Thoughtcrime!

I don't care what this guy said in public, this is unconscionable.

I don't care if this Lutheran pastor is against gay clergy (it's apparent that he's against himself being a gay clergy), for a reporter to lie his way into a confidential support group and then reveal what transpired is lower than Keith Olbermann. This piece of dirt dig great damage to this group's ability to help people.

But this is typical of today's gay activist. Put your name on a ballot initiative and you may get your place of employment picketed. Or your home. Or your church. But only if you are white, because even though black people put California's Prop 8 over the top these fairies didn't have the onions to got into the 'hood.

These people demand respect and dignity? Why should I give it to them when they have no respect for others?

Yes, I said fairies. I was considering using the other F word.

I hit the Creative Minority Report every day. You Catholics have really great blogs. If my pastor knew I was reading them......

The President of the School Board of the City of Detroit

BTW, a little bit of a parental advisory on these links.

Usually when I am in a boring meeting I just have a country music song stuck in my head.

Maybe he was just taking a former Surgeon General's teaching to heart.

And you wonder why people home school.

H/t Michelle Malkin

The hand that empties the cradle rules the world

Mark Steyn rocks hard, again:

Europe’s economic crisis is a mere symptom of its existential crisis: what is life for? What gives it meaning? Post-Christian, post-national, post-modern Europe has no answer to that question, and so it has 30-year-old students and 50-year-old retirees, and wonders why the small band of workers in between them can’t make the math add up. 

America and its famed "Puritan work ethic" has been, up until now, somewhat insulated from this phenomenon.  The current Administration's attempt to impose a Euro-style cradle-to-grave state from above has met with a huge wave of opposition.  However, how long can it last?  The culture has already abandoned most of everything else associated with actual Puritans, for good or ill; the work ethic isn't just going to prop itself up once everything else has gone.  And in the end, the next generation always has to carry on the struggle of civilization against entropy; if there isn't a next generation, then the struggle is by definition lost.  It's little sense worrying about a healthy society if there's nobody left to socialize with.

When Barack Obama started redistributing American wealth, a lot of readers dusted off Mrs. Thatcher’s bon mot: “The trouble with socialism is that eventually you run out of other people’s money.” But European social democracy has taken it to the next level: they’ve run out of other people, period.

However, the Puritans may have been on to something.  Laugh all you like, they helped build from nothing the incredible country we live in.  Tossing out all of the ideas that inspired them is not going to help us keep up.  Has discarding their alleged prudery helped us enjoy more fulfilling sex lives?  We console ourselves by saying "They thought sex was dirty and we don't," and that may have more than a bit of truth about it - but we're the ones who've suddenly stopped having kids.  (Whatever we say they thought, they must have been enjoying themselves.)  The few that we do have are in many ways worse-cared-for, despite our obsession over shielding them from every-increasing bits of the unfairness and routine difficulties of life.  We legislate winning and losing out of their games, and find that they can't handle setbacks, nor succeed with grace.  We put their feelings in front of their education or their discipline, and are amazed that they are uninquisitive, self-absorbed, entitled, and lazy.  Good luck forming lasting and healhty relationships that way.

Those who are going to solve the first trouble are the ones who are toting four and six and more children along in a minivan while their enlightened neighbors snicker in an empty house.  I suspect the way they raise those kids is going to start to solve the other problems as well - on a practical level, you need to have good working rules in place to have a successful family society, and the larger it gets the more opportunities for learning those lessons that also serve in the larger human family.  On a cultural level, the smart money is on the culture that values virtue, hard work, friendship, healthy competition, winning with class, and losing with dignity; the one that treasures life and all its pleasures and thinks about how they ought to work together in the best order - not trampling each other and themselves selfishly.  Giving up that advantage is a disaster.

I'm hopeful despite it all, but we have to start to at least appreciate the good lessons our ancestors taught us, even if some points are disupted.

Having a gayer-than-thou attitude..

Update: I really need to get out more.

