Texas: Abstinence Only Sex-Ed Results in Highest Teen Pregnancy Rate in Country
About Michael John ScottMr. Scott is the owner and publisher of Mad Mike's America. He is a U.S. Army veteran, career law enforcement executive, and dog trainer. He is a university professor, and criminal justice consultant, holding several degrees, including a master's in criminal justice and human services. He has completed the requisite coursework toward his doctorate, and is still working on his dissertation.
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Texas is in the news again,and as usual, it’s not good news for an enlightened forward thinking population, but we’re talking about Texas here so I doubt there’s much to worry about when it comes to forward thinking.
Ben Torres/Al Dia
Texas lawmakers passed legislation in 1995 urging local school districts to eschew sex education classes in favor of Jesus based abstinence-only sex education. This bizarre measure gave districts the power to decide how, or even if, they would teach sex education. Such a counter-intuitive policy flew in the face of the accepted educational notion that knowledge is power. Unfortunately for the children of Texas, the Bible thumping legislators believed a morality-based strategy was worth trying, so abstinence-only moved forward.
In 2009, fourteen long years after this wrong-headed legislation was passed, David Wiley and Kelly Wilson, professors at Texas State University, conducted a comprehensive review of sex education at 960 of the state’s 1,028 school districts and found that an amazing 94 percent were not giving students any human sexuality instruction beyond abstinence-only. Two percent ignored sex education altogether. Which meant only 4 percent of Texas districts were teaching youngsters about responsible pregnancy, contraception and disease prevention.
The results of this feckless policy have been devastating.
In 1992, Texas had the ninth-highest teen pregnancy rate in the country. By 2008, it had jumped to third-highest. In other categories, the statistics are just as staggering today: Texas is ahead of the national average in teen births, repeat teen births and high schoolers who have had sex. The state lags behind the national average in high schoolers who have used a condom or birth control pills for their last sexual encounter.
Because of Texas’ dedication to Jesus, the Bible, and other such nonsense, state taxpayers are left with a $1 billion annual bill for teen births and that’s just the tip of the proverbial iceberg. Babies born to mothers ages 15 to 17 have poorer health, lower cognitive development, do worse in school and have higher incarceration rates.
Not surprisingly a February poll of bipartisan voters showed 84 percent of Texans said they “favored a comprehensive program that includes teaching abstinence but that also provides scientific-based information.” That approach, abstinence-plus as it’s been called, has been previously endorsed by the the Dallas News, among other Texas newspapers.
Led by Sen. Ken Paxton, R-McKinney, lawmakers, however, rather than embracing the will of the public, are using sex education to push an anti-abortion agenda that would lead to state intervention in local decision-making. Say what?
SB 521, co-authored by Paxton, would ban materials or speakers from Planned Parenthood, seen as a tool of the devil by Jesus loving Texans. What makes this even worse is it would require parents to fill out forms to opt-in their children for sex education and the forms would have to be turned in two weeks before sex education is discussed in class. Let’s face it, any parent who has dealt with field-trip permission slips knows how unlikely that is to happen.
Professor Wiley called this a bureaucratic nightmare. “It will shut down sex education in most districts,” he said. He fears that, if it gets to a vote, SB 521 is likely to pass because of its anti-Planned Parenthood tag.
Such ludicrous legislation would be a huge disservice to the state’s children. A much better approach, one more in tune with modern thinking, would be for the Legislature to pass SB 310, a measure by Sen. Rodney Ellis, D-Houston, which endorses an abstinence-plus approach and leaves control in the hands of local districts.
Don’t Texas lawmakers have anything better to do than engage in culture war games?
Thanks to Dallas News for story contributions.
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James Smith
March 16, 2013 at 8:53 am
Come om now, were you really expecting logical, helpful ideas from politicians?
When you combine all the factors, politicians, pandering to the religious reich, and Texas, isn’t that a Formula For Failure?
RickRay
March 16, 2013 at 9:02 am
I guess Texan dads are going to have to show their sons how to put on a condom. “Hey, Dad !” ” What’s a condom?” Texan moms will have to show their daughters what a birth control pill and a morning after pill are. Let’s face it; these kids know more about contraception than we ever did. But, because of their ‘faith’ (LOL), they figure Jeebus will look after them and make the sperm and egg disappear at the time of conception. These types of Texans need to watch Penn & Teller’s series on “BULLSHIT.”
http://www.penn&tellerbullshit/youtube.com
Leslie Parsley
March 16, 2013 at 9:08 am
Everything in Texas is bigger including teen birth rates, but according to the latest figures from the CDCP, Mississippi and New Mexico are a step “ahead” – making Texas third. But that can sure change at the rate they’re going. Ignorance is anything but bliss as it turns out.
Michael John Scott
March 16, 2013 at 9:19 am
Wow. Thanks for that information Leslie. I will add that. Much appreciated. Shocking nonetheless. Texas only third.
James Smith
March 16, 2013 at 9:46 am
Ignorance is bliss. But how happy should you really be? Maybe we could term it “Texas Happy?”
Jess
March 16, 2013 at 11:19 am
More kids having babies, that may grow up in poverty and end up in prison is just a bonus for the private prisons in these states. Maybe they should talk to Jane Fonda. She had a really successful program in Georgia, to lower pregnancy rates among teens a few years ago, she could get her group into Texas see what could be done. Doesn’t help matters when the GoOpers are all about closing Planned Parenthood nationwide, so these girls and boys have a place to go find out about how to go about sexytimes without getting pregnant. Lot of them too with this abstinence stuff, they have oral and anal sex because that isn’t real sex according to them. Which gets into why this shit goes on. Commander cuckoo bananas, giving money to faith based groups to preach this shit should never have happened and the fact that Prez O continues it is mind boggling.
Michael John Scott
March 16, 2013 at 5:44 pm
I’ve long maintained that Obama is a Rightie in Leftie clothing. There are any number of Bush policies he continued, and even kept on several Bush cabinet members, and organization bosses.
James Smith
March 16, 2013 at 6:13 pm
You may have even seen me comment that, for all BHO has really changed, he could be W’s chosen successor. The “Patriot” Act has been extended, Guantanamo Bay gulag is still operating. We’re still in two counter-productive wars, and ramping up for more. His own appointees are admitting drone strikes on American inside the USA are a possibility, and even his pathetic health care plan is a Republican from no less than Mittens Romney.
Bush is probably ROFLHAO.
Norman Rampart
March 16, 2013 at 4:53 pm
Now in the 21st Century this is just wrong.
On the plus side I grew up in a relatively small community in the north of England and my only knowledge of sex came from watching sheep – which was clearly a worry
However. I discovered sex around 14 with a girl who was equally keen to discover sex.
Whilst I most wholeheartedly agree that kids should be educated about sex – not at 9 years old like they seem to be doing over here I hasten to add…let kids be kids whilst they are kids eh?…at least educate them from 12/13 years old when they are often becoming sexually awake/aware.
But I will say that my education in this vein was far more enjoyable with my 14 year old girlfriend than it would have been in any classroom.
Classroom’s can be ‘cold’.
Heather wasn’t.
At my age ‘happy memories’ are often all you have left…..but BOY!!!!…are they happy or what????