The principal of a high school in Texas (where else?) is censoring the school’s yearbook.
Senior Megan Estes, editor in chief of The Elk, said the point of the article, featuring two seniors who also are teen mothers, was to show fellow students how the girls are coping with motherhood and how their lives have changed. Estes said the principal told her he felt the article “glamorized” the teen mothers’ mistakes.
Principal Paul Cash said the topic of the article conflicts with the school’s abstinence-based curriculum. He also said he does not think the community would want that topic covered in the yearbook.
I think reality conflicts with the school’s abstinence-based curriculum. I wonder if he’s got an answer for that?
Probably something like “close your eyes real hard.”
Remember, teens will never have sex if we don’t talk about it.
This is the kind of shit that drives me absolutely crazy. First of all, abstinence only don’t work. We know that. So let’s get that out of the way from the start.
The worse point, though, is that even talking about teen motherhood is viewed as “glamorizing” it. Anyone who has spent time with teenage mothers, listening to them describe the challenges in their lives that involve trying to be bother mothers and students–and often employees as well–knows that there is no “glamorizing” going on. These kids deserve credit for getting the work done to have graduated, despite the difficulties that having a child presents. An honest picture shows that these young women have succeeded under difficult circumstances, and talks about each of those.
That’s not glamorizing what they did. It’s providing an honest assessment. Could we deal with reality please?
Yup, sounds like that policy’s working real well.
Remember, teens will never have sex if we don’t talk about it.
The Introductory chapter to my MA thesis was titled “Don’t Talk About it or They’ll Do It.” I studied 10 years of Christian Right discourse on sex ed. These people make me crazy. They are so ignorant and so dishonest. And there’s a very real cruelty to a lot of the ideology as well.
Principal Paul Cash said the topic of the article conflicts with the school’s abstinence-based curriculum.
More like, “It shows what a failure the abstinence-based curriculum has been, and we can’t let people learn this fact, lest they decide to change it.”
I thought abstinence-only meant abstinence was the only thing you could teach, not abstinence is the only thing that exists. But what really caught my attention in the article was this:
That is bad on so many levels.
Of course, this brings to mind Roy Zimmerman’s
“Abstain With Me”.
MAJeff wrote:
I certainly don’t endorse the theory that teens will never have sex if we don’t talk about it, and the fact that the school even has an abstinence-based curriculum is a clue to how they’ve got things fundy backwards. But I’m not going to jump the gun and say this is an “honest picture” or that the young women have “succeeded” in everything they wanted to do. We really don’t know that and the odds are their pregnancies have cost them a lot in terms of future potentials. Potential life choices they hadn’t anticipated are gone now.
Were those costs talked about honestly?
Texas pays a high price for their Voluntary Ignorance Only policy on well,…everything.
Texas has a teen age pregnancy rate much higher than the national average. Which will most likely go up since the national average is going up in lockstep with abstinence only sex ed.
A lot of states that value children over ideology have told the federal government to take their unworkable abstinence only fundie nonsense and shove it.
Were those costs talked about honestly?
I dunno. You’re right, context matters. For some young women, graduation as a mother is a much greater accomplishment (in terms of difficulties faced, etc.) than others. (I’ve got one friend in particular who’ve talked about feeding her kids hamburger helper without any hamburger, and who now has Masters Degrees…there were some hurdles overcome in her life…but I’m also thinking of the young women I saw in very poverty-stricken areas having to drop out of school just to take care of their children…) I would have no problem, indeed, it would preferable, if the larger issue were discussed and these young women’s lives as both entries into the larger phenomenon, but also as some of the stories that comprised the graduating class….
MAJeff, #3:
Actually that depends on what you mean by “work”. If the goal is to prevent unwanted pregnancy, then sure, obviously abstinence-only doesn’t work. But I’m going to argue (despite my snark at #4) that that’s not the real goal. Busybody moralizers need bad examples to point to, and abstinence-only provides them. They need a way to pigeonhole people as “good girls” or “bad girls”, and abstinence-only makes it humiliatingly obvious who the “bad girls” are. Abstinence-only does exactly what its cynical promoters want it to do, and they simply don’t care if lives get ruined in the process.
In this sense it’s not unlike school prayer, the real point of which is not to defend children’s religious rights. It’s to give school officials a litmus test by which to identify non-conforming troublemakers and pigeonhole kids as either “one of us” or “one of them”.
that the young women have “succeeded” in everything they wanted to do.
And I didn’t say at everything they do. But they succeeded in getting their high school diplomas. In large parts of this country, that is an accomplishment (which says very sad things about the state of our nation).
Teen age pregnancy correlates very highly with present and future poverty.
There goes college, careers, traveling around the world, and anything but an uphill struggle forever.
A few might break out of that cul-de-sac but not many.
“I beleive that as principal of the school it is my obligation to make sure that whatever our students put into press accurately reflects the ideals and values of the community,” Cash said.
