An interesting group of articles in the Washington Post looked at how teen sex is viewed and carried out in Western Europe and America. In Western Europe, teen sex is predominantly viewed as a normal and healthy part of development. In America, teens receive mixed messages about sex, being told to wait until marriage while at the same time living in a hypersexualized culture. And, judging from the article, American teens aren’t waiting to have sex, but they are failing to protect themselves:
“The outcome? Levels of teen sexual activity look remarkably similar here and abroad, but U.S. rates of teen pregnancy, childbirth, abortion and sexually transmitted diseases are among the highest of all industrialized nations, despite recent decreases.”
Posted by Melissa Cooley
Registered?
Commenting on WE Blog now requires you to be a Kansas.com member. Use the links above to register, if you haven't already, or to log in.Contact us
Follow us
Daily Archives
-
Recent Comments
- Regular on ACORN stole election?
- Regular on ACORN stole election?
- CapnAmerica on ACORN stole election?
- Regular on ACORN stole election?
- Phantom on Open thread 11/21
- CapnAmerica on ACORN stole election?
- CapnAmerica on ACORN stole election?
- Phantom on Open thread 11/21
- Phantom on ACORN stole election?
- CapnAmerica on ACORN stole election?
55 Comments
Well those western Europeans are just not civilized! They have safer sex, more fuel efficient car and a realist view of life! Snotty Europeans!
And our wonderful KSBOE members want to further hinder teaching our kids about safety and prevention.
It would be interesting to see what the sex education classes cover in Europe. Any chance they do a little more than preach abstinence?
But…that wouldn’t make any difference, anyway. Our BoE has proven remarkably adept at ignoring scientific findings, facts, truth, and anything that isn’t taught in the Bible.
Overcoming a couple of generations of indoctrination and promotion under the guise of education cannot be reversed in 5 or 10. It will take that long to rid the system of the unqualified activists infecting the system alone.I find it remarkable that there are still those among us that would advocate a return to the very sort of tatic that caused the problem in the first place. In any event, only a fool would use the methods and models provided from the likes of European examples. A more successful approach is likely to be found using the european example and doing the opposite.
I’m sure we all remember being teens with raging hormones and thinking about sex. But it is my place as a parent to teach and talk about sex education. I talk to my kids about all sorts of things including sex. I’m very open and honest about my experiences with sex, drugs (and rock n’ roll), peer pressure etc (age appropriate of course I’m not going to tell my 3 year old the same stuff as my 12 year old). I’m not going to be hypocritical and say wait til marriage. I just encourage my 12 year old to wait until he’s older, preferably late high school or into college and make sure he really loves the person and she loves him. And I’ll tell my 3 year old (and the one on the way) the same when they’re older.
Sooory–
Have you ever been to Europe?
And what part of their lower unwanted pregnancy rate and their lower rate of STD’s do you particularly object to?
This is an interesting statistic especially when Kansas spends millions of taxpayer dollars every year for teen pregnancy prevention programs. Why is there no requirement of improved statistic for the money to be spent? This is on top of what is done at the schools. Kansas needs to look a what they are funding and try something different.
“I find it remarkable that there are still those among us that would advocate a return to the very sort of tatic that caused the problem in the first place.”
Gosh, would that be the christian position that has been so successful? Or were the liberals in charge of the success? You talibaners cant have it both ways. If we were in charge, we claim the success. You say you are NEVER in charge, so you cant take credit for success.
You must have been educated in a school supervised by the Kansas Board of Evangelicals. Let connie morris and steve and their merry band undo all the success. Come on, I dare ya.
You just want more little souls in your taliban indoctrination camps so they can grow up, get some of that republican wealth, and put more in the collection plates.
So much for christian “values”. Lower rates of abortion? Lower rates of STD’s? Lower rates of unwanted pregnancies?
Please dont make us be like europe. The american taliban has SO MUCH better results to report.
Who ya gonna belive? Sorry or those lyin’ eyes of yours.
LH, yes, I have been to Europe and that is exactly the reason I believe as I do. Many people base their belifs on sales pitchs, ideology, and tourist experiences, but when you get there and into the communitites, you find out very quickly that the reality is far different than what you might imagine. The absolute best way to learn an appreciation for our own way of life is to experience the reality of the “European example”.
“European example”.
Care to explain/elaborate? I’m thinking that this is a pretty sweeping generalization.
