The Blumenfeld Education Letter

"My People Are Destmyed For lack Of Knowledge" HOSEA 4:6

February 1988 EDITOR: Samuel L. Blumenfeld Vol. III, No. 2 (Letter # 18)

The purpose of this newsletter is to provide knowledge for parents and edul.ltors who want to save the children of Ameril.l from the destruttiv(' fOr( es that endtlllger them. Our children in the public schools are at gr.wt' risk in 4 ways: iH.

The Dangerous Trends in By Mike Arata

In a 1953 presentation before a committee decide that more sex educa­ number of Pl anned Parenthood workers, tion, more contraception, and introduc­ Dr. Lena Levine sounded a clarion call tion of so-ca11 ed school-based health for American teenagers to hel p raise clinics are the solution. Planned the curtain on a drama that came to be Parenthood responds with a $1 mill ion known as the "": campaign to persuade the TV networks to lift their bans on contraceptive Our alternative solution is to be advertising. ready as educators and parents to help young people obtain sex satis­ Ho1 d on there, don't ca11 in the faction before marriage. By sanc­ arsonists to put out the fire, says tioning sex before marriage, we Rep. Dan Coats of Indiana in so many will prevent fear and guilt. We words as he presents the minority view must also relieve those who have on the Select Committee: "Progress ive 1y them of their fear and guilt over the last 25 years we have, as a feelings, and we must be ready to nation, decided that it is easier to provide young boys and girls with give children pills than to teach them the best contraception mea,sures respect for sex and marriage. Today we a va i1 ab1 e so they wi11 haVE! the are seeing the results not only in necessary means to achieve sexual increased pregnancy rates but in in­ satisfaction without having to risk creased rates of drug abuse, venerea1 possible pregnancy. We owe this to disease, suicide, and other forms of them.(1) se If-destructive behavi or," comments

Mr. Coa ts • ( 2) We11, we have seen Dr. Levine' s future, and it doesn't work. Fast Approximately 10% of the unwed 15 forward to December, 1985: the House to 19 year-old girls in our country now Select Cormlittee on Children, Youth, become pregnant -- about twenty times and Families reports that there are now the rate when was 1.1 million teenage pregnancies each officially founded in 1942. Almost year, of which 430,000 end in abor­ ha If of those young girl s wi 11 abort tions. The controlling members of the their babies, often at their friendly

The Blumenfeld Education Letter is published monthly. Sources of products and services described are not necessarily endorsed by this publication. They are intended to provide our readers with information on a rapidly expanding field of educational activity. Permission to quote is granted provided proper credit is given. Original material is copyrighted by Hosea Communications, Incorporated. Rate: 1 year $36.00. Subscription Address: Post Office Box 45161, Boise, Idaho 83711, Phone (208) 322-4440. ______----, .--______Education Letter, Pg. 2, Feb. 1988,