So the students do not count as a part of the community, eh? And the ideals and values of the community do not include sympathy?:/
The story is two weeks old. The yearbook was due for the publishers yesterday. I tried to find news about this but I found no current information.
Those students are free to publicize – on their own dollar.
Replace “teen mother” with “drug user” or “DUI”
Again, it’s the schools policy rightly put forth to
provide examples to AVOID teen prenancies, to
avoid the use of drugs and oh, let’s say drunk driving.
Chances are, the article won’t put forth how life is really
going to suck for them and what opportunies they’re going to
miss. Instead – what do the students write about? – a
candy coating of how some student supposedly ‘overcame’ some ordeal they got themselves into because of bad choices, their choices.
When you glamorize and tell these teens’ stories, thus
the school promoting opposing views, it just confuses
the heck of the high schoolers and that age is difficult enough.
Do you think those teens really want to be pregnant?
Why not tell the stories of the kid that was sexually
abused or the guy that got the DUI or the group of stoners
that will end up making you fries in a few years?
Those stories would be fairy tales, soon forgotten and nowhere
close to reality without any regard to the future life consequences
of bad choices those people made. Where’s the reality in that?
Reality for the bad choices some make isn’t the reality most of
us want, or need, nor care, to hear.
motherhood is the equivalent of drug addiction. Might be a new angle worth trying….
The people who push “Abstinence Only” sex education (which gives no advice or information on birth control whatsoever) will always think the program works — even if 99% of the students who take it end up pregnant. They are not looking at statistics. They are looking at personal stories — the one kid who did it right.
Remember, this is for the most part the same religious crowd which takes the tale of Noah and his Ark — a situation where every human being on earth excluding 8 and every living animal on earth excluding a single pair of each species is DROWNED in sudden, screaming agony — and they tell it to their kids, as a happy, happy story about happy, happy animal buddies and God and His loving promise of the pretty, pretty rainbow to the happy, happy Noah family. They take a situation where virtually everyone in the entire world will suffer excruciating torments in eternal agony except for a few Real Christians — and they call it Good News.
The idea of sacrificing the many for the sake of a perfect few is nothing new to them. If they became convinced that Abstinence Only Sex Education actually increases both teen sex and teen pregnancy, it would not bother them a bit. They would tell each other the wonderful story of little Brittany who took the class, took it to heart, and SHE never ended up having sex before marriage, because of that class. It worked! Happy, happy Brittany. Good news. Yea!
I think reality has a conflict with most of Burleson, Texas.
One of the three self-described radical Christian activists arrested July 4 for attempting to ignite a bomb at a Burleson church pleaded guilty Feb. 5 in Dallas.
Let’s compare
With philos1856, senior dipshit and fuckwit’s clever analysis:
What was Sastra’s comment about eschewing reality in favour of personal stories?
Oh, in case philos1856 doesn’t get that I’m making fun of his or her extremely limited intelligence–likely given his or her demonstrated inability to read, I’m going to spell it out for him or her: you’re a retard, and for all of our sakes I hope you’ll practice abstinence only for the rest of your life, you dumb shit.
you’re a retard, and for all of our sakes I hope you’ll practice abstinence only for the rest of your life, you dumb shit.
http://home.earthlink.net/~tjneal/stupid.wav
Simply put, it’s pathetic. The senior who wrote this article is obviously taking her potential as a future journalist very seriously and is trying to cover tough issues — tough issues that Fundy grown-ups prefer to shut their eyes to.
What part of growing up made these people forget that a lack of awareness leads to mistakes?
So Megan didn’t write the piece in an apocalyptic light. Her choice to show strength in the face of adversity illustrated that THERE IS ADVERSITY IN THIS CIRCUMSTANCE. It is the perfect approach for her purpose — to remind her classmates that actions have consequences.
If I hadn’t been reminded of these very consequences in high school, I might not have held off having sex out of fear of the consequences. Other kids around me — the ones whose parents refused to talk to them about sex, the ones who didn’t have the facts — had sex, got pregnant, and lamented their stupidity.
It’s just as PZ said… “close your eyes real hard.”
Happy, happy Brittany
0.o
hmm, let’s try that surprised look again?
O.o
P.S. As bizarre as it is for me to say this, there was a Family Guy episode that actually had a strong message about this exact topic.
Ear sex, anybody?
promoting opposing views… just confuses the heck of the high schoolers and that age is difficult enough.
As a former high schooler myself, I would respond, “Bite me.”
Close your eyes ….. and what? Lie back, and think of England?
Ear sex, anybody?
naww, too busy lickin’ toad.
:p
MAJeff wrote:
True, you didn’t. And getting their high school diplomas is a good thing. Don’t confuse my position with philos1856’s. But I do suspect these high school kids don’t really know yet what the costs of a family are in the long term. I sure didn’t have a clear picture of what post high school life would be like when I was in high school. That’s not going to really sink in till they’re out of high school and trying to go to college or get jobs. I hope they have families that can help them.
