When I was in school, we made friendship bracelets

The scandal-icious story about a supposed “pregnancy pact” between 18 teenaged girls attending Gloucester High School in Massachusetts has been all over the media lately. As you know, the mainstream media is selective about the stories they regurgitate & the chosen few stories they do tell us are usually told to shape public opinion on a specific issue or idea. So, when a story like this is so widely discussed I can’t help but wonder what I’m expected to take from it. Initially, I figured the story was another one of those convenient election year tales of teen girl promiscuity intended to scare the be-jesus out of parents & turn their attentions toward candidates that preach about Family Values and the evils of premarital sex (A.K.A. the politicians that still blame Eve for society’s ills). Upon closer inspection, I sensed the underlying message of the story was that teen pregnancy rates, which had been on the decline for fourteen years prior to Bush’s ascension to the throne, were increasing because pregnancy had gained a sort of “cool” status among underage girls. Instead of blaming the government policies that fund ineffective abstinence-only sex education, at the expense comprehensive sex ed programs that actually work, we were supposed to be pointing the finger at irresponsible teen’s that find procreation “trendy”. Now, I realize that a story about sexually active teen girls can be used as an all-purpose parable to justify any ridiculous assumptions you have about young women, teens, pregnancy, pre-marital sex, etc. etc. etc. For example, TIME magazine ran an article penned by Nancy Gibbs that uses the Gloucester girl’s story to gush about Crisis Pregnancy Centers (or CPCs).

CPCs are notorious for their use of misinformation and intimidation to keep women from seeking abortion services and the scary thing is, they out number actual clinics 2 to 1. They are not usually staffed by medical professionals. They are designed to look like clinics inside (waiting room, white lab coats, etc.), are often located near actual clinics, and use deceptive names to imply that they are full-fledged health care facilities. CPCs do not offer women referrals for abortion services or birth control. They have been known to pull fucked up shit to force women to continue their pregnancies, like extending the waiting period for pregnancy test results so that the women have time to take in all the anti-choice or religious propaganda CPC staffers can throw at them. Flat out lies about emergency contraception are common and women are told ridiculous shit like abortions cause breast cancer & infertility. In a nut shell, Crisis Pregnancy Centers pretend to offer assistance and help to pregnant women, only to confuse, lie, and guilt-trip ladies into adhering to their own moral dogma.

Now, the TIME magazine article suggests that the knocked-up teens of Gloucester were not planning pregnancies as much as they were rejecting abortion. None of the gals in question utilized the services of a CPC, as far as I can tell, but Gibbs uses the final paragraph of her story to bring them up anyhow. She writes:

This has been the mission of the crisis-pregnancy-center movement, the more than 4,000 centers and hotlines and support groups around the country that aim to talk women out of having abortions and offer whatever support they can. If not in Hollywood, then certainly in Gloucester, teen parents and their babies face long odds against success in life. Surely they deserve more sympathy and support than shame and derision, if the trend that they reflect is not a typical teenager's inclination to have sex but rather a willingness to take responsibility for the consequences.

Hmm… because a bunch of under-aged girls trying to get pregnant despite their lack of income, housing, a complete high school education, life experience, or legal sovereignty is CLEARLY a case of being responsible. Clearly.

Common sense ain't all that common

The House Appropriations Subcommittee on Labor, Health and Human Services, Education, and Related Agencies (TRANSLATION: the H.O.R. click that decides how much money is spent on non-military shit that actually benefits the American population) voted yesterday to continue funding the Community-Based Abstinence Education (CBAE) program, even though plenty of recent research has proved it to be counter-productive. Apparently, ideology is much more important than the welfare of America’s adolescents!

The CBAE program, according to the Department of Health and Human Services, distributes tax dollars directly to public & private organizations that develop and implement sex education programs that focus solely on abstinence (discussion of sexual activity is not allowed within these programs & is reason to have funding revoked). These programs (according to the government site on the subject) teach that sexual activity outside of the context of marriage is likely to have harmful psychological and physical effects; that bearing children out-of-wedlock is likely to have harmful consequences for the child, the child’s parents, and society; and that a mutually faithful monogamous relationship in the context of marriage is the expected standard of human sexual activity. Most adults can see the problems with this curriculum quite clearly, but apparently Congress cannot. They still set aside millions each year to fund programs that tell our children that having sex with anyone but your spouse will fuck up your head, your life, your body, your parents, and society itself. But we can’t get universal health care…

