As I’ve long suspected, condom usage is not solely about sex education. According to the Brown Daily Herald, many teens who don’t use condoms despite knowing the dangers, fail to do so because of the decreased stimulation and/or because of their partner’s expectations. It’s not for a lack of knowledge, it’s a failure to act on that knowledge. In that respect, it makes no difference what kind of sex education the kids had, whether it’s comprehensive, abstinence-only, or a blend of the two. It doesn’t matter what they tell you to do if you’re not gonna do it anyway.
What I’m far more interested in seeing is the sex education models in countries whose pregnancy and infection rates are lower than ours. Regardless of which model of sex education a person prefers, I think we can all agree that the pregnancy and infection rates are too high. With that in mind, we need to find a model that actually works, not just a model that meshes with our politics - or goes against the politics of the people on the “other” side. Cuz I swear that even if it was statistically provable that abstinence-only sex education worked, some of my friends to my left would argue against it. Likewise, if it was statistically provable that comprehensive sex education led to decreased risk among teenagers, some of my friends to my right would still disapprove. That kind of stubborn ideological loyalty is all well and good, but in situations like this, I would think that the most important thing would be doing whatever would have an impact on the numbers.
Bearing all that in mind, though, I’m not sure that what works in other countries would necessarily work here. I don’t know if it’s because the US is far more heterogeneous than most comparably-developed countries or if it there’s a cultural factor, but whatever we found would probably need some modification. Still, looking at a plan that actually seemed to work would be a good place to start.
Ultimately, what this proves is that people will make their own choices based on their own criteria, regardless of what other people tell ‘em to do. It doesn’t matter what play the coach calls if the players don’t run the play.
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