Do NOT take sex advice from this man. Srsly. Via Miqel @ Flickr.
While visiting a country ravaged by AIDS, the man told reporters: “You can’t resolve [AIDS] with the distribution of condoms. On the contrary, it increases the problem.”
Got that? Condoms make AIDS worse. Apparently, yesterday was Opposite Day in Yaounde, Cameroon, where Papa Ratzi decided to favor the world with his bons mots about how to prevent deadly sexually transmitted diseases: be “moral” and “responsible.” I’m pretty sure he meant to say “keep it in your vestments or you’ll make the angels cry tears of blood and you’ll go to the hot place,” because using a condom to keep yourself and your bed-buddy safe and disease- and/or fetus-free is responsible, and yes, even a moral good.
Read the rest of the AP story here. The man is a fucking loon. Jeebus.
Hello? I mean HELLO? Benny, dude, I know you were in Hitler Youth and also the head of the Inquisition, so my expectations are pretty low, but really? Srsly? It’s the *prevention*, not the disease that’s the problem?
Of course, this shit is Exhibit A for why Catholicism desperately needs radical reform. It’s no wonder that parishioners are leaving the Church in droves and no one wants to be a priest anymore (let alone a nun). Keep it up, Benny, and you’ll finish what Martin Luther started.
This had me SO pissed off yesterday. It’s one thing for the pope to reiterate the Church’s stance against contraceptives like condoms, even for disease prevention. It is, however, completely wrong and if you ask me, immoral, for him to suggest, COMPLETELY FALSELY that condoms would somehow make AIDS worse. He will have blood on his hands for anyone who heeds his words and fails to use condoms and contracts AIDS.
i just wonder, does he think subsaharan africans are just more reckless sexually than the rest of the world? is that why they carry 65% of the world’s HIV load? what a simple, simple man.
The only explanation I can think of is that he thinks the poor peeplz in Africa reuse the condoms. Shut up, pope!
Still too angry for coherent comment. Will just quote Python and headdesk.
Every sperm is sacred.
Every sperm is great.
If a sperm is wasted.
God* gets quite irate.
*Or Benedict XVI
Every sperm is sacred,
Every sperm is good!
Every sperm is needed
in your neighborhoooooooood!
Y’all can keep all the sperm in your neighborhood. Not. Interested.
And yes, the Pope/the Church definitely has (more) blood on its hands re: this matter. If I believed in a Supreme Being, I’d tell Benedict to watch out! That he is more interested in controlling people than saving their lives is unconscionable.
Objectively, I know the pope has a lot of influence… but he is such a cartoon, I can’t take him seriously enough to even get angry. My Pope-rage circuits must have blown when I learned about the Hitler Youth.
I like the Great Male Narcissists tage.
“You can’t resolve [AIDS] with the distribution of condoms.”
So true, Mister Pope! I mean, until women have full and complete agency, until they are no longer brutalized, bought and sold, and treated like rapeable objects, until they’re in fully ownership of their bodies, all the condoms in the world will not totally eliminate the AIDS pandemic.
Oh, that wasn’t actually his point. Damn.
@PhDork: God is not amused, for realz.
According to Jewish law–which Benny’s boss, J.C., was *totally* into–the highest priority is always placed on saving human life. So the widespread use of condoms, which would save untold lives, would be not only okay with God, but *mandatory*.
I nominate Laughingrat to be the next Pope!
Oh, it doesn’t work like that? Damn.
Laughingrat, right on. The church is masterful at taking a genuine realization and twisting it beyond all recognition to make sure it harms as many people as possible. And it has to be at least in part because they are just not talking to any women. they are truly clueless about the coercive conditions of most womens sexual lives. we can be loyal in marriage all we want but it’s not gonna keep us from getting AIDS.
Hear hear, if we have to have a rat for pope let’s make it a laughing rat.
The NYT has an editorial on this topic today: http://www.nytimes.com/2009/03/18/opinion/18wed2.html?ref=opinion
Laughingrat >>>>>>>>>> Laughing Ratzinger.
Laughingrat FTW!
LOL @ Soalg, too.
*bows*
When I’m Pope, cheese is gonna be the new sacrament.
That would be an awesome internet meme. “When I’m Pope, I’ll…”
Can we have JPII back please? I mean, not ideal, but better….
JPII was decidedly not better on this issue. He was the one who really harped on contraception being evil. This is actually Benny’s first statement on it as pope.
Yes, be moral and responsible: BY USING A GODDAMN CONDOM!!!
Unfortunately, JPII was just a kinder, gentler, more crowd-friendly face for the same hard-line misogyny. Remember, Ratzinger was JPII’s henchman when he ran the Inquisition (which has been re-branded as “Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith”). A lot of JPII’s conservative policy bullshit came straight from Ratzy. They were a bit like Bush and Cheney.
does he think subsaharan africans are just more reckless sexually than the rest of the world? is that why they carry 65% of the world’s HIV load?
They are, and yes.
Many Westerners get uncomfortable about judging cultural practices, especially w.r.t. Africans because of our long, nefarious history. And I sympathize with that view, but in this case it is absolutely correct to blame reckless sexual practices (specifically, male insistence on “dry sex” with women) for the high rates of HIV infection. [Unless your idea of responsible sexual behavior includes rubbing dirt mixed with babboon urine into the vagina immediately before sex.]
More info, if you dare:
http://www.salon.com/health/sex/urge/world/1999/12/10/drysex/
BTW, I’m not Catholic and I do favor condom usage (both locally and globally), but in this instance the Pope is probably correct that condoms won’t reduce the spread of HIV because (1) African men won’t wear condoms even if they’re available, (2) African women are raised not to question or refuse African men’s desires, and (3) dry sex means many (most?) condoms would break anyway. Culture trumps condoms, I’m afraid.
Condoms certainly won’t increase HIV, though; that’s just stupid.
I don’t think we necessarily disagree, contrarian. I work on health in subsaharan africa so i’m aware of the issues you speak of, however i would argue that most of that goes to issues of development and the status of women. which brings us back to laughingrat’s point. If the pope was saying, condoms won’t stop aids because the status of women is too low to allow them to meaningfully negotiate safer sex practices, then I would agree with him. But that’s not what he’s saying. He’s saying that condoms are bad because they promote and spread unchaste behaviors, which has been proved to be incorrect by many studies which I can find and link you to if you’d like. I’d also point out that that salon article is very old, and the reasons for the high rate of HIV in certain subsaharan african countries is very complex and can’t be reduced to a preference for dry sex (this is also not a universal practice in high HIV incidence areas). Condoms, in concert with many other interventions, do indeed have a demonstrable effect on rates of HIV transmission. Of course you can’t just distribute them absent education and information. But who besides the Pope thinks that is what anti-AIDS practitioners are suggesting?
I think it’s really dangerous to talk about “Africans” in any context, contrarian, but especially if you’re throwing around judgments. There are 61 territories and more than 900 million people on that continent, with more ethnic groups, languages and faith traditions than I can count.
I’ve heard of “dry sex,” and I don’t doubt that it is a cultural complication, but nobody needs the Pope (or anyone else) talking shit like “condoms are the problem.” Cameroonians need the Pope (and everyone else) saying “condoms prevent disease,” “it’s cool to use condoms,” “it isn’t ‘manly’ to spread disease,” etc. And they need education, and free condoms, and medical care to contol the spread of HIV. Not lies and bullshit, or racially-dodgy talk about “culture.”