Sex Ed: Ethics and Effect

[Ana the Ist]

Thank you. I think I know what you mean. You mean that it made you more aware of how common stds are (?). Is that right?

I think that is a legitimate thing to be presenting in sex ed.



I think that is a legitimate thing to be presenting in sex ed, as well as being a good law.



Oh, interesting. You don't think that psychological and sociological data related to sex before marriage is factual (but is rather only "quasi-factual"?

For example, I don't know the sociology or psychology well. But supposing that teens who have sex before marriage have much higher rates of depression and other mental health disorders, would you agree that that should be presented?



You mean in case the law has changed, or if there is new medical information?

Not just how common they are, but also how easy they are to spread.

If there was data to suggest that teens who engage in pre-marital sex have higher rates of depression...yea, I do think that could be useful information. I think it's probably important to point out that the depression could be the result of the sex, the cause of it, or completely unrelated (do you see why I said "quasi-factual?").

Yea...changes in law or medicine would be something to stay current on. Didn't the hpv vaccine get introduced to the public in the last 10 years or so? That's useful information...

 

[Ana the Ist]

That's not sex education that jurisprudence and belongs in the same class as teaching Americans it's illegal for black people to ride in the front of the bus.

What?

 

[patricius79]

You are correct that "harm reduction" theory covers both sexual intercourse and drug use.

Thanks. So why aren't we teaching kids how to do drugs more safely?

However, you don't need to go to the drugs and dirty needles thing. Alcohol is a factor in the spread on STDs and HIV too. All mind altering substances are. IV drug use and anal sex just dramatically increase your vulnerability to them.

Medical science already knows alcohol and marijuana--as mind altering substances that reduce inhibition and affect choices--are factors in the spread of STD among young people. Yet, they keep their lips zipped. Why? Because its more "cool" to pull out the zero tolerance card and call for total "abstinence" from these substances among the young. It's even illegal for a 16 year-old to buy and drink beer in most states even though the vast majority of 16 year-olds probably do drink beer. I got drunk for the first time at age 13. I wasn't even in high school. I'd say it was pretty common in Milwaukee for 12 and 13 year-olds to get drunk for the first time. Eh... I could even buy beer and hard alcohol at age 13 and 14 and I looked like I was was... about 10 or 9? LOL!!! I didn't start getting carded in Milwaukee corner stores and liquor stores until I came back home from the Marine Corps. The cops or mayors office or something must have decided they were going to tighten up on things. Make sure people followed the laws that is.

I agree intuitively that there is probably a connection between use of alcohol and fornication/STDs.

I also have heard there is a strong connection between teen inappropriate contentography use and risky sexual behavior.

Are either of these brought up in comprehensive sex ed?

 

[SuperCloud]

What?

That's a legal thing. Has nothing to do with the overall plenitude of human erotica and all the enormous fetishes humans have. A lot of human sexuality is not as "vanilla" as presented in any sex ed class. Or does sex education classes for kids in the USA cover BDSM?

Of course a lot of girls mean "yes" when they say "no." A lot of them mean "no" when they say "no" too. Most are able to decipher what's being communicated. Some better than others of course. Just like "flirting" isn't always explicit statements of "Hey! I want you to take me in the back room and...."

Rather "flirting" deals with a lot of less explicit statements. A lot of it can be eye communication. Body language. References with double meaning. And women and girls expect males to be code breakers.

However, for sake of legal matters and staying out of trouble, it is better to just understand the word "no" coming from a girl can be used against you in a court of law and send you to prison. Even if she's grabbing you by the collars of your shirt towards you, spreading her legs, and humping you.

 

[patricius79]

Not just how common they are, but also how easy they are to spread.

Okay. Thanks. How or why are they so easy to spread?

If there was data to suggest that teens who engage in pre-marital sex have higher rates of depression...yea, I do think that could be useful information. I think it's probably important to point out that the depression could be the result of the sex, the cause of it, or completely unrelated (do you see why I said "quasi-factual?").

I was thinking more of depression which comes after the fornication. But you bring up an interesting issue, which may just be ignorance on my part: assuming that states with comprehensive sex ed really do have lower rates of STDs and teen pregnancy than states with abstinence only (which I think they do), how do we know that this is a causation rather than a correlation?

Yea...changes in law or medicine would be something to stay current on. Didn't the hpv vaccine get introduced to the public in the last 10 years or so? That's useful information...

I don't know. But thanks.

