For one, does the girl on the left look 14? Evidently I'm a dirty dirty old man.
Moving on, the story is about the HPV vaccine. That's right, it's an HPV vaccine. Sure, it can prevent cervical cancer. However, it's an HPV vaccine. Cervical cancer is linked to the pathogen HPV. Not telling your kids that it's an HPV vaccine is hiding something silly from them. They should know -- it's a vaccine for an STD. If they're 13 or 14, they should know about sex by now. If they don't, you're an idiot for not addressing it with them, and you're basically asking them to learn about it from their peers (which they'll probably do anyway). Additionally, all schools should have had sexual education by that point (unless you live in backwards Deliverance hickville land). Sure, they may not know about STD's yet, but if they know about sex, they're at least ready to talk about STD's with you.
From the story . . .
Cervical cancer vaccine changes 'the talk' for many parents
What they thought would be a routine physical for her volleyball team found 14-year-old Amanda Zaborowski and her mom facing a big question: Did they want Amanda to get a new vaccine that would protect her against the common and serious sexually transmitted disease HPV, or human papillomavirus?
What's the big question? Yes, you want her to get the HPV vaccine!! Are you an idiot?
This was a doctor that her mom, Linda Zaborowski, had trusted since Amanda was a child. She thought the vaccine sounded like a good idea. But she ultimately wanted her daughter to make the decision.
Huh? Are you an idiot?
Do they simply say it's a vaccine against cancer and leave it at that? Or should they also explain that HPV is a sexually transmitted disease that, among other symptoms, causes genital warts?
Are you an idiot?
The next section of the story is called "Growing up faster" and begins . . .
Linda Zaborowski says it was clear that she needed to give Amanda, her eldest daughter, more information than less.
Did you really need to think about that for very long? Concealing SEX from her when she's FOURTEEN is just SILLY.
She started to realize that when she sat in on Amanda's fourth-grade lesson on reproductive anatomy a few years ago and discovered that some girls were already menstruating.
Okay. Now you're really pissing me off. And now is when I stop quoting from the article.
Clearly Amanda was taught about sex in fourth grade. She KNOWS it exists. Sure, she may not know much about it, but she knows that one day she'll be having it. She may not know about STD's. So right now, without knowing about STD's, she thinks sex is just something natural that people do that doesn't have any consequences outside of maybe pregnancy (which, I'm sure, hasn't really sank in yet).
So keeping her from knowing about STD's actually seems to promote sex MORE than telling her about them.
Tell her about STD's. Tell her about all of the complications of sex. Give her information. Make her responsible. She's got an active reproductive system. That's just as much of a weapon as a car is. When she turns 16, you want her to be responsible in her car. Well, now that she's 14, you should give her all the tools to be responsible about her reproductive equipment. After all, women mature faster than men at that age. She'll be able to handle it.
The whole debate is stupid. Would you not give your child an MMR vaccine because the child protested against it?
The vaccine is just good sense. It will be nice when it becomes good common sense.
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