Just Don't Do It: Abstinence Only-education

The religious right's answer to unwanted pregnancy and STDs is to just not have sex at all. I personally do not have a problem with abstinence, what I do have a problem with is my tax dollars being used to pursue a campaign of mass ignorance. Sex education is an attempt to prevent problems such as unwanted pregnancies and STDs through education. Planned Parenthood states that this attempt to pursue mass ignorance actually exacerbates the problem:

"There is little evidence that teens who participate in abstinence-only programs abstain from intercourse longer than others. It is known, however that when they do become sexually active, teens who received abstinence-only education often fail to use condoms or other contraceptives. In fact, 88 percent of students who pledged virginity in middle school and high school still engage in premarital sex. The students who break this pledge are less likely to use contraception at first intercourse, and they have similar rates of sexually transmitted infections as non-pledgers (Walters, 2005; Bearman and Brueckner, 2001)."

This is an interesting pursuit, the "just don't do it" policy. I could apply the same logic to other social problems: if I did not want to be sexually harassed at work, then all I would have to do is change my gender, and "just not be female."