Posted on 09/02/2008 11:19:08 AM PDT by pissant
BLOOMINGTON, Minn. -- Mitt Romney, responding to reporters' questions about sex education policy in the aftermath of the news that Sarah Palin's teenage daughter is pregnant, told reporters he had always thought abstinence should be part of a comprehensive sex education curriculum.
"I would not propose that people don't get any sex education but abstinence," he said.
But in 2006, as then-Governor Romney prepared to enter the Republican presidential primary, he announced with great fanfare that he would redirect money from a federal abstinence education grant -- money that had the state had been using to promote abstinence within comprehensive sex education programs and in PSA's -- into school programs that taught abstinence alone.
The move complied with new rules promulgated by the Bush administration restricting schools from using the money to teach anything but abstinence. The rules said programs funded by the grant must promote a strict eight-point message that premarital sex is harmful and that abstinence is the only way to prevent pregnancy.
(Excerpt) Read more at boston.com ...
OT, but Romney told Laura this morning that he was definitely not interested in a cabinet position in the White House. Hinted that he may return to private sector.
as if there is zero teen pregnancy where they teach sex ed
Abstinence-only education is a BAD idea.
Romney has already begun the 2012 campaign.
You are among friends so it's "safe' (as it's ever going to be) to give us all some personal testimonies.
Exactly, I mean since contraceptives are being passed out in the public schools, clinics, and everywhere else like free samples on the street the incidence of teen pregnancy has plummeted...OOPS!
First as Bill Bennett said abstinence has worked every time it is tried. The problem is when you get two healthy, young people together who think they are in love abstinence is not always the first thing on their minds. The best sex education takes place around the kitchen table between parent and child. The sex education taught in schools teaches nothing but the mechanics giving sex the imprimatur of acceptability, but none of the moral or responsibility issues surrounding sexual activities.
And your evidence for that is what?
“Exactly, I mean since contraceptives are being passed out in the public schools,”
Not in our public schools.
They don't just teach "mechanics" or biology.
That was SexEd1.0. Since the latter half of the 20th Century, thanks to Reich, Kinsey, and femininsts, the sex positive agenda has pushed for an end to all moral judgements over sexual pairings of any kind. Such advocates also believe that everyone should experience such pleasures at every age. Positive.org has a "just say yes" campaign.
As homosexuality is put equal to heterosexuality, sex ed teaching moves beyond "reproduction" and "disease" to incorporate "respect" for "diversity" of sexual fetishes (as well as encouragement to experiment). "Safe" sex education includes discussion of proper cleaning of toys (keep them clean to prevent infection), techniques to avoid physical harm with some riskier or more physically intrusive acts, etc.
Education moves beyond basic reproduction information to protection from social disease, variations of positions/acts, and political/social reeducation under the guise of "diversity" training.
Condoms in school wasn’t about preventing disease/pregnancy. It was about forever shifting the debate of “IF” kids should be having sex to “WHEN...”.
I’ve never thought that “abstinence-only” sex education was useful.
I learned a lot about reproductive biology in our sex-education courses. They should still teach that.
Anyway, “abstinence” education works to stop teen pregnancy, but there is more to sex education than stopping teens from having sex.
Of course, in the modern lingo, that’s all we are really talking about, not all the other parts of what used to be a rational sex education course.
gracesdad, I agree with you that abstinence-ONLY education is a bad idea, if by that it is meant that the various methods of birth control are never covered or explained to the students. Consider this, everyone: There are many, MANY people (even, horrors! some of us FReepers) who choose to use birth control WITHIN THE BOUNDS OF THEIR MARRIAGE. Perhaps they have just gotten married and think they’d like to wait a year or three before the first baby, or would like to space their children out a bit, or many other reasons. Now, if these nice married people do not learn about methods of birth control in school, where will they learn them? From their parents? That is great, if parents are willing to cover the subject and also make sure they have good info on how things work (and what the rate of failure is, why one b/c method is better than another, etc.) but parents are busy and often, yes, too embarrassed to deal with it. If kids don’t get the info from either parents or schools, they will get it from less-reliable sources. I remember back when I was a teen and my school did not cover any of this info, and my relationship with my parents was such that I could not go to them with questions. I got all my b/c info from COSMO magazine, of all places! which of course meant I got a big healthy dose of liberalism with it.
I wish schools would simply cover the bare bones of sex ed and b/c info and leave it at that. The REAL problem is that liberal teachers have taken the mandate to teach kids the scientific aspects of sex ed, and turned it into a forum for why kids should experiment with every perversion under the sun, question their own sexual orientation (when they might never have thought of it on their own), and of course feel free to go out and have a good time without benefit of marriage. THAT is the real issue. It is not the scientific aspects of sex ed that’s the problem, it’s the baggage that has gotten attached to it.
Okay, end of my rant. Feel free to flame, I probably won’t even read replies to this. But I am a real Republican, just not an evangelical. I was out last Saturday working phonebank for the McCain campaign. I will be doing the same next weekend.
If you don't really stand for anything what do you stand for?
Looks like Romney is twisting that knife sticking in Palin just a little bit.
Looks like Romney is twisting that knife sticking in Palin just a little bit.
Thank God this RINO wasn't the VP choice.
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