Abstinence Only Education: Because not talking about sex means kids won’t have it
The New York Times ran a story today spotlighting the slow march away from abstinence only education. The article reported that birthrates in American teenagers has been steadily falling since 1991 but that the state of Texas has seen the smallest decline despite receiving the most money for abstinence only education. This, in a nutshell, explains the absolute absurdity of abstinence only education.
If a teenager wants to wait to have sex before they get married, great. Good for them, it’s nice to see the youth of America having principles and sticking to their guns when these principles are called into question. Why on earth, though, would we want our federal government to have a policy stipulating that kids can’t have a real sex education class (I would challenge anyone to show me how abstinence only education can actually be considered educational) in school? Let’s face it most kids don’t want to go to their parents to talk about sex and most parents feel equally as awkward having the birds and the bees talk with junior.
Kids aren’t going to decide to have sex simply because they know how to do it safely. That’s the biggest flaw in the AO argument. It’s as if AO proponents fear that by telling kids how STD’s are contracted and how to use a condom correctly or what other means of birth control are available the students will run out and start shacking-up as soon as class gets out. Have a little more faith in your kids America. If a child is staying abstinent for moral reasons then telling he or she how to put on a condom shouldn’t change that. However by not teaching a child who has no intent on saving it until marriage how to have safe sex you’re not only doing huge disservice to the child but you’re also burdening your community with undue healthcare and social service costs which will come from the unplanned and unwanted pregnancies. A condom is a lot cheaper than maternity care for an uninsured woman.
I have no problem with including an abstinence portion included in a more rounded sex education. After all, the only 100% surefire way not to contract a sexually transmitted disease or to get pregnant is by not having sex in the first place and teens should know that condoms don’t work every single time. This mentality that if we only talk about abstinence with our children then they won’t have sex before marriage (or before they’re ready) is ridiculous. We need to stop being a nation of ostriches in give teenagers the information they need in order to be healthy.
After all this is NOT a moral issue, it’s a health issue and the government needs to realize this.
on July 18th, 2007 at
Sex, Teens, and Abstinence-Only Education:…
Liberal College Kid explains that kids aren’t going to decide to have sex simply because they know how to do it safely…….
on July 18th, 2007 at
Yes, kids will have more sex if they know they can do so without as much risk of STDs or pregnancy. It’s simple common sense. And yes, premarital sex is a moral issue…you acknowledged as much when you praised the kids who choose abstinence for their “principles” earlier in your post.
The placement of a subject into a school curriculum carries with it an implicit endorsement. By showing high school kids how to have “safe sex,” you encourage those who may be on the fence between abstinence and peer pressure to feel a little more comfortable going all the way. And believe it or not, there are reasons other than the possibilities of disease and pregnancy for them not to.
on July 18th, 2007 at
Hey Old Conservative Curmudgeon! Thanks for bringing some balance to the discussion. I’d like to (politely) respond.
Let’s assume, hypothetically, that you’re right. Let’s say (and I have no idea, empirically) that informing teens about safe sex (condoms, emergency contraception, etc.) actually causes more sex to happen among teens.
Even if we concede that, it seems to me that we’d rather teens be having more sex (safely) than less unsafe sex. People who study this kind of stuff have come to some pretty strong conclusions that abstinence-only sex education leads to higher rates of teen pregnancy.
So which would we rather have: more sex or more teens getting pregnant?
Basically, even if you’re right (and I’d wager you’re only marginally so) about higher rates of sexual activity among youth given a more comprehensive approach toward sexual education, the numbers are still kind of against you—at least if you’re of the school of thought that thinks teen pregnancy is a bad thing.
If you’re like many conservatives, think of how this might affect abortion rates. Just because teens don’t learn about how to have sex safely doesn’t mean they won’t hear (via TV, the internet, friends, etc.) about that controversial procedure. And, call me crazy, but I’d surmise that higher teen pregnancy leads to higher rates of abortion (whether or not abortion remains legally protected).
