Saying people shouldn't have sex if they don't want a baby...

[EstimatedProphet]

is like saying people shouldn't eat if they don't want to crap.

Waddya think of my new slogan? :)

Seriously, I know this is extreme, and not really a valid comparison. I'm not trying to compare having a baby to defecating, or trying to say that babies are feces, or anything of the sort. I know some people will try to take it that way.

The human sex drive is as innate and fundamental to the human psyche as the feeding drive. This point is the elephant in the room that fundamentalists refuse to talk about. It is a necessity for a healthy human being to have some sort of sexual expression. Prolonged abstinence is simply not psychlogically healthy, any more than starvation is biologically healthy, and promoting abstinence only as a means of birth control and of behavior in society is just as destructive as trying to promote starvation as a method for weight loss. In some cases absitnence may be mentally clearing, but that doesn't make forced abstinence a healthy option for living.

30 Days last night had a pro-choice activist live in an anti-choice maternity home for a month, and one of the things discussed in the show was that the mothers were able to (forced, actually) watch anti-choice propaganda videotapes on a daily basis. Yet, information on birth control was not available, because they believed birth control to be a bad thing. Even though it would give the women living in the shelter the opportunity to control their lives and not have another pregnancy they could not support, birth control was still considered a bad thing, and abstinence was presented to these women as the only moral option to not carrying a baby to term. What this really comes down to is: live in misery, or be prepared to have a baby.

[Selatius]

1. You should compare it to masturbation instead

Saying people shouldn't have sex if they don't want babies is like saying men shouldn't masturbate if they don't want sperm coming out.

Turn the damn message on its head.

(Edited to correct a flaw in thinking)

[EstimatedProphet]

9. Unfortunately

the same people often say that masturbation is a sin too.

[gratuitous]

2. How about . . .

Having sex if you don't want a baby is like saying you shouldn't eat if you don't want to get fat.

Both sexual activity and eating are innate drives, as you mention. Without information on good sex habits, just like information on good eating habits, a person is at risk for all sorts of health complications.

[EstimatedProphet]

7. That's a good one too

[Warren DeMontague]

3. Of course. They don't give a shit about "babies"- it's control. It's an

anti-sex agenda. And after they start throwing women in jail for having abortions, they'll move on to criminalizing birth control, and instituting "biblical law" punishments for gay, pre, or extra-marital sex.

They're fucking nuts, that's all there is to it.

[whistle]

4. It's acceptable, but I can tell you this that every time one has sex

....it does not logically follow that one will automatically have a baby, but every time one eats, one will always have to crap! Unless one is an anal retentive republican, then it does not always logically follow that one has to have a crap. Republicans have a reputation for holding their carp.....you know the old saying...."shit is money!"

[EstimatedProphet]

8. That's true. It's not a perfect analogy

However, both drives are a biological imperative, and I think it gets the point across. ;)

[Kolesar]

5. There are a number of conservatives who suppress the urge to do the dirty

...deed. They probably look at adulthood as a blessing because their teenage hormones fade away and they get to a point where they could suppress the carnal urges. A republican woman I knew told me that her mother said that "sex was a deed a wife had to do to accomodate her husband".

[ComerPerro]

16. I knew a lot of people like that. They are usually lying

They don't supress anything.

I know a lot of girls who were pregnant before they were married, and before they even turned 20.

And every one of them comes from a conservative family.

[Red Right and BLUE]

30. Absolutely. I can relate to this.

Here I am, liberal as hell, and I never had to deal with an 'accidental' pregnancy (not that I don't love ALL "my" babies all the same). Almost all my 'conservative' friends and family have been preggo out of wedlock. The ones who haven't simply haven't had kids yet or they have had an abortion.

It's all about anti-sex and repression and fear.

[Kickoutthejams23]

6. If you believe birth control is bad and you have sex well....

you live with the obvious outcome. I think the regular Birth control pill should be available over the counter. I think long term solutions such as Norplant should be promoted more. (How many parents who willing drive their teenage daughter to get a piercing or tattoo but won't get them Norplant?) I mean if your daughter is thirteen she will probably be sexually active in the next five years.Why not take care of that problem ahead of time?

I'm happy to see the morning after pill OTC. And free condoms should be everywhere. Realistically tell kids the truth. If you knock someone up (or get knocked up on your own) before you are ready be prepared for your life to resemble a living hell at times.

Birth control pills were wildly used by girls in my Junior High school and High school when I was growing up in the eighties (The parents always used that coy to control acne excuse) I'm honestly surprised it is still an issue today.

[noonwitch]

10. I dated a catholic guy who refused to use condoms

He said it was a sin for him to do so, but he could have sex with me if I was on the pill, as I'm not a catholic.

I told him I wasn't going on the pill because I smoke and am over 30. I further said the sin was premarital sex, not using a condom. Why was he willing to commit the big sin and not the small one?

He didn't ever get any from me. He found a stupid woman to knock up a few months later, and married her.

[Warren DeMontague]

22. Wow. Talk about your selective interpretation of religious dogma.

Either that, or he just didn't like using rubbers, and was too chickenshit to cop to it instead of blaming the pope.