 

[beaverpond]

I was on the school board when dealing with STDs, Abortion Rates, Teen Pregnancy, Teen Sex, at what age teens started having sex and so on. Mind you it was a very isolated region...it was just our school district.

However, I was not satisfied with looking at just our school district for some things, state stats for other things, and then national stats for still others...so I went out of my way to talk to the state CDC to help me narrow things down to our region of the county which only included three other towns outside of our school district and boy did that change numbers drastically. In the seven towns in our region of the county, we had 11 teen pregnancies in 2013, 4 STDs, 0 abortions and the study that was provided by the students and staff showed that 87% of the students had been having sex going back to age 11 most it was once or twice, but five students admitted to having sex more than 5 times, and one student admitted to having sex more than 10 times with multiple students. Of those surveyed only one student admitted to having a STD. Why they interviewed 487 out of 581 students I am not sure...they were so close to interviewing the entire student body, why not going the extra distance. They only found a very small number who had never had sex at all. I am wondering if they chose not to use some of the stats because it was showing less favorable numbers for them.

This all came about because our Superintendent and Chairperson of the School Board were trying to do an end run around the entire school board as well as parents and staff of the whole district by allowing distribution of condoms at the high school. I actually refused to allow this to be swept under the rug and took it to two local newspapers that week. We had many angry parents at the next meeting of the school board.

I ended up being put on the committee that wrote the policy for the distribution of these and I fought it all the way. It took us more than a year. We heard from staff, students, parents on the issue. By the time it was all said and done, there is an opt out form so parents have a say in the fact that their kids are not allowed to receive them. The parents are also notified each time their child is given one by way of an e-mail and or a phone call. Kids are encouraged to discuss this issue with their parents and the dangers of sex with too many people and possibly getting a STD as condoms do not prevent these things from happening.

The thing is that when this all took place, it forced a great many parents to have a discussion about sex with their kids on so many levels like nothing our school system has ever seen before. Many parents started to realize that they no longer wanted the school to teach their kids about sex any longer and started denying the school the right to instruct their kids on the subject matter as the parents wanted the kids taught with their moral values. Many parents have even gone to the local church for guidance on the subject as I have been learning recently. They want the kids to know God's plan, not just their morals or ethics on the issue.

To think this all started in our school system because I did not want condoms handed out in our high school and I did not want this just swept under the rug by two people to make this happen without others knowing about it first. You would not believe how many people I ticked off in one night and how much I did not care as to how much I ticked them off.

 

[patricius79]

I was on the school board when dealing with STDs, Abortion Rates, Teen Pregnancy, Teen Sex, at what age teens started having sex and so on. Mind you it was a very isolated region...it was just our school district.

However, I was not satisfied with looking at just our school district for some things, state stats for other things, and then national stats for still others...so I went out of my way to talk to the state CDC to help me narrow things down to our region of the county which only included three other towns outside of our school district and boy did that change numbers drastically. In the seven towns in our region of the county, we had 11 teen pregnancies in 2013, 4 STDs, 0 abortions and the study that was provided by the students and staff showed that 87% of the students had been having sex going back to age 11 most it was once or twice, but five students admitted to having sex more than 5 times, and one student admitted to having sex more than 10 times with multiple students.

Wow. I don't understand. How could seven towns only have 11 teen pregnancies and 4 STDs? And how could these same towns have 87% of the kids having had sex at least once?

Of those surveyed only one student admitted to having a STD. Why they interviewed 487 out of 581 students I am not sure...they were so close to interviewing the entire student body, why not going the extra distance. They only found a very small number who had never had sex at all. I am wondering if they chose not to use some of the stats because it was showing less favorable numbers for them.

This all came about because our Superintendent and Chairperson of the School Board were trying to do an end run around the entire school board as well as parents and staff of the whole district by allowing distribution of condoms at the high school. I actually refused to allow this to be swept under the rug and took it to two local newspapers that week. We had many angry parents at the next meeting of the school board.

Good for you! Wish I could have been there.

So I take it you support abstinence-only sex ed?

If so, can you tell me what this kind of sex ed is like?

I ended up being put on the committee that wrote the policy for the distribution of these and I fought it all the way. It took us more than a year. We heard from staff, students, parents on the issue. By the time it was all said and done, there is an opt out form so parents have a say in the fact that their kids are not allowed to receive them. The parents are also notified each time their child is given one by way of an e-mail and or a phone call. Kids are encouraged to discuss this issue with their parents and the dangers of sex with too many people and possibly getting a STD as condoms do not prevent these things from happening.

