(no subject)

[theweaselking]

In Oregon, in any Albertsons store, you can buy four brands of condoms in many styles and flavours, "Six Secret Ways To Turn Her On", Cosmo's "How To Make Your Own Sex Video" - but you can't buy Seventeen magazine, because of an article called "Vagina 101", which clinically, correctly labelled the important parts of the vagina during and after puberty and gave ways to tell what is normal, what is unusual but okay, and what is worth seeing a doctor over.

That's right. Once again, factless titillation? Okay! Actual sex education? BANNED.

Comments

[rimrunner.livejournal.com]

This is the part that blows my mind:

"Once their innocence is gone, it's gone," said Debbie Cottingham, 42, toting groceries alongside her 14-year-old daughter. She said it's her job as a mother to teach her three daughters about their bodies.

I knew where babies came from by the time I was six. I had an idea of the basic mechanics and anatomical configurations involved by the time I was ten, thanks to my state-sponsored, public school sex ed class, and my county-tax-funded, free and accessible public library.

And I see that the Multnomah County library system subscribes to this magazine and the subscription is current. Of course, there's probably only one copy and it may not circulate, but at least it's there.

I don't shop at Albertson's anyway.

[unnamed525.livejournal.com]

That woman is retarded.

[rimrunner.livejournal.com]

I knew someone like that when I was growing up. She taught Sunday School at my church (I was Catholic).

She didn't want her 13-year-old daughter to go on a class trip to Florida because the boys from our school would be staying in the same hotel.

She was also opposed to sex ed in public schools. I don't know how my mother, who had a much saner attitude, dealt with her.

[unnamed525.livejournal.com]

I'd say something like, "Yep, your daughter is a known whore, which is why you can't trust her around boys. I guess you must have been too or you wouldn't understand it."

Well ... if I was in a bad mood.

[rimrunner.livejournal.com]

I wouldn't. But that was because I knew her daughter was remarkably rational and sane, considering. In a way, that was what made the whole thing so ridiculous.

Of course, this was in the same county where a sex ed controversy erupted late last year.

[unnamed525.livejournal.com]

What do these people mean by "moral"?

[theweaselking.livejournal.com]

"Moral" means never exposing your children to anything that makes you uncomfortable, regardless of circumstance.

[anton-p-nym.livejournal.com]

It's the pictures... slack-jawed troglodytes can't read the text well enough to find it objectionable, but piktchers of "no-no" stuff get their attention.

-- Steve finds sex-ed uncomfortable, but is far less comfortable with the letting kids stumble into parenthood (or worse) the old-fashioned way.