South African Government As Strict As High School Lunchladies
Because there are hardly any pressing problems left in South Africa with which its government must deal, two weeks ago President Thabo Mbeki (on the left) signed into law a bill that makes it a criminal offense for teenagers under 16 to "kiss, touch or rub up against each other in public." They probably did this in some sort of half-assed effort to stop the spread of AIDS in South Africa, since they don't really want to get into things like comprehensive sex education and massive condom distribution programs and whatever, not that Mbeki believes that HIV causes AIDS anyway. This was, in fact, also the rule at my high school, and I was warned for holding my boyfriend's hand under the lunch table and then given detention for whispering in his ear and it definitely didn't stop me from having sex, so take that lunchladies and stupid government leaders! What did keep me from getting pregnant/diseased from said sexing, though, was the extremely comprehensive sex ed classes that were required by the State of New York and taught without embarrassment by our teacher. But, hey, a new law criminalizing teenage PDA is sooo much better. [ Cape Argus ]