...in sports.

Three bisexual men filed a lawsuit in Seattle, Washington against the North American Gay Amateur Athletic Alliance (NAGAAA) claiming they were discriminated against for not being gay enough to participate in the organization's Gay Softball World Series, The Seattle Times reported Tuesday evening.

The three men who filed the suit, Steven Apilado, LaRon Charles and Jon Russ, claim their softball team, D2, was disqualified from participating in the softball championship because the alliance ruled they were "nongay."

I don't even want to think about the kind of evaluations needed in order to determine if you are gay enough to play in the Gay Softball World Series.

But wait, there's more! In politics.

Veteran Rep. Babette Josephs (D., Phila.) last Thursday accused her primary opponent, Gregg Kravitz, of pretending to be bisexual in order to pander to lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender voters, a powerful bloc in the district.

"I outed him as a straight person," Josephs said during a fund-raiser at the Black Sheep Pub & Restaurant, as some in the audience gasped or laughed, "and now he goes around telling people, quote, 'I swing both ways.' That's quite a respectful way to talk about sexuality. This guy's a gem."

Kravitz, 29, said that he is sexually attracted to both men and women and called Josephs' comments offensive.

A straight guy pretending to be bi? What would Rock Hudson think of that? Maybe I am a male lesbian, a woman attracted to other women, but trapped in a man's body.

I really need to get out more.

Catholic priest pleads guilty to child molestation

Well, not exactly.

Former teacher Stephanie Ragusa pleaded guilty today to having sex with two middle school students.

Ragusa, who taught at Davidsen Middle School, faces up to 10 years in state prison and 10 years of probation when she is sentenced June 15.

She pleaded guilty to three counts of lewd and lascivious battery in a March 2008 case involving a 14-year-old boy.

She also pleaded guilty to two counts of having unlawful sex with a minor in an April 2008 case involving a 16-year-old boy.

Both boys were students at Davidsen Middle.

Just making my point. And here's more news about the Tampa Bay teacher abuse scandals

Now they tell us

It's not a Catholic thing.

"We don't see the Catholic Church as a hotbed of this or a place that has a bigger problem than anyone else," said Ernie Allen, president of the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children. "I can tell you without hesitation that we have seen cases in many religious settings, from traveling evangelists to mainstream ministers to rabbis and others."

Here in Tampa Bay, we don't worry about the priests. Your 14-year-old son is more at risk of being raped by his female public schoolteacher.

Thank God I'm not a parent.

I'd be living in terror that my daughter would meet this guy.

Levi Johnston, Sarah Palin's grandbaby-daddy and the bane of her existence, is pitching his own docu-series in which he will introduce viewers to Alaska.

Why shouldn't this deadbeat live off Palin's fame? There's a whole cable network (MSNBC) doing it.

BTW Levi, about the Playgirl spread. The vast majority of Playgirl customers are not women. You may be developing a fan base you might not appreciate.

The esteemed theologian...

....Sir Elton John.

So it comes as a surprise that in Parade magazine this week, John claims that one of the central figures of Christianity is in fact a homosexual.

"I think Jesus was a compassionate, super-intelligent gay man who understood human problems," he tells Parade. "On the cross, he forgave the people who crucified him."

Of course Jesus is not gay. We all know from The Da Vinci Code that He was shacking up with Mary Magdalene.

Tiger, Tiger burning bright

Keep your way far from her And do not go near the door of her house,
Or you will give your vigor to others And your years to the cruel one ;
And strangers will be filled with your strength And your hard-earned goods will go to the house of an alien ;
And you groan at your final end, When your flesh and your body are consumed ;

Proverbs 5:8-11

Not a whole lot has changed in the 3000 years since these words were written. And from what we know of the writer he didn't follow his own advice.

The technology makes things more interesting. Bathsheba never had any text messages or voicemail to hang over King David's head. And maybe a rewrite where the poor guy loses his hard-earned goods to the cocktail waitress.

