legislating morality

[z0wb13]

lifenews.com/2010/02/01/nat-5950/ - this study is from 2010.

the study is here, if you are interested. i took the time to read through it, and i would still disagree that abstinence only programs are a panacea. but here is what the authors of the study say:
the results do not mean that abstinence-only intervention is the best approach or that other approaches should be abandoned.

further: The limitations of this trial should also be considered. The data were based on self reports, which can be inaccurate because of the failure of memory or socially desirable responding.

https://jamanetwork.com/journals/jamapediatrics/issue/164/2

so after reading the study, i can tell you that it isn’t so clear cut. what the researchers found out was that all types of sex ed instruction reduce the likelihood that 12 to 14 year olds will have sex. the good news here seems to be that abstinence only programs don’t seem to have an effect on condom use.

another thing to consider is that the program wasn’t an “abstinence-until-marriage” program, and that besides discussing reasons why teens shouldn’t have sex, it also offered comprehensive sexual instruction including condom use and std information. "[The study] was not designed to meet federal criteria for abstinence-only programs. For instance, the target behavior was abstaining from vaginal, anal, and oral intercourse until a time later in life when the adolescent is more prepared to handle the consequences of sex. The intervention did not contain inaccurate information, portray sex in a negative light, or use a moralistic tone. The training and curriculum manual explicitly instructed the facilitators not to disparage the efficacy of condoms or allow the view that condoms are ineffective to go uncorrected.

Also, the schools should have a firm line on what they are willing to teach. Being that a student can be suspended for taking an aspirin on their own, why is it okay for them to hand out condoms and show teens how to use them? That’s like giving people guns and bullets and saying “if you want to know how dangerous guns can be, read this pamphlet, but let’s focus on the fun aspects of the shooting range.”

i agree that suspension for an aspirin might be overkill, but then again, in every school i’ve seen, students have to sign a zero-tolerance contract that says they won’t bring anything to school. if a kid needs an aspirin, or any other other medication, they are supposed to go to the nurse. if a student is caught using condoms at school, they are probably going to be expelled.

but the analogy to condoms being like loaded guns i think is way off-base. plus, there are a ton of colorful comments that spring to mind, so i should probably just leave it alone;p but handing someone a pamphlet isn’t really comprehensive instruction, so no it’s not anything like what you are describing. for instance, in the study that we are discussing, the students all went through an 8 or 12 hour program, and both reduced the incidents of stds.

Let the schools teach abstinence, and let the parents step in and talk about any topics the kids may be curious about. I’m not sure when the public education system became the answer for any uncomfortable topic, but if children are afraid to talk to their parents about sex, are they really mature enough to be making decisions about it?

schools can promote abstinence, and honestly i agree that 12 years old is too early to be having sex. but what you are suggesting has been shown to be completely ineffective. it isn’t a morality issue, it just doesn’t work. the study that you linked too didn’t use the kind of instruction that you are suggesting, so the point is moot. and furthermore, i don’t think that the problem is children being too uncomfortable or incurious to discuss sex with their parents. it is probably more likely that the parents are uncomfortable, and that they have no training or instruction to offer outside of their own experiences. a sex ed instructor will know more about up-to-date information than almost any parent, barring your parent(s) being an OBGYN.

if you are actually interested in the topic, here is an interesting site and a quote: Abstinence-only-until-marriage as a method of birth control is spectacularly ineffective. Like other methods, abstinence-only-until-marriage works if ‘used’ consistently and correctly. Common sense as well as available research, suggests that in the real world, it can and does fail routinely – as evidenced by the staggering proportion (95 percent) of Americans who have had premarital sex.

 

[z0wb13]

@sedonaman: are you talking about abortions inside the U.S., or outside? it wasn’t very clear.

i’m kidding, of course. you were actually repetitive to the point of incoherence. i had to read your post 3 times before i realized that you weren’t trying to make a point, but rather being derisive to draw me into some argument about who is more american. that’s what is called an ad hominen argument, and is weak because what is important to debate is not who is saying what, but what they are saying.

so i’m going to respond to this revised version of what i think you were trying to get across.

First, we were told artificial birth control was the answer to reducing unwanted pregnancies and hence abortions in the U.S. That didn’t work because the number of unwanted pregnancies increased. Then we were told the solution was to make abortion “safe and legal,” and later “rare” was added. We were going to save poor women from rusty coat hangers and back-alley butchers.

okay, so now this begins to make more sense. but i don’t know who told “we” any of these things or when. it just sounds like empty platitudes, like “i like good movies, but i hate bad movies.” that sort of evaluation is objectively meaningless. but the other problem with your logic is that the part in bold is a post hoc ergo semper hoc fallacy. yes, the number of abortions has increased, but no, you can’t say that it was caused by artificial birth control.

Although we might have saved a few from dying from rusty coat hangers and in the back alley, the number of abortions increased, so that apparently didn’t work either.

i don’t see the logical connection here at all. are you saying that if abortions were extremely dangerous, they would be less common? i suppose so, but this probably wouldn’t effect the number of unwanted pregnancies.

We in the U.S. were told that we needed sex education, so we got K-12 sex education shoved down our throats But unwanted pregnancies, and consequently, abortions still increased.

this is wrong for two reasons. first, there is no k-6 sex education anywhere that i’ve ever heard of. sex education starts in middle school if it is covered at all. i know that it is different from state to state, but my point is that there is no sex education for incredibly young children anywhere. the second thing is that none of this information is being shoved down people’s throats. the vast majority of americans want some sex ed in their schools. look it up if you don’t believe me, but most people want kids to learn, at least, about stds and pregnancy.

