Ignorance Got Me Pregnant

[Egalia]

The efforts to censor birth control information continue. The good news is that students are fighting back:

"The Associated Press has picked up the story about the Tennessee high school that seized all 1,800 copies of the student newspaper because it featured an informative article about birth control."

http://guerillawomentn.blogspot.com/2005/11/ignorance-got-me-pregnant.html

"Oak Ridge School Superintendent Tom Bailey has decreed that the censored high school newspaper will be reprinted with the offending birth control article entirely removed. The feature on body art will be revised."

http://guerillawomentn.blogspot.com/2005/11/oak-ridge-students-fighting-for.html

[waiting for hope]

1. Okay - I agree

that banning information will lead to ignorance but where are the parents in all of this? I sure as hell am not going to rely on my daughter's future school programs to teach her about birth control.

[Trish1168]

5. I've already taught my daughter the facts of life......she's only 8

I wanted to be the one to tell her. I've lectured her on boys already (and how they try to 'use girls'). She doesn't know all the technicalities yet, but she will before age 11. And she WILL know about birth control and how pregnancy can affect her life.

If she has sex after age 16 I will not freak. I just don't want her to be promiscuous (she needs to have more self respect).

Parents do have a role to play, but as we know from history, hiding stories regard sex does not reduce pregnancy. Hiding information about sex is stupid and ridiculous. Besides, it makes kids all the more kicked to do it if it is forbidden (and they're bored).

[kitkatrose]

7. Yes, because you're responsible.

But what about those students with uber-religious parents who won't/can't teach them about sex, STDs, pregnancy, birth control and all that? Or even those that just plain don't care? THAT's who the information targeted, is my impression.

[waiting for hope]

8. Oh geez, holy crap....

aren't these the ones that cry foul when teen pregnancy and et al is on the rise? It still amazes me how little responsibility some parents take in the raising of their kids. Monkey No See, Monkey No Hear, Monkey No Speak......then bitch about why their kids are getting poor grades, have low self-esteem and blame the teachers (who, now I'm on a rant....suffer low salaries and hectic/stressful working conditions so they can pay off their student loans - getting that graduate degree so they can find a better position is more than most are willing to do) when their child is having behavioral problems..

Okay, I feel better now - I've been looking into schools for my son starts Kindergarten next year and have had this floating in my head...

[kitkatrose]

13. You betcha!

I grew up in the South; my sex ed consisted of one class period (<hr) of the school nurse droning about diaphrams, condoms, the pill, and insisting that abstinence is the only sure way to prevent pregnancy and disease. Well, duh, since no sexual contact occurs, unless God is choosing baby mamas that day, it ain't gonna happen. Of course, my sex ed was in an interpersonal communications class where I also learned how to set a table and do a wedding, important things like that, which was optional, and even the sex ed portion was optional because it took forever to get the nurse to come see us (we shared one with a few other schools and had her about once or twice a week--your tax dollars in action).

I think it's still worth sending your son to public schools, I went and came out normal (or close enough to it :D). YOu seem to be a good parent; that'll do more for him no matter what school he goes to will do, in terms of education, self confidence, and all that other good stuff.

And I have a rant about teachers, well two of them since I'm at the collegiate level and its exam time, but I won't get into them now. :)

[demnan]

2. Yeah, let them learn in the back seats of cars

what was good enough for the parents is good enough for the kids. :sarcasm:

[mongo]

3. This quote says it all

Students said the birth control article contained information lacking in the high school sex education class, which they ridiculed as inadequate.

[Warpy]

4. Ah, the neverending battle to control a daughter's body

It's been doomed to failure throughout human history, yet every generation of parents think they can succeed where their forebears failed so miserably.

I'd rather see education aimed at helping girls get through their teens and twenties alive, and preferably not burdened with children they never wanted and can't care for properly.

[femrap]

6. Don't you think it is about time that we educate the

boys? Hey, if matriarchy ruled, boys who irresponsibly ejaculated would have their testes removed.

Seriously, the sowing of the wild oats is so damn old. The lame excuse of boys will be boys is adding population to a planet that is FULL UP (as the Dutch say). When do males grow up and take responsibility?

Respect needs to exist. Can we teach respect?

[bloom]

9. "Tough child support laws may deter single men from becoming fathers.."

...study finds"


"Researchers studying the factors behind out-of-wedlock births have found a significant variable that often is overlooked: child support.
States that are strict in enforcing child support have up to 20 percent fewer unmarried births than states that are lax about getting unmarried dads to pay, the researchers found."

http://www.uwnews.org/article.asp?articleID=10608



I suspect it helps if the guys know they will be paying.

Though some don't care - like the local case of the 41 year old who impregnated the 16 year old. He's hoping the paternity test shows that he's the father. :eyes:

[mongo]

10. Last time I checked, it took two to make a baby

if matriarchy ruled, boys who irresponsibly ejaculated would have their testes removed.

Using your logic(?) shouldn't we also give a hysterecomy to the unwed mothers?

[bloom]

11. I've never noticed society encouraging young women

to have children indiscriminately by several men. (The equivalent of the sowing wild oats idea. Seems just the opposite.)

Have you?


But maybe - you just happened to miss her point.

[mongo]

12. I didn't miss the misandry in the comment

and I don't see how anyone can think that unwanted pregnancy is the exclusive fault of the male.

And I don't believe that society encourages young men to create children with multiple women. Have sex - perhaps, but not pregnancy, certainly not in this day and age.

US high teen birth rates are the fault of the lack of proper sex education in our schools - and parents with their heads in the sand about providing access to birth control. It is the inherent prudishness of our society that causes the bulk unplanned pregnancy -- not some cultural conspiracy to get men to father children by multiple partners.

Geesh.

[liontamer]

14. but only girls are encouraged to remain abstinent

and the general argument given for the double standard is that "boys don't get pregnant" while the previous poster's statement was full of gross hypberbole, there is too much emphasis on teaching girls to be abstinent while the boys will be boys attitude still prevails.

More effort should be dedicated to informing both children about sexuality and sexual health, and the messages given children of either sex should be standardized.

so no more good girls / losers or sluts/studs female/male double standards

[funflower]

15. Our society doesn't even encourage boys to make an attempt at responsible

use of birth control. Information is great, but until boys believe they will be responsible for the result - whatever it is - there is no incentive for them to behave responsibly.

[mongo]

16. Sure there is a greater incentive for women to behave

responsibly. No way to overcome the biology involved. (at least not yet...)

But I'm not so sure about "society". I guess it depends on what sub-culture of America you are in.

Both boys and girls get the same sex-ed. They both get the puritanical (just say no) message there. The fundimentalist/religious take on abstinance doesn't say that boys can have sex but girls can't.

But pop culture acknowleges that young people have sex. Yeah, women are called "sluts" in hip-hop, rap, etc., but I don't think it has the same negative values as it once did. Kind of like the N word in that respect.

And there is incentive for men to behave responsibly. It's called child support - which may not have been very well enforced in the past, but that is becoming a thing of the past.