Even if common sense isn’t enough to convince a Representative on the Appropriations Subcommittee that CBAE is a waste of public funds, one would think that all the research on the subject might sway their opinions on the matter. For example:

• Mathematica Policy Research, Inc. released their study of abstinence-only policies in early 2007. The 164-page report concluded that such programs were ineffective in preventing teen sexual activity. The programs didn’t have an impact on when teens “got down to business” or how many partners they hooked up with.
• The National Campaign to Prevent Teen and Unplanned Pregnancy released their study in late 2007 that also concluded that abstinence-only programs had no effect on the sexual behavior of teens. One of the researchers even suggested that comprehensive sex ed arms adolescents with information that allows them to be more confident in their ability to say ‘no’ to unwanted sexual behavior.
• 17 States have refused to accept CBAE funding because the program is ineffective. This should be a pretty clear message to Congress that CBAE ain't cool. Wouldn’t you think?

The clearest diss on the Appropriations Subcommittee decision was articulated by the director of the ACLU's Washington Legislative Office, Caroline Fredrickson:

"It’s hard to imagine a good reason why, in these tight economic times, Congress would intentionally flush taxpayer dollars down the drain by spending them on disproven, ineffective abstinence-only-until-marriage programs. We are floored that they continue to ignore study after study, and the consensus of the pubic health community, all concluding that these programs censor vital health care information, teach gender stereotypes, discriminate against lesbian and gay teens, and in some cases promote religion in the classroom in violation of the Constitution."

That's what I'm saying.

Fear of Fucking

Cat asked me once: "If you had a daughter, what beliefs would you want to instill in her?". I responded: "I would want her to think she was cool". My reasoning was that if a young girl believes that she is cool as she is, she is likely to have a healthier self image, more self esteem, and be more confident during the gauntlet of high school than her peers. She would be less subject to peer pressure, more sure of her academic abilities, and wouldn't feel the need to engage in sexual activities before she was ready to prove her worth. This last part came to mind earlier while I was browsing my favorite feminist news site and came across a link to the article located HERE. It's another ridiculous tale of wigged out parents, sex ed curriculum, and the hymens they think are endangered by truth. Parents in Schenectady (X-B-Aladocious), NY have beef with the school district because sex education taught to seventh and eighth graders relies on materials developed by Planned Parenthood. The instructor was never permitted to discuss abortion or abortion rights, so that is not the issue here. Instead, the problem that these dipshit caretakers have with the curriculum is the suggestion that "masturbation is a source of pleasure." An equally dipshit-esque doctor, Michael Rochet, warned that the suggestion would facilitate curiosity among students & would lead to more sexual activity. This particular county in New York has the state's second highest teen pregnancy rate and I'll bet it has more than a little bit to do with the fucked up approach of parents & educators to sexual matters. First off, masturbation is a source of pleasure and by 7th or 8th grade most of these kids already figured that out. Second, a sex ed course is supposed to educate the class about sex, not force feed them a bunch of moralistic bullshit, so that the teens will have the tools to approach sex (or not approach sex) with accurate information. Censoring subjects that the teens are already up on game about will only give them reason to doubt the accuracy of the rest of the shit they're taught & that won't help reduce the pregnancy rate, now would it? Instead of trusting in what they learn from the instructor, they will turn to the "wisdom" of peers & we all know how much bullshit boys tell girls in order to get in their pants ("You won't get pregnant if you jump up & down afterwards!", "You can't get pregnant in a pool!", or the ever popular "...if I pull out" line). Third, wouldn't casting masturbation in a favorable light be advantageous to the goal of reducing teen pregnancy? After all, if your "going it alone" there is no chance of becoming knocked up. This relates to my theory of child-rearing mentioned above because if these parents & that moronic doctor understood the motivations of many sexually active teens, the sex ed curriculum wouldn't be the villain here. Many teens have sex before they are ready to because they are looking for acceptance or approval during the time that their self esteem's are in the toilet. If a youngster has faith in their coolness, if they believe they are loved and they are worth something regardless of what their peers say or do to them, they aren't going to need the approval or acceptance of a would-be statutory rapist. When you pair that with an accurate dose of sex ed, you are more likely to have teenagers that abstain from sex until they are ready to get down like mature folks. And that's real talk!