Prude Awakening
At institutions funded by government money, teachers have to preach "abstinence only." The problem is, writes Jane Brody:

Experts who have spent decades studying teenage sexual activity have gathered ample evidence to refute the basic premise of abstinence-only sex education. They say this approach is not adequate to protect youngsters from unwanted pregnancies and disease.

"There is nothing in any peer-reviewed scientific journal to suggest that teaching abstinence-only is effective in getting teens to delay sexual activity," said one expert, Cynthia Dailard, a lawyer and senior public policy associate at the Alan Guttmacher Institute, a nonprofit organization devoted to advancing sexual and reproductive health and rights.

In contrast, Ms. Dailard has reported, considerable evidence shows that sex education promoting abstinence, but also providing information on the benefits of contraception for those who do not remain abstinent, does delay the start of sexual activity. Such programs also reduce the incidence of teenage pregnancies and S.T.D.'s, she has found.

Furthermore, she and others who have reviewed the findings of many carefully done studies are worried about the effects of the abstinence-only approach on teenagers who do become sexually active. If teenagers are given no information about birth control, or only negative information, the studies indicate that they are less likely to use any method of protection, and are thus more likely to become pregnant or contract a sexually transmitted disease than are teenagers who are well informed about condoms and other contraceptive options.

One national study, published in 2001 in The American Journal of Sociology, found that while some teenagers who promised to remain abstinent until marriage delayed sexual activity by an average of 18 months, they were more likely to have unprotected sex when they broke their pledge than those who had never pledged virginity in the first place.

The problem, too, is the idea, taken as a given by far too many people, that sex is a terrible, horrible thing for teenagers. Sure, if you're a religious fanatic, you'll probably feel some guilt. But, the French, for example, don't seem to be suffering from rutting wildly in their teen years. Then again, they have ready access to contraception and information about using it correctly, and they can walk into any pharmacy and get the morning-after pill if there's an accident (along with a lecture from the pharmacist on the dangers of using it as regular birth control).

Knowledge is power. Power to protect oneself from pregnancy and sexually transmitted disease. Unfortunately, we don't give our teens power. No, we give them a long lecture on the merits of prudery instead. Now, maybe this makes the god squad feel all squishy inside, but Brody writes that "about one-half of unplanned teenage pregnancies result from failures to use any contraception, researchers find, and the other half from ineffective contraceptive use." Yes, thanks, in large part to the fundamentalists among us, American kids are sexually ignorant and may be in for HIV, an unplanned pregnancy, and/or a nasty case of chlamydia, syphillis, or the clap.