The following is a report from one of my correspondents in the field. (Edited slightly to remove identifying details; names changed to protect the guilty.)
So I call my cousin a couple of weeks ago and we’re chatting about how weird our family is and somehow he’s skirting the issue of sex before marriage. Now, I’ve been pretty sure that he’s been sexually active for a couple of years, but this isn’t exactly something that you just TALK about, especially in my family where it just DOESN’T HAPPEN. Clearly.So, my little baby cousin is getting a lot of action. He tells me that he doesn’t see that there’s anything wrong with having sex, or having sex with a different person every weekend. I tell him that my view is that as long as no one is getting hurt and that he’s living in a way that he’s truly happy with, I’m totally fine with whatever. (Hi, like I care how many people anyone fucks.) So we’re establishing that this is all okay, judgement free zone, etc. And then I (stupid, naivé, child of the 80s that I am) mention something about as long as people are being SAFE, I couldn’t really care less.
He laughs.
Excuse me?
He LAUGHS.
I do my best not to COMPLETELY flip out and fight back my major maternal instincts and go into prime educator mode. Now, you can fuck as many people as you want. You can fuck however you want. You can fuck whomever, however, whenever - I don’t care, but you MUST use a condom.
I spend the next 45 minutes having a SAFE SEX TALK with my EIGHTEEN YEAR OLD COUSIN because NO ONE has ever talked to him about this shit. You CANNOT imagine my fury. In WHAT instance is this my role??? I am equipped for many things, but having a sex talk with an 18 year old is NOT one of them. I’m sorry, I’m not READY to do that kind of parenting yet. Two year olds are about my speed at this point. Having to explain to an 18 year old boy why it is absolutely IMPERATIVE that you use a condom EVERY time - this I am not prepared to do.
I DID it, but what the HELL.
THIS is the problem with conservative Christian “teachings.” All he was EVER taught was “no sex before marriage.” Okay. You know what, if those are your values, FINE. You teach them. As parents, you have the innate right to teach your children whatever fucked up (or not fucked up) beliefs you may have. HOWEVER, how can there NOT be an “if” clause? Because, guess what people, your Christian kids still have sex. Maybe not all of them, but HOLY FUCKING SHIT. If they DO, they need to understand WHY it’s important to be safe about these things.
I’m still floored by this. Clearly, he’s enough younger than we are to have not been COMPLETELY freaked out by AIDS. He grew up in a time where everyone knew what it was and what the parameters were - there was no terror factor involved. REGARDLESS, is he assuming that ALL of these girls he’s fucking are on the pill? And that they REMEMBER to take it EVERY day? There is more than one way to fuck up your life.
The best part (and the most telling for my value system) was when he told me how he’d been talking to my sister the week before and had sort of mentioned this, but she’d started to get pissed off / judgemental, so he stopped telling her. She “didn’t want to hear it” so he didn’t tell her. Now, my sister probably has a pretty good idea that he’s having sex, but NOTHING else. Great. Exactly WHAT does that accomplish with your high Christian morals? By NOT judging him, I had a MUCH more substantive conversation with him and HOPEFULLY stood some chance of making him think about using condoms.
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20 Responses to "Abstinence-only education will get us all killed"
I don’t get the whole abstinence-is-the-only-way approach, either.
If you profess Christianity, a central tenet is that people should be forgiven for their mistakes. (I don’t personally believe sex before marriage is necessarily a mistake, but I understand and respect that some people do.) So you believe that having sex outside of marriage is a mistake. But instead of allowing your children enough information to protect themselves while they work out their own choices, you withhold lifesaving information because you don’t want them to make this particular “mistake”? So, if they’re not going to be “pure” then it’s OK for the punishment for this particular transgression to be death?
Excuse me, where is *that* in the Bible. Christianity is supposed to be about loving and caring for other people in the way that our Creator cared for us. It absolutely drives me nuts when people use this as an excuse for propping up ignorance and hostility.
OK. Sorry. I am really rambling, but I have had similar experiences with young relatives as well, and it just drives me bananas.
The above comment should read that it drives me nuts that people use religion as an excuse to prop up ignorance and hostility.
/rant.
Thank god I went to High school at a time when we actually GOT sex education. Complete with the condom and the banana. That’s just pathetic. The poor kid. I hope there weren’t any accidents that he doesn’t know about yet.
