I grew up in a time before AIDS. The big threats about premarital sex were pregnancy and gaining a reputation as a slut. Having sex with someone couldn’t kill you, just your reputation.
From personal experience, I can tell you that anything that’s made mysterious and avoided will inspire curiosity in the young. With me, that happened with marijuana, which I didn’t like, thank goodness. But in my day, you couldn’t spread a naked photo around the world with the click of a button.
People are hysterical over the new sex-ed curriculum introduced this week by the Wynne government. Knowledge is power and learning the real names of body parts, what it means to give consent and that once you send a photo, it’s no longer under your control, are good things in my view. I also don’t understand the point of rallying against the course at Queen’s Park (other than political grandstanding) because parents can simply take their children out of the class if they’re so horrified. They can do that with any class. And I’m a little horrified with Conservative MPP Monte McNaughton, whom I’ve always known to be a rational and nice guy, allegedly alluding to Wynne’s sexual orientation (she’s gay, if you don’t know) as a reason why she should not govern sex-ed. He later clarified his comments as meaning no Premier should guide Ontario kids about sex-ed and called the Liberals defensive for suggesting he was homophobic. Next time, say Premier, not Kathleen Wynne, Monte.
Anytime humans deal more with reality than a lack of truth, you’ll find me there showing support.
Her retort was fantastic. Even more, though, was the fact than a Conservative MPP was outed as denying evolution. So this is the slippery slope we’re headed down up north of the 49th parallel now? At least the party is trying to distance itself from him (or seems to be). What next? Gravity? Are we denying that along with climate change and evolution, just like our Fox-y neighbours to the south? Oy vey.
Um, sorry – not suggesting FOX is denying gravity – yet. At least not until President Obama says he believes in its law.
I wonder if I ever told this story: One morning I cited a CNN poll on something American, can’t remember what, and a man called me and tore me a new one. “I drive in the US all the time and I can tell you that the only fair and balanced news down there is from FOX!” Why, dude, because they CALL it fair and balanced? Oy vey. Bush Jr’s government had to be the worst. That President didn’t believe in evolution. I must paraphrase Richard Dawkins: science is the same no matter where you live, no matter the colour of your skin or your upbringing. Religion bends itself to suit human will.