4 ms·

Maybe I'm being unnecessarily cynical. Yup.

jessedhillon 16y ago
I don't think I'm being cynical but I'm open to the possibility. The response from the religious groups to the HPV vaccine was very much along the lines of what I laid out in my original comment. Here's a Catholic perspective on the matter: "...and by eliminating one element of risk it might act as a green light for promiscuous behaviour,” said the Catholic Church spokesman. Taken from, http://www.christiantoday.com/article/catholic.church.warns.new.vaccine.may.increase.underage.sex/4592.htm http://www.christiantoday.com/article/catholic.church.warns.... It's pretty amazing that, on Hacker News, a glib throwaway comment like this gets any votes whatsoever. If you disagree with what I wrote you should at least be able to take a minute to write a few well-formed sentences that make a point, instead of leaving this comment that adds nothing.
- dexen 16y ago
  There are two groups of reasons to refrain from promiscuous behavior. One is the high-visibility, high-impact kind of reasons, like risk of infections. The other is the low-visibility, high-impact kind of reasons, like effects on morality, family relationships and whatnot. Now the other group, being low-visibility, is much harder to convince people about, than the high-visibility group of reasons. Whoever teaches people to refrain from promiscuity may be naturally fond on the high-visibility group of reasons as an easy argument. Should the high-visibility group be dismounted (by successful vaccinations, in this case), it suddenly becomes harder to get the message through. Which was expressed in a slightly roundabound way with, ``and by eliminating [[the highly-visible risk]] [[people may feel greenlighted]] for promiscuous behavior''. In short, a vaccine by itself isn't a message in any direction (it's neutral), but lessens one of messages left there by evolution (STDs). Uh, that's my take, anyway.

I don't think I'm being cynical but I'm open to the possibility. The response from the religious groups to the HPV vaccine was very much along the lines of what I laid out in my original comment. Here's a Catholic perspective on the matter: "...and by eliminating one element of risk it might act as a green light for promiscuous behaviour,” said the Catholic Church spokesman. Taken from, http://www.christiantoday.com/article/catholic.church.warns.new.vaccine.may.increase.underage.sex/4592.htm http://www.christiantoday.com/article/catholic.church.warns.... It's pretty amazing that, on Hacker News, a glib throwaway comment like this gets any votes whatsoever. If you disagree with what I wrote you should at least be able to take a minute to write a few well-formed sentences that make a point, instead of leaving this comment that adds nothing.

dexen 16y ago
There are two groups of reasons to refrain from promiscuous behavior. One is the high-visibility, high-impact kind of reasons, like risk of infections. The other is the low-visibility, high-impact kind of reasons, like effects on morality, family relationships and whatnot. Now the other group, being low-visibility, is much harder to convince people about, than the high-visibility group of reasons. Whoever teaches people to refrain from promiscuity may be naturally fond on the high-visibility group of reasons as an easy argument. Should the high-visibility group be dismounted (by successful vaccinations, in this case), it suddenly becomes harder to get the message through. Which was expressed in a slightly roundabound way with, ``and by eliminating [[the highly-visible risk]] [[people may feel greenlighted]] for promiscuous behavior''. In short, a vaccine by itself isn't a message in any direction (it's neutral), but lessens one of messages left there by evolution (STDs). Uh, that's my take, anyway.