That’s fine and dandy, and I don’t necessarily disagree seeing how I came from a Christian home where sex before marriage was discouraged, but safe sex also was taught.
But the bigger question is … despite having the abstinence-only education we currently have, how in the world does this 18-year-old not have some small ounce of sex education locked inside his head from merely living in the world today? There are condom ads throughout magazines, safe sex specials on things like MTV and numerous references to sex and the like all over the place. Even if his parents didn’t present any other sex education aside from abstinence, one would think he would have come into contact with some sort of safe sex education.
I find it hard to believe (not that I’m doubting the sincerity of the ‘correspondent in the field,’ but perhaps the cousin).
Total cluelessness is unfortunately more prevalent than we might like to believe. Depending upon the, ah, “rabidness” of his family’s beliefs, he might lead a much more sheltered existence than one might think. I mean, I’m supposedly a member of the “MTV generation,” and I never really saw MTV until I was at least 18 — and my parents weren’t strict, we just didn’t have cable. Until I went to college. And I’m not making this up.
Jmac, you and I both agree and disagree on a lot of things, but we both respect each other’s opinions and beliefs. That being said, this “I find it hard to believe…” BS is completely disingenuous to me.
If we took ten people off the street and asked them to name one senator or representative from the state of Georgia, how many do you think could? That information, after all, is everywhere. Not only would you see it in public buildings, but also on the tv, radio and newspapers on a regular basis. Similarly, how many people off the street do you think could name the states bordering Georgia? Or how many do you think could name the countries bordering the US? How many people do you know who drive cars every day of their lives do you think couldn’t identify even one component of their internal combustion engine?
Ignorance is everywhere and as the information age has exploded around us, many people are still ignorant by choice. Without googling, could you tell me what is in a buttery nipple shot? Without googling, could you tell me what the county seat of Tolbert County is? Just because the information is available or even useful is no guarantee that it will be gathered by people, even those that need it most. Are you able to strip down and rebuild a transmission in an afternoon? Why not? Well, that information is available…
Suggesting, therefore, that because the information is available (somewhere out there) a person should know it is an interesting kind of elitism. You and I are similar in the fact that we both seek out all kinds of information that we find fascinating. I knew more about sex at age 10 than most adults that I encountered at the time, but that doesn’t mean that I expected all the kids in my grade to show the same interest or the same ability to track that information down.
Now, when you couple information with social taboos, you get interesting exercises in ignorance like this kid. He’s obviously been raised in an environment in which sex isn’t discussed, why, then, is he expected to go out and research something that he’s never even heard discussed at the dinner table? It’s probable that 18th century English literature was never discussed, either, would you also expect him to be an expert on it, too? That information is, after all, available out there, too.
I understand that this kid should be held responsible for his actions, but responsibility also lies with his parents, his school and his church for not arming him with the knowledge required to be an adult. Kids aren’t raised in vacuums and they cannot be expected to learn everything on their own. Extrapolating your personal experience to everyone else’s out there is dangerous and elitist, especially if you come from a family that prized learning, reading and knowledge like I suspect you did (and I did, too).
I realize that your doubt is on the kid’s actual knowledge, but I assure you that after volunteering at Planned Parenthood clinics and talking to some sexually active teenagers, you’ll be ready to walk into a high school yourself and explain this stuff to them because much of what they know they’ve gleaned from TV, movies, and their friends, and we all know how accurate all that is…
Shit like this infuriates me. INFURIATES ME!!! And you have this stupid fucking administration shifting the funding towards this bullshit!!! GODDAMMIT! I just don’t get why people are so freaking ignorant… let’s not pass that onto our kids, right?
Ep — your comparisons are just as disingenuous.
Sex sells, it’s everywhere, and it’s highly unlikely in this specific case that the kid has never heard about condom use (inferring from the “no one” talked to him about it). Yes, if someone sat down and talked to him it would stick better than seeing ads on TV and such, but the info is abundant. The comparisons you make to buttery nipple shots, tranny rebuilding, and the county seat of Tolbert are no where near as available (i.e., without someone seeking them out for themself) as condom ads or sex talk. The things you cite are available, but not commodified or consummerized in popular culture like sex is.
Which leads to both good information and bad information, but the information is abundant. I’m willing to bet that a vast majority of kids can name brands of condoms, what Red Bull “gives you,” and who broke up with who on the O.C. last week. These things are interesting to kids and they remember them.
