segunda-feira, 23 de julho de 2012

Students Confront Contraceptive Establishment With "1Flesh" Website - by Elizabeth Crnkovich

I PRI

“We want sexy back!” This is the cry of today's generation, raised in a sex-drenched culture that threatens to empty relationships between the sexes of all love, meaning and romance. 

A network of university students from around the country, brought together by Marc Barnes, knew that human sexuality was intended to be something beautiful, and that it deserved greater respect and appreciation in the world today. They decided that it was high time that someone told the truth about sex, and exposed the root of today's widespread sexual dissatisfaction. 

So it was that in May of this year, these students launched a website entitled: “1Flesh: The Revolt Against Contraception in Marriage.” They described their effort as “A grassroots movement in opposition to the use of artificial contraception, dedicated to bringing great sex to the entire universe.” 

The sexual revolution of the last generation has left a legacy of broken lives and broken hearts for all to see. Young people do not want to make the same mistakes as their parents and older siblings. They want to be seen as persons, not sex objects. They want romance, not the humdrum boredom of loveless sex. They want monogamy, not the multiple partners that leads to STDs. Today's generation is searching to regain what their parents lost. 

1Flesh believes that things went wrong when contraception entered marriage. Not only is contraception not the answer, they believe that it is a root cause of all our present ills. It lessens the bond of sexual union, dulls its unifying nature, and causes many health problems that could be avoided if couples used natural family planning. This is where 1Flesh takes a stand against society's current practices. 

The goal of 1Flesh is “to spread words of rebellion; that sex should be awesome and saved until marriage, that pregnancy can be justly avoided without harmful chemicals, and that love is worth fighting for.” 

The website contains a vast array of images, videos, testimonies, data, and statistics all arguing against the use of artificial birth control and in favor of what it likes to call “100% organic sex.” It also introduces readers to a natural and healthy means of fertility regulation, namely, Natural Family Planning. It explains the benefits of several different NFP methods, such as The Creighton Model Fertiltycare System and The Billings Ovulation Method, in detail. 

And that’s not all. The website is chock full of information about the emotional, physical, and environmental dangers of artificial birth control, all told with flashy and attention-grabbing visuals that I found both informative and entertaining. 

In their own words, 1Flesh strives “to inform women of the risks of birth control pills, to call out pharmaceutical companies for their life-endangering, false and manipulating advertising of the drugs, and to promote the concept that women can understand and work with their own fertility instead of relying on pharmaceutical companies.” 

I was impressed by the detailed explanations of how men and women are harmed emotionally and physically by the use of contraceptives such as the pill and condoms. I was particularly touched by testimonies from former contraception users, many of whom now rely upon NFP, about how they have found physical and emotional health again after experiencing the negative impact of contraceptives in their lives. 

The website has received a great deal of publicity since it went online in May, and Marc Barnes has been interviewed by the Huffington Post and other media outlets. As you might expect, the site has also received more than its share of attacks. 

But Marc and his collaborators are hanging in there, fighting the good fight. They saw the need, heard the cries, saw the demand, and so took action. We at PRI salute them!