neighborhood Planned Parenthood clinic. Dr. Richard is particularly crit­ Caring for the illegitimate children ical of scholastic sex-ed programs and who haven't been suffocated, poisoned public agencies which promote a false pickled, or dismembered by the abor: sense of security among adolescents by tionist now costs the country an sanctioning their use of contracep­ estimated $17 billion a year, a 600% tives. She points out that although increase in the last 20 years.(3) federal expenditures on so-called "fam�ly planning" and "pregnancy pre­ Even Pl anned Parenthood has hi�d to ventlOn " programs guadrupled from 1971 admit failure. The September/October to 198 1, there was a 48% increase in 1980 issue of Family Planning PerspecCi teenage pregnancies (to 1. 1 mi11 i on a tives, published by -rTanne year) and a 133% increase in the abor­ Parenthood's research arm, the Alan tion rate for girls aged 15 to 19 Guttmacher Institute, stated that "More during the same decade. She also men­ tions America's epidemic of venereal te�nagers a re usi ng contracepti ves and uSlng them more consistently than ever di sease -- wh i ch i nvo1 ves 20 mi11 ion before. Yet the number and rate of cases of venereal herpes, 5 million premarital pregnancies continues to cases of chlamydia, and thousands of rise. " Six years later, the same publi­ people dying of AIDS. cation stated that 18.4% of the young women who had relied on condoms to Dr. Richard arrives at her con­ prevent pregnancy had in fact become clusions through analysis of a large pregnant. (5) number of separate research studies. These investigations provide grounds A recently released study by for a general indictment of both teen­ age contraceptive programs and the Dr. Dinah Richard, entitled "Teenage Pregnancy and Sex Education in the sex-education curricula that are cur­ Here are Schools -- What Works and What Does Not rently found in most schools. some of the topical statements drawn Work," reaches an important sUl1l11ary from these separate reports. conclusion on the issues of teenage pregnancy and venereal disease: sex 1. Though the teenage pregnancy education without moral guidance � rate jumped from the 1960's to the harmful both for kids and for at large. 1970's. the pregnancy rate has remained society fairly steady through the 1980's. The birth rate for teens has dropped, how­ ever, due to an "epi demi c" of abor­ Editor's Note: tions. Mike Arata is an articulate, con­ 2. A sizeable percentage (28%) of servative teacher who has taught teenage pregnancies are intended rather for 18 years in the public schools than accidental. of the Cincinnati area. He has been an effective critic of the govern­ 3. Federal funding for family­ ment schools and of the N. E. A. This report on sex education was pre­ planning programs has increased, not sented on November 9, 1987 to the decreased. the problem of teenage Mariemont, Ohio, school district pregnancy. Sex Education and Substance-Abuse­ Prevention Committee. We thank Mike 4. Regul ar use of •.• contra­ ceptives has not reduced teenage for his permission to reprint the substance of this report in our pregnancies. Letter. 5. Contraceptives have not de­ creased teen .

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6. Contraceptive education in- Medicine and Health Services at George creases teen promiscuity. Washington University, in 1978. (9) As Dr. O'Reilly's comments regarding K-12 7. Modern sex educati on ii gnores sex-education programs are still the principles of developmental psy­ appropriate in the here and now, we may chology with regard to childrl�n and do well to examine them in greater teenagers, thereby creating psycho­ detai I: logical problems in young people. In particular, modern sex educators tend Many school systems, both public to ignore the latency period in child and private, have adopted [K-12 development. sex-education] courses. A multi­ million-dollar educational enter­ 8. Modern sex education h,as not prise is invo Ived , with cons ider­ only created problems for youn9sters, able vested interest also on the but has gone on to cause problems for part of contraceptive manufac­ the same people during their aduHhood. turers, pornographers, and such organizations as SIECUS, Interna­ 9. Modern sex education often tional Planned Parenthood, and Zero fail s to teach young people about the Population Growth •..• physically and psychologically harmful consequences of contraception and abor­ • • . they [the sex-educati on pro­ tion, or the significant likelihood of grams that are found in most developin� sexually transmitted schools] may propose and promise diseases (STD's) and cervical cancer. what they cannot deliver -- namely, value-free instruction that will 10. And once again, Dr . Richard's insure what they call "responsible" summary conclusion: Sex education is sexual behavior •••by [which] is not benefi cia I without mora I ins truc­ implied reduction of venereal dis­ tion.(7) ease, reduction of illegitimacy, and reduction of unwanted pregnan­ Special mention should be accorded cies. • . . one of the reports cited by Dr. Richard. Dr. Jaqueline Kasun, an Provision of detailed sex instruc­ economist whose comments have appeared tion either in the co-educational in the Wall Street Journal, has found classroom or in-private to pre­ that those states with the highE!st per pubertal child is ill-advised and capita "" expenditures potentially harmful. The profes­ have the highest rates of teenage sional reason for this fact is the pregnancy. (8) existence and importance of the latency period in human personality One of the most disturbing trends growth and development. Thi si s a in modern sex education is the movement period of varying duration, in most of explicit sex-education programs into cases covering the ages of six lower and lower grade levels . A number throu�h puberty, during which of experts on child psychology have thoug ts about sexual matters are identified the ages of 6 through minimal. The consensus reached at puberty as a latenc� period during the [1969 meet ing of the Ameri can which a child's sexua thoughts, fan­ Association of Child Psycho­ tasies, and interests are minimal and analysis] was that the child's relatively quiescent -- but a time when deve I o�ment is not served by en­ academic course instruction is ideal. couraglng his sexuality at this stage of life. This last statement is in fact a paraphrase of remarks made by Dr. Sean Dr. O'Reilly also quoted Dr. John 0' Reilly, professor at the Schoo I of Meeks, Director of Child and Adolescent

