Elvis Presley legal music downloads christmas peace cd2, free downloads of music. Elvis Presley artist of the century cd2, love me, ill be home on christmas day. Elvis Presley got my mojo working, oh little town of bethlehem now and then theres a fool such as i, gentle on my mind. Elvis Presley baby i don t care theres gold in the mountains, it s now or never. Elvis Presley lawdy miss clawdy somebody bigger than you and i tomorrow is a long time, elvisgold records vol 5. Elvis Presley his hand in mine, make the world go away, free download music white christmas. Elvis Presley music websites im a roustabout, best music download site adge of reality. Elvis Presley after loving you i ll hold you in my heart, free mp3 player downloads. Elvis Presley if that isnt love, music store cant help falling in love, when my blue moon turns to gold again. Elvis Presley here comes santa claus free mp3 music download wear my ring around your. Elvis Presley big boss man best of the king jailhouse rock, its now or never a mess of blues, it is no secret what god can do. Elvis Presley kiss me quick, collection vol 2, little sister, a fool such as i. Elvis Presley memories old shep, music downloads free downloadable music. Elvis Presley cindy cindy mp3 free download therell be peace in the valley for me. Elvis Presley youre so square my baby dont care almost download music burning love. Elvis Presley now and then there s a fool such as i, the first noel run on, you don t have to say you love me. Elvis Presley got a lot o livin to do roised on rock download music for free online. Elvis Presley free music download programs funny how time slips away, youre the devil in disguise, he ll have to go. Elvis Presley download classical music are you sincere, i really don t want to know. Elvis Presley love letters from elvis, that s someone you never forget music to download legal music download. Elvis Presley all shook up, wild in the country, collection vol 4. Elvis Presley i m leavin have i told you lately that i love you, judy, a mess of blues.
When was the last time you picked up a book, watched a movie, or flipped through pictures to get a glimpse of something—anything—to do with sex? Okay, next question: when was the first time?
For just a minute, let’s put all religious views on the matter aside. Whether you’re Catholic, Lutheran, Jewish, Baptist, Buddhist, Muslim, Atheist, or anything in-between…whether you think sex before marriage is wrong or not: let’s look at the facts.
First let’s look at the primary fear that goes through your head when you think of sex; pregnancy. A survey taken in 2010 indicated that 34.4 teens out of 1000 gave birth. A teenage pregnancy is defined by the pregnancy taking place and ending before the mother has reached the age of twenty. The teen pregnancy rate in the USA has dropped, but the United States and the United Kingdom are still among the highest in the world for teen pregnancy rates. Almost a third of teen pregnancies end in abortion. It’s shown that in teen pregnancy, the mothers are less likely to finish high school and attend college, and the rates for poverty among teen mothers and their children are high. It’s not an inviting future.
In America, birth control is widely accepted and promoted, but it’s not as effective as it’s marketed to be. Let’s take a look at some of the most common forms of birth control. Birth control pills are not magic; they have an 8 percent failure rate with typical use. Pills have to be taken every day, and can often be forgotten. A condom is great, but it only works if you remember to use it. And even if it is used with every act of intercourse, it has a 15 percent failure rate. An IUD has only a 0.2 to and 0.8 percent depending on the type used, but an IUD can potentially cause dangerously heavy periods, grow through the uterine wall, enter into the womb, and cause miscarriage in the event of failure and pregnancy. A contraceptive sponge has a 32 percent rate of failure, and spermicidal gels or foams have a 29 percent failure rate. None of them are perfect.
Sexually Transmitted Diseases (STD) are a risk former generations never had to worry about. But in this day and age there are at least 20 STDs, including HIV/AIDS. Sexually Transmitted Diseases are more common in girls than in boys. That is because women have what is called a ‘transformation zone’ on their cervix, which decreases as they grow older, but leaves them open to infection with STDs. The vagina is actually very well protected against infections, with elastic like fibers and walls over 20 cells thick, described by Dr. Miriam Grossman (author of Unprotected: A Campus Psychiatrist Reveals How Political Correctness in Her Profession Endangers Every Student ) to be like a self-cleaning oven. But the transformation zone is where we are open to infection, along with anal sex. Have you ever wondered by STDs such as HIV/AIDS are so common among the gay community? The walls of the rectum are only 1 cell thick, easily damaged and wide open to infection.
For women, we are often obsessed with our “choice” in our reproductive health, but women are built differently than men. Should we be infected with an STD, it could cause serious damage to our reproductive tracts, such as scarring, which can close the fallopian tubes and render us unable to bear children later in life. We are also severely uneducated when it comes to our biological clock. Childbearing is easiest in the early to mid twenties, but as women get older, the chances for conceiving become less and less, and our chances for miscarriage or birth defects doubles when we reach somewhere around the age of thirty.