#17—Have you read the article the students wrote? No? Me neither. So, maybe it does “candy coat” the realities of teen motherhood. But maybe it doesn’t. Neither one of us knows, because we have not read it.
Secondly, if you’re interested in only reading winners’ stories, and never dealing with the reality of someone who—horrors!!—made a mistake, even a really bad one, fine for you. No one’s forcing you to read the article.
And yes, it is accurate to speak of “overcoming” one’s own bad choices, although obviously it’s not the same as overcoming obstacles that one has no control over. It still takes a certain amount of guts to look at some mess that you’ve made in your life, accept responsibility, and still try for better things.
Now now – no need to worry about abstinence; that charming personality and overflowing compassion should serve philos1856 admirably as birth control.
So, which form of motherhood would you recommend, injection or oral?
That’s not going to really sink in till they’re out of high school and trying to go to college or get jobs. I hope they have families that can help them.
I’d bet that a lot of the mothers have better ideas of the difficulties ahead than do the kids who aren’t parents.
One of the things that makes me crazy is a position like philos’s. Let’s make their lives more difficult, shall we?
It’s hard work being a parent, even harder as a single parent, even harder as a teenage single parent. Providing resources that will help alleviate some of the difficulties, and informing folks about what life is like, and how becoming a parent changes life and produces new challenges, both seem to me to be ethical and efficacious approaches to these problems. Better educated kids tend not to get pregnant as often and kids who are parents tend to do better when there are programs in place to help them succeed.
But no. We’ve got to punish them. And we’ve got to punish their children. That’ll show everyone else!
So, which form of motherhood would you recommend, injection or oral?
Well, I’m afraid of needles, so I’d go with smoking or snorting.
Spot on, PZ. That’s how religious conservatives live, I think. They just stick their fingers in their ears, close their eyes and sing, “Lalala, we’re not listening.” That is why they are so out of touch with modern American culture.
MAJeff wrote:
True, in fact I’m pretty sure of it, they need that knowledge now. I didn’t. But better isn’t necessarily completely on target. How could it be? All they’ve known is school.
Jee, I wonder how that makes those gals feel? Maybe they should ask him, to his face, what he really thinks of them. I predict stuttering.
Anybody else wonder if the principal’s interest in censorship might be related to the fact that two pregnant teens in his school doesn’t say a lot for the efficacy of his abstinence-only education?
Oops, looks like Joe beat me to the punch.
Wimp. Only a real mother mainlines motherhood. Tie me off, off. TIE ME OFF!
So, which form of motherhood would you recommend, injection or oral?
I thought oral was what all the kids were doing these days to keep from getting pregnant in the first place.
Here is a good story about a Colorado state rep. who called teen moms “sluts” in a public speech, but then had the guts to go visit a teen mom specific high school after they wrote letters giving him what for. It really is worth the read.
Just completed reading “Atlas Shrugged” by Ayn Rand and she has a great word for principals and other creationists who think like that: somnambulists.
I thought oral was what all the kids were doing these days to keep from getting pregnant in the first place.
That’s aural, as per the mention of Family Guy above.
…
Probably something like “close your eyes real hard.”
Apparently the young ladies did not get the message to keep certain other body parts ‘closed real hard’.
…tom…
.
Aural sex, ha ha HAHahahaa. Perfect. :D
Seriously, though. We should all be so lucky as to have a Lois Griffin-type visit schools and tell kids what their parents–who seem to have forgotten what it was like to be a teenager–won’t tell them.
My dad didn’t have the sex talk with me — even when he caught me fooling around. I think deep down he knew I was too terrified to actually “go all the way”. Our sex talk came when I was 19 and I went to stay with a boyfriend in another part of the state. “Just don’t come back married or pregnant, okay?” This same method would not work with a kid who wasn’t smart enough to be afraid of sex. :D My fear didn’t work against me, it worked for me. By the time I was grown-up enough to know what the risks were, I was conditioned enough by my knowledge to know how to avoid mistakes.
Unfortunately, priming kids with the idea of abstinence is like plugging up a dam with bubblegum. At some point, it’s just going to explode. And then that dam explodes with… er… babies.
Since we’re talking sexuality education, I’m going to put in a plug for some folks I think do pretty good work:
http://midwestteensexshow.com
They do web-based sexuality education. It’s officially only for people over 18-years-of-age. However, if you’re interested in doing sexuality education among youth, or if you have young people, they do awesome work. I’ve also supported them by purchasing this t-shirt, which I wore to teach on Valentine’s Day.
Oh, is aural sex what you get when you call 1-900 numbers? That could get expensive. Mr. Deity sort of used that for a laugh, too.
A dam exploding with babies is not a mental image I wanted!
Ewwww.
Why are there articles about these teens in the yearbook, anyway? It sounds like they might work well in a school newspaper, but yearbook?
My high school did a lot of “special interest” articles throughout the yearbook. It was especially nice for the students who weren’t the typical center of attention for the school – there were pages for the vo-tech program, the auto shop students, etc.