Well since I am not even religious Ksfarmgrll your rant has little meaning to me other than what I expect from a displaced advocate of failed experimentation into the benefits of promoting irresponsible behaivor under the guise of education. Your methods didn’t work and I can’t blame you for wanting to be the one to correct the damage done by those of like mind. The fact of the matter is, this is not possible any longer. People have lost patience with your methods and excesses. It is now time for someone else to try something new. The first step in which the removal of unqualified advocates, with credientials based on life’s experiences. These people must be replaced with actual teachers who are committed to the subject they teach and do not feel a right to teach whatever it is they like, and damn what the parents say. The very notion that public education should be used as a tool for social engineering, should not only be wiped off the minds of those in education, it should be criminalized with penalties similar to that of child molesters. Teachers have a job and molding minds is not it, despite how you were educated. That is the parents domain, not the advocates, like it or not.Your time is up, please accept that for your own peace of mind, and please for the sake of decency reconsider your need to insult, belittle and demean those that disagree with you, as it only serves to undermine your own position.
YBS, are you saying that you have some experience living in Europe?
I am sure you’d agree that visiting Europe is like visiting the US: it’s impossible to learn about US culture unless you’re immersed in it for some time.
My understanding is that most Europeans’ lifestyle is far superior to that of Americans: better health care, better cultural opportunities, far more vacation time taken to benefit from the increased culturual opportunities, free university education (and in Germany an apprencice/journeyman system in place for those not ready for university), and a cradle-to-grave social financial-safety net in many countries.
Granted this lifestyle is financed in part by the US (in that they don’t have to spend on their armies, we do all that and send our armies to Europe to protect them).
If a nation lives above its means but has no military to fund, how do you argue that it’s cultural mores (i.e., the “European example”) is inferior to that of a country living above its means mainly in order to fund an army to protect Europe (the “American example”)?
Are you somehow arguing that loaning our Army to Europe, all on the US taxpayer’s dime, that somehow this makes us suckers, yeah, but also somehow also superior to Europeans? In what way? Like morally?!?
Either you don’t know what you’re talking about or you’re somehow just prejudiced against Europeans. I think the “European example” is probably quite a bit better than the “American example,” ca2006 anyway and per capita.
Uh Sorry?
Just who are you talking about that is gonna be doing the teaching instead of the teachers? Other teachers?
I hope you plan to pay them better!
Maybe you can even pay them enough to forget their own common sense and shill your rather sans religion puritanical notions.
I guess I am still not sure what Sorry is complaining about. Hopefully, he will clarify.
You’re a’peein?Hell, I’m a’peein’ too.
Heheh. Sorry misses the entire point. Unwanted pregnancies are down NOW. Abortions are down NOW.
Is that a result of what we have been doing, since you clearly state WE have been in charge?
Exactly what do you want to have happen differently? MORE unwanted pregnancies and abortion numbers going UP? Sure ybs, go right ahead. You and connie do what I suggested. REVERSE ALL THE GAINS!!!!
Since you claim we have been in charge, and people are losing patience with US, which part do you not like? The lower unwanted pregnancies or the lower abortion numbers?
It is YOUR day that has come and gone ybs. Your policies have been abject failures. Why would we want more of you and your kind?
Excellent post flike.
Ybs?
Could it be that the Europeans are just a bit more evolved socially than we are here in the good ol USA?
In addition to what flike siad I’d add that in their attitudes toward nudity and other such things, the Europeans may make sex less a “forbidden fruit”.
I was gonna make a joke here, but it wouldn’t be funny.
I’ve NOT been to Europe. But I know that there is not the tabboo against nudity that we have here.
Is it rude to suggest that a country where a large number of folks are put aback by a woman publicly nursing her infant is just a bit LESS evolved than one where a naked woman on a bus may turn a few heads but not cause society to slam to a screeching halt?
Oh I get it. I bet it the dropping STD figures ybs doesnt like. Sex cant be with out punishment. HEHEH.
And if condoms lower the STD rate, of COURSE we wouldnt want kids to know about them.
Just let them have sex without protection. The higher STD rates, higher unwanted pregnancy rates, and higher abortion numbers will teach them that sex is WRONG.
Damn those liberals for wanting to lessen the harm. Kids SHOULD be punished with pregnancy and disease.
just ask connie morris.
“for the sake of decency”
So now we get to sob’s, I mean ybs’s real agenda.
To define decency for everone.
Disagree with ybs? You are promoting indecency. Heheh.
Maybe ybs should have been the WE “values” editor.
Randy and Melissa, you must be damn lonely there.
YBS:”The very notion that public education should be used as a tool for social engineering, should not only be wiped off the minds of those in education, it should be criminalized with penalties similar to that of child molesters. Teachers have a job and molding minds is not it, despite how you were educated.”
