From where I stand Mr. Maher’s point is that organizations such as yours have made statements against the HPV vaccine because you all are concerned that it may encourage non-married women and teenage girls to engage in sex. Bridget Maher, an employee of your organization, is on the record as stating “Giving the HPV vaccine to young women could be potentially harmful, because they may see it as a licence to engage in premarital sex,” (New Scientist). If this is not the official position of the FRC, why has she made this comment and why has the FRC done nothing to publicly retract the statement?

Ms. Maher is not the only one from your organization to make such statements. Tony Perkins has stated that “it [the vaccine] sends the wrong message” (Fortune).

There is also an alert on your organization’s site dtd Feb 9, 2007 about Governor Perry’s move to make the vaccine mandatory wherein a reference is made to the myth of “safe sex”, complete with scare quotes.

I believe that these unretracted statements paint a picture of an organization that is not remotely concerned about the actual health or welfare of women. In fact, I believe it is reasonable to conclude from these statements, similar statements from other like-minded organizations and the combined actions of all of you that the entire shtick is about making sex as scary as possible.

Furthermore, over the years organizations such as yours have repeatedly misrepresented the effectiveness of condoms in the transmission of STDs as well as overrepresented the failure rates of condoms and other forms of birth control. And don’t even get me started on your organization’s stance on abortion. There is also the entire anti-birth control wing of the abstinence only movement to consider which has only gotten bolder in recent years.

As for painting Bill Maher as being in the same category as Ann Coulter, that’s absurd. Ann Coulter is a category. No one on the left comes close to her. I challenge you to find one person on the left that has consistently stated things that are comparable to the Ann Coulter quotes in the provided link.

And he also misrepresents the position of the Family Research Council. FRC’s position on the HPV vaccine is exactly the opposite of what he claims:

FRC announced in October of 2005 that we would enthusiastically support the development of the vaccine and federal approval of its use, including its addition to the list of vaccines recommended to physicians and of those made available to lower-income families through the Vaccines for Children program. Virtually all pro-family public policy organizations have announced similar support for the vaccine itself.

http://www.frc.org/get.cfm?i=LH07B02&f=WX06K03

Maher, like his friend Ann Coulter, is more concerned about demonizing his enemies than he is in telling the truth.

Hm.. who is calling people these names again? If you can’t cite a source, it’s you.

That said, I think the vaccine should be widely available. Perhaps not mandatory, as it is relatively new and untested, but there you go.

-Religious nonwhacko