104142 by driving bear on 10/02 at 2:46 pm

“What % chance of death should is acceptable for american teens.”

Sex is a human function, and in the US we keep “children” as children for a period of time exceeding rationality. The death rate from STD’s among teenagers is far lower than one might expect.

We let them drive, that kills the highest number.
We let them work in the fields where poison is applied.
we let them ride bicycles, walk on busy streets, live with alcoholic parents. In their later teens, we encourage them to join the military, so you answer the question:  What level of risk are we willing to accept for our young people?

I don’t know what satan (that figment of christian imagination) has to do with it, but obviously you’re pretty flustered about this issue.  Your anger is apparent in your declining grammar skills.  So keep on practicing abstinence and all will be well.

To: driving bare (oh sorry, bear)
Couldn’t you just as easily use the facts to educate teens to use condoms as opposed to “just saying no?”  I am saying, teach the facts, but give options, not one skewed view of how to deal with rising teen pregnancies and STD’s.  Abstinence is not the only answer and teens deserve to have all the alternatives presented to them so they can make the choice.  Your method basically chooses for them and makes any other alternatives “wrong”.  Hate to break it to you, but there are other opinions out there.  And, right back at you regarding a dictionary.  You could use it to check your spelling.

It’s too bad “driving bear’s” mom and dad didn’t practice abstinence.  That way, we wouldn’t have to hear about his cock and bull stories about how abstinence is such a great thing. Get a clue won’t you “driving bear”?

The one thing that has been proven by the right wing over and over again, especially the last couple of years, is that the more you try to repress and pretend that sex and sexual desires are wrong or immoral, the more they will manifest themselves in ways that are repugnant.  Repression is NOT the answer moron!

Education and discussion (with parents, etc.) and (*gasp*) informed personal choice (I know that’s something you right wingers don’t approve of) are what will effectively address these kinds of issues.  But, teen pregnancy will NEVER be eliminated totally, no matter how much or how little sex education is provided. 

On the other hand, the proven, sure-fire way to encourage teen pregnancy and sexual activity is to tell kids to “just say no” or to pretend that they are not human beings who are interested in sex.  Crawl back into your hole “driving bear”, your time IS DONE.

Our job as parents has always been to teach and guide our children and to prepare them to live in our society.  Education cannot be emphasized enough.  Abstinence is a choice, not an educational program.  It “teaches” fear of one’s sexuality and the need to repress normal urges.  Haven’t we seen enough in society of what repression does to people?  Abstinence may be 100% effective in preventing STD’s and pregnancy, but it’s also 100% effective in stifling a developing teens natural feelings and making them feel that those feelings are somehow wrong.  I’m not advocating rampant sex among teens either, but at least educate them as to the risks involved and teach them early on a sense of self worth and respect, so they can make the choices that benefit them.  The religious method of attempting to teach “morals” through fear has not proven to be effective.

We need to teach our children about safe sex. Counting on abstinence is absurd. And where does this unrealistic idea come from? Religion. What a shocker. Another fine example of the harm that irrational organized religion does to our culture.

One of the primary reasons that abstinence education won’t work is that teenagers, with considerable justification, see that many of the adults who are advocating this sort of thing are themselves blatant hypocrites, whether it involves sex or any other topic.  On a topic that is as important as sex, it should hardly be surprising that “Do as I say, not as I do” is ineffective.

It is interesting to me that the “born again” “R’s” are continuing to try to control the sexual behavior of teens; however, they can’t control their own religious leaders and zealots. Self denial produces self-indulgence as we have witnessed in the news media over and over again.

I hope that this 3 month funding for the abstinence programs is just for fazing out of this crazy funding for the religious right(wrong again) groups.

The best way not to hit by a car is to never cross the street.Sex is more fun than crossing the street.One could only have hoped the parents of the person who keeps writing that abstinence is 100% effective had practiced it.Americans are so infantile about sex.News flash teens are going to have sex the only question is are we going to put them at a higher risk for stds and pregnancy by not informing them.As one study showed teens who sign abstinence pledges have higher incidences of oral sex and anal sex.Where do I sign up?