For a guy who is world famous, Tiger has worked hard to mind his own business. He's never been on MSNBC calling me a teabagger or a racist. He has done nothing to harm the economy. In fact, he has probably created more jobs than the other public figures mentioned on this blog. Hopefully he can get his family back together.

A public service, yeah, that's the ticket!

An ABC affiliate in D.C. will run a story on breast exams during November sweeps.

The ABC affiliate in Washington is airing a two-part series that takes a close — and unobscured — look at breast self-exams. The series is airing during the fall "sweeps" period critical for a TV station's ad revenue, prompting concern by a parental watchdog group. But WJLA insists it's not just a naked attempt to boost the ratings.

The two segments include clinical demonstrations of self-exams, and the breasts of the two volunteers are not blurred. They were to air during the 5 p.m. and 11 p.m. newscasts Thursday and Friday.

Forgive me for my cynicism, but it is common practice here in Tampa for local stations to do stories on the strip joint industry or prostitution during ratings periods. Or other sensational stuff like, "Your children will DIE!!!! Film at 11."

It was about time that some local news department would decide to double down.

You thought wrong, kiddo

You know... five years ago, if I had to make a list of impossible things that would never happen, you performing a coup de grace, by pulling a Michael Hutchense on yourself, would have been right at the top of the list. But I'd be wrong, wouldn't I?

In this case, yes, we all were. There's little else can be said, either - except two things. First and most obviously, that it's a terrible and sad end for anyone. Second, that it's likely enough that Mr. Carradine had company, with said company fleeing the scene before his discovery. We may never know for sure. This is Bangkok, after all. Can't be too careful with your company.

It's (blank)'s fault!

No... not Bush. It's the oldest (blank) in the book - the Church.

MIAMI (Reuters) – A popular U.S. Roman Catholic priest photographed frolicking with a woman on a Florida beach announced on Thursday he had joined the Episcopal Church to pursue the priesthood in a faith that allows married clergy.

"I've seen with my own eyes how many brothers of mine serve God as married men and with the blessing of having their own families," said Father Alberto Cutie, whose removal from his Miami Beach parish prompted public debate about the Catholic Church's celibacy requirement for priests.

Now, I want to start here: I feel for the guy. No joke. He wants to serve God, and he feels that his vocation is marriage. He and I have that much in common. One of the things that the seminary is meant to do is to bring a man's vocation into focus. Every year plenty of seminarians realize that their call is to raise families instead of parishes, and they leave, as they ought. Sometimes there's a miss and someone is ordained, as Fr. Cutie is, or they take a lifetime vow in a lay order, and they realize along the way that God's call is to marriage. And this is what brings me to the upsetting thing about all of this.

The thing is, that nobody wakes up one morning with a huge lump on his head and a collar on his neck. Fr. Cutie knew going in about the discipline required of Roman Catholic priests. If he didn't, there is one last reminder at the ordination ceremony:

You ought anxiously to consider again and again what sort of a burden this is which you are taking upon you of your own accord. Up to this you are free. You may still, if you choose, turn to the aims and desires of the world (licet vobis pro artitrio ad caecularia vota transire). But if you receive this order (of the subdiaconate) it will no longer be lawful to turn back from your purpose. You will be required to continue in the service of God, and with His assistance to observe chastity and to be bound for ever in the ministrations of the Altar, to serve who is to reign.

By stepping forward despite this warning, when invited to do so, and by co-operating in the rest of the ordination service, the candidate is understood to bind himself equivalently by a vow of chastity. He is henceforth unable to contract a valid marriage, and any serious transgression in the matter of this vow is not only a grievous sin in itself but incurs the additional guilt of sacrilege.

This is the standard. The Church gets a lot of flak for the standard, but it deals in free will, and a person understanding and freely choosing to bind oneself has the right to know what, exactly, that choice entails. It's hardly a big secret, in any case. And there is always the understanding on the Church's part of the people she shepherds and cares for. Had Fr. Cutie later realized that he had taken vows that God had not asked of him, he could go to his bishop and ask to be laicized, to be relieved of his vows and office in order to pursue his true vocation.

