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 Lone Cat wrote:
I'd like to pack one. find a loooose white girl, and XXX hehehe have some fun meow.

By my understanding, most of the loooose white girls in your country are actually guys pretending to be girls, or am I mistaken?

 Madcat87 wrote:
Ahh abstinence that old chestnut, I'm gonna repeat the very first thing that was said to us during our first class of highschool sex ed.

"The fact is there is only one 100% way of preventing STDs and unwanted pregnacies and that is to not have sex at all.

But since we all live in the real world let's talk about condoms."

Cute, but the issue gets rather more "sticky" when it crosses into the territory of "other people's money."

Though, with that said, I hardly think this is any sort of pressing concern.

 Monster Rain wrote:
You're better than that.

I'm drunk and don't deserve the retrospective that MR gave me. I'm done here for the night.

You're better than that.

"Other people's money" arguments disregard the fact that it's cheaper to provide contraceptives than to care for the children.

 Mannahnin wrote:
"Other people's money" arguments disregard the fact that it's cheaper to provide contraceptives than to care for the children.

Sure but I don't think we should have to pay for those either. Personal responsibility is a pain but thus is life.

 Mannahnin wrote:
Free, freely-available birth control saves the taxpayers money overall, gives poor women better control over their lives and families, and can help out even better-off women who are in a temporary situation of restricted finances, like in college or unemployed.

There is no moral grounds on which NOT to provide it. it's in our rational self-interest in a society. The religious strictures of those who oppose it legitimately apply only to its personal USE. If your religion forbids using contraception, then it would be immoral to force you to personally use it. But it is also immoral for you to impose your religion on empoyees who do not share that religious belief. Which is functionally what you're doing if you refuse to provide coverage for your employees. Especially the poorer ones.

IME the best Catholics (to choose one example) I know are very concerned with the plight of the poor, and I'm honestly shocked that organizations which are opposed to abortion are not gangbusters in FAVOR of wider and easier access to contraception. It seems a no-brainer. The only explanation I can come up with for it is that it's not, in its essence, about contraception being bad. It's about making it more difficult for women to control their own bodies and reproduction.

Agreed. I was about to say something like that.

 KalashnikovMarine wrote:

 Mannahnin wrote:
"Other people's money" arguments disregard the fact that it's cheaper to provide contraceptives than to care for the children.

Sure but I don't think we should have to pay for those either. Personal responsibility is a pain but thus is life.

And your personal responsibility is to pay into programs that help people less fortunate than yourself, and that may someday help you when you're in a time of need, in addition to other basic social needs such as education, roads, policing, and other valuable services. I'm sure most Americans aren't too happy about having to pay for a war in Iraq, but thus is life.

It's all well and good to just say we shouldn't be paying for it but that just conveniently ignores the reality of the situation.

We will be paying for it as our governments have decided to continue support for welfare/centrelink/healthcare/whatever you countries equivalent is, So why not pay for it in a way that actually costs us less?

 KalashnikovMarine wrote:
Sure but I don't think we should have to pay for those either. Personal responsibility is a pain but thus is life.

Hint: welfare for poor parents is for the children. You know, the people who did nothing wrong and can't yet take responsibility for their own survival.

 daedalus wrote:

 Lone Cat wrote:
I'd like to pack one. find a loooose white girl, and XXX hehehe have some fun meow.

By my understanding, most of the loooose white girls in your country are actually guys pretending to be girls, or am I mistaken?

nah. I know where to find one.

I don't really understand this argument against national programs like health care because it's "Other people's money".

In reality with programs like this you're contributing to something that benefits you as well as everyone else. If you're that fiscally irresponsible that you can't afford something like a 1% Medicare levy like in Australia, then you have other issues.

People in poverty (usually the ones who receive the most help and "Other people's money") are not there purely because of their own doing, the sooner certain people accept that the sooner I'll take their opinions seriously. Then again it's the same mentality that people apply to rape victims. "They shouldn't dress like that if they don't want the attention."

AgeOfEgos wrote:Poverty and social inequality are, as accepted by most, the leading cause of teenage pregnancy.

Until we start looking for ways to raise people up, instead of locking people out---I cannot fathom why we (as a nation), would not encourage the use of contraceptives. It is vastly cheaper, in every way imaginable, than paying for the birth of a child--whom will likely repeat the cycle 15 years later. It appears to be one of the best investments we can make with our tax dollars---disregarding the many women on contraceptives for other medical issues.