Our culture is obsessed with sex. Everywhere you turn there is an ad promoting birth control, abortion, sex, and all manner of sex related materials. But when it comes to actually holding an educated conversation, we stammer and blush, and hurry from the room. Parents who do not educate their children on safer sex leave them to their own devices, and the material they will find widely available preaches only of sexual exploration and freedom.
I was at the library a few weeks ago, and I picked up several sex education books targeted at middle-school children and teens. The first thing I saw when I opened one book to a random page was “what to do when you decide to bring the baby home”. That told me everything about what the book was telling our children; feel free to explore your sexuality, make your own choices, use birth control, abortion is an option, and…if all else fails, do you want to keep the baby, or give it up for adoption?
The problem with abortion (despite any religious views) is that is can cause scarring, an incompetent cervix in a later pregnancy (where the cervix gives out and cannot carry the baby to term, resulting in a miscarriage), and emotional scarring. Women who have suffered abortions report that they often bled for days, and in the case of chemical abortions, held fetuses in their hands, and suffered for the rest of their lives with memories of the child they were told did not exist.
That brings us back to the beginning. When was the last time you picked up a book, watched a movie, or flipped through pictures to get a glimpse of something—anything to do with sex? When was the first time?
Children are exposed to sex from an early age; encouraged to be beautiful, sexy, to explore, exercise their freedom…but when pregnancy, the very thing the sexual act is designed for, occurs, there is scandal and shame. STDs can cause infertility, and even death, not to mention the emotional trauma that comes with it. Pornography? Forget about it. Even in this over-sexed culture, it’s sinful. Prostitution is outlawed. Who needs it anyway? We’re selling ourselves, and you don’t even have to pay.
You can turn on the TV, go to the mall, or even to the library, and find anything you want about sex. And I have no doubt, that opening that first misguiding book as a nine or ten-year-old, leads us to this: to slavery to sex, and our own free will. Just because you have the right to ‘make a choice’ to do something, doesn’t mean you have to do it.
Author’s Note: “I want to share this information with people because I believe that ignorance is a danger to us and to others. The religious influences in our lives, which I believe are a great help shaping us morally… don’t give us the practical information that, let’s face it, could possibly come in handy for a lot of people.”
You might assume that the recommendations by the World Health Organization, as well as a variety of studies done in England, the Netherlands, and Denmark, might give pause to the German-owned Bayer company in its promotion of their newest incarnation of the hormonal birth control pill Yasmin, which contains an estrogen compound called and Ethinyl estradiol (“World”). The third generation birth control pill, Yasmin, also contains the progesterone drospirenone, which contains potassium, linked to the increased occurrence of blood clotting (Bederman, Kientz). Bayer has faced sanctions and had to pull ads aimed at teens that claim benefits such as preventing acne and PMS, and the FDA strengthened warnings for the Yasmin pill (Meredith, “Birth”). Given the many lawsuits against Bayer’s Yasmin, many might question whether this has gone far enough (“Health”). Since environmental health affects human health indirectly, the hormonal pill should be banned as an environmental hazard or required to be sold with a warning label containing a simple and direct message because not only the environment but women and teenage girls in particular face risks equal to if not greater than the lung cancer risk faced by a smoker.
Why is a drug that has been classified as a group 1 carcinogen (carcinogenic to humans) by the World Health Organization treated as a standard for women’s health and featured in ads targeting young teen aged women? The synthetic estrogen hormones are not eliminated by water treatment plants (AP). High concentrations of these hormones can and do affect wildlife and humans generally — not just the women taking the hormonal birth control pill. According to Luke Dery, “estrogen has been tied to changing the endocrine function and harming the brain of both animals and human beings” (Dery). Because Yasmin is the highest profit producing-drug that Bayer makes, they appear to be able to afford a strategy of marketing, followed by restrictions and penalties resulting from lawsuit settlements (Feeley, “Research,” “Contraceptives”).
Even if Bayer faced further restrictions, such as paying to pollute waterways, the fact remains that the hormonal contraceptive pill is known to be harmful to the environment and humans. According to a website by the Watershed Institute at the University of Wisconsin Eau-Claire: “Overexposure to estrogens have been correlated with increased rates of breast, uterine, and prostate cancer; heart disease; and stroke; as well as decreased muscle mass, sperm count, and sex drive in humans” (“Estrogen”). Although the hormonal contraceptive pill is curiously not listed among the sources of estrogen on the university website, it is implicated in a video produced as a public service advisory (“Estrogen”).
