Ex-Church of Christ Support Board

This issue I have, is not with C of C although I wasn't sure where to post this.

My church (very conservative one, again, not a C of C) wants to go on a local college campus and do STD testing of students there, and offer counseling about abstinence.

I don't know why I have a problem with this, but I do. It seems like this is once again about shaming and stigmatizing people. I don't think its any of their business who has an STD. I think it would be better to just hand out free condom packs. There are many contagious and serious diseases out there, why don't they do information and counseling sessions about those also? For example, why don't they offer free flu shots or TB testing to college students? is it because they can't really shame people about catching those diseases?

This same church has a very active presence on the same college campus with abortion counseling. A few years ago, they got into some problems with the college board who didn't want them there anymore. There were some complaints.

boundaries, anybody?

If this were in context of an active campus presence focused on all sorts of health issues, that would be one thing. But you have identified the problem with this plan - it is a leetle teeny bit TOO focused!

agricola wrote:boundaries, anybody?

If this were in context of an active campus presence focused on all sorts of health issues, that would be one thing. But you have identified the problem with this plan - it is a leetle teeny bit TOO focused!

Agree.

Also, a person with an STD is only going to infect the people he has sex with. Which might only be one person.

However, someone with the flu, measles, mumps, etc could potentially infect hundreds of other people just by walking onto their campus.

HPV can lead to cervical cancer, but Christians don't want young women to get vaccinated for it. Unless I was able to counsel women about the vaccine, I wouldn't participate in this STD counseling at all.

Here's the thing about the HPV vaccine... and condoms, and birth control, and pretty much any contraception or protection...

They don't want you to know about them or get them, because they honestly think that if kids get condoms, it will embolden them to have sex, and they DO NOT WANT YOU HAVING SEX. Like, ever. And they are quite certain that if Little Johnny gets a condom, he is going to say to himself "hey, I can't get anybody pregnant, so I am literally going to f**k everything that moves."

And yes... they're projecting...

In their mind, women should never ever ever ever ever have sex until they are married, and then only with that one guy, who will only ever have sex with her, and so there is absolutely no need for the HPV vaccine. After all, abstinence is 100% guaranteed to work! Or not...

Honestly, I have never had an STD in my life, but if I did, the LAST people I would want to know about it are Church of Christ people. Scratch that... church people in general. You may as well post it in the paper at that point, because there is no way they are keeping that a secret. The more shame, the better.

And what business do any of them have doing any sort of counseling? Are they licensed to do so? If so, why not open a clinic near the school?? My guess is that they are utterly unqualified. Yet they want to pry into the private lives of these young adults and use their misfortunes as a way to recruit them to their religion.

I don't think they are qualified to do any counseling at all. Unless they have a counseling license or a medical license.

Otherwise I don't think they should be doing STD counseling. They might be giving out serious misinformation. Also, unless they have completed training in HIPAA there is great potential for personal privacy abuses.

I also think its a huge waste of time to try and "stop" adults from having sex.

Generally if one is only having sex with their spouse they are at a very low risk to pick up a STD. Therefore, if you want to reduce your chance of picking up an STD to around nil, then engaging in sex with only your spouse is an obvious bit of advice. And the Bible is all about sex within marriage.

The fact that it is not the desired advice or preferred advice does not change the fact that reducing risky behavior is a good thing. And sure, thinking about talking to culty type folks about your sexual activity is creepy when what they are really about is not STD but "conversion" to their church.

But Is the organization hiding that they are a Christian and Bible believing organization? I doubt it. Now if it were the Scientology folks or the Planned Parenthood group then yeah, they might not be upfront about everything their organization is doing. So IMO college age adults would be aware that a Bible based religious group or a Muslim group is not going to be in favor of sex outside of marriage.

klp wrote:Generally if one is only having sex with their spouse they are at a very low risk to pick up a STD. Therefore, if you want to reduce your chance of picking up an STD to around nil, then engaging in sex with only your spouse is an obvious bit of advice.

I really disagree with this. Married people get STDs too, in fact, I'd be willing to be that worldwide, married and singles contract STDs in about equal numbers. Also adding to the problem is that married people are less likely to get tested for STDs because nobody thinks they are at risk for it, including (often) themselves.

The riskiest behavior is, ultimately, not practicing safe sex. The best advice to give someone is to use protection.

You can tell someone to get married, but that won't help them if they aren't at a point in their life where they can find a marriage partner.

STD's don't arrive out of the clear blue sky. You catch it from somebody who caught it from somebody who....


No, klp is right - but.
But - in an ideal world - which this one isn't - and college campuses are probably not the best places to 'sell' that option.

Besides, once somebody HAS an STD, it is a bit late to start talking about 'abstinence' and total monogamy - I mean, that ship has sailed, right?

Unless we are going to start marrying off people at about, say, age 12, then any 'sex education' should cover all sorts of things, including 'safe sex' as well as 'conception prevention' and maybe even dating advice, premarital counseling and some practice with child care while we are at it.

You can get STDs from rape, too, and college campuses are one of the locations date rape is most likely to happen. THe campus health center has people trained to do the testing and counseling, plus I'd hope there's a local Planned Parenthood. This is something that should be left to the professionals.

cathym wrote:You can get STDs from rape, too, and college campuses are one of the locations date rape is most likely to happen. THe campus health center has people trained to do the testing and counseling, plus I'd hope there's a local Planned Parenthood. This is something that should be left to the professionals.

Its for Planned Parenthood, in my opinion. They know and have the training to counsel people. However, many religious groups want to abolish Planned Parenthood.
Also, if there is ever a vaccine that prevents HIV, they are going to try to block that also. At best, they will just spread misinformation about the vaccine. At worst, they will try to legally prevent people from getting it, by excluding it from healthcare coverage and other little tricks.