I’m with tinvfrog, #48.
I don’t endorse censorship or abstinence only sex education, but this really isn’t something that belongs in a year book.
A school paper is perfect for this sort of thing. The students used poor judgment by placing it in the yearbook.
Frank discussions of issues like teen pregnancy have their place, and it’s not in a yearbook. Should we have a section devoted to drug abuse as well? Both are important issues, but they don’t belong in a yearbook.
OEJ
It’s always Texas.
The tone and the circumstances are important. If a student died of a drug overdose, let’s say, I could see the yearbook running an “In Memoriam” page. (Depends on the school and the student, of course, but it’s not beyond the realm of the possible.) I was on my high school’s literary magazine, and we would certainly have tried to do such a thing. We’d have been shot down, naturally: our administrative staff didn’t even like the opinion column which said that we should kick boy bands in the crotch and run away.
We’re not shutting our eyes really hard – it’s just not our problem and why involve me, with your problem, in my yearbook?
Well, for all the ‘censorship’ fanatic readers that seem to endorse the promotion of stories highlighting the unfortunate and negatively influencing life-altering decisions high schoolers can make in their lives instead of the positive ones that relate well to the school’s and communities’ philosophy, you are free to open up your own school,
write your stories ad nauseum about all the mistakes your peers make
and see what happens.
In the meantime, quit whining.
Of course, no one will know what will happen to the student themselves. They’re forgotten. Or, will you help them?
We’ll just think they’ll climb themselves out of the mess and well,
you’ll go on with your life, now won’t you?
Too bad Ms. Estes doesn’t compare the pregnant students from 20 years
ago and see how they’re doing.
My highest regards to these two girls for a difficult job accomplished. However, for approximately 95% of teen agers becoming pregnant, their life script is written, and it ain’t pretty. I do not have the studies at hand, and actually read them a number of years ago. My best recall is that, statistically, most will not finish high school, will have another pregnancy soon, will stay below poverty level, etc., etc. I worked all my career as a public health nurse–I vote for lots of sex education, contraception and abortion when necessary. Hormones will win over abstinence every time. Thanks for a great blog.
Let us get past all the socio-sexual politics of abstinence-only education and focus on the immediate issue at hand – should the school’s yearbook glamorize and otherwise validate teen motherhood? I for one say no. Featuring teen mothers in the school’s yearbook, regardless of how their situation is treated, provides a very significant stamp of approval that is simply innappropriate.
Oh, really? WTF?!?
Whatever happened to “Teach The Controversy”?!? Whatever happened to “Give the kids all the information they need, and let them decide what’s right”?
LMELLAO
Kseniya, what does the ELL in LMELLAO stand for?
“write your stories ad nauseum about all the mistakes your peers make
and see what happens.”
Um… maybe education happens? Lower teen pregnancy rates happen?
I really love your “We’re not closing our eyes, we just don’t want to look at that!” statement. Pathetic.
Texas. Gotta love ’em, bless their pointed little heads. Don’t bother us with your reality, we want pretty prom pictures.
Abstinence-only education is right – they’re abstaining from education.
“Kseniya, what does the ELL in LMELLAO stand for?”
I’m guessing “ever-loving liberal”
Oddly enough, in at least one study girls who got pregnant and had (legal) abortions were more likely to stay in school than girls who had babies or girls who didn’t get pregnant. It seems that decding to have the abortion made them feel more in charge of their lives. The major feeling reported after aboortion is relief.
“We’re not shutting our eyes really hard – it’s just not our problem and why involve me, with your problem, in my yearbook?”
Thanks, philo1856, for a prime example of the attitude most people in our society have toward their fellow human beings.
Life isn’t all butterflies and rainbows, and these young mothers shouldn’t be relegated to the invisible, “we don’t really talk about that here” category at their school or in their community. Why not at least deal with the topic in the yearbook? The school community probably doesn’t have a newsletter or some other method of telling the stories of the students there, so maybe the yearbook is the only way.
Oh and Tom? FOAD, you misogynistic twat. Either that, or make disparaging comments about the boys involved in these teenage pregnancies as well. They didn’t really keep it in their pants either.
Craig is a… a genius!
Too bad Ms. Estes doesn’t compare the pregnant students from 20 years ago and see how they’re doing.
I’ll ask my nephew how he’s doing 24 years after his mother got pregnant as a teen. Oops, can’t. The band he formed after his university graduation is busy touring right now.
Fuck, philo, but you really need to go play in traffic.
I couldn’t agree more with most of the sentiments expressed here. Abstinence only sex ed is a disaster for everyone. But look on the bright side of things. Fifty years ago, pregnant teens would have been sent away to a home for pregnant girls, who were then made to feel filthy and slimy, and forced to carry the child to term only to give it up for adoption. And the girls’ absences from home for six to eight months was explained away by saying they’re sick or some such lie. At least today pregnant teens in most places have the option of an abortion and if one does choose to carry the child to term, neither the child nor the mother is usually ostracized with the same condemnation they were half a century ago–except maybe in Burleson TX. Things have changed for the better. They just haven’t gotten where they should be.
promoting opposing views… just confuses the heck of the high schoolers and that age is difficult enough.
