With the news
yesterday that teen pregnancy rates have increased for the first time in
2005-2006 since the 1990s, the debate over abstinence-only education versus
comprehensive sex education has been revived. Fortunately, this fall President
Obama signed the Fiscal
Year 2010 Omnibus Appropriations bill, which ended “funding for
the failed Community Based Abstinence Education program and instead directs
significant resources into medically accurate, evidence-based teen pregnancy
prevention programs.” Those significant resources are split
75%-25%, with the former including programs that have been proven to work and
the latter including “innovative possibilities”, and it is possible that ab-only
programs would be included in the latter 25%.
The ACLU’s opposition to
abstinence-only education is based
on several factors. Ab-only education censors vital health care information,
stigmatizes homosexuality by discussing sex purely within the context of
heterosexual marriage,
implies
STDs are punishment for
homosexuality, promotes gender stereotypes and in some cases, advocates
religious doctrine. It does all of this with our tax dollars.
Lastly, ab-only
education is not effective. The New York Times writes that “While it is difficult to
pinpoint precisely how different factors influence teenage sexual behavior, some
experts speculate that the rise in teenage pregnancy might be partly
attributable to the $150 million a year of federal financing for sex education
that emphasized abstinence until marriage, avoiding all mention of the possible
benefits of contraception.”
Fortunately, it is now 2010, and the aforementioned
Appropriations bill is in effect with the appropriate re-allocation of tax payer
dollars to sex-ed programs that are actually effective and kinder to our civil
liberties. But be on the look-out as health care moves forward, because ab-only
advocates definitely have their eyes on tax dollars for ab-only education
programs.