Sex, Lies, and Newspaper Clippings

I will often cut out and Blu Tack to my bedroom wall especially poignant or witty sentences or paragraphs that I encounter in newspapers. I've been reading the past few days' worth of Sydney Morning Heralds, and have decided to add three clippings to my wall today, which is quite a good haul.

The first is from an article about the legal difficulties facing transsexuals in Australia today (I couldn't be making this up if I tried). The article covers a full page, but the excerpt that I am keeping reads:


In Australia few couples are willing to go public. But theirs are great love stories, nonetheless. Bobbi and Susan, married for 13 years, and parents to a five-year-old, have drawn closer in the five years since Bobbi confessed her feelings. In November she had the operation.

"It took me 37 years to admit to myself who I was," Bobbi says. "Susan's first words to me were, 'The marriage is over.' I got the divorce papers; I was prepared to give her the house and everything in it. She hated what I was doing, she was losing a husband."

They never did divorce, and Bobbi had an operation in November. "When you have a true soulmate, nothing is too much trouble," Bobbi says. "Love can be boundless."


In an article all about the grown-up issues of marriage, sexuality and the law, that short tale, strange and unexpected as it was, really hit me with its youthful Disneyesque message - its testament to the power of love. Cue the Celine Dion.

The second article I read was about Sarah Palin, John McCain's new running mate (whom, I must note, merits her own post. Stop bugging me, Sarah, I'll write it when I'm good and ready). This piece was about Palin's support for abstinence-until-marriage sex education programs, and the impact these programs have had on America.

The closing paragraph, which quite appalled me, went thusly:


Abstinence programs, which cost $US176 million in 2007, have been controversial since a congressional committee report found teens were being wrongly taught that HIV can spread via sweat and tears, and that condoms failed to stop transmission of HIV up to 31 per cent of the time in heterosexual intercourse.


The cost doesn't really bother me; newspapers love to give the seemingly high costs of various government programs to provoke outrage amongst their readers, while not providing the proper context of how expensive goverment projects really are, and how much money governments really have to play around with.

But while I really should not have batted an eyelid at the misinformation spread to lend credence to the pro-abstinence educators' policies, I have never quite been able to rid myself of the tendency to be irritated every time I encounter a new instance of fudged figures. Although I see the value, and even the necessity, in figures of authority blatantly lying to the people to achieve their goals, it has never sat quite right with me.

And finally, to take us out on a lighter note; the third quotation, also from the abstinence article:


...studies had found the programs to be ineffective in changing sexual behaviour.

"The states have realised this is not a public health approach and 25 states have withdrawn. Sarah Palin's own state, Alaska, has pulled out..."


It's really important, in this world of thorny issues and weighty problems, to take the time out to enjoy some nice, wholesome sexual innuendo. Adios, and have a most wonderful day.