In the Blog

I knew this was coming

September 19th, 2007     by Stacey May Fowles     Comments

A piece in the Toronto Star today reports that Catholic school boards across Ontario are facing complaints that the province’s HPV vaccine program promotes promiscuity. (We’ve debated the broader implications of Gardasil being offered to grade 8 girls in Ontario on this very blog, but “promoting promiscuity” wasn’t something that came up in those discussions.) Last night, the Halton Catholic District School Board narrowly rejected a motion to ban the program from area schools. Toronto’s Catholic District School Board votes tonight. From the Toronto Star:

 The board believes the vaccine will give students a signal of support for premarital sex.

And this from Regis O’Connor,  Huron Superior Trustee:

“Giving it means children are going to be promiscuous.” 

Um, really? I respect the argument that maybe it’s a little too soon to be doing a province-wide vaccination without further testing, but this “vaccinated girls will become sluts” school of thought infuriates me for so many reasons. Having said that, it doesn’t surprise me. The “vaccine encourages our girls to go wild” bullshit has already been happening south or the border. Above and beyond the fact that I don’t believe in abstinence-only education, this kind of logic doesn’t make sense: regardless of whether or not women and girls have sex outside of the approved (heterosexual) marriage, they’re still at risk when the have sex inside of marriage, no? So the vaccine will protect her if her husband has HPV, no?

 

Thoughts?

Tags: news flash

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