Abstinence Education <- Discuss

[Dragunov-21]

I don't know if this is in quite the right section, but I've been doing a little reading on AE (I've come to America for a couple months), and been spoiling for an *intelligent* debate on the subject.

 

In my opinion, AE is one of the most dangerous ideas ever brought into the world. I'm someone who treats sexual intimacy as something not to be taken lightly, but AE terrifies me.

 

The fact is that sex is a biological imperative, not something read from a tome of secret knowledge that can be hidden from children. Safe sexual practices, on the other hand, are a purely learned skill/knowledge base.

 

I'm not advocating teaching technique in schools, (though it'd prolly make for a few less awkward misunderstandings lol), but in my opinion, to try to make kids scared of sex in the hope that it will be enough to keep curiosity and biological imperatives at bay is ridiculous.

 

Discuss

[sidehop]

It's very difficult in my opinion to influence young teens to not have sex with the whole world around them basically advertising sex in one form or another.

 

Although I think it is a good idea to give them such education but also offer safe sex education if they do decide to go that route.

[Ceremony]

I think schools should take an unbiased standpoint and just give the facts. Obviously not having sex is the only way to avoid STDs and pregnancy but they should be informing kids on what to do if they do have sex. My school taught sex ed and it didn't make me mess around with every guy in school.

[karvala]

Well this is dangerously religious and political territory for ENA, so I'm not sure how long this thread will survive, but while it's around I will just say the following.

 

Misunderstandings between science and religion, of which abstinence education is a classic example, are exactly that: misunderstandings, and a two-way street. Your argument that abstinence goes against biological imperative and is not likely to be 100% effective is a scientific argument, and in that context it's perfectly correct. But abstinence is not taught as a scientific position. You might as well as criticise women in Saudi Arabia on the grounds that dressing head-to-toe is not a sensible thing to do in the middle of the desert. Neither of them make scientific sense, but neither of them are offered as scientific positions. They are offered as religious positions, and religion is not subject to scientific scrutiny. For someone who believes, as an integral part of their approach to the truth, that abstinence is the only correct behaviour before marriage, it makes complete sense that they would teach this or ask for this to be taught, and it would be just as irrational if they asked for their views not to be taken into consideration as it would be for a scientist to ask that the evidence they offer on the ineffectiveness of abstinence should be ignored.

 

In short, religious actions should be judged on grounds of consistency with religion, and scientific actions should be judged on grounds of consistency with science. Do that, and it'll all make perfect sense. Of course, that requires you to temporarily suspend belief in both, and that's not an easy thing to do....

[Dragunov-21]

For someone who believes, as an integral part of their approach to the truth, that abstinence is the only correct behaviour before marriage, it makes complete sense that they would teach this or ask for this to be taught, and it would be just as irrational if they asked for their views not to be taken into consideration as it would be for a scientist to ask that the evidence they offer on the ineffectiveness of abstinence should be ignored.

 

But if the kids AE is being directed at believed/accepted this as part of their approach to truth, they wouldn't need it, and wouldn't end up teen pregnant.

 

I feel that the only way to avoid an undesirable situation is to be as informed as possible, so you have a reason not to (in this case) have unprotected or premarital sex.

 

If you believe in abstinence, then it works, but a lot (I would say the majority) of kids don't, and then, a lack of knowledge about solid biological fact (that sex can lead to children or STIs) becomes the ultimate liability.

 

 

 

Also, is political/morally controversial material out of bounds in ENA? If it is I apologise, is there a mod I can ask?

[DropToZero]

Yeah I would do your best to keep the political and moral out of this, but it seems like it would be hard...

 

I'll just say this one thing...

 

My girlfriend and I, both 22, within the past month decided we wished to become celibate until we were married(which could be years from now)...

 

She had a very open sex life, talked about it a lot, and was very open about her sexuality...so as hard as this choice was for me, it was even harder for her I would have to think as we've been through this.

 

...What I want to get to, is this norm...and how it seems to have switched. My girlfriend tells her friends about her sex life, and so when she went to work to talk about it, she begins telling them about our recent choice of abstinence...

 

...guess what happened? 8 out of 10 people looked at her like ..."What??? Why???" ...only two claimed to have understood and said they thought it was a good choice. Then I recently learned that one of her friends, one of the two who -understood- told her she thought my g/f should hook up with someone else, b/c her friend thought I was trying to control her with this choice and she should see *what else is out there*, even though it was both our choices. Not to even mention the things the other 8 people said such as "He's cheating on you, he's got someone on the side, he's trying to control you and change you, I'm going to try and tempt you into giving in sexually."

 

...So much for these friends I'd say ...many of them don't seem like such good friends IMO.

 

Either way... that's all I'm putting in, just a good real world example of the way the norm(at least in my example) seems to have shifted... abstinence is...crazy now? hmmm?

[Scorpion Fury]

I think it's ridiculous. So teens don't know about safe sex and contraceptive use and they get pregnant. And then on top of that, they want to outlaw abortion? That's going to be disastrous.

 

All I see in the states where they do teach abstinence only, is a bunch of uninformed teens, ignorant to the practices of safe sex, that are going to do what they want anyway and get pregnant and spread STDs around. They are teens after all and have the "It won't happen to me" mentality.

[Scorpion Fury]

And yes, their parents can teach them about contraceptive, but can you imagine being 16 and getting the birds and bees talk from your parents? Holy awkwardness!

 

Not a lot of parents and teens feel comfortable discussing this together, so they just don't.

[karvala]

But if the kids AE is being directed at believed/accepted this as part of their approach to truth, they wouldn't need it, and wouldn't end up teen pregnant.

 

I feel that the only way to avoid an undesirable situation is to be as informed as possible, so you have a reason not to (in this case) have unprotected or premarital sex.

 

If you believe in abstinence, then it works, but a lot (I would say the majority) of kids don't, and then, a lack of knowledge about solid biological fact (that sex can lead to children or STIs) becomes the ultimate liability.

 

Of course, I agree that from a non-religious perspective, the end result of abstinence teaching leaves a lot to be desired. Believe me, I'm not advocating it. But that's still a scientific argument. If I were a religious fundamentalist who had a firm conviction that abstinence was the only correct behaviour in this situation (and I emphasise that "if"!), I'd say that children having sex while using protection was even more undesirable, and that the solution would be to better persuade them of the merits of abstinence, than to give up and accept the other behaviour.

 

Also, is political/morally controversial material out of bounds in ENA? If it is I apologise, is there a mod I can ask?

 

There is a vague rule about not having religious or political threads here, mostly because they tend to become a little overheated rather quickly, but it's not actually written in the forum rules, so if we all behave ourselves we might get this one in under the wire. Avman is the guy to contact if you really want to play it safe though, or any one of the mods.

[Dragunov-21]

Thanks Karvala.

 

And I guess when you put it like that it becomes a question of which is the lesser evil, safe sex or unwanted babies and STIs?

 

I just think that the problem is that although the parents/teachers might have beliefs that focus on abstinence, they are often so naive as to expect that their kids will be too, just because it's "right".

 

[EDITTED OUT]

 

I respect others' rights to choose the education they feel best for their children, but I would implore AE-centered parents not to rely on your kids' ignorance and fear of sex to stop them doing it...

[avman]

Thread closed as a religious/political debate.