NEWSSEX EDUCATION

Today, December 1st, is World AIDS Day. Despite the fact that worldwide, fewer people are getting infected with HIV and those that are HIV positive are living longer, women and young people are particularly vulnerable to contracting the virus. Half of all people living with HIV are women -- and half of all new infections occur among young people. AIDS is a leading cause of death among women of reproductive age around the world. It's not simply luck of the draw, of course. Women and young people are not being given access to the tools and information they need to protect themselves; and Congress has continued the outpouring of federal funds we've thrown into misleading at best --   and completely ineffective at worst --  abstinence-only-until-marriage programs. Astoundingly, the health reform bill re-introduced $50 million for these Title V programs.

Women in this country -- and around the world -- are in danger of contracting HIV for other reasons as well, of course. Planned Parenthood Federation of America (PPFA) says that in order to curb the epidemic, the United States needs to invest in quality sex education programs, but also ensure access to sexual and reproductive health services and woman-controlled HIV prevention methods like the female condom. It's not rocket science: if we can empower women and young people with tools and education, instead of cutting off access and using fear as a (failed) motivator, we'll save lives.

Unfortunately, in many places worldwide HIV/AIDS prevention and treatment services are separated from other sexual and reproductive health services like family planning. We need to make it easier for women and young people to access the full range of care, in one place, at the same time; from HIV testing to birth control.

In fact, tomorrow, across the United States, Planned Parenthood student organizers plan to collect thousands of petition signatures to be sent to Congress, asking senators and representatives to “support successful investments in international women’s health, including reproductive health and HIV/AIDS prevention.”

On October 15, Republican Congresswoman Jean Schmidt addressed an assembly of Catholic schoolchildren in her home state of Ohio. Near the end of her talk, Rep. Schmidt was discussing how issues of morality and law intersect when she felt it completely appropriate to bring up the issue of abortion.

In front of her young audience (some students were only six years old), Rep. Schmidt defined abortion as "the taking of a child's life in the mother's womb." This coming from a woman who has fought to keep real sex education out of the classroom. Somehow she thinks it is scandalous and inappropriate to teach students how their own bodies function, but it is completely acceptable to share your personal views on abortion with little kids (and without prior knowledge or consent from parents).

The school principal was disturbed enough to write a letter to the kids' parents that  same day. He let them know that their children might come home with questions, having heard Rep. Schmidt indicate "that abortion involves the killing of a child before it is born."

For all that conservative organizations and some media blame progressives for sexualizing teenagers, teen sex is the one topic that they cannot get off of their brains. This is especially true when twisting science and statistics in studies related to teenage sex and its effects.

A new study on the impact that teens' sexual activities had on their academic ones drew conservative media like sharks to a chum-filled cove. Unlike the sharks, however, those who reported on this study were not honest about the findings.

Most news sources reported the same poisonous tripe: While admitting that teens who engaged in bedroom activity in the confines of a committed relationship didn't have trouble with school, and showed no negative effects towards planning a future involving college, they over-emphasized the idea that teenagers who engaged in "flings" tended to be delinquents with no futures.

When I contacted Heather Corina of Scarleteen fame for her thoughts on the coverage of the study, I found out that it is members of the media who are interpreting the findings this way. In her post, she interviewed one of the study's authors, Bill McCarthy, to clear up some of the confusion.

Turns out, words like "commitment," "fling," "hook up," or any word defining the length or depth of a relationship between teenagers is absent from the study. The study's data was self-reported by teenagers who were asked if they had sex in romantic or non-romantic settings, based on a series of statements about various situations regarding those relationships. The projection of adult concepts of relationships onto teenager situations by the media has clouded the actual findings, and shifted the focus from things that could be useful into harmful stereotypes.

When it comes to sex education, America is seriously backwards.

The American Academy of Pediatrics came out with a recent policy statement denouncing the continued misinformation that guides our decisions about sex ed. We can probably thank the Religious Right for making us the one and only Western country that believes (or at least, pretends to) that education about birth control will increase sexual activity, teen pregnancy, and the spread of sexually transmitted infections. We can also thank them for the abstinence-only education that actually does raise the rate of teen pregnancy and STIs to a point higher than our more sexually chatty peers, while failing to keep youth from having sex.