Then, we got debauchery indoctrination in higher-ed, and unwanted pregnancies, and consequently, abortions in the U.S. still increased.

i’m afraid you’ve gone off the rails here. i really have no idea what debauchery indoctrination is, but part of me wants to sign up for it;p

okay, i think i got it. maybe. you are saying that if abortions were dangerous, and there were no contraceptives available, there would be less abortions. but, because contraceptives are available, and abortions are relatively safe, there are more abortions.

well, more abortions than what? i mean, you have nothing to compare your numbers to. there are more abortions performed year over year, but there is also a growing population. maybe there is a correlation between the relaxation of sexual mores in the 70’s (which i wasn’t around for frowny-face), and maybe there is a connection to the increase in divorces and single-parent homes. but that is all outside of the scope of discussion.

if outlawing abortion could reduce the number of procedures, then you might have an argument. it would certainly make obtaining the procedure much more dangerous and expensive. and it would also probably skew unfavorably for minorities and poor people, while rich people could take a trip to canada. but then, you also seem to want to limit access to birth control and contraceptives. how could this possibly reduce abortions? if more unwanted pregnancies means more abortions, than less would mean less, unless there is some magical math that i’ve never heard of coming into play.

the entire post seems to just point to things that didn’t work to reduce abortions. but you don’t seem to have any ideas on how to make things work better. it reads very pessimistically, and in that light, i understand why you would try to lash out at me.

so unless you have a time machine to go back to before there was medicine, or a talking fish that grants wishes, or some other magical means to reducing the number of abortions, then you should think about practical solutions. outlawing abortions outright is not an option, because there are constitutional protections, and the number of restrictions placed on the procedure (like no late-term, 3rd trimester) seems like a reasonable middle ground to me. but some of this other stuff, like having to pay for an ultrasound or get “counseling”, just seem like a dishonest, and ultimately ineffective, end-run around women’s reproductive rights.

================================================================

anyway, what about drug laws? they don’t seem to work very well either. i’m all for needle dispensaries, to reduce the number of HIV infections. this position doesn’t make me pro-junky. i’ve never done needle drugs, and get the willies whenever i see needles on tv. but, i also don’t think AIDS is a good thing to promote, so i have to cave to the “leftist public-health dumbocrats” or whatever position it’s called;p

 

[z0wb13]

the study is here, if you are interested. i took the time to read through it, and i would still disagree that abstinence only programs are a panacea. but here is what the authors of the study say:
the results do not mean that abstinence-only intervention is the best approach or that other approaches should be abandoned.

further: The limitations of this trial should also be considered. The data were based on self reports, which can be inaccurate because of the failure of memory or socially desirable responding.

http://archpedi.ama-assn.org/content/vol164/issue2/images/medium/poa90086t1.gif

so after reading the study, i can tell you that it isn’t so clear cut. what the researchers found out was that all types of sex ed instruction reduce the likelihood that 12 to 14 year olds will have sex. the good news here seems to be that abstinence only programs don’t seem to have an effect on condom use.

another thing to consider is that the program wasn’t an “abstinence-until-marriage” program, and that besides discussing reasons why teens shouldn’t have sex, it also offered comprehensive sexual instruction including condom use and std information. "[The study] was not designed to meet federal criteria for abstinence-only programs. For instance, the target behavior was abstaining from vaginal, anal, and oral intercourse until a time later in life when the adolescent is more prepared to handle the consequences of sex. The intervention did not contain inaccurate information, portray sex in a negative light, or use a moralistic tone. The training and curriculum manual explicitly instructed the facilitators not to disparage the efficacy of condoms or allow the view that condoms are ineffective to go uncorrected.

i agree that suspension for an aspirin might be overkill, but then again, in every school i’ve seen, students have to sign a zero-tolerance contract that says they won’t bring anything to school. if a kid needs an aspirin, or any other other medication, they are supposed to go to the nurse. if a student is caught using condoms at school, they are probably going to be expelled.

but the analogy to condoms being like loaded guns i think is way off-base. plus, there are a ton of colorful comments that spring to mind, so i should probably just leave it alone;p but handing someone a pamphlet isn’t really comprehensive instruction, so no it’s not anything like what you are describing. for instance, in the study that we are discussing, the students all went through an 8 or 12 hour program, and both reduced the incidents of stds.

schools can promote abstinence, and whole-heartedly i agree that 12 years old is too early to be having sex. but what you are suggesting has been shown to be completely ineffective. it isn’t a morality issue, it just doesn’t work. the study that you linked too didn’t use the kind of instruction that you are suggesting, so the point is moot. and furthermore, i don’t think that the problem is children being too uncomfortable or incurious to discuss sex with their parents. it is probably more likely that the parents are uncomfortable, and that they have no training or instruction to offer outside of their own experiences. a sex ed instructor will know more about up-to-date information than almost any parent, barring your parent(s) being an OBGYN.

if you are actually interested in the topic, here is an interesting site and a quote: Abstinence-only-until-marriage as a method of birth control is spectacularly ineffective. Like other methods, abstinence-only-until-marriage works if ‘used’ consistently and correctly. Common sense as well as available research, suggests that in the real world, it can and does fail routinely – as evidenced by the staggering proportion (95 percent) of Americans who have had premarital sex.

 

[Mumbles140]

so after reading the study, i can tell you that it isn’t so clear cut. what the researchers found out was that all types of sex ed instruction reduce the likelihood that 12 to 14 year olds will have sex. the good news here seems to be that abstinence only programs don’t seem to have an effect on condom use.

another thing to consider is that the program wasn’t an “abstinence-until-marriage” program, and that besides discussing reasons why teens shouldn’t have sex, it also offered comprehensive sexual instruction including condom use and std information. "[The study] was not designed to meet federal criteria for abstinence-only programs. For instance, the target behavior was abstaining from vaginal, anal, and oral intercourse until a time later in life when the adolescent is more prepared to handle the consequences of sex. The intervention did not contain inaccurate information, portray sex in a negative light, or use a moralistic tone. The training and curriculum manual explicitly instructed the facilitators not to disparage the efficacy of condoms or allow the view that condoms are ineffective to go uncorrected.

i agree that suspension for an aspirin might be overkill, but then again, in every school i’ve seen, students have to sign a zero-tolerance contract that says they won’t bring anything to school. if a kid needs an aspirin, or any other other medication, they are supposed to go to the nurse. if a student is caught using condoms at school, they are probably going to be expelled.

