http://www.democraticunderground.com/10141140493
Quoting from the link in that post:
The bill prohibits funding for programs or materials “directed at youth, that are designed to promote or encourage sexual activity, or normalize teen sexual activity as an expected behavior, implicitly or explicitly, whether homosexual or heterosexual.”
Funds also cannot be used to help distribute materials on school grounds that are either “legally obscene” or, again, that “normalize teen sexual activity as an expected behavior.”
The bill also prohibits funding for contraceptive distribution in schools, or for sex education or HIV-prevention education programs that don’t teach “the health benefits of abstinence.”
The problem with this approach, advocates say, is that sex education is most effective when it acknowledges how normal teen sexual behavior actually is. Sixty-one percent of young people have already had sex by the time they turn 18, and 95 percent of Americans have sex before marriage.
A report by Advocates for Youth, an organization promoting adolescent sexual health, finds that effective sex education “should treat sexual development as a normal, natural part of human development” in order to help young people make healthy decisions about not just sex, but also relationships and bodily autonomy...."
I'm assuming that since this source isn't in favor of the amendment that it's not spinning it to minimize what it's saying. If it was "abstinence-only," that report, I suspect, would lead with that.
So it doesn't require abstinence-only as the only sex ed; it doesn't even require a focus on it. It just requires not teaching that it's normal and healthy for teens to have sex. Are there health benefits to abstinence? Sure: no danger of pregnancy or STDs, reduced emotional downside to breakups, little chance of being caught humping in the school stairwell or in the parking lot, and lets not even go into the realm of latex-related dermatitis. Nobody seems to mind that last bit, prohibiting federal funds for contraception; there are a lot of funding sources for that kind of thing anyway.
The sticking point is having a teacher get up and say it's okay for those 14-year-olds to screw. Or the 15-year-olds. Or 16-year-olds. The (R) insist that not be said. This source apparently insists on that being an obligatory part of the program--screw away, just do it safely.
Thing is, a lot of parents are trying to teach their sons to keep it in their pants and teach their daughters to stay out of their boyfriends' beds. "But ma, I was told that fucking makes me healthy--I'm 13, so what if it's my fourth boy. This month. Don't you want me healthy?"
I'm always a bit iffy when it comes to the schools undermining parental authority because the schools aren't responsible for the kids' conduct and upbringing in the same way the parents are. How many people bothered to indict Roof's high school teachers for what he did? No, it was his parents that were held responsible for his upbringing, nobody asked about diversity sensitivity training in 9th and 10th grades. Ask a principal, "Are you responsible for teaching character and morality?" and most principals will cringe and run for cover. Some will say yes--anti-bullying, tolerance, and run down the usual list of societal changes that are currently popular. But if the kid doesn't live up to it, well, it's really policing and not ensuring that the message gets through that matters. Some will split character from morality. But as soon as parents start yelling, it's "raise shields and head away at warp 9" unless there's some piece of policy or legislation requiring them to do the moral thing, thereby making it a legal thing and grounds for dismissal.
= new reply since forum marked as read