L- ____.--J ___�The Blurenfeld Education Letter - Post Office Box 45161 - Boise, Idaho 8371l. ______-, r-______Education L.etter, Pg. 4, Feb. 1988 Services at the Psychiatric Institute learning phase in child develop­ of Washington, who wrote: ment. In this respect, it is anti­ educational.(10) The relative quiescence of the latency period is extremely impor­ Those who would violate the period tant in the development of a broad of latency with explicit sex-education cognitive catalog of skills ..•. programs should read and ponder the The focus of latency is on gather­ following additional quotation: ing information about the world and developing skills in dealing with The fact that the child often asks it. Much of the previous sexual where ch ildren come from does not curiosity [of very early childhood] mean that one must explain it is sublimated toward the accom­ through and through when the child plishment of these tasks. is so young. There is much that he Classroom interaction which is or she does not know about other explicit and directed toward ana­ life problems .... A child must tomical details of sexual activity learn that many aspects of human between human beings is an unfortu­ life comprise an intimate secret nate interference with the norma­ realm which need not be shared or tive developmental processes of the exhibited to all. age. It is clear that sexual in­ struction in the lower elementary Only at a later age, when the child grades is unwarranted and poten­ has already developed his under­ tially destructive to a large per­ standing of people's intimate life centage of our children. and a habit of prudent silence about certain things, can he or she Dr. Myre Sim, Professor of Psychi­ be told about sex. atry at the University of Ottawa, added his own comments in responding to a re­ But when and by whom shoul d he or quest for information by Dr. O'Reilly: she be told? After reach ing the age of puberty, and then by his or It shoul d be recogni zed that the her pa rents. • . • Such ta1 ks wi11 school structure and grading then be both justifiable and bene­ system, while generally adequate ficial, for they will correspond to for other educationa 1 atta inments , the natural awakening of the sex are unsatisfactory for teaching sex drive in the young person. to children. This may upset some pedagogues who feel that all educa­ Such talks must also cover sex tion should be grist for their mill hygiene and particularly questions and that nobody else should be of sexual morality. involved in the process. While this may be good trade unionism, it is Sex education is and should be bad education in this particularly education for love -- that is, a sensitive and individual field. great and profound feeling enhanced by unity of life, yearnings, and hopes. And such education must be Sex is basically a private matter conducted without overdependence on and does not lend itself at serious cynical public discussion of phys­ and responsible levels to public iological problems. display, and this is what modern

sex educators are doing ••.• Proper example is most important. If the child witnesses from the I agree [said Dr. Sim] that dis­ first year of his or her 1 ife a turbances of the latency period genuine love between father and interfere wi th the mos t product ive mother, their mutual respect, aid,