I agree, though, that if the kid actually never heard from anyone specifically about condom use, then that’s a wrong that should be righted. But comparing Jmac’s comment to “man on the street” segments by Jay Leno is just silly. Most people don’t care about who their representative is and there are no commercials with funny slogans and music that tell them, so they don’t find that out.
I do wonder this, though, because I’m ignorant of the specifics: What does “abstinence-only education” actually entail in practice? Are there schools that actually do this and if so, what is the curriculum they teach? Non-anecdotal evidence would be ideal, but I realize it may not be as available as “my friend’s sister’s cousin’s kid goes to a school where they told her to NEVER have sex because her cahooter will rot out if she does.”
Russ,
Well, you’re entitled to your opinion, but as commodified and available as sexualized messages are in our society, real information about the mechanics and consequences of sex are few and far between. For every one hundred shows that suggest sex is a fun, zesty and possibly life-changing activity, how many actually discuss the fact that you can get pregnant the first time you do it? How many discuss the success/fail rates of different methods of birth control? How many actually lay out the importance of being a responsible sexual partner and preparing beforehand. Hell, how many even discuss that there ARE different forms of birth control, besides the condom and the pill? Simply because a kid can name a brand of condom or have a hazy idea that birth control SHOULD be used is a far cry from knowing WHY birth control should be used and HOW to do so properly.
I think you’ve made a very good point in your suggestion that “most people don’t care about who their representative is and there are no commercials with funny slogans and music that tell them, so they don’t find that out.” Similarly, most people don’t care about the importance of thinking about sex beforehand, of considering the ramifications and consequences of being sexually active and of fully understanding what an endeavor getting involved in a sexual relationship actually is. We’re talking both adults and kids here, married and unmarried. People want to have fun and feel good, two things that sex represents, but they don’t want to deal with all that other stuff. Fortunately, as adults, they are typically better able to deal with the consequences or, at least, are able to keep those consequences hidden from people around them if need be. Abstinence-only education does nothing to alleve this lack of responsibility, but then fails to even give kids the honest information they need to make the decisions properly, even if they wanted to.
I think of it like driving a car. Imagine if driving was only legal for people who had a high school diploma. Now, imagine if this law was basically unenforced, except for specific instances in which it was a slam dunk case that the person was driving illegally. Now, consider that “driver’s education” was essentially “you can’t drive until you’re a high school graduate, only after this point are you deemed responsible and mature enough to operate a dangerous motor vehicle.” During this lecture, no information about how cars work, the positives and negatives of driving and no information about the responsibilities entailed in driving cars isn’t covered at all. All it consisted of was car crash videos, accident victims and pictures of hunks of twisted and wrecked metal. Now, any kid can borrow his parents keys (and many parents don’t mind because, hey they drove when they were kids) when they’re out and take the car out, without knowing the rules of the road and understanding the consequences of his actions. Driving is a dangerous endeavor, far more dangerous than sex, yet we allow 15 and 16 year olds engage in this activity after preparing them and forcing them to be responsible. Kids need the a car to get to work, to see his friends and to pursue hobbies, but instead of a being a responsible driver who’s aware of what the risks are and has a modicum of relevant information given to him, without proper education he’s an ignorant kid who’s knowledge of driving is derived from riding in cars or watching cars on television. I realize it’s an inexact analogy, but it’s suggestive of the kind of inanity that is abstinence education.
Just as it’s completely ridiculous to suggest that having a high school diploma does anything for one’s driving skills except put an arbitrary limit on the pursuance of an activity it’s equally absurd to suggest that marriage is some magical event that makes a person responsible and mature enough to engage in sex. Sex is a serious thing, something that should be carefully considered and something that someone should wait to do until they are ready. However, just like you’ve surely done things in your life before you were ready and just as you’ve surely engaged in activities in your life that had the potential for harm, you’ve just as surely educated yourself beforehand about it. Now, I’m not saying that this education should absolve someone of their responsibility, far from it, when honest, factual and relevant information is given to kids in normal sex education and they STILL fail to act responsibly, we can pin the blame on no one but themselves. But giving kids an ideologically stunted and moralistic view of sex while simultaneously withholding factual information in an effort to prevent them from engaging in this activity is deluding only the people that sponsor these kinds of programs and is doing a grave disservice to kids by giving them less that useful (or actively harmful) information.
