If you are poor and the only enjoyment you have is free sex, would you have time to look for a condom?

Question

Confused?... well think about this people... Just watched the "Beat the Drum" South African Movie ... All about AIDS... What a disaster this epidemic...Cried....Huge cultural differences in the way the world is trying to impose the condom and the way the poor african can handle this info... still confused... STOP PUSSYFOOTING AND DICTATE THINGS (IN AFRICA ) THROUGH DICTATORSHIP WAYS OTHERWISE YOU WILL NOT SOLVE THIS DISASTER... UNLESS YOU DONT WANT BLACK!!

Answer 1

You're being far too simplistic about this issue.

The destruction of African culture is heartbreaking. However, the thing that's truly horrifying, and more heartbreaking than any other aspect of what is occuring there, is that AIDS IS PREVENTABLE and yet, people are refusing to do the one thing they could be doing to prevent it. Worse, in some cases, they're refusing even to listen, or to acknowledge the one thing they can do to prevent it.

I agree that everyone has the right to maintain their cultural identity. They have the right to have sex. They have the right to have children. They have those rights even if their culture, their sexual habits, and their ability to procreate combine to spread a deadly disease further and further into their population.

They have those rights even if exercising them results in the deaths of every single last one of them. They have those rights if the children they produce are born infected. They have those rights even if the children they produce are born in to poverty and privation. They have those rights if the children they produce are born only to be orphaned by the deaths of their parents.

The solution to the epidemic in Africa MUST include the recognition among Africans of the causes of AIDS, the activities which spread it, and their willingness to take enough responsibility for their sexual practices to help themselves.

I have absolutely no desire to participate in dictating terms to anyone about their sexual habits, whether it be individually, or as part of the assistance my country offers to AIDS-stricken regions. But, if those regions are asking for help, they have to be willing to accept it in an effective form. Education and prevention is effective. And yes, prevention includes unpopular things like testing, condoms, and abstinance if you haven't got 'em.

If people who are dying are not willing to listen to people who are telling them how to avoid dying, whether it be because they're too embarrassed, too shocked, or too unwilling to do what they have to do to prevent it, then I submit that they are making their choice. I'm not suggesting that we give up trying, but no one can force them to listen, or act on the knowledge, any more than they can force them to wear a condom.

This has nothing to do with skin color. At some point, people have to want to live, and to see their children live, badly enough to fight for their own survival, whatever that entails. No one, no matter how much money they can throw at it, is going to be able to 'solve' this epidemic without that participation.

Answer 2

You cannot mandate condom use to people who do not know what condoms are. You cannot enforce such a mandate either. There is no way to keep track of every couple having sex.

The issue here is that condoms are a new idea for South Africa and many of the people do not like them. In fact, there are many people in the U.S. who do not like condoms and refuse to use them. South Africans will eventually generally accept condoms, but that will take some time. Educating the people about condom use will work much better than any mandate.

You mentioned having the time to look for a condom, but again you have to know about condoms to be on the lookout for them.

Take care,
Troy

Answer 3

I don't understand what the first part has to do with the second part. Education is the key to their ignorance and will emancipate these people. But change is slow. Remember dictators in Africa often will not allow change to happen because if it did they couldn't be dictators anymore. So, rich are rich and poor are poor and there is nothing in the middle. No middle class. That's not to say you can't join the peace corps just remember that change is slow.

Answer 4

Remove their debt. Educate them (mostly women), let them be a prosperous nation. This can lead to many things.

Answer 5

hellz naa. i wouldnt look for a condom anywayz..