Government waste alert!
I ran into something today that should have the teabagging crowd howling, but I'm guessing we won't hear a peep. Since they're all about railing against the wasting of tax money, I'd like to rally them to the cause of stopping the feds from spending $50 million a year on something that would produce the same return as flushing that money down a toilet. Sen. Orrin Hatch of Utah (no surprise there) is the sponsor of a bill that just cleared the Senate Finance Committee on a 12-11 vote. The measure would give $50 million annually to support abstinence-only sex education. Hatch says that approach works. Facts suggest otherwise. A study ordered by Congress two years ago showed that students who were in abstinence-only classes were just as likely to have sex as those who didn't. There also was a study showing that many of the kids who take those pledges to remain virgins until after marriage are perhaps technically accomplishing that by delving into oral and anal sex. So it would appear that Sen. Hatch is in favor of America's God-fearing kids going off the sexual "main menu" and, since good kids don't use condoms, subjecting themselves to all kinds of nasty diseases. At the same time, just as many of them will be having regular sex as kids who don't get the "just say no" instruction. And, of course, he wants to spend $50 million a year to accomplish this. Does that sound like good government?
Labels: Government, Politics, Sex, Stupidity
posted by Brant at
12:40 PM
10 Comments:
Nobody has ever gotten pregnant while practicing abstinence. Let's hear the arguments, "It doesn't work." Sure it does. No sex, no conception. This is not hard to understand.
By the way, abstinence has zero, nada, zilch, to do with being "God-fearing."
This is yet one more attempt at a back-handed slap at those who uphold standards of which you don't approve. The veil is very thin. The same theme, just different actors. You are entitled to do the slapping, so don't get huffy on us now.
Abstinence certainly does work. Teaching it as the one-and-only manner of sex-ed instruction for our kids clearly does not. And you can't separate religion and abstinence-only sex education. Who do you think is pushing that, the atheists?
Brant you are correct. Abstinence only programs do not work for all kids. I am for teaching abstinence only but if it is combined with teaching about condoms, birth control pills, etc. Naive people need to get a grip and realize that kids are having sex and that teaching abstinence only is not going to stop curious kids from going out and having sex. All it is doing is keeping these kids from knowing how to protect themselves from not only pregnancy but sexually transmitted diseases. I applaud the kids that actually practice abstinence until marriage but how many of them actually do? I haven't seen any polls on that one. And how many of them are actually telling the truth when they say they do, a quarter of them, maybe. I wish politicians would stop wasting time and money on abstinence only programs in schools and start spending that money on sex ed courses that provided for both ends of the spectrum.
I assume that all of the posters here today are over 18, so let's try to recall a time many years ago...at the drive-in perhaps (yeah, I'm that old), a secluded parking spot on the edge of town, behind the bleachers at a football game...did we want to stop? Hell no.
Spend about an hour around a group of high school freshman while they're in their comfort zone. You'll be stunned at what you hear. My 15-year-old son was getting nude pictures on his cell phone of a girl who wanted to have sex with him. She wasn't his girlfriend, and worse, she wasn't quite 15 at the time. She didn't want a relationship, just sex.
We certainly could use that $50 mil for something better. While we're on the subject, how much money is being allocated for AIDS education in Africa, and how much of that is earmarked for abstinence education? Talk about throwing money away. It shouldn't take millions of dollars to, as they said in Monty Python's "Life of Brian," "...put one of those rubber things on his ol' fellow."
Abstinence makes the heart grow fonder? Go ahead, teach abstinence-only and fund it, but also fund responsibility if your hormones can't define abstinence. I'd rather teach my kid to say no as long as possible, but to have a backup plan -- like a condom -- if it doesn't work.
Brant, you are exactly right, atheists push nothing. Posts here and in the O-R forums by those claiming atheism, have a long list of nothings. No moral standards, no convictions, no truth, no purpose or meaning in life, no (add you own in here, and others as necessary to complete). We cannot expect anything to come from nothing, so we know that atheists are not pushing this, or anything else.
I'm glad you agree that abstinence does work. The 2009 talking points of "being realistic" are just that, talking points. Some things in life are necessary, but having sex is not one of them. I know, I know, it may come as a shock. The posters here who call having sex outside of marriage is have bought the mantra of our culture.
What would an abstinence only class be like? You walk into the room, sit in the chair, the teacher comes in and tells you.
"Just don't do it, OK?"
Study period for the next 39 minutes and 30 seconds.
Isn't abstinence already "a part" of the sex education curriculum since about 1984? About 1987 VA Beach public schools added gay awareness to the grade school health curriculum. I wonder what the money will be spent on? I will go check it out. On a side note...My college put out baskets of condoms on the tables in the lounge/study areas, they seemed to stay full for weeks. Refill or no interest in safer sex???.....
To a teenage couple, sex is arguably the most fun they can have and it’s free, at least in the short term. Abstinence is a tough sell. Secondly, I would never grab a condom from a basket in a student union. I know a kid that filled condom machines at a gas station and would run a needle through the packages just for fun.
One key phrase in the initial post, and all the comments: personal responsibility.
Whatever happened to personal responsibility. To excuse irresponsible behavior because it it is no longer realistic is simple wrong. The sexual freedom of the '60s has brought us all kinds of things, including discussions such as this one. Oh sure, irresponsible behavior existed before that time, but the '60s brought into the open, gave it validation. It also brought STDs, HIV-AIDS infections, unwanted pregnancies, extra-marital affairs in greater numbers, day care centers in high schools, just to name a few.
Responsibility for one's behavior, a new idea for 2009. Self-discipline, another new idea for 2009. Moral standards based upon convictions that remain firm. Sounds new, doesn't it?
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