Effects of estrogen, as seen in a graphic from a University of Wisconsin Eau-Claire film called “Estrogen and Estrogen Mimics.” Pedal and Paddle Pollution Video Tour, Part 9, Lower Chippewa River. YouTube. 3 Feb 2011. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pcBDXdNsbTY
When environmentalists hear about the water pollution resulting from hormonal contraceptives, they are quick to point out other sources of synthetic estrogen deriving from pesticides such as atrazine, cattle raising practices, and plastics, such as BPA Bisphenol A, found in a wide range of products (“Can,” McGuire). This is a valid point. Yet, no one has claimed the birth control pill–essentially a steroid—as the sole source of estrogen contamination in water. Ignoring this fact, environmentalists generally invoke the precautionary principle except when hormonal contraceptives are involved. Increasingly, however, it is becoming clear even to environmentalists as well as those inside the pharmaceutical industry that dangers exist for the environment, specifically for animals and humans. Mary Buzby, the director of environmental technology for drug maker Merck & Co. Inc., said: “There’s no doubt about it, pharmaceuticals are being detected in the environment and there is genuine concern that these compounds, in the small concentrations that they’re at, could be causing impacts to human health or to aquatic organisms” (qtd in AP). Hormonal contraceptives are designed to operate at the micro scale for the sole purpose of interfering with female fertility within the endocrine system. They do not disappear when taken but are released later when a toilet is flushed. The fact that these steroids are endocrine disrupting compounds means they are particularly dangerous when present even in trace amounts.
As the University of Wisconsin Eau-Claire video notes, America’s plumbing infrastructure was built at a time when people were not aware of the dangers of estrogen and estrogen mimics. Projected costs to revamp sewer systems are huge (McKie, “Water”). Reverse osmosis, for instance, is capable of removing pharmaceuticals; however, it is extremely expensive and produces several gallons of polluted water for every drinkable gallon (AP). Currently, there is no required testing or established federal limits for trace amounts of drugs such as contraceptives in the drinking water, and regulations do not address trace pharmaceuticals.
Perhaps the biggest problem with the newest oral contraceptives is the extensive marketing to teens (Alley, “Bayer’s,” “Birth,” “EU”). Like cigarette advertising of the past, which played on a young person’s desire to belong and to behave in mature, cool ways, the Yasmin ad depicts high school age girls in cliques or pairs, who seem to be in on a secret. The girls in the ad huddle together, leaning in to find out what the others know, giggling together excitedly or looking off in the distance, as if having an “ahah” moment. The ad implies that Yasmin provides entry to a secret club, and what young woman doesn’t want to be part of the girl group that’s in the know? The ad makes it appear as though casual sex is on a par with a sporting activity in which one takes proper precautions and then can go ahead.
In reality, however, casual sex leaves casualties. Sexually transmitted diseases, unwanted pregnancies, abortion, being used, degraded, left broken hearted: contraceptive use often leaves women devastated. Young women are especially vulnerable to sexual assault, heartache, mood swings, and depression. Steroids put women at risk for a long list of side effects, among which is high blood pressure and blood clots because the blood is thickened (Balinski). This makes the heart work harder. In an article called “Hormonal Contraceptive Use Among Adolescent Girls in Germany in Relation to Health Behavior and Biological Cardiovascular Risk Factors,” scientists found that teenage girls on hormonal contraceptives experienced an increased risk of cardiovascular problems (Du). Apparently, women with higher than normal levels of estrogen are at higher than normal risk for strokes and heart disease. These are serious health risks, and youth does not minimize the risk.
More long-lasting consequences include infertility and interference with the selection of a husband, something most teens probably have not considered. Taking the pill for a long time can interfere with the woman’s menstruation so that she fails to return to a regular cycle when she stops taking the steroid. In some cases, women never regain their fertility. Equally disturbing are the studies showing how the pill affects the choice of mate in humans (Phillips). The interference is caused because the way a hormonal pill works is by mimicking pregnancy. This affects the man looking for a mate, because a pregnant woman is not in her fertile time and thus is not attractive as a mate. Steroid use, in a sense, makes the woman less attractive.
This is not just a matter of dating selection either. Because the best immune system protection and expectation of fertility is derived when the man and woman provide divergent genes, a woman traditionally was attracted to men who smelled different from her relatives. Humans have receptors below the eyes that perceive the pheromones through smell. Some theorize that a woman on steroids is seeking a male with the instincts of a pregnant woman, who seeks brotherly or fatherly protection. Moreover, the researchers found women on steroids no longer show a preference for males with distinctive facial or vocal features that are traditional cues of masculinity (“Unnatural”).