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and concern -- and their open mani­ if experts agreed as to what festations of tenderness and af­ hea lthy sexuality is -- wh ich they fection -- these will be the most do not. Sex education in the powerful educational factors. They schools, given at ever younger ages will awaken the child's attention and without clear-cut theoretical to serious and beautiful relations or research justification, is an­ between man and woman. other way in which some contempo­ rary schools are encouragi ng thei r No, as Dr. 0' Rei 11y revea 1s, these pupils to grow up fast.(12) comments were not drawn from a papa 1 encycl ical. They appeared in a guide If societal problems force educa­ for sex education published in Soviet tors to act � loco parentis, then why Education, a monthly journal published don't we do jusTtliat? We should hold by the Soviet Academy of Educational back on sex education until it's devel­ Sciences, in 1949. (11) opmentally appropriate for the child. And we should then insist that the The article marked a sharp reversal education provided be firmly grounded in Soviet educational philosophy, for in traditional moral principles and explicit instruction in human sexuality traditional family ideals. had been a pa rt of the Sovi et curric­ ulum since 1921, with less than satis­ Instead, we seem to have a fascina­ factory results. tion with allowing kids to make prema­ ture choices in the realm of human I find it ironic that an atheistic sexuality. Adults generally don't society can recognize the benefits of allow immature children to make choices delaying sex education until the onset in such aspects of their daily lives as of puberty and even then makinq sure nutrition, proper rest, toilet train­ that the instruction is firmly grounded ing, school attendance. . .. So why in moral principles and nuclear-family do so many sex-education (and for that love -- while we who live in a country matter, so many "drug-education") that was founded on Judeo-Christian programs presume mature decision-making ethics have instituted our own �asnost capability on the part of children? pol icy in the realm of sex education; we "let it all hang out." To be more I presently teach mathematics to specific, we insist on adver'tising three sections of 8th graders. I find sexual activity to groups of young that a number of these children cannot children in our schools. even take sufficient initiative to bring their books, their homework, David Elkind, Professor of Child their pen and pencil to class. I train Study at Tufts University, has com­ such children to assume proper minimal mented on the situation in his best­ degrees of responsibility. I don't give selling book, The Hurried Chil�: them choices in the matter, because their failure to assume personal re­ there is far from total sponsibility will eventually have agreement as to whether sex educa­ serious consequences for both them­ tion in the schools is beneficial selves and the society which might have to � age group, much 1 E!SS to to support them. Isn't that also the young people approaching adoles­ case with teenage pregnancy and vene­ cence. One has to conclude that sex real disease (and drug involvement)? education in the schools reflects adult anxiety about young people's Let's remember that children don't sexuality. The "prejudice" that think like adults. When we as adults early sex education will produce discuss sexual matters, we can think in children with "healthy sexuality" the symbolic and the abstract. But when is open to serious question -- even chil dren dea 1 with such thi ngs, they

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operate in the concrete: words tr"j gger the fact that it was developed by a pictures; pictures trigger action state health department that has appar­ (experimentation). ently been co-opted by "gay-rights" activists. Additionally, the Ohio So let's not subject our kids to program: the de-sensitizing (modesty-removing) and de-moralizing exercises which have 1. Fails to fully implicate homo­ been inserted into school curricula sexual practices in the exponential nationwide by Planned Parenthood types. spread of AIDS among homosexual males. Kindergartners don't really need to Sodomy is particularly dangerous, as make coed vis its to inspect toil ets and Dr. Gloria Mav1igit has pointed out. urinals, followed by discussions of The inner lining of the rectum consists both slang words and proper terminology of a single layer of columnar epithe­ for anatomical features of males and lium, "which is not only incapable of females. And high schoolers rE!ally protecting against abrasive effect, but don' t need to study illustrated gui des also promotes the absorption of an for condom use and other "safe sex" array of sperm antigens, thus ensuring practices. their exposure to the immune apparatus. " In contrast, "the lining of the Safe sex? We should not forget vaginal mucosa comprises a squamous that one of the rationales being ad­ layer epithelium capable of protecting vanced for the expansion of expl icit against any abrasive effect during sex-ed programs is the spread of IUDS. intercourse."(15) Analysis of the data contained in the October 26 "AIDS Weekly Surveillance Only 6.7% of the cases of AIDS Report," pub1 i shed by the federal reported in the country have invol ved Centers for Disease Control (CDC), women; and a majori ty of those have however, shows that rationale to be a been documented as IV drug related poor one. In the , only cases. It is now specul ated that many 183 of the 44,395 cases of AIDS re­ of the cases of "heterosexual AIDS" ported so far have involved children cases reported in the country may in­ aged 13-19 -- or about one for every 90 vo1 ve the same unwise anal-sex prac­ school districts in the country.(l:!) tices in which homosexuals routinely engage.(16) The CDC report doesn't make <:1 ear the modality of infection for these It has become obvious, with the adolescent children; but it would ap­ fact that homosexual males continue to pear from other epidemiological data represent 74% of all AIDS cases in the I've seen that in a large majority of U.S.,(13) that should not the 1 imited number of adolescent AIDS be tolerated as just an "alternative cases, transfusion problems or drug lifestyle" but rather should be re­ involvement are implicated, rather than garded as a parasitic deathstyle. sexual activity. 2. Says there is no evidence for Nevertheless, the Ohio Department casual transmission of the HIV virus of Health and Ohio Department of Educa­ whi ch causes AIDS, though severa 1 tion have promulgated their own AIDS studies have turned up cases of HIV educational package for use in the seroconversion through apparently schools. Robert Bowers, Assistant State casual means. (17, 18, 19) Further, Schoo 1 Superi ntendent, says the program 69% of physicians surveyed believe they is "about as explicit as anything I can get AIDS from their patients.(20) know" because "it teaches that it [AIDS] is transmitted through the ex­ 3. Neglects to mention the rapid change of body fl uids. "(14) antigenic drift (mutational rate) of the HIV virus or its already estab­ The Ohio program has a number of lished similarity to the maedivisna deficiencies, not the least of which is virus which fatally infects sheep,{2l,

