Posted on 02/24/2006 8:49:24 AM PST by Responsibility2nd
SOME YEARS AGO, Rolling Stone magazine published a survey on the attitudes of baby boomer parents. The gist of it was that the people who had gone through the sexual revolution did everything, regretted nothing, and wanted their children to do none of it.
This didn't surprise me. Nothing changes your perspective as much as becoming a parent, and the first order of child-raising is protection. I remember Hillary Clinton's wry sexual advice back when she was first lady and the mother of a teenager: ''My theory is don't do it before you're 21, and then don't tell me about it."
Today parents of teens, boomers, and Gen-Xers alike are often whiplashed by the culture. With one eye, they watch the media sexualizing younger and younger children. With the other, they read the blinking warning signals of danger, from pregnancy to disease to AIDS.
(Excerpt) Read more at boston.com ...
Instead of teaching sex education or teaching abstinence, just throw the kids in jail
So, why not just throw the problem out there, and then take an agnostic position toward it? It doesn't involve a lot of work, but it leaves the impression that you care.
The Globe sucks.
LOL! Exactly.
"There was also the testimony of Dr. Elizabeth Shadigian, best known as a stalwart of the abortion-gives-you-breast-cancer misinformation campaign. She said that teenage girls are always the victims of sexual activity because ''there's always a power differential between a boy and a girl." When girls have sex, they aren't doing, she said, ''they have been done to.""
Wow, what a backward view of women. She totally removes the possibliity of women making a free choice.
Excellent line!
This is just another "Red State Republicans are knuckle dragging oafs" hit piece.
Crazy Shirley from Oceanview?
Tis true, but this is an Ellen Goodman column.
I thought usually Ellen dished out some good columns (that I agree with).
But not this time.
70's Feminist Lack-O-Logic alert.
"70's Feminist Lack-O-Logic alert."
You would think so but I think she is a conservative.
So, what part do you disagree with? Are you saying you think that all under 16 sexual activity between under 16 year olds should be treated as sexual assault?
"Wow, what a backward view of women. She totally removes the possibliity of women making a free choice."
That's one way to read it, but I took her to mean that any consequence resulting from the activity (ie pregnancy) rests with women, and always will rest with women. Abortion is supported, in large part, by individuals who believe in sexual equality, and abortion removes the "burden" of consequence for sexually active women, allowing sexual activity to continue unfettered, in the manner wrongly supposed of males ... no guilt and no repercussions. The trouble with all this idealism about equality is that it completely blows past the fact that another human life has been created, and that the ultimate inequality is perpetuated by denying the humanity of that life. So, this "burden" is still there, just removed from sight, to fester in the backs of the minds of these women. There are also medical consequences, in addition to the psychological, but any discussion of this has been rapidly discredited.
I'm thinking of it along these lines:
Suppose an 18 year old has sex with his 17 year old girlfriend. Why he could be charged with statutory rape, and be labeled a child sex offender for the rest of his life.
But just 10 days ago, when he was 17 also? No harm no foul?
What's up with that?
Either states must be consistent and call a spade a spade - that is call ALL underage sex a crime - or just ignore the problem and teach sex education, and watch the teen pregnancies rates continue to sky-rocket.
Either states must be consistent and call a spade a spade - that is call ALL underage sex a crime - or just ignore the problem and teach sex education, and watch the teen pregnancies rates continue to sky-rocket.
Don't be ridiculous. That is a false dilemma, and only an especially stupid person would fail to see that. Since I'm not an especially stupid person I'll just note that: no, that is utterly false. A state need not do one or the other.
Moreover, your "spade" is not a spade, because it's also false that all underage sex is criminal. In order for a spade to be a spade then the spade has to be a true statement. Yours isn't.
Finally, your statement that sex education is "ignoring the problem" of minors have sex is also absurdly false. It is obviously addressing the problem, not ignoring it. Whether it's addressing it in the right way is an open question.
It is an impressive achievement to cram so much fallacy and absurdity into one short sentence! I don't think I could do it if I tried. I bow to your skills!
PS. Oh, and as far as statutory rape, it's worth noting that in a number of states the age of consent is 16 or 17 but the age above which one might commit statury rape is 18 or 19. Therefore, you automatically don't have a situation arise where two people having sex born a few days or even months apart would become statutory rape.
And I duly note your sarcastic abilities. But I'm not impressed.
I'm also not impressed at your anti abstinence approach. Apparently teaching sex education is OK with you.
I'd ask - but but I dont care - what is OK with you? Teaching condom usage to 14 year olds? 8 year olds being taught oral sex? Even younger?
Just so you know: Underage sex is wrong. This is true for 13 year olds as it is for 8 year olds.
I am sorry, but the legislative intent of "age of consent" laws has always, always been to discourage "adults" from having sex with "children" (age of consent).
The legislative intent of such laws was never, and until now in Kansas, used to legally prosecute two minors who "consented" to have sex with each other.
The purpose of the new draconian approach, may have very noble and moral motives (discourage sexual relations by teens and children), however the blunt instrument of making criminals of two teens, where no force and no adult was involved seems not only not good sense but contrary to what most parents, even religious parents, would want to see happen to their own children. Even now, when an unmarried 17-year-old girl has consenual sex with an unmarried 18-year-old-boy, rarely is the boy prosecuted for "statuatory" rape. Why? Because such a prosecution is generally, in such a case, in contradiction of the spirit of the intent of the "age of consent" law; even though it conforms to the "letter" of the law.
I would think both sets of parents would look at the criminalization of their children as state authority gone too far.
That state authority and the dollars behind it would be put to better purpose as added attention to education and public relations programs encouraging abstinance.
You know, that isn't always the case. There are a heckuva lot of men out there paying child support, some of whom didn't want to get divorced, and some of whom didn't even sire the whelp.
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