Couldn't agree with this more.

kronk wrote:The topic is Contraceptives and You:

I'm 100% for contraception. People should need licenses to breed just like they need one to drive.

In fact, I believe you should get an implant the second you are fertile and only get that implant removed if you can pass a test.

That wasn't satire or hyperbole. Too many stupid people.

I agree completely. Not so much with 'stupid' - lets call it uneducated - people, but those who just take from society in many ways yet contribute nothing in return. In the UK at least there is a real problem with an 'underclass' (I won't say just poor people, you also get people with money who are a massive inconvenience to everyone around them) who have massive families at a young age, don't bother to raise their children, and those kids then go on to commit the crimes, and drain from the state in welfare and other ways. They get to 16, and the cycle repeats. Yet no politician would dare to even say something like this - their career would be in tatters the moment they even hinted at such a concern, even though it is probably the prime reason for about 90% of the social and economic problems in the UK today. They would get branded as a 'Hitler' or a 'Stalin' or some other such nonsense by their political opponents who would make capital out of it.

Not sure what the answer is really. Having visited Israel in the past and read about it a lot, I quite like the idea of the 'Kibbutz' - the self contained community, where you take the responsibility for raising children out of the hands of the parents who are unable to do so well. Children attend from early in the morning until late in the evening, and the minders (more than just academic teachers, they show the kids everything about life and social responsibility, clubs and sports are involved etc) and so the exposure the kids have to their parents is reduced. Israel has one of the lowest juvenile delinquency rates (as well as crime rates) in the world, and I found generally a much stronger feeling of social responsibility amongst the people who live there. I won't doing something similar would solve all the problems, but it would sew the seeds for future generations. It would be expensive of course, but nothing like the expense that having to correct these sociological problems costs.

 Lone Cat wrote:

 daedalus wrote:

 Lone Cat wrote:
I'd like to pack one. find a loooose white girl, and XXX hehehe have some fun meow.

By my understanding, most of the loooose white girls in your country are actually guys pretending to be girls, or am I mistaken?

nah. I know where to find one.

Ah, well, I can find ONE. That's easy.

Also, to be fair, I had mistaken your flag for the Philippines initially, not Thailand, hence my comment. Damn 'muricans. I apologize.

 Monster Rain wrote:
If only there were some way, that was free, for people to not get pregnant that was for all intents and purposes 100% effective.

Ha! If only...

 KalashnikovMarine wrote:

 Mannahnin wrote:
"Other people's money" arguments disregard the fact that it's cheaper to provide contraceptives than to care for the children.

Sure but I don't think we should have to pay for those either. Personal responsibility is a pain but thus is life.

That's kind of what I was going to say.

I'm not sure when this debate morphed from "people should have ready access to contraception" to "people are entitled to free contraception." There are some good arguments for it, though. I can just understand the fact that people think it's lame to have tax dollars go toward paying for things that aren't actually necessary.

 MrScience wrote:
. Then again it's the same mentality that people apply to rape victims. "They shouldn't dress like that if they don't want the attention."

This is hysterically wrong.

 Monster Rain wrote:

I'm not sure when this debate morphed from "people should have ready access to contraception" to "people are entitled to free contraception." There are some good arguments for it, though. I can just understand the fact that people think it's lame to have tax dollars go toward paying for things that aren't actually necessary.

Well, to be fair, one is just the extreme of the other. Removing cost from contraception makes it as ready as it can possibly be short of having a condom dispenser in your house and someone standing by to apply it.

You should first understand that I personally think we should continue providing free contraceptives for pragmatic reasons.

I just don't think that this belief is necessarily objectively morally correct. I would also say that, ideologically, I'm not crazy about having other people pay for things that basically come down to the irresponsible choices made by the recipients, but if I was given an opportunity to choose what programs and expenditures to cut to balance the budget contraception would be very near the bottom of the list.

 KalashnikovMarine wrote:

Sure but I don't think we should have to pay for those either. Personal responsibility is a pain but thus is life.

So I take it you also would like to see fire and police protection paid for by recipients?

And what personal responsibility? Why should I care for a child that made the awful personal choice of being born to an uncaring family? Surely they must be held responsible for their actions. I imagine that sounds somewhere between "insance" and "inhuman", but the point is that we, as a society, have developed a certain set of expectations with respect to proper behavior. If we want those expectations to have meaning we should not only enforce them (in the above case by legal means) or incentivize them (in the case of birth control by way of subsidy).

 dogma wrote:


So I take it you also would like to see fire and police protection paid for by recipients?

