I graduated high school with 105 people two and a half years ago. Thirty of them now have children. A few got married, but the vast majority are struggling single parents who have nothing to look forward to except living in a rural Oklahoma community, population 5,000, for the rest of their lives.
Is it their fault they were stupid and didn’t use contraception? A little, because my tiny hometown is situated in the middle of an impoverished area where free birth control is available at the local health clinic. Is it their fault that the ones who were using birth control may have used it ineffectively because they were misinformed? Partially.
But mostly I blame the school administrators and the ridiculous abstinence-only sex education they have been enforcing for years.
In this town, sex is a four-letter word, and I mean that literally, because most of the people I graduated with would have added an extra "x" on the end. Sex isn’t talked about in school until eighth grade when it comes up in biology, and even then, it’s talked about in the strictest, most anatomically correct way. When it comes to actually having it, the only thing that’s said is, “Don’t do it until marriage.”
It is also important to note that my hometown is situated right in the middle of the Bible belt, on the Oklahoma-Arkansas state line. The popular belief is that abstinence is the only way to keep our children safe from the perils of premarital sex. Since most of the administrators and school board members are also actively involved in the Baptist church, the school curriculum is carefully crafted to inform about the act of coitus, but not about the consequences. They also believe and tell their children that sex is fine as long as it’s done within the bonds of marriage. This approach is dated and, as my tiny town proves, it obviously doesn’t work.
Article comments
1 - Steve Barr
Thank you Meghan! I concur.
2 - Scott
I agree as well.
I'm a Liberated Christian blogger who challenges the religious mindsets behind "Sexual Purity" and Abstinence-Only Sex Education.
As I say on my website and blog: It's one thing to challenge the youth to delay sexual activity until they are older. It's another thing to scare them with propaganda and tell them a condom is a "provision for sin".
-Scott
3 - Jonathan Sullivan
I'm starting to be under the impression that people who are 100% gung ho about abstinence or eunuchs or no one wants to have sex with them anyway. This whole trend really needs to die down, and adults need to remember how they felt when they were that young.