Well, that's not exactly the order he went in.

He was relieved of his duties at St. Francis de Sales parish in Miami Beach earlier this month after the entertainment magazine TVnotas published photos of him in swim trunks, snuggling and kissing a woman on the sands of a beach in Florida.

Cutie later said he had fallen in love with the woman and broken his vow of celibacy. He apologized for his behavior, but told the Univision Spanish-language television network, "I didn't stop being a man just because I put on a cassock. There are trousers under this cassock."

The apology is good - but the line about not being a man anymore? That's grade-A balderdash. Bravo Sierra, padre. The Church didn't ask him or any priest not to be a man anymore. The concept that a man is only equal to his sexual faculties is completely insulting.

At his news conference, Cutie described his move as "going into a new family" and said he would continue to proclaim God's word. "I will always love the Catholic Church and all its members who are committed in their faith and have
enriched my life in so many ways," he said.

So... why, then, would Fr. Cutie move to the Episcopalian church, when the Eastern rite Catholic churches permit married clergy? Of course, you'd have to married first, and as we have seen, this is not the case here; but again, there is the active ministry of the Church. There is the authority to grant dispensations at need. The saying, "Hard cases make bad law," is applicable here - the whole disicpline ought not to be overturned just for one wayward and willful man reneging on his vows, but it's possible to do something in the individual situation. That isn't possible once Fr. Cutie decides to bail.

The Spider is fond of saying that pastors are high-value targets of the evil one, and this is why. The more of them in high-profile spots that take public falls, the better his business is. It's part of the general strategy of those who oppose the Church to bring up its faults:

Some Catholics expressed sympathy for Cutie and said it was time to end the celibacy rule. Others said that, given the recent scandals involving U.S. priests sexually abusing young boys, and Irish priests raping, flogging and enslaving children in Catholic schools, they were relieved that Cutie had merely become involved with an adult woman.

Again, I'm forced to call complete BS. Who are these "some Catholics," and who are these "others?" No quote? I'm going to just come right out and say that every single one of these some and others are either theoretical, or people in the newsroom. No doubt, one could find examples of these. Fair enough. Why, then, were NO such examples found by either the two reporters or the two editors credited? They certainly found room to list up some of the more horrible sins and scandals of the recent past.

All of this could have been mitigated. I have no idea if Fr. Cutie ever did come forward to his bishop or to his confessor. It seems likely that he either didn't, or that nobody close to him was able to convince him that this was a bad idea; he went forward with this canoodling, and broke his vows. Then he held this little presser in order, not to apologize, but to justify himself by leaving the Church and putting the blame on them, instead of squarely on himself.

In the media of course he comes off like an honest fellow, caught in conflicting loyalties, and stuck with no other way out... and the media, which can't really be bothered to do even the online research I've done tonight, will gladly play this up as the acceptable storyline, with his own complicity. It's hard enough that the foes of the Church exclude any good she does or any virtue she teaches in favor of scandal and crime; worse that the good padre decided to join with those foes by blaming the Church for his own faults. It's the big danger in becoming well-known in general: it becomes more about the person and less about what they're known for. It can be politics, or music, or acting, or nearly anything else one can think of - the person stops doing their best work because they focus on themselves rather than the work. Fr. Cutie's attitude here is not that he ought to sacrifice to be a priest; in effect it's the reverse and the congregation has to sacrifice to have him - he has to be married and satisfy both his own needs and the needs of his family, first. And that's the congregation he wants to get - what of the one he's just betrayed? The priesthood is not all about him.

His words at this press conference would not be out of place coming from the mouth of any starlet going to rehab, or suspended athlete, or elected official caught cheating on their spouse. In this case, the wronged spouse is Christ Himself, which makes it doubly terrible.