Ask and ye shall receive:
Via Planned Parenthood.
More info on Abstinence-only education.
From About.com:
This is the one that gets me the most:
Says who?
Busybodies and people who can’t mind their own business, that’s who.
One by one:
But, uh, sex is fun and enjoyable and people want to do it. Why don’t we talk about the psychological, health, and social benefits of HAVING sex, since that’s what the vast majority of the human race that makes it to adulthood is going to be doing at some point or another…
Why? What good does this kind of arbitrary moralizing do for us as a society and, more importantly, for the kids that are actually receiving this message? Does the promotion of alcohol abstinence keep people from drinking? Drug abstinence obviously keeps kids from doing drugs, right? And, if they’re school-aged married children, is it all of the sudden OK for them to have sex? What if they’re not self-sufficient yet?
And yet, despite abstinence-only education, kids still have sex. They just get more STDs when they have had gone through a few years of abstinence-only “education” than their better-educated counterparts. If it’s not working, why continue under the delusion that it is working?
Again, says who? A cultural standard from the days when men were men and women were property? C’mon.
It’s also likely that it will have positive psychological and physical effects. I wonder if they also teach that sexual activity in a committed marriage can also cause harmful psychological and physical effects?
Well, hey, this I agree with. But what does it
“Just Say No!” style programs only teach kids that adults can’t be trusted for reliable information. Case in point: alcohol “education” programs and the huge amount of teens abusing alcohol.
This I also agree with. However, what if you’ve achieved self-sufficiency and unmarried or in an uncommitted relationship? Is that completely discarded in favor of the above directives?
When it comes down to it, I don’t necessarily disagree with most of these points, but the fact is that without accepting the fact that manner in which these points are promoted might actually counter-act responsible and mature sexual behavior and change the curriculum accordingly, the program causes more net negatives than positives…
I didn’t mean for my comments to come across in a flippant or disingenuous kind of way, rather I was merely articulating - rather poorly - much of what Russ said regarding how common it is to see sex, and safe sex in some instances, in the private sector, even if it isn’t taught in an educational environment. I was more flabbergasted that someone who is 18-years-old wouldn’t have a clue about safe sex - and though I can accept he didn’t have all of the information (i.e. different kinds of birth control), it is still difficult for me to comprehend him not having some basic knowledge about safe sex (however rudimentary it may be).
It would seem to me that if this individual had seen some glimpse of popular culture (for instance, the Friends episode where Rachel tells Ross she’s pregnant is all about condoms and their success ratios) he would have some sort of understanding. I don’t wish to say this is OK by any means - far from it - but to have absolutely no comprehension of what a condom does is alien to me, and that’s what I’m confused by. Not that he has a comprehensive sexual education in his head, but that he (apparently) was so ignorant that he had to be lectured about safe sex in general. But I am no expert in sex education or awareness among today’s youth, so I don’t wish to speak too much to that aside from express my puzzlement.
Still, I agree with much of what you said eponymous concerning responsibility. I thought it was very honest and sincere, and I appreciate you taking the time to express it.
And, FWIW, there is no Tolbert County in Georgia. There’s a Colbert in Madison County, though it’s not the county seat (that’s Danielsville). OK, now I’m just being a smartass. :)
Ep — I agree with your comments above. What I was getting at was that I think that most kids have been exposed to the idea of protection, but not in an effective way. But claiming that someone has never heard or talked about condoms is slightly goofy. The kid knew what they were after all.
I don’t blame schools, though, I blame parents, mostly. But, I also think that within education should be some sort of biological/scientific information about sex like you mentioned — withholding this information doesn’t do anyone any good at all. Information isn’t moral or immoral — it’s what one does with information that is. Leave the doing up to the person to decide — and parents should be responsible for the moral information, not schools.
I haven’t read the info you listed — but I will and I appreciate you taking the time to post it.
Oh, where to start on this lovely Friday afternoon?
Jmac, I was incredulous too when I first read this. But I agree with epon (and he already said pretty much all of what I would’ve said), assuming that because you experienced this, that, and the other, it must be the same for everyone else, is a dangerous thing.
