Sometimes it seems like conducting a classroom lesson on sex education is a landmine with wrong steps possible at every turn. Take the experience of Faith Kramer, an 8th grade teacher from Staten Island, NY. In 2008, this 26-year teaching vet was removed from her classroom after the Department of Education claimed that she had violated a regulation prohibiting verbal abuse, or the use of language that could cause “fear, physical or mental distress,” and charged her with using corporal punishment for doing so.
So what did Kramer do or say to her students? Nothing really. It seems she simply followed state guidelines on teaching about about HIV.
As the New York Times reports,
On Feb. 6, 2008, the teacher, Faith Kramer, a health and physical education teacher at Intermediate School 72 on Staten Island, taught a state-mandated lesson on the various behaviors that can transmit H.I.V./AIDS. According to legal documents filed with the case, she wrote down the polite words for sexual organs, sexual acts and bodily fluids on the board — and then asked her students to list any other terms they might know for those things.
[According to a judge reviewing the case] in doing so, she appeared to be following the spirit of a state syllabus that directed that students be encouraged to use sexual terms that they understood, so that they could relate those words to the more formal terminology. “If students use different terms,” the syllabus says, “make sure they understand the relationship between both sets of terms.”
Apparently, the principal who requested an investigation, and the Department of Education which conducted it, weren’t exactly up to date on those curriculum guidelines. As a result, Kramer was taken out of the classroom for over six months and sent to an administrative detention center before she was able to resume her duties. Now–in a case that a federal judge decided could proceed despite the city’s attempts to dismiss it–Kramer is seeking damages for mental anguish, lawyer’s fees and the loss of extra after-school work.
As someone who teaches sex ed, I have to say, Kramer’s experience does sound pretty mentally anguishing. Teachers shouldn’t have to censor themselves at every turn–especially if a topic or word is introduced by a student.
Obviously, it is important to be sensitive, careful and appropriate when talking about sex with teens. But, you also have to be clear and make sure that kids know what you are saying, even if that means clearing up misconceptions by using language that doesn’t often get used in other classes. Really, one missed word can render an entire lesson meaningless. For example, you can’t expect students to understand what you are saying if you tell them to avoid getting ejaculate into the vagina during intercourse by using a prophylactic, when the words they know in this context are cum, coochie, screwing and rubber.
Both Faith Kramer, and her state’s mandated curriculum seem to get this. Too bad that principals like hers, not to mention, the New York City Department of Education, don’t.
How many times do states need to push abstinence-only education before deciding that telling kids to just say no, just isn’t working? In Utah’s case, it seems like an awful lot. Thanks to Utah Senator, Orrin G. Hatch, the health bill, (which, thankfully, includes $375 million for comprehensive sex education), has set aside $250 million for abstinence funding.
Utah’s teens have long had this brand of education. In fact, state law not only requires “emphasizing abstinence before marriage and fidelity after marriage,” but it also prohibits teaching, “the intricacies of intercourse, sexual stimulation, or erotic behavior; the advocacy of homosexuality; the advocacy or encouragement of the use of contraceptive methods or devices; or the advocacy of sexual activity outside of marriage.”
So how’s that working out for Utah? Apparently, not so well. A recent report found that between 2004 and 2008, Utah’s teen birthrate grew by over 30%. During that time, chlamydia rates increased 70% among teen girls, while the rates of gonorrhea also rose at nearly that level.
Lynn Beltran, the HIV and STD program manager at Salt Lake Valley Health Department explained, “People want to say we don’t have a STD problem among teens here in Utah. We are here to say absolutely we do have a problem.”
Unfortunately, some of those people, say, Orrin Hatch, also seem to be dead set on forcing the rest of the country to absolutely have such problems as well.
This Mother’s Day, the birth control pill turns fifty. Never far from debate, the pill has spent the past five decades being hailed as a women’s liberator, scorned as a moral malady, and tweaked in an ongoing effort to reduce this medication’s numerous side effects. But in all that tweaking one issue has never been at the forefront, namely an attempt to reduce the effect that the pill has on a user’s libido.
Partly, that’s because until recently, the fact that this was even a problem was only known anecdotally. However, a German study, just published in the May issue of the Journal of Sexual Medicine, can finally confirm this very real part of a lot of women’s pill experiences. After looking at over 1,000 sexually active women, the researchers concluded that those using hormonal contraception were, indeed, less likely to be interested in having sex.
