I guess the "culture of life" extends to cancer now?

[forsyth]

Well, obviously not all of it, but there's a significant portion of the "pro-life" crowd that doesn't give two shits about children, or women, or anything like that. Well, not protecting them, anyway. All they want is to enforce their medieval sexual morality on people.

From The Washington Post:

""A new vaccine that protects against cervical cancer has set up a clash between health advocates who want to use the shots aggressively to prevent thousands of malignancies and social conservatives who say immunizing teenagers could encourage sexual activity.

...

Conservative medical groups have been fielding calls from concerned parents and organizations, officials said. "I've talked to some who have said, 'This is going to sabotage our abstinence message,' " said Gene Rudd, associate executive director of the Christian Medical and Dental Associations. But Rudd said most people change their minds once they learn more, adding that he would probably want his children immunized. Rudd, however, draws the line at making the vaccine mandatory.

"Parents should have the choice. There are those who would say, 'We can provide a better, healthier alternative than the vaccine, and that is to teach abstinence,' " Rudd said.""

Um. Not exactly, no. Unless you're talking life-long abstinence and ensure nobody ever gets raped. And the argument that ""We're going to be sending a message to a lot of kids that you just take this shot and you can be as sexually promiscuous as you want and it's not going to be a problem," he said. "That's just not true."" is moronic.

It's not about making people healthier, it's about the fact they'd lose their "OMG CANCER!" threats to use to try and scare teenagers out of having sex. Which demonstrably DON'T WORK, anyway.

More at Obsidian Wings.

Comments

[leticia.livejournal.com]

Quick comment because I'm about to run to town.

I think pretty much anyone sane will agree that providing a vaccine isn't exactly going to undermine whatever moral character America's teenagers have - and by whatever, I'm not saying "They don't have much," but rather, "Their moral character may exist yet not be the same that the people making the point think is appropriate."

On the other hand: A shot is an invasion of the physical self, body-integrity. The government forcing such things on you is /certainly/ a privacy issue.

Schools currently demand certain vaccinations, but their purpose is to assure that classrooms do not become vectors for disease; HPV is not exactly an airborne easily communicable disease which will turn schools into death-traps.

There is a difference between saying "This shot should not be available to parents who choose it," and saying "This shot should not be forced on our children without our permission."

And this IS a civil rights issue. The government forcing non-essential medical procedures is kinda creepy, don't you think? And shots are creepier than hair getting cut without consent. (Yet none of us think the police should be able to do that, do we?)

[raanab.livejournal.com]

What about the tetanus shot? Tetanus is not spread person to person but by having a bacteria enter the blood stream, most likely through a deep puncture wound. The reason to stick this HPV vaccine in with the group of shots around puberty is to ensure the vaccine is received before the person is exposed to any HPV which would render the shots useless.

And if someone is so hard up to expose their children to a now easily preventable form of cancer, well, the Christian Scientists could probably provide information on how to get past mandated medical procedures.

[leticia.livejournal.com]

Liability issues, mostly.
'Cause kids can hurt themselves.
By all means, the HPV shot should be available. But forcing it on people is another thing. It IS a civil rights issue.

Now, if your stance on civil rights is "When it comes to medicine, the government should decide what treatments you should recieve" that's fine, but other people - myself included - disagree.

Did you see the Bush administration's report on mental illness? Me, I don't want the pharmeceutical companies screening school kids and prescribing drugs by government mandate, yet one could argue that it's important to fight this ADD epidemic.

[raanab.livejournal.com]

Yes, because adding one more vaccine to the set we already have mandated is a horrible civil rights violation. It is a vaccine, it does not deal with the functionality of any body part, it introduces a dead strain of a virus into the body so that the immune system can learn how to protect itself against it.

And I really doubt Tetanus shots are in place due to threat of lawsuits, it's been around for a good number of years well before the time liability become such a major concern. If we have the ability to stop the major source of a form of cancer by a vaccine why shouldn't we? This is not some chemical stew designed to tinker with the inner workings of the brain, this is not some invasive procedure. It is a vaccination, and in order for it to be effective you have to get it before you get exposed to it.

And as for civil rights, yes, sometimes the rights of the whole trump the rights of the individual.