L-____ --.J The 8lurenfeld Education Letter - Post Office Box 45161 - Boise, Idaho 83711�___ BIBLICGRAPHY

1. lena Levine, "Psychosocia1 Development," unpublished paper presented to Planned Parenthood workers, quoted in Planned Parenthood --News, Surrmer 1953, p. 10.

2. Report of the Select Camd.ttee on Ollld:!:en, youth, am Families, 99th Congress, Teen Pregnancy:. What is Being Done? (Washington, D.C.: US Government Printing Office, 1986), p.386.

3. Center for Pcpulation �ioos, 1985 study cited by Cincinnati Enquirer in "Teen Pregnancy Challenges Educators," July 20, 1986.

4. Edward A. Wynne et al., '"DeVeloping Character: Transmitting Knowledge-­ Sustaining the Momentum for Reform in American Education," cited by Claudia Winkler, Editorial Page Editor of the Cincinnati --Post, in "The Schools' Part in Buildinq Character," Nov. 26, 1984.

5. Editorial, "Safe Sex for Teens," Cincinnati Post, Dec. 11, 1986.

6. Congressional Budget Qffi�. Pregnancy and data from the Alan Guttmacher Institute, unpublished reports. Birth data from National Center for Health Statist:ics, 1982, vol. 33, no. 6, Supplement (Sept. 28, 1984), p. 16. Cited in I�port of Select Committee (op. cit.), p. 398.

7. Dinah Ridlard, "Teenage Pregnancy and Sex Education in the Schools: What Works and What Does Not �iork" (San Antonio: Crisis Pregnancy Centers, 1986), pp. 1-9.

8. Jaqueline Kasun, "TeenagE� Pregnancy: What Conparisons Among States and Countries Show" (HunOOld1: State University, 1986), p. 6.

9. Sean Q'Reilley, "Sex Education in the Schools," (Thaxton, Virginia: Sun Life, 1978).

10. Ibid.

11. Ibid.

12. David Elkind, The Hurried Child (Reading, Massachusetts: Mdison-Wesley, 1981), pp. 60,�.

13. Centers for Disease Control, "AIDS Weekly Surveillance Report," Oct. 26, 1987, p.5.

14. AP Report, "Celeste, Health Chief Back AIDS Education," carried by Cincinnati Enquirer on April 16, 1987.

15. Gloria Mavligit et al., "Chronic Immune Stimulation by Sperm Alloantigens Journal of the American !"Iedical Association (.J1\MAJ, Jan. 13, 1984, p. 237.

16. David Bolling and Bruce Voeller, "AIDS and Heterosexual Anal Intercourse, Letter in .J1\MA, July 24/31, 1987, p.474.

17. Jonathan Harm et al., "Prevalence of HTLV-III in Household Contacts of Patients with Confirmed AIDS and Controls in Kinshasa, Zaire," .J1\MA, Aug. 8, 1986, p. 721.

18. S.Z. Salhahudin et al., ''HTLV-III in Synptom-free Seronegative Persons," Lancet 1984 ii: 1418. BIBLICXiRl\FHY, continued

19. V. Wahn et al., "Horizontal Transmission of HIV Infection Between Two Siblings," Lancet 1986 ii: 694.

20. Report from Third International AIDS Conference, published in Cincinnati Enquirer, June 5, 1987.

21. Jdm Seale, "AIDS Virus Infection: Prognosis and Transmission," Journal of the Royal Society of Medicine, August, 1985, p. 613.