Now that this information is “officially” out there, I have a feeling that someone will begin to tinker with existing hormones in the hopes of creating a pill (or patch, or ring, or gel, or spray) that doesn’t make women see the bedroom as only a place to get a good night’s rest. And while that’s all fine and good, it’s not really enough.
Currently, women who can’t use hormones are limited to barriers (like condoms and diaphragms) and IUDs for their birth control, neither of which is wildly popular. What we really need is a better non-hormonal option. Unfortunately, what we will probably get is simply more of the same; slightly tweaked hormones wrapped in a shiny new package and marketed as having less of a libidinal effect.
Until 1973, “homosexuality” was classified as a mental disorder by the American Psychiatric Association. However, since then, the notion that sexual orientation is a condition that can be “cured” has faced increasing criticism from a wide range of professional organizations. These include such luminaries as the American Medical Association, the American Academy of Pediatrics, and the American Psychological Association, a group whose most recent position on the matter is: “efforts to produce change could be harmful, inducing depression and suicidal tendencies.”
Yet until now, the state of California has had a statue on the books calling for research into cures for “homosexuality.” This was found within a larger law passed in the panicy 1950s that required research into sex crimes. However, the law also had the distinction of explicitly equating gay men with child molesters, referring to them as sexual deviants and mandating the state to actively support the search for a cure for “homosexuality.”
Earlier this month, Democratic Assembly woman, Bonnie Lowenthal, introduced a bill that would remove this section of the law. It unanimously passed the state assembly on Monday, and while it still needs to go to the state senate, it is expected to pass there as well.
Though it might seem like a token move, this bill makes an important statement in a climate where far too many religions still preach that faith should be enough to turn you straight. Or where kids are still forced into ex-gay “reparative” therapy by parents buying into the claim that being gay is deviance embodied.
Of course, in such an environment, it stands to reason that not everyone would back the law’s repeal. One group that has expressed open opposition is Parents and Friends of Ex-Gays & Gays (PFOX), an organization dedicated to the men and women they claim “make the personal decision to leave homosexuality.” The organization’s California educational director, Jeralee Smith, told the AP she didn’t support the bill because,“I just don’t think any door should be closed when we’re trying to stop attacks on children.”
Right, because calling gay children “sexual deviants” and telling them to they should strive to change a core part of who they are is a good way to protect them from attacks?
Whether the Smiths of the world like it or not, not everyone is straight, yet these types continue to cling to long disproven theories and outdated myths in the hopes that doing so will bolster half-baked claims about the dangers of being gay. Happily, as the imminent repeal of California’s archaic law clearly shows, such claims are getting harder and harder to make.
There are some ads that just stick with you. One that I’ve never forgotten was a 30 second commercial that began with a terrified blond woman wearing tight jeans, sky high heels and a bustier (it was the early 90s) and running down an alley as a chain saw wielding maniac chased her.
After discovering an unlocked door, she flung it open and: SURPRISE! All her friends were waiting with a birthday cake. And the guy she had been so desperately fleeing? Well, he followed in after her, pulled off his mask, and grinningly cut the cake with his chainsaw. As the screen faded to a Guess Jeans logo, a sultry voice informed the viewer that these jeans were wearable in any situation.
“Hmm,” I remember musing, “I kind of want those.” Then, “Man, that was really messed-up.”
Using twisted concepts to sell a product is common, of course, and I am by no means the only woman who has ever been tempted despite (or maybe because of) such tactics. Fashion magazines geared towards women are full of ads depicting everything from what appears to be a gang rape (Dolce & Gabanna) to a woman pulling her purse out of a pool next to a corpse (Jimmy Choo) to a lingerie clad model being strangled by a man’s tie (Duncan Quinn).
But while the brands have clear motivations—develop an image, lure in customers, sell a product, have them coming back for more—the motivations of the female consumers who respond to such ads are more complicated.
To learn more about this issue, researchers, Barbara J. Phillips and Edward F. McQuarrie, interviewed regular readers of fashion magazines and discovered that most women don’t consider the implications of violent sexist ads, but rather, they gravitate to them for the tantalizing narrative.
They recently published their findings in the Journal of Consumer Research and explain that the women who liked such ads, “Would be transported into the story world set in motion by the ad’s pictures, asking themselves, ‘What is happening here?’ and ‘What will happen next? These women would immerse themselves in the images, examining its lighting, colors, lines, composition, and creativity.”