This type of ignorance appalls me, and I wonder for a moment how anyone could actually be so ignorant (though it’s becoming easier and easier with the way the Bush administration is endorsing fundamentalist Christian teachings these days, but I digress) - then I remember that, oh yeah, I come from a middle-class suburban family where knowledge was valued (though sex was almost never discussed at home - but again I digress - that’s a topic for another time), I had sex ed in school, and ever since I was a teenager I’ve had an abiding interest what sexuality is all about because, well, that’s just how I am. But not everyone is the same. Kids in impoverished or rural areas are the obvious example. But ignorance is widespread. I remember reading a blog by someone who volunteered with “high-risk” teens; she recounted how one 16-year-old girl believed that the only way to get pregnant was from a blowjob (and swallowing) because “the sperm goes into your stomach.” Scary stuff.
Epon also pretty much covered the points about just because sex is “everywhere” doesn’t mean accurate information about it is everywhere. Many of the pop culture representations of sex that we see are so far from reality that they should be in a completely different category. I have just as much of a problem with the sexual stereotypes perpetrated in TV, movies, etc. as does the Christian Coalition, but for entirely different reasons. (Again, another topic for another time.)
Fianlly, big ups to Epon for the citations. He included a few that I mentioned in a previous post. The glaring inaccuracies (and that’s putting it lightly) and platitudes in these “curricula” are horrifying. It kind of makes me want to stop paying taxes and move into a mountain shack surrounded by guns when I think about the fact that my tax dollars are being used to endanger people’s lives by spreading this bullshit.
Epon hit the nail on the head witht his:
I have never understood this mentality that marriage is the cure-all to everything. I wrote about this very topic fairly recently, though I’m too lazy to go search for the link right now. I don’t recall suddenly being endowed with all sorts of new abilities when I got married (or having them taken away when I got divorced). It’s an absolutely ludicrous concept that has never made any sense to me, from the time I was a kid (because, growing up in Augusta, Georgia I certainly heard plenty of people preaching “Wait ’til marriage!” from the time I was old enough to have any inkling of what that even meant). You can’t just tell kids, “Waiting until marriage is best, there could be consequences otherwise!” What consequences, and why? And why will there not be the same “consequences” so long as you have a piece of paper showing that the state says the two of you share taxes? Not every marriage is a good relationship; some marriages are fucked up. But is everything still “okay” even at that point? The mind boggles.
To summarize my ranting: You can’t just say, “waiting til marriage is the standard!” and have kids just accept it. That’s not learning; that’s brainwashing. And it doesn’t work.
Epon wrote:
To whit:
(Go read the full article)
I also have a collection of other links that show a direct correlation between prevalence of abstinence only education and an increase in rates of unintended pregnancy and STIs. (I’m sure Duane, our resident public health worker, could fill us in as well.) But I guess I better go ahead and post this and see if any more of the peanut gallery has chimed in.
Just chiming in about the issue of ignorance and the availability of information about safe sex.
I am sure many teens in this guy’s situation have *heard* information about condom use. But they choose to disregard it. No one they trust is telling them that safe sex is important. The message they get is that sex is always bad unless you’re married. A little experimentation will show them that’s not true, so why trust those other messages.
Part of the parent’s role in preparing their children for the world at large is to convey a sense of importance about taking all kinds of precautions (why it’s important to not drive at high speeds, why seat belts are good, and if you choose to have sex, condoms are necessary, etc.) And to be a reliable, credible source of information. Be someone they can trust.
Most teenagers do not yet have a sense of their own mortality. They need an authority figure to say ‘hey, yeah, this may sound like not much fun, but it is really important.’
It’s when kids learn that you can just ignore facts of life that aren’t appealing to you (evolution scares you? fine, you can’t just *not believe* in it. think sex outside marriage is wrong? act as if it doesn’t exist) that they are vulnerable to this kind of ignorance.(hey, condoms sound like a hassle, i’ll just decide they aren’t necessary.)
What really burns me up is the sense that in denying your children information, you are somehow “protecting” them. Who honestly believes that people won’t have sex if they just are *never* told about it, or are told they can only have sex if they get married?
Since the dawn of time people have been getting together before marriage, outside of marriage, etc. This is not something new.
Cat, I think you’re also missing a very key component of this issue as well. While I don’t necessarily dispute what you’re saying here, I also think most guys (like the ones we’re discussing here) disregard what little safe sex education they possess because they simply don’t want to use a condom. It’s cumbersome, it’s less manly, it makes it ‘not feel as good’ and the like.