Thank you, philos1856, for reducing me to a drooling half-wit who can’t do much more then stare blankly and wimper when faced with two different viewpoints. Your respect warms my soul and brightens my life. Clearly, My classmates and I are not near adults capable of facing the world and evaluating what we want. We’re all toddlers who should be back in the nursery!
I think the principal is on to something….they should research the sexual history of the parents of the kids in the school. Any kid whose parents were teens or unmarried at conception…those students shouldn’t be pictured as well.
…just a modest proposal
Any kid whose parents were teens or unmarried at conception…
My parents’ fortieth anniversary was yesterday. My fortieth birthday is in September. Mom didn’t like it when I figured that out at about the age of 9. Nothing like having to go in front of the asshole church elders and apologize to them and the congregation in order to still get married in her church.
Featuring teen mothers in the school’s yearbook, regardless of how their situation is treated, provides a very significant stamp of approval that is simply innappropriate.
Yeah, and shaming them works sooooo much better. Why, back when sluts were sluts and pregnant teens got sent off to group homes to give up their babies in secrecy, the teen pregnancy rate was way lower than it is now! Oh, wait. It was almost twice as high then as it is now.
Since you don’t agree with the teens being mothers, I guess you’re in support of them having abortions instead, then?
And do you honestly think a page in the yearbook is “glamorizing” it? Jeez, I think I’ll get pregnant so I can have a bigger picture and a paragraph in my school yearbook! Big influential factor, there.
The original article says that stories on teen moms in the yearbook has been done several times before; it’s just this principal who is opposed to it ostensibly on the grounds that the yearbook is a school publication, which is supposed to be educational and “not intended to be venues for student expression.”
Isn’t the school yearbook supposed to be exactly that, a venue for student expression? Otherwise why have students do all the work putting it together?
If anything, these two teen mothers are the living proof that abstinence-based curriculums DO NOT WORK.
Kids want to fuck. Okay? It’s simple. It’s the hormones, it’s the lust, it’s the instinct and the strong feelings it gives. Telling them not to do it only makes it better for them. Let’s face it, doing something forbidden is even more awesome when we’re kids. If anything, they should use the two girls as a way to promote safe sex, and not say they are a bad example! They’re an example of something “bad” that can happen for a teen for sure, but only because of the probably-missing-condom part… not because they had SEX.
I bet he’s against masturbation too. And pro marriage. Damn it, teens just can’t have any fun.
Oh, and my parents are a whopping 19 years older than me, and their marriage is a whole 7 months older than me, so tballou, philos, and Tom, fuck off.
I thought he was banned, anyway.
Funny choice of handle, given what a proven hater he is.
Hey, what ever happened to “academic freedom” and “teaching the controversy?”
Oh, right; that’s just for evolution.
For what it’s worth, we had a pic in one of recent high school yearbooks that showed one of our grads with her little boy. He was three, so you can do the math. No big deal, at least for us.
Of course, we’re a librul school affiliated with those backsliding Episcopals …
#16: The story is two weeks old. The yearbook was due for the publishers yesterday. I tried to find news about this but I found no current information.
I searched on Facebook and found a HS-looking girl by that name in the Dallas/Ft. Worth network, which is Burleson’s area. I sent her a message asking her what the outcome was. I’ll post back here if I get a response.
When my parents got married, I was already 11 years old and had two younger brothers. Does that mean I’m going to Hell? Or that they are? Or all of us are? Ye Gods! This is confusing. Maybe mom and dad were so stupid they didn’t realize they were “in trouble” until I was eleven. This thinking thing is really hard. And overrated. Damn you athiest of atheists!
Maybe mom and dad were so stupid they didn’t realize they were “in trouble” until I was eleven.
Well, you know, those pregnancy test results can be pretty hard to read sometimes.
Wasn’t the same Megan Estes. Nuts! She did say that she’s been getting this question a lot lately.
Carlie :-D
FishyFred, she’s in the Burleson High School Network, not Dallas/Fort Worth. I told her that someone was trying to find her and she was amused.
The article didn’t end up in the yearbook. The pages were instead filled with hundreds of quotes from students at the school.
Actually, whether or not a teenage girl who gets pregnant and raises her child ends up living in poverty depends a lot upon the socioeconomic class of her parents. The teenagers who raise their children below the poverty line and pretty much stay there generally start out there. Middle and lower middle class girls who were planning to go to college prior to the pregnancy generally do, even thought it usually takes them longer.
Plus, at my rather exclusive university, when we took an informal poll of the women on my dorm floor as to how they lost their virginity and the kind of birth control used, pretty much all reported “No birth control” or “withdrawl”. Yet because they happended to not get pregnant or else aborted if they did, they are”roll models” and those who got pregnant aren’t. Right. Makes lots of sense.
