Well, maybe a little surprised that it took the American Medical Association so long to chime in.  But, they’ve just voted that comprehensive sex education is the most effective.

Sex education that provides information about abstinence, condom use and other contraceptive methods is the most effective way to reduce the growing number of teenagers who contract a sexually transmitted infection or become pregnant. So federal funding should flow to comprehensive programs proven to address these public health issues, according to a Council on Science and Public Health report adopted at the AMA Annual Meeting.

The American College of Obstetricians / Gynecologists reaffirmed their commitment to comprehensive sex education last month, noting:

With births to adolescents in the US on the rise for the second year in a row, The American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists (ACOG) reaffirms its position that every teen should be provided with comprehensive, scientifically accurate sex education and that access to contraception services should be available to all teens.

The US continues to have the highest rate of teen pregnancy of any industrialized nation. The birth rate among US teens ages 15-19 was 42.5 (per 1,000) in 2007, marking a 5% increase since 2005. Births to adolescents had declined 34% from 1991 to 2005.

Experts believe the increase is partly due to abstinence-only sex education programs combined with decreased contraception education and decreased contraceptive use among teens. “Abstinence works for some teens, but the idea that most teens will wait to have sex indefinitely is rigid and impractical,” said Richard S. Guido, MD, chair of ACOG’s Committee on Adolescent Health Care.

Curious to know what your kids are learning in school?  It’s a pretty safe bet that it’s not what you got (as lame as that was) because we’ve invested over $1 billion dollars in “abstinence-only” education … which has been proven time and again to be ineffective.

So if you want to know … ASK!  You’ve got a right to see the curriculum and to know what’s going on in your child’s classroom.  And if it’s not comprehensive - ask why not!

Here’s PETA in Reno.  For some reason, the only way they seem to be able to show their disgust over the treatment of animals … is to treat women disgustingly.  Really?  So, treat women like second class citizens until chickens are free?

I’m all for people taking action on behalf of causes they’re passionate about!  It’s what I do for a living.

Feministing.com has written about PETA’s misogyny many times:  “Should we be surprised this is the work of PETA? It just never ends.”  I get that putting people in cages shows that caging up animals in inhumane.  But why, exactly, are we only caging women?  And why are they in bikinis … instead of feather suits?

I think one of their commenters, GottaBeMe, said it the best:  who nicely summed up the issue (in a previous PETA thread):

“But again, the issue for me is that although PETA has apparently used naked men in a tiny number of their ads (which I’ve never seen and got nowhere near as much press as the naked women) is the fact that they have long used the objectification of women to attract attention to their point.I’m not saying that the women who get naked for PETA are being exploited. I’m saying that PETA is promoting and using the objectification of women as sexual objects to get attention for their cause, which has nothing to do with sex.”

Sometimes PETA’s tactics are even more astonishing … to the point of endangering the people who should be protected.

Reason Hit & Run points out:

PETA recently celebrated World Vegetarian Week in Memphis by shrink-wrapping its interns (and laying them out in their parking lot) like a couple of flank steaks, despite 80+ degree weather.

When officers inquired about the well-being of intern Shawn Herbold (bottom) and volunteer Thomas Olsen, a sweat-soaked Herbold replied that she was in pain and feeling nauseated from the heat after being wrapped in cellophane for 30 minutes, and also asked how much longer she needed to stay there. Byrne let her know it wouldn’t be much longer and left her under the hot afternoon sun for 30 minutes more while debating with the officers.

The kicker:

PETA would never treat a cow that way, but I guess it’s OK for an intern.

Morgan  graduates from high school next week and is planning to do a year with Americorps before starting college.  She’ll also be doing some traveling I’m sure.  More than anything else, I think her month in Uganda has shaped her world view and helped her grow into an amazingly beautiful and compassionate young woman.  While she was there she volunteered in a teen center, AIDs clinic and an orphanage.

See for yourself in her African Experience video.

Is it just me, or has there been a lot of commentary this week about Republican women, sex, sex education, and politics?

It started with Bristol Palin making the rounds with her son and her dad as the spokesperson for the Candie Foundation.  While a lot of folks gave her a pretty hard time about it - I had to agree with this post from Reproductive Health Reality Check:  “Why We Need Bristol (And Levi)”  Christina Page of Birthcontrolwatch.org noted that although she’s not polished, Bristol actually is saying what most of us are saying (although she’s clearly off script when she gets this out:)

But in her roundabout way, Bristol is in fact voicing the core message of comprehensive sex ed which is: there’s no better protection against pregnancy and disease than abstinence, teens should postpone becoming sexually active, but those that are having sex need to use to protection.

A few days later, Meghan McCain chimed in with The GOP Doesn’t Understand Sex on the Daily Beast.  She raises a question I share:

Here’s what I’ve never understood about the party: its resistance to discussing better access to birth control. As a Republican, I am pro-life. But using birth control and having an abortion are not the same at all. Actually, the best way to prevent abortions is to educate people about birth control and make it widely and easily accessible. True, abstinence is the only way to fully prevent pregnancy and sexually transmitted diseases. Still, the problem with abstinence-only education is that it does not make teenagers and young adults more knowledgeable about all the issues they face if or when they have sex—physically and emotionally.

