OK, number one, JOURNALISTS don't use stock photos. They work with PHOTOJOURNALISTS, who take relevant pictures of relevant people. This is not an ad - at least, we are led to believe it's not. And if this alleged news organization is going to use stock photos despite the total lack of professional standards that implies, they can well afford to buy a complete set; they don't have to download a cheesy free clip art package from the Internets.

Number two, this "scientist" according to the paper, "acknowledged the study dealt only with women already strugging with fertility problems. But he said: 'We need data on the general population to confirm this, but we think we're going to get it.'" I know things change, but that bears no resemblance to the Scientific Method they taught me when I was in fifth grade - except insofar as it is the exact opposite.

Oh, I get it. He and the newspaper have the exact same professional standards! Cute. Maybe it IS an ad.

ACTUAL fertility awarenes/natural family planning is really easy, but it requires very specific daily observations of multiple fertility symptoms. You can't use a computer to tell you when you're ovulating or when your period is coming. This is why the rhythm method doesn't work: it relies on every woman having a cycle that is a set number of days, with presumed ovulation on a certain day of that cycle. And you know what you call people who use the rhythm method of birth control....

I hope this phone has a REALLY BIG RED DISCLAIMER.

"The only 100% effective way of [preventing out-of-wedlock pregnancy] is abstinence." Sure, and the only 100% effective way to prevent car accidents is to abstain from driving. And the only 100% effective way to prevent migraines is to abstain from having a head.

If people were actually able to practice abstinence, it WOULD be 100% effective. But back here in Reality, we know that even the most earnestly chaste adults do not succeed at abstinence 100% of the time. So calling abstinence 100% effective is a LIE. Abstinence is only 100% effective if you have 100% abstinence. (Not impossible, I guess. Just very, very improbable. Maybe the government is secretly working on an Improbability Drive?)

I don't think anyone really believes abstinence-only propaganda works. I suspect that Mr. Horn (is that his real name?) and all his friends are just trying to pull down a couple more years of semi-legitimate salary before the administration gets run out of town on a rail.

"married couples are reportedly having more sex than unmarried couples"

It's not really what the article focused on, but my understanding was that married people were having more sex than polygamous/single people - not more than couples who weren't formally hitched. What you're talking about isn't really addressed.

The long report mentioned in the article talks about the inflexibility of "the workplace" - meaning that the culture of work does not support parents. People with "good" jobs are routinely expected to work more than 50 hours a week - without overtime pay. Parents are not seeing their families at all. Of course, the sore point with me and many people like me is that "the workplace" has always been inflexible for people in the service industry and other low-paying, low-benefit jobs. But the point here, I think, is that this inflexibility has crept into office culture as well. If you want flexibility, you have to take a job that doesn't pay well, doesn't offer health insurance and/or has no retirement program.

The big thing "the workplace" is holding over our heads is health insurance. Universal single-payer health care would give families so much more flexibility. I hope it happens by the time my children are grown. But I'm not holding my breath - because who knows how I'd pay that hospital bill if my husband's provider decided my turning blue and passing out wasn't an emergency! ;)

I made calls for Move-On, and every person I talked to said the Iraq war was the single most important issue they were voting on this election year. This is anecdotal, but a Gallup poll on how churchgoers and non-churchgoers view this election shows that a huge majority of the general public sees this election as a war referendum (68% of the former and 60% of the latter said the Iraq war was the most important issue for them in an open-ended poll question). In other elections, things like college tuition could make a difference for women voters, but I think it's meaningless this year. How about Jim Webb doing a commercial on killing off our babies in a pointless war?

with the "innocent boys" comment???

Did John Kerry write this?

They didn't study Web porn at all. They saw that since Al Gore invented the Internets, rape rates have gone down and they MADE UP AN EXPLANATION FOR IT. I agree that psych experiments on porn (as described in the article) are probably useless, but this "study" is utter trash. Worse than any porn I've ever averted my innocent eyes from.

to your congregation, Pastor - if you have one. I am a feminist, and I think the "innocent boys" joke is offensive too. But I'm not calling anyone names. Not even you.