[aikoaiko]

11. A better analogy would involve something that is not essential to sustain

... life.

Something the right always does but is not critical for sustaining life. Afterall, one does not have to have sex to sustain ones own life -- the species, yes, but not one's own life.

Of course, I can't think of anything better :D

[EstimatedProphet]

12. Yeah, but I like the shock effect

[Yupster]

13. Is it okay to say that to men though?

But not to women...

That if you don't want to have a baby, then don't have sex?

I've been told that hundreds of times here on DU.

If you don't want to end up paying child support for your child then you should have kept it in your pants. This is a discussion we've had hundreds of times.

[EstimatedProphet]

19. IMO it is ridiculous to ask anyone to not have sex as a solution

It's too basic a drive. And it is like telling someone to starve themself in the damage it does to the psyche.

[Yupster]

23. I agree with you, but

I've been told 100 times on DU that if a man doesn't want to be a father, he needs to keep it in his pants.

[EstimatedProphet]

28. Well, he does at least need to take precautions

I don't agree with the 'keep it in your pants' line either - although I understand the intention towards responsibility. I don't think telling anyone, male or female, to not have sex if they don't want a child is realistic.

[Sammy Pepys]

14. Maybe this is too much information...

...but I enjoy a nice dump. I'm sure lots of other people do too. Hence, the problem with the quip.

[EstimatedProphet]

20. Yeah, that may be too much information :)

[kurth]

15. 130-lb person can burn 7 calories per 5 minutes of vigorous sex

Highly recommended.

[mrreowwr_kittty]

17. Sex makes people happy and feel good

And you don't even need a partner!

Happy, good-feeling people are less likely to be manipulated into religious fervor, war fever, consumerism, etc. etc.

That's why they hate it.

[Warren DeMontague]

18. Also, frequent orgasms in men in their teens and twenties prevents cancer.

http://www.newscientist.com/article.ns?id=dn4861

Another in a long line of scientific facts that the church, sorry, the government (fuck, it's hard to tell the difference, these days!) would prefer you didn't know.

[Warren DeMontague]

21. Seriously, if they really were interested in preventing abortions...

they wouldn't be fighting tooth and nail against birth control at the same time. The HLA plank in the Republican Party Platform, as it has stood for the past several decades, would criminalize the birth control pill because -according to most major "pro-life" organizations in this country- using the pill is morally equivalent to getting a surgical abortion.

The crazy ginkuses who think that just-fertilized eggs deserve full rights under the 14th amendment, and that stem cells are little tiny people (but strangely negelct the fight to "save" unfertilized eggs and sperm.. perhaps that's next) aren't interested in reducing the numbers of abortions, because (aside from it really being about deep-seated resentment at the wanton fucking other people are "getting away with") the things which WILL help reduce abortions -like universal health coverage including contraception, availability OTC of not just Plan B but all oral contraceptives- are morally anathema to them.

Instead, they'd like to agitate for the "rights" of pharmacists to deny EC to rape victims or dispense lectures about Jesus instead of pills to unmarried, fornicatin' women. At least until they can turn the pill into a controlled substance.

I have a several point plan for anyone who is truly interested in reducing abortions:

Support a SPHC system with universal contraceptive coverage. That way, any woman who does get pregnant won't have to worry about not having prenatal or other health care.

Support a liveable minimum wage, so the concept of a poor single mother raising a kid in this country won't be such a cruel joke.

Support research into newer and better contraceptive options, the medical technology of which has not been significantly uptdated in decades.

Allow gays to get married. After all, gays don't have unplanned pregnancies very often.

Support realistic, honest sex ed in schools, including information about and availability of contraceptives.

Like I said above: Make Plan B *and* oral contraceptives available OTC, so a woman won't have to worry about the last open pharmacy in the county being staffed by some Jesus-drunk dimwit when the time comes to refill her prescription and she happens to be on a business trip to bum-fuck RedStateVille.

And last, but certainly not least- if you really, really, really don't like abortion:

Don't have one.

[upi402]

24. i'm for crap

thanks for the post because i'm on a crap theme somehow too.
must be something in the water.

[leesa]

25. They don't believe this junk anyway. How many married couples give up

sex when they are no longer fertile for whatever reason?

[Blackthorn]

26. But really, how else can you guarantee not to get pregnant

Frangers, the Pill, whatever are not, and will never be, 100% effective at stopping pregnancies.

[and-justice-for-all]

27. Sexual Surpression is typical xtian extremist banter.....

They tried this crap in the DARK AGES, sexual supression can lead to mental disorders and sever stress. You can either have sex or do what Opus Dei dose, supress your sexual desires and mutilate yourself.

Remember kids, religion as the wack jobs are trying to sell people and have sold, is BAD. To them, their faith is a mass control tool over you and your check book.

[newspeak]

29. "every sperm is sacred"

come on sing it all together now!!!! See, Sammy Sperm is sacred, that's why they want to outlaw those interesting, stimulating sex toys that mostly women want to buy--cause Sammy ain't getting no action!!!!!!