I can see your point, Walter. I can't understand why it's so difficult for some parents to cover all the sex ed bases, so I think it's a good thing as long as it's done properly.
What Massachusetts considered to be sex ed is an extremely poor way of teaching something that really isn't that complicated and they're just confusing the hell out of these kids.
I'm curious, Walter, if you mention love while teaching sex ed? I ask because the Massachusetts schools didn't cover that area.
Love was THE theme for many kids* (and one of the major parts of ANY of my group work).
* that's the groups between 12/13 and 15 with girls (boys started that not before 17, 18 and were generally more interested in SEX).
Slappy Doo Hoo wrote:What the hell is wrong with you?
Thomas, next time you visit the US, maybe you'll be a star on the TV show, "To Catch a Predator."
Chai wrote:After finally paying some attention to Thomas posts, it seems that he likes to consider himself avant garde and bohemian, not on the same plane with us mere mortals with a sense of morals.
No. I just honestly disagree with you. If you guys have arguments or evidence on the issue, I'm interested to hear and discuss them. If you only have
ad hominem speculations, I will just ignore you, and suggest that the two of you return the favor.
JPB, citing '[url=http://www.advocatesforyouth.org/publications/factsheet/fscondom.htm]facts on condoms[/url]', which in turn cites a textbook called '[url=http://www.contraceptivetechnology.org/]Reproductive Technology,[/url] wrote:two pregnancies arising from an estimated 8,300 acts of sexual intercourse, for a 0.02 percent per-condom pregnancy rate.[3]
* In one year with perfect use (meaning couples use condoms consistently and correctly at every act of sex), 98 percent of women relying on male condoms will remain pregnancy free. With typical use, 85 percent relying on male condoms will remain pregnancy free.[3]
* In one year with perfect use, 95 percent of women relying on the female condom will remain pregnancy free. With typical use, 79 percent relying on female condoms will remain pregnancy free.[3]
* By comparison, only 15 percent of women using no method of contraception in a year will remain pregnancy free.[3]
Reference 3: # Hatcher RA et al. Contraceptive Technology, 18th rev. ed. New York: Ardent Media, 2004.
Thanks, JPB. That is a decent source for Miller's claims.
In Thomas's defense, not that he needs me to defend him, Americans are much more uptight about sexuality that Europeans are. That is reflected in the poor attempts we have made to provide adequate sex education in our schools.
Ok Thomas, I'll try to find a large study that points out it's not ok to f**k kids. Maybe NAMBLA has some good info on their site.
Sorry Swimpy, but when the conversation turns to open wondering why it's wrong for a 40 year old man to have sex with a 14 year old, I draw the line.
Not everything has to be explained with facts and figures.
Even if such an obvious thing was brought up with volumes of easy to find data, the validity of it, whether or not it was all the data, whose definitions were being used, would all be put up to scrutiny.
In the meantime, I don't see any data being brought up where it's healthy for these things to happen, or even for people of a similar young age engaged in sex.
Show the data, show the data....well, show your data. It's easy to sit back and question others on obvious things, making them run around and do the work.
Convince us of your point, or convince us that you really don't know.
That's crap when someone says to the effect "well, I just really don't KNOW if it's not heathy for a 13 or 14 year old to have sex with a 45 year old, I just don't KNOW."
Thomas, you just like to jerk people around. Admit it.
Swimpy wrote:In Thomas's defense, not that he needs me to defend him, Americans are much more uptight about sexuality that Europeans are. That is reflected in the poor attempts we have made to provide adequate sex education in our schools.
And one of the reasons for the late arrival of sex education in Public Schools is the fight often waged in the US between Church and State.
No need to apologize to me, Chai. I think Thomas, in his own inimitable way, has put a spotlight on how we Amerkins wig out whenever anyone mentions that people under some magical age are having sex. The fact is that they are.
Let's not turn this into an argument about adults preying on children. Even if that never happens, young people will continue to have sex. We can either attempt to educate them and provide them with the tools they need to protect themselves or stick our heads in the sand.
Good sex education should also include education on avoiding becoming a victim.
OK, wig away.
Chai wrote:In the meantime, I don't see any data being brought up where it's healthy <snip> for people of a similar young age engaged in sex.
It doesn't matter whether or not it's healthy. It's happening, and has been happening for decades.
What are parents and schools doing about it? How are they preparing children for their very real sexual thoughts/desires/activities?
~~~
When I see people saying it's not right for children/young teenagers to have sex, I often see (in real life) the same people not helping their children understand the sexual feelings/desires they have/will have.