We’re not shutting our eyes really hard – it’s just not our problem and why involve me, with your problem, in my yearbook?
Nothing bad ever happens to you, right?
http://www.lyricsfreak.com/o/oingo+boingo/nothing+bad+ever+happens_20102799.html
moron.
Yeah, and shaming them works sooooo much better. Why, back when sluts were sluts and pregnant teens got sent off to group homes to give up their babies in secrecy, the teen pregnancy rate was way lower than it is now! Oh, wait. It was almost twice as high then as it is now.
*just claps speechlessly and uproariously*
maybe this is insensitive, but why [b]are[/b] there teen mothers in a country where abortion has been legal for more than three decades now?
it isn’t that they like the hardship that they know they will face if they do become teenage mothers, is it?
oh! wait, is this another result of the ‘every life is sacred’ ideology?
oh! wait, is this another result of the ‘every life is sacred’ ideology?
Every sperm is sacred, every sperm is great. If a sperm is wasted, god gets quite irate.
Every sperm is sacred, every sperm is great. If a sperm is wasted, god gets quite irate.
Then why’d he make it better for our prostates (you know, less cancer) if we waste the shit? Bastard!
Then why’d he make it better for our prostates (you know, less cancer) if we waste the shit? Bastard!
easy religiotard answer:
You aren’t SUPPOSED to live that long. Prostate cancer is one of God’s ways of calling you “home”. By masturbating (or having regular, nonprocreative sex), you’re sinning by challenging God’s will as to your intended expiration date.
Now that I’ve pointed out the obvious, expect this explanation to replace “you’ll go blind!” as the preferred exhortation from religiotards against masturbation and free love.
*bows*
God did always seem a bit of a schmuck to me.
And why’d he put the cure to hiccups there?
God did always seem a bit of a schmuck to me.
oh, no, no…
God loves you sooo much, he simply wants you with him that much sooner, see?
youz just bein’ a hater.
:p
seriously, how these religiotards manage to spew stuff like this without puking is beyond me. i can’t even do it sarcastically without feeling ill.
I’m just about as pro-choice as they come. But remember that it’s just that – a choice. Sometimes not an easy one to make. And it is ok to choose to bring a baby to term, even if it leads to you dropping out of school, working a dead-end job, living in a small apartment by yourself. Because… fuck, man, it’s a brand new life. It’s amazing. The kid that the fetus grows into will probably appreciate it at some point. It is nice to be alive, and if you have family to support you, it’s not the miserable, gut-wrenching daily horror that some people seem to make it out to be. And that kid is no less worthy of life just because his or her parent fucked up. Speaking as one of *those* kids.
I’m one of the more successful ones: I’m going to college and Making Something Of Myself. But even the lower-class, the bartenders and fast-food clerks and high school dropouts, they’re just as worthy of experiencing life as any of us lefty laptop-toting blog readers. Abortion is an option, yes, but it’s an option for the mother to consider, not you. If she values having a baby over future income, that’s her right. And if you don’t think so, you can help yourself to a warm glass of go fuck yourself.
youz just bein’ a hater.
Um, yeah.
But that prostate thing is something Shubin definitely neglected in his description of the roots of hiccups.
If she values having a baby over future income, that’s her right
did i hit a nerve here? i wasn’t saying that the teenage mother-to-be doesn’t have the right to have a baby; i was saying that the fact that there are so many teenage mothers is probably because of their religious (christian) beliefs. i hope that that clears it up.
Right, why should your beautiful mind be bothered with such dreadful stuff–a stunning argument. By the way, it sure seems like it’s the pregnant girls’ yearbook and not yours, innit?
sea creature wrote:
The socioeconomic class of your parents will determine much of that whether you’re pregnant or not. What about the other costs? What does it do for her chances of marrying? How much longer will she be dependent on her parents? etc. etc..
How is it any less the girls’ yearbook than anyone else’s? If they’re seniors too why should they be airbrushed out, or publicly shamed? As other commentators have mentioned that hasn’t worked so well as a deterent to sex in the past – teenagers tend to have sex, it’s what they do. The trick is to try to make sure they do it without the STIs and pregnancy that inevitably result when they try to do it without access to basic facts about safe sex (i.e. when they have been the unlucky recipients of an abstinence-only education).
Also, why the focus on the girl’s bad choices? Assuming they weren’t visited by inconvenient angels in the middle of the night there are fathers out there who are either criminal (if they’re mothers at 17/18 presumably the sex happened whilst the girls were underage) or teenagers themselves. Why no mention of their bad choices?
“And why’d he put the cure to hiccups there?”
Ummm wait, how do YOU cure hiccups again? O_o
Well, *my* granny taught me to swallow a spoonful of sugar; obviously, a certain Dr. Odeh and colleagues subscribe to a different method:
[1] Odeh M, Oliven A. Hiccups and digital rectal massage. Arch Otolaryngol Head Neck Surg. 1993 Dec;119(12):1383.