Taxation is the taking of the money that an individual earns or is given, but we recognize that as we all live in this society we need to pay for it's upkeep.

Schooling requirements, such as the requirement that you must send your child to school from x age through y age. That most definitely infringes on freedom of movement, but as a society we realize we need the citizens to learn certain things and therefore a child needs to go through a certain level of schooling.

Law, for while someone might feel it is their right to swing their fists wildly about, society pretty consistently rules that that right ends at another person's nose.

Vaccinations, we mandate vaccinations because it requires a minimum of intrusion on the individual for a huge amount of benefit for the whole. Crippling diseases that tormented previous generations were wiped out or nearly wiped out. A prick on the arm and polio, tetanus, measles, and so on are no longer a threat.

[leticia.livejournal.com]

Children can be homeschooled; there is no infringment on rights of movement.

Even if so, past rights violations do not excuse future ones.

Cervical cancer is not exactly a highly contagious disease; it's not like a polio epidemic.

[raanab.livejournal.com]

They still must be schooled. No choice whatsoever in the matter.

Because the right to die of a painful disease because of someone else's choice is so important.

Ah, no, the cancer itself isn't, but the cause of it is, and while the general cause is sexual, there are non-sexual transmission methods.

[leticia.livejournal.com]

Fact of the matter is, parents have always been proxies for their children's rights.

Is not giving a child a vaccination neglect?

You are trying to define it as so, but this is a vaccination for a disease which is pretty much only an issue with certain behaviors.

Are you completely incapable of seeing where some people might consider this a civil rights violation? Or do you simply consider the Other Considerations more important than this particular violation?

[raanab.livejournal.com]

No Leti, it is not a risk for just certain behaviors. It is a risk for anyone who has sex in their lifetime. You don't need to sleep around or have unprotected sex to be at risk for it, and while I see numbers like 50% or 74% of sexually active adults having a form of it, (CDC and article in American Journal of Medicine) only 1% at any given time shows any symptoms.


And tell me, is it wrong to mandate immunization against MMR, Tetanus, Polio, Small pox etc. Is it a violation of civil liberties to get those shots?

And you know what, no, I cannot see where you are coming from other than possibly a contrarian or devil's advocate point.

[leticia.livejournal.com]

Sex is a 'certain behavior'. In marriage or not. 99% of the time, sex does not happen without your knowledge and chance to plan ahead, but I don't see anyone suggesting that all women of childbearing age be kept on contraceptives by law in case of the other 1% of times.

I really haven't looked into it, but I'd certainly assume a minor formerly deprived of their vaccine could get it after they reached adulthood.

So you do not think that there is any possible civil rights issue in people getting a shot which is arguably not necessary. I am merely being contrary for pointing out that it's a valid issue. WITHOUT, mind you necessarily taking a stance.

A bit knee-jerking, are we?

[raanab.livejournal.com]

No Leti, the 1% is people who physically show signs of having the disease, there is somewhere around a 50-74% chance of an adult who's had sex to have the disease, only 1% of them have signs of it.

And the vaccine MUST be taken before the person has any exposure to the disease, and if I remember the stuff about the trial, it was three shots and if you came in contact with the disease in between shots it pretty much cancelled things out.

Look, you could arguably say some of the other diseases that we vaccinate against against are not necessary, you don't need a tetanus shot really if you don't plan on impaling yourself on rusty nails, but except maybe for anti-medicine religious nutjobs, I really don't hear people saying that the tetanus shots are a infringement of civil rights. And while it happens to less people than the nail thing, there is such a thing as rape, or even exposure to the disease in a non-sex situations, it is transmitted through skin to skin contact, and it is possible to get an oral infection (although not as easily as a genital infection apparently) which could be spread through kissing, and while not a problem now with the use of disposable versions, there have been women who have gotten the disease and then cancer through improperly cleaned medical instruments.

[leticia.livejournal.com]

Jesus, did you even READ what I wrote? Unlike impaling yourself on a rusty spike, sex is a /choice/ 99% of the time. The 1% was 'the rest of the time' though I didn't feel it necessary to say 'rape'. And the point remains, no one's trying to force any OTHER medical care pre-emptive in case of rape.