Planned Parenthood of New York City's blog, 'NYC Unrated & Unfiltered, points out that sex education is "the one subject in school that could potentially save your life." Whether you engage in sex in committed relationships or have casual sex with different partners, getting tested for STIs and always using protection when you don't know the sexual health status of your partner is a must. Often people who only have sex in monogamous relationships believe they are safe, but all it takes is unprotected sex with one infected person to catch an infection that can range from itchy and annoying to life-threatening. And because a person can be an asymptomatic carrier or delay in showing signs of infection, it's easy to unwittingly pass on a disease when you're not in tune with you're sexual health.

In 2006, officials in Yunnan Province, China, stumbled across Focus On The Family patriarch James Dobson's radio commentaries, and liked what they heard about parenting, gender issues, family values, and, most significantly, pre-marital sex. On a 2007 trip to the United States, they made a point of stopping by Colorado Springs to compliment Dobson and give their respects.

The meeting, an indicator of the increasing surreality of international politics and the bizarre overlap between the extreme right-wing and the Communism-as-dictatorship "left wing," led to the exportation of Focus on the Family's abstinence-only programs to China. It took two years to translate the program and two years to push it through all the appropriate bureaucratic channels (the Communist Party insisted on no religious or political references, which, as Slate writer Tracy Clark-Flory remarked, is deeply ironic seeing as the organization is essentially an emphatically Christian lobbyist for the far right-wing).

And in the previous week, abstinence-only programs kicked off in China, with their condoms-don't-work scare tactics and their antiquated clunkers like, "If you want to celebrate our love, bring me roses at 7 p.m. and let's go to dinner." The latter actually sounds a lot like some of the more guileless, rosy-cheeked propaganda from the height of Chinese Communist rule, when couples were forced to pledge their love wholly to the state, and even small gestures of affection could be seen as indications of insurrection (see Jung Chang's Wild Swans for more on this).

What do we need? "[S]traightforward information about human sexuality and the need for contraception when having sex." When do we need it? Now!

The American Academy of Pediatrics (AAP) has a new policy statement, Sexuality, Contraception, and the Media, warning that youth turn to the media to make up for their sexual ignorance when denied comprehensive sexual education. When a couple gets hot-and-heavy on the boob tube (much less internet porn), they generally don't stop to give the viewing audience an info session about the importance and correct means of using condoms and other forms of contraception, making it a wide-reaching but weak source of sexual smarts. That's why children and teenagers require comprehensive sex ed to prevent unwanted pregnancy and sexually transmitted infections.

And no, "just don't do it," is not an effective means of stopping sex and its potential negative outcomes. "It is unwise to promote 'abstinence-only' education when it has been shown to be ineffective," the AAP states. (I know the good doctors take a dry, professional tone, but you just know they're rolling their eyes at the need to explain this yet again.)

The brief continues: "The United States is the only Western nation that still subscribes to the dangerous myth that giving teenagers access to birth control ... will make them sexually active at a younger age. Other countries advertise birth control products widely and have a much lower rate of teen pregnancy." Case in point: Roxann MtJoy's recent article "Dutch Teens: More Sex, Less Pregnancy." The AAP further cites a study finding that 86% of progress made in reducing teen pregnancy is thanks to contraceptive use. "No glove, no love," is such a catchy slogan.

Proponents of abstinence-only education use a slew of (sometimes fabricated) reasons why teens should be denied comprehensive sex education, including promoting the idea that proper sex ed encourages sex, and having sex will ruin grades, attendance, and chances at higher education. Not so much, according to a new study.

Researchers from the University of California-Davis and University of Minnesota found that teenagers having sex in committed relationships can brag about their grades and college prospects just as much as their sexually inactive counterparts. The study even suggests that sex can be — wait for it — good for teens: "Teens in serious relationships may find social and emotional support in their sex partners, reducing their anxiety and stress levels in life and in school."

Now, teen pregnancy definitely has a negative impact on a student's ability to juggle midterms with morning sickness and homework with diapers. But schools should focus on overly high preventing teen pregnancy, and delaying students' first time having sex is only one component of that agenda. Unless, of course, you're promoting abstinence-only ed, in which case the issue is sex and sex only, with teen pregnancy the scare tactic used to keep teens from having sex.

No matter how much ab-only education you throw at teenagers, many of them will still have sex. They'll just be more likely to do it without using protection. And while often people of all political stripes will say well, nobody wants teens to be having sex, but if they're going to do it anyway, they should at least be prepared, I take issue with that stance.

Turns out, as Jill from Feministe so aptly put it, people in the United States are great big hypocrites.

