The rate of teen pregnancy in Illinois has increased by 2% (but, hey, its still under the national average) and Mississippi now can claim its throne as the state with the highest rate of teen pregnancies. Sexphobics, you are doing a great job!
Teenagers who make “virginity pledges” to remain abstinent until marriage are just as likely as teens who do not make such pledges to have premarital sex and are less likely to use condoms and other birth control methods, according to a study published in the January issue of Pediatrics
Under the Bush Administration, federal support for “abstinence-only” education
programs has expanded rapidly. The federal government will spend
approximately $170 million on abstinence-only education programs in fiscal year
2005, more than twice the amount spent in fiscal year 2001. As a result,
abstinence-only education, which promotes abstinence from sexual activity
without teaching basic facts about contraception, now reaches millions of children
and adolescents each year.
Without going into the failure of the current Administration in regards to the War, the economy and NCLB (which is likely tied to why Mississippi is the most pregnant state), abstinence-only education has failed our children. Its much like when I pledged in 4th grade to be alcohol, drug and tobacco free and by 7th grade, that pledge had been entirely forgotten. It is a joke; a sick and dangerous joke.
Let’s face it, sex is cool. Sex feels good, it makes you sexy, it wins you friends. No amount of “don’t have sex” that is preached by the schools and churches is going to take away from the fact that humans like to have sex. The value of virginity is an antiquated notion based solely upon the belief that a woman’s value is attached directly to her hymen. Why are you people still pushing this? Can’t you see how hypocritical this is, and how you are just hurting your own kids?
They, the adolescents, are onto you. They know that virginity doesn’t matter. They know you were all having pre-marital sex (yes, anal sex counts). They know that you watch HBO when you think they aren’t around, mentally (and even physically) orgasming to the very acts that you deem taboo. They know everything… just check their Facebook account.
You are fighting a losing battle against the media, against peer pressure and against people like me, who feel that everyone should be armed with the knowledge and tools to protect themselves. I am thankful that with the new Administration, my children will enter into their adolescent years being taught safe sex. Safe sex does not mean “if it walks, fuck it!” It does not give promiscuous permission for deviant group sex. Its simply giving a child the necessary tools to enable them to navigate the strange and sometimes lonely waters of sex.
Buh-bye Bush. I can’t say that enough.