Karma Sutra gonna get you

In moving to the DC area, Dawn Eden winds up getting closer to the action - in a manner of speaking. The action is represented by a column by Ms. Ally Pregulman in The Hatchet, the student newspaper of George Washington University. Be warned, this is tough reading for anyone who has a daughter or younger sister, but it needs to be read.

(Aside - nice touch not calling it the Daily Hoya or something. The name shows more imagination than much of the content.)

Ms. Eden quotes a few standout items and asks for a kindly rebuttal...

At the outset, let's get the dull business of "prudery" out of the way. This is not going to be a post full of naive disbelief that college students are actually (gasp) having ess-eee-exx with each other. In fact, I find that the naivete is usually from the kids towards the oldsters. Whenever one tries to talk sex with the younger generation, they assume "you don't know how things are nowadays," and forget a few facts. For one, we oldsters (or not so oldsters) were once youngsters ourselves - we remember our own days of frolic. In fact, we are many of us not quite removed from those days. (Where do you kids think you came from, anyway? Didn't we have that talk?) In fact, it is usually teens who are horrified that their parents are actually (gasp) having ess-eee-exx with each other. So much for prudery.

What's more, the young-uns don't draw the obvious conclusion - we were there, and now we're here. They'll age, too. Their bright vanguard of the hip and knowing will be inexorably overtaken by the ranks of the square and staid. As such, the advice that we have now is borne of the experiences we had then; those experiences are not nearly so foreign or unrealistic as their own. This isn't mere hypothesis that fails in the face of reality, but reality itself distilled into workable theory. It's they, not us, who are flying in the dark when they disregard what their elders have learned the hard way.

As such, when Ms. Pregulman starts her column by saying that "Mom and Dad's move-in day advice won't be anything like this," we can agree. For the sake of young adults everywhere, we certainly hope their parents' advice is different. What's offered here is, in short, a disaster - ironically offered up as the fruits of experience. In fact, one commenter at the Dawn Patrol calls it "harm mitigation," and that sums it up perfectly. Does anyone think it's wisdom to talk about mitigating harms that are simple to avoid? It's as if we decided to teach kids how to bounce off cars rather than teaching them how to look both ways and not to play in the street. What's more, Ms. Pregulman has utterly nil to say about mitigating the harms that following her advice will probably cause.

There will be fisking later, but first let's have some actual advice. Rather than mitigating one's risks when it comes to sex, it's simpler to avoid them. Chastity is not only perfectly acceptable, it is by far the most reasonable and charitable way for anyone to live.

To start, chastity isn't merely "abstinence über alles." Just as honesty is a positive value beyond "don't tell lies" and temperence is a positive value beyond "don't overindulge," chastity is a positive value beyond merely not hooking up. It is, in short, integrity in one's sexual being.

We see integrity as very important in other areas of life. We need to be honest with others; with ourselves moreso, if we hope to understand what we desire out of life. We then need to be prudent, to understand what will and won't advance our goals. We need to be charitable, so that our pursuits won't harm others. We need to be brave so we won't turn back when opposed. We need to have understanding, so we can learn from life and know best how to apply those lessons. And we need willpower - both to chose, and then to persist. One simply goes further in life when all of one is moving in the same direction.

Damage to our integrity in those areas shows pretty quickly in the bottom line, so to speak: we don't get where our hopes would take us. We wind up being unhappy, and making others unhappy. It's usually obvious when the problem is telling lies, or failing to stick to our studies, or an overfondness for double-chocolate extra-thick chocolate chunk sundaes (with chocolate sauce). But when it comes to chastity, these simple truths have been pretty well obscured by a lot of talk about being well-adjusted, having control over our own bodies, and enjoying a great gift freely. As a result, if we fail to be chaste we not only wind up with the same troubles as other failures in integrity, we often don't know why we're unhappy. We're smart, work hard, tell the truth, care for others, and know where we want to be, so what's up?

