Does A Mandated HPV Vaccine Uphold The Culture Of Life?
South Dakota War College has a post up defending Texas Gov. Rick Perry’s decision to mandate the HPV vaccine, which I previously posted on here.
His reasoning is summed up thusly:
If we oppose abortion because an unborn child should not be made to suffer a penalty for the parent’s error, why shouldn’t we try to protect someone from differing consequences of the same act?
My answer: Because it puts us on the road to where Great Britain is with social workers trying to take a boy away from his mother because she feeds him too much.
Listen, the government simply has no business mandating things to protect us from our own behavior. And yes, I’m aware that there are already vaccine requirements in place for other types of diseases, but the difference between those and HPV is that those other diseases are highly contagious. Meaning, generally, that you can get them just by hanging around other people with the disease. HPV is something you get by engaging in a certain specific type of behavior. Sex, to put it bluntly. If you don’t have sex, or if you just aren’t promiscuous, your chances of getting HPV drop to near zero.
Personally, I have no problem with the HPV vaccine. I’m planning on looking into it when my own daughter reaches an appropriate age, but my point is that the vaccine should be a choice, not a mandate. I think it is right for the government to protect us from things like murder, which is what I consider abortion, but I don’t think the government should force us to make choices to protect us from our own behavior. And while the choice the government is mandating this time around might be a good idea (again, I think the vaccine is great) next time it might not be anything we’re so keen on.