So the children, rightly or wrongly, think their parents don't know that they (the children) are having those feelings/desires - "don't understand" - and proceed to sexual activity without having been able to honestly speak with their parents about their sexual thoughts and feelings.
Ignoring the reality of those desires/feelings, or being uncomfortable talking about them is simply a cop-out. People had those kids, they're responsible for them - all of the good and bad, fun and not-so-fun bits.
If they don't want to do it themselves, I think they should admit their squeamishness and be pleased that it can be discussed at school.
~~~~~
~~~~~
edit: and there's Swimpy having said it in a more succinct and nicer way.
Quote:young people will continue to have sex. We can either attempt to educate them and provide them with the tools they need to protect themselves or stick our heads in the sand.
Good sex education should also include education on avoiding becoming a victim.
OK, wig away.
I watch different posters' modes of discourse here, including my own. There are some few that argue near sans emotion about principles (some even take a side for fun, on occasion) and based on closely watched verbiage and logic; some, on the other hand, 'argue' almost purely from emotion.
I put myself in between, as occasionally expressing opinions I've obtained through threshing my oft emotionally felt views past logic tests that my brain throws at me. By the time I've worked out some of my political opinions, for example, they've been through myriad of my own logic thresher tests. I've little interest in arguing them, though I have interest in any new info to my data base for the next threshing scenario.
Thomas argues closely re what phrases and sentences mean.
First of all, Thomas didn't say 40, although that number doesn't matter in the argument. When I was fourteen I was, g'help me, in love with Fess Parker, aka, Davy Crockett. No idea how old he was in 1956.
When I was 17, I was gaga about a 35 year old film editor on a trip I took with my dad to make an industrial film. My gaga-ness kept me from fulfilling my signed application to become a postulant in an order of nuns, so it was pretty powerful. (Nothing came of it, I remained virginal, not all so odd back then, in that time and place. Not least because he didn't hit on me.)
I generally see 14 and 30 as a power differential, at least in some places and times. In, say, the US today, I see a thirty year old taking away the nascent years, the precious awakening years, which are too messed up as they are, from children wanting to get away from parents' rules, 'children' being the word on purpose given how we raise our young - that's another whole subject and I'm not against protecting them.
Of course Davy Crockett and I would have been a destructive liason. (I would have said rosaries for him and he would have become Saint Crockett).
But, I can imagine sometime, somewhere, that 14 and 30 could work. It is human nature that it could. It has done, and not all so long ago in our US history. It happens all over the world.
People need to be equipped with information, period.
I gather Walter could tell us more about timing re what is appropriate from years to years, not to put him on the spot.
On Montana's take on Massachusett's teachings, it has me wondering - I somehow doubt that quote you made, Montana, as being typical of the teaching. Maybe you got a bunch suggesting exploration. I'd like more data on that.
Not that this is not the time for exploration, but the suggestion of it, I'd have to think about.
With Swimpy,
Good sex education should also include education on avoiding becoming a victim.
Chai wrote:
In the meantime, I don't see any data being brought up where it's healthy <snip> for people of a similar young age engaged in sex.
ehBeth said:
It doesn't matter whether or not it's healthy. It's happening, and has been happening for decades.
Decades... millennia..
ossobuco wrote:Chai wrote:
In the meantime, I don't see any data being brought up where it's healthy <snip> for people of a similar young age engaged in sex.
ehBeth said:
It doesn't matter whether or not it's healthy. It's happening, and has been happening for decades.
Decades... millennia..
It's not kids having sex with each other...but a 30 year old man has to be a sick bastard to have sex with a 14 year old. Sorry I do not have any studies to link, or I don't know anyone my age who bangs kids and is "normal" I can talk about.
I can only speak personally to decades :wink:
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slappy, I'm not 100% sure what anyone else is talking about - I'm simply (?) talking about young people having sex.
Lot of us wouldn't be here if our great grandmothers hadn't had sex at 15, with a 30 year old or older. Get over it, it has been part of life. Some portion of those great grandmothers loved those great grandfathers.
No, I sure don't recommend it, re the power issue, plus the too-soon wake up to adult concerns.
So, all those great grandfathers were pervs?
My grandfather was 32 when he married my 16 yr old grandmother, they remained happily married for over 60 years.
I find (and found) to difficult to specify a certain age when a kid could have sex. I really don't think it's something someone else should decide (besides legal borders which are, however, on a different level).
I've some very personal ideas about younger women<>men and older women<>men having sexual contacts.
But this is just a result of my socialisation ... and changed/chances over the times.
Has there been any mention of the role of religion in determining when a child should become sexually active?
