In Richard V. Reeves 's article “Shame is Not a Four-Letter Word”, published in The New York Times on March 15, 2013, he argues that shaming is a viable tactic to battle teen pregnancy. I strongly disagree with most of the author 's points, including his idea that shame is useful against teens, his claim that access to contraception and competent sex ed isn 't enough and his opinion that the negative effects of shame are not devastating enough to outweigh the positive. Reeves claims “[Shame] acts as a form of moral regulation, or a social “nudge”, encouraging good behavior while guarding individual freedom.” Teenagers have very little shame, and it 's not an insult. Science says that our frontal lobe, the part of our brain that aids in decision-making and understanding consequence is not fully developed until we enter adulthood. As a teenager, you may not be able to make great decisions without someone there to help you weigh the options. Add raging hormones to the mix and you can see how so many teenagers end up in rough situations like pregnancy, drugs and alcohol. We have used shame and scare tactics in programs like DARE before on children and teens, the general reaction to them is indifference. Shame does not stop teens from doing these things, knowledge does. When a teen is told that doing drugs is shameful, they aren 't really gaining knowledge about the subject, you may inadvertently be giving them a challenge instead. However, if you show them the effects of said
The term “Teen Pregnancy” was rarely heard or talked about previous to the mid 70’s and Now is consider an epidemic globally. Teen pregnancy refers to women between 13 and 19 years of age, who have not yet reached childbearing age and are still physically and mentally undeveloped to have children. During the early 70’s and middle 80’s teen pregnancies rates reached a peak to uncontrollable numbers. But this social issue has its origins in the 1950’s. Several significant social changes during the late 50s and early 60s such as the “Women’s Rights Movement”, the creation of the anti-conceptive pill , “The Gay liberation movement” of the late 1960s among others, brought along, long-lasting effects that still affect the current American
Teenage pregnancy is linked to many critical social issues, such as poverty, lack of education, out-of-wedlock births, health issues, education, child welfare, and overall child well-being. These issues have been a social problem for decades, but it wasn’t until recent years when it emerged from being social invisibility to becoming an urgent crisis. “In 1995, in his State of the Union address, President Bill Clinton singled out teenage
Throughout the “Genesis of Shame,” David Velleman, expresses his concerns about our culture’s lack of privacy. Velleman states his ideas throughout the passage, however, most describes our culture’s dependence on honesty adversely by stating, “ They assume that honesty requires one to express every inclination and impulse. Velleman’s statement implies people should move away towards total honesty. Although this passage was written in 2001, Velleman’s claim is still applicable in today’s society. People in our culture should make more of an effort to keep things private as it would place ordinary people at risk from fraudulent crimes.
Such a controversial vote ignited a great debate throughout the community: among parents, school officials, government officials, and religious leaders. It forced the community to discuss a topic that is still uncomfortable for many confer --youth sex education. “How should we go about teaching sex education to children?” When should children be exposed to this type of information?” These are the types of questions the community pondered while weighing in on the debate. Despite the sexual revolution of the 1900’s and into the 2000’s, discussing sex education is still a contentious topic even in 2015. The author Nancy Gibbs does a extraordinary job examining the various perspectives of the debate in “Birth Control for Kids?
Oliver’s next line sums up why we need accurate and authentic comprehensive sex education in schools: “Kids have good questions that need good answers.” Oliver goes on to deliver startling statistics such as only 22 states have laws in place to mandate sex education and with only 13 of those states requiring the curriculum being taught to be medically accurate (LastWeekTonight, 2015; Avery, Carvell, Gondelman, Gurewitch, Haggerty, Maurer, Oliver, Sherman, Tracy, Twiss, Weiner, 2015). Oliver continues to spew forth important reasons why abstinence only sex education can be detrimental to adolescence. Some abstinence only sex education programs compares people that engage in pre-marital sex as “used toothbrushes” or “chewed up gum” (LastWeekTonight, 2015; Avery et al. 2015). A video clip of Elizabeth Smart, a well-known rape survivor, discussed how detrimental abstinence only education affected her mentally because all she could think of was being a piece of chewed up gum even though it was