Sorry, you seem to have some strong feelings here, please share what you think legitimately falls in the realm of what public ed. should do, and what falls outside of it. Would you criminalize physical education, for example?
Responding to you first JR becasue it your question is shorter.Yes, JR, other teachers, that have been taught by professors who are actually qualified to do their job. What many do not realize is that the lion’s share of the problem in eduction is not with the teachers themselves, as it is with those that taught them to do the job in the first place. These so called professors are being replace at breakneck speed, and tenure is not an issue. They are simply not renewing contracts and eliminating topics and classes that were added for nothing other than increasing revenues and collecting special interest donations.Most current teachers are fantastic I admit, however there is a sub culture that cannot even pass the exams now necessary to prove their qualifications. These are the people that need to go, and they are.Also in the new picture are teachers coming into the field in mid career who have been out in the business world who actually know what it is like, and what is needed in education.Yes, without a doubt they need more money. Much of this can be accomplished by the elimination of the various tentacles in the Board of Education beast and their jet setting administrators.Personally, I’d love to see a seperation of politician and education, but that isn’t anything we will ever get on the plate.
“These so called professors are being replace at breakneck speed, and tenure is not an issue.”
I smell horowitz and his “liberal college professor” meme. Heheh.
you do get style point for gymnastics though for trying to weasel that in.
Next meme?
You you ever get the feeling that these anti-public education jihadists just switch nic names when they get shown to be what they are?
Ksfarmgrl,I really don’t know what to think of you. I used to think you had some sense, however, all you seem to be able to do is insult me and make claims that are completely unfounded. I’m sorry if you are having a bad day, but your snippy fit is not impressive at all.
..and the unfounded claims part would be…?
YBS:You’re saying: 1) eliminate teachers who can’t pass comptency tests, 2) encourage/recruit teachers who have had real life experience with their specialties.
These sound okay to me. Please explain to me what you would “criminalize”.
heheh. btw, I dont care what you do or dont think of me. After all, seventy percent of kansans would agree with you. I’m just a little bit used to it.
Naw kfg I’m guessing this is sorrys first foray into this. He is hanging WAY too many grapefruits up there to have pitched this before.
Ybs? People are entering the education field from other fields? Some are. Good on them their sense to want to give something back. I’d bet dollars to dinars though that the flow of “qualified” people is in a negative direction OUT of education. The pay sucks and people don’t respect you. People treat you like crap in the biz world too, but the pay is better.
Maybe you could tell us about this “new education” idea you are speiling? YOu’ve not really done that.
Is it “secular values” you’re railing against? Examples of this would be?
DD,I don’t believe that public education is a proper venue for social engineering period. Not a single political, religious, ethenic or other special interest’s position should be a part of any public school’s cirriculum.This doesn’t mean that they cannot be familiarized with the many different positions on different topics, but we cross the line into brainwashing when teachers are allowed to indoctinate. I believe this is a crime against the children and the families and it needs to be halted in no uncertain terms.
I remember so well when that young buck Bambi and his little friends Flower and Thumper came to ask my wisdom on these matters.
You human folks so busy yourselves overcomplicating the simplest things. I’ve just one word for you.
Twitterpated.
Some secular values have their place JR, but unfortunately money calls and I have to run. Take care for now.
You too Ksfarmgrrl.
Sounds like a lot of bone-head opinion to me. I’m not seeing any reference to facts.
“social engineering” – would like to see some operational definitions of this boogey man – or at least some examples.
I think Europeans would agree with you 100%, YBS. Thing is, in Europe parents have 2 big advantages over Americans in sex ed:1) Consensual sexual behavior among adults is considered nobody else’s business, especially between adults whom you as an adult personally know.2) #1 above results in far less personal judgments of others (i.e., less nosiness) and as a result sex is not stigmatized to the degree it is here.
Europeans are far more likely to figuratively shrug their shoulders at sexual gossip, while Americans are far more likely to snicker and point fingers, figuratively.
Adults who think they can tell others what do do sexually are definitely on the outside of society in Europe, but they’re the norm here (in fact, they’re politically empowered as a special interest group at every level of government in the US).
Of course this means that in discussions with their children European parents don’t have to consider guilt and shame outside criminal sexual behavior, and that in turn means they can have far more honest discussions with their kids than can Americans.
So in Europe “sex ed is taught by” parents rather than teachers; having teachers “teach” about sex ed is as ridiculous idea to Europeans as it is to Americans.
It’s the source of guilt and shame, American Christianity, that gets in the way here, frankly.
DD, amongst the education jihadists
social engineering = any attempt to impart facts and information that do not conform to the bible.