Still questions remain. Phillips and McQuarrie were drawing from a very small sample size (only 18 women were interviewed). So even if we can generalize their findings to the larger fashion magazine reading population, there still has to be more behind a positive response to this type of branding than simply the desire to follow a captivating story.
Maybe women who find these images compelling have internalized the messages they are seeing and don’t find them offensive. Maybe they think the ads are edgy and counterculture. Maybe they have tapped into sexual desires and fantasies. Maybe the response is part of a larger backlash against feminism. Maybe the woman are drawn to these ads like rubberneckers watching a car crash.
The topic definitely needs more exploration. But ultimately, whatever women’s reasons are for finding such ads appealing, I still think that there has to be a better way to sell shoes.
We are halfway through April, which you may not have realized has been dubbed “Abortion Recovery Awareness Month” for the second year in a row by Texas Governor, Rick Perry and Minnesota Governor, Tim Pawlenty.
Just for the record: Abortion Recovery Awareness Month is not designed to offer comfort to women needing to recover from the experience of trying to obtain an abortion under ever more present restrictions (the newest being Nebraska’s recent law requiring mental health screenings for women seeking the procedure). Nope, this “month” is simply another way for abortion opponents to showcase tired old scare tactics in the hopes of demonizing a procedure that 35% of all American woman will have before they are 45.
As Texas governor RIck Perry told the Christian Post, “An abortion is a tragic ending, not only because of the loss of a life, but also because of the physical and psychological trauma caused by the procedure itself.”
That abortion is physically and psychologically traumatic is just a given to a lot of folks–even to many people who support a woman’s right to a safe legal abortion. But this conventional wisdom isn’t actually backed by science. In 2008, the American Psychological Association found that while having an abortion can be a difficult decision that can cause feelings of sadness, serious mental health issues are not a direct result of having an abortion.
According to this organization,
“Some people cite “post-abortion syndrome” as a consequence of having an abortion, although there is no medical diagnosis with this name. So-called post-abortion syndrome has been likened to post-traumatic stress disorder: a lasting depression, often resulting in substance abuse and sometimes even suicide attempts. The APA task force found that research to date does not show a direct connection between a single elective abortion and such mental health issues.”
Furthermore, early abortions, performed by trained medical professionals, are generally uncomplicated medical procedures and are far safer for women than, say, carrying a pregnancy to term. The Guttmacher Institute explains, “Abortion is generally safe in settings where the procedure is legal and openly available.”
Sadly, I have a feeling those things don’t matter much to the Perry’s and Pawlenty’s of the world, people who it should be noted, will never need an abortion, yet who seem convinced that they know just how those who do will respond to one.
As a health teacher, nothing irks me more thank encountering stories of teachers who’ve gotten into trouble for discussing sex. For many of us, this is a subject that just naturally comes up during the course of a typical lesson.
But the situation in a Wisconsin county is making the usual debates about comprehensive sex education versus the abstinence-only variety seem almost quaint in comparison. That’s because teachers in this state are facing an impossible situation.
Recently, Wisconsin mandated a sex education curriculum that required teachers to teach about condoms and other forms of birth control. Sounds pretty straight-forward, right? It would have been, but last week, a D.A. named Scott Southworth announced that teachers who followed this law, could end up in jail for breaking another: namely, contributing to the delinquency of minors.
A letter sent to five school districts by Juneau County District Attorney Scott Southworth said the instruction could amount to contributing to the delinquency of a minor if teachers know students are sexually active. He said the districts should drop sex education until the law is repealed. Southworth also argued that teaching contraceptive use encourages sexual behavior among children, which equates to sexual assault because minors can’t legally have sex in Wisconsin.
Southworth isn’t the first person to try to keep a discussion of sex out of the classroom. Legions of abstinence-only supporters have been working on that for 15 years. Nor is he the first to try to make talking about sex by teachers a crime. Indeed, a few years ago, something similar happened in Utah, when a Salt Lake City teacher with over 30 years experience was put on paid administrative and threatened with criminal charges after she answered students’ questions about oral sex, masturbation and what it meant to be gay. That incident prompted Representative Carl Wimmer, (he of criminalizing miscarriage fame), to suggest introducing a law that would both make it illegal for teachers to answer students’ sex questions, and would also set up a teacher registry listing the names of those educators who dared to do so!