but the analogy to condoms being like loaded guns i think is way off-base. plus, there are a ton of colorful comments that spring to mind, so i should probably just leave it alone;p but handing someone a pamphlet isn’t really comprehensive instruction, so no it’s not anything like what you are describing. for instance, in the study that we are discussing, the students all went through an 8 or 12 hour program, and both reduced the incidents of stds.

schools can promote abstinence, and honestly i agree that 12 years old is too early to be having sex. but what you are suggesting has been shown to be completely ineffective. it isn’t a morality issue, it just doesn’t work. the study that you linked too didn’t use the kind of instruction that you are suggesting, so the point is moot. and furthermore, i don’t think that the problem is children being too uncomfortable or incurious to discuss sex with their parents. it is probably more likely that the parents are uncomfortable, and that they have no training or instruction to offer outside of their own experiences. a sex ed instructor will know more about up-to-date information than almost any parent, barring your parent(s) being an OBGYN.

if you are actually interested in the topic, here is an interesting site and a quote: Abstinence-only-until-marriage as a method of birth control is spectacularly ineffective. Like other methods, abstinence-only-until-marriage works if ‘used’ consistently and correctly. Common sense as well as available research, suggests that in the real world, it can and does fail routinely – as evidenced by the staggering proportion (95 percent) of Americans who have had premarital sex.

1. It shows that abstinence only had the lower percentages, specifically for condom use and multiple partners. When you give condoms to kids with raging hormones and an ever-growing sexual curiosity, then show them how to use the condoms, you can’t expect them not to have sex. It’s like giving a high schooler a 12 pack of Budweiser, but thinking it is okay because the box says “Drink responsibly.” How does anyone that age have a firm enough grasp of ‘responsible’ to make those decisions?
2. Abstinence-only teaches about STDs, how they spread, how to be tested, etc. They also teach about pregnancies, risks that can occur during pregnancies (especially among teenagers), as well as other sexual health issues. The three things that were not allowed to be discussed in sex ed (at least when I took it) were masturbation, homosexuality, and birth control. We were instructed to ask our parents or guidance counselor if we had questions concerning these items.
3. Yes, I would hope if a student was caught ‘using’ a condom in school, they would be expelled for committing sexual acts on school grounds. However, how many girls take the pill at school? Isn’t that also ‘self-medicating’?
4. An 8-12 hour program means roughly 2 school weeks (10 days) where you have sex ed instead of PE. Do you think that is enough time for kids to fully be presented all the risks of sex? To fully understand the weight of their actions?
5. The study didn’t show abstinence-only was completely ineffective. In fact, it showed it was more effective than other methods. You have to realize the belief isn’t that no child will have sex by learning abstinence-only. The class doesn’t teach abstinence. It teaches about sexual health, and it says abstinence is the only sure-fire way to prevent pregnancy. That’s it. That’s what abstinence-only sex ed is. The only mention of birth control is to discuss with parents or a guidance counselor.
6. If parents are embarrassed, then they can take the kids to an OB/GYN or other doctor who can go over the up-to-date risks with total doctor-patient confidentiality.
7. Yes, abstinence-only education doesn’t mean every child will wait until marriage to have sex. However, when used effectively, it is 100% effective. What can the pill (if used perfectly to the T) and condoms (if put on properly) claim as their effectiveness? Antibiotics can ‘disable’ the pill, and condoms can break/tear. When you start looking at it, these aren’t that safe of alternatives, even being used ‘properly’…

 

[sedonaman]

@sedonaman:
…

The burden of proof is on the advocate of change. You have offered no proof at all that your ideas will work.

 

[Mumbles140]

@sedonaman: are you talking about abortions inside the U.S., or outside? it wasn’t very clear.

i’m kidding, of course. you were actually repetitive to the point of incoherence. i had to read your post 3 times before i realized that you weren’t trying to make a point, but rather being derisive to draw me into some argument about who is more american. that’s what is called an ad hominen argument, and is weak because what is important to debate is not who is saying what, but what they are saying.

so i’m going to respond to this revised version of what i think you were trying to get across.
this is wrong for two reasons. first, there is no k-6 sex education anywhere that i’ve ever heard of. sex education starts in middle school if it is covered at all. i know that it is different from state to state, but my point is that there is no sex education for incredibly young children anywhere. the second thing is that none of this information is being shoved down people’s throats. the vast majority of americans want some sex ed in their schools. look it up if you don’t believe me, but most people want kids to learn, at least, about stds and pregnancy.

okay, i think i got it. maybe. you are saying that if abortions were dangerous, and there were no contraceptives available, there would be less abortions. but, because contraceptives are available, and abortions are relatively safe, there are more abortions.

well, more abortions than what? i mean, you have nothing to compare your numbers to. there are more abortions performed year over year, but there is also a growing population. maybe there is a correlation between the relaxation of sexual mores in the 70’s (which i wasn’t around for frowny-face), and maybe there is a connection to the increase in divorces and single-parent homes. but that is all outside of the scope of discussion.

if outlawing abortion could reduce the number of procedures, then you might have an argument. it would certainly make obtaining the procedure much more dangerous and expensive. and it would also probably skew unfavorably for minorities and poor people, while rich people could take a trip to canada. but then, you also seem to want to limit access to birth control and contraceptives. how could this possibly reduce abortions? if more unwanted pregnancies means more abortions, than less would mean less, unless there is some magical math that i’ve never heard of coming into play.

the entire post seems to just point to things that didn’t work to reduce abortions. but you don’t seem to have any ideas on how to make things work better. it reads very pessimistically, and in that light, i understand why you would try to lash out at me.

so unless you have a time machine to go back to before there was medicine, or a talking fish that grants wishes, or some other magical means to reducing the number of abortions, then you should think about practical solutions. outlawing abortions outright is not an option, because there are constitutional protections, and the number of restrictions placed on the procedure (like no late-term, 3rd trimester) seems like a reasonable middle ground to me. but some of this other stuff, like having to pay for an ultrasound or get “counseling”, just seem like a dishonest, and ultimately ineffective, end-run around women’s reproductive rights.

