating that innocence, which must pain them whenever they encounter it, they want to extinguish it as soon and as thoroughly as possible. That's why they want into the first grade classroom.

C.S. Lewis once remarked, "Normal sexuality, far from being a given, is achieved by a long and delicate process of suggestion and adjustment which proves too difficult for some individuals and, at times, for whole societies." In our society, today, there are many who want to increase rather than diminish the difficulties, with a view to eliminating normal sexuality as a recognizable good. They seek to bring this about primarily by shifting the educational prerogative away from parents into the hands of the state -- and thus, more and more, into their own hands. Call this a battle in a culture war, however, and you'll find yourself accused of spreading alarm and despondency.

Now where was that video screened again?

photo credit: New York Times

[NYer]

This is THE CULTURE in which our children are being raised. No matter how closely you guard and protect them, they will eventually meet up with these children when they are older. How rapidly our society has slid down the slope!

[weegee]

It isn’t just that they will meet up with these children and their parents and coaches later, it is that they are forbidden under political correctness from making a moral judgment over their lack of morals yet the society will be free to mock their moral attitude as “prudishness” and “puritanical”.

The Sex Positive Agenda is a philosophical order with an amoral agenda (literally, it seeks to end the moral judgments over sexual pairings of any type and it seeks to see everyone sexually active at every age). Abstinence is considered unhealthy in their worldview.

New “hate crimes” thought crime legislation makes it criminal (or at least subject to persecution if not prosecution) for speaking out against such indoctrination.

[NYer]

Excellent points! Thank you for posting them to the thread. Are you as sick and tired as I am over television advertisements for ‘sexual enhancement’ pills and lotions - during family viewing hours!

[Gene Eric]

>> They seek to bring this about primarily by shifting the educational prerogative away from parents into the hands of the state — and thus, more and more, into their own hands.

The balance of information we present to children up to recent days was not derived through chance but cultivated over generations with the understanding of sensitivities and consequences. Radical departure from these traditions will prove too abrasive to the intrinsic morality most humans choose to live by. Such is a catalyst to civil unrest.

[GOP_Thug_Mom]

I call them up when my kids aren't around and tell them something like this, "No one wants to hear about how heavy my menstral cycles are, and I sure as heck don't want my children to hear about a man's 'erectile disfunction', etc."

They usually don't know what to say once I get graphic with them .

[NYer]

Lol .... are you calling the pharmaceutical companies or television stations?

[Scotswife]

“If the question was ever in doubt, it should be no longer: the great majority of sex-ed enthusiasts and AIDS educators are sexual misfits themselves, and their fervid interest in getting into the classroom with children — other people’s children — stems not from a desire to protect those children from harm but from the need to vindicate their own sexual choices”

One of the best observations I’ve read in a long time.

[wagglebee]

Homosexual Agenda and Moral Absolutes Ping!

Freepmail wagglebee to subscribe or unsubscribe from the homosexual agenda or moral absolutes ping lists.

FreeRepublic homosexual agenda keyword search
[ Add keyword homosexual agenda to flag FR articles to this ping list ]

FreeRepublic moral absolutes keyword search
[ Add keyword moral absolutes to flag FR articles to this ping list ]

[trisham]

If the question was ever in doubt, it should be no longer: the great majority of sex-ed enthusiasts and AIDS educators are sexual misfits themselves, and their fervid interest in getting into the classroom with children -- other people's children -- stems not from a desire to protect those children from harm but from the need to vindicate their own sexual choices.

**********************

So it seems.

[nmh]

This is terrible.

They are EMOTIONALLY unready and unprepared for this. They are robbing them of their innocence and introducing them to things they don’t understand. It’s emotional ABUSE.

[nmh]

Sick of it, is putting it politely.

I have an 8 year old girl. She doesn’t understand it. She’ll as me what does Viagra do for a guy? I tell her it’s a product for INSECURE males that believe this will make them more “manly”. I reassure her that manly men don’t need these kinds of drugs. A loving spouse will love them for how they are.

[gidget7]

I agree wholeheartedly! Equally as offensive is the Herpes commercials, portraying responsible loving attractive couples, who have a minor normal inconvenience in their lives, and are taking care of their partners. Or, “have a happy period”. And What?? is with the bath tubs in the Cialis commercials?

[nmh]

They try to make social diseases no big deal - and look - these are attractive carefree couples that have it too! Maybe it’s a good thing! It’s sickening. Yeah the period stuff - that goes right over her head. She’s ONLY 8! Next year they talk about that at school - it’s rushing childhood in a NEGATIVE way. They shouldn’t be concerned about that stuff. It will just gross her out.

I’d like to throw those bathtubs at someone ... . Another disgusting commerical is the “Grandparents” ready to get it on when the grandkids arrive and they then gently maul each other ... YUCK! I’d be disgusted if my parents acted that way in front of our kids or even me. Keep your personal life to YOURSELF!

[marinamuffy]

Are you as sick and tired as I am over television advertisements for ‘sexual enhancement’ pills and lotions - during family viewing hours!

I am 30 years old and hate it when those commercials come on. Especially when I'm watching tv with my parents! If I have control of the remote, the tv gets quickly muted. If my dad has control, I get to hear him sing along to "Viva Viagra". It's horrible! :-)

marinamuffy

[ROLF of the HILL COUNTRY]

“How rapidly our society has slid down the slope!”

We’re no longer sliding; we’re free-falling towards Gomorrah!!!

[ItsOurTimeNow]

True story:

7 year old daughter was watching TV when a commerical for Cialis came on. Wife couldn’t get to the TV soon enough to change the channel, and as the commercial was over, Daughter says to my wife, “You should get that for Dad. I think he has E.D.”.

Mortified, my wife says, “What on earth do you mean?”

Daughter says, “It’s for Ear Disease, and you always say that he doesn’t listen to you.”

[NYer]

The punch line is amusing but the story simply underscores what I have said time and time again. I can understand them running these commercials late at night but not during daytime viewing.

[Pinkbell]

I don’t like those either. My cousin is unfortunately a conservative turned liberal, and he and I were having a debate about that. I was saying they should not be showing those adds, at least not during family hours. At least we aren’t as bad as Europe yet, which allows full nudity. They people over there think that we’re prudish!

[Etoo]

[I tell her it’s a product for INSECURE males that believe this will make them more “manly”.]

 

 

It's also a product used by males whose ability to maintain an erection has been destroyed by methamphetamine and MDMA abuse:

 

Party and Play, or PNP, is Internet code for sex and any combination of crystal meth, Viagra and MDMA, also known as ecstasy. The code, if you know where to use it, has aided easy access to both crystal meth and sex partners, in part triggering the Internet’s new moniker in the gay community: “bathhouse of the new millennium.”

http://www.google.com/search?hl=en&q=Homosexual+Methamphetamine+Viagra+MDMA&btnG=Search