22. Matthew GcIIDa et al., "Sequence Homology and Morphologic Similarity of HTLV-III and Visna Virus, a pathogenic Lentivirus," Science, Jan. 11, 1985, p. 173.

23. J. Ba.rre-Sinoussi et al., "Resistance of AIDS Virus at Room Terrperature," Lancet, 1985 ii: 721. See also Lionel Resnick in JAMA, April 11, 1986.

24. AP Report, ''No Answer on Insect, AIDS Connection," carried in Cincinnati Enquirer, July 1, 1987.

25. Reported in Liberty Report" Septerrber, 1987.

lIDDITICIUIL &lOlCES, GEHMl\NE'ID'DIE 'IDPIC OF SEX EIXCATICIil IN 'DIE ::un:u:s:

1. Gene AntaUo, The AIDS Cov� (San Francisco: Ignatius Press, 1986).

2. JCl5EPl Benza and RalIiJ. Zmwalde, Preventing AIDS (Cincinnati: JALSCO, Inc., 1986).

3. Eric BnXIin, "How to Destroy the Family, SWedish Style" (Buies Creek, North Carolina: Canpbell University, 1985).

4. Claire Chambers, The SIECUS Circle: A Humanist Revolution (Belmont, Massachusetts: Western Islands Press, 1977).

5. Mel Gabler, NoDIa Gabler, What Are They Teaching --Our Children? (Wheaton, Illinois: SP PublicationS, Inc-=-;-i985T.

6. Carl Ham, "The Charlotte-'Mecklenburg Sex Education Curriculum: A Report to Parents, Grandparents, and Ordinary Citizens" (Charlotte, North Carolina: North Carolina Policy Council, 1985).

, 7. Hmanist Mani£estos --I -II (Amherst, : American Humanist Associ- ation, 1973).

8. Phyllis Sdllafly, editor, Child Abuse in the Classroom: Excerpts from Official Transcripts of Pl:'oceeru.ngs before the U.S. Department of EduCa­ tion (Alton, Illinois: Pere Marquette Press, 1984). Testimony reitera­ ted in the book concerned regulations to inplement the Protection of Pupil Rights Amendment, also known as the Hatch Amendment. ----, r-______---L ducation Letter, Pg. 7, Feb. 1988-______

22) perhaps through fecal contamination Ted Koppel, ABC's Nightline of drinking water or even through air­ host, had the right idea in the gradua­ borne mucous aerosols. tion address he gave at Duke last spring: "We have actually convinced 4. Neglects to mention the estab­ ourse lves that slogans will save us. lished room-temperature survivability 'Shoot up if you must, but use a clean of the HIV virus outside the human body needle.' 'Enjoy sex whenever and with for at least three days under dry con­ whomever you wish, but wear a condom. ' ditions and up to two weeks under moist No! That answer is no. Not because it conditions. (23) isn't cool or smart or because you might end up in jail or dying in an 5. Neglects to mention the pos­ sibil ity of insect transmission of the AIDS ward, but no because it's wrong, HIV virus. HIV is now known to survive because we have spent 5000 years as a in the intestinal tract of mosquitoes race of rational human beings, trying -- though transmiss i on of the disease to drag ourselves out of the primeval through insect bites has not yet been slime by searching for truth and moral established.(24) absolutes. In its purest form, truth is not a polite tap on the shoulder. It is 6. Says that there is now no a howling reproach. What Moses brought danger of HIV infection through blood down from Mount Sinai were not the Ten Suggestions."(25) transfusions. Any health professional can tell you otherwise. The ELISA If the mission of the dis­ antibody test used to screen blood may trict's program includes prevention of not pick up HIV antibodies for several teenage pregnancy and reduction in the months after infection occurs. frequency of venereal disease infec­ tions, then it would appear that adop­ Obviously, much of this infoY'mation tion of the K-12 programs currently will be unsettling to children. Given being promoted throughout the country that problem, and given the fact that is ill-advised. These programs serve to juvenile AIDS is seldom if ever trans­ entrench much of what has failed mitted sexually, it should be clear a 1ready. that chi 1 dren need to hear a simpler, more direct message than that conveyed 2. We should hold back on sex by the Ohi 0 AIDS program: Sa ve Sex -­ education until the subject is not "safe sex." Hold off on sexual DEVELOPMENTALLY APPROPRIATE for the activity until marriage. child. We should then insure that the instruction provided is firmly grounded Given the dimensions of America's in traditional moral principles and prob 1 em with teenage pregnancy and traditional family ideals not venereal disease, and given the patent Planned Parenthood chic. failure of programs currently in place to deal with those problems, I suggest 3. PARENTS and TEACHERS must do a consi deration of several common-sense better job of educating children about ideas: the importance of postponing sexual involvement until after marriage. 1. We must DEFINE what we mean by Marriage should be presented as the "sex education," and clearly establish most moral, most fulfilling, and most its strategic purpose in our schools. societally beneficial situation in Fone end of the spectrum, as pointed which sexual involvement can be experi­ out by a newsletter I once heard enced. Promotion of the contraceptive quoted, are the Ten Commandments and menta1 ity compromises that message. all that they imply. At the other end Perhaps what we really need is parent of the spectrum is a pimp teaching a education. young girl how to be a prostitute. The end toward which we shoul d gravitate 4. If we must teach sex education, seems obvious. then a positive, pro-active approach to

