Parents play large role in teen sex ed

[RC]

When it comes to sex, what parents tell their kids makes a difference, a national speaker on abstinence said.

Parents have the most significant influence on whether or not teens have premarital sex, said Shelly Donahue from WAIT Training in Colorado. The acronym stands for Why Am I Tempted?

“Tell them the truth: I want you to have great sex, but not now. It is not healthy for kids to have sex,” she said.

Today and Friday, Donahue will help train about 30 North Dakota teachers and youth workers on abstinence education. On Wednesday she addressed about 60 adults at a community event at the Ramada Plaza Suites in Fargo.
>SNIP<

For example, she reminds sexually active teen boys that they’re having sex with someone else’s future wife.

http://www.in-forum.com/articles/index.cfm?id=167958§ion=news
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And yet there is nothing about girls having sex with someone's future husband.
Also these "kids" have functioning adult bodies with all the hormones and desires of "real" adults. and yet we still treat them like 8 year olds.

[ayeshahaqqiqa]

1. Well, its better than being told

"don't disgrace the family" but not being told exactly what you do that could disgrace it--which is all the information I had from my mom and grandmother.

[Firespirit]

2. This abstinence only/virginity pledge crap is misogynistic to the core

For example, she reminds sexually active teen boys that they’re having sex with someone else’s future wife.

The girls' virginity pledges use rhetoric like "preserving yourself for your future husband." Telling them that if they have sex with someone who they don't end up marrying, it's an affront to the man that they do marry. But yeah, with the boys, premarital sex isn't an affront to their future wives, but to the future husbands of the women they have sex with!

It's truly mindblowing. The message to the girls is that they have no worth except as chattel for a man, and the boys' message is that women are something to be, effectively, owned.

I have NO problem with older teens and twentysomethings remaining abstinent by their own choice, FOR THEMSELVES. Not for anyone else.

Not to mention that some of those girls, statistically, are lesbians, and some are hetero but will never marry at all.

[neuvocat]

5. That's just priceless.

I could see it now:

You cheated on me. How could you do this?

What are you talking about?

You're my wife and you slept with someone else, you hussy!

I was 17 back then!

And...?

YOU AND I DIDN'T MEET UNTIL I WAS 25!!!

[NMMNG]

3. That may not be the best approach

For example, she reminds sexually active teen boys that they’re having sex with someone else’s future wife.

Too many guys don't stop when the woman is somebody's current wife, so why would the fact that she's some guy's future wife stop them?




And yet there is nothing about girls having sex with someone's future husband.



Teenage girls aren't supposed to have sex, don't you know? :sarcasm:

[Neurotica]

4. Wait til you hear this one

A national abstinence speaker appeared at several of our high schools this year and conducted mandatory assemblies for all the students.

Among many other unbelievable things, he told the boys in the audience that it was their responsibility to protect the girls from their desires!

He also pretended to drop a cinderblock on a boy's genitals to illustrate the risks associated with sex (in particular, condom failure rates). BTW, the boy was strapped down to a table at the time.

[JerseygirlCT]

6. I agree with the headline

Though absolutely not the abstinence only crap.

I think there's absolutely everything right with a parent encouraging a teen not to engage in sex before they are ready -- physically, emotionally, financially... for the repercussions. I think it's right to teach them to think beyond the moment, and beyond their raging hormones and to act responsibly toward themselves and others.

And I think parents who abandon this aspect of raising kids shouldn't be surprised to find they have kids with poor attitudes toward sex and relationships. I certainly don't trust the schools or friends to this part of my teen's education!