Lastly, I’m curious about these “reasons other than the possibilities of of disease and pregnancy for [teens] not to [have sex].” Would you be willing to elaborate?
Thanks for posting with us!
on July 18th, 2007 at
My two cents:
cent one:
My guess is that he’s thinking primarily of emotional impact–sex famously has an emotional component to it, and yes, “teenagers” differ emotionally from adults. There’s also a possibility that sex correlates with funky things like a drop in grades, increased drug use, who knows, I have no data whatsoever on it…
cent two:
“Abstinence Only” as a strategy for sexual education makes no logical sense to me. Imagine applying this strategy to other subjects in school:
Math teacher: Jimmy, someday you will have to solve this equation that I’ve written on the board.
Jimmy: Miss Math Teacher, I’m worried that I’ll get the wrong answer.
Math Teacher: Well, Jimmy, the best way to avoid getting the wrong answer is not to do the problem.
!!!!
on July 18th, 2007 at
Jason, I like your first cent especially. It’s true that sex during teenage years can be an immensely emotional experience. So let’s tell our children that! Let’s be open and honest about the risks and dangers of sex while at the same time spreading knowledge about proper condom use, birth control, and other safe-sex practices.
That’s precisely why I call it a comprehensive approach. Let’s give our children access to more, not less, knowledge before they make the decision whether or not to be sexually active.
on July 18th, 2007 at
And what about so-called “model roles”? Today’s mass media are promoting the air-headed celebrities with exhibitionistic attitude towards sexual matters, like Paris Hilton. For me it seems be a little disturbing… I still remember the talk show, when the “star” of Polish edition of “Big Brother” has admitted, that she see no difference between the “whore” and “sexually liberated woman”. It was one of the most embarassing moment in my life, espetially because she has significant number of fans…
on July 19th, 2007 at
Allow me to chime in. Sexual intercourse is not a life skill, it is an instinct. It is not a trade (for 99.9% of the population, and is illegal for the other .1%.) It is not an academic pursuit.
By the logic of “teaching” kids about safe sex, should we not also have mandatory safe gun handling courses? I mean, good for the kid who sticks to his principles and never fires a gun, even in self defense, but wouldn’t it be safer if, for those kids who are going to insist on firing weapons anyway, to at least learn about it at school? Most parents aren’t qualifed to inform or train their children on proper firearms handling.
My point is this: there are a lot of stupid things kids do. A lot of unsafe behaviors they are drawn to. A lot of dumb, off-hand things that they will do in high school have the potential to affect the rest of their lives.
But school isn’t designed to prevent reckless behavior (frankly, sometimes it seems structured to do the opposite! Segment kids by nominal age, pack them into rooms with a 30:1 ratio with an adult, and demand that they not develop into a Lord of the Flies culture? Yeah, that makes sense.)
I’m fine for sex education in the class room, as long as it also incorporates mandatory weapons training, responsible wine tastings, and the rules for low-speed games of vehicular “chicken.”
Of course, nominally useful activities, such as math, english and sciences will likely have to be eliminated.
But as long as our kids are safe, I guess it won’t matter that they are stupid.
on July 19th, 2007 at
Dan- I like your analogy to gun safety classes but I think it fails in that the percentage of the population which will ever fire a gun is much lower than the percentage of the population which will have sex. You said that your point is that kids do a lot of dumb and stupid things and that school “isn’t designed to prevent reckless behavior” but how is sex education aiming to prevent reckless behavior? I think the point is that sex ed. won’t stop kids from having sex (that’s a decision for kids to make on their own, hopefully after consulting their beliefs and personal feelings). It will, hopefully, prevent most cases of pregnancy or sexually transmitted disease in teenagers who aren’t ready to handle something of that magnitude. I realize this leads to the “well if they aren’t ready to handle it then they shouldn’t have sex” argument and that is true. However, if we’re going to be realistic, we have to acknowledge that kids are going to have sex even when they aren’t ready. We should at least give them the means to protect their health.
on July 19th, 2007 at
The problem with that sort of thinking is that condom use isn’t something a kid needs to be trained to do. They already know: trust me on this, they do. I was a fifth grader when AIDS awareness became a top-of-mind cultural phenomenon. We’ve been “teaching” kids to use condoms and birth control in school systems, on television, in print, for longer than I’ve been alive, and youth condom “aptitude” hasn’t improved a bit.
