Kids These Days

When I was 12, I did not know how to buy a condom nor what to do with it. Sex ed was not very thorough in my schools, to be sure, but no one seemed too worried; none of us would be having sex any time soon.

But fast forward a dozen years, and I can understand why a middle school in Maine made birth control available to its students. Kids at that age are strangely in the know when it comes to sex--for those of you in doubt, go to a middle school cafeteria and listen carefully. Yet most middle schoolers (and far too many high schoolers) are completely clueless when it comes to safe sex and preventing pregnancy.

Some parents complain that schools should not have the right to "push" contraception upon the kids. They could argue that sex education is a family issue, and thus the decision to begin taking birth control should be a private one. I don't disagree with the idea that families should discuss sex nor do I think schools should wholly relieve parents of the burden of "the talk." And finally, not being a doctor, I can't say for sure that birth control is good for any woman. Nonetheless, I do worry about a couple things if we were to leave sex ed entirely up to parents:

1. Some parents refuse to give their kids enough information about their bodies and sex to make healthy choices. I can count the number of times my mom or dad ever discussed sex with me on my nonexistent third hand. How do you expect little Johnny to know how to take care of business when his dad's too shy to utter the word "penis?"

2. Lots of people assume that because adults know that it's a bad idea to have sex at such a young age, kids will too. Kids don't share all the same sensibilities that their parents were raised with. And shame just isn't what it used to be.

When my mother was 13, a pregnant girl would have been removed from school and sent to live with an out-of-town relative. Most people would have felt that the shame of a baby making babies was enough to justify an exodus.

When I was 13, they encouraged pregnant girls to leave school when they began to show; they could catch up when they could. No one discussed these girls with us, and everyone in school agreed that being 13 and pregnant was bizarre. Sure you had to hide those girls away to make sure the others wouldn't catch "baby fever" (not a scientific term, but definitely noticeable among teenage girls), but the sense of shame, though, just wasn't as intense as in my parents' generation.

As a teacher in an inner city school, I witnessed 2 of my students drop out of school to have a baby. The other kids thought that that was the coolest thing. They had no clue how to prevent pregnancy nor avoid catching STIs, but they could all get down with the idea of getting a boyfriend and "getting my baby."


3. Not all parents think getting pregnant at 14 is bad. Honestly. They were born when their moms were 15. In some parts of our country--mostly the parts ignored by white christians opposed to sex education--there is no sense of shame at having a child without a husband or a high school diploma. What 30 year old new grandmother is going to shame her child for following in her footsteps?

Now you can argue--correctly, I think--that these parents have set a terrible example. But who should set the example then? This is the question at the heart of cyclic poverty. Can education overcome entrenched destructive behaviors? We'll never know if we're never allowed to try. Birth control for middle schoolers may not be safe, but withholding or giving incomplete information about sex because one finds it personally uncomfortable or morally unattractive is ultimately much more dangerous.