NationStates Jolt Archive

I had an interesting conversation with some girls on another forum, about abstinence-only sex education. It was a poll, and the question was "Sex education", and the options were 1)is unacceptable for it promotes sex, which I do not want people having 2)is a very good thing, since it teaches people about sex 3)is a terrible lie, everyone knows that condoms have holes in them and 4)other-elaborate. Well, one girl, Onyma, posted this gem:

To all those who picked the first choice, how does learning about sex promote intercourse? That is like saying learning about the Trojan war promotes worshipping Greek Gods.

My answer: That's also like saying learning how to drive encourages you to joyride and hit 50 other cars/pedestrians, LOL.
I'll give you the link, if I can.
What is your opinion on sex ed? Should it be abstinence-only, or should it be completely informative? This is a subject that means a lot to me, as a teen. What are your opinions on it?

No replies? No other opinions? :(

What is your opinion on sex ed? Should it be abstinence-only, or should it be completely informative? This is a subject that means a lot to me, as a teen. What are your opinions on it?
As both father and grandfather, I know that if the situation gets intense enough, teenagers are going to have sex, almost without exception. While I think that abstinence should play a role in sex education, I'm a strong supporter of teaching the full spectrum, including use of condoms, STDs, etc. To do otherwise is to foolishly bury your head in the sand.

I had an interesting conversation with some girls on another forum, about abstinence-only sex education. It was a poll, and the question was "Sex education", and the options were 1)is unacceptable for it promotes sex, which I do not want people having 2)is a very good thing, since it teaches people about sex 3)is a terrible lie, everyone knows that condoms have holes in them and 4)other-elaborate. Well, one girl, Onyma, posted this gem:



My answer:
I'll give you the link, if I can.
What is your opinion on sex ed? Should it be abstinence-only, or should it be completely informative? This is a subject that means a lot to me, as a teen. What are your opinions on it?


Seperate the factual from the normative:

The factual: here is how you use a condom.

The normative: if we catch you using one, we put you in jail.

As both father and grandfather, I know that if the situation gets intense enough, teenagers are going to have sex, almost without exception. While I think that abstinence should play a role in sex education, I'm a strong supporter of teaching the full spectrum, including use of condoms, STDs, etc. To do otherwise is to foolishly bury your head in the sand.

Exactly. That's sadly what happens in my story, which is called "Think of the Children!!" And sadly, it happens in the USA, which already has the highest rates of teen pregnancy in the world. It's not becasue of the availability of condoms- they're hardly available anymore. It's because of misinformation and a society that thinks sex is evil :headbang:

Seperate the factual from the normative:

The factual: here is how you use a condom.

The normative: if we catch you using one, we put you in jail.

Normative....? :confused: Not sure what that means, sorry. :(

But, if I'm correct, were you saying something like this?

Real: Here is how you use a condom...
What really happens: Even if you use one, you will become pregnant, get AIDS, gonorhea, and syphilis, give birth to a brain-damaged baby, and live in poverty only to die and go to Hell.

That's what I got from it. :(

No more opinions? Arg... I want opinions, facts, stories, etc. :mad:

It's not becasue of the availability of condoms- they're hardly available anymore.
Huh? Condoms are everywhere! I see them in every drugstore and convenience store I go into! :confused:

Huh? Condoms are everywhere! I see them in every drugstore and convenience store I go into! :confused:

Not for me. It's rare to see one where I live. MY town is run by a church up in frickin' VIRGINIA (half its members live in my town or in the neighboring county, and I used to attend). :headbang:

Also, what I meant was, nobody knows where to get them now, because the sex misinformation teacher won't tell us. :upyours:

Also, what I meant was, nobody knows where to get them now, because the sex misinformation teacher won't tell us. :upyours:

Your town may be restricted, but surely you don't depend on teachers to tell you where to buy things. Which teacher is responsible for telling you where to buy ice cream?

That's like this quote(not verbatim):
Saying the cervical cancer vaccine will encourage teenage sex is like saying the tetanus shot will encourage people to step on a rusty nail.

Your town may be restricted, but surely you don't depend on teachers to tell you where to buy things. Which teacher is responsible for telling you where to buy ice cream?

Er... we kind of have to. Parents will freak out if you ask questions like that, and isn't it up to the sex ed teacher to tell you where to get contraceptives? Though, I guess, you could ask a doctor...

Er... we kind of have to. Parents will freak out if you ask questions like that, and isn't it up to the sex ed teacher to tell you where to get contraceptives? Though, I guess, you could ask a doctor...I take it they don't sell them in convenience stores, or something. What part of Virginia?