For one thing, we have an integrity problem we don't recognize. For another, chastity involves not only sexual integrity, but a lot of the other areas of integrity as well. A deficit here starts draining the other areas of integrity as well - we start to lie to ourselves about our real problem, we become sidetracked trying to avoid something we need to practice, or else we become less sure that we need it.

We do need it. We don't often believe that utter fulfillment is to be found in lies, or in exquisite foods, or in ruthlessly trampling others. We can fall for it for the moment but it's hard to found a bedrock philosophy on such things. Those who show the least care for themselves in these areas are usually quite quick to cry foul when it's done to them; which shows that whatever they may say, integrity is important to them - at least, in other people. ("Hypocrisy is the tribute that vice pays to virtue.") We do, however, fall quite often for lies about sex, as described above.

There's a good reason for that: the things we're told about being well-adjusted, having control over our own bodies, and enjoying a great gift freely are all true. The lie is that we gain all of that by indulgence in sex, whenever and wherever. But five minutes' thought should show us the reality: when it comes to sex, it is the chaste who are well-adjusted, controlling our own bodies, and enjoying the gift freely. Well-adjusted, in that their sexual nature is in accord with the rest of themselves, and not at odds; in control, in that the will chooses rather than blind moods; and freely enjoyed as I hope to explain below.

Setting aside for the moment all of the complications of disease and pregnancy, there's the question of emotional and spiritual involvement in sex. True sex demands integrity, not just in abstention but also in practice. It's meant to connect us in the body, but also in mind and spirit through the body. Sex whenever with whomever invariably runs in to a contradiction - because the mind and the spirit have to be divided to be thus completely given to more than one other person. This is not integrity with others - not in honesty, not in charity, and certainly not in sexuality. It's also not integrity with oneself, because one has to divide oneself into little boxes in order to keep the damage from spreading into the other areas of one's character: sex in this box, and all of things that sex was meant to connect in other boxes. One is no longer having sex to the full - it may be pleasurable but it is not possible to describe it as free enjoyment, because one is by definition not free to let one's full self flow into the union.

Nor is one capable of accepting all that flows in the other direction. How could one accept the full trust and vulnerability of the other in a sexual union and then betray them later? There are two answers: either one can't, in which case one must refuse to receive what is given; or else one can, in which case one is rather a total bastard - treacherous and untrustworthy, ruinous to self and others.

It takes a lot of integrity to be oneself instead of what other people expect. It takes discipline and self-command to take the direction that will do good for you and others, rather than the easy way. There's a saying that any log can simply float downstream; all the strength and willpower comes from heading the other way, first to choose that path and then to travel it. That holds true in virtue as well, and virtue about sex is no exception.

So a chaste person also gets a good amount of training in things like courage and prudence and honesty. The show respect for themselves and others, no less than they do by being honest or brave or thoughtful. They also gain in knowledge, because if anyone wants to their limits, they are best served by testing their strength against something that pushes back. Sex pushes on us from every angle - and most strongly from within. The outer pressures for sex would be far fewer, and weaker, if it were not so. Ads use the language of sex as a selling point because it speaks to us in a way we readily understand, for example. Simply indulging whenever we feel the urge can teach us little about ourselves. In fact, it simply means that sex (being strong) will push us anywhere the urge goes. We lose our power to choose when we simply go along. It's easier to laugh when the bully kicks the class bookworm; or to go along with a group lie when somebody starts to ask hard questions. We don't normally think much of ourselves when we do those things. Chastity should be no exception in our mind, since it is no exception in reality.

Feeling fisky

(Part one above.)

Keeping all that in mind, we can now read Ms. Pregulman's column with open eyes.

This may be your first time sharing a room. Respect your roommates by not hooking up when they are there - even if you think they are asleep.

Neither here, nor anywhere else, will you observe the author advising us to respect ourselves. One can at least congratulate her for her lack of hypocrisy.

So please, for the sake of your sex life, have a signal; put a ribbon on the door, anything to show the room is occupied. Even better, meet an upperclassman that has a single bedroom and go there.

