I know it's a cliche, but I think I'm getting progressively jaded and cynical as the days and weeks go by. For instance, I've convinced myself that if I think about contemporary politics for too long (like the bald-faced sham of an election that resulted in the presidency of George W. Bush that EVERYONE seems to have forgotten and forgiven long ago), I'll go crazy, so I consciously limit my thinking on that subject. Subsequently, things don't outrage me as much. The headlines in The New York Times regularly say things like "U.N. Weapons Inspectors in Iraq Find A Bent Spoon in Hussein's Kitchen; Bush Sez This Means War", and I don't even bother to read the full story. So much Republican/conservative politics is based on cognitive dissonance. All available evidence shows that society improves when women have total access to legal abortion, so conservatives say abortion's gotta go. One of the bases of the U.S. Constitution is governmental/public neutrality on matters of religion, so Republicans say we need Christian prayer in public schools. And all available evidence points to the fact that abstinence-only or vague, non-specfic sex-ed programs do not work to reduce teen pregnancy and disease, so Republicans say they're the only way to go. And it's not just conservatives in the U.S. Right-wingers in England are the same way.

"A GOVERNMENT-backed course is encouraging pupils under 16 to experiment with oral sex, as part of a drive to cut rates of teenage pregnancy. Family campaigners believe that the course, called A Pause, is having the reverse effect by exciting the sexual interest of children."

Family campaigners. What a chilling phrase. Toward the end, they quote a teacher as saying

“There was no framework for talking about responsibility or the emotional side of relationships. By following this course, I feel that teachers are implicitly supporting under-age sexual activity.”

Cognitive dissonance. Nations with comprehensive, in-depth sex-ed programs have low rates of teen pregnancy and disease, so right-wingers say vague, abstinence-only programs must work. I'll end thusly: 1) Humans enjoy fucking. 2) Teenagers are humans. 3) Teenagers enjoy fucking. But if I let myself think about it for too long, I'll go insane.