...said Crassus, ominously.

 dogma wrote:

 KalashnikovMarine wrote:

Sure but I don't think we should have to pay for those either. Personal responsibility is a pain but thus is life.

So I take it you also would like to see fire and police protection paid for by recipients?

And what personal responsibility? Why should I care for a child that made the awful personal choice of being born to an uncaring family? Surely they must be held responsible for their actions.

KMarine and Dogma... what are we arguing about?

Contraceptive IS accessible now... so, what's the dealio?

 whembly wrote:

Contraceptive IS accessible now... so, what's the dealio?

That it isn't freely accessible and, to a degree, that certain organizations are allowed to refuse to provide coverage for it.

Of course, this is just part of the larger healthcare debate. This is most notable with respect to the OP's cited example of insulin, which should be covered by all rights. Of course, it most likely never will be as Americans seem to have this weird idea that they're somehow "free" in an abstract sense.

 Fafnir wrote:

 Monster Rain wrote:
If only there were some way, that was free, for people to not get pregnant that was for all intents and purposes 100% effective.

If only it were any fun...

....sterilet?

The idea that people should pay for their own contraception used for contraceptive rather than medicinal purposes would be very "ethical" if everyone had equal access to contraception services. But that isn't the case.

In other threads we have seen various examples of how contraception is not accessible, e.g. girls accused of being whores by the pharmacy assistant when they go to collect a prescription, and where Roman Catholic funded hospitals and insurance companies want to refuse to provide contraception services because it conflicts with their religious beliefs.

There is a perception that contraceptives are a recreational product.

Barring examples where contraceptives are used medicinally (let's not pretend this isn't a completely separate issue), can anyone tell me why this perception is false?

 Manchu wrote:
There is a perception that contraceptives are a recreational product.

Barring examples where contraceptives are used medicinally (let's not pretend this isn't a completely separate issue), can anyone tell me why this perception is false?

The nul hypothesis would be that contraceptive drugs are medicinal drugs, thus it is up to you to prove that they are recreational drugs, not us to prove that they are not.

Would you consider a married couple that either isn't ready for children, or does not want more children, to also be recreational? Married sex, as any comedian will tell you, is far from recreational. Are we back to saying sex should only be done if the point is procreation?

 dogma wrote:

 whembly wrote:

Contraceptive IS accessible now... so, what's the dealio?

That it isn't freely accessible and, to a degree, that certain organizations are allowed to refuse to provide coverage for it.

And that's the crux of this debate.

Should it be "free" in all and every cases?

Or can't we have a "win-win" system here? Contraceptive IS readily available and if it's not free now, you CAN get them cheaply.

The mere fact that Religious institutions don't want to provide them doesn't mean that women CANT get what the need else where. So, let those institutions not cover them...

I know this because A) I have lots of familiy working for Catholic organizations and B) I regularly work with the OB\GYN groups... and interestingly enough, this is a common discussion topic.

Of course, this is just part of the larger healthcare debate. This is most notable with respect to the OP's cited example of insulin, which should be covered by all rights.

I agree with the OP that this is assinine. His point ( I gather ) is that insulin is more LIFE THREATENING requirement than having cheap contraceptives to prevent pregnancies... I think that's his point about "the priorities".

Of course, it most likely never will be as Americans seem to have this weird idea that they're somehow "free" in an abstract sense.

Eh... I don't think Americans would object to Universal Health Care in the same way as the Canadian/NHS model as much as the opposition to ObamaCare.

If the federal spending can be under control (that is, reduce the overall size of government), then that can free up enough jack to replace Medicare/Mediaid with a Universal Healthcare. Then, THEN the religious institutions won't have any standings on not paying the tax. But, force them to purchase/manage packages that runs contrary to their belief... its no surprise why they up in arms.

 SilverMK2 wrote:
The nul hypothesis would be that contraceptive drugs are medicinal drugs

No it's not.

 Ahtman wrote:
Are we back to saying sex should only be done if the point is procreation?

The idea that non-intentionally procreative sex is recreational is in no way denigratory of marital relations. It certainly doesn't imply that the only purpose of sex in marriage is procreation.

Poverty is the key indicator to early teenage pregnancy.
There is an association between poverty, single parent households and lower education.

So--what we are asking is--that a teenage child, who lives in poverty, likely has more contact with peers and multimedia than her single working parent, likely has no hopes for a college education (or examples/parental motivation to seek one)---to spend their money wisely and purchase contraception with what limited funds they have--or ignore hundreds of thousands of years of biological hardwiring and not engage in sexual acts.

That's not a bet I would be willing to take.