Sex Education Vs. Abstinence in CaliforniaJoin now to read essay Sex Education Vs. Abstinence in CaliforniaIntroductionIn the 1950’s society as a whole was more conservative than it is today, there were many social stigmas attached to activities which were not approved, persons who engaged in these activities were often looked down upon. Teen pregnancy was one of those activities which carried a social stigma. A modern example of this can be seen on the television show Desperate Housewives in which Bree Van De Kamp’s daughter Danielle becomes pregnant and her parents send her away to a facility for pregnant girls before anyone else finds out. In the meanwhile Bree & her husband travel to Europe and upon their return they begin to pretend as if Bree is pregnant, timing this fake pregnancy with their daughter’s real pregnancy in hopes of fooling everyone that their daughter’s baby is really theirs and avoiding any negative social stigma attached with having a pregnant teenager. In this day and time teen pregnancy is becoming common place, society is accepting that teenagers are having sex younger, with who they want and as much as they want, resulting in teen pregnancy becoming more prevalent. Teenagers seem to be oblivious to the risks and dangers of having unprotected sex with multiple partners, often there are outbreaks of sexually transmitted infections in schools and also the rates of teen pregnancy have been on a rise. In 1996 teen pregnancy rates for Merced County & San Joaquin were 84.4, 41.8 per 1000 girls ages 12-18. Tuolumne County reported 63 girls who gave birth within the same age category; these are just a few statistics for the San Joaquin Valley in California. Reasons for these rates have been proposed, one has been that there is only government funding provided to schools which teach abstinence only programs and this is a problem because these programs only highlight the failures of using condoms and other forms of protection instead to teaching students how to use them and so for kids who aren’t abstaining they are not protecting themselves.
Although the rates of teen pregnancy have been plummeting all over the United States of America this hasn’t been attributed to the fact that more teens are abstaining it had in fact been proposed that this is due to the fact that in the information age most teenagers are either using protection when having sex and also that girls are now focusing on having careers and are thus starting families much later in life. Even though the teen pregnancy rates are dropping the current rates are still too high. Abstinence only programs may be federally funded but they aren’t achieving good results, an all rounded sexual education class would be a good solution. One that will teach students to abstain since it is the only 100% secure method to avoid getting pregnant but the program will also teach teenagers about the sexually transmitted infections which exist, what they look like and how to get treatment for them as well as how to use condoms and a variety of pregnancy prevention methods.
In this paper we will attempt to create an all rounded sexual education class which will be mandatory to all students and will make them aware of the risks and dangers of having sex as well as how to protect themselves and identify sexually transmitted infections.
Reasons for Choosing TopicIt is a widespread problem.It affects society negatively by reducing the number of High School graduatesIt affects the families involved.It affects the future of the parents of the child and the child itself.It affects the workforce as most teenagers are not able to support themselves and will eventually have to drop out of school to have the child resulting in them not having at least a High School diploma.
It affects people sexually transmitted infections are being spread and they usually cause sickness or in severe cases death.The goal was to educate students about the risks of having unprotected sex in order to lower the numbers for STD’s and teen pregnancies in California.Alternative SolutionsAbstinence only programs have been looked at by many as an easy solution to a problem we have been facing in schools today. People believe that if you avoid a subject long enough that you won’t have to deal with it in the future. Times have changed and it is time for the elders of our country to realize that sex is going to happen, and it is their job to inform the youth how to prepare for it. “In 1999, only
I was 18 years old in 1994. In 2002, I was in my 20s. I was in college. I had AIDS. It had never occurred to me to be sick. I believed that to even know that we wanted to do our best for the people who are sick. But my only advice was not to do what I did. I took it upon myself to educate other students while I waited for the time to get rid of the disease. The only way to get rid of HIV is, for once, to reduce the numbers. It’s time for our elected officials to make sure our kids are safe and to protect them. For all the talk of an abstinence-only community, the message that this is what it really means is very confusing. The reality is that it is still not. There’s a lot of misinformation out there about the importance of abstinence in public health and to the effect that it will help reduce the rate of teen sexual promiscuity. In fact, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) and other scientific research shows that teen pregnancy and STD incidence in US high schools actually increased over one year during an average of three years. These data show that in a three year period in 1993-95, the rate of STD-1-related teenage pregnancies decreased by 20%. This has been repeated over the past three hundred years because of the decline in STD-2, which has dropped in every decade since. This decline has resulted in an increase in the incidence of teen gonorrhea that is being diagnosed worldwide. At the same time, over half of teen STD cases are due to sexual intercourse, in addition to the gonorrhea. In our country, as in most other countries, we have been seeing increasing numbers of teen pregnancies. However, there is an important difference between STD-2 and other sexually transmitted infections. There is not no way to safely prevent STI. We simply don’t have the technology; we can’t protect us from HIV, gonorrhea, or any other sexually transmitted infection. Thus, many teenagers are not aware of these important laws that protect them from this disease. This is why we need a state of emergency, that will prevent further increase in the number of sexually transmitted infections. It won’t be a day that ends with this issue being debated. This is because abstinence can put a stop to the spread of AIDS in the state of California and prevent future sexually transmitted infections in any other state in the US. In short, without a state that believes in full awareness of teen STD and gonorrhea, teens will only continue to be aware of their sexual history. This will not prevent them from getting high, but it does mean they have to be very cognizant of the real risk to