No Homo Promo Laws are Not New
Has Ron DeSantis Ever Had an Original Thought?
It was an emotionally tough week for anyone who cares about reproductive rights, contraception, the trans community, sex education, or the future of democracy. While we were waiting around for the Supreme Court to rule on mifepristone (see story below), the Iowa Attorney General stopped funding the program that ensured Emergency Contraception for rape victims; trans people in Missouri were being detransitioned because of a new law that essentially made it illegal for doctors to provide gender affirming care; and Ron DeSantis’ administration moved to extend his “Don’t Say Gay” law through 12th grade.
Last year, Florida’s legislature passed the “Parent Bill of Rights,” which brought us an uptick in banned books, a firing because of the statue of David’s penis, and a fight between the governor and Disney (that Walt’s head is currently winning from inside its ice tomb).
The law banned all instruction on sexual orientation and gender identity through the third grade. At the time DeSantis explained that it was not okay to tell children that they could be whatever they wanted to be when they grew up: “It's not something that's appropriate for any place, but especially not in Florida.” (So true, but not in the way he means.)
DeSantis isn’t bothering with the legislature for this next move: it’s a rule change being put forth by the state Education Department that only needs to be approved by the state Board of Education (the leaders of both are DeSantis appointees). The rule change expands the ban through 12th grade “unless required by existing state standards or as part of reproductive health instruction that students can choose not to take.”
Florida’s sex education law leaves most decisions up to local school boards. Schools don’t have to provide sex education at all, and if they do, it doesn’t have to be medically accurate but should stress the “consequences of teen pregnancy.” That said, some districts have adopted broader reproductive health classes (with opt-out provisions), and it seems that this rule change won’t affect those existing classes. (I do find the bit about state standards odd given that this rule was written by the same agency that wrote the state standards. Shouldn’t the Florida Department of Education know what’s required by the Florida Department of Education?)
Remember though, the “Don’t Say Gay” rule isn’t limited to sex education classes. In theory, it prevents those who teach Language Arts, Social Studies, Psychology, and any other humanities class offered in a school from assigning books with gay characters, teaching about the gay rights movement, looking at psychological or sociological research, or lauding the contribution of LGBTQ people throughout history. God forbid they put a rainbow flag on the bulletin board.
While Ron’s “Don’t Say Gay” rule is garnering the presidential hopeful a lot of press, let’s be clear, this isn’t even an original idea. When I started in the field of sex education in the late 1990s, many states’ sex education laws included “no homo promo” provisions. Passed at the height of the HIV/AIDS epidemic, the language of these rules varied, but Arizona’s summed up the sentiment pretty clearly:
No district shall include in its course of study instruction which: 1. Promotes a homosexual life-style; 2. Portrays homosexuality as a positive alternative lifestyle; 3. Suggests that some methods of sex are safe methods of homosexual sex.
Some of these provisions also noted that homosexual sex was illegal in their state, pointing to anti-sodomy laws even after those were declared unconstitutional by the Supreme Court in 2003’s Lawrence v. Texas. (Note that this is one of the decisions that Justice Clarence Thomas wants the court to reconsider in our collective post-Dobbs nightmare.)
Thankfully, the LGBTQ rights movement has made a lot of progress since the heyday of these laws, and many states saw the error of their ways. Efforts to repeal these laws has been refreshingly bipartisan. North Carolina got rid of its law way back in 2006. In 2016, Utah did away with its “no homo promo” language with Republicans controlling the legislature and a GOP Governor. Arizona’s Republican-controlled legislature repealed the above law in 2019 with the support of Republican Governor Doug Ducey.
I suppose none of us should be surprised that Texas still has its 1991 law on the books or that it inaccurately notes “homosexuality is not a lifestyle acceptable to the general public and that homosexual conduct is a criminal offense.”
Again, this has been inaccurate since 2003 because of a Supreme Court ruling, but it’s inaccurate in other ways as well. You can’t look around this country right now and say that the general public doesn’t accept homosexuality. Yes, homophobia still exists, and it’s still harming people on a daily basis, but the general public (much of whom is actually gay) is largely okay with homosexuality. A 2019 Pew poll found that 72% of people in the U.S. said homosexuality should be accepted which is up from 51% in 2002.
