Computer Viruses Suck

I really like tinkering around with computers. It has always intrigued me to learn about how they work and what they can do. I am still constantly amazed by the new technologies that come out each day. One thing I do not like though is malicious software. Any kind of this software such as viruses, trojan horses, worms, adware, etc. has no place in today's world of computing. Yet all of it exists and it is becoming more prevalent every day.
I just did a thorough scan of my computer and it found 235 infected files. This is just ridiculous. I remember installing Windows XP once and I had the internet connection plugged in. In between the time that I realized it and the network hardware activated (about 20 seconds) 4 worms penetrated onto the system. Luckily they weren't very harmful ones and I was able to manually patch up to SP2 with a CD that I burned it to beforehand. But seriously should I have to do this?
I liken this to to anarchy. Even though there is software out there to prevent and remove viruses and malicious software, people are still creating them. Computers don't create them.
Come on people seriously, stop it. I have had to reload my windows like 4 times this year just because people wrote something malicious and it screwed up my computer. I am getting tired of it.
Well I guess I will keep my windows disks close and use Linux as much as I can. I don't see this situation getting any better any time soon. In fact it probably will get much worse.