Julie Sternberg
March 21, 2007
Julie Sternberg is a senior staff attorney with the American Civil Liberties Union Reproductive Freedom Project.
Adolescence. We’ve all been there, and I would bet that most everyone remembers how awkward it can be. Hormones surge. Bodies transform. And suddenly there are a lot of questions about sex, pregnancy and sexually transmitted diseases. Teens often cobble together answers to these new and embarrassing questions, yet the information they come up with is often uniformed, ill-advised, or downright wrong.
And so we, the adults, attempt to help teens navigate these tricky waters with instruction in school that provides truthful information, helping them make healthy choices and avoid the perils of unintended pregnancy and disease.
The problem is somewhere along the way this system was hijacked by an ideological agenda, leaving teens to suffer the consequences.
If you’re like the majority of Americans, 75 percent to be exact, by the age of 20 you’ve had sex without being married to your partner. By the age of 44 that percentage rises to 95 percent. These figures, from a recent study published in Public Health Reports, make clear that engaging in sex before marriage is the cultural norm in the United States and has been for decades.
Yet our government is downright obsessed with abstinence until marriage. In fact, since 1996, the federal government has poured more than a billion dollars into programs that are required to promote abstinence until marriage, and forbidden from teaching about contraception, unless it is to emphasize failure rates.
Keep in mind that this isn’t about the government encouraging teens to delay becoming sexually active until they are mature enough to make healthy choices—without a doubt a wise message. Rather, these programs use an eight-point definition of abstinence that claims that abstaining from sex outside of marriage—at any age—is the expected standard of human activity, and that sex outside of marriage is likely to have harmful psychological and physical effects.
It gets worse. Not only are these programs encouraged by the government to teach that condoms fail, but many federally funded curricula exaggerate failure rates. A report released in December of 2004 by a committee of the U.S. House of Representatives detailed the distortion and misinformation found in some of the most widely used federally funded abstinence-only-until-marriage curricula. One such curriculum even compared using a condom to playing a game of Russian roulette.
The report also found widespread proffering of stereotypes as scientific fact. A few examples: Boys need to achieve, girls don’t. Boys can focus on only one activity at time. Girls are hampered by their emotions. Boys’ brains are like microwaves. Girls’ brains are like crock-pots. (Let me know if you can figure out what the last one has to do with sex.)
Of course, the million-dollar question (or should I say, billion-dollar question) is: Do these programs work? The answer: No. Research shows that while some abstinence-only-until-marriage programs may delay sex for a bit, most teens who participate go on to have sex before marriage and when they do start having sex are less likely to use condoms and get tested for STDs.
In contrast, evidence shows that programs that promote abstinence and provide teens with information on how contraception protects against unintended pregnancy and STDs actually result in teens delaying sex and increased contraceptive use. Yet there is no federal funding for such reality- and truth-based programs.
Abstinence-only-until-marriage programs are clearly not about science, nor are they about promoting public health. Rather they are about pushing a particular agenda.
There is hope on the horizon. Many organizations, including the American Civil Liberties Union, are working to eliminate or decrease federal funding for abstinence-only-until-marriage programs, and to build support for legislation such as the Prevention First Act and the Responsible Education About Life Act. Both bills would provide funding to support comprehensive sex education and the Prevention First Act would require federally funded programs to provide complete and medically accurate information on contraceptives.
Of course, we still have a long way to go. There is, however, a lot that each individual can do. Start shining a light on what is being taught in the schools in your community. Ask questions. Speak up. Fight for change. Help ensure that the next generation gets a dose of reality, not ideology.
More information on efforts to combat abstinence-only-until-marriage programs in your community is available at TakeIssueTakeCharge.org
March 21, 2007
Julie Sternberg is a senior staff attorney with the American Civil Liberties Union Reproductive Freedom Project.
Adolescence. We’ve all been there, and I would bet that most everyone remembers how awkward it can be. Hormones surge. Bodies transform. And suddenly there are a lot of questions about sex, pregnancy and sexually transmitted diseases. Teens often cobble together answers to these new and embarrassing questions, yet the information they come up with is often uniformed, ill-advised, or downright wrong.
And so we, the adults, attempt to help teens navigate these tricky waters with instruction in school that provides truthful information, helping them make healthy choices and avoid the perils of unintended pregnancy and disease.
The problem is somewhere along the way this system was hijacked by an ideological agenda, leaving teens to suffer the consequences.
If you’re like the majority of Americans, 75 percent to be exact, by the age of 20 you’ve had sex without being married to your partner. By the age of 44 that percentage rises to 95 percent. These figures, from a recent study published in Public Health Reports, make clear that engaging in sex before marriage is the cultural norm in the United States and has been for decades.
Yet our government is downright obsessed with abstinence until marriage. In fact, since 1996, the federal government has poured more than a billion dollars into programs that are required to promote abstinence until marriage, and forbidden from teaching about contraception, unless it is to emphasize failure rates.
Keep in mind that this isn’t about the government encouraging teens to delay becoming sexually active until they are mature enough to make healthy choices—without a doubt a wise message. Rather, these programs use an eight-point definition of abstinence that claims that abstaining from sex outside of marriage—at any age—is the expected standard of human activity, and that sex outside of marriage is likely to have harmful psychological and physical effects.
It gets worse. Not only are these programs encouraged by the government to teach that condoms fail, but many federally funded curricula exaggerate failure rates. A report released in December of 2004 by a committee of the U.S. House of Representatives detailed the distortion and misinformation found in some of the most widely used federally funded abstinence-only-until-marriage curricula. One such curriculum even compared using a condom to playing a game of Russian roulette.
The report also found widespread proffering of stereotypes as scientific fact. A few examples: Boys need to achieve, girls don’t. Boys can focus on only one activity at time. Girls are hampered by their emotions. Boys’ brains are like microwaves. Girls’ brains are like crock-pots. (Let me know if you can figure out what the last one has to do with sex.)
Of course, the million-dollar question (or should I say, billion-dollar question) is: Do these programs work? The answer: No. Research shows that while some abstinence-only-until-marriage programs may delay sex for a bit, most teens who participate go on to have sex before marriage and when they do start having sex are less likely to use condoms and get tested for STDs.
In contrast, evidence shows that programs that promote abstinence and provide teens with information on how contraception protects against unintended pregnancy and STDs actually result in teens delaying sex and increased contraceptive use. Yet there is no federal funding for such reality- and truth-based programs.
Abstinence-only-until-marriage programs are clearly not about science, nor are they about promoting public health. Rather they are about pushing a particular agenda.
There is hope on the horizon. Many organizations, including the American Civil Liberties Union, are working to eliminate or decrease federal funding for abstinence-only-until-marriage programs, and to build support for legislation such as the Prevention First Act and the Responsible Education About Life Act. Both bills would provide funding to support comprehensive sex education and the Prevention First Act would require federally funded programs to provide complete and medically accurate information on contraceptives.
Of course, we still have a long way to go. There is, however, a lot that each individual can do. Start shining a light on what is being taught in the schools in your community. Ask questions. Speak up. Fight for change. Help ensure that the next generation gets a dose of reality, not ideology.
More information on efforts to combat abstinence-only-until-marriage programs in your community is available at TakeIssueTakeCharge.org
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