This advice is in response to nearly being caught mid-frolic with her boyfriend. Now, many people would describe this as a wake-up call, but the author has hit the snooze button. Let us not be caught napping ourselves: a ribbon on the door is not a solution. My generation used a rubber band or some other subtle signpost. Believe me, when the roomie's dad walks her back to her dorm and she sees the ribbon (or whatnot), it isn't going to spare one the embarrassment: he is going to see it, and he is going to know. If one is worried about one's good reputation, one needs to actually preserve it, and not merely keep up the pretense. Pretenses slip - for example, when one writes a column exposing the reality behind the appearance, with one's name for a byline - or just when one grows incapable of keeping track of what one told whom, when. Here, the advice of Joe Torre comes into play: "I always tell the truth. This way, I never have to remember anything." *

And, under the heading of "harm mitigation" - if any young ladies are reading, please do NOT choose a beau simply based on how many other people are in the house with him. And if you do feel the utter and absolute need to frolic, do NOT give up control of your surroundings by going to his place, and ESPECIALLY if he lives alone. Should you suddenly feel differently, you have less resource to escape or refuse there, and less reason to hope that somebody will interrupt to your benefit.

Always use a condom. I know it's old news, but just do it. I have a friend who takes birth control and stopped using condoms to "see what it feels like." So far she has been lucky, but I don't want to be the one to take her to Planned Parenthood. The abortion clinics in D.C. have the most protesters because of their location - you don't want to be harassed while taking care of an unplanned situation.

This is high on the list of positive values in the zeitgeist - the Freedom Not to be Hassled. ** In fact, you can see it here before the author ever reaches her gripe about protestors: "I don't want to be the one to take her..." Why not? Better that she have to get harassed by herself, so the author doesn't have to be bothered? Being there for others means taking on some hassles; it comes with the territory. In fact, any attempt to achieve mastery (or even competence) requires that we take some trouble; we have to learn, we have to persevere, and we often have to stop our ears to people who tell us we're wasting our time. It holds true for education or athletics or hobbies or creativity, and it certainly holds true in love. Refusing this essential aspect of life is a major indication that the author isn't ready for sex at all, and her advice on the topic is not likely to be helpful.

A little bit of bubbly never hurt anyone's libido, but girls, don't go home with the guy you've been taking shots with all night. Get a number and call later.

"Hi, is this Ally? Hi. We were getting totally blitzed the other night, remember? Vaguely? Yeah, so, uhm... want to get together for some lunch after the polysci lecture?" This can't really be serious. Again, ladies - don't waste your time on a guy whose appeal rises as the bottle empties. You have to sober up sometime. Besides, a guy whose self-control can't keep him on his own two feet (or on the road) for the trip back home is going to reveal that little character flaw in a lot of other areas too.

And guys, too much to drink will seriously hurt your game. You don't want to be known as the freshman who couldn't get it up.

This is the second time the author mentions freshmen having sex. Again, not that it's shocking or anything, but seriously, what's wrong with being known as the freshman who isn't sleeping around? For that matter, is there anything wrong with not having one's prowess known at all? College should be about classes every once in a while. Nor do I see any sort of health in this catty dishing about other people's personal issues. The first part of this column said, in effect, "protect your good name." This part of it helpfully adds, "because nobody else will." This is more than a point in favor of sobriety; it's also a good reason to keep zipped.

Hooking up in bathrooms is never OK. If you wouldn't want to touch it, don't have sex on it. However, if your roommates are home and you need to get it on, the shower is a suitable alternative.

One is tempted to regard the whole column as parody at this point. Is this supposed to encourage us to have sex? First step - have no self-control as who else is around; second step - have no ability to stop once one is started; third step - go to a shower, where heck-all knows what else has gone on before one's arrival, and go to it there. Presumably, the shower is a far more public domain in a dorm or apartment than is the room itself, which at least has a lock on the door. In my freshman dorm, the bathrooms and showers for the whole floor were the same room; further, one wing was guys and one wing was girls, which meant that it would be 9000 times harder to make a clean getaway, no matter how much body wash one used. (But by all means, protect your reputation with a ribbon on the door that everyone knows the meaning of, including everyone else on the floor.)