Er... we kind of have to. Parents will freak out if you ask questions like that, and isn't it up to the sex ed teacher to tell you where to get contraceptives? Though, I guess, you could ask a doctor...

There are these places called Chemists. I believe they may just stock them.

Er... we kind of have to. Parents will freak out if you ask questions like that, and isn't it up to the sex ed teacher to tell you where to get contraceptives? Though, I guess, you could ask a doctor...


Oh my. How will you ever live out in the REAL world?

We don't really know whether or not teaching kids about sex causes them to have it. We simply don't know that.

What we do know, however, is that teaching them about sex does cause them to have safer sex (provided they actually pay attention and/or don't "rebel against the man" by deliberately being unsafe).

I'd rather err on the side of education.

Er... we kind of have to. Parents will freak out if you ask questions like that, and isn't it up to the sex ed teacher to tell you where to get contraceptives? Though, I guess, you could ask a doctor...

Pharmacy.
Do you have a Rite-Aid? CVS? Duane Reade?
http://virginia.uscity.net/Pharmacies/

Llamas!!!

Kids need to be taught for at least one good reason: Schools are a festering ground for rumour and false speculation. If you don't tell them anything, they're going to pick up the wrong ideas very quickly, and that is a far worse alternative to hearing the facts and acting on them.

The number of stories we hear from teenage mothers in Britain about believing that you had to have persistent sex with the one father in order to get pregnant is obscenely large. Knowledge like that would be so easy to pass on in the classroom, and yet it doesn't happen. Instead, children rely on peer-to-peer information.

Just to give you an example of how damaging this could be, imagine the following. Your kids and their friends have set up a Wiki to share their collective information. They use this as their primary resource. Now, suppose no knowledgable individual outside their circle chooses to read or change it. Eventually, one of them includes an article on Sex based on what they have seen on TV. After a little community modification and discussion, they publish it to the site. This gets spotted by other kids, included on their wiki, often with a few other modifications, and so on.

Now imagine what the page might look like after about 20 times of being passed on.

This is what your child will think without formal Sex Education.

I'm partial to the first one.

I think they should encourage teens NOT to have sex until they feel ready and in a comitted relationship, but of course teach all methods and sides, contraception, STD prevention, etc.

Basically teach them everything they need, but also say "You now know this, but don't go out and fuck everyone you see."

My "Education program

*Clip of people with horrifying disease*
This will happen to you children, it's inevitable. Even if your wearing those little silver bracelets. So make sure she's hot enough before you boner 'er.:)

We don't really know whether or not teaching kids about sex causes them to have it. We simply don't know that.

What we do know, however, is that teaching them about sex does cause them to have safer sex (provided they actually pay attention and/or don't "rebel against the man" by deliberately being unsafe).

I'd rather err on the side of education.
We agree? :eek:

Llamas!!!
Where??? :eek:

Er... we kind of have to. Parents will freak out if you ask questions like that, and isn't it up to the sex ed teacher to tell you where to get contraceptives? Though, I guess, you could ask a doctor...

Mine didnt, they taught me all about "the act" when i was 9

Mine didnt, they taught me all about "the act" when i was 9

I meant paretns get freaked out when you ask about contraceptives.

And to whom it may concern... In the US, some pharmacists refuse to give teens contraceptives, and oftentimes you need a parent with you when you go to the doctor. That's why nobody knows where pregnancy crisis centers are, where to get contraceptives (dependign on what type of it you need...)

Kids need to be taught for at least one good reason: Schools are a festering ground for rumour and false speculation. If you don't tell them anything, they're going to pick up the wrong ideas very quickly, and that is a far worse alternative to hearing the facts and acting on them.

The number of stories we hear from teenage mothers in Britain about believing that you had to have persistent sex with the one father in order to get pregnant is obscenely large. Knowledge like that would be so easy to pass on in the classroom, and yet it doesn't happen. Instead, children rely on peer-to-peer information.

Just to give you an example of how damaging this could be, imagine the following. Your kids and their friends have set up a Wiki to share their collective information. They use this as their primary resource. Now, suppose no knowledgable individual outside their circle chooses to read or change it. Eventually, one of them includes an article on Sex based on what they have seen on TV. After a little community modification and discussion, they publish it to the site. This gets spotted by other kids, included on their wiki, often with a few other modifications, and so on.

Now imagine what the page might look like after about 20 times of being passed on.

This is what your child will think without formal Sex Education.

This is also how the child will think with abstinence-only sex education. The teacher won't tell them for moral reasons, they're too embarrassed to tell their parents, and they can't just walk into a clinic without a parent (and often, they can't drive there, and have no way to get there.)

Where??? :eek:


THERE! *Points*

OVER THERE! Next to the pancake!

