The Pope Can't Get Away With This

Pardon my excess here, but occasionally I just lose it. Someone needs to tell Pope Joseph Ratzinger to stop the demagoguery or abort this trip to Africa.

His statement Tuesday, reported as a virtual Papal pronouncement -- that condoms actually increase the spread of HIV -- is frankly unconscionable. And immoral.

What the Hell is the matter with the Associated Press? How can MSNBC in good conscience run a story on his trip to Cameroon with that as the lede quote and then offer nothing to challenge it?

Where is the simple professional follow-up: "What, sir, is your evidence?"

The AP did report that about 22 million people in sub-Saharan Africa are infected with HIV, according to UNAIDS. In 2007, three-quarters of all AIDS deaths worldwide were there, as well as two-thirds of all people living with HIV.

I challenge anyone -- especially Ratzinger -- to offer one scientific study with a peer-reviewed methodology that shows widespread distribution of condoms has increased the spread of HIV.

That statement is so preposterous it's already being reframed as if the Pope simply favors other methods of pandemic control for spiritual reasons. But that is not what he said.

According to AP, he told reporters aboard the Alitalia plane heading to Yaounde:

You can't resolve it with the distribution of condoms. On the contrary, it increases the problem.

If Ratzinger wants to stay in Italy and scare school kids by telling them God is watching when they French kiss or masturbate, that is his sexual silliness. But this is a matter of life and death.

There are women in these countries at the mercy of promiscuous husbands who refuse to wear condoms. And in one absurd, self-serving statement this Pope has given those men a fresh argument to justify their selfish and deadly behavior.

Equally tragic are the children in these countries who are orphaned at young ages after watching their parents -- and sometimes their siblings -- die cruel and painful deaths that a condom might have prevented.

It's been almost seven years since the World Health Organization began publishing significant scientific findings in British medical journals that showed the widespread impact condom use can have in slowing infection rates in impoverished and developing countries.

In the next few days, news organizations and wire services are going to run all types of benevolent photos of Ratzinger meeting with local dignitaries and conducting spiritual services on his much touted first trip to Africa.

He'll be seen by people in the countries he visits and elsewhere as a powerful and trustworthy spiritual figure, which is all the more reason for journalists covering the trip to flush out the basis of this bizarre statement they have widely reported.

If Ratzinger has a scientific study or some other legitimate evidence, then he needs to lay it out and we need to have that discussion. But only lazy, sycophantic journalists would let a remark like that go unchallenged at the onset of this event, much less give it worldwide currency.

And without proof, only a shameless demagogue or a truly wicked person would make such a statement.

Comments

[Eodnast]

Evidence (http://www.sciencemag.org/cgi/content/summary/320/5877/749?ck=nck) shows that in Africa condom use as a primary prevention strategy is not effective in sub-Saharan Africa. Instead, prevention strategies that aim to reduce multiple sexual partnerships tend to be effective. While there are no scientific studies to my knowledge that have shown that condoms as a primary prevention strategy increase the prevalence of HIV in Sub-Saharan Africa, there are cases (Botswana, for example) that indicate that what that what the Pope said may have scientific merit. And there are no studies, to my knowledge, that show that condom use is effective as a primary prevention strategy in sub-Saharan Africa.

What is your evidence that would indicate the Pope was wrong? The evidence you presented in this article applies only to Asia, and does not address Africa, where sexual behavior is significantly different.

[drkazmd65]

The (many) reasons I am no longer a Catholic iclude the Church's stances on Birth Control, Women being fit for becoming Priests, and the constant idiocy they display as regards sex, HIV and population control.

As a practicing Wiccan,.... I remain amazed that ANYBODY out there under the age of 50 still considers what the Pope has to say as even remotely important or relevant.

[Bitsko]

Agreed, but freethinkers have been saying "The Pope Can't Get Away With This" for eons.

[MilwaukeeDan]

Mr. Cutbirth, I'm not Catholic or very religious for that matter, but I let my sence of morality guide me. There are no morals in the Catholic leadership. European Catholics are dying off faster than they are reproducing and the traditional Catholics(first world whites) have left the church en mass worldwide. That's why this crackpot is all over Eastern Europe and the Third World, he needs fresh meat to feed the Vatican.

[llisa]

I couldn't believe it when I read that he said that! That's about all it will take to set African AIDS prevention programs back by decades!

Wicked? Yes, I agree.

[Marnie1]

"What your said!"

That's American for, "Amen".

The Catholic church has an aborhant history of disrespecting and mistreating women and children.

In Africa and SE Asia, where HIV/AIDS is epidemic, the vast majority of sufferes are women and children, and they are very often innocent victims of infidelity and incest.
They are the Children of a Lesser God - the God of those who deny the realities of HIV/AIDS and actively thwart those who are actually trying to slow its spread and care for it afflicted.

The recognition of what HIV/AIDS was came in the mid 1980's. It is now 2009 and the Pope and his ilk are still not even up to 1990 in their knowledge and mentality.

[coastalcarla]

I vote for "truly wicked person". This is the same man that has swept pedophilia under the rug, promoted some of the worst offenders to cushy Vatican positions, and allowed a holocaust denier to keep spewing lies. Now he's lying to a country decimated by AIDS about the effectiveness of condoms. All to further his own agenda: the expansion of the unholy Catholic Church. He is truly wicked.

[ConcernedAboutRFuture]

Imagine... the church stating the OPPOSITE of what is actually true. Kind of like movig pedophiles around from city to city instead of exposing abuse.

The pope is proof that there is no god.... or at least the god that they claim to exist. If a catholic god was out there.... he would have destroyed this DEMON long ago.

The only chance of reducing the aids epidemin in Africa is the use of condoms.

Pope... a truly pathetic hypocrite.

[Bethab]

After decades of the sexual abuse of children, nothing these people do surprise me anymore.

[isleptwithjoeyramone]

Yet more proof that the Church is woefully out of touch with the real world.

[LWitherington]

Here here Professor Cutbirth.