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by pauljburke 4594 days ago
>As an aside: don't forget the largest major anti-condom propagandists is not African at all (ie, the Catholic church).

That would be the curch that also goes on about abstinence before marriage and monogamy afterwards? Never understood why the church gets beaten up for that (not a fan of the stance on condom use but this implies people "religously" follow one of their rules while blatantly ignoring others).

5 comments

The difference is that you can't really convince people to practice abstinence and monogamy. You can quite easily convince people to not use condoms. Failing to take this into account when you are in a position of authority is unethical at best. Spreading misinformation such as HIV being able to get through condoms is plain old evil.
If you abstain you have no chance of getting pregnant. It depends: http://skeptics.stackexchange.com/questions/3167/do-condoms-... .
Sex is part of human nature. It used to happen before Humans invented the notion of marriage. The church is trying to stop something that is intrinsically a part of us, that is a bad strategy and is actively making the world a WORSE place.

A better idea would be to encourage people to use condoms. This does not circumvent human nature and has a much better chance of working.

Don't defend ill thought out policy with bad logic.

Violence and war are also parts of human nature, that doesn't mean religions should give up preaching peace and forgiveness.
Most people don't wake up in the morning with the urge to fight someone, a lot of people do wake up with the urge to have sex. Sex, like voilence, will always happen. We need to find a way to work with what we've got rather than trying to suppress are human needs.
> people "religously" follow one of their rules while blatantly ignoring others

That's mostly how it works. People follow the rules they like and ignore the ones they don't.

It's not just about (not) following rules. When you have no access to condoms because of the church, it doesn't matter what you think and follow.
> this implies people "religously" follow one of their rules while blatantly ignoring others

Is that so implausible?