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As reported at Time Magazine this week, most of the United States has started to wise up about the ineffectiveness and bias of abstinence-only (which differs from abstinence-plus or comprehensive sex education, both of which contain accurate and in-depth information on sex and sexual health, but which usually also make clear that forestalling sex or certain kinds of sex is often most safe) sex education pushed by the Bush administration, and which is funded by billions of taxpayer dollars to date, and $50 mil
One of the things that has a great influence in both how I enact sexuality education and how I conceptualized my approach from the get-go is my background with teaching in the Montessori Method.
In the last week, a congressional committee began -- finally!
We're already gearing up for the 2008 election and some candidates have some rather antiquated views on birth control. That's right, the pill and other routine methods of contraception considered controversial -- at least if you're trying to gain the Republican nomination for president. Take a look at what some of the candidates are saying:
I sent this in response to the New York Times piece published last week regarding abstinence-only education. Alas, I didn't hear back from them, so I offer it up here instead. I feel it's important to get as much informed commentary out there on this issue as possible right now, especially considering the recent continuance and increases given to abstinence-only funding.
"In 2005, 47 percent of high school students (6.7 million) reported having had sexual intercourse, down from 54 percent in 1991. The rate of those who reported having had sex has remained the same since 2003.
Of those who had sex during a three-month period in 2005, 63 percent -- about 9 million -- used condoms. That's up from 46 percent in 1991.
I'm about to take a much-needed week off -- one I've needed for a good year or more! -- but I wanted to hop in and catch all of you up with some recent changes here at the site, some new articles, and a couple pressing issues out and about in the world.
What we are talking about here is celibacy, the deliberate choice not to have a sexual partner for any period of time. There's nothing ambiguous about that. Being celibate entails sharing NO sexual acts with a partner: any kind of intercourse (vaginal or anal), oral sex, manual sex, and so forth. In other words, no physical, sexual contact with others; meaning any genital (penis or vulva) touch, with mouths, hands or anything else between you and someone else is off limits.
This probably isn't a big surprise for most people but it does take away a tool of the abstinence-only camp. For years they've been disparaging condom efficacy because condoms weren't proven to make a difference with things like HPV.
Between this study and the new vaccine HPV is looking more and more managable all the time.
Representative Barbara Lee (D-CA) and Senator Frank Lautenberg (D-NJ) introduced a bill yesterday that would provide $206 million a year in grant money to states for comprehensive, medically accurate, and science-based sex education. The bill, called the Responsible Education About Life (REAL) Act, would create a grant-giving program to be administered by the Department of Health and Human Services.