| Topic: |
Religions > Atheism |
| User: |
"Fredric L. Rice" |
| Date: |
05 Feb 2005 08:15:07 PM |
| Object: |
Say No - or Yes - or Maybe? |
FEBRUARY 4, 2005
Say No - or Yes - or Maybe?
BY RACHEL PROCTOR MAY
Most researchers agree that the jury is still out on whether
abstinence-only programs can play a role in reducing teen pregnancy and
STDs, and a new study by Texas A&M researchers isn't going to help settle
the issue. The state-sponsored study found that teenagers at two dozen high
schools became sexually active at a higher rate after participating in
abstinence-only programs. Before participating, 23% of the ninth-grade
girls in the study were sexually active, a number that jumped to 29% after
participating. For 10th-grade boys, the percentages increased from 24% to
39%. However, before fans of comprehensive sex-ed immediately load the
study into their policy-battle arsenal, let it first be noted that the
study included no control group of students who didn't participate in the
abstinence-only programs. That renders the study meaningless for anything
other than proving the five ab-only programs studied were not 100%
effective. In other words, perhaps without the program, the numbers of
sexually active teens may have jumped even higher - nobody knows.
This is an important point because even the most successful "comprehensive"
sex education programs - the ones that include contraceptive and STD
information - show only modest impact on teens' behavior, and many have
themselves been proven ineffective. A 2001 study of comprehensive sex-ed
programs by the National Campaign to Prevent Teen Pregnancy found only
eight curricula that were proven to either delay sexual activity, decrease
pregnancy rates, decrease STD infection rates, or some combination of the
three. What is important, says Bill Albert of the campaign, is that we not
get bogged down in arguments for or against broad categories of
"abstinence-only" or "comprehensive" education, but to find and disseminate
the programs and curricula that have been proven to work
- all of which, for the time being, include solid information about
contraception.
"We do have a small but growing list of programs that seem to work," said
Albert. "Generally people want to spend money on things that are proven to
be effective." But that doesn't apply to the Bush administration: This year
the federal government will spend around $130 million on abstinence-only
programs.
http://www.austinchronicle.com/issues/dispatch/2005-02-04/pols_naked8.html
---
Stop Elmer Fudd web site: http://www.ElmerFudd.US/
Covert text file server: http://www.notserver.com/
Scientology crooks: http://sf.irk.ru/www/ot3/otiii-gif.html
FRice Antiwar: http://www.skeptictank.org/antiwar.htm
Another Scientology murder: http://PerkinsTragedy.org
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| User: "desert phile@hot mail.com L. Ron Hubbard" |
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| Title: Re: Say No - or Yes - or Maybe? |
06 Feb 2005 10:27:40 AM |
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On Sun, 06 Feb 2005 02:15:07 GMT, (Fredric
L. Rice) wrote:
Say No - or Yes - or Maybe?
Most researchers agree that the jury is still out on whether
abstinence-only programs can play a role in reducing teen
pregnancy and STDs[....]
No one expected such programs to do so: certainly not the radical
"conservatives." No one in the American Treason Party expected
their "abstinence-only programs" to be effective; no one in the
media did; no mainstream centrist politicians did; none of the
tiny few liberals did. The "abstinence-only programs" were never
meant to modify teen behavior: they are meant to modify *ADULT*
behavior, i.e., voting and spending. If the American Treason Party
wanted to reduce teen pregnancy and sexualy-transmitted disease,
they would teach contraception.
The only way to modify teen behavior is to modify teens, perhaps
through genetic engineering. No rational human being expects
anything less to work.
---
http://lastliberal.org
Free random & sequential signature changer http://holysmoke.org/sig
"Who knows but if men constructed their dwellings with their own hands,
and provided food for themselves and families simply and honestly
enough, the poetic faculty would be universally developed, as birds
universally sing when they are so engaged?" -- Henry David Thoreau,
from _Walden_
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| User: "Al Klein" |
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| Title: Re: Say No - or Yes - or Maybe? |
06 Feb 2005 06:47:35 PM |
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On Sun, 06 Feb 2005 16:27:40 GMT, desert phile@hot mail.com (L. Ron
Hubbard) said in alt.atheism:
The only way to modify teen behavior is to modify teens, perhaps
through genetic engineering. No rational human being expects
anything less to work.
The human body {is designed|evolved} to have sex by around the age of
13. Expecting kids to abstain, without having been educated as to WHY
they should abstain (rationally, not religiously), is believing in
fantasy. Even if abstinence-only programs were designed properly only
very limited success could be expected. Which is why proponents of
a-o programs are criminally negligent.
--
"...I contend that we are both atheists. I just believe in one fewer god than you do.
When you understand why you dismiss all the other possible gods, you will understand
why I dismiss yours."
- Stephen F. Roberts
(random sig, produced by SigChanger)
rukbat at verizon dot net
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