"Get Some"

One Sunday morning in Manhattan a few years ago, I was with my daughters and was confronted with a particularly lewd billboard.  I had never done so before, but I decided to call the city's 311 information number to complain.  I spoke to the operator for more than ten minutes, as he tried to find any suitable category for recording the complaint -- there were countless categories, but nothing remotely relevant for a billboard depicting two nearly naked models engaged in an obvious sexual act.  No "public indency" category, no "inappropriate advertising" category, nothing.  In the end, the operator told me to call the police if it was really a problem.  The not-so-subtle message was that I was Ward Cleaver, and this was no longer the 1950s.

I'm no longer a New York City resident, but I thought of that 311 operator when I read about the new government-sponsored ad campaign launched in the city on Valentine's Day.  That operator won't lodge a complaint about indecent billboards, but he will gladly take my order for free condoms!  For the record, I do not reflexively dismiss every attempt by a government to facilitate safer sex among its residents.  Indeed, I still struggle mightily to understand the Church's opposition to the distribution of condoms among high-risk populations in Africa, for example.  But the Church's hardline position may become significantly more compelling if the New York model becomes the alternative: i.e., does a "safe sex" government initiative mean having tax dollars implore every resident, young and old, to "get some?"