Another Republican woman off script, but I have to agree.  Why aren’t Republicans the world’s biggest proponents of birth control?  I don’t assume, as Meghan seems to, that all Republicans are “pro-life.”  The last survey I saw from Nevada, just asking the straight out question, showed that 52% of Nevada Republicans describe themselves as “pro-choice.”  But whichever philosophy one subscribes to … you’d think that birth control to prevent unintended pregnancies would be the “common ground” we could all agree on.  I know - asking a lot.

Then today, I ran across this article US News & World Report:  Republican Women are Stay-At-Home Moms While Female Democrats Run for Congress.
Bonnie Erbe questions the geographic theory (Democrats are stronger in the North and West where women get elected, Republicans are stronger in the South where voters are more likely to elect men), and instead her theory is that GOP women embrace traditional roles.

I think the main reason, however, is that Republican women are generally more traditional than Democratic women, who tend to be more progressive. Therefore, GOP women are more likely to be fulltime homemakers or to work part-time and not to pursue all-consuming careers such as politics.

I know!  I’m biased AND my family is hardly a representative sample.  But geez!  Of course, I had to comment.

My mother was the first woman elected to a constitutional office in Nevada and my grandmother was the fist women elected to a federal office in Nevada. Both are pro-life Republican women who managed to balance work, family and pretty impressive political careers (and, yes, I know I’m biased).

My view of women’s issues is not the same as theirs, but I’ve found (maybe because I do live in the West) that Republican women believe in looking at candidates based on their merits.

One of the important aspects of the Republican philosophy is the idea of individual responsibility, which fits in with the idea of voting for the best candidate.

I think Mary Kate Cary may be 100% right that the GOP will lose a huge percentage of women if it rejects moderates. But really, how many women get to play “homemaker” any more? In this economy - that’s a function of education, financial situation and philosophy, right?

My favorite take on it all is that smart women have better sex.  So, study up!

” Emotional intelligence seems to have a direct impact on women’s sexual functioning by influencing her ability to communicate her sexual expectations and desires to her partner.” Greater intelligence may also lead to more elaborate fantasies that help get the job (whether alone or with a partner).

Good to know.

Learned a lot at Reno Tahoe WordCamp — kind of amazed, no idea why, at how many local folks are blogging about safe, healthy, wholesome sex.  We’ll have to have our own session next time, I’m telling you!

Couldn’t have said it better …. it’s worth checking out Michael Higdon’s column in “The Sagebrush,” especially his last one:

Shedding sex’s taboo means more dialogue, not less

He starts out by saying:

The most interesting feedback I received this year about my columns is that “sex is a topic best discussed between a man and a woman inside the bedroom. It does not belong in a newspaper.” Are you sure?

And continues with very thoughtful analysis of the sometimes crazy world we live in … saturated with sex in some ways yet fraught with as many taboos as Victorian England in others.

While you’re there, browse through some of the articles … the writing is pretty amazing!

Read the rest of this entry »

Maybe after today, I’ll be better about blogging!  Sure to be inspired.  See  you there?

Great line up of speakers … including Reno’s own Ed Adkins, Michelle Montoya, David LaPlante, Chelsea Otakan and Colin Loretz.  Plus national WordPress folks!  I’m excited.   (Still a little buzzed from the Reno Jazz Festival concert - Jerry Gonzales and the Fort Apache Bank last night, but the coffee’s brewing … I’ll be ok.)

“La Boheme” at Nevada Opera tomorrow.  The weekend is packed!

You too could be a certified abstinence educator, if you can stomach the misguided test to become one. 

Interesting article from the Pittsburgh Post Gazette on the Abstinence Clearinghouse’s certification program.  Only $50 to take the test and $20 for their Abstinence 101 guide.

Again, by giving young people information that is too little or too late, we are putting their lives in danger.  April is STD Awareness Month. 

The state of Nevada requires that all school districts teach sex education with an empahsis on preventing HIV/AIDs.  And we must be doing alright.  Unlike our performance on other health measures, Nevada is right about average for sexually transmitted diseases.  You can see how we rate on Chlamydia, Gonorrhea, and Syphilis in these 2007 CDC reports.

Self recently published a great article on the choices — or choice avoidance — many women (and men) in their 20’s are practicing when in comes to birth control, not to mention the rest of their lives:

Single, pregnant and panicked
Pretty sure it was Socrates who said “the unexamined life isn’t worth living.”  I admit, I probably was much too goal and plan oriented in my 20s (and whose plan was that anyway?):  college degree, marriage, kids, MBA, executive director job.  I had them all … but wasn’t exactly where I wanted to be.  Still - it’s a lot easier to drift in your 30s.

This story from CNN highlights one of the reasons I’m pro-choice … because sometimes women and girls are horribly abused.  This story gives some amazing insights into the values of those who are against abortion:

• The Catholic Church in Brazil excommunicated the doctor who performed an abortion on a 9 year old girl who was repeated raped by her step-father from the time she was about 6 years old.
• Archbishop Don Jose Cardoso Sobrinho of Recife said the stepfather was not excommunicated because “A graver act than (rape) is abortion.”

What kind of church does not protect a young girl who has been raped and abused for three years?  And only reassures her that “minors are exempt from excommunication”?

This is the position of the church?  We won’t protect you, we don’t hear your cries, and what you’ve done was a sin?  That’s shameful.

I’ll be presenting Saturday, March 7th at 6 p.m. at Se7en on West Street.  Hope to see you there!