Poll: Big Issues with Abstinence-Only Sex Ed

[Treblaine]

I can't answer you poll because I don't understand what "I support this" is for?

-Would this support the bad situation you describe?
or
-Would this support your proposal that it should be stopped?

---


I think the message should rather than be:

"Have sex with condoms"

but be

"Do not have sex WITHOUT condoms"

That's the problem with sex, the whole semen transfer business. Semen includes such a large number of shedding cells it transfers blood born diseases very effectively and the vajayjay or butthole is not like the skin over your body, it is is mucosa membrane vulnerable to all sorts of these microbes.

And IF a condom does break (fucking HOW, look how much latex condoms can be stretched before they break)...

(I guess if the condom has been in your wallet for 2 years, yeah it may have partially dissolved)

... then you put on another condom if there is still time. This is where a morning after pill would be very useful as while not every dude carries an STI, all of them likely have active sperm cells. Also abortion needs to be a practical option when that doesn't work. Roe vs Wade applies just as much to teenagers as adults.

the fact that the government grants funding to school districts that promise to teach abstinence-only sex "education" instead of a comprehensive, fact-based style.

Which government? State Government? Federal government?

 

[ReservoirAngel]

My sex education was comprehensive and as far as I'm aware it still is.

Then again I'm from a place where "people having sex for fun makes the baby Jesus cry" is not considered a valid argument.

 

[Mylinkay Asdara]

I think the back-and-forth between Varric and Aveline in DA2 kinda fits with this whole thing - she's asking him to do signs or even graphics for the lawless to stop breaking the law and he suggests he just paint her a sign that says "Don't" and she can hit people with it.

It just doesn't work to keep telling people not to do something and since they're going to do it (or at least a significant percentage of them are) it is better policy to educate them what the risks are and how to minimize the risks and fallout of having sex. Then they can decide if they're going to do it or not with some knowledge of what's involved rather than being told they shouldn't have the decision - since they clearly do.

 

[Treblaine]

Why does religion always come up in these? You want to talk about misinformation, you shouldn't spread it!

The honest reason abstinence-only sex ed has survived as long as it has is to reduce the number of children that end up in the adoption system due to teen pregnancies. It's all about the $$$, why else do you think they would provide *funding* for a specific school related activity, when public school funding is done by the head in attendance per day for everything else?

If it were based on any religious stance they could simply inform the school that they were not allowed to teach anything else, like they do with everything else you learn in high school.

Um, they CAN'T forbid teaching anything else as that would blatantly violate the Establishment Clause of the Constitution. This is a way of getting religious ideology enforced surreptitiously. Then again it isn't ENTIRELY religious, but it is NOT SCIENCE, it is based on conservative bias. Abstinence-only policy does not come from the perspective of wanting to prevent unwanted pregnancies, or prevent the spread of STI/D's. It comes from the perspective of stopping ALL sex outside of marriage.

Encouraging abstinence isn't a very good way of stopping girls getting pregnant, contraceptives ARE. Contraceptives like the contraceptive pill, and ideally barrier methods like condoms.

It is not an "honest reason" for abstinence-only to prevail over encouraging barrier methods like condoms in protection from STIs and contraceptive pill or morning after pill for protection from getting pregnant. These are cheap and effective. You don't even have to put the condoms out for free, just sell them but ALLOW them to be sold where young students can easily buy them.

 

[Treblaine]

Or, and I know this is crazy, they could have LISTENED AND NOT DONE ANYTHING! I mean, its not out of the question, considering the whole "can not control it" thing is a myth. Most teens are smart enough to control what they do and not let thier hormones rule them, and its a small minority that cant.....or at least, thats what it seems to be in the Midwest. (maybe the whole "Shotgun cleaning" practice helps.)

It's quite clear from the rate of both unwanted/teen pregnancies and the spread of serious STIs that NOT ENOUGH are restraining themselves. Restraining, abstitnence, may be ideal. But it's crazy that "Abstinence ONLY" will work.

Shotgun practice might work if the father is somehow always able to know what is going on, but when the daughter fears her boyfriend will be physically harmed if her father discovers she is pregnant or has carbs or whatever, she will simply keep the outcome a secret.

I mean this "Abstinence Only" education won't even make pregnancy-testing facilities available, the girl won't know they are pregnant till they have missed one or two menstrual cycles. They aren't even taught how to recognise STIs and what to do if they get them... jsut the assumptions they should never be exposed to them.

Imagine if this was done with other things:

Herp: "Don't drive dangerously or you'll have a crash"

Derp: "But what if I do have a crash and am injured, who should I call"

Herp: "I guess you better call Marty McFly and get in a time machine as you weren't even supposed to have been driving dangerously. I guess you are just shit-outta-luck and I won't tell you where you can get any help"

That is exactly what is done with Abstinence-Only: don't have sex. If you do, you are on, your, own.

