think teens are out of control? here’s a reality check
Unpublished post, originally written 12/24/08 for my now defunct state of sex education blog on gURL.
Teens and sex: it’s a topic that never seems to run out of steam. One minute we are hit with a story about Jamie Lynn Spears’ baby, and the next we are told that Bristol Palin is hot on her trail.
If that doesn’t catch our attention, reports that one in four America girls carry an STD, or warnings that access to Internet porn will eternally thwart a teen’s development, are sure to do so.
But do these headline grabbers really tell the whole story? Not by a long shot.
Sure, some teens are uneducated and uninformed. Some make bad choices, and some have questionable morals. But plenty are on the right track.
For example, a recent study done by the Centre for Sexual Health & HIV Research at the University College London found that teens are actually more likely to use condoms than are adults. And while the American teen birthrate is shockingly high, it is nowhere near its 1954 level.
Though it is often assumed that teens are more sexually active today than they were at any other point in history, this assumption handily ignores both reality and the past.
Generation Y did not invent the concept of underage sex. Colonial youth engaged in something called “bundling,” where it was considered acceptable for young couples to lie in bed together to “stay warm.”
Kids in the fifties were getting it on in the back seat of dad’s car, and seventies teens took advantage of one of the safest periods of sex in history: syphilis had long since been cured, morals had relaxed, the birth control pill was an option, abortion was legal, and AIDS was a decade away.
Today’s teens often get blamed for their promiscuity, skewed values and risk taking as if their lifestyle choices are completely novel. Really though, while the cast and setting are ever changing, much about the plot remains the same.