See also: information vs. superstition
Doesn’t learning involve a change in behavior, or the potential for a change in behavior. Could one argue that the teaching of this change was brought about by a process of “social engineering”?
I think YBS may have an idea what he is talking about. (Or, he may not, either). I am afraid I don’t know what he’s talking about at this point.
KFG:I thought it was code for something specific. It was not clear to me what he was talking about. If you are correct, no wonder he was dancing around the subject like he was.
Thanks for clarifying that.
Thank you, flike, for your contributions here today.
I’m way behind on this one, but…
Julie, I’ve raised my kids the same way you are doing with yours. They’ve turned out pretty well. Not perfect, but not bad either, although they’ve had their problems, on and off. Either way, the oldest 3 are adults now, and all are intelligent, caring people. I feel certain yours will be, too. The common sense approach goes a long, long way.
As a volunteer escort at a local women’s clinic, I’ve seen lots of teenagers who thought that birth control was more immoral than sex. they’re the ones getting abortions, or taking home babies they can’t care for.
You see the thing is, if you wanna promote abstinence then you can’t promote birth control. (I hope you rational beings out there know why) When you promote safe sex AND abstinence, kids are getting a mixed message. Therefore, if you’re a teen and you’re being taught that abstinence AND safe sex is the way to go, you’re definitely gonna go with the safe sex; because your hormones are raging, you get the satisfaction of experiencing it, and you can fulfill your fantasy of nailing some cheerleader.
That’s why you’ve gotta teach either abstinence only or safe sex only.
Hi I am visiting from southern France. What the article says above is true …. In France we start doing it at a very young age. Especially if there are troubled times thru out the world. Actually, In France, we do it under the bed. When the USA eliminates some of the threats in the world …. we come out then!
I dunno, CrusaderX. I think the message “Absintence is the only FOOL PROOF method of preventing pregnancy/STDs, but condoms are a close second” is simple, to the point and effective.Then show them gruesome pictures of oozing, nasty STD-ridden private parts. I think that would convince some kids that even a 1% chance of contracting that isn’t worth the 20 minutes of pleasure.
20 minutes of pleasure.
THAT’S ALL?
Bwahahahaha!
Okay, cru x, in your case, 3 seconds.
Yeah JM youre hilarious! Youre a real riot! Did ya get that joke from your 12 year-old friends?
Talking about high school boys here…from what I’ve heard from friends, 20 minutes is very, very generous.
Tara,I hate to bring this up, but the people who are most actively promoting abstinence as the only foolproof method of preventing pregnancy are the same ones who will defend to the death the literal occurance virgin birth!
Jed,I believe in the virgin birth, but I’m fairy confident that it was an isolated incident :)I should rephrase: Abstinence is the only foolproof method UNLESS YOU ARE CARRYING THE SON OF GOD. And condoms are a close second.
Tara,An isolated incident? Virgin birth was claimed by at least five middle-kingdom Egyptian Pharaohs, two Chinese emperors, a Buddhist bodhisatva and maybe half a zillion Greek demigods (depending on your definition of virgin birth), and all with exactly the same evidence as the christians present. Seems like it used to be fairly common!
“Virgin birth” is the same myth as “I swear I only did it ONE time and got pregnant”. Yea sure….I believe you.
A day late and a dollar shy. Oops, make that two days late.
Now I don’t have a link to this for proof, nor do I know Hebrew, Aramaic or Greek, but I have heard that the word “virgin” did not, at the time the Bible was written, mean a chaste woman. It meant a woman who had not borne a child.
There are stories that Mary had been married before, her husband slain, and she had been raped by a Roman soldier. The rape resulted in pregnancy, and being a family friend, Joseph married her. So “virgin” in that context would be correct.
Jed, do you have this link?
http://www.truthbeknown.com/origins.htm
RD,No, but I looked it over. My response has always been, when somebody asks me if I believe in Jesus, is to ask which Jesus they are referring to. Jesus has been reinvented so many times, to fit so many agendas, that nobody alive today has a clue about who this Yeshua Ben Yousef was, or what he really preached! Most biblical scholars today believe that about half of what is attributed to Jesus was never said by him. That’s a problem that occurs often where an oral tradition gets involved. Ever played “Grapevine?” On top of that, each person that reads those sayings interprets them in light of their own experience, which may be vastly different from that of the guy sitting next to them, let alone somebody halfway around the world, in a completely different culture, speaking an entirely different language in a completely different time. Not to mention all the interpretations tailored to fit a particular political or cultural agenda! So when somebody claims to have some hotline to the truth about Jesus. I remain skeptical.