 

[Verzin]

America's education of sex ed is fucked. (see what I did there?)
Media is hyper-sexualized. Average age of intercourse is somewhere between 13-15 if I remember correctly.

in my experience with sex ed: Abstinence. I tried to bring up alternatives i.e: monogamous consensual relationships that practiced safe sex once during a discussion.

I was shut down immediately. The teacher practically JUMPED to shut me up and then go on a long speech to the tune of ABSTINENCE before marriage or ROTTING GENITALS!!! FEAR SEX CHILDREN!! FEAR IT!! FEAR!!!!!
Then he showed up some gross pictures of various diseases.

At that moment I lost all respect for that teacher.

Here is what I think sex ed should be: FACT. Pure Fact. Teach children about the risks. Teach them how to minimize them. Teach them anatomy. Teach them that society has a huge number of different views and outlooks on sexuality. Encourage them to ask their parents about theirs, but also to form their own opinions based on the facts.

 

[Aurgelmir]

Biggest problem I see with abstinence-only is that it is not education.

All you are saying is "You should not have sex, because having a baby at 16 is not cool"
Problem is that this won't stop people from bumping uglies... only now they do it uneducated.

Teach kids how all of this work and they are at least prepared. Abstinence teaching and sexual education IS NOT mutually exclusive. And no teaching people about something doesn't make them go out and do it. (Because they are already doing it)

 

[Brutal Peanut]

Believe it or not, I never went to any kind of sexual education class in school. My family, is a family of medical professionals. What I went through and saw for information about sex and the consequences of forgoing safety measures, was far more horrific than any class described to me by my peers. Since I live in Southern California and apparently nothing was ever too horrific for my peers, just awkward and giggle-worthy. I also looked up quite a bit of information on my own to educate myself, since that has always been my way. I also watched different programs that described masturbation and sexuality, in a positive and healthy light, as long as one was safe.

I think it's important to actually stress both cold-hard facts on diseases, pregnancies, etc., encouraging teens/young adults to not be scared of buying contraception, proper safety practices and use of contraceptives, and abstinence (not until marriage, just until they feel they are ready and not to feel pressured). However, I can't help but feel religion should be left at the door on something like sexual education. Then again, I don't mean to offend, it's just my opinion.

 

[Sir_Auron_the_Badass]

I can't answer you poll because I don't understand what "I support this" is for?

-Would this support the bad situation you describe?
or
-Would this support your proposal that it should be stopped?

---


I think the message should rather than be:

"Have sex with condoms"

but be

"Do not have sex WITHOUT condoms"

That's the problem with sex, the whole semen transfer business. Semen includes such a large number of shedding cells it transfers blood born diseases very effectively and the vajayjay or butthole is not like the skin over your body, it is is mucosa membrane vulnerable to all sorts of these microbes.

And IF a condom does break (fucking HOW, look how much latex condoms can be stretched before they break)...

(I guess if the condom has been in your wallet for 2 years, yeah it may have partially dissolved)

... then you put on another condom if there is still time. This is where a morning after pill would be very useful as while not every dude carries an STI, all of them likely have active sperm cells. Also abortion needs to be a practical option when that doesn't work. Roe vs Wade applies just as much to teenagers as adults.

the fact that the government grants funding to school districts that promise to teach abstinence-only sex "education" instead of a comprehensive, fact-based style.

Which government? State Government? Federal government?

Federal Government provides the funding, but it's up to individual states and then school districts to decide if they want to accept that funding at the cost of comprehensive sex-ed (whether or not they were already providing it).

As for the poll, the ones that say that you agree with means you support what form of sex-ed your school district (as far as you know) currently teaches.

 

[applesandoranges]

edit

 

[Treblaine]

Federal Government provides the funding, but it's up to individual states and then school districts to decide if they want to accept that funding at the cost of comprehensive sex-ed (whether or not they were already providing it).

As for the poll, the ones that say that you agree with means you support what form of sex-ed your school district (as far as you know) currently teaches.

So at what level is the funding being stopped if they deviate from teaching Abstinence Only? Is it:

-Federal government mandate
-State government mandate
-District regulation

 

[Sir_Auron_the_Badass]

Federal Government provides the funding, but it's up to individual states and then school districts to decide if they want to accept that funding at the cost of comprehensive sex-ed (whether or not they were already providing it).

As for the poll, the ones that say that you agree with means you support what form of sex-ed your school district (as far as you know) currently teaches.

