Let’s talk about sex (or not)

You’re driving along, little 9-year-old Madison safely buckled into the passenger’s seat, clutching a teddy bear in her downy little arms, when black storm clouds appear. Huge raindrops start breaking their backs against the windshield until they blur.

It’s OK. It’s an STD storm, and you’re protected—but this one is full of information about Human Papillomavirus. You find the statistics disturbing. You hear phrases like “gynecologic oncology” and the Center for Disease Control saying, “HPV is the most common sexually transmitted infection in the United States. High-risk HPV types can cause cervical, anal, penile and other genital cancers.”

You drive on hoping little Madison didn’t hear the word “penile.”

You hear survivors saying cancer of the cervix kills about 300,000 women worldwide annually, including about 4,000 in the United States, and how they had to have hysterectomies to save their lives. “Not my Madison,” you think, turning the wipers to high.

“Premarital sex is dangerous, even deadly,” says Leslee J. Unruh, president of the Abstinence Clearinghouse. “Let’s not encourage it by vaccinating 10-year-olds so they think they’re safe.” You think, “Yes, that’s the worst thing we can do. I remember my grandfather talking about how, in 1924, when Wyeth developed the tetanus shot, how everyone was so happy because they could play with rusty nails with physical impunity.”

You come to a railroad crossing. You hear the twang twang twang of the bell as the gate slowly lowers, and you think, “Isn’t this why we paid for that damned trench?” But this isn’t a train—it’s a gravy train, and Texas governor Rick Perry is the conductor. The big guttural Merck & Co., Inc. diesel locomotive is at the lead followed by dozens of gravy-filled cars.

He’s going around the country picking up state legislators and governors who are splashing around like pieces of anthropomorphic roast beef in tubs full of well-seasoned pan sauce. One portly legislator runs and does a belly flop into a mattress-sized biscuit. “I think I voted for that guy,” you say, turning to cover little Madison’s eyes.

You think of that august body of hairy-armed, Stetson-cologned legislators having the nerve to even talk about little girls and sex and making the HPV vaccine mandatory. Or did they say that? Or was that just the Texas governor?

Your head is spinning, so you turn on the radio, and a dry-throated creature who refuses to take a sip of water is on the air. The caller says how penicillin is the brainchild of the One World Government Lizard People, and that the vaccines are full of mercury and equine piss just like the black airplanes that crisscross the sky emitting chem-trails full of liquid Prozac to subdue the population. The host, the one with the scratchy throat, says, “not to mention the abortionists, the feminists, the ACLU, the Illegals for School Choice, and the Transgendered for Free Crack who are invading our schools with propaganda.”

Just as Madison wakes up, you look at her innocent little face and think how life was much easier when you didn’t have to make choices!

Nothing but a power grab by Big Pharma, Big Vagina, Big Blowjob and those godless wizards over at Merck, still paying for that financial ruin that was Vioxx.

Decisions.

The bill’s sponsor, Senate Minority Leader Dina Titus, calls you on the cell phone and says, “The bill (SB409) is a mandated insurance benefit to cover the HPV vaccine and also screening for prostate cancer. Two bills got combined. It doesn’t mandate the [HPV] vaccine. It just provides it to children in the Nevada Check-Up plan and Medicaid if people want it, so it’s an important day in Nevada’s history for young women’s health.”

Decisions.

Wait, you think. You mean the government’s not going to decide this one for me?