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Sex is the great equalizer, for does not the rich man conduct his doggy-style in much the same way as the poor man? Granted, the rich man conducts his to the tune of $5,000 per night while the poor man's might've cost him a bottle of Strawberry Hill at the liquor store down the block, but in the end, both situations result in guttural noises and a tattered web of ego-salving lies.

But there's a dark side to the equalizing power of sex. Minnesota may be the 13^th smartest state, according to the last round of the Smartest State Awards, but once the subtle, nigh ultrasonic rustling sound of frilly underwear hitting the floor causes blood to rush south to engorge parts unknown and the sheets are stained with fesenjoon, we're every bit as willfully, soul-crushingly stupid as Arizona, #50 on the list. As a result, the occurrence of sexually transmitted diseases has risen steadily in Minnesota, since as far back as 1996.

Now, to be fair, it's quite possible that Minnesotans strip down and make like crack-addled bunnies significantly more often than your average Arizonan, especially given that our fair state goes for approximately six months without seeing sun nor experiencing warmth, so it's natural for us to seek solace and body heat in mind-numbing bacchanalia. But that's no excuse for a nearly four percent gain in cases of syphilis, chlamydia, and gonorrhea in just the last year. And of course, that doesn't include the rampant crabs, trichomoniasis, genital HPV infection and other assorted cooties generally associated with icky boys.

There's plenty of blame to go around for the fact that double bagging it will soon be standard practice when picking up moderately attractive drunks in front of the Lone Tree Bar downtown. We'll start with the modern-day Pandora's box that is the state government, of course. A paltry $1.3 million in state funding was proposed for STD screening and public education in the legislature. Of course, in these days of instant gratification, the funding was cut. $1.3 million is too much to spend on a program that would likely take a few years to return the investment in the form of healthier babies, reduced cancer rates, and a dramatic drop in Nietzsche-esque insanity and sibling lust - a condition HMOs are often loathe to cover. Plus, think of the horrific janitorial costs as thousands of men shift uncomfortably, attempting vainly to hit the urinal whilst their collective crotches are on fire.

There are certainly other reasons for this steady decline in pubic health. These include:

• pediatricians and family doctors reluctant to talk with their patients about sexual health for fear of finding out just how the lollipops handed out after each visit are truly used by oversexed teenagers,
• abstinence-only sex education programs - because preventing kids from learning about how to protect themselves in the event they want to bang their way through the cheerleading squad/football team/woodwind section of the school orchestra seemed like such a good idea at the time

The bottom line is that half of high school seniors and more than 75 percent of college students in Minnesota are happily humping their way through their academic careers, and many of them think that love is all the antibiotic they need. That's not even mentioning the staggering fact that 25 percent of girls 14-19 in the U.S. have an STD. A problem with this scope may require a bit more than good intentions, a subscription to Penthouse and the occasional call to DTMFA from Dan Savage.

To put an even finer point on it, before he started gnawing on the furniture and frothing at the mouth (but after he started chasing his sister's skirt), Mr. Nietzsche said that, "...if a woman seeks education, it is probably because her sexual apparatus is malfunctioning." Given that we're inexorably headed toward a day when the entire state experiences a burning sensation when it pees, it may be wise to offer the education before the girls, or boys, have a chance to request it.