Bear with me, this is my first stab at writing a diary!
For some reason, I've been fascinated by the drama of the soap opera lived by the Palin family in since last fall when Sarah first vaulted to national prominence. It probably speaks to the voyeur within me that peeks out occasionally, no matter how hard I try to control it.
The latest part of this saga concerns Sarah's daughter Bristol and her support of abstinence education for teenagers.
Join me after the fold...
Posted by Rachel Weiner on HuffPost yesterday, May 6:
Bristol Palin, daughter of Alaska Governor Sarah Palin, went on "Good Morning America" to launch her new pastime as an ambassador for abstinence.
Anchor Christopher Cuomo pointed out that Palin's own personal history went against her abstinence-only message for teens. (Palin, 18, recently had a baby with former boyfriend Levi Johnston.) She became pregnant after she and Levi failed to use protection (something Johnston admitted on the "Tyra" show.)
Palin was less forthcoming on this issue than her ex. "Regardless of what I did personally, I just think that abstinence is the only way you can effectively, 100% foolproof way you can prevent pregnancy," she responded. Asked how she squared her own experiences with her new campaign, she added, "I'm not quite sure, I just want to go out there and promote abstinence and say, this is the safest choice. This is the choice that's going to prevent teen pregnancy and prevent a lot of heartache."
I'm a Pastor up here in the "liberal" Northeast...in fact, in Vermont - arguably one of the bluest of blue states now (despite the fact that we were widely known as a Rock Rib Republican state a generation ago).
I thought I'd do a tiny bit of research on Teen Pregnancy Rates and see how they compared between the blue Northeast and red Texas. Very interesting results are shown for the year 2006 - the most recent I found posted.
Now, I know perfectly well that statistics can be made to support almost any position if they are twisted enough, but the numbers I found were this: Texas ranked 5th among the 50 states for the largest number of pregnancies for young women between 15 and 19.
50th on the list in the same category? New Hampshire, followed in 49th by Vermont and 48th by that bastion of liberalism, Massachusetts.
I'm not an expert in this area, but I have worked with teens for over 30 years as a Pastor. In my experience, people in general and teens in particular are not going to listen to a message of "abstinence only." Christian teens and non-churched teens alike need to hear the truth about how to effectively deal with their sexual lives.
Question of the day: Why is it that Republicans/Conservatives have a "hands off" policy concerning everything except the most personal of issues, human sexuality?
See here for the original article: HuffPost