According to a Gallup poll, 38% of people in the U.S. think that getting it on before you tie the knot is a big moral no-no. However, according to a study done by the Guttmacher institute, a whopping 95% of people in the U.S. have sex before getting married anyway (if they ever get married, that is). Even among people who chose to abstain until at least 20, 81% of them still did the deed by the time they were 44.

This, of course, isn't really big news in 2010, but the study finds that this has actually been going on for decades, like since the 1950s. The study derived its findings from data from several rounds of research from the National Survey of Family Growth.

The study only covers heterosexual, penis-in-vagina penetrative intercourse, which leaves a whole realm of possibilities open, and makes me wonder what the numbers would have looked like if they had included things that many young people don't consider sex when they are desperately trying to "save themselves" for (heterosexual, of course) marriage. It does, however, note that people are getting married later these days, which is probably one reason why people are less willing to wait until marriage (not that I am a huge advocate for the whole "wait for marriage" trope).

This data indicates, as Lawrence Finer at Guttmacher points out, that there are some serious problems in the push for abstinence-only-until-marriage sex education going on in schools across the U.S. With so many people opting to not choose abstinence, it seems that the wiser choice would be to get as much information about sex and protection into the hands of young people as possible.

In the season finale of Glee, Quinn flashes back to the day she had sex with Puck, the moment that would transform her from cheer captain to pregnant teen. Quinn, the president of the high school Celibacy Club, asks Puck about protection. "Don't worry," he responds. "I've got it covered."

It's obvious that Quinn is not taking birth control; the protection that Puck should be using is a condom. But does he? Is Quinn one of the unlucky girls who get pregnant despite using a condom, or is Puck's response just a ploy to get laid, but he doesn't bother? (To stick with one topic, I'm not going to get into the issues of consent involved here, given that Quinn is uncertain about having sex and Puck's response is to attempt to get her to drink another wine cooler.)

We can assume that Quinn, whose uber-conservative parents kicked her out of the house when the pregnancy was revealed, didn't learn about safe sex at home. And it's also safe to assume that the Ohio high school offers a typical strain of abstinence-only education, which leaves students with zero knowledge about sex. After all, Finn believed that his sperm swam through a hot tub to impregnate Quinn. And cheerleader Britney, whose promiscuity is emphasized, nonetheless asks after being advised to use protection, "Does he mean like a burglar alarm?"

In having sex-out-of-wedlock with Puck, Quinn becomes one of the many teenage girls who engage in sexual intercourse despite abstinence-only-until-marriage classes and virginity pledges. (Puck points out that her friends Britney and Santana broke their pledge.) And when these girls do have sex, they are far less likely to use contraception, because you know what? They hardly know what it is.

Glee has done a pretty awesome job addressing the issue of sexual orientation, through Kurt's coming and his adorable dad, who struggles through his own prejudices to always stand up for his gay son. (It could do better with Britney and Santana's queerness.) Given how pissed the Religious Right is over making gay the "new normal," you know the show must be doing something right. On other key issues, it doesn't always hit the mark. And despite the ongoing storyline with Quinn struggling as a pregnant teenager, the show's writers missed a golden opportunity to address the harm done by inadequate sex education with the explicitness given to Kurt's sexuality.

After years of abstinence-only has demonstrated that just telling kids not to have sex doesn't keep them from getting down, the Obama administration is opting for the brilliant tactic of pursing an "evidence-based approach." What, pray tell, don't this mean? Well, it means that $114 million in this year's federal budget will go to programs that can provide evidence that they actually work to decrease the number of candidates for 16 and Pregnant.

NPR takes a look at one such "evidence-based approach" to decreasing the rate of teen pregnancy. Michael Carrera's government funding-approved comprehensive approach starts appropriate sex ed at a young age, recognizing that if you wait to long, it's already too late for many young people, and it's harder to influence their behavior. His program works to dispel gender myths, teaches youth about the challenges of teen pregnancy (because, disturbingly, not all such pregnancies are unplanned), and exposure to creative extracurricular activities that have been demonstrated to delay students' sexual debut.

With prevalent myths flying around like that sex standing up reduces your chance of getting pregnant, or that "double-bagging" condoms increases their effectiveness, young people could really use some comprehensive sex ed. (And these aren't even the most dangerous ones — let's not even discuss the youth who believe that believe drinking bleach prevents AIDS and Mountain Dew can stop pregnancy.) And, really, who can object to taking an evidence-based approach to sex ed? If telling youth "just don't have sex" on repeat is nothing but a waste of taxpayers dollars, abstinence-only education isn't accomplishing what anyone wants.

Photo credit: telofilo