Piano World Home Page Forums Restricted and Archives The Coffee Room Bush's Sex Scandal

Don't exagerrate. We all know that the country is about evenly divided.

It is not an exaggeration to suggest that we are now witnessing a backlash from the former liberal hegemony.

10 years ago we wouldn't have been able to have this conversation. Now Hillary and other Dems are trying to reframe the discussion to include all those who they smugly thought could be left out.

With all due respect to those who would like to divide this into a liberal vs. conservative, Democrat vs. Republican, religious vs. non-religious issue, that's not the point.

As a country, or a society we can't go back to the good old "Ozzie and Harriet" days. We aren't going to revisit history and wish it could be different, or hidden, as it was in those good old days.

This is today. Deal with the reality that 60% of your children are exposed to sexually communicable (possibly lethal) diseases by the age of 18.

What is the best way to deal with it?

Good question. A first step is to not start the discussion with titles such as "Bush's Sex Scandal".

A second step would be to not make abstinence only as a "religious" position but rather one that best respects the intrinsic human dignity of the children.

I thought you wanted nitty gritty.... I'm sorry

Did you really expect anything less, titling the thread "Bush's Sex scandal". I think you got exactly what you were looking for.

I would agree with the first step.

As to the second, (for all of you abstinence only folks) what is argument against the abstinence plus programs? Is the fear that more kids will have sex if they know how to prevent pregnancy?

I assume these abstinence plus programs are teaching abstinence, but also teaching about pregnancy and STD prevention? Isn't an important part of education giving our kids access to information that will help to prepare them for the future? Realizing that they may not need these "tools" yet, but that they need to at least have the knowledge to make the correct choice for themselves when they are adults? Just curious.

Jodi

No, I don't damn well know that.

Could you tell me what the liberal agenda is? Can you tell me when all of the liberals got together and adopted this agenda?

Abstinence was a non-starter in sex education curricula for so long because the schools were expected to teach basic facts, not morality or behavior. They were to teach the biology and anatomy of sex, not whether it was good or bad to engage in it.

The teaching of abstinence steps outside of this strict limit we had on sex education for several decades and speaks to "acceptable" behavior and a given morality about sex; a morality not necessarily shared by all and an area which rightfully is the province of the home and the parents not the schools.

Do you really believe that in a society as sexualized as this one, a sexualization that has come primarily from corporate America, that it is the discussion about condoms and the pill for a couple of weeks in the classroom that has teenagers who are sexually obsessed by nature deciding it's OK to have premarital sex?

American parents have been betrayed in teaching their own sexual mores to the children far more by corporate America than they have been by sex education in the schools.

It seems to me that the Separation clause could appropriately be applied to discussions of contraception and birth control in the classroom.

Somehow RZ you miss point that "big business" and "values free education" (to which I was exposed in the 1970s) are two sides of the same agenda: the educational agenda of the NEA is servile to the technocrat's wishes to create a mass of emotional-responsive worker-drones who produce and consume according to their basest (and not coincidently the most profitable) inclinations.

In fact, it was only after Dewey that we see shifts where "schools were expected to teach basic facts, not morality or behavior".

As far as where and when, you can start with the Humanist Manifesto (1933) and the major writings of its principal framers and signatories.

Sorry to assume that you "d*mn well" knew this... it was most uncivil and presumptuous of me.

I have seen your views on education in other places and I agree with you and have felt the same for a long time. We have created a vocational education system in order to feed our capitalistic, materialistic economic needs, not a knowledge education system. You argue for a return to a liberal arts education and so would I. The problems you have identified are, to me, what are exactly wrong with education in this country.

I think where you and I will differ is that those you purport to agree with who are arguing most loudly against sex education that provides the students with all of the information that is available (as is appropriate to their age) are the same ones who will argue against a true liberal arts education.

Ask those who argue most vociferously about abstinence in sex education whether they want their children taught Aristotelian ethics as a means of testing their own ethical base. Ask them if they want their children to be taught scholastic reasoning as a means of judging the validity of America's world view and societal philosophies. Ask them if they are willing to expose their children to an education which objectively analyzes and provides an understanding of the development of Western thought from Ancient Greece through the Enlightenment and into the 21st century. Ask them if they are willing to have their children come to a true analytical understanding of comparative economic theories including Marxism along with capitalism, recognizing there is good and bad in all economic systems. Ask them if they encourage their children in true scriptural exegesis or want to deny scriptural interpretations which are not their own.

You know as well as I do what those who are most aggressive in their demands about abstinence and against the inclusion of birth control education would say if you asked them the above.

You and I are far more alike in our view of a proper education than you may think, Ivory. But don't you think you are betraying your own educational values when you adhere to an educational theory that discourages giving the student valid and true information rather than encourages them to gain as much information as possible and then to be given the intellectual tools as to how to handle that information?

RZ:

FWIW, I am not in the abstinence only camp -- but I also know it is not simply a "religious" issue and that many make the case on purely personalistic grounds. Age appropriate, to be sure, but this is highly dubious grounds to be put in the hands of the NEA or the government in general.

I could see a scenario where "sex ed" included all the very problematic downsides to artificial contraception methods -- as well as showing the effects of post-abortion trauma syndrome to young women and the statistics (not at my finger tips right now) that indicate serious impairments to future earnings for those who conceive while in their teenage years.

These have not been part of the mix -- and in fact many abortion advocacy groups such as Planned Parenthood that have led the vanguard for sex ed have blamed conventional "religious morality" for PATS (eg, "Christians making women feel guilty).

As far as the more "vociferous" -- I assume you intend Christian fundamentalists -- these are not folks I am in much conversation with. The litmus test you suggest would (in my estimation)be widely accepted and positively affirmed by most of the people I know who are against publicly funded sex ed courses that showed "techniques" in a value free and non critical environment.

Perhaps this is common ground for future discussion?

RZ - "a sexualization that has come primarily from corporate America"

Nope. Sexualization comes from our natural and pleasurable desire for sexual experience and variety. It's part of the human condition. Capitalism is the best social system ever evolved to meet human desires in a complex, populous society. Teens *will* have sex. They have for tens of thousands of years, and no silly, fear-mongering school program will change that. They need to be educated how to do so safely, either in school or by the parents, or both.

I support both sex and big business. Wonder where that puts me?

ivory: "indicate serious impairments to future earnings for those who conceive while in their teenage years."

Yes, this is why abortion must be legal, and for those under 18, free as well.

"post-abortion trauma syndrome to young women"

No such thing. No reason to teach lies to young people. Some people may feel sad, its their right, but no reason to medicalize it into a "trauma syndrome".

Jeffrey said: " Yikes, the answer is not the killing of unborn babies!

Adoption is a wonderful alternative.

Sure, Jeffrey, and some people call the Holocaust a lie. Do the research on it.

Probably a major investor in [EDIT: adult movies]?

Thanks IT.

free for whom? There is a cost we must bear. I don't want money collected from me to kill little ones. A society chooses how to spends its money.

I'd prefer a society with the wisdom necessary to prevent pregnancy than the hindsight to kill it's mistakes and the cruel coldness to keep it's lowest echelons in check.