My reading of his post was that you should stick to US statistics because most people here are US citizens, so citing abortion statistics for 3rd-world countries has no effect on our decisions to ‘legistlate morality’ in the US concerning abortions.

Also, my reading of the most recent post you quoted was that those things (ABC, etc) were proclaimed as ‘the answer’ to lowering the number of unwanted pregnancies/abortions, and yet the abortion rate has continued to go up over time. That seems like a pretty solid logical argument to me. I don’t believe his point to be one of pessimism. I think it is pointing out that the ‘solutions’ offered by abortion advocates and the liberal left have not done anything to prevent abortions, so why keep listening to them? We have our suggestions, and the study quoted above shows that abstinence-only education causes lower sex rates, doesn’t hinder condom use, and signficantly reduces the number of multiple partners. Sounds pretty solid compared to the alternatives…

Actually, there is K-5 sex ed. It isn’t to the level of detail as middle school sex ed, and it certainly does not go into certain topics, but I remember having a couple afternoons where boys and girls split up and they talked about puberty, sexual curiosity, etc.

Lastly, I think it is funny when you talk about middle ground, and yet call sedonaman dishonest. Look at the lies and false truth campaigns employed by PP, NARAL, NOW, and other pro-abortion advocates. They try and tell people it really isn’t a human growing inside of them. Well let them take a look and see. They say there is no other good alternative - what they mean is there is no other ‘consequence-free where you can avoid a pregnancy’ alternative. What about adoptions? How many potential parents have had to go overseas to adopt children? And women’s reproductive rights? I give women the right to reproduce, and once they choose that right, whether planned or not, they create another human being, who is entitled to their right to life.

"It is a shame that a child must die so that we might live as we wish.” - Mother Teresa

 

[sedonaman]

…Look at the lies and false truth campaigns employed by PP, NARAL, NOW, and other pro-abortion advocates. …

They are self-perpetuating death merchants. They tell kids not to have sex, but “if you do, slip this condom on. And if you ‘get into trouble,’ we have the final solution.”

Reminds me of the beer-making seminars when making beer in your home was illegal. You were told, “Don’t put this bag of grains into a container of 10 gals. of water; don’t add this bag of yeast; don’t add a pound of sugar; don’t mix it; don’t let it ferment for three week; don’t siphon it off into bottles; and don’t seal the bottles, because if you do all this, you will be breaking the law.” The only thing missing was a government paid lawyer to bail you out when you got caught.

We will just have to cut z0wb13 a little slack because he wasn’t around when PP et al sold us his ideas in the ‘60s and on. But maybe we can borrow a play from his own book and tax sex devices like he suggests that we do for illegal drugs. Tax birth control pills; tax sex-ed books; tax condoms; tax abortions; tax whatever is part of the trade.

 

[z0wb13]

if abstinence is 100% effective, then where did jesus come from?

it only works, like other birth control methods, if used consistently. since the overwhelming majority of people have sex before marriage, and presumably before they want to have kids, the point is moot.

 

[Mumbles140]

if abstinence is 100% effective, then where did jesus come from?

it only works, like other birth control methods, if used consistently. since the overwhelming majority of people have sex before marriage, and presumably before they want to have kids, the point is moot.

Precisely why His Incarnation is miraculous.

And you are blaming abstinence because people don’t use it properly. When ABC IS used properly, it still can cause pregnancy. And with the high number of sexually active people in the US, these aren’t ‘win the lottery’ type odds…

 

[z0wb13]

Precisely why His Incarnation is miraculous.

And you are blaming abstinence because people don’t use it properly. When ABC IS used properly, it still can cause pregnancy. And with the high number of sexually active people in the US, these aren’t ‘win the lottery’ type odds…

birth control cannot cause pregnancy; when used carefully and consistently, the chance of becoming pregnant is vanishingly small. and if that isn’t being careful enough, then you can always double down with spermicide and condoms. or, men could get a vasectomy. when combining forms of birth control, the chances of having an unwanted pregnancy become statistically insignificant, or miraculous of you prefer;p

but by withholding that information from children i don’t see how you are doing them any favors. like you mentioned earlier, ABC might not work if you are taking antibiotics. but if, like you suggest, discussions about birth control are completely omitted from sex ed class, a teenager (or whoever) might never learn that.

it’s like your condoms aren’t 100% argument. this isn’t quite right. they are extremely effective if used correctly. they are ineffective when they tear, break, etc. but if teenagers aren’t ever shown how to use them correctly, then how will they know the proper way to use them?

i’ve seen a (poor) argument that goes something like this: most plane crashes happen during the last 15 minutes of the flight. therefore, the flights should be 15 minutes shorter so that less accidents occur.

think about why this strategy won’t work. you seem rather astute (correcting my spelling;p) so you might have come up with it already. the answer is that the last 15 minutes of a flight are spent landing, when the plane is coming back into contact with the ground at a high speed. that’s almost the definition of a crash: hitting the ground at high speed.

by saying that kids shouldn’t be taught how to use condoms (correctly) because they might not work (if used incorrectly) is bad logic. and the idea of teaching people to be abstinent until marriage is unrealistic. i mean, kids are influenced so much more by their peers and parents anyway; the few hours spent on sex ed in the classroom is going to be one of the least influential pieces of the “when am i going to give it up” puzzle in a young person’s life. but, if they learn how to use condoms effectively in those few hours, or that BC doesn’t work if taking antibiotics, then it will reduce the spread of disease and lower the rate of pregnancy.

i think we could agree that abstinence should be promoted. and we probably agree that we shouldn’t lie to kids. but i think that leaving out information is a kind of lying. btw, i also think that promoting santa claus is dishonest, so i’m probably outside of the mainstream;p

 

