Is it any surprise that virginity pledges have just as much sex as dirty miscreants who don’t sign pieces of paper promising to keep their waists encased in cement until they’re married?  Short answer would be no.

Virginity pledges are perhaps one of the more creepy things I have ever read about.  Some pledge ceremonies involve the patriarchal figure (daddy) in the pledge’s life and in the case of girls, promise to belong to the father until she has been properly given away.  Ewww?

Sex education needs to be honest and informative because teens are going to have sex.  If you don’t think they will, just think about how much fun you have when you do it.  Yeah, it’s the bee’s knees I think.  Sex is great.  During my adolescent life, I didn’t have much in the way of education to go on.  I remember figuring out how the public health nurse was full of crap when she gave us all a demonstration of how promiscuity ended up with our entire class (less two abstainers) being struck with an STD via some misleading demonstration…but beyond that, the only other form of education I got was…actually pretty much nothing.  I remember getting all pissed off when a girl who was the subject of my affection was frightened half to death by “the birth video” that they forced her to watch.  That was a downer let me tell you.

The only reason I ended up on top (a pun?) and without something horrible to worry about like being a dad at the age of…well…let’s say it was young.  The only reason I didn’t have to worry about that was because of hearing some honest words about safe sex that didn’t come from the school.  Had I not learned some of the most basic things about being safe or been treated honestly, I surely wouldn’t be living the life I am now…with two kids…a job…and oh god.  Well ok…it would have been worse really.  The kids I have now are step kids so they were entirely my choice to be sure.

I have a point?

Ok…the voice in my head tells me I have a point to make here.  Basically it’s just about being honest.  People forget that kids are actually other people who depend on us bigger people for learning about the stuff we often take for granted.  They aren’t stupid or evil (well…they aren’t stupid anyway) but they do have a lot less than us in the way of experience and if we are honest with them, they can benefit from what we have already and what they will inevitably gain either with or without us.

Just be honest about sex education mmmk?  If you clicked on the link above, you would be reading this with the knowledge that aside from those virginity pledges having just as much sex as others, they also used protection less often and ran into problems more often.  There’s a good case to be made for the idea that such a result isn’t entirely their fault either.

Sometimes you have to wonder if the cops have it too good in some cases.

When writing out a hold up note to be used at a bank, it’s probably best to not use your pay stub…but at least the stub proves you’re a productive member of society.  Maybe that’ll get him some lenience in his trial if his rank stupidity doesn’t get him any.

Do you ever get the feeling that you’re being talked down to by the media?  Sometimes it’s a feeling that comes up via the use of redundant terms like “repayable loans” referring to the auto bailout packages (since when is a loan anything but repayable?) from Ontario and Ottawa or idiot level information expounded by “experts” in whatever field.  It frustrates me that as a layman,  I can see ridiculous junk like this so frickin’ often.  Is it any wonder that I don’t have any great level of faith in news media or doctors when I see an expert say that smoking marijuana puts you at risk for contracting cancer?

What really frustrates me here is that in order to refute this kind of ridiculous garbage, I have to dig up some other expert’s chatter about how cannabis doesn’t cause cancer.  I can’t simply point out that no cannabis only smoker (and there are lots of em out there) has EVER been documented to contract cancer as a result of using the stuff because I’m just a retarded layman.  I don’t have 300 years of indoctrination..err…schooling under my belt so my opinion, no matter how well researched or compelling, is ultimately not at all credible so far as the vast majority are concerned.

I also can’t point out that this expert’s assertion that cannabis smoking can cause asthma is utter bunk.  See that?  I used the word bunk in a blog post all about pot.  Ingenious?  Oh yes…yes it was.  Anyhow, I can’t point out that many asthma sufferers actually find great relief in smoking cannabis…because I’m a dumb layman.  I can’t point out that THC is a proven expectorant and bronchial dilator that actually relieves asthma symptoms and acts totally differently than smoke containing nicotine…because I’m a dumb layman.  An idiot who calls herself an expert on CNN’s website can hide behind a medical degree and cite exactly zero sources while in order to refute her claims, I have to point to stuff like research done in 1860 (scroll down to the bottom of page 11 and read on to page 12) that shows the “magical” effect of cannabis on sufferers of cannabis.  That kind of frustrates me that idiots who claim to have been educated can get away with lying and calling themselves experts while I can’t possibly do the same and neglect to do the whole lying out my arse bit. I have no credibility but ill informed morons with a degree do? YARG!