The thing is that when this all took place, it forced a great many parents to have a discussion about sex with their kids on so many levels like nothing our school system has ever seen before. Many parents started to realize that they no longer wanted the school to teach their kids about sex any longer and started denying the school the right to instruct their kids on the subject matter as the parents wanted the kids taught with their moral values. Many parents have even gone to the local church for guidance on the subject as I have been learning recently. They want the kids to know God's plan, not just their morals or ethics on the issue.

To think this all started in our school system because I did not want condoms handed out in our high school and I did not want this just swept under the rug by two people to make this happen without others knowing about it first. You would not believe how many people I ticked off in one night and how much I did not care as to how much I ticked them off.

Yeah, I think that parents have the primary responsibility for sex ed, and the schools should be working with parents to make sure their kids are exempted from anything their parents don't want taught to them.

And certainly schools have no right to be teaching about "safe sex" without affirming that fornication is wrong.

And they have no right to be distributing condoms to kids to begin with, let alone without the consent and knowledge of the parents.

The main issue I have with comprehensive sex ed is that it is values neutral--i.e. morally relativistic.

 

[Poor Beggar]

I'm not expecting to win an argument here. I realize I'll be in the minority, and less intelligent and less-informed than most who respond.

Thanks for helping me muddle through my ideas and thinking.

I would ask people to be respectful, civil, and to ask out-of-the-box questions about this complex issue, rather than only repeating what the media reports.

Personally, my current position is that kids (in high school, not earlier) should be delicately taught about things like contraceptives and abortion (just so they hear about these things in schools first rather than their peers first)--as well as why they are wrong--and oral sex (and other popular degradations); along with more time spent on a positive spiritual teaching about the meaning and goodness of sexual feelings, the goodness of sexual integration, purity and freedom (maturity),;and the goodness of sex within marriage, the importance of good character (as to sexuality) for having true friendships; and the moral wrongness of sexual immorality, like fornication, inappropriate contentography, masturbation, anal sex etc. The program should explain the social, emotional, psychological, and economic consequences, of having sex before marriage.

I would like to know more about how sex ed has been taught in schools, and what are the good and bad effects and ethical issue involved.

If anyone has been taught abstinence-only sex ed in schools I would like to know their experience and what it entailed.

Was anyone taught using the Sex Respect or other of the more reputable abstinence programs, like Sex Can Wait, Friends First, Pure Love Club, PEERS, Choosing the Best, Heritage Keepers, Best Friends, Worth the Wait, For Keeps, or other?

Also, what does "comprehensive sex ed" entail exactly in school, in your experience?

Some of the other related issues for me are:

--what was the rate of teen pregnancy and teen STD before comprehensive sex ed?--say, in 1900, 1910, 1920, 1930, 1940, 1950.

--what is the rate of pre-marital sex and teen pregnancy, and abortion, and STDs today in states where comprehensive sex ed is taught?

--in states where abstinence-only is taught.

--how exactly is the efficacy of comprehensive (or abstinence only) measured? how do we know we are dealing with causation rather than correlations?

(btw, my hypothesis as to why abstinence only is reported not to work is that perhaps it is based on a Puritanical model involving too much fear and a failure to affirm the goodness of sexual feelings, and because--perhaps?...--it is being taught in a culture where even family values people have accepted contraception, and are thus not fully integrated or happy themselves)

--how can we control for all the variables?

--even if comprehensive sex ed is more effective at preventing STDs and teen pregnancies--which it may well be, usually--why would that prove that it is a good thing, or that it has more good effects than bad (which may not be getting measured, for cultural reasons)?

--if you are someone who believes in comprehensive sex ed, how do you know that it correlates (or causes) with more good effects than bad effects?

--how do we know that the those who are doing the studies on abstinence only (or comprehensive sex ed) are unbiased?

This may not seem "practical" to some, but the only thing that will delay sex is rebirth in the Spirit. Carnal people will do carnal things.

 

[Poor Beggar]

Wow. I don't understand. How could seven towns only have 11 teen pregnancies and 4 STDs? And how could these same towns have 87% of the kids having had sex at least once?

Because teens are brighter than our sitcom culture has made them out to be.

 

[patricius79]

This may not seem "practical" to some, but the only thing that will delay sex is rebirth in the Spirit. Carnal people will do carnal things.

Recently I read from a book by Mary Eberstadt, who says that Christians live longer, are healthier, give more to charity, contribute more to social capital (productive social groups) than the general population.

