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1993-03-23
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Random Thoughts - A Charlen's-Eye View
Sex Education In The Schools...Among Other Things
by Charlen Kyle
Recently I was asked why I support sex education in the schools. A
parent who opposes it worries, "What about the public schools where they
counsel students on birth control and hand out condoms to the kids? And
talk about non-marital sex as if it's quite all right?"
It is clear to me that the parents have dropped the ball on
this. Parents don't like to believe their kids would ever be sexually
active while still in school. However, times have changed. When I was in
school, (in the 1940s and 1950s) sex was not talked about. We didn't run
into it when present at adult conversations, nor in magazines, newspapers,
TV, radio, on the street, nor even very often in conversations among
ourselves.
Dates were usually doubles or chaperoned. A mother was always home.
Kids who were going together didn't have that much time alone to be fooling
around or get carried away. Parents more or less felt there wasn't any need
to go into more than the sketchiest of details until we were "old enough to
need to know," which was certainly older than high school.
Now, explicit references to sex are everywhere. Even kindergartners
can't help but know all about it, whether their parents want to believe it
or not!
In my class, only one girl had started her menstrual period by the
end of sixth grade. These days some start in third grade and many in fourth.
In the Washington metro area, 60% of tenth graders are sexually
active, and 40% have had more than 5 partners. One in 47 has AIDS. Parents
don't want to face this. Many refuse to face it. The ball has been dropped.
If parents and churches were doing the job in a timely manner, it
would be different. At this point, with AIDS, the stakes have been raised.
We are not just talking about illegitimate babies and curable venereal
diseases any more. We are talking about our children's * very lives *.
* Times * have * changed *.
In response to the objection that since AIDS continues to get worse in
some areas where schools have sex ed classes and give away condoms, why have
it at all? Just think how much worse it would be if there were even less use
of condoms and more entirely unprotected sex than there is already. Condoms
are not highly effective, especially when used improperly. Young people who
use them often do not use them right, so protection is all the poorer. You
are suggesting throwing the baby out with the bathwater here. Your logic is
that some education is less than perfect so we should forget about education
at all. I say, let's do a better job.
My position on teenage (and younger) sex is that though they are old
enough physically, they are not old enough or mature enough mentally or
emotionally or psychologically to handle it, and for that reason teenagers
should not indulge in sex. This is a theme which should run through every
sex ed course.
"Just say no!" and "It's a sin!" are just not enough. Kids are doing
it anyway, because they think it is going to be fun.
They need to know several things.
1. They risk their lives (because of AIDS).Condoms are
only partially effective.
2. They risk other diseases, herpes, genital warts, etc.,
some of which may later limit their choice of partners.
3. They risk pregnancy and its very heavy consequences,
since no contraceptive is 100% effective. If they become
pregnant, they essentially have three choices, any one of
which will most likely lead to a lifetime of regret.
a. They can keep the baby and raise it
themselves. Sudden full responsibility for
a completely dependent human being, 24
hours a day, seven days a week, basically
for the next 18 years, puts a real crimp in
the teen-age and young adult lifestyle and
good times. Between the financial and the
basic personal needs which must be met,
there is a * whole * lot * less * left over
to meet those parents' own personal
needs.
b. Adoption may seem simple, but for the
rest of their lives the birth parents will
worry about that child and wonder if they
did the right thing and look back with
regret, and grieve for the child they have
lost.
c. Abortion, even when one truly believes
that the fetus has not yet become a
person, still leads to its own brand of
regret, and grieving for the loss of the
potential child that might have been; this
sorrow too, lasts a lifetime. * Any * of
these consequences are truly too heavy to
wish upon any young person.
4. I haven't even mentioned the heartbreak teenagers go
through at the inevitable breakup of the usual series of teenaged
romances, all the more piercing if the couple has shared a sexual
relationship.
I am not an advocate of such things as teen sex, or abortion. I am
about as far away from an advocate of that as anyone you will ever meet. I
do not, however, believe that children should pay for a childish mistake,
or for the omissions of well meaning parents, with their lives, or with a
pregnancy bringing any or all of the consequences listed above.
That is why sex education in the schools is so crucial. The parents
and the churches have dropped the ball. Even with the education many
students will still get AIDS, still get pregnant, still end up with
abortions, still endure a lifetime of regret. But ust because we can't save
all of them is no reason not to try.
A good program will stress all of the above points as to why young
people should wait to indulge in sex. But then it should follow the above
with these words. For those who choose to close their eyes to the above
realities and go ahead anyway, they will most likely regret it.
However, at least they should know how to do everything they can to
try and protect themselves from the worst consequences. No method guarantees
protection, and many are quite iffy. If a female is old enough to get
pregnant, she is old enough to be protected by contraception, and to know
what causes pregnancy.
Regarding an assumption that my pro-choice stand is an endorsement of
abortion, my position is this:
I think an abortion brings a lifetime of grieving for the child that
might have been. However, it is not my place, or the government's place, to
tell a woman which burden is going to be heavier, the load coping with
bringing the pregnancy to term and what follows, or the abortion and the
grieving that follows.
=X=X=X=