The US Is Facing an 'Out of Control' STI Epidemic, Experts Warn

Lets go really big in terms of connecting the dots. Wind the clock back to 1900. That generation certainly had its own set of problems. I am not going to claim that was some kind of golden age, but a lot has happened societally since then. There was the rise of feminism. I don't think that was 100% bad, but no fault divorce was one of the milestones of the feminist movement. In time we figured out that this new "achievement" had huge consequences because of the way it affects the children. Children who are raised in stable homes with a father and a mother have advantages over children who are not raised in those environments. Rather than repent and acknowledge the natural consequences of rejecting God's prescribed design, we double down and we invent new philosophies that blame the problem on the healthy family structure. You see they are the oppressors, and the kids who fall behind with a crumbling family structure around them are the oppressed.

Feminism also embraced promiscuity and free sex. So, sex outside of marriage picks up steam. Sexual liberation throws off the supposed shackles of Christianity and its ethics and morals, but there is a big problem: if you have free sex, then what do you do with all of the babies? This is a big problem, and this is why the abortion mills were created. It is also why contraception was created, which I am not completely against, but it exists primarily to enable the sexual revolution. There is also another problem with free sex, and that is the STDs. So, more technological advances have to be made in the areas of medicine to circumvent the natural consequences of the choices that we make. And like the pagan nations of antiquity who embraced free sex, we had to kill the babies that were the result of the free sex.

With the sexual revolution we also see the advent of pornography, which has its own set of problems as well. It is hard to say if there is a direct causal relationship with the advent of pornography and the dawn of the serial killer era, but right in the middle of the vortex of the sexual revolution we see the serial killer phenomenon emerge from 1970-2000. Many of these serial killers were driven by sexual fetishes and fantasies. I think it is wishful thinking to divorce this societal phenomenon from the sexual revolution of the second half of 20th century. So, technology needed to rapidly advance in the criminal justice world to be able to catch these perverted serial killers.

Then we continue the sexual revolution, and people start embracing homosexuality and transgenderism. But there are natural consequences for these choices as well. STDs continue to be a problem. AIDS has taken many lives. There is also the problem of procreation. These are consequences for certain kinds of lifestyles and choices that are built into the natural order. The inability of some lifestyles to procreate is one of those consequences. So, rather than see the writing on the wall in the natural order, we double down and we try to technologically innovate to circumvent the natural consequences of choosing to live these lifestyles. So, we see the rise of IVF and surrogacy. IVF is a form of eugenics. It is abortion on steroids as several human beings are often conceived and then discarded in the process. And then surrogacy is one of the most ironic things to emerge out of all of this because we are learning my body my choice does not apply to surrogate mothers who want to keep their babies. When you really dig into what happens with IVF and surrogacy, you will find there are monstrous injustices involved with both of them. But we are a determined society that will do almost anything to live the lifestyles we are determined to live. Consequences are irrelevant to those who are determined to live the way they want to live. There is also the additional problems of DNA and biology. So, we've invented new ways to circumvent basic physical biology by pumping hormones and doing surgeries that often are irreversible.

So, the big picture here is anyone can look at the natural order and they can know what God's design is. They can see that lifelong monogamous marriage between a man and a woman is God's design for having children. They can see that lifelong monogamous marriage between a man and a woman is God's design for sex. And they can see judgment in nature for those who don't live within that design. It is obvious. However, people are determined to rebel against this and circumvent the obvious natural consequences for living outside of the obvious design for human beings we see in nature. So, we have been building a twisted sexualized technologically enabled Tower of Babel of sorts where we are attempting to rise above the Creator and the natural order He created for mankind. That is essentially what is a happening.

So, to answer some objections further up thread...yes @l_boy we have medically innovated around some of the natural consequences of these life styles. There are aspects of our Tower of Babel that work as intended. That is true. More medical funding might bring the number of Syphilis cases down. I believe you are correct on this point, but that does not refute the point that fundamentally human choices are the genesis of these problems. That is the head spring from which these problems flow. If people changed their lifestyles the problem would go away very quickly. It is the obvious solution to the problem, but the one we are unwilling to implement.

 

I think you are slightly misrepresenting me on one point here. I am libertarian to an extent. I think people should be free to make their own decisions and choices if they don't trample over others. I don't want to change that aspect of our society. Nonetheless, I think our choices are often shrouded in self-deception. Often times choices can be like that thing you really want, and then later at the end of it all you get the thing you were after and you ask yourself why did I do this to myself? All sin and immorality is like that eventually.

Now to address your second point, yes I am willing to make adjustments to my opinion as I grapple with more evidence. I openly admit that some of my opinions are only as good as the data and the facts that go into them. Sometimes there are data points or facts out there in the aether of the internet that I have not considered yet. That does not mean that I necessarily capitulate to an opposing viewpoint when I consider those facts, but I do make adjustments when I have obviously said something in error.

 

I did not make any comments indicating a precise time frame during which divorce rates increased in the country. I also did not say this had any kind of impact on Syphilis. I was simply looking at the big picture of the social movements that have impacted family and marriage in the US in the 20th century to now. It is evidently true that divorce rates increased in the 20th century, and we know that feminism had a big impact on that. I don't think any of that is controversial.

 

Some historical context:

The development of penicillin during the Second World War had a dramatic impact on the syphilis story. By 1947 it was the standard treatment and a highly effective cure, with the antibiotic reducing case numbers in the UK by 90% within ten years. But it was the withholding of this cure that was central to a clinical study that became a byword for racist and unethical experimentation. The Tuskegee Syphilis Study ran from 1932 to 1972 and involved nearly 400 impoverished African-American men living in the US State of Alabama. The men had been diagnosed with latent syphilis, meaning they had the infection but were yet to show obvious symptoms. The purpose of the study was to follow the effects of the disease when left untreated. Not that the men were ever informed that they had syphilis, they were simply told they had ‘bad blood’.​

The history of syphilis part two: Treatments, cures and legislation | Science Museum

Prior to the introduction of penicillin states had marriage laws on the books that required couples to get tested for syphilis, before they could get married. These laws were repealed state by state from the 1970's to the early 2010's. Penicillin was a game changer, though, and this is what got the number of people infected with syphalis under control.

 

Also from the same article:

Inevitably, personal behaviours are still central to the global status of syphilis. For example, researchers have recorded sharp rises in cases amongst men who have sex with men. They propose this has much to do with a reduction in condom use, which for many years has been a key form of protection against human immunodeficiency virus (HIV), the virus that can cause another STI – AIDS. A result of HIV increasingly being seen as a manageable, chronic condition rather than the untreatable disease it once was. Similarly, recent research in Japan has suggested a direct link between rising syphilis cases and the increased use of dating apps by young heterosexual men and women.
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The history of syphilis part two: Treatments, cures and legislation | Science Museum

 

Bad analogy. I am not advocating for the government to police anyone’s sex life. What two people do together in their bedroom is between themselves and God, assuming there are no minors involved and it is consensual.

Also, those who are at risk of contracting syphilis pretty much put themselves at risk with their choices. I don’t know all of the other possible transmission methods, but unless if rape or forced drugging is involved people can live their lives normally with no inconvenience and avoid getting syphalis.

FWIW, the health organizations are the ones who want to get involved in this, not me. The OP was more of a commentary on the consequences of past actions on present realities.