[Mumbles140]

birth control cannot cause pregnancy; when used carefully and consistently, the chance of becoming pregnant is vanishingly small. and if that isn’t being careful enough, then you can always double down with spermicide and condoms. or, men could get a vasectomy. when combining forms of birth control, the chances of having an unwanted pregnancy become statistically insignificant, or miraculous of you prefer;p

but by withholding that information from children i don’t see how you are doing them any favors. like you mentioned earlier, ABC might not work if you are taking antibiotics. but if, like you suggest, discussions about birth control are completely omitted from sex ed class, a teenager (or whoever) might never learn that.

it’s like your condoms aren’t 100% argument. this isn’t quite right. they are extremely effective if used correctly. they are ineffective when they tear, break, etc. but if teenagers aren’t ever shown how to use them correctly, then how will they know the proper way to use them?

by saying that kids shouldn’t be taught how to use condoms (correctly) because they might not work (if used incorrectly) is bad logic. and the idea of teaching people to be abstinent until marriage is unrealistic. i mean, kids are influenced so much more by their peers and parents anyway; the few hours spent on sex ed in the classroom is going to be one of the least influential pieces of the “when am i going to give it up” puzzle in a young person’s life. but, if they learn how to use condoms effectively in those few hours, or that BC doesn’t work if taking antibiotics, then it will reduce the spread of disease and lower the rate of pregnancy.

i think we could agree that abstinence should be promoted. and we probably agree that we shouldn’t lie to kids. but i think that leaving out information is a kind of lying. btw, i also think that promoting santa claus is dishonest, so i’m probably outside of the mainstream;p

Condoms: However, according to a study in the Sexually Transmitted Diseases Journal of the American Sexually Transmitted Diseases Association condoms have a breakage rate of 2.3% and a slippage rate of 1.3% which “may translate into a high risk for individuals who are very sexually active.”[1] With proper knowledge and application technique—and use at every act of intercourse—women whose partners use male condoms experience a 2% per-year pregnancy rate with perfect use and a 15% per-year pregnancy rate with typical use.[2] (from Wikipedia - you can search for condoms and review the footnotes if you like).

So even used ‘perfectly’, still 2 out of 100 women every year get pregnant. That number increases 7-fold with ‘typical’ use. Abstinence perfectly used results in 0 out of 100. Heck, even if you think you are doing it right, there is a 3.6% chance something will go wrong with the condom. But they don’t talk about that when pushing for condom lessons in sex ed.

Check out this chart, and look at some of the ‘effective numbers’ for birth control, and this is for a site that is supporting teens learning about birth control: kidshealth.org/teen/sexual_health/contraception/bc_chart.html#

As for education, you don’t seem to understand what we’ve been saying. Abstinence-only education means that birth control methods are not taught, and abstinence is only referenced as the 100% sure-fire way to prevent pregnancy. If you want to learn how to practice abstinence, go to Church. If you want to learn how to use a condom (which even when used perfectly, still 2 pregnancies per 100 women a year), go to a doctor. I’m not saying to ban condoms from teenagers - I’m saying keep it out of the schools, and let the kids talk about it with parents, pharmacists, or doctors. Heck, everyone has a smart phone - I’m sure you could find videos online instructing you how to use ABC.

I’m not saying don’t teach it - I’m saying don’t teach it in the schools. And remember that PP is always willing to hand out condoms like Halloween candy, regardless of age, but they won’t tell you that 15 out of 100 people with ‘typical’ condom usage will get pregnant every year. Hmmm, I wonder why? Oh, that’s right, because they can sell their ‘choice’ to end the life of a child. Again, no mention that abortions are linked to severe health issues later in life, as well as significantly increased odds of premature birth and low birth weight…

 

[z0wb13]

abstinence is 100% if you practice it. i cannot agree with you more. but you seem to be ignoring the fact that in any long-term, romantic relationship, the practice of abstinence drops to about 0%. it’s almost a definitional thing isn’t it? a marriage has to be consummated, but there are many married couples, that for many different reasons, don’t want kids. anecdotally, i don’t know any married couple that use condoms or the pill that have had any unwanted pregnancies.

show me an accidental pregnancy, and i’ll show you a couple that wasn’t using birth control correctly. btw, in my mind, the rhythm method, or what i have seen here as natural family planning, isn’t reliable birth control, and neither is coitus interruptus. as far as i’m concerned, it’s just rolling the dice and hoping that you won’t get pregnant this time, but month over month, eventually the NFPers are going to get unintentionally pregnant.

anyway. i don’t think i even understand what you are promoting. is it to teach kids to be abstinent until marriage, or abstinent forever unless they want to have their own children? because every study ever done on the subject shows that “abstinence-until-marriage” education has no effect on when people first become sexually active.

the one study that you have found to dispute this is dubious for two reasons. first, it relies on self-reporting. i would not be that surprised if you “taught” kids abstinence was the “right answer” that they would be more likely to self-report that they had been abstinent. you cannot be sure, i guess barring some medical examination or a lie-detector, whether the kids in the survey are actually being influenced or just telling the researchers what they think that they want to hear.

the other problem i have, with the only study on the planet that supports your position, is that the difference in outcomes is rather small. there is a 0.7% difference between the abstinence-only program and the 8 hour “comprehensive” program. that tiny difference is just as likely to be a statistical anomaly as it is to be an actual result. that’s how statistics works, and that there are dozens of studies that did not detect any meaningful difference in sexual behavior from abstinence-only programs carries much greater weight.

furthermore, if you had taken the time to read the one report that you want to use to prove your position, then you would have realized that far from being an “abstinence only” program that you envision, the students were taught about how to use condoms.

really, you should read these sources that you keep pointing me to. this is from the second paragraph of the page you mentioned: The most effective way to prevent pregnancy is abstinence. However, within the first year of committing to abstinence, many couples become pregnant because they have sex anyway but don’t use protection. So it’s a good idea even for people who don’t plan to have sex to be informed about birth control.

