On Mon, 22 Sep 2008 05:31:42 -0700, "Joel Koltner"
wrote:

"John Larkin" wrote in message
.. .
Humans have radically changed their social behavior in the last few
thousand years; dolphins and chimps haven't. AIDS is killing a lot of
people, but not many dolphins or apes, as far as I can tell.

Death due to AIDS is less than 2% (of all deaths) in developed countries --
people who engage in safe sex practices anyway can generally improve their
odds of survival more by examining what they eat and how often they exercise
than worrying about whether or not an additional tryst is going to kill
them.

In undeveloped countries, AIDS is a much bigger concern. Comprehensive
education is needed, which includes not only telling people that, yes,
abstinence provides 100% protection against AIDS (and perhaps a marked
decrease in their enjoyment of life :-) ), but also that, if they are going
to have sex (and the vast majority will -- after all, those "Promise Keeper"
kids in the U.S. end up having pretty much the exact same amount of
pre-marital sex as non-Promise Keepers!), what methods should be used to
largely prevent the transmission of disease.

It's not the amount of sex that's dangerous, it's the number of
different people you do it with, and how many people *they* do it
with. That should be the bottom line of sex education. Girls should be
taught to go after shy geeky guys, and not the gorgeous popular
football jocks, because the geeks are a lot safer.

"The only use that women have for engineers is to marry them."


And of course hand out plenty of free condoms while you're at all...


They are unaffordable in poor countries, and used less than half the
time by teens in the USA.

John