The Wisdom of Youth

My plan to tell you about a cool website that I found has been derailed.
I was reviewing some feedback from my students and two comments are just too important and insightful to go unshared.

We watched a film last week (or parts of one) that showed footage from the "sexual revolution."  It discussed sex and objectification of women among other things. These two comments refer to different things.  The second comment was made by several students in similar fashion.  These are college aged adults.

1) beauty is not earned (this may be one of the most profound statements I have ever heard)
2) sex doesn't always result in disease or children - sometimes it just feels really great and leads to  an orgasm.
(note that the people who said this also gave foot notes about using protection and contraception - because they are smart!)

I am really going to miss teaching next semester.

Birth Control VS STD Control

Today the Institute of Medicine recommended that birth control (prescription types) be made available without a copay.
I can understand why many people support this.

I do not use prescription birth control - in my whole adult life, I may have used the pill for a week.  I do not like drugs - really.
That being said, I am in no way against birth control.  When I heard this on the news today,  I had a aha moment.

With the exception of condoms, women are fully responsible for the purchase of birth control and if they do not have the money - they must rely on the man to accept wearing a condom or use the rhythm method, to prevent pregnancy.

So this is good news BUT:

 There is a very important point that needs to be made - birth control does not protect against sexually transmitted diseases.  Condoms are not 100% effective for birth control  OR disease prevention, but they are certainly the way to engage in Safer Sex -