[continued in next post]

 

[z0wb13]

you said: If you want to learn how to practice abstinence, go to Church. i could not disagree more. the classroom is just as good a place as any for young people to learn strategies about how to remain abstinent until they are emotionally prepared for the realities of sex. mostly, it would focus on how to resist peer-pressure, which is dependent on having strong self-esteem, and to a lesser degree any relevant facts that could help them to make better decisions. and in a perfect world, i would like to see guidance counselors try to identify students that are more likely to become sexually active at too young an age and try to give them special attention or interventions. i know that will never happen due to budget cuts, but i can dream.

you also said: Heck, everyone has a smart phone - I’m sure you could find videos online instructing you how to use ABC. this might not turn out alright. there are the obvious pit-falls of typing in something to google and getting unintended results. there is also the fact that not everyone (like poor people) has a smart phone, and not everyone (like poor people) has access to health care, or doctors to consult about the kinds of questions you are proposing. but everyone does have access to an education in this country. if your basic point is that people can dig up information on their own, why not get rid of schools entirely? well, because people learn critical thinking skills in school that helps them to tell the difference between good and bad information. if you just set people loose on the internet, with no instruction, i don’t think you will get the very best results.

anyway, if you want to read an exhaustive study on the subject, you can see one here. Conclusions: Primary prevention [abstinence-only] strategies evaluated to date do not delay the initiation of sexual intercourse, improve use of birth control among young men and women, or reduce the number of pregnancies in young women.

and my last point, which you shouldn’t take very seriously, is that if you are a christian, and you believe that jesus was born from a virgin, then you cannot then go on to claim that abstinence is 100% effective. because if it were, then jesus would never have been born. the two are mutually exclusive. so either abstinence isn’t the silver-bullet that you are claiming, or a fundamental pillar of your faith demonstrably wrong. i’m being flippant, so just try to chuckle and move on;p

you’re right, that if someone doesn’t want to deal with the consequences of having sex, they should remain abstinent. but it’s like saying if people don’t want to get into a car accident, they should refrain from driving a car. that would work, if people didn’t need to drive. abstinence only sex ed might work, if sexual desire wasn’t the second strongest human instinct after self-preservation. but you have to prepare for the inevitability that eventually children are going to grow up and want to have sex, and when they do they would be better served by having as much information available as possible.

 

[z0wb13]

Again, no mention that abortions are linked to severe health issues later in life, as well as significantly increased odds of premature birth and low birth weight…

there is no proof that any of this is true. not that wikipedia is the best source, it’s just the easiest: Abortion does not impair subsequent pregnancies, nor does it increase the risk of future premature births, infertility, ectopic pregnancy, or miscarriage.

if you want to dispel any other misconceptions you have about abortion, you could look here.

the facts are that around 70,000 women are killed worldwide by unsafe abortions in the developing world, a mortality rate of 367 per 100,000 procedures. that’s compared to 0.2–1.2 deaths per 100,000 procedures in countries where it is legal and safe, making it a safer medical procedure than actually giving birth.

i don’t see how these numbers don’t concern the “pro-life” position at all. instead, you just throw around colorful language, call me [indirectly] a merchant of death, or inaccurately describe abortion as a genocide. it’s all very emotionally charged, but it ignores the facts, and those are that if abortion was made illegal in the US, then more women would die from unsafe procedures.

answer these simple questions:
would outlawing abortions reduce unwanted pregnancies, and how?
would reducing access to reproductive health care (by, say, defunding planned parenthood) affect the health of babies, and how?
what do you mean by “abstinence-only”? show me a lesson plan.

 

[Mumbles140]

abstinence is 100% if you practice it. i cannot agree with you more. but you seem to be ignoring the fact that in any long-term, romantic relationship, the practice of abstinence drops to about 0%. it’s almost a definitional thing isn’t it? a marriage has to be consummated, but there are many married couples, that for many different reasons, don’t want kids. anecdotally, i don’t know any married couple that use condoms or the pill that have had any unwanted pregnancies.

show me an accidental pregnancy, and i’ll show you a couple that wasn’t using birth control correctly. btw, in my mind, the rhythm method, or what i have seen here as natural family planning, isn’t reliable birth control, and neither is coitus interruptus. as far as i’m concerned, it’s just rolling the dice and hoping that you won’t get pregnant this time, but month over month, eventually the NFPers are going to get unintentionally pregnant.

anyway. i don’t think i even understand what you are promoting. is it to teach kids to be abstinent until marriage, or abstinent forever unless they want to have their own children? because every study ever done on the subject shows that “abstinence-until-marriage” education has no effect on when people first become sexually active.

the one study that you have found to dispute this is dubious for two reasons. first, it relies on self-reporting. i would not be that surprised if you “taught” kids abstinence was the “right answer” that they would be more likely to self-report that they had been abstinent. you cannot be sure, i guess barring some medical examination or a lie-detector, whether the kids in the survey are actually being influenced or just telling the researchers what they think that they want to hear.

the other problem i have, with the only study on the planet that supports your position, is that the difference in outcomes is rather small. there is a 0.7% difference between the abstinence-only program and the 8 hour “comprehensive” program. that tiny difference is just as likely to be a statistical anomaly as it is to be an actual result. that’s how statistics works, and that there are dozens of studies that did not detect any meaningful difference in sexual behavior from abstinence-only programs carries much greater weight.

furthermore, if you had taken the time to read the one report that you want to use to prove your position, then you would have realized that far from being an “abstinence only” program that you envision, the students were taught about how to use condoms.

really, you should read these sources that you keep pointing me to. this is from the second paragraph of the page you mentioned: The most effective way to prevent pregnancy is abstinence. However, within the first year of committing to abstinence, many couples become pregnant because they have sex anyway but don’t use protection. So it’s a good idea even for people who don’t plan to have sex to be informed about birth control.