So at what level is the funding being stopped if they deviate from teaching Abstinence Only? Is it:

-Federal government mandate
-State government mandate
-District regulation

More likely than not, it would be at the district level; each individual district will ask or be asked if it wants the funding. Obviously the ones seeking out and asking will most likely vote yes, but the ones being asked might say no, at which point they become uneligible for the funds (until the next vote on it, probably when new members come in/old members leave) and another district is turned to and asked.

CAPTCHA: butler did it. How strange, I just recently watched Clue the movie.

 

[Sir_Auron_the_Badass]

The teachers themselves weren't so damn narrow-minded but they were forced to teach a more or less abstinence only curriculum for sex-ed.

99% of the time the only thing they could talk about were the *possibility* of consequences from having sex and unprotected sex all the same.

But when kids asked questions they were able to stray from the bs, so it was all good once everyone caught on, and I would like to say we got a good idea on it all, from both sides thanks to the teacher(s) themselves.

I know what you mean, my PE teachers were the ones teaching my health class, except for the days sex-ed was supposed to be covered. The district brought in a pro-abstinence representative for those days, who totally wasn't (christian) religiously biased *cough* wore priest's black clothes, white collar, large cross neckless, and carried a bible *cough*. There were a few kids in the class from various other religions besides any form of Catholicism (since this was, in fact a public school) that asked the representative why they should follow his set rules because their religion/deity doesn't follow those rules, and all he said was "because the true god doesn't allow it". I facepalmed so hard as soon as he looked away after that. The day after that our actual teachers purposely let slip that they were forced to take those days off because the school knew they were a lot more open-minded about sexuality and contraceptives than the district would've liked, and that if they taught it their way, they would've been fired.

 

[Plinglebob]

Only sex ed I got when I was younger was a lesson when I was 11 about the general mechanics and another when I was 14. I learned more from Monty Python.

Spoiler: Not safe for work

 

[BarbaricGoose]

The curriculum in my school was comprehensive, and I am a Don in the Mafia, but I also support this. Abstinence doesn't work.

 

[Naeras]

But I feel that if a private school wants to do something, and the parents paying to send their kids there approve it's no one else's business.

As long as they don't complain when their kid turns pregnant because one of their friends says that "you can't get pregnant from the first time" or "as long as you don't kiss it'll be okay".
Yeah, I've heard those. =/

 

[malestrithe]

Federal Government provides the funding, but it's up to individual states and then school districts to decide if they want to accept that funding at the cost of comprehensive sex-ed (whether or not they were already providing it).

As for the poll, the ones that say that you agree with means you support what form of sex-ed your school district (as far as you know) currently teaches.

So at what level is the funding being stopped if they deviate from teaching Abstinence Only? Is it:

-Federal government mandate
-State government mandate
-District regulation

State level. All education policies in the state are decided by your states board of education.

Federal government can't mandate anything. Apart from the 40 percent the Feds give to the states for education regardless, programs like Race to the Top and No Child Left Behind are more of a contract deal. It is no different than the one you signed when you started working. You do what is expected of you, don't screw up often and you get paid. The feds can only do what the state allows it to and nothing else. No Child Left Behind was never enacted in Utah or Massachusetts. Race to the Top is not enforced in 5 states.

Districts rarely do more than make sure State policies are enforced.

 

[Master_of_Oldskool]

My school district is unfortunately still abstinence based. When I took the class, my teacher, whom I shall refer to from here on as Mrs. Westboro K. Santorum, was horrifyingly enthusiastic about it. Mrs. Santorum gave us a brief introduction to the actual biology involved, and then spent the rest of the semester, and I shit you not here, telling us how relationships work. For most of four months, this completely untrained, unqualified zealot spouted armchair psychology bullshit about how men only react to visual stimulus and women only react to emotional stimulus, how a relationship not built on a "solid foundation", i.e. one without sex, could never hold up, and even how porn, in her opinion, could end marriages.

My favorite part, I think, was when she demonstrated how sex with multiple partners made one lose their ability to have a meaningful relationship... in the same way that tape loses its stickiness. This was far, far too much stupidity to take on one sitting. I raised my hand, waiting patiently as Mrs. Santorum told us a parable about a crack whore, all the while sticking the tape to things and ripping it off. Finally, her story concluded, she was forced to acknowledge me, and I explained, in one-sylable words, that people are more complicated than tape. And Mrs. Santorum's response?

"No they're not."

That's it. That's all. Not a single rational argument, not even some dubious bit of pseudo-psychology. Just "No they're not." The entirety of human thought and emotion, no more complicated to her than a strip of plastic and adhesive.

Westboro K. Santorum still teaches there.