Regarding the May 11 column by Mary Collier:

Your goal is to prevent adolescent sexual intercourse. I applaud your efforts to teach adolescent girls how to withstand the messages of our sex-saturated popular culture. I also would applaud any efforts you might make to influence the toning down of that sex-saturated culture - to use your energy to protest the excesses of corporate advertising, driven by profit over morality, in the sponsorship of sex-saturated television programming.

I disagree, however, with your characterization of others working with equal sincerity to empower young women to prevent adolescent pregnancy and STDs. You imply a lack of sincerity on the part of those who try to empower young women who may not adhere to abstinence, and assume they support succumbing to "the lures of sexual activism ..." Your assumptions and argument are disingenuous. Before you assume you hear a "condescending" or "cynical" tone of voice in others, listen to your own voice. Your analogy "we'll provide you with unfiltered cigarettes without the consent of your parents" is a condescending misrepresentation. The ones who are providing adolescent girls with the metaphorical "unfiltered cigarettes" are most often their adolescent peers.

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