April 2007 Archives

Abstinence Education Does Not Impact Sexual Beahvior

A recent study of four abstinence education programs finds that the programs had no effect on the sexual abstinence of youth. But it also finds that youth in these programs were no more likely to have unprotected sex, a concern that has been raised by some critics of these programs. The study found that youth in the four evaluated programs were no more likely than youth not in the programs to have abstained from sex in the four to six years after they began participating in the study. Youth in both groups who reported having had sex also had similar numbers of sexual partners and had initiated sex at the same average age.

When will the religious nuts give up on "abstinence only" education?! It is hurting the youth they think they are protecting. There have been other studies in the past that confirm this result as well. Enough already!

Boing Boing: Craigslist hoax ad leads to destroyed home

This happened in Washington. I couldn't believe it when I heard about it and now it's made it to Boing Boing. Scary.

The next time some religious person tries to say that there is some secular conspiracy around religious holidays and that the common secular symbols, such as the Easter bunny, Santa Claus, etc. are taking away from the significance of their holiday, remind them that their religion is primarily responsible. Easter is a perfect example. Most of the supposed "secular" symbols were actually Pagan symbols that were co-opted by early christians in an attempt to make their religion more palatable to the Pagans and make it easier to convert them.

The Pagan origins of the Easter Bunny talks about how Eggs, the word Easter, and the Bunny were Pagan symbols from Vernal celebrations co-opted by christians.

The Pagan origins of Easter conflicts somewhat with the aforementioned site but still shows how many of the symbols existed long before Jesus supposedly came on the scene.

More important is to remember how many of the core symbols of the christian Easter story were actually co-opted from previous religions, including Pagan. The crucifixion, resurrection, drinking blood and eating his body, etc. are all symbols from Pagans. Most of them are parallels to the Egyptian god Horus.

The Religious Tolerance website has tons and tons of other quotes, discussions, references about bible and religious teachings that are very interesting.