I also read that there is an inverse relation between the number of Catholics in a country and its HIV rate.

What I'm getting at is, I agree that sexual education is ideally taught in the context of a Trinitarian undrestanding of sexuality.

 

[Poor Beggar]

Recently I read from a book by Mary Eberstadt, who says that Christians live longer, are healthier, give more to charity, contribute more to social capital (productive social groups) than the general population.

I also read that there is an inverse relation between the number of Catholics in a country and its HIV rate.

What I'm getting at is, I agree that sexual education is ideally taught in the context of a Trinitarian undrestanding of sexuality.

Yeah, too many people fall for the leftist worldview that presupposes "the problem" is a lack of education--more knowledge will help. Go forth and educate them is their version of the Great Commission. Based on that reasoning, college campuses should be the most sanctimonious places on earth.
Yeah...

 

[patricius79]

Yeah, too many people fall for the leftist worldview that presupposes "the problem" is a lack of education--more knowledge will help. Go forth and educate them is their version of the Great Commission. Based on that reasoning, college campuses should be the most sanctimonious places on earth.
Yeah...

Yeah, I definitely think Christianity has done far more good for the world than any worldly, external solutions like contraceptives or abortion.

"Safe sex ed" may lower teen STD rates and teen pregnancy rates, but may have other, worse effects.

We've had a lot of it for a long time, and I think the level of sexual maturity in colleges and in the country generally is very low.

Btw, I like the "everything is everywhere" idea in your profile.

 

[Poor Beggar]

Btw, I like the "everything is everywhere" idea in your profile.

People tend to want to move to a new city, get a different job, leave and find a new church, etc. Then they get there and it's the "same" people and the "same" problems.

 

[beaverpond]

Wow. I don't understand. How could seven towns only have 11 teen pregnancies and 4 STDs? And how could these same towns have 87% of the kids having had sex at least once?

That left me wondering why they only reportedly surveyed with less than 100 kids to go...why not go the distance or did they and they did not like the results so they left a bunch out. I could not prove it, but it left a lot of us wondering the same question. We have a lot of churches, 32 to be exact, in our school system. You want to see some active Christian families and they turn out when you least expect it and sometimes for some odd issues.

We had a whole bunch of complaints filed a couple of years ago when the Christmas Concerts were being done. The elementary kids were singing carols in foreign languages, but had no idea what they were singing and the tune was not familiar to the kids or the parents. The kids were never taught what the carols meant in English. This turned the school system on its ear for the next year as the next year there were all kinds of Christian Christmas Carols and only a couple of complaints of not enough secular ones. However, the administration compared the eleven that year to the more than hundred the previous year and figure it was a good trade off.

Anyway, Christians can be your best friend or your worst enemy on some issues. I think many of the Christians found the staff and student report of the 87% and so many kids having sex going back to age 11 and so many times a little far stretched. It even made some of us wonder if putting 11 year olds on the same bus as high school students as questionable, but then it brought up the validity of the report again when looking at the numbers from the State CDC. Something just does not line up.

 

[paulm50]

I'm not expecting to win an argument here. I realize I'll be in the minority, and less intelligent and less-informed than most who respond.

Thanks for helping me muddle through my ideas and thinking.

I would ask people to be respectful, civil, and to ask out-of-the-box questions about this complex issue, rather than only repeating what the media reports.

Personally, my current position is that kids (in high school, not earlier) should be delicately taught about things like contraceptives and abortion (just so they hear about these things in schools first rather than their peers first)--as well as why they are wrong--and oral sex (and other popular degradations); along with more time spent on a positive spiritual teaching about the meaning and goodness of sexual feelings, the goodness of sexual integration, purity and freedom (maturity),;and the goodness of sex within marriage, the importance of good character (as to sexuality) for having true friendships; and the moral wrongness of sexual immorality, like fornication, inappropriate contentography, masturbation, anal sex etc. The program should explain the social, emotional, psychological, and economic consequences, of having sex before marriage.

I would like to know more about how sex ed has been taught in schools, and what are the good and bad effects and ethical issue involved.

If anyone has been taught abstinence-only sex ed in schools I would like to know their experience and what it entailed.

Was anyone taught using the Sex Respect or other of the more reputable abstinence programs, like Sex Can Wait, Friends First, Pure Love Club, PEERS, Choosing the Best, Heritage Keepers, Best Friends, Worth the Wait, For Keeps, or other?

Also, what does "comprehensive sex ed" entail exactly in school, in your experience?