Guys, don't text a girl you hooked up with a month later for round two. Chances are she's moved on to bigger and better and isn't interested in you anymore. Regardless of your intentions, call back within two weeks. After that, she's moving on.

If everyone followed all the rest of the advice, this isn't really going to make a difference, is it? Guys will also have moved on, to the next young woman who's reading the column.

If it's red and itchy, go to the doctor. Student Health Service has seen worse and it's never OK to leave something untreated. I know its uncomfortable, but you don't want to sit on the bench too long; get tested and get your head back in the game. Plus, they have free condoms.

At least this is slightly good advice. Never leave a health problem untreated. But here I think the author fails to notice an obvious contradiction - she knows this is uncomfortable but is giving advice that is guaranteed to land the reader in many future uncomfortable situations; and as she's said above, she doesn't want to be the one to help the reader through it.

Oh, and free condoms! Rather than, say, condoms that one must purchase oneself, thus taking ownership of what one will be using them for.

College is a great time to try new things.

A subject you've never read before? New foods? Yoga?

Ask your girl to bring over a copy of Cosmopolitan. There's always a list of 100 things you've never tried or even thought existed.

Or that you missed when it ran two years ago.

If you're feeling really adventurous, pick up the Karma Sutra and learn about ancient civilizations.

One would be better served in reading a history book. (One hopes that the kids won't get a similar taste for cannibalism, human sacrifice, ritual drug use, or other hallmarks of ancient civilizations; I know the hour is late on some of this as well.)

Girls, I know it's been a while since high school cheerleading, but I promise your flexibility will return.

And if you were just on the flag squad, tough. Sex is for pretty people!

With all this new learning, don't forget about studying! Give yourself goals and reward yourself for doing well. Guys, don't get discouraged. Every girl has different needs. If something tried and true lets you down, pay more attention in anatomy or discover it for yourself... you will be rewarded for your findings.

Lest anyone else miss that Blinding Flash of the Obvious, let's go ahead and spell it out: swapping partners every few weeks is an impediment to gaining skill, not a help. One is starting over every time - and not from zero, either, but from less than zero, because they have to unlearn the habits that were good for a previous beau in order to please the new beau.

How many people who are "lousy in bed" could have saved themselves endless trouble by waiting until they got married? Sure, they would have been awkward and ignorant; but they also would have only one learning curve. They would have been awkward and ignorant in a secure place, committed to the other, and committed to by the other, with a whole lifetime to learn and enjoy, in full freedom and peace. (If Cosmo is such fun, how about twenty years' worth of issues?) Best of all, they can show the same charity to their best beloved, and neither would have to worry about competing against the memories of sex with other people. They get full enjoyment of each other without wasting their mind and heart on comparisons and cold judgments. Again - that is the true reward for one's findings, and again, it is given not to the indulgent but to the chaste.

The fisking was, alas, grouchier than the column. That's inherent, I suppose, in criticism as compared to offering a sound positive alternative.

* As an example of what I mentioned at the beginning - Torre said this in the bygone days when he managed the Atlanta Braves; back when there was big-league baseball in Montreal and neither that nor NHL hockey in the entire state of Florida. Reagan wasn't even president YET. And where's my prune juice and tapioca, consarnit?

** If it came with the reciprocal Freedom Not to Hassle Others it would have more to recommend it. But instead it's paired with the Freedom to Hassle as We See Fit: it demands the right to lecture instead of converse, making the other person a target rather a participant in an exchange of ideas. As a result it makes people rude and ignorant, trampling other people while shutting off any possible attempt to learn from their reply. What if they have new or overlooked information? What if they notice a flaw in your thinking? If it's really that important to be right, then maybe that flaw is something one would like to correct.