DriveThru – Get What You Need

The U.K. Federal Commission for Children and Youth (FCCY) discovered that 12- to 14-year-old boys are having sex without condoms. The solution? 

The “Hotshot,” a small condom specifically designed to fit 12-year-old boys. Because handing out Jr. Condoms to Junior at school will fix the slightly more-than-concerning problem of pre-teen boys having sex, right?

The U.K. Telegraph reports that Family Planning groups along with the Swiss Aids Federation, lobbied to have the smaller condom produced. No surprise here. International Planned Parenthood wants to “help” children as young as 10.

Even Joe Leprechaun doesn’t have to eat Bangers and Mash to know that throwing condoms – even little condoms – to lads and lassies will not fix the U.K.’s core behavioral problem of kids having sex with kids.

Sex should never be promoted as an acceptable activity for children, little condom or not. Government and schools should not be teaching to the lowest standard, unless they hope to “achieve” the lowest standard.

Isn’t it due time the FCCY and other government entities to raise the standard, rather than listen to “Family Planning” groups, whose very existence depends on children having sex with children and propagating dire, desperate circumstances?

What children need is more parental communication - including instruction about sex – and more school advocacy for higher sexual standards and a touch (perhaps a load) more discretion from the media. What they don’t need is a smaller condom.

See Focus President Jim Daly’s blog on this subject.

Five out of 12 major anti-family policies in the omnibus spending bill are related to funding abortions and liberalizing sex education. You can thank bill-supporting Members of Congress (House, Senate) and our President for the following “gifts” just before Christmas 2009:

• Elimination of abstinence education funds ($zero$)
• Funding for Planned Parenthood (Title X funding boost to $315M)
• Publicly funded abortions for D.C. residents in our nation’s Capitol
• U.S. funding for U.N. population control, including China’s one-child policy and subsequent abortions (U.S. Taxpayers will pay $5M more)
• International family planning – fund overseas abortions – Mexico City Policy – ($103M more)

The Heritage Foundation posted a Web article titled, “Twelve Anti-Family Gifts From Congress,” [Dec. 22, 2009],   that lists another seven egregious funds and policies passed in by Congress in the omnibus spending bill. Policies such as more funding to keep people on welfare, needle exchange, limiting free speech, ending D.C. scholarship program, domestic partner benefits for D.C. employees and legalized “medical” marijuana … “high” in a pear treeeeee …

Supporting Members of Congress voted in favor of this bill, and President Obama signed it into law. We certainly hope they enjoy all the Piggy Pudding they passed in the $1.1 Trillion Pork-nibus spending bill with more than 5,000 earmarks.

Though this battle was lost in 2009, the war is far from over in 2010.

MORE INFORMATION

• See a PDF of The Heritage Foundation’s Twelve Anti-Family Gifts From Congress … 
• See Appendix for 2010 Budget of the U.S. Government … 
• See Consolidated Appropriations Act, 2010 – H.R. 3288 (omnibus spending bill) …  [PDF]

There’s been a growing movement afoot for states to “voluntarily” adopt national curriculum standards. So far 47 states have signed up (the holdouts are Alaska, Texas and South Carolina).

“Voluntary” is a subjective word, since it’s becoming obvious how the Obama Administration intends to use federal funding as a stick to force contrarians into line.

While this is a concerning trend, it’s not really time for flashing sirens yet—because, so far, academics are still fighting amongst themselves over who exactly should have input into the final standards and what they should look like. It remains to be seen whether the states can agree.

So I guess you could say the threat level is yellow.  In the meantime, we can look to England for some insight into where this might lead.

In 1989, England implemented a national curriculum with a call for uniformity on core subjects. But what started as core standards, now includes compulsory sex education classes that teach kids about homosexuality and same-sex unions.   Apparently, faith-based schools are not exempt—they’ll have to engage in controversial teaching, while explaining that it “runs contrary to their religious beliefs.”

Others experts have expressed concerns that politically correct agendas are edging out core subjects and that student performance on national tests has stalled in recent years.

So before we embark on another failed experiment, perhaps we should learn a lesson from our friends across the ocean.

A Government-backed youth program in the United Kingdom did not reduce teenage pregnancies, by half, as promised. An independent report, published in the British Medical Journal and commissioned by the UK Department of Health, concluded that the Program only reduced teen pregnancies by 11 percent from 2004 to 2007.  And now, teen pregnancy rates are starting to climb.

The strategy has involved the expansion of comprehensive sex-education programs and the provision of contraception in schools – exactly what the U.S. intends to do with sex education in the proposed 2010 federal budget. More than 12 years have passed and the UK has seen little progress, if not the opposite of what they wanted.

Regarding United Kingdom students in the comprehensive, contraception-based ”safe-sex” program:

• Students were more likely to have sex at an earlier age than the comparison group (not enrolled in the safe-sex  program)
• More than twice the number of girls in the safe-sex program became pregnant versus the comparison group (16% v. 6%)
• More than half the students in the safe-sex program had sex before the age of 16, almost twice as many as the comparison group (56% v. 33%)

Despite millions of dollars (pounds) poured into the comprehensive, safe-sex program, Britain maintains the infamous reputation of having the worst teen pregnancy problem in Western Europe. The report concludes that there was no evidence that the scheme reduced pregnancies, delayed sex, cut cannabis use or achieved a fall in how often the teenagers got drunk compared to their peers.

“This approach undermines any attempt by parents to discourage their children from having early sexual relationships, and the consequences have been all too predictable,” according to the Telegraph article.

Meanwhile, back in the United States, the Obama Administration and House of Representatives have zeroed out abstinence education funding.

What now? The 2010 Budget plans to pour millions of dollars into comprehensive sex education programs that have already proven ineffective in Europe and have little evidence of working in the U.S.

It looks like we’re planning to spend millions treating the symptoms rather than addressing the problem. For groups like Planned Parenthood, SIECUS, Advocates for Youth, Durex condoms, et al, this should be quite lucrative, at the expense of another generation.

Truth be told, sex is not “safe” outside the context of marriage - it has consequences, even within marriage. And there has never been a condom created to protect the hearts and minds of children and young adults. We are emotional, intellectual, social and ethical beings – not merely physical commodities to be exploited for self-gratification.

Isn’t there a better way to spend taxpayers’ money and train children to a higher expected standard? Your Congressmen  are supposed to represent you, the citizen. Tell them what you think about the removal of abstinence education in exchange for contraceptive-based, “safe-sex” education in America.

Read entire Telegraph article …

MORE ARTICLES ON THIS TOPIC:

Multi-million pound Government scheme ‘could have increased teen pregnancies’
 
Teenage pregnancies: a real sex scandal: The disappointing fall in teenage pregnancies is the result of a shocking failure of policy.