Some of the other related issues for me are:

--what was the rate of teen pregnancy and teen STD before comprehensive sex ed?--say, in 1900, 1910, 1920, 1930, 1940, 1950.

--what is the rate of pre-marital sex and teen pregnancy, and abortion, and STDs today in states where comprehensive sex ed is taught?

--in states where abstinence-only is taught.

--how exactly is the efficacy of comprehensive (or abstinence only) measured? how do we know we are dealing with causation rather than correlations?

(btw, my hypothesis as to why abstinence only is reported not to work is that perhaps it is based on a Puritanical model involving too much fear and a failure to affirm the goodness of sexual feelings, and because--perhaps?...--it is being taught in a culture where even family values people have accepted contraception, and are thus not fully integrated or happy themselves)

--how can we control for all the variables?

--even if comprehensive sex ed is more effective at preventing STDs and teen pregnancies--which it may well be, usually--why would that prove that it is a good thing, or that it has more good effects than bad (which may not be getting measured, for cultural reasons)?

--if you are someone who believes in comprehensive sex ed, how do you know that it correlates (or causes) with more good effects than bad effects?

--how do we know that the those who are doing the studies on abstinence only (or comprehensive sex ed) are unbiased?

Here's the mountain some, we can call them the "abstainers" to save time, have to climb over before they preach what's written in the bible about sex.

They have to join what was written in the bible, the culture of those times and how we are created. Because the abstainers hold an outdated and biologically wrong view that was written by men to suit men in the Bronze Age, carrying on customs from the Stone Age.

With so many flaws, its no longer fit for the modern world.

 

[patricius79]

Here's the mountain some, we can call them the "abstainers" to save time, have to climb over before they preach what's written in the bible about sex.

They have to join what was written in the bible, the culture of those times and how we are created. Because the abstainers hold an outdated and biologically wrong view that was written by men to suit men in the Bronze Age, carrying on customs from the Stone Age.

With so many flaws, its no longer fit for the modern world.

What do you think should be taught in the schools as to sex ed?

 

[patricius79]

That left me wondering why they only reportedly surveyed with less than 100 kids to go...why not go the distance or did they and they did not like the results so they left a bunch out. I could not prove it, but it left a lot of us wondering the same question. We have a lot of churches, 32 to be exact, in our school system. You want to see some active Christian families and they turn out when you least expect it and sometimes for some odd issues.

We had a whole bunch of complaints filed a couple of years ago when the Christmas Concerts were being done. The elementary kids were singing carols in foreign languages, but had no idea what they were singing and the tune was not familiar to the kids or the parents. The kids were never taught what the carols meant in English. This turned the school system on its ear for the next year as the next year there were all kinds of Christian Christmas Carols and only a couple of complaints of not enough secular ones. However, the administration compared the eleven that year to the more than hundred the previous year and figure it was a good trade off.

Anyway, Christians can be your best friend or your worst enemy on some issues. I think many of the Christians found the staff and student report of the 87% and so many kids having sex going back to age 11 and so many times a little far stretched. It even made some of us wonder if putting 11 year olds on the same bus as high school students as questionable, but then it brought up the validity of the report again when looking at the numbers from the State CDC. Something just does not line up.

It's a tough thing. How do we know whether the "scientists" doing these surveys are unbiased? Clearly there is an agenda among scientists and social scientists as there is among Christians.

I don't necessarily trust something from the CDC or the media. But I don't want to completely write it off either.

 

[Crowns&Laurels]

What do you think should be taught in the schools as to sex ed?

They really just need to teach the real life consequences of early sex, from the pressure of pregnancy to social adversity.
But they don't. They teach doing whatever one wants, just watch out for diseases.

 

[patricius79]

They really just need to teach the real life consequences of early sex, from the pressure of pregnancy to social adversity.

as well as the psychological stunting of one's sexuality (getting stuck in sexual adolescence)

But they don't. They teach doing whatever you want, just watch out for diseases.

I think that's accurate. From what I can tell, the abstinence part is not emphasized at all in comprehensive sex ed.

But of course part of their standard response is: "hey, look at the states that teach abstinence only: they have the highest rates of teen STDs and teen pregnancies. And the studies show that abstinence only just doesn't work to reduce sexual activity either".

I need to have a better response to that argument. What would you say?

 

[beaverpond]

My problem back then was using National Records, State Records, and Student Surveys for all different sets instead of using them for as many commonalities as possible. That is why I contacted the state CDC and wanted stats for our region of the County as I knew it would be more accurate than so many different resources.