THE great national contraception controversy of 2012 has landed in California. The specific issue here is a state-supported program allowing teenagers to get free condoms by mail. Backers say the program will cut down on pregnancies and diseases, but opponents say it will only encourage more kids to have more sex.

In that it’s a fight between people who put the highest priority on promoting health and people who claim to be guided by moral principles, there are echoes of the squabble over the Obama administration’s mandate that employees of religion-based institutions have access to birth control through their health coverage.

Why is there still a contraception controversy in 2012? What’s the point of further debate about the wisdom of contraception? Wasn’t this generally settled in the last century, before any of today’s teens were gleams in their mothers’ and fathers’ eyes?

There are reasons public officials are talking about this again, but no good reasons for wasting much breath on the topic.

Republican politicians are only too happy to talk up their opposition to the federal mandate, portraying it as a question of religious freedom. This is another way for candidates to prove themselves to the ultra-conservative wing of their party, and a way to try to chip away at President Obama’s health care overhaul.

Democratic politicians are even happier to keep the Republicans talking. Anything that rings of opposition to birth

control makes the GOP sound
retrograde, and women voters in particular will not approve of a step backward on sexual freedom.

This is, after all, an issue that affects women most of all, making it outrageous when the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee, chaired by Rep. Darrell Issa, R-Vista, recently held a hearing on the religious-freedom vs. access-to-birth-control question and invited only men to testify.

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Editorial: Condom conflict

The debate over contraception is over, and access to birth control won
Posted: 02/26/2012 12:00:00 AM PST

THE great national contraception controversy of 2012 has landed in California. The specific issue here is a state-supported program allowing teenagers to get free condoms by mail. Backers say the program will cut down on pregnancies and diseases, but opponents say it will only encourage more kids to have more sex.

In that it’s a fight between people who put the highest priority on promoting health and people who claim to be guided by moral principles, there are echoes of the squabble over the Obama administration’s mandate that employees of religion-based institutions have access to birth control through their health coverage.

Why is there still a contraception controversy in 2012? What’s the point of further debate about the wisdom of contraception? Wasn’t this generally settled in the last century, before any of today’s teens were gleams in their mothers’ and fathers’ eyes?

There are reasons public officials are talking about this again, but no good reasons for wasting much breath on the topic.

Republican politicians are only too happy to talk up their opposition to the federal mandate, portraying it as a question of religious freedom. This is another way for candidates to prove themselves to the ultra-conservative wing of their party, and a way to try to chip away at President Obama’s health care overhaul.

Democratic politicians are even happier to keep the Republicans talking. Anything that rings of opposition to birth

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control makes the GOP sound retrograde, and women voters in particular will not approve of a step backward on sexual freedom.
This is, after all, an issue that affects women most of all, making it outrageous when the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee, chaired by Rep. Darrell Issa, R-Vista, recently held a hearing on the religious-freedom vs. access-to-birth-control question and invited only men to testify.

In the case of a U.S. Senate race in Massachusetts, it’s literally a man vs. woman issue. Incumbent Scott Brown accuses challenger Elizabeth Warren of wanting to “dictate to religious people about what they should believe” by supporting Obama’s modified plan to allow workers at religious institutions to get free contraception from the organizations’ insurers.

Warren, a Democrat, said a bill supported by Brown, a Republican, would “threaten everyone’s health care” by letting employers deny employees any medical service that defies their beliefs.

Not for the first time, a political shouting match drowns out real conversation among people with sincere feelings about the subject.

The reason the issues involving contraception seem not to be settled in the minds of many conservatives is that such culture-war issues never are entirely settled in people’s minds. The battle is kept alive by those who want to take the culture back to how it used to be. Their memory of how it used to be often is rosier than the reality.

Take the part of this that is playing out in California this month.

Since Valentine’s Day (how sweet), youths from 12 to 19 have been able to order free condoms from a website run by the nonprofit California Family Health Council. No more than once a month, teens can receive in the mail a plain yellow envelope containing a package of 10 condoms, lubricant and health brochures. The idea is to make birth control and sexually transmitted disease prevention available to teens who might not be able to afford condoms in stores, or too embarrassed to buy them in person.

Administered by the California Department of Public Health and helped along by a $250,000 grant from the federal Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, the program is starting in five Central and Northern California counties with the state’s highest rates of STDs.

It may not be realistic to assume vast numbers of teens will take advantage of the program. But it’s no less realistic than the assumptions of the program’s critics.

“Why would our state government encourage teens to have sex when they aren’t emotionally prepared – and equip them to do so behind their parents’ backs?” Karen England, executive director of the faith-based political-action group Capitol Research Institute, was quoted saying.

As if, otherwise, teens routinely consult their parents on sexual matters.

Measures to reduce unintended pregnancies and cases of disease must be part of public health policy. For the majority of people, old or young, the benefits more than make up for the costs. If parents and religious leaders want to discourage kids from having sex, they are free to preach the virtues of waiting.

It’s an issue for the home and church, not for the campaign stump, not in 2012.

Presstelegram.com