Back to School: Sex Ed for Teens
It’s school time again and if you are a parent of a teen or even a pre-teen, your child may attend a sex-ed class this year. But something going on in the news lately has really got me seeing red.
I’m incensed about what is going on the sex-ed community.
Planned Parenthood has just released a document (titled Exclaim!) in preparation for the United Nations Conference on children later this month. The upshot of the document is to advocate for the sexual rights of our kids. You read that right- the document says that every child has the right to make his/her own decision when it comes to sexual activity. Furthermore, they advocate that kids should have access to sexual counseling and services without their parents knowledge. Even if they’re 11 years old.
Let’s put political, religious and even ethical views aside for a moment. Let’s simply look at kids and some medical facts (outlined in my book Your Kids At Risk ).
- 20 million Americans contract a new sexually transmitted infection every year in the US and about 50 % are in kids and young adults.
- 1:5 people over age 12 tests positive for genital herpes
- 1:4 teens (all teens- not just those having sex) get a sexually transmitted infection every year
- HPV causes 99% of all cervical cancers and teen girls are more prone to getting cervical cancer if infected because of differences in their anatomy
- 40% all girls 14-18 y/o state that they have sex that they don’t want to have because they don’t want to let their boyfriends down
- According to a medical study released in Sept 2001, if we don’t dramatically change course (teach our kids to put the brakes on), by the year 2025 (how old will your grandchildren be?), 30 % of all men and 40% all women will test positive for genital herpes.
Shall I continue? If you question the validity of the above numbers, I have an extensive bibliography.
Regardless what you think about Planned Parenthood, think about this for a moment. We now know, through extensive research done by neuroscientists, that teens are not capable of full abstract thinking. This means that they lack the ability to understand in a meaningful way that action A leads to consequence B in 5 days. That’s why your 17-year-old son genuinely believes he can drive his car 90 mph into a tree and walk away from the car. He just doesn’t get it.
Planned Parenthood knows this. It’s made national news in the past few years. So what gives, then, when it comes to sex education? Physicians universally agree that in 2011, sex for kids is really risky stuff. They shouldn’t have it. It is no longer a religious or moral issue; it is a medical one.
Why then, would the document from Planned Parenthood state in Exclaim! that kids have sexual rights when they aren’t capable of understanding that disease is very real and that if they buckle to sexual pressure, their lives could be at stake? I can think of one reason they would write this and sacrifice the health of our kids: keep sexual freedom alive.
Don’t get me wrong. I’m not a sex hater. As a matter of fact, when I speak to teens across the country, I always begin by shouting, “Sex is amazing!” to the kids. I tell them that sex is too great to waste on the teen years because scientists know that if they start having sex at 15, their chances of getting an infection are exponentially higher than if they wait. Then I talk to them about their hearts, their feelings.
Many out there don’t have their facts straight- including Planned Parenthood. They are not an organization of physicians, they are social activists. So do right by your kids. It’s a tough sexual climate out there and they need you to step up to the plate and do the real educating. Make them put the brakes on and tell them why. They’ll love you for it.
What say you, parents? Have you spoken honestly and frankly to your kids about sex? If they are teen or even pre-teen, what’s stopping you?
13 Responses to “Back to School: Sex Ed for Teens”
Great post! Thanks for getting this message out there.
Did you actually read the whole pamphlet? There are probably close to 100 rights listed in it. You don’t really quote any of them. Could you elaborate on which you specifically are against? Are you against granting children the right to not be genitally mutilated, for instance?
Nowhere in this post do you actually quote the pamphlet. That sounds like lazy blogging to me or else simply writing based on someone else’s talking points — in which case you should cite their talking points.
Curtis, could you post a link to the pamphlet so that we can read the actual document?
Hopefully this short one works: http://bit.ly/qLgjtb
If you read any of Dr. Meeker’s books, you would know she’s anything but lazy. I read the IPPF pamphlet, and Dr. Meeker is right on the money. Her book “strong fathers, strong daughters” changed my life and I recommend it to every father of a daughter. I’m reading “boys should be boys” right now and am equally inspired. Try reading her books, then criticize her (otherwise, you are no better than what you are wrongly accusing her of — being lazy)
IPPF is a wolf in sheep’s clothing. And yes, I have read the Exclaim! publication. It attempts to do just what is now evidenced by Curtis’ post. Exclaim! does state there is a difference between “reproductive rights and health” (what Curtis is talking about) and “sexual rights” (i.e. sexual expression, pleasure, and exploration). If IPPF can intermingle and confuse the two, they will have successfully created a gray area devoid of any moral compass. This moral abyss will, like a giant whirlpool, drown all who venture too close to it’s grasp. By the way, I did notice that the word “young” was glaringly absent from their glossary on page 33.
