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Society
Why American Teens Need To Talk About Sex
by Elayne Clift
When a
15-year-old girl in Gloucester, Massachusetts, found herself pregnant
recently, she was not particularly alarmed. Instead, she ran off to
share the news with her friends, exclaiming, "Sweet!", according to one
press report.
The teenager is one of 17 young girls at Gloucester High School to
become pregnant this year. The school's annual rate of teen pregnancy is
usually three or four.
Initial press reports, which swept the country like a brush fire,
alleged that the girls had formed a "pregnancy pact", agreeing to get
pregnant and raise their babies together. Subsequently, the school
principal, Joseph Sullivan, corrected the record, saying that he did not
recall using the word "pact" when interviewed by TIME Magazine, but he
stood by his statement that "a significant number of the pregnancies,
especially among the younger students, were the result of deliberate and
intentional behaviour."
The plethora of pregnancies has reopened a national dialogue around the
causes of and the solutions to teen pregnancy in America, which again is
on the increase following a period of decline. According to the Centers
for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), teen pregnancy rates in the US
rose in 2007 for the first time in 14 years. Condom use among teens
declined during the same period. The Planned Parenthood Federation of
America (PPFA) reports that an estimated 750,000 American teens will
become pregnant in 2008; most of these pregnancies will be unplanned. It
says, the US has more teen pregnancies than any other developed nation.
The story of the Gloucester girls has fuelled speculation as well as
educated debate about everything from pop culture to day care centres in
high schools and abstinence-only messages vs. the dispersal of free
contraceptives without parental knowledge in high schools.
Some social critics say that films, such as the Academy-award winning
'Juno' and 'Knocked Up', both of which romanticised teen pregnancy and
made it look easy, have spawned new ideas about having a baby among
impressionable teenagers. Others add that the proliferation of celebrity
magazines featuring star pregnancies suggest that babies are
fashionable. Fashion itself is increasingly sexualised and promoted to
younger target audiences. And TV programmes routinely include explicit
sexual scenes - the number of such scenes has nearly doubled since 1998,
according to a recent study by the Kaiser Family Foundation, a
non-profit organisation that focuses on major health issues in America.
Public health experts focus more on the failure of the Bush
Administration's push for the abstinence-only education approach.
According to the highly-respected Guttmacher Institute, which studies
sexual and reproductive health issues and trends, federal "abstinence
until marriage" programmes have been ineffective in teaching young
people sexual responsibility or in changing their sexual behaviour.
Further, sex education advocates urge better education around safe sex
and the distribution of condoms.
But, what do Gloucester's teenagers say? One male student told a
reporter that "when you live [here], there's nothing to do but have
babies." But Alycia Mazzeo disagreed. Pregnant at 14 and now the mother
of a seven-month-old daughter, she says, "it's not all cute things like
dressing up your baby," adding that she'd like to talk to other girls
about the reality of being a teenage mother.
Gloucester last saw this kind of media frenzy when it lost many of its
fishermen to "The Perfect Storm." Now the small fishing town outside of
Boston is in the spotlight again because a group of girls, pregnant by
intention or not, have vowed to stick together while raising their
babies. Their school has child-care facilities for up to seven mothers;
the facility is already full for next year.
Amid the furore, school and city officials are debating how to improve
their sex education programmes and whether or not to provide free
contraception, which many in the tight-knit Catholic community oppose.
In May, the school's top health officials, Dr Brian Orr and nurse
practitioner, Kim Daly, resigned in a dispute over the distribution of
contraceptives. Both Orr and Daly supported confidential distribution to
students; the hospital that provides funds to the school clinic
objected. To date, school Superintendent, Christopher Farmer, has been
quiet on the issue, commenting only that public schools have a
responsibility to help young mothers complete their education.
Advocates of in-school day-care and other programmes designed to support
pregnant youth say that the situation calls for a delicate balance
between responding to students' needs, while sending a clear message
that it is not okay for teens to get pregnant. Diana Makhlouf, director
of the tee-parenting programme at another high school near Boston, calls
the situation "complex." Girls are not getting pregnant just because
their school has a day-care centre, she says.
Bill Albert, chief programme officer for the national campaign to
Prevent Teen and Unplanned Pregnancy, says taking care of teenage moms
is the right thing to do. But adds, "We have to be equally strong in
sending a message preventing future teen pregnancy, and about how
raising children and having children is an adult activity."
Whatever position an individual or organisation takes on solving the
renewed teen pregnancy crisis that looms in America, there is consensus
on one point: Parents, schools and others in the community need to talk
about sex, contraception and babies. One psychology professor put it
this way, "We need to really help kids think this through."
July 27,
2008
By arrangement with
WFS
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