Facebook condom campaign against Pope
Critics took to the social networking site Facebook to voice their fury over Pope Benedict’s remark that condoms do not prevent HIV. A campaign on Facebook has recruited tens of thousands of supporters to bombard the Vatican with condoms to protest against the Pope’s controversial remarks about the spread of HIV. About a dozen Facebook groups have sprang up, criticizing the pontiff.
A few thoughts on this matter:
- The critics’ suggestion that the Pope contributes to the AIDS problem rests on the dubious assumption that men who refuse to listen to the Vatican on prostitution and sex outside of marriage somehow become devout Catholics when it comes to condom avoidance. So this tiny population of remarkably inconsistent adherents is responsible for infecting one out of every ten to one out of every four people in certain countries?
- Proponents like to quote condom failure rates of 2% to 10%, but those figures are for only one instance. If condoms make people feel “safe” enough to continue their sexual habits, the cumulative probability of at least one condom breaking becomes 21% to 72% after only twelve sexual encounters (i.e. only once per month for a year). Once every other week translates to a cumulative probability of 41% to 93%. Once per week means chances of 65% to 99.6%. And those probabilities assume a condom is used every last time. In short, by implying to someone that it is preferable to not have sex when carrying a deadly disease, but that we will supply you with the means to continue, we statistically almost guarantee someone new will become exposed to the virus.
- Many of these posts will also fail to mention that Edward C. Green, a director in the Harvard AIDS Prevention Research Project, states that the best data available supports the Pope’s contention; he notes that, in every African country that has seen a drop in HIV infection rates, the drop is associated with increased monogamy, rather than condom promotion. Tim Allen and Suzette Heald wrote for the Journal of International Development that condom promotion actually proved counter-productive in Botswana, while abstinence-first in Uganda saw remarkable improvements in infection rates.
- How, then, to deal with the HIV epidemic in Africa? If 10% to 25% of a country’s population were being wounded or killed by violent crime, wouldn’t we suggest the government take some pretty strong measures? Perhaps it is time for countries with high infection rates to approve frequent, mandatory testing. And if a new infection results and the infector cannot produce proof of a recent negative test, perhaps that should carry the same penalty as negligence or domestic physical abuse carries here in the West.
In short, the Pope is not the problem – if his advice were followed completely, we would not be talking about an AIDS crisis in the first place. Failure of societies to follow good advice does not render it bad advice.
Bryan Kirchoff
St. Louis
@Bryan
Thank you for sharing your insight….
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, I rate this post for four from five. Decent info, but I have to go to that damn google to find the missed pieces. Thanks, anyway!