I just love all these claims that abstinence and celibacy work. Abstinence only works if a kid is faithfully not having sex. What teenager do you know who is sincerely practicing abstinence, or being celibate? NONE. Kids are out there doing it to beat the band. And, few parents are brave enough to confront them about sex, once they’ve started cutting loose that pony for regular riding.

Having abstinence taught in the classroom is no more likely to stop kids from having sex than learning algebra will make them Pythagoras. Let’s be practical, and realistic.

The same folks pushing this kick want to close down Planned Parenthood and make abortion illegal. Now, unless you’re heterosexual and in a Christian marriage, they want you to stop having sex. That’s a bit much, I think. America may be a lot of things, but abstinent and celibate aren’t two of those things. Unintelligent and uneducated about sex are, though.

Our kids need good sex education. I’d rather it be taught in the classroom in a proper setting than learned the way I learned it, on my back in the flatbed of some thunder cat’s blue Chevy pickup, without an inkling of carnal knowledge or a condom. Today’s teens can’t be left go the way we were. There’s just too much out there to harm them. They need all the information we can give them. We can’t go on this blissfully ignorant.

Please! These sanctimonious sexually repressed idiots need to let that foolishness go.

We need to spend a little funding on offering parenting classes to young folks who have already miserably failed the government’s first attempts at enforcing sexual abstinance. Condoms and birth control pills are way cheaper than child support payments, or, worst, the loss of lives when they’re cut short from having haplessly contracted AIDS or HPV.

Since these rascals are going to continue to have very regular sex, let’s arm them with some knowledge, wisdom, and honesty with all that good lovin’ they’re out there making, instead of crippling them with a puritanical recrimination of the sex they’re having. Real grown ups can do this without giving some adolescent rascal the impression we’re advocating their illicit sexual activity. After all, the first lesson ought to address how they, too, can go to jail for their own underage sex with each other. They may not be tried as adults, but they need to know they risk being confined to a juvenile detention center until the day they reach the age of their majority in their respective states. Adolescents need to KNOW it all! After all knowledge is that ounce of prevention that provides the many pounds of welcomed cure and safe protection from such punitive beasts as sexually transmitted diseases, unwanted parenthood, and the penetentiary, where having frequent sex may not necessarily be their right or privilege as a victim of prison rape. In the end, yes, these are their lives to live, their sex to undulge, and their choices to make. Yes, they’re going to exercise their rights, the law and parents be all damned, the same way we did, from that first innocent kiss to our more recent truly trifling behavior.

This preparation really should be the parents’ responsibilty. Since too many parents are dropping the ball on this, let’s work to include education on human sexuailty in high school ciriculums nationally. We use tax dollars to pay for any and everything else we can justify in contemporary education where we can get away with it. That abstinance is not working is no news flash. A condom might help though, if we tell these knuckleheads how and why to they MUST use it. We all need to grow up. Sex is nothing at which adults in a first world nation as advanced as the USA should still be cringing with embarrasment. Sex is as necessary a human function as breathing air. Yet, we’re never too ashamed of human respiration to breathe, are we?

Um, no, the “left” - whatever that is—maybe the voice of reason??- says that horny teens will never practise abstinence, be it from intercourse or masturbation.  The radsical right REpubs just don’t get it, even though they’ve all been in that situation.  Don’t have sex- don’t even think about it! - what a pathetic stance.  Sexuality is a normal thing, a blessing from—yes—God. So deal with it, you radical right idiots—don’t tell us it doesn’t exist. Radical rights hate sex - they prove that over & over—but what sense does that make?  We are sexual beings.  I guess the radical right feel we need to be squelched, subdued, run over, dissed, ridiculed.  What poppycock!! (Look it up you ignorant conservatives)  Sexuality is normal, welcomed, delightful.  Get used to it, you right wing nutjobs.