I respect the rights of parents to decide that they don’t want their children to participate in this program, and some of those reasons are indeed valid. I can accept that.

Tho, I will say that we do require children to be immunized for several things, why not HPV?

I don’t make assumptions about why people make the decisions they do, so please don’t think that I’ve made them about you. I haven’t.

Unfortunately, religion and specifically Christianity has played a very negative part in this entire discussion. It’s kind of hard to have a reasonable conversation with people who believe that vaccinations will encourage sexual behavior. But smart people can disagree and still maintain civility.

Thanks,

nina

Please do not make the mistake of assuming that because I wish to retain the right to control what enters my body, or the body of my child, that I am some religious whacko. Please give me credit for assuming control of my own life.

As I will leave you alone to do as you wish with your body, please leave me the right to do as I wish with my own (and that of my child.

I have my reasons, and they are not your reasons. And you should know that they have nothing to do with Christainity or religion.

There certainly are Christians out there who practice their faith and have their beliefs and who live their lives in accordance to that belief system. Unfortunately, and you hit the nail on the head, the problem is the Christianists. People like Falwell, and Dobson, and Tony Perkins; who I suppose mean well, but they’ve become exceptionally dangerous because they’ve managed to drag Christianity into the political and governmental arena.

What scares me to death, and I think about this every night before I go to bed because I worry about the world my son will grow up in, is that the president of the United States is one of those “rapture christians’ who would gladly embrace armageddon, and who may very well bring it about before he leaves office.

Christianity in this vein is the most dangerous thing the world has ever known. The most powerful man in the world with his finger poised on the button, and all in the name of some god…who doesn’t want your teenaged children to fuck and who hates homosexuals, but believes in a supply side economy and always votes republican.

Thanks sweetie, I really appreciate hearing your views on this.

xoxo,
nina

And there are places like the Riverside Church that carry a true message.

I gave up Christianity a long time ago, but I still keep a wary eye on it.

But mention “Christian” today anywhere and the first thing that likely comes to peoples’ minds are people like Jame Dobson, Pat Robertson, Jerry Falwell, Donald Wildmon, Ted Haggard, and others I refer to as “Christianists”.

Of course, this might also come to mind….just kidding. ;)

Christianity, like the US, has been hijacked by hate-mongers and bigots and war-mongers, all under the pretense of Christianity and Conservatism, and in such a short time (27 years).

Christianists represent neither. They are a cult. And they have become the “face” of the US to the rest of the world today.

Last year, some evangelicals started to realize they may be mistaken as this article conveys. Wayward Christian Soldiers By CHARLES MARSH

Thank you for sharing your thoughts with me. It’s encouraging to hear a voice that expresses a view of Christianity that’s also willing to recognize the seriousness of this issue. Unfortunately, the claim that this is about a power struggle between the Texas state legislature and the governor’s office seems a little hollow. If I’m not mistaken, the executive branch in Texas doesn’t have that much power to begin with, and based on recent news reports, Governor Perry has indicated that his executive order was considered an advisory action. So what I find troubling is the ‘why’. Why play politics with women’s lives?

As for your separate note; you don’t owe me an apology for how I and others have been treated by the religious right. The apology you owe is to the American people and the world. I’m sorry you feel as tho your religion has been portrayed by the media in a negative way. I would disagree with that statement. If anything, the religious right has brought negative attention on itself by its own actions. For example; why has the religious right which is primarily comprised of evangelical Christians, injected itself into the political process? This doesn’t happen in other westernized countries where there are very clear separations of church and state, but here in America, the evangelical Christians, otherwise known as “The Base” or as translated in Arabic “al-qaeda”, are essentially a defacto wing of the republican party. I think when evangelical Christians remove themselves as a voting block, and stop trying to influence the political process in this country then the negative views about your religion may change.

I’m sorry to be harsh with you, but your religion doesn’t give you the right to tell consenting adults how to live their lives, who to have sex with, what medical choices a woman should make with her doctor, who should marry who, what medical research can be done for the benefit of all mankind, what people should read, watch on television, see on the internet, or listen to.

Your religion belongs in your homes and in your churches and out of everyone else’s lives. When that happens, then I think this respect you’re looking for might be forthcoming.

Thanks,

nina aoki

On a separate note, it’s best not to generalize groups. Many of us “Religious Christo-Fundies” stand behind this vaccine. I would also like to ask for a little respect from you for the countless Christians in the world who do not agree with how the average media outlet portrays us. Christ cared more about saving lives and saving people than many Christians demonstrate. I’d also just like to personally apologize for how many of you must have been treated by people claiming Christ’s name. Just know He is more loving, generous and compassionate than any of us can possibly be. And many of us are just trying to show a small bit of that each day.

I share those views. What was most surprising is Texas’ governor Rick Perry is a Republican, but of course he has ties to lobbyists from Merck, but hey, as long as we can get it thru, we’ll take it anyway we can. Tho Texas is one crazy place, that’s for sure!

It still shocks me how powerful the religious right became in the 90’s and in the first half of this decade, but I think they’ve peaked. But I think also that they were allowed to become so powerful because progressives didn’t take them seriously. We tend to dismiss them as loons (which they are), but that doesn’t mean that we can turn a blind eye politically. We cannot, because if anything we’ve learned that they will spread like a virus if we don’t. But here’s the amusing thing, they always manage to self destruct in the end. Didn’t Newt just admit to having an affair while he was pushing to impeach Clinton for a blowjob? And what about that Ted guy in Colorado who was hooked up with the gay male prostitute?