If a tobacco company had published a document proclaiming the right of young people explore the pleasures of tobacco, everyone would be up in arms. IPPF is no different than big tobacco. While (supposedly) no tax dollars go directly to the abortion process, tax dollars do support IPPF’s overhead, and the marketing of such self-serving garbage as Exclaim! More sexual freedom = more abortions sales = more bottom line profit for PP.
I think what the pamphlet does is bigger than anything sexual, reproductive, free, or whatever word-mix one can put together. The message in the IPPF’s message completely removes the parent in the relationship of the child (the teen that should be sexually “free”). Of course, they do so without actually saying that the parent has no role in the child’s sex education. I had to re-read to make sure of this, because it baffles me. “Parental” is replaced with “cultural”, and they also made sure to include “freedom from coercion” which, to me, insults my parents and my own role as a parent – regardless of age, gender, ethnicity, religion, or marital status.
The main point I drew from Dr. Meeker’s post is that “Regardless of what you think about Planned Parenthood, …teens are not capable of abstract thinking.” That’s why parents are in charge of their children’s rights until they are 18. When I was a teen, my mother reminded me many times that I don’t have certain rights yet, and I thank her for it.
I think that you may be reading it too much from an American standpoint. Freedom from coercion means freedom to not be pressured into marriage at menarche. Or pressured into parenthood at 15. Or pressured into thinking you’re an abomination for your sexual orientation. In many parts of the world, parents are the PROBLEM, not the solution. From our own ethos, though, I can see your point. Comprehensive sex education is a universal right. But that education, in our country, would benefit greatly by the involvement of parents.
While I don’t agree with everything in the pamphlet, and disagree strongly with a couple things, I don’t see it as any more offensive than Humanae Vitae.
These sorts of details and discussion are, I think, more important to the subject than the original blog post which simply vilifies PP.
I think I may have found the pamphlet itself even more troubling than Dr. Meg’s characterization of it! PPF (or IPPF) has lead the cultural revolution’s efforts to disassociate sexual relationships from fertility and reproduction entirely. Should ALL people have the right to be free from coercion of any sort? Of course! But that is entirely different from being free TO DO whatever one wants.
Once people recognize and embrace the inherent link between the unifying and pleasurable aspects of sex, and the reproductive aspects of sex, sex becomes a real communion between men and women. Access to birth control does NOT free young women, it subjugates them to the men who want to exploit them sexually without consequence. It makes young women BELIEVE they are free when they are not.
Young women need to not only be free from coerced marriage at menarche and genital mutilation and rape, they also need to be free to simply say “no, I’m not ready for sex” without society and planned parenthood telling them “everybody’s doing it and we can make it safe, so go ahead!” It’s really not safe –emotionally, psychologically or even physically– until a person is in a committed, monogamous relationship … marriage perhaps?
I agree with much of what you said. The points where I disagree are pretty minor indeed. I think the pamphlet could very easily have been worded differently so as to allay any fears that it is saying “kids should be able to have sex whenever they want.” If that was intentional as opposed to just poor writing, then it certainly is a troubling self-portrayal by IPPF.
Much of what you said is directly applicable to my thesis. Interesting.
I suggest Premarital Sex in America by Regnerus and Uecker for a look into the truth about what is happening. Some of it is overblown (hookup culture) and some of it is ignored (the ill effects on women of casual sex). Interesting sutff.
The flip side is women (and men) should also be free to say “I like having sex when ever and with who ever I want because it is my choice.” We don’t speak opening enough either about masturbating for a sexual release if there is no other outlet.
If we can pass laws that say kids do not have the right to drive until they are 16, if we can pass laws that say kids do not have the right to vote until they are 18, if we can pass laws that say kids do not have the right to drink until 21, then every parent can say that our kids do not have the right to sex until post-high school or post-college or post-marriage or any other time parents deem appropriate.
So a single 50 year man or woman isn’t allowed to have sex if their parent told them “no” until marriage. That is ridiculous.