To avoid the problems found, for instance, in the Russian royal line’s propensity for hemophilia, humans have a system for screening potential mates that prefers diverse genes. The best choice of mate, it turns out, is one with divergent genetic qualities, yet women on the pill tend to go with the pheromones that resemble a relative’s. Women traditionally gravitated toward men displaying masculine qualities; not so on the pill (Wenner). Less immunity from diseases may be one of the long term results in the offspring of women on steroids (Roberts). The pill confuses the process of attraction and disrupts the normal patterns of interaction between men and women.
A woman on steroids overlooks or dismisses men that were once at the top of her list. According to the studies, her body thinks she’s pregnant, so the woman on steroids is not interested in men in the same way. Although still dating in the hopes of finding a lifelong partner, the woman is less likely to attract the man best suited to her genetically (Phillips). Teens are trying to fit into their adult roles, and many want to find a lifelong mate. By offering the hormonal pill to teenagers, we are disrupting normal dating patterns and putting them at great risk of cardiovascular problems because adolescents are already experiencing an influx of hormones and the pill may put them at a greater risk of blood clots.
The teen brain is not totally finished developing. Even those not altogether opposed to contraceptives question whether teens should ever be prescribed hormonal birth control. As Katie Clancy points out, girls as young as twelve are often placed on steroids to “regulate” their periods, yet healthy menstruation is characterized, especially at first, by its irregularity. Clancy questions whether hormonal contraceptives will damage what is actually very sensitive human biology. Further, Clancy highlights the fact that accumulated or lifetime exposure to estrogen is a known risk factor for cancer. For these reasons, she specifically cautions against prescribing steroids to adolescent girls (Clancy). Jacking up the estrogen levels in a teen may permanently mess up the brain’s own regulation orchestrated by the hypothalamus and pituitary gland.
If the concern is unwanted pregnancies, surely it is wise to look at a method that has been shown to be effective in reducing out of wedlock pregnancies among teens. Many commentators have noted the low success rate of teen contraceptive use, often referred to as a high discontinuation rate. In contrast, researchers at the University of Pennsylvania found that teaching abstinence reduced the number of unwanted pregnancies. Contrary to the expectation voiced by former President Bill Clinton and others, those taught about the benefits of abstinence did not lead them to behaviors that would allow them to get AIDS later (Ertelt “Study”). The teens were actually able to refrain from sex until a later age than those not provided with abstinence education. The study concluded that abstinence programs encourage teens to take a long view, teaching them to consider their long-term goals of education and career or having a family. By comparison, the safe sex program was less successful (Ertelt “Women”). Clearly, there is a better alternative to pushing steroids and emergency contraception on young girls.
Do patients routinely read all the fine print provided with a prescription? Most scan the pages briefly and assume the doctor evaluates the risk for them. The small print is often overwhelming, and the tendency of a healthy person is to suppose the doctor would not prescribe it if the risk was too great. However, as has been argued here, the chemical hormone estrogen is a known carcinogen and should not be used as a routine medication ever. According to the World Health Organization, estrogen causes cancer in humans. Because of the insistence on what has come to be known as reproductive rights, physicians apparently prefer to take a hands-off approach, accepting the feminist charge that steroid drugs are required for women’s health. Given the increasing research on the detriments to the environment as well as health concerns and unwarranted risks for women and adolescent girls, steroids should be banned outright — or at least sold with a simply-stated warning label in bold type face on the outside of the package:
Balinski, Thaddeus. “Study: contraceptive pills put teen girls at increased risk of high blood pressure.” Life Site News. 12 July 2012.
“Can Birth Control Hormones Be Filtered from the Water Supply?” Earth Talk: The Environmental Magazine. Scientific American. http://www.scientificamerican.com/article.cfm?id=birth-control-in-water-supply
Feeley, Jef and Naomi Kresge. “Bayer’s Yasmin Lawsuit Settlements Rise to $402.6 Million.” Bloomberg Business Week. 31 July 2012. http://www.businessweek.com/news/2012-07-31/bayer-s-yasmin-lawsuit-settlements-rise-to-402-dot-6-million
McKie, Robin. “£30bn bill to purify water system after toxic impact of contraceptive pill.” The Guardian. 2 June 2012. http://www.guardian.co.uk/environment/2012/jun/02/water-system-toxic-contraceptive-pill
Meredith, Kristine. “Current Yasmin and Yaz Label Warnings Are Inadequate.” Yaz on Trial. 9 Dec. 2011. http://www.yazontrial.com