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sex education, such as Colleen Mast's 10. We must observe the legal re­ SEX RESPECT program, should be adopted. qui rements of the HATCH AMENDMENT and SEX RESPECT promotes chastity as a its attendant enforcement regulations. healthy, cost-effective a lternati ve to the popular contraceptive mentality. In 11. We must utilize our collective other words, children should be taught power to require that our legislators firmly that is the only 100% rel"iable and governmental agencies STOP method of birth control and venerea1 SUBSIDIZING both promiscuity and disease protection. Again, teaching illegitimate births with massive about contraceptives compromises that government funding. Simple economics message. tells us that what we subsidize, we 5. We should ensure that materials promote. which unnecessarily contradict the message of abstinence ARE REMOVED from 12. We must work cooperatively to school libraries and resource centers. CHANGE THE GLAMORIZATION OF SEX that Specifically, magazines like Ms., which occurs on TV, on records, and in the runs articles like "Multiorgasmic Men," print media. "Teen Lust," and "Gay Gothic," and ads for "sexual aids," witchcraft, and 13. To the extent possible, we lesbianism, should be removed. should base decisions in the realm of sex education on HARD FACTS rather than 6. We should realize that sex speculative opinion. education is as much a matter of style as of substance. WHO TEACHES IS AS In the final analysis, as Betty IMPORTANT AS WHAT IS BEING TAUGHT. Kuehner said in an editorial letter, 7. We should AVOID VALUES-NEUTRAL "There is only one thing that must be EDUCATION which unwisely tells immature given to children who want to be children that they have a wide ran!Je of sexually active, and that is how to say choices. 'NO. "' And those chi1 dren who don't care about sexual activity should not 8. We should SEPARATE THE SEXES be energized by school programs to give for any sex education program that is it a try. contemplated. Youngsters who come into the classroom with natural modesty (Mi ss i ng footnote numbers were for should be permitted to retain it. charts and graphs which were deleted due to space limitations.) 9. We should EXERCISE GREAT CARE BEFORE INVITING OUTSIDE SPEAKERS to te11 students about sexua1 issues. Otherwise, we may wind up with another PURE Conference Walter Sherman (Pres i dent of AIDS Volunteers of Cincinnati), who not only PURE (Parents for Unalienable pl ied a student audience last spring Rights in Education) will hold its with misinformation but went on to first national annual conference at suggest that if the girls in the audi­ Christian Liberty Academy, 502 West ence were to ca rry condoms in the i r Euclid Avenue, Arlington Heights, purses, they could easily cover their III inois 60004, (Chicago area) on heads in a rainstorm • . . and if a Friday evening, March 25, and all-day condom could cover their heads, well Saturday, March 26, 1988. The purpose then, a condom could easily cover his of the conference is to develop a na­ fist ••.and if a condom could easily tional strategy for the assertion of cover his fist, well then •..Walter, parental rights and the defense and who is nominally an Episcopalian expansion of educational freedom. All minister, also told a young woman after are welcome to attend. For informa­ his talk that the Bible is deficient in tion, call Sharon Pangelinan at (806) that it "just says no." 373-8849.

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