Today let’s review some memorable quotes from this year on sex education. Check out previous The Year in Quotes posts here and here.
“Men sexually are like microwaves and women are like crockpots.”
“If a woman is dry, the sperm will die. If a woman is wet, a baby she will get!”
“You know people talk about you behind your back because you’ve had sex with so many people. It’s so empty too. Finally, you get sick of it all and attempt suicide.”
“Girls, taking into consideration that guys are more easily sexually turned on by sight, you need to think long and hard about the way you dress and the way you come on to guys…If a guy is breathing, then he’s probably turned on…How can you tell a girl is an easy target for a guy?…By the clothes she wears… A girl who shows a lot of skin and dresses seductively fits into one of three categories: 1) She’s pretty ignorant when it comes to guys, and she has no clue what she’s doing. 2) She’s teasing her boyfriend which is extremely cruel to the poor guy! 3) She’s giving her boyfriend an open invitation saying, ‘Here I am. Come take me.'”
“Giving a condom to a teen is just like saying, ‘Well if you insist on killing yourself by jumping off the bridge, at least wear these elbow pads – they may protect you some?’ Knowing that STDs can kill and that there is at least a 30% failure rate is like helping the teen kill them self [sic]. It is a lie to call condoms ‘safe sex.’ If there is a 30% failure rate of condoms against life threatening diseases, then calling them a way to have ‘safe sex’ is like ‘helping’ someone commit suicide by giving them elbow pads to ‘protect’ them or finding them the safest spot from the bridge to jump.”
— From abstinence-only curricula used in public school sexuality education classes in Texas, Florida and likely other states, Just Say Don’t Know, a report from the Texas Freedom Network Education Fund, February 2009
“Everyone should be abstinent or whatever, but it’s not realistic at all.”
— Bristol Palin, unwed teen mother and daughter of former Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin, FOX News, February 18, 2009
“You offend parents far less by giving less information than (by) giving (teens) more.”
— Kyleen Wright of Texans for Life Coalition, making her case for keeping teens ignorant through abstinence-only-until-marriage programs rather than offering abstinence-plus sexuality education in Texas public schools, TFN Insider, March 31, 2009
“If mom had a baby at age 15, are her morals going to be setting different standards than someone who has grown up in the American culture where that is not typical? As a matter of fact, we would look at someone impregnating a 15-year-old as child abuse.”
— Cathie Adams, then-president of the far-right Texas Eagle Forum (TEF), blaming high teen birth rates in Texas on immigrants rather than ineffective abstinence-only sex education policies TEF supports and that are common in Texas public schools, Dallas Morning News, September 1, 2009
The murder this year of George Tiller, a Kansas doctor and abortion provider, didn’t have anything directly to do with sex education, but wouldn’t giving teens medically accurate information on responsible pregnancy and disease prevention help lower the number of abortions? That’s lost on the religious right, a movement that spawned these examples of vile extremism:
“To call this a crime is too simplistic.”
— Dave Leach, a prominent anti-abortion activist in Des Moines, Iowa, talking about the murder of Dr. Tiller, New York Times, June 1, 2009
“‘Tiller the Killer’ is dead. Who will mourn for this man? . . . It is not a tragedy that Tiller will never be a killer again. Will anyone argue that it is a tragedy that the name of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ will never again be dishonored by this church-going Sweeney Todd of the medical profession?”
— Doug Phillips of San Antonio-based Vision Forum Ministries, TFN Insider, June 1, 2009
“You know people talk about you behind your back because you’ve had sex with so many people. It’s so empty too. Finally, you get sick of it all and attempt suicide.”
I would never want to encourage sexual activity in the K-12 crowd, but that quote needs a little modification to reflect reality. I would rewrite it like this:
“If you live in a Texas town populated heavily by Christian Neo-Fundamentalist families, their children will talk about you behind your back because you’ve had sex with so many people and will broadcast it as widely as possible. They are so empty-hearted. Finally, you will get sick of their constant hounding and attempt suicide.”
I suppose it is the modern equivalent of stoning. The person who has never had an exciting sexual fantasy cast the first stone. Any takers? I didn’t think so.
I guess that would make me one of those 100 W Amana Radar Ranges that you bought in the 70’s that took 15 minutes to heat up a cup of water, and is now in the attic or in the garage, and maybe dangerous enough that if you plug it in you might get shocked.