Gay marriage isn’t the political wedge issue it once was; even Karl Rove couldn’t use it to drive GOP voters to the polls today (and I don’t think his bigotry against the LGBTQ community is going to help DeSantis in his bid for president). No one is boycotting ABC because of a lesbian kiss like they did with Ellen—we see way hotter same-sex kisses and sex scenes on network shows and streaming services alike. And we now have actors, rappers, athletes, teachers, and politicians who are able to be openly and proudly gay.
I hate that DeSantis is doing this and that more states may follow suit, and I realize that these laws will still cause damage. One study compared kids in Texas with kids in those states that didn’t have “no homo promo’ laws and found that Texas kids were more likely to hear homophobic remarks and face harassment or assault in school. They were also less likely to have access to school professionals who were specifically trained to help them.
At the same time, I think that today’s kids are not in the same place as the kids of the 1990s who had few opportunities outside of school to learn about sexual orientation. Today, they have the internet for information, numerous entertainment options that include gay characters, and influencers and other celebrities who can tell them that it will get better.
Moreover, in the 90s it was hard to get anyone to care about “no homo promo” laws or see the damage that they could do. Now, the “Don’t Say Gay” law has been denounced by major corporations, celebrities, and the President. That’s progress.
By no means are we done. Homophobia still exists and the fight against “otherness” has moved on to trans kids and become exponentially crueler—it’s trying to take away their right to choose bathrooms, play sports, and get the medicine they need. In some states, it’s even threatening to take them away from supportive parents. We, as voters and humans, must continue to fight these laws and show kids that there are adults around the country who support them and are trying to help.
(If you haven’t seen it already, check out Molly Kearney’s bit on SNL in which they tell trans kids, “What’s happening to you is wrong and you don’t need to be scared. Our job is to protect you, and your job is to focus on being a kid.”)
The week wasn’t all bad, though. It included Fox being forced to pay $787 million dollars in damages and firing Tucker Carlson. I guess he can spend more time tanning his balls.
Fewer People Seem to Know that HPV Causes Cancer
We—meaning science—have known since the 1950s that HPV is an STI and since the early 1980s that it causes cancer, but we—meaning society as a whole—apparently still haven’t gotten the message.
A new study revealed that too few people know about HPV to begin with, and even fewer realize it causes cancer of the cervix, penis, vulva, anus, mouth, and throat. Even more disturbing—the percentage of people who have this awareness has dropped since 2014.
The study, which was presented at the annual meeting of the American Association for Cancer Research, analyzed data from the Health Information National Trends Study (HINTS) from 2014 to 2020. HINTS collects data from a nationally representative sample of adults in the United States. This analysis included 10,933 participants. All participants were asked if they’d ever heard of HPV. Those who said they had were then asked, “Do you think HPV can cause anal, cervical, oral, and penile cancers?”
First and foremost, only 70% of participants had ever heard of HPV. This is particularly disturbing because most sexually active people will get HPV during their lifetime. (Most infections will clear on their own without causing any symptoms.)
Of those who had heard of it, only 70% knew it was linked to cervical cancer which is a 7.4% drop when compared to 2014. While the decline in knowledge was less steep for other HPV-related cancers, awareness was even lower: only 29% knew HPV was linked to oral cancer, 28% to penile cancer, and 27% to anal cancer. The study doesn’t tell us why HPV knowledge has dropped though some public experts theorized that the focus on the pandemic pulled attention away from many, if not all, other public health issues.
I recently came across an article about research my great-grandfather had done. I think I’ve mentioned him before. He was a urologist in Brooklyn in the starting in the 1930s. He noticed that his clients—most of whom were Jewish and, therefore, circumcised—had far fewer incidences of penile cancer and venereal diseases (known today as STIs) than was found in the general population. He published research on this and ultimately a book that advocated for widespread circumcision and got him named the original “zealot” by today’s “intactivists” who argue that male circumcision is unnecessary and barbaric. (Far more recent research explains that the without proper hygiene, intact foreskin can harbor viruses and bacteria that cause STIs, including HPV which can then lead to cancer.)
