Fix that and porn and prostitution take their legitimate place in a balanced society.
In fact I encounter a lot of people discussing sex ad nauseum in the US, especially women.
ETA: Gender disparity in willingness to discuss sex in the US at least in the workforce may have to do with sexual harassment laws and company policies, which didn't come from the religious establishment.
Cindy thinks that the restrictions that policies place on sex-oriented companies like hers are tantamount to wanting to “pretend sex doesn’t exist.”
Actually, that's precisely what companies like Apple, Google, and Microsoft aren't doing. Not wanting to be exposed to porn does not mean you think sex doesn't exist. It is an illogical and simplistic equivalence.
As for the charge that American government is "influenced by religion", why single out the USA? All world governments are influenced by religious principles of some kind. Codified law systems spring from religion. It's why the law makes a moral judgement about murder, or speeding (to use a less severe crime as an example).
"Religion", rightly understood, does not paint sex as "dirty." It places sex within the boundaries of a moral, social and legal code. The Puritans were actually some of the most lusty, sex affirming (within marriage) people of their time.
I don't think China or Russia are for example.
> Codified law systems spring from religion. It's why the law makes a moral judgement about murder, or speeding (to use a less severe crime as an example).
You don't need religion to make such moral judgements.
We have an absolutely horrifying clerical renaissance here in Russia. Church gets a lot of media attention, a lot of general public attention, a lot of lawmakers' attention. By recent polls, 75% of Russians consider themselves orthodox christians.
Just two examples of how this influences everyday life:
1. There is a university called MIFI (aka National Research Nuclear University Moscow Engineering Physics Institute). For a long time there was a statue of a wayfarer on their campus with the following words "Дорогу осилит идущий" (I don't know English equivalent, literally: "The one who walks will overcome the path"). This statue, nicknamed "An Eternal Student", was considered an unofficial symbol and words an unofficial motto of MIFI students. However, right before patriarch Kirill visit to the institution, statue was replaced by a cross.
Before and after pic: http://ic.pics.livejournal.com/statixaos/16015392/2819/origi...
Also, later they announced they were opening a theological faculty there. In a nuclear research university.
2. A road accident happened in Moscow. Drunk hieromonk Ilia was driving a Mercedes G-wagon (!) at 140 kmph and crashed into a Skoda. Afterwards he crashed into three road workers, two of whom died. Putting aside how monk can own and drive expensive cars, mysterious things began to occur to this case. For some reason, no one bothered to take his blood sample or arrest the young monk, who was taken by (allegedly) unknown person home. In the court a person, who wasn't even present at the crash, told the judge that it was Skoda that crashed into and killed road workers. Video records from the case showing Mercedes were, wait for it, "destroyed by a computer virus". For no apparent reason, after all this Ilia decided to confess to everything.
Also, the case of pussy riot, who were given prison time for disorderly conduct and many, many different annoying things.
PS: If you actually look at history religions where codified well after laws became common.