Farrah Fawcett, Jaclyn Smith, Kate Jackson

A sex icon when I was growing, Farah Fawcett is in the hospital. She is apparently suffering from complication related to treatment for anal cancer.  Again, the media skirts the issue of what are the main causes of anal cancer, just as when Jade Goody was dying of cervical cancer.

As with cervical cancer, HPV is the main cause of anal cancer, and anal sex is major contributor of the transmission of the HPV.  Sexual promiscuity is the main cause of the transmission of HPV.  Women and gay men are especially at risk of anal cancer.  Gay men are apparently 17 times more likely to come down with anal sex than men who do not have sex with men.

There is a vaccine against HPV, Gardasil, which apparently is effective against the strains of HPV which cause 70% of cervical cancers.  So immunized girls who are sexually active are still at risk, though greatly reduce.

The media has largely abdicated its responsibility to warn people about the dangers of promiscuous sexual relations, gay sex, and anal sex.  Dr. Craig Carter would suggest that is because of pansexualism; he writes (April 4, 2009):

What is it about sex that makes people stupid? …

Pansexualism is the real ideology driving the sexual revolution. It is the doctrine that sexual liberation means that all should have sex with all at will. It holds up promiscuity and the unisex ideal as its goods. True sexual liberation can only occur when sexual pleasure has been totally detached from the bonds of family life and procreation. Pansexualism seeks to sever the connection between parents and children because that tie stands in the way of complete sexual liberation for the autonomous individual. Parenting prevents individuals from satisfying their hormonally driven desires with whomever they feel like doing it with at any given moment. So the family must die. It is an obstacle to individual fulfillment; it is inherently “oppressive.”

Margaret Sanger turned the birth control movement into a powerful social force and the whole basis of her philosophy was the idea that sexual pleasure is a right and the highest good. Contraception and abortion, she taught, are necessary tools in order for individuals to find sexual fulfillment. The whole population explosion scare of the 70’s and even the eugenic message of the 20’s and 30’s were secondary in many ways. They served as convenient rationales at the time, just as the environmental hysteria of the contemporary world does. The strategy is to figure out what people are worried about (the white race being over-run by the dark races, population increase, global warming, etc. ) and then promote contraception and abortion as the answer. This is more effective politically [than] just coming out with one’s pansexualist agenda.

My tendency in making such a report is not to criticize the victims in their hour of despair. This is about media malpractice, and the dying person should be left in peace. But I’m having not a little trouble with Ms. Fawcett. She apparently received embryonic stem cell treatment for her cancer in Germany because of the current ban which Obama is removing.  I consider it wrong to save your life at the expense of another.

Update: But now her producer denies that it is stem cell treatment that she is receiving, against so many media outlets have repeated this story (including the Toronto Star). Is this another case of media malpractice? The mistake here is reporting a rumor as fact.

Update: Farrah Fawcett died on June 25, 2009.