[continued in next post]

1. I know plenty of married couples who have ‘unplanned’ pregnancies - I would avoid the term ‘unwanted’ unless you are referring to abortion/adoption. And are you saying the statistics are false that properly used birth control is not 100% effective, significantly less so in certain cases? Also, I believe that NFP considers itself 90% effective, but the whole idea is being open to life, even if you want to delay pregnancy at one point.
2. You really don’t understand abstinence-only education. Let me give you a sample of what a sex ed class is like when it comes to birth control: “Just to remind everyone, the only 100% certain way to avoid pregnancy is abstinence. Now, moving on to health issues of sex…” It isn’t advocating abstinence, nor is it expecting everyone to be abstinent. It just chooses to stay silent on ABC, masturbation, and homosexuality.
3. I’m not sure how else you expect sexual data to be reported with doctor-patient privilege and information consent laws. It all has to be self-reporting because each subject will not be followed and observed. For your second objection to the study, who are you to say what could be considered an anomaly? How do you know it doesn’t swing further, and that group of girls just happened to be more sexually active than the rest of the population? You accept the results for what they are, and .7% may not seem like much, but out of every 1,000 teenage girls having sex, roughly 7 more will become pregnant by learning about condoms.
4. Looking at the study, the ‘Abstinence only’ column performs significantly better than ‘Safer sex only’. My guess is that ‘comprehensive’ covers both aspects, but still are not as good as the abstinence-only column.
5. I read that part also, but didn’t think it applied. First, it is anecdotal and is backed by no actual statistics, unlike the other data. Also, we should blame the people, not the method. I’m not saying withhold information, I’m just saying that if that is the most ideal method, then let it be known as such. And your study showed similar results for condom usage among those with abstinence-only education. This quote is targeting a group of the population who ‘proclaim abstinence’. How many people do you know who have even said that they are waiting until marriage? Seriously, how many middle schoolers tell their friends they aren’t going to have sex until marriage? What about when they reach high school, or college? I’ve known two - myself, and a close college friend.

 

[Mumbles140]

you said: If you want to learn how to practice abstinence, go to Church. i could not disagree more. the classroom is just as good a place as any for young people to learn strategies about how to remain abstinent until they are emotionally prepared for the realities of sex. mostly, it would focus on how to resist peer-pressure, which is dependent on having strong self-esteem, and to a lesser degree any relevant facts that could help them to make better decisions. and in a perfect world, i would like to see guidance counselors try to identify students that are more likely to become sexually active at too young an age and try to give them special attention or interventions. i know that will never happen due to budget cuts, but i can dream.

you also said: Heck, everyone has a smart phone - I’m sure you could find videos online instructing you how to use ABC. this might not turn out alright. there are the obvious pit-falls of typing in something to google and getting unintended results. there is also the fact that not everyone (like poor people) has a smart phone, and not everyone (like poor people) has access to health care, or doctors to consult about the kinds of questions you are proposing. but everyone does have access to an education in this country. if your basic point is that people can dig up information on their own, why not get rid of schools entirely? well, because people learn critical thinking skills in school that helps them to tell the difference between good and bad information. if you just set people loose on the internet, with no instruction, i don’t think you will get the very best results.

anyway, if you want to read an exhaustive study on the subject, you can see one here. Conclusions: Primary prevention [abstinence-only] strategies evaluated to date do not delay the initiation of sexual intercourse, improve use of birth control among young men and women, or reduce the number of pregnancies in young women.

and my last point, which you shouldn’t take very seriously, is that if you are a christian, and you believe that jesus was born from a virgin, then you cannot then go on to claim that abstinence is 100% effective. because if it were, then jesus would never have been born. the two are mutually exclusive. so either abstinence isn’t the silver-bullet that you are claiming, or a fundamental pillar of your faith demonstrably wrong. i’m being flippant, so just try to chuckle and move on;p

you’re right, that if someone doesn’t want to deal with the consequences of having sex, they should remain abstinent. but it’s like saying if people don’t want to get into a car accident, they should refrain from driving a car. that would work, if people didn’t need to drive. abstinence only sex ed might work, if sexual desire wasn’t the second strongest human instinct after self-preservation. but you have to prepare for the inevitability that eventually children are going to grow up and want to have sex, and when they do they would be better served by having as much information available as possible.

1. But why should it be offered to everyone? There are many different religious and cultural aspects to this debate, so at a public school, for the sake of inclusion, why not play it safe. Why not stick to the basics that everyone can agree on, and let other parties (parents, counselors outside the classroom, physicians, etc) deal with the subjective/specific issues that are often debated. Not sure where you went to school, but the only time we learned about ‘peer pressure’ was in D.A.R.E. in 5th grade.
2. The smart phone comment was a joke. Thank goodness for abortion-loving Obama because now everyone can have health care! Also, there are things called free clinics, that will provide information to anyone. And I don’t ever remember “Putting on a condom 101” being part of a curriculum. School’s don’t teach you how to go the bathroom, tie your shoe, etc. Some things are learned outside of school.
3. I will read the study later, but several of those assertions are refuted by the previous study.
4. You are right. 1 women in the history of the world was completely abstinent and wound up giving birth to God Incarnate, the Savior of Mankind. She was spared the stain of original sin, and was assumed into Heaven, where she became Queen of Heaven and Earth. Don’t know of anyone who would complain about that…
5. Do you think 7th graders fully understand the responsibilites of children? Do you think that stops them? As much as I can’t stand MTV, the show 16 and Pregnant (at least from the title) shows kids what it is really like to have a child in high school, and I hope it doesn’t spare on the troubles a teenage pregnancy can cause. And I did have a fraternity brother who lost several friends in one year from car accidents, so he never got his license. He got around with friends and public transportation. And if you live in a rural area, that’s what bikes are for! See, when you only present the one option and make everything else seem impossible, you aren’t being responsible…
6. I think hunger, thirst, and shelter surpass sex (for the pleasure aspect - I include it with preservation if you are talking about reproduction; I doubt any middle schooler is having sex to make sure humans aren’t wiped out). Secondly, sex isn’t a basic necessity for personal survival. It may be an instinct, but it has to be maintained. Just because eating is okay doesn’t mean we should always eat because we like the taste. Lastly, as people get older, they can learn for themselves - this burden shouldn’t be placed on middle schools to teach people who are just starting to go through puberty.