I used to work with a guy at my old job who he, and his buddies, never used condoms for the same reasons and bragged how they would just pay for abortions if they happened to get the girl pregnant, which he had done twice in the past (this, of course, gave me strong urgings to punch him in the face, but I resisted). I’ve heard from the morning DJs on an Atlanta radio station dismiss condom use - again because it ‘doesn’t feel good’ - so they rely on the woman using the pill and how most STDs can be treated with medicine, so it isn’t that big of a deal.
These are people who have heard about safe sex, but intentionally choose to not practice it for selfish reasons. And that’s maddening to me.
So while I’m not discounting your concerns, I’m also suggesting there are other issues at work.
Greetings from the land of anonymity. Writing anonymously is weird for me, since I stand by every opinion I have. However, given that this isn’t about ME, but my cousin…I’ll just stay the “CITF.”
Let me respond to a few things…
Russ, you’re absolutely right. If I had claimed that my cousin had never heard or talked about condoms before that WOULD be goofy. Perhaps this got lost in translation from private email to blog, but what I said was, I spend the next 45 minutes having a SAFE SEX TALK with my EIGHTEEN YEAR OLD COUSIN because NO ONE has ever talked to him about this shit.
Slightly different from claiming that he’d never heard of condoms. Just to clarify…
Sure, virtually every 18 year old male in this country is going to have some level of familiarity with condoms. That really doesn’t matter if they don’t grasp the significance of using them.
This kid went to a public school and had sex ed (some of it post-Bushie abstinence only nightmare, some of it pre). He knows about condoms. He knows about the pill. He knows a few basic facts. Clearly, that kind of education was still not sufficient. However, even if you have a GOOD sex ed class, if it is NEVER mentioned by your parents or any other adult you know, how much is it really going to stick? Did you learn all of what you know about STIs and prevention from your health classes in school? Was that sufficient?
Don’t get me wrong, I’m not saying that sex ed in schools is irrelevant. By no means. Obviously, it needs to happen (it should happen, regardless of the safety need) and it clearly needs to be done more effectively. My point is that these conversations need to occur both in the classroom and at home.
Teaching cold hard facts isn’t going to have impact - in any subject. You have to make it relevant and real. It’s like teaching history as a series of dates. I don’t know anyone who cares that the Civil War ended in 1865. However, there are quite a few million people who very much appreciate that with the end of that war came the beginning of a new era in which people could no longer be legally bought, sold and killed in this country because they were property. You can’t just teach facts, you have to teach context and impact.
You’re going to tell me that very few people actually get that. You probably didn’t get that in school and you somehow learned this lesson. Fine.
However, I’m guessing that the vast majority of people who visit this blog are mid-twenties or older. We grew up in a world where safe sex was in the news literally every day. There was so much paranoia about AIDS because of the lack of information about it that, whether they wanted to or not, the adults in our lives were FORCED into conversation about it. There were examples of people living with and dying from AIDS in the media all the time - whether in the news or entertainment.
It’s a different world today. Sure, HIV is in the news from time to time. There’s Bono again, ranting about the crisis in Africa. It’s not here and it’s not portrayed as the impending threat that, say, a Muslim might be. Today, people in the U.S. live with HIV and we know how it’s transmitted. Today’s 18 year olds never lived in a world where with that kind of fear. Where people actually freaked out about the possibility of transmission through sweat or tears.
I’m saying, our experience was very different.
I am not trying to make excuses for his behavoir. Let’s remember that the entire basis of this conversation was my vehement opposition to that behavior. I’m simply trying to put it into context for you so you’re not so quick to write it off as the thoughts and actions of one stupid kid. YES he has been irresponsible. YES that behavior is stupid. But if you never encounter the reality of why that is the case, you’re much less likely to come to those conclusions. If you’ve never known anyone with HIV. If you’ve never known anyone who’s died an AIDS-related death. If you’ve never known anyone who has (admitted to having) an STI that can’t be cured with a quick round of antibiotics. If you didn’t grow up in the culture of fear surrounding AIDS…and no one has ever talked openly about this with you - why would you understand?
The usual conservatives that visit Amber’s blog (god help us) had a few more comments that made me want to smack them, but I’ll refrain. Eponymous has my gratitude for fighting those battles. Officially, you rule. Because I couldn’t say it any better, I’m going to end by quoting you:
Amber, you’re pretty much right on.
:D CITF, I love you. (But I don’t love you.)