What I found was an article that ran in Detroit Jewish News on August 4, 1950. The results of his research were being presented in Paris at the International Cancer Congress by his son (my grandfather who was also a cancer researcher at the time but had retrained as a psychiatrist by the time I was born with the white beard to prove it). The article explained that similar research had been done in Fiji where two different social groups took different approaches to circumcision. The women whose partners were not circumcised had rates of cervical cancer that were 9 times higher.
What struck me most, however, was the line that called “cancer of the cervix of the womb” the “largest killer of women worldwide.” That’s not true anymore because of science. First there was the Pap Smear or the Pap Test which could detect changes to the cells of the cervix before they became cancerous, plus treatments that could prevent these changes from becoming cancer. Then there was the discovery of the connection between certain types of HPV and cervical cancer, as well as the HPV test which could detect the presence of these types. And then there was the vaccine.
In the U.S. today, there are approximately 37,300 cases of HPV-related cancers each year including 11,100 cases of cervical cancer, 14,800 cases of throat cancer, 6,900 cases of anal cancer, 2,900 cases of vulva cancer, 900 cases of penile cancer, and 700 cases of vagina cancer. There are also 190,000 cervical precancers detected. The CDC estimates that 90% of these could be prevented with vaccination.
I like to think that Poppy Abe, whose formal portrait watches over us and scares visiting children in my powder room, would be pleased and amazed at the progress science has made. But medical advances can only work if people use them. (BTW: that’s Nana Martha next to him, I was named after her. Also, I love my bathroom floor.)
The CDC recommends that all young people get the vaccine as part of routine vaccinations for 11-12 year olds. Research shows that the vaccine produces a stronger immune response when given during the preteen years, and fewer shots are required. Also, the vaccine is designed to prevent infection with HPV, so vaccination is best done before kids are exposed to the virus.
Still, vaccination rates for HPV lag behind other routine vaccinations. They are subject to all of the absurd misinformation about vaccines in general. (We’ve just learned that the Florida Surgeon General deliberately falsified Covid-19 vaccine data to make it look more dangerous. Read this, it’s very disturbing.) HPV vaccines are also subject to all the prudery of our country, which has always been afraid of prevention methods turning women into sluts. (Spoiler alert: they don’t.)
Public health experts have been trying to move away from discussing HPV vaccination as STI-prevention and emphasizing instead that the vaccine prevents cancer. In fact, when my youngest was given her shots in preparation for 6th grade, her pediatrician referred to it simply as the cancer vaccine. Great move in my opinion.
Studies have shown that awareness of the link between HPV and cancer does increase vaccine uptake, but this study shows that we’ve stalled or even backslid on that awareness.
So, the next time you’re at a dinner party, do the world a favor and start talking about penis cancer.
Last Mifepristone Update for Awhile
On Friday evening (long after some of us who’d been waiting all week needed a Xanax), the Supreme Court finally issued a decision temporarily halting the Fifth Circuit’s mifepristone decision and reverting rules back to the FDA’s preferred rules.
After two long weeks of chaos—one judge said mifepristone shouldn’t be available at all; a judge of equal authority elsewhere in the country told the FDA not to change its availability; an appeals court said it could remain available but only under older, stricter FDA rules; and Alito promised the Supreme court would weigh in by Wednesday and then extended that to Friday—there is a temporary peace. (Last week’s issue takes you through the step-by-step of how we got here starting with the 1873 Comstock Act. Check it out if you need a refresher.)
The Supreme Court’s stay on the lower courts’ rulings sends the case back to the Fifth Circuit to hear the government’s full appeal. More importantly, it says that the stay will remain in place through the appeals court’s decision until such time as the Supreme Court hears/rules on the case or officially refuses to hear the case. This means that no matter what the Fifth Circuit decides (and the odds are on it ruling against mifepristone) nothing will change instantly. Court cases can take a long time to get to SCOTUS. So, for the foreseeable future Mifepristone is available through 10 weeks of pregnancy, at some brick-and-mortar pharmacies, and by mail.
Also, I was right that Alito feels no guilt. He and Clarence Thomas were the only two justices who voted against the stay. (For an interesting look at Alito’s own hypocrisy, check out Steve Vladeck’s substack newsletter One First.)