But this is still something we have to fight for, even if we just manage to raise awareness.

Thanks for the links sweetie, I’ll check those out.

xoxo,
nina

Texas being the home of crazy people (sex toys are outlawed) and all, has put misguided beliefs above the general public’s well being. A misguided belief system that’s being carried out with a political agenda.

This is the heart of what’s going on today in the US. And this is the cause of the other problems the country’s having today.

Rick Perry (nothing to brag about as a governor) tried to do the “right thing” (mandatory vaccinations) for the wrong reasons (accepted money from the pharma).

I like what Sam Harris has to say, and I’ve included an article by him and someone else.

“God’s Dupes” by Sam Harris

“What Happens When a Country Gives Up Religion: as Spain Shows, Nothing Much”
by Martin Varsavsky.

This is a fantastic list of quotes and historical information. And even tho it doesn’t directly speak to the issue of HPV or Gardasil, it does speak loud and clear about the religious right’s obsession with other people’s sex lives, which is a real issue and actually does have bearing on the efforts to enact mandatory vaccination.

Even if we as a nation aren’t successful in making vaccinations mandatory (and I sincerely hope we are), at least we’ve made so much noise about this subject that perhaps more women will talk to their own doctors about this, and maybe a few mothers will take their daughters all on their own and get them protected. It just makes sense.

Thanks sweetie, and I agree, organized christianity most certainly is the world’s most dangerous religion.

xoxo,
nina

It’s always good to remember something about the Christian Mythology and the Christianists. No matter how much they try to make a place for themselves at the table, they will always be considered “the crazy uncle” that needs to be locked away in the basement.

And it’s always good to remember ( . . . History Lesson . . . ) that the Founding Father of the United States understood the dangers of this religion.

The 1797 Treaty of Tripoli was signed by President Adams to proclaims America’s Government Is secular.

And the Founding Fathers themselves were smart enough to realize the dangers this religion posed. Here are some their quotes regarding Christianity.

John Adams
“I almost shudder at the thought of alluding to the most fatal example of the abuses of grief which the history of mankind has preserved — the Cross. Consider what calamities that engine of grief has produced!”"

In his, “A Defence of the Constitutions of Government of the United States of America” [1787-1788], John Adams wrote:
“The United States of America have exhibited, perhaps, the first example of governments erected on the simple principles of nature; and if men are now sufficiently enlightened to disabuse themselves of artifice, imposture, hypocrisy, and superstition, they will consider this event as an era in their history. Although the detail of the formation of the American governments is at present little known or regarded either in Europe or in America, it may hereafter become an object of curiosity. It will never be pretended that any persons employed in that service had interviews with the gods, or were in any degree under the influence of Heaven, more than those at work upon ships or houses, or laboring in merchandise or agriculture; will forever be acknowledged that these governments were contrived merely by the use of reason and the senses.

James Madison
Called the father of the Constitution, Madison had no conventional sense of Christianity. In 1785, Madison wrote in his Memorial and Remonstrance against Religious Assessments:
“During almost fifteen centuries has the legal establishment of Christianity been on trial. What have been its fruits? More or less in all places, pride and indolence in the Clergy, ignorance and servility in the laity; in both, superstition, bigotry and persecution.”

“What influence, in fact, have ecclesiastical establishments had on society? In some instances they have been seen to erect a spiritual tyranny on the ruins of the civil authority; on many instances they have been seen upholding the thrones of political tyranny; in no instance have
they been the guardians of the liberties of the people. Rulers who wish to subvert the public liberty may have found an established clergy convenient auxiliaries. A just government, instituted to secure and perpetuate it, needs them not.”

Benjamin Franklin
Although Franklin received religious training, his nature forced him to rebel against the irrational tenets of his parents Christianity. His Autobiography revels his skepticism, “My parents had given me betimes religions impressions, and I received from my infancy a pious education in the principles of Calvinism. But scarcely was I arrived at fifteen years of age, when, after having doubted in turn of different tenets, according as I found them combated in the different books that I read, I began to doubt of Revelation itself.

“. . . Some books against Deism fell into my hands. . . It happened that they wrought an effect on my quite contrary to what was intended by them; for the arguments of the Deists, which
were quoted to be refuted, appeared to me much stronger than the refutations; in short, I soon became a through Deist.”

In an essay on “Toleration,” Franklin wrote:
“If we look back into history for the character of the present sects in Christianity, we shall find
few that have not in their turns been persecutors, and complainers of persecution. The primitive
Christians thought persecution extremely wrong in the Pagans, but practiced it on one another.
The first Protestants of the Church of England blamed persecution in the Romish church, but practiced it upon the Puritans. These found it wrong in the Bishops, but fell into the same
practice themselves both here [England] and in New England.”

Dr. Priestley, an intimate friend of Franklin, wrote of him:
“It is much to be lamented that a man of Franklin’s general good character and great influence should have been an unbeliever in Christianity, and also have done as much as he did to make
others unbelievers” (Priestley’s Autobiography)

Thomas Paine
This freethinker and author of several books, influenced more early Americans than any other writer. Although he held
Deist beliefs, he wrote in his famous The Age of Reason:
“I do not believe in the creed professed by the Jewish church, by the Roman church, by the Greek church, by the Protestant church, nor by any church that I know of. My own mind is my church.”
“Of all the systems of religion that ever were invented, there is no more derogatory to the Almighty, more unedifiying to man, more repugnant to reason, and more contradictory to itself than this thing called Christianity. ”

* * * * *

It is and has always been the world’s most dangerous religion.