Journal 10

Abstinence Sex Education Does Not Reduce Teen Sexual Activity

In this article, Arthur Caplan discusses the issue of abstinence sex education versus comprehensive sex education. He discusses how large of a controversy this is by discussing the wide variety of opinions about what should be taught and the many differences in state laws about the topic. Caplan presents his reasons for believing that abstinence sex education fails to reduce teen sexual activity. He is very firm in his opinion and is very critical of this type of education. In his article he draws from numerous studies, polls, and statistics to generate support for the points that he is making. First, he presents information that shows that the majority of teens are not staying celibate until marriage and makes the argument that, therefore, we need to educate students about how they prevent teen pregnancies and the spread of disease because most teens will have sex even if they have had an abstinence sex course. He also presents studies in many states that have seen these programs fail to make any improvement in teen sexual activity. Finally, Caplan discusses the fact that many parents say that that they want their children taught abstinence sex education, but will often change their tune when the children graduate high school and in many cases did not wait until marriage themselves.

I like a lot of the points that Caplan makes in his article and I like that he was not making the point that sex before marriage is acceptable, instead he focused on his belief that it is something that is going to occur. He presents his belief that abstinence sex education fails to prepare students for this fact, and fails to even have an impact on the number of teens who will remain celibate until marriage. I think that he does present a convincing argument. His use of statistics really supported his argument. However, I did feel that he made some assertions that had only a little support. I think that in these cases he relied too much on relaying his opinion instead of presenting support for his beliefs. Overall, though, his argument was convincing and he did present good support for his points, especially when you consider that there are few ways to quantify success or failure of these types of programs except through polls.

I think that this article can be very helpful in my paper because it presents ample valuable information that I can use to support my ideas. It has reliable statistics that demonstrate the failure of many of these programs. One useful piece of information that I could cite is that “70 percent of teens have engaged in oral sex by the time they reach 18, and more than 45 percent have had intercourse at least once.” I think that this statistic is useful because it shows that teens are going to engage in sexual activity and it makes much more sense to educate them on the safest way to do that rather than attempting to prevent something that is widely going to occur anyway.

Arthur Caplan, "Abstinence-Only Sex Ed Defies Common Sense: Education Policy Spreads Ignorance, Sends Confusing Message to Teens," MSNBC.com, October 13, 2005. © 2008 MSNBC Interactive. Republished with permission of MSNBC.com, conveyed through Copyright Clearance Center, Inc.