[2] Odeh M, Bassan H, Oliven A. Termination of intractable hiccups with digital rectal massage. J Intern Med. 1990 Feb;227(2):145-6.
[3] Fesmire FM. Termination of intractable hiccups with digital rectal massage. Ann Emerg Med. 1988 Aug;17(8):872.
One thing missing from the comments is the cost of preggers to the District. For the price of five preggers, I can have a full (30 kid) class or one of the non-football sports. Any principal would be very aware of the costs and really would not want any more preggers.
Don’t whine to me about how keeping them in school will benefit society. That’s not part of the District Budget. Here in whitest Dumbf**kistan, the preggers cost the SD huge amounts of money in special classes, medical needs, and accomodations. We are losing our AP classes, some of our gen-ed classes, and sports may also be gone. For some kids, sports are the only reason to stay in school. They are not academic and their jobs will always suck. Yet, we can pay for teen sex. Back in the BadOldDays, SDs paid for things out of their own pocket. Only when Uncle Sugar helped did we find the funds to keep mommies in school.
You had sex, got pregnant, deal with it. Return in six years to finish. Your kid needs you, now.
Mold, then I assume you’re all in favor of the school nurse handing out condoms and birth control pills? That’s been done quite successfully in some school districts, and is a lot cheaper than the daycare and other support for girls with teh babeez. But for some weird reason the people who scream and yell about how bad teen pregnancy is are also the people who scream and yell about any efforts to lower the pregnancy rate. Imagine that.
“Preggers”?
Calling people anything other than people is always somewhat of a warning sign.
CAUTION: ILL-THOUGHT-OUT SPITE AHEAD.
@thalarctos: …I think the only reason that would work is because of the sheer fear of having a finger jammed up the chute.
“Bad hiccups uh? Okay, bend over, I’m gonna massage your rectum.”
“…It’s ok, it has suddenly gone away.”
But I think it’s plausible that any surprise Kancho would stop hiccups.
Carlie & MissPrism:
Slow down there!
Mold’s reference to living in “whitest Dumf**kistan” is a dead giveaway. It’s sarcasm. It’s hard to tell sometimes, I know.
Perhaps I am missing something, but it seems to me that not only should there be stories about pregnant teens in places for the high schoolers to read, they should be brutally honest! Let’s hear completely about what it’s like being a teenage mother. Let’s hear about all the “morning sickness” they had (funny name – everyone I know who is pregnant is sick all the time, not just in the morning). Let’s hear how painful childbirth was. Let’s hear about having no money and no time for any personal activities, as your whole life is tied to the responsibility of raising your child. And let’s hear about how it was not something planned, but a result of carelessness, and, it could happen to you.
These stories should be the equivalent of the old “Scared Straight” videos and not squealched. They should be required reading for every 6th grader.
John, are you sure? I took the whitest dumf*istan reference to mean that Mold was mad about living in an area that caters to pregnant girls. If it’s sarcasm, I guess it got past me.
Sorry if I read you wrong Mold. In case there is any doubt, the following sentence is intended sarcastically:
Yes, Pablo, that is a fantastic idea because “Scared Straight” worked really well and, even better, if we terrify girls enough, they might kill themselves after a positive pregnancy test and save us all loads of trouble!
Or better yet be too scared and in denial about their pregnancies to even take the test and then act very surprised when a dead baby is discovered in the dumpster one fine morning.
But hey, at least they won’t be taking precious money away from the Basketball Team!
Abstinence based curriculum? What is that? Is it for real? I’m reading this and I’m thinking from which planet did the principal came from!
To let y/personal bias and prejudices get in the way of y/job trying to decide what is good for others to read (and think) is typical of North Korea, Cuba or China! Not the US!
Next up, abstinence-only drivers’ ed. You mustn’t drive without a licence. We won’t tell you anything about driving until you have a licence. You can’t practice driving without a licence. No information about driving will be provided, as that would only encourage people to drive.
That’s brilliant, Stephen. That will go nicely with existing abstinence-only SexEd and abstinence-only Biology, and will open the door for a top-to-bottom abstinence-only curriculum, in which students are taught to abstain from thinking and learning.
I’ll run for School Board in 2010. By 2016, World Domination will be only a hop, skip and a jump away. I owe you, big-time.
I don’t understand the idea that depiction equals glamorization. Growing up, I spent a lot of time slogging through manure-filled barnyards. If my mom had taken of photo of me doing that, and had it published in our Lutheran church’s newsletter, would that have been glamorizing slogging through manure-filled barnyards?
Ah, but those photos would not show you drowning in said manure.
By this Principal’s logic therefore, those photos would indeed be glamorising slogging through manure-filled barnyards.
Ohhhh yeah. The sight of a 16-year-old changing diapers, sitting up all night with a cranky baby, and trying to get homework done at the same time says “glamorous” like nothing else.
