www.publications.parliament.uk/pa/cm200607/cmselect/cmsctech/1045/104505.htm#a12

www.publications.parliament.uk/pa/cm200607/cmselect/cmsctech/1045/1045i.pdf is the full 12th report.

And they’ve been at it in Africa for hundreds of years. And Africans have been at it for hundreds of years as well. If the threat of the eternal fires of hell didn’t persuade you that the missionary position was right, the prospect of mere earthly sickness isn’t going to change minds either. Although of course, if you’re sceptically minded, you don’t see people literally going to hell, and you do see people dying of AIDS. (Unless you’re excessively sceptically minded.)

What I think the message should be, if we’re not also donating to pharmacies, is like Tom Lehrer’s proposed theme song for [Oedipus Rex]: you shouldn’t love too much.

That’ll be news to anyone who’s ever met a communist.

But let’s not get bogged down in semantics. In my experience, when people say that preaching chastity doesn’t work, their objection is not that the advice would be perfectly good if only it weren’t coming from a religion, and they tend not to back the same advice if it comes from non-religious organisations. Call it something other than “preaching”, if you like.

> And I certainly presumed that we were discussing people who say “…and no you can’t have any condoms”.

Why? (And isn’t that another mischaracterisation? I think there’s a significant difference between “can’t have” and “shouldn’t use”.)

By the way, though I admit I did mention in passing my lack of disease, this thread is about unwanted pregnancies. Disease prevention is not a common reason for abortions. Again, I think you’re arguing with something I haven’t said.

All I suggested was that it is grossly simplistic to say simply “Preaching chastity doesn’t work.” That preaching does not exist in a vacuum; it is one of many competing ideals being preached at us.

For the record, I’m a staunch atheist who have always honoured my marriage vows and have every intention of continuing to do so, and have zero unwanted children and zero STDs. The suggested ideal (aka “preaching”) of fidelity seems to have worked on me, at least — which is why I think claims that it Doesn’t Work Full Stop are missing something.

And a marriage license costs about 50 quid. Any lavishly expensive ceremony is purely optional, as is having it in a church.

Male genital mutilation turns out to be satisfyingly effective, if you accept the latest statistics from Africa. Of course the word “satisfying” stands out like a sore, ah, thumb.

I find it interesting when people claim that preaching abstinence doesn’t work — not because they’re necessarily wrong, but firstly because it’s a misrepresentation: no-one’s preaching abstinence except the papal hierarchy to its priests; what is preached by Christians and Jews to their followers is fidelity, a different thing entirely — and, after all, most abortions are not being carried out by happily married couples. And secondly because, even if preaching fidelity doesn’t work either, those who point this out never acknowledge that there might be any other preaching going on. The fact is that preaching fidelity is a minority pursuit in a society in which preaching promiscuity is popular and prevalent. Regarding it in isolation is ridiculous.

To my mind, the question isn’t simply “Does preaching fidelity work?” but “To what extent does preaching fidelity work, and what factors increase or decrease its efficacy?”

But it’s wrong to think the two aren’t linked. The religious mindset is in favour of making both abortion and contraception illegal. The consequence is that abortion is more frequent and more dangerous.

In Western Europe, with more enlightened (i.e. less religious) attitudes towards sex and reproduction, abortion is less frequent and safer.

I think it would be quite a leap to assume that the study shows that abortion rates would go down if you legalised it in those countries where it is presently illegal.

bhascience.blogspot.com/2007/10/abortion-in-news-passions-run-high.html

Although pro-choice, I do find the very high rates of abortion in the US disturbing; were I their president, my solution to this would be to have somebody stand at the school gates, church steps and social security offices handing out free contraception and sex ed materials to anybody even vaguely interested in it.

Instead, the evangelical right prefer to preach abstinence (which demonstrably does not work), with the possibility of pregnancy/STD/cervical cancer as a threat to ensure compliance. This is not dissimilar with their approach to AIDS prevention in Africa (preach abstinence instead of distributing free condoms).

Meanwhile, the liberal so-called-left does not want to espouse the “abortion is bad, let’s really try to tackle it” because they believe (correctly for all I know) that that position will undermine the slim legal margin that keeps abortion legal.

So everybody in their right mind dislikes the idea of frequent abortions, abortion as contraception, late abortions etc. yet there is no political will to reduce their numbers in a way that does preserve the fundamental right to chose.

Ironic, no?