 

[z0wb13]

For your second objection to the study, who are you to say what could be considered an anomaly?

i have a degree in math. i’m just telling you how statistics work. if you do enough studies, there is a chance that you will get a type 1 error, which is basically a false positive.

but i really don’t understand how you can call what you are describing as “abstinence-only” as sex education if you aren’t going to talk about sex. you might want to call it biology class. why have a sex ed class at all if you aren’t going to teach anything about it? just let the kids play some more volley ball with the level of instruction you are suggesting.

i’m being serious. what would your perfect sex ed class be like? i understand no masturbation, no ABC, and no homo. so i understand that you want to pretend that not everybody masturbates, that gay people don’t exist, and that there are no ways to reduce the chance of pregnancy. now that you have wished all these realities away, what will you be left with to teach? that you can spread AIDS through tears? what’s the point of teaching about STDs if the kids on your planet are going to be abstinent anyway?

unless you tell me what you will teach, i’m just going to have to assume that “abstinence-only” is effectively the same as no sex ed in public school. i’ve seen this sort of end run around educational standards before. creationists want their religion taught in public school, so they thought they could trick people by relabeling it as intelligent design. you don’t think sex ed should be part of the curriculum, so you just demand “abstinence-only” and gloss over everything relevant.

 

[Mumbles140]

there is no proof that any of this is true. not that wikipedia is the best source, it’s just the easiest: Abortion does not impair subsequent pregnancies, nor does it increase the risk of future premature births, infertility, ectopic pregnancy, or miscarriage.

if you want to dispel any other misconceptions you have about abortion, you could look here.

the facts are that around 70,000 women are killed worldwide by unsafe abortions in the developing world, a mortality rate of 367 per 100,000 procedures. that’s compared to 0.2–1.2 deaths per 100,000 procedures in countries where it is legal and safe, making it a safer medical procedure than actually giving birth.

i don’t see how these numbers don’t concern the “pro-life” position at all. instead, you just throw around colorful language, call me [indirectly] a merchant of death, or inaccurately describe abortion as a genocide. it’s all very emotionally charged, but it ignores the facts, and those are that if abortion was made illegal in the US, then more women would die from unsafe procedures.

answer these simple questions:
would outlawing abortions reduce unwanted pregnancies, and how?
would reducing access to reproductive health care (by, say, defunding planned parenthood) affect the health of babies, and how?
what do you mean by “abstinence-only”? show me a lesson plan.

Harms of abortions: 4abortion.net/ingles/physical_consequences_after_abor.htm

I’m very concerned about abortions worldwide, and stopping one facet won’t do it. That’s why it has to be a grand-scale change to how things have been done - handing out condoms, showing them how to use them, and letting people have abortions to ‘fix their mistakes’. It has to be about education, limitation, and providing alternatives. You say 70,000 women die a year from unsafe abortions, which is tragic. But that is 70,000 children that could be adopted. And think how many unborn children there are every year? Does that number mean nothing to you?

Again, trying to pick out specifics like “If you take away this” or “If you ban this” doesn’t do anything for a solution. Those are parts of it, but there are many parts that all need to work together.

As for a sex ed class that is ‘abstinence only’, I’ve tried explaining this as best I can. I will give it one more shot of what topics are covered: Anatomy, the marital act, the specifics (anatomy-wise) of how the sperm is released and the egg is fertilized, issues with sexual health, types of STDs and how to identify and treat them. It is made clear that three topics will not be discussed - ABC, masturbation, and homosexuality. When the teacher said “We cannot talk about birth control”, he would also add it to remember that abstinence is the only 100% method to preventing pregnancy. That was the only mention of birth control methods and abstinence in the entire class (I think it was 3 weeks of sex ed class instead of gym class during each year of middle school).

 

[Mumbles140]

i have a degree in math. i’m just telling you how statistics work. if you do enough studies, there is a chance that you will get a type 1 error, which is basically a false positive.

but i really don’t understand how you can call what you are describing as “abstinence-only” as sex education if you aren’t going to talk about sex. you might want to call it biology class. why have a sex ed class at all if you aren’t going to teach anything about it? just let the kids play some more volley ball with the level of instruction you are suggesting.

i’m being serious. what would your perfect sex ed class be like? i understand no masturbation, no ABC, and no homo. so i understand that you want to pretend that not everybody masturbates, that gay people don’t exist, and that there are no ways to reduce the chance of pregnancy. now that you have wished all these realities away, what will you be left with to teach? that you can spread AIDS through tears? what’s the point of teaching about STDs if the kids on your planet are going to be abstinent anyway?

unless you tell me what you will teach, i’m just going to have to assume that “abstinence-only” is effectively the same as no sex ed in public school. i’ve seen this sort of end run around educational standards before. creationists want their religion taught in public school, so they thought they could trick people by relabeling it as intelligent design. you don’t think sex ed should be part of the curriculum, so you just demand “abstinence-only” and gloss over everything relevant.

Congratulations, I have a BS in Accounting. My point was that you projecting that it ‘could be’ a Type 1 error doesn’t mean anything. You may be right or you may be wrong - there is no way we can prove that right here, so we have to accept it at face value.

I explained in this last post, and to repeat again, you clearly haven’t the slightest idea what sex ed is, which worries me that with a college degree you have never had a sex ed class before. Also, choosing not to discuss topics doesn’t mean people pretend they don’t exist. We would be directed to ask parents, counselors, doctors, or others about those specific things, but they were not part of the curriculum (just like how learning to take a shower isn’t part of your PE curriculum). There is no pretending, but do you think it is appropriate for a grown man to teach a middle school boy how to masturbate, or should they spend time showing the diagrams of anal/oral sex? Sex ed in middle school is about reproduction, anatomy, and STDs - that’s it.

I’ve tried telling you countless times what an abstinence-only sex ed class is like - my apologies that you hadn’t the slightest idea what a sex ed class teaches. Have you ever been in one?

 

[spockrates]

Hi, Z0w. Not sure if you already were asked this, but if we don’t legislate anything dealing with morality, then what else should we use as a basis for legislation?