Perhaps I’m being a little harsh though.  This CNN “expert” probably didn’t lie about anything.  She’s just as dumb as a stump which doesn’t actually excuse her misinformation though.  If she is willing to accept the label of “expert” on a given topic, she should probably at least bring herself up to snuff on the available information regarding the topic material which she is discussing.

It’s my layman’s opinion that reading much of what passes for “expert opinion” on much of the web could give you cancer. Watching experts on the television and listening to their opinion will actually give all of your friends cancer and melt one third of your brain.

As a side note, it must be noted that while some asthma sufferers find relief from smoking cannabis, others do not.  Rather than saying “for some people it’s just different” it’s more to do with the quality of the cannabis.  While cannabis that has been improperly flushed before harvest will likely cause more problems than benefits for an asthmatic, cannabis that is grown organically and properly cured will likely have wonderful benefits for an asthmatic.  Certainly cannabis of almost any quality that is vapourized and not smoked will have beneficial effects for 99% of asthmatics and I would bet my left arm on that…but again, remember that I’m just a dumb layman.

Hey, did you ever hear the one where two Jews walk into a bar?  Yeah…I’m Jewish so I don’t actually want to tell the rest of the joke because it hurts my cultural sensibilities…honest.  Oh ok what the heck.  they bought the bar! HAHAHahahahHAHAhahah….ha…hahaha….ha?  Not laughing?  Ok…well there’s a better one.

Did you hear the one about how the cops arrested a chemistry student after claiming his home chemistry lab was actually a meth lab?  No?  Well check it out.

This is an odd kind of situation isn’t it?  A chemistry student builds a home lab.  He buys fertilizer that is sometimes used by meth producers and as a result, the police claim they got a tip about it from the woman who sold it to him.  So much for protecting those anonymous sources.  After they get the tip, the bust into his home with a warrant and see his home lab.  Despite not finding any meth or even traces of it, they surmise that this chemistry student at the University of Saskatchewan is a drug baron of sorts so he gets hauled off to jail.  They then later admit that he’s not actually a meth kingpin…but he still has some kind of a trial going on because he had equipment that could have been used for making bombs?

You know…I have bleach under the sink…I could make bleach bombs.  I also have everything one needs to make a pipe bomb as well.  I must be a hardened domestic terrorist.  I’m not of course, I’m just tempted constantly to become one.

There are two things that really strike me as ridiculous on this one.  Firstly, the cops admit that the kid wasn’t doing what they thought but in an attempt to make it seem like their complete screw up resulting from a lack of the ability to perform basic police work was ok, they come up with another ridiculous charge for the student.  Even though he hasn’t done anything wrong at all, has harmed no one and hasn’t indicated any desire to do so, he still gets treated like a criminal with bail conditions imposed such as the requirement to tell his educators of the charge and perform science experiments only under supervision.  So that seems like a completely unjust situation for an innocent person to be in.

The second thing here that gets me is the bit about a young scientist getting smacked around for being a young scientist.  All this student was doing was taking his education home and expanding on his ability to learn about the subject matter in which he was interested.  A member of the unwashed masses saw him doing something that seemed kind of suspicious and so she called the cops.  The cops didn’t realize that a mistake had been made and recognize a bright young mind doing what bright young minds are apt to do…no, they locked him up.  Does anyone else get the feeling that some people are just downright frightened about science?

As I live in Saskatoon, I shouldn’t be giving a tip of the hat to anyone because I even have a subscription to this newspaper…but Canadian Cynic gets it because I’m too lazy to read a newspaper for some reason.

After watching that video, I must conclude that she most certainly is and it has everything to do with how her lips are moving.  She’s awesome!

Tip o’ the hat goes to Saskboy.