Thankfully, that law didn’t pass. But this new incident in Wisconsin is a reminder that such thinking is still alive and well. Yes, there are teachers out there who have engaged in criminal sexual behavior involving students. But the average teacher talking about sex ed, sure isn’t one of them. Like supporters of abstinence-only education, supporters of muzzling teachers, are working under the premise that kids who don’t know about sex won’t have it.
How many more pregnant teens with STDs does this country need to realize this will never be the case?
Remember how 2006 and 2007 saw a slight rise in America’s teen pregnancy rate after a 15 year decline? Well, it seems that this was just a blip and not a permanent trend. Phew.
The CDC released data today showing that,
“The birth rate for US teenagers 15-19 fell 2 percent in 2008 to 41.5 per 1,000, reversing a brief two-year increase that had halted the long-term decline from 1991 to 2005. The birth rate for Hispanic teenagers declined to an historic low.”
But what was behind that temporary rise anyhow? It’s tough to say for sure, but a link between the lack of access to birth control and abortions for teens, and the impact of Bush era abstinence-only programs seems fairly obvious. And 2008, the year that we saw the halting of rising teen pregnancy rates? Well, that was also the one in which twenty-five states declined the federal abstinence-only funding. That’s a big change from the preceding years when as many as forty-nine states were accepting the money.
Of course, it is also important to note that during this time, the birth rate for women of all ages, not just teens, was rising to its 2007 peak.
In the grand scheme of things the slight rise and now slight decline aren’t such a big deal. But what is, is the fact that America has long boasted the highest rate of teen pregnancy in the Western World. So while we should feel a little better about our situation, we also need to realize that when you are starting from a bad place, the simple fact that things aren’t getting worse isn’t necessarily a cause for celebration.
We seemed so close.
No, not to real health care reform–though that would have been nice– but to the end of abstinence-only-until-heterosexual-marriage education.
This is the federally funded program that since 1996 has been teaching kids in schools across the country that the only way to avoid teen pregnancy, STDs and emotional ruin, is to just say no to any sex that isn’t maritally sanctioned. To further this goal, programs were barred from discussing everything from birth control and condoms to abortions and non-hetero sexual orientations–except to stress the dangers of such things.
Countless studies, not to mention our recent rise in teen pregnancies and STDs, demonstrated that this tactic didn’t work. In light of this mounting evidence of failure, the number of states accepting abstinence funding had been steadily decreasing over the past few years. Another sign that abstinence was on it’s way out? The Obama administration cut federal funding for such programs, set to go into effect September 2010.
Looks like things have changed.
Within the thousands of pages that make up the health bill, is nestled a $50 million a year line item for, yes, those very abstinence-only programs.
As the Washington Post reports,
“The bill restores $250 million over five years for states to sponsor programs aimed at preventing pregnancy and sexually transmitted diseases by focusing exclusively on encouraging children and adolescents to avoid sex. The funding provides at least a partial reprieve for the approach, which faced losing all federal support under President Obama’s first two budgets.”
I guess that parents across the country can breath a sign of relief that their teens won’t be learning about condoms and birth control, because apparently, despite legitimate science proving otherwise, these things don’t work. And the unplanned pregnancy option that isn’t parenting or adoption? Why would a country with a teen pregnancy rate twice as high as Canada’s, and seven times as high as the Netherlands need to tell teens about that?
The Indiana University School of Medicine recently conducted a study looking at why sexually active teen girls who subsequently choose abstinence (often after an STD diagnosis) later resumed having sex.
What it found is that teen girls aren’t always driven to have sex out of depression or rebellion. In fact, of the girls who resumed sexual activity after a period of abstinence, one of the main factors was being happy and having a secure relationship.
“A number of studies demonstrate associations between depressed mood and sexual risk behaviors. However, studies using daily diaries and momentary sampling have demonstrated close temporal associations between improved mood and sexual thoughts and behaviors…Adolescent sexual intercourse is frequently presented as an entirely opportunity-driven risk behavior. Our data present a more nuanced picture, in which sexual intercourse is associated with important relationship attributes, such as partner support and perceptions of relationship quality.”
We live in a world where teen sex is often portrayed solely in negative terms and it’s common to assume that teen girls have sex to “get love” or because they are depressed or insecure. Yet despite this conventional wisdom this study reminds us that like adults, teens have sex for a whole lot of reasons, some of them actually pretty positive.
