Teen Preganancy is DOWN! whoohoo!

[gopunk]

http://seattletimes.nwsource.com/html/nationworld/134404091_births13.html

The strong economy also likely played a role in the lower teen birth rate.

"They could see they should be spending time improving their education and occupational skills, and postponing marriage and childbearing," NCHS demographer Stephanie Ventura said.

Births to 15- to 19-year-olds dropped to 48.5 for every 1,000 women, a record low and down from 49.6 in 1999. Over the decade, teen births dropped 22 percent.

"The credit goes to the teens themselves," said Sarah Brown, director of the National Campaign to Prevent Teen Pregnancy. "There are only two ways these rates can go down: less sex and more contraception. There's evidence that these teens are doing both."

 

[StageLeft]

Do your part! Screw a 19 year old!

 

[punkrawket]

somebody isn't keeping up with their end of the deal.....

welp.... *tugs on belt* looks like someone needs to pick up the slack


j/k

 

[dullard]

This thread is pretty much common knowledge. Many things have been shown in repeated studies to decrease teenage sex and thus reduce teen births and teen abortions. These things include:
1) More education - especially about Aids and other STDs. Teenage sex drops significantly with more education.
2) More explicit TV shows and more graphic movies. Teenage sex was near an all time high during the time the words 'sex' and pregnancy were banned from TV. Those old black and white shows even banned a couples bedroom from having a queen sized bed - two twin beds were used instead. Also when it is easily found on TV, fewer teenage guys find other ways of 'relief'.
3) National sex scandals. As the nation talks about bad things that sex can do, parents tend to talk to their kids more (and kids listen more).
4) Strong economy. A good economy has many benefitial effects.

The problem comes from the huge number of groups that argue against the four factors above.

Religious groups argue against #1 - leading to more teenage sex, abortions, and births. It is really ironic that the religious groups end up causing the three things they really hate.

Many Democrats (especially Leberman) want more regulations and restrictions on games and movies.

Republicans had a great time bashing Clinton and saying that he destroyed the nations morals. At the same time the scandal came out, teenage sex and births hit a record low... Doesn't sound like a decline in morals to me.

Unions argue against things that lead to strong economies. Politicians from all sides often argue for things that will hurt our economy...

 

[gopunk]

This thread is pretty much common knowledge.

i don't think so... at least i didn't know that teen pregnancies are down.

Unions argue against things that lead to strong economies. Politicians from all sides often argue for things that will hurt our economy...

in general, people argue for whatever will benefit them, which isn't necessarily what is best for everybody.

 

[dullard]

Sorry, everyone I've ever talked to knew that the 1990's had extremely low teenage sex, abortions, and births. Its been in the news so many times that I said it was common knowledge.

Far too many times, things work the exact opposite way that individuals intend. Did you ever hear about the criminal release study? Some researchers showed movies to violent criminals on the day they were released from prison (right before they were released). The criminals that were shown G rated movies committed DOUBLE the number of violent crimes in the next month. The criminals that were shown violent movies committed half the number of crimes in the month after being released. Rambo seemed to have the best effect in reducing crimes. Now with that in mind, should we add restictions to violent games and movies? The same applies to sex related materials.

Think what the effect that Ashcrofts latest statue hiding will have. This sends two direct messages. 1) the human body has something wrong with it that should be hidden - this certainly doesn't help those people with disorders (example: eating disorders). 2) That the human body is something forbidden. What do teens do with something forbidden? Answer: they do it more. Teenage drinking is banned in America - we have lots of teenage alcoholics. Teenage drinking is socially acceptable in Germany - they have few teenage drinking problems. Now we just sent a message that sex is forbidden...