If you're not going to read what I'm saying, why should I bother? Why should I believe that you're /thinking/ and not /reacting/?

There are a lot of people in this country, on both sides of a lot of issues, who could desperately stand to step back from their base assumptions and say "What does the other side think? Is there any validty in the position?" You don't have to ultimately agree with the position to recognize what it has right.

At no point have I said the civil rights issue is the prime consideration. I am saying it /exists/.

[raanab.livejournal.com]

Let's see, my argument boils down to the fact that we vaccinate people against other diseases that they have a good chance of running into, and since 50-74% of adults who have had sex have HPV this is not some little overblown protection for people who get raped, it is a vaccination for the vast majority of people who have sex once or more in their lifetime who run the risk of picking up a disease that 99% of the time shows no symptoms on the carrier. The vaccine is three shots, and from the article on the drug tests, had a waiting period of I believe a month between shots, and the women who got the shots who didn't have HPV prior to the test but had sex before the full run of the shots nullified the effect of the shots. So this is not like the pill, this is not like emergency contraception this is something that needs to be finished with before the person becomes sexually active. So practically speaking, the best time to give the shot is before the person becomes sexually mature.

Ok, please, other than the civil rights issue which you were pushing earlier, tell me what valid reasons there are for refusing a vaccine?

(really, other than your arguments and one nut on fark, I haven't seen Civil liberties as an argument)
All the arguments I have seen boil down to the "if the kids get it they'll become sluts!" or the even better "This will hurt our campaign for abstinence only education" which reads to me like "If this happens we can't show worst case scenario nightmare pictures and say that's what will happen to you even if you have sex with a condom on"

I understand that there are concerns about vaccines, mainly caused by some bastards at the top of drug companies using mercury based preservatives in some vaccines to save money, and that is a valid concern, and frankly, I believe the people in charge of making that decision and the lawmakers trying to provide cover for them need to be nailed upside down to a tree by their testicles. But to oppose one single vaccine because the disease it prevents is primarily transmitted sexually does not strike me as having much to it's arguments than "But it's sexual! only tramps get it!" and yes, the more partners you have, the more likely you are to get it, but there are a whole lot of people in monogamous relationships who acquire while being faithful to their spouse and their spouse being faithful to them. Maybe if the disease was not so easily spread, or if it had symptoms to it. But the majority of people out there who have had sex have one form or another of it, and most of the people who have it wouldn't even know they have it, except for the cancer it seems like it is a mainly benign series of diseases.

Another problem with singling this vaccine out from the others has to do with the whole parental proxy of rights, while many parents will understand the need for the vaccine, there will be plenty of others who know their children would never have that nasty dirty premarital sex and so they would never have the need for the sex vaccine. And while it would be great if all the people who take chastity oaths or lived up to the parent's hope that they'd wait till marriage lots of teenagers have sex, which screws up the ability of the vaccine to do its job.

The vaccine should have to stand up and prove its own strengths, and if it does that and deals with a problem that the general public has a high chance of running into then let it join the ones we already have. It shouldn't have to deal with extra hurdles just because sex is associated with it, especially if there are no other workable preventions against it.


Geeze, if I spent nearly as much time on my nano project as I spent arguing this I'd probably be ahead of the game =p

[raanab.livejournal.com]

(oops, misread the first paragraph, never mind my 1% bit)

[forsythferret.livejournal.com]

I do have a good reply to make to this later, but my main point is that the civil rights issue isn't where many of these people are approaching it from. I was poting this first to highlight the nutbars who use abortion and everything else to try and support their medieval view of sex and gender roles and such. But I will address the civil rights portion of it. Later.

And I also think the government should provide sex ed and contraception free, which probably makes me some kind of sex-crazed commie or something. Real reply tomorrow. Later today. Whatever. I hope.

[leticia.livejournal.com]

No, it's not. But the thing a lot of people protesting this protest seem to miss is that they're not saying "Your kid can't have this." They're saying "Don't force this on my kid."

...it continues with "Because I am such a crappy parent if my child has this vaccination, she will runaway to become a Tijuana whore," if you read between the lines, which is... a bit odd. And really, really, scarily counter productive.

[forsythferret.livejournal.com]

In your second line, you summed up nearly everything I was trying to say. I feel no further need to comment.