Free Condoms at the Kern County Fair in California

The annual Kern County Fair and Parade in California was recently subject to a confrontation of ideas. Held sometime in October 2007, the fair was attended by people from all over Kern County who came to celebrate and have a good time together. There were all kinds of people attending, and all kinds of groups and organizations hosting booths. In the Democratic Party booth, volunteers were organized to give away packs of condoms for free to college students. Some people attending the fair were unhappy about this.

Though there was not ill intention on the part of the organizers, the Democratic booth pacified the group of people who reacted. The condom giveaway activity was stopped later on in the parade when a complaint was filed with the booth. The party said the free condoms were intended to help educate people, especially college students, about safe sex. It should be noted that the group is openly supporting advocacies to help combat the spread of communicable sexually transmitted diseases and the emergence and increase in volume of unwanted teenage pregnancies through the use of contraceptives like condoms. Kern County in particular has been subject to a rising teenage pregnancy rate in the last few years. STD infection rates have also risen.

Various research groups in the county through the years have noted the continuing problem of sexually transmitted diseases and unwanted pregnancies especially among young people. The problem is greatly attributed to the limited sexual awareness education still bogging the local school system. Though many teens and young people seem to be now more aware of the problems, the volume of unprotected sexual intercourse still rises each year.

In the case of what happened at the fair in Kern County, a few vocal citizens voiced their dissent because they felt the free condoms were not really appropriate for a public affair that the occasion was. Later on, it was also found and proven that the Democratic Party was not authorized to distribute free condoms because the deed was not enumerated and identified in the existing and signed contract between the group and the fair’s organizers.

The fair’s organizers note that they see nothing wrong with the distribution of free condoms. The only problem was the manner on how the condoms were distributed, the timing and the appropriateness. Some parents claimed that their sons were given the free condoms, which they felt was inappropriate.

The party immediately aired apologies. The event was a clear manifestation that even in the current times when people think more in a liberated manner, problems arising about conservatism and traditional norms and behaviors still surface. The complaints over the free condom distributions at the fair shows that debate and talk about safe sex is still something which is taboo in American society, especially in more rural areas.

This incident will hopefully elicit a good and rigorous debate among the attendants of the fair. Parents and safe sex advocacies still have plenty of issues to agree with each other. Although the common interests of both parties is to prioritize safety, it can be inferred that many people still think that one way to protect young people is to spare them from education about safe sex. For the sake of Kern County, we can only hope that this approach will somehow be more effective than it has been historically proven to be.