It is because “safe sex” is eschewed by youth, not because of lack knowledge, but because of lack of self-control, lack of foresight, and lack of a long view.
This is inherent to youth. “Put the condom on the banana” isn’t exactly an AP course. The tips for safe sex conduct fit on the back of a pokemon card. Were not talking about the laws of Thermodynamics here, but about a cultural knowledge that has been ‘peated and repeated for my entire life, from cradle, and eventually, to grave.
It isn’t the curriculum: it is the behavior. Until sex education involves designated, monitored pre-marital sex rooms for students wanting to engage in intercourse, the semester in sex ed classes is a complete waste of time.
The kids smart enough to “grok” safe sex are going to practice it, and daydream during sex ed. The kids too stupid to practice safe sex aren’t going to “get it”, even after a semester’s worth of curriculum.
Huge waste of time. Collossal.
Keep in mind the opportunity cost: the time spent teaching kids something they already know and may or may not practice is time NOT spent preparing them academically for the things that they are actually going to be judged on when they graduate.
Should we also do “safe drug use” classes? I mean, lots of kids are going to do that anyway, so shouldn’t we at least let them know where they can score the cleanest meth?
on July 19th, 2007 at
[…] conversation at Liberal College Kid, where some of my friends post. Lots of good stuff in the […]
on July 19th, 2007 at
I’ll gladly concede LCK’s main point, which seems to be that abstinence-only sex ed is ineffective. I believe that is true, because I believe that, from my perspective as both a mandatory student and a social observer, all sex ed is ineffective.
on July 19th, 2007 at
Dan- you’re right, it’s pretty easy to figure out how to put on a condom but sex ed is needed to let teens know that if they’re going to have sex they need to use protection every single time. It’s a message that should be repeated to teens, they need to know the risks they’re taking when they decide to have sex. Also, the drug class is a false analogy because both doing meth and having unprotected sex are bad for your health, regardless of how “clean” the meth is (and can anything that’s made with household chemicals ever be that clean in the first place?)
on July 19th, 2007 at
Making false analogies will not help anyone’s arguments. The fact remains that abstinence only education is not working. It is time to move in a new direction and try something proven to be effective. Finally, making assumptions about schools based on one’s own experience is perhaps the most damaging aspect of our school system. Every study done on the matter says safe sex education lowers pregnancy rates among teens compared to abstinence only programs. I don’t think wanting to prevent teen pregnancy should be a political issue… Then again, neither should saving the environment.
on July 19th, 2007 at
Ben,
I think you’re presenting a false choice. It’s not a choice between “more safe sex” and “less unsafe sex (I’m assuming that what you mean by that is that fewer kids have sex, yet do so without contraceptive devices). It’s a choice between our schools endorsing teenage sex or not…. whether or not we should show teenagers how to give in to temptation with more confidence that there’ll be no consequences.
My guess is that a lot of kids who learn “safe sex” in the classroom will have “unsafe” sex when it comes down to the moment of passion. To be fair, I also don’t have any illusions about how successful abstinence education is for teenagers who have already drunk freely from the American cultural cup of sexual promiscuity without consequences.
As for the “other reasons” you’re asking about, do you really not know what they are? What did you think of girls in high school who gave it up too easily? What attitudes about women do guys get when they begin adulthood by screwing everyone in sight? is sex supposed to be connected at all to love? Do we want teenagers to understand what the connection is?
on July 19th, 2007 at
Wow, we’re going all over the place with this one, aren’t we?
Dan: I think you might be trying to reduce this argument to absurdity, but I’ll address your gun argument anyway. We do take steps to dissuade kids from shooting one another. In schools, we try to teach children to resolve their disagreements peaceably. We encourage them to share. We push them to talk things out. Both in and out of the classroom, we strive to make firearms inaccessible to our youth.
