Lafayette
Over the last few weeks, the two houses of the Colorado legislature passed a bill that will mandate the teaching of science-based information about contraception and sexually transmitted diseases in sex-education curriculums that will remain abstinence-based. It’s about time.
Teaching high school students about contraception and STDs just makes sense. The fact is, teenagers are going to encounter sexual situations. Anyone who tries to deny that fact probably hasn’t spent much time around teenagers lately. Our society, especially the entertainment media, is constantly bombarding my peers and me with sexual images. Sex is a reality in the lives of many teens, and I can think of few options to change that unfortunate reality beyond completely reworking our society from the ground up.
With that in mind, having sex-ed classes that teach about contraception and STDs is the best solution to our society’s situation. If we cannot fight the disease – underage sexual activity – at least we can fight its harmful symptoms – teen pregnancy and the spread of STDs. Which isn’t to say that abstinence education is bad. Some do get the message and follow it. It is a tolerable solution for many. But teaching only abstinence is not enough.
Teenagers don’t like to feel like they’re being treated as children. We don’t like to think we’re not being told the whole story just because of our age. After years of being taught basic concepts, only to be told that what we were first taught is in fact an oversimplification and mostly wrong, many students become belligerent about not being told the whole story.
Students in a health class where only abstinence is being taught react in this way. It’s been a year or two, but I was there. I remember the snickers, the rolled eyes, the friends whispering, “Do they really expect us to believe this?”
What teenagers do like to feel is that they are being treated as adults. The atmosphere in a literature class the first time the teacher lets students discuss a work on their own, or in a science class the first time the teacher lets the students mix the chemicals to use in a lab, is electric. Students get excited – we are being allowed to chart our own course without teachers guiding every step.
This atmosphere, although a little more muted and with more giggling, is the same one in health classrooms when contraception and STDs are discussed. Those are adult subjects – subjects that adults have to and do consider on a daily basis. Students know that they are serious subjects, and they treat them as such. And they do so with interest, and, in my experience, maturity, because they realize the subjects are being presented to them not as teenagers, but as young adults.
Beyond just helping teenagers make safer decisions, however, teaching about contraception is especially important as it relates to an even more controversial subject: abortion.
State Sen. Brandon Shaffer, a Democrat from Longmont whose district includes my home, summed up my view when he was quoted in The Denver Post recently: “For me, this bill is really a pro-life bill. It’s about reducing unintended pregnancy and abortion.” I couldn’t agree more.
Abortion is an extremely touchy issue. Just about everyone has their own emotional and moral reasons for their position on it. I honestly still don’t know where I stand on the issue. I empathize with the arguments of both sides. (And, for those of you tempted to e-mail me with reasons why your side is right, I would just like to state, for the record, that I’m sure I can find plenty of material to do my own ethical research, if it’s all the same to you).
What I do know is this: A situation in which all sides would be happier is a situation in which fewer abortions and all the emotional strings attached to them are necessary. This situation could be brought about if there are fewer unplanned pregnancies. And the more teens know about contraception, the fewer unplanned pregnancies there will be. Teaching about contraception is a logical step not only towards preventing teenage girls and their families from having to go through the trauma surrounding an unplanned pregnancy, but also towards finding a piece of common ground in a divisive issue. It is one small solution to a part of a big issue.
Teaching about contraception and STDs in sex-ed classes does not encourage teenagers to have sex. If anything, learning about STDs scares some enough to make the safer choice of abstinence. Learning about contraception and STDs in the classroom helps to demystify sex, and knowing about the consequences of unprotected sex – and ways to avoid those consequences – can only help prevent more teenagers from suffering from those consequences.
We know that teenagers are going to have sex. It just makes sense to make sure that they are armed with information that will at the very least keep them safe.
Joel Minor (joelminor@comcast.net) is a senior at Centaurus High School in Lafayette.