This principal should not be depicted in the yearbook. It would only glamorize stupidity.
Comments 62, 66, 69, 109 and 113 bear repeating.
What was “Scared Straight”?
“philos” is banned. “philos1856” is not banned. Make of that what you will.
Comments 62, 66, 69, 109 and 113 bear repeating.
What was “Scared Straight”?
“philos” is banned. “philos1856” is not banned. Make of that what you will.
What was “Scared Straight”?
Scared Straight was a program that took “at risk” youth and made them live in a prison for a certain period of time, to get a feel of where their lives would supposedly be heading if they didn’t change their ways.
One can see its most current example in the “Help, my child is out of control and needs boot camp” episodes of the Maury Povich show.
@David Marjanović #114:
Looks like the ban triggers are a bit loose around here.
#98 thalarctos cited the following:
I’d like to jump in and note that there are more peer-reviewed research papers on terminating hiccups with digital rectal massage and on traumatic anal intercourse with a pig than on intelligent design. I’m keeping a running tally based only on what I learn from Pharyngula posts.
I actually passed along the reference to that hiccup research to a friend who was afflicted (& hospitalized) with hiccups for most of a week after an operation. It was hard not to laugh at his situation, but it was actually pretty serious: he got almost no sleep until they cured him (by pumping his stomach all night long — no fun, but it worked).
I first heard about this hiccup stuff while riding in a friend’s car the day after Thanksgiving and listening to the IgNobel awards ceremony on Science Friday.
Physicalist,
Comedy aside, it just goes to show: actual research = useful! ID = useless.
I hope your friend feels better!
I heard about it from the IgNobel’s too. And yes, it is a good illustration that the lowest of real scientific investigation is miles above anything the ID folks have to offer. (And, yes, the hiccups left, never came back, and he’s had no problems since. Apparently they nicked his diaphragm while operating, which started the hiccups, but the operation was otherwise a complete success.)
J, if that tally idea is not just crying out for a web page (if not a dedicated blog), then I don’t know what is.
If pregnancy is like drug abuse, does that make abortion the same as successfully finishing rehab?
J, if that tally idea is not just crying out for a web page (if not a dedicated blog), then I don’t know what is.
straight up!
I’d be happy to volunteer my time to put a site together for you, and find you a free (hopefully) host for that.
that would be damn funny (and actually interesting for the cites), and to the best of my knowledge, nobody is doing anything quite like that.
I’d suggest site before blog, unless you have a lot of free time on your hands and you want to keep it up.
(I still can’t figure out how PZ has the time to maintain this blog)
Thanks thalarctos and Ichthyic!
Ichthyic, you’re on! Seeing as I’ve got very little free time and I’ve never set up a site or blog, just a very simple site as a clearinghouse for “things that make it past peer-review instead of ID” would be awesome. Have you got a web site/blog where I can drop you a line?
That would actually make a great group blog–esp with the peer reviewing science thing PZ does. Get a group of folks to find the strangest things scientists are researching, and campare their results in a running tally versus ID.
You could steal that old 80s move theme “Wierd BUT REAL Science!”
Julie, The school board at Schuyler Public High School in the 1970’s confiscated all the yearbooks after a class member was named “Mother of the Year” because she kept going to school after she had her child. I heard she actually took the kid to school with her, but I didn’t go to the HS with her, myself.I did hear her say almost exactly what you typed, though. She was a brave woman for her times.
#127 Jeff,
“You is talking loco, and I like it!”
/Zoolander
j,
and ichthyich and whomever gets involved in this–I just think y’all could produce a fabulously entertaining, and educational, site at the same time….this exactly the combination of education and ridicule that makes a brilliant tactic in the battle against those fools…
I hope y’all make it work!!!!
Making Babies Is Very Glamorous
This whole thing is completely ridiculous. I am a liberal pro-lifer, and I think that we should be praising these young ladies for their courage and willingness to succeed. That this guy disapproves of it because of political reasons is completely disgusting to me. What a better way to promote abortion, when teen pregnancy is just a liability to a failed policy.
Why not trying to actually educate your students on how to use birth control properly every time, but when accidents happen treat them with compassion and aid them in future successes. I would think this the more logical stance. Alas, as is the case with many of our conservative, crazy abstinence-only friends, logic is something to be avoided. As Colbert would say, “I like the truth, it’s facts I’m not a fan of.”
Have you got a web site/blog where I can drop you a line?
shoot me an email and we’ll get to work.
fisheyephotosAThotmailDOTcom
I’ve got some ideas where to host it, but we’ll need to put something together first.
Ah, thanks for the explanation.
You know, on a German private TV channel there’s a series on how a “Super-Nanny” (English in the original) gets pretty incredible children back into some kind of control… anything like boot camp is not even mentioned…
Ah, thanks for the explanation.
You know, on a German private TV channel there’s a series on how a “Super-Nanny” (English in the original) gets pretty incredible children back into some kind of control… anything like boot camp is not even mentioned…