But you can’t take away a kid’s penis, buddy. You can’t lock them up in steel underpants or make sexual intercourse illegal without a background check and license. Teens are going to have sex. In great numbers. Especially when society exhibits all kinds of sex—entertainment, advertising, etc. Having one high school class filled with overblown scare tactics and urgent pushing to refrain from sex just doesn’t work empirically.
And I think many of us are misinformed as to the complexities of sex ed. I’m not advocating that we mandate condom use, I’m advocating that we teach children about the diverse methods of birth control, the true risks and dangers of STIs, and even the emotional risk involved with promiscuous sex. Far too many children don’t fully understand how pregnancy works, that the pull-out method isn’t safe, or even—gasp!—how to correctly put on (or, more importantly, take off) a condom. And it seems to me that, in order to address this deficiency, offering this knowledge in our compulsory education system is the best way to reach the masses.
And “safe drug use” classes? Perhaps not, but we should stop misrepresenting the overblown dangers of some drugs (say, cannabis) and tell them the truth. Correct knowledge is a good thing.
OCC: I don’t think that’s the choice we have to make, either. I simply meant to illustrate that, empirically, abstinence-only education leads to higher rates of pregnancy and unsafe sex. And even if—IF—comprehensive sex ed leads to higher sexual activity, at least it’ll be safer sexual activity overall.
And while I appreciate that you “guess” that many kids who learn safe sex will later have unsafe sex, it doesn’t do much to discredit the numerous studies that show a safe-sex education really does reduce teen pregnancy and STI transmission.
Lastly, let’s address some of these “other reasons” for what they really are. I am, of course, aware of them; I just didn’t want to ascribe positions to you that weren’t truly yours.
The “girls in high school who gave it up too easily” were the victims of ridiculous double standards, the residue of our Victorian-era classification of sex as sinful, and blatant sexism. Moreover, much of said sexual activity isn’t the result of healthy sexual desire, but low self-esteem, coercion, and social confusion. It seems to me that goals of comprehensive sex ed: safe sex, low unwanted pregnancy rates, protection from STIs, and so on shouldn’t be sacrificed because of the presence of these other social ills. (Also, how many of these girls do you really think had sex because of their sex ed classes or the accessibility of condoms?) And a connection to love? Sure, let’s be honest about the deep emotional ties that often come with sexual intercourse. But let’s not say that all other sex is inappropriate! Or that, post-marriage, sex suddenly transforms from dirty and sinful to fine and dandy. That would be to instill a norm that that’s narrow-minded and intolerant.
Boo narrow-mindedness and intolerance!
Take care, everyone.
on July 20th, 2007 at
That double standard will always be with us, Ben. Guys who can score regularly are heroes to their peers. Girls who do the same thing are labeled as easy, and lose respect. But really, both parties lose out. They turn the ultimate expression of love, something meant to be private, tender, and tied to an emotional commitment, into something cheap and meaningless.
As a matter of public policy, it doesn’t matter what I think of premarital sex between consenting adults. When it comes to encouraging children to bed down with one another via the school curriculum, it becomes a legit topic for discussion. Do you think it’s OK for teenagers to have sex? At what age do you think it’s OK for them to start?
on July 31st, 2007 at
17
on July 31st, 2007 at
OCC,
I think that, south park references aside (see above), the appropriate age for sex depends on the individual.
What strikes me as odd is the idea that withholding information about something which can destroy someone’s life is a good idea. Even if taking a sex ed class encourages sexuality, it is hardly the only thing a teen is exposed to that encourages sexuality.
In other words, sex ed or not, teenagers are going to get horny. Why is it better that they know nothing about it?
I’m going to draw an analogy to mushrooms (food kind). Some mushrooms taste good. Some mushrooms kill you. Sooner or later, you’re probably going to want to eat some mushrooms. Wouldn’t it be nice if you knew which ones were which?
That’s my thinking. What am I missing?
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