Pharmacy.
Do you have a Rite-Aid? CVS? Duane Reade?
http://virginia.uscity.net/Pharmacies/

Not in our town, no. They're 15-30 minutes away. :mad:

It's not becasue of the availability of condoms- they're hardly available anymore.

They had a whole bunch of them for free sitting in a basket in the cafeteria of my town's community college. Based on that, I'd guess that they're pretty widely available in my area. I personally intend to remain 100% abstinent for my entire life, barring marriage (which is an extremely unlikely possibility in my case.)

On the other hand, I support education that covers everything, not just abstinence. Because although I intend to be abstinent, some of my peers probably don't have the same plans.

In fact, that is the way it is at my school. They teach that abstinence is the only 100% sure way to not get an STD or end up pregnant, but they teach other methods of contraception, too. That's probably the best way to teach it, I guess.

We agree? :eek:

Satan is laughing. ;)

They had a whole bunch of them for free sitting in a basket in the cafeteria of my town's community college. Based on that, I'd guess that they're pretty widely available in my area. I personally intend to remain 100% abstinent for my entire life, barring marriage (which is an extremely unlikely possibility in my case.)

On the other hand, I support education that covers everything, not just abstinence. Because although I intend to be abstinent, some of my peers probably don't have the same plans.

In fact, that is the way it is at my school. They teach that abstinence is the only 100% sure way to not get an STD or end up pregnant, but they teach other methods of contraception, too. That's probably the best way to teach it, I guess.

Where do you go to school? In my State it's the law to only teach these God-awful abstinence classes. I plan to remain abstinent too.. but yeesh... ain't gonna be forever... :mad:

Where do you go to school? In my State it's the law to only teach these God-awful abstinence classes. I plan to remain abstinent too.. but yeesh... ain't gonna be forever... :mad:

In Florida. And even though it's my personal decision to be abstinent for my whole life or until I get married (if I ever do) I definitely disagree with that law.

In Florida. And even though it's my personal decision to be abstinent for my whole life or until I get married (if I ever do) I definitely disagree with that law.

:eek: I wanna live there! Well, I would, if it was far less hot... It's pretty hot up here in Carolina. :( :mad:

WHY ARE SOM ANY PEOPLE VOTING THE LAST OPTION?! :mad:

Ah well... They seem samrter than those idiots who passed that law...

:eek: I wanna live there! Well, I would, if it was far less hot... It's pretty hot up here in Carolina. :( :mad:

I bet it is hot up there, with the current heat wave. On the news, temperatures north of Florida look much hotter than temperatures here, or at least unusually similar to our usual temperatures. Of course, in Florida, we're used to it.

So, the law in your state allows only for abstinence courses to be taught? Are the abstinence courses required courses for graduation?

Are such laws found in other states, and if so, is it a regional trend? If it is, I'd guess that such laws would usually be found in the South and possibly some parts of the Mid West. Just a guess, though.

At least as far as they teach us in geography class, South Florida is a region on its own, separate from the South, and charectorized by an economy based on tourism, many universities and colleges, and many metropolitan areas in a relatively small amount of space.

Here in Florida we have sex ed. as a one-month part of a required semester-long class called Life Management Skills. It's basically health, so the class also focuses on nutrition, mental health, stress, drugs and alcohol, and relationships. It's usually taken in either freshman or sophomore year.

I bet it is hot up there, with the current heat wave. On the news, temperatures north of Florida look much hotter than temperatures here, or at least unusually similar to our usual temperatures. Of course, in Florida, we're used to it. Really? Well, today it's much better, as we had a frickin' monsoon here last night.

So, the law in your state allows only for abstinence courses to be taught? Are the abstinence courses required courses for graduation? Yes, and no, not to my knowledge. I just got out of middle school, so maybe.
Are such laws found in other states, and if so, is it a regional trend? If it is, I'd guess that such laws would usually be found in the South and possibly some parts of the Mid West. Just a guess, though. I'm not sure, but there probably are.
At least as far as they teach us in geography class, South Florida is a region on its own, separate from the South, and charectorized by an economy based on tourism, many universities and colleges, and many metropolitan areas in a relatively small amount of space. :mad:

Here in Florida we have sex ed. as a one-month part of a required semester-long class called Life Management Skills. It's basically health, so the class also focuses on nutrition, mental health, stress, drugs and alcohol, and relationships. It's usually taken in either freshman or sophomore year. In freshman year at the local high school, it would either be a separate little lecture-class thing, or it may be part of the physed program called "Healthful Living." :rolleyes: I've only ben having real health classes since 6th grade and I haven't learned anything new.