Excuse me, your living in an AIDS ravaged continent that possibly can spread to the rest of the world. Please don't have sex until your married, or I suppose you can use this! *hands you a package of latex that you have never seen before*
How effective is our public health assistance to Africa? Sure, its undeniable that HIV in Africa is at an all time high, so how is the government handling this situation.
Well Mr.Bush decided to enforce the Global Gag Rule, where foreign health initiatives tend to be abstinence only programs. Well there is a problem with that. 1. Why are you imposing your religious based activism on a foreign countries, 2. what are the implications of your interaction against African Cultural norms? HIV rates in Africa have not gone down. Program = ineffective.
So what are other viable alternatives? Perhaps provide condoms in Africa (which happens to be the most plausible option to Americans) But again, 1. Why are you imposing your beliefs on the people, and 2. what are the implications that interaction can cause.
For one thing, your stigmatizing the whole continent. You're telling an African individual that they might spread HIV and they must protect themselves or, well, you eventually die. That transposes itself in our society today. There are constant made stereotypes against the minority population, one example can be seen in the Haitian Immigration policy, where Haitians were believed to carry HIV.
Furthermore, what do you think that will do to their culture? (Africa)
How will an African male feel about wearing a condom, how will that affect his self esteem?
What effects will happen to women? If women want the man to be protected, how will the man feel towards his spouse? (domestic abuse? gender discrimination?)
Everyone needs to stop and think about our public health policies. Perhaps funding African governements money might be enough, instead of going their ourselves.
• 
• 
• 
• 
• 
• 
• 
Why exactly is wearing a condom emasculating? I think saving your life is better than having trouble getting it up because you have to wear a condom.
Your post makes it sound like you think Africans are stupid or something. A lot of the trouble in combating HIV in Africans is reducing the stigma about the disease and getting people tested. HIV and AIDS victims are ostracized in many instances so most people don't want to get tested when they know they have been at risk.
Common sense is as rare as genius. ~Emerson
I think you're misunderstanding my point.
I am all for using a condom to save a life, however, thats socially/scientifically acceptable in the society that we live in, not neccessarily in Africa. For one thing, I am not saying Africans are stupid. Your assumption that Africans know everything/accept everything we do is the foundation of my post. It's dehumanizing when you don't account for their cultural norms, which is the second part of my post. For instance, using a condom is scientifically proven to reduce the risk of HIV, however, I'm analyzing what other implications arises from such action (ie gender discrimination, stigma). You talk about how the problem is stigma. The second part of my post also talks about why i think this stigma occurs. Going into a country the way we are doing, telling them they are going to cause AIDS to proliferate is the reason why so many Africans feel "ostracized" from the "non carriers."
"A lot of the trouble in combating HIV in Africans is reducing the stigma about the disease and getting people tested. HIV and AIDS victims are ostracized in many instances so most people don't want to get tested when they know they have been at risk. " I totally agree with you. That is how the U.S. and the rest of the world should be handling this problem. We have to reduce the stigma about people getting TESTED first as well as being able to properly diagnose the disease and such.
Next time you reply to a comment, please use the reply tab, so that the person knows you're responding to them. If I misunderstood your point its because it wasn't clear in the first place. I never said, nor implied that African people know everything. And I'm still not understanding your whole "condom stigma" thing. I would appreciate if you could explain that further.
The whole HIV stigma in Africa was not caused by the U.S., its part of their culture. Many AIDS organizations and the United States Peace Corps are working to combat this stigma.
Common sense is as rare as genius. ~Emerson
I'm sorry I didn't push the reply button, but I'm glad you were able to comment back in a period of 10 minutes. I'm also sorry if my blog wasn't clear to you, feel free to ask questions. As for the Africans knowing everything or not- it doesn't matter if they know how to use a condom or what not. Your assumption that condoms are the best thing for the African people is simply imperealistic. I don't know how to make that more clear.
This is where the whole "condom stigma" thing comes into play. Countries don't even want to distribute condoms and condom usage is extremely inconsistent. For instance, in Uganda 1-2% of women want condom use. (Shelton, Sr.Medical Scientist Office of Population and Reproductive Health @USAID 2006).
Amnesty International also stated how cultural norms prohibting women from recieving information on reproductive health
These social and economic issues should be addressed first before condom distribution
Your point where HIV stigma in Africa was not caused by the U.S. is a false conception. This stigma didn't even exist till "Peace Corps" and other organizations came into play. Just because organizations exist doesn't make them effective. Peace Corp for one thing is highly critisized for producing AntiAmericanism sentiments because of our continued practice of our cultura while disregarding theirs. Fabrizio, a former Peace Corps director even went so far in describing instances where Peace Corps volunteers damaged relations with countries that they were in.
Point being, these AIDS organizations combating this "stigma" which you say was in African culture isn't doing much. We should have seen a decrease in rates by now. Effective or not, point is that condom distribution fails until that stigma is resolved.
If you want full citations or the actual pieces of evidence that was cited in this comment, or more evidence for that matter, just pm me and I'll send you the whole file dedicated on Condom promotion.
Point out where I said condoms were the best thing for African people.
I don't know what it is exactly about your post or your comment, but your point isn't clear. And I don't just mean that I'm specifically having problems understanding your statistics or anything. I don't get what kind of plan you're espousing, and you still aren't fully explaining what you mean by this "condom stigma" thing. I think you're thinking a lot in your head, and you're not reading back what you're writing to make sure it makes sense to someone that isn't you before you post it.
Common sense is as rare as genius. ~Emerson
Let me just make you an outline...
I wrote a blog talking about how our public health assistance (providing condoms) doesn't work.
Your first comment talked about how there is nothing wrong with a condom, saving a life is good and stuff. That's where I got the assumption that you thought condoms was the best idea for the Africans. Nevertheless your advocating the status quo. You also stated how the problem is the stigma.
I responded by saying how I'm not arguing if condoms work or not, if they are bad, or whatever. I'm saying it won't work in their country because of cultural norms. Thats were the statistics and such came in.
Then there was this whole discussion on the condom stigma thing. To reduce everything that I said in 3 points:
1. Condom distribution doesn't work.
2. Condom distribution disregard cultural norms
3.These cultural norms prevent people from actually using them.
Finally, I'm not espousing a "plan", but rather exploit the implications of our current programs ie effects of condom promotion, discussion on stigma, etc. and also, I'm sorry if you don't understand what I'm trying to say because I'm "thinking too much in my head without reading what I'm typing." But atleast it's a discussion. Try asking more specific questions, that might make my answers more pointed for your benefit.
Surprisingly, that outline really helped. Now, why doesn't condom distibution work? And what are these cultural norms you keeps talking about but not defining?
Oh, and feel free to start a new comment thread, this is geting too skinny.
Common sense is as rare as genius. ~Emerson