Politics.

Let me for a moment discuss at random my feelings on politics. Now my father is a republican, my eldest brother is as well, my other brother is a Green Party member and I'm firmly nothing. Don't get me wrong, I'm not some fool who puts their fingers in their ears and chants 'la la la' every four years and tries to pretend that everyone is overly excited about pie. I do follow politics and learn about the candidates and will even be voting this year. Now wait you might say, you're 26 years old, you've been able to vote for years! Well frankly every last election I've been old enough to vote for has been a choice between two slightly different shit waffles and I couldn't think of a single reason to choose one shit topped breakfast food over the other. The primary reason I don't ascribe to any one party is because I find all the choices stupid. I'm a pagan who is pro-choice, likes guns, is all for them gays getting married and loves the environment very very much. This doesn't really fit with the various parties that currently exist. I've looked I tend to disagree on some major point and am unwilling to look the other way.

That big lead in brings me to McCain and his VP choice. I'm all for a woman vice president and that's great and all but my issues with both him and her are pretty big. Recently it got out that her 17 year old daughter was pregnant. This has created a pretty big storm and lots has been said but while a whole lot of dialog is being flung about not much is in truth actually being said. I believe that yes it should be a political issue. Not in the matter of lets pry into their personal lives but more so the idea behind it. It's now common knowledge that her teen daughter has been knocked up. I frankly don't need to dig deeper into their family lives. My problem with it is simple. Palin supports abstinence only programs. Frankly they don't work. You don't walk up to someone and say "Now there is this thing out there called Cheesecake and you'll really really want to try it but DON'T! It's immoral and you should wait till arbitrary later date x that seems impossibly far away because you are young and short sighted. Now... go!" I use cheesecake because sex is as fun as cheesecake is delicious. The fact her own daughter managed to get pregnant at the age of 17 (something I magically avoided due to my NOT WANTING TO GET PREGNANT) shows how disconnected she is with reality and how illogical her mindset is.

Sex is fun and when you are a teen it's pretty darned easy to have. Without giving teenagers the proper tools to handle it they'll of course run around and bump uglies with each other spreading diseases and getting pregnant. You need to explain to them what VDs are but don't try to use it purely as a scare tactic. It's vital that they know about the various different bith controls that exist and give them valid facts about how they work and how well they work. A lot of abstinance only programs outright lie about condoms and attempt to only paint them as evil. So not only are you failing to give children the proper education in the same breath you are taking away a vital tool to protect them and demonizing it! It's ignorance that leads to these foolish decisions that in turn end up putting teens at risk.

Face it. Teens will have sex. It's silly to think that they wont and it's naive to assume that this is a current problem. Sure teen sex was slightly less previlant in the 50s but the culture was so massively different then! Sex wasn't displayed and sold at every street corner. Flesh is being peddled and the amount of intense imigary that we inundated with every day is downright shocking. With the constant temptation of sex, the flood of hormones teens experience it's a miracle they aren't jumping each other in the streets.

So, come voting day that'll be just one of the many reasons I wont be voting for McCain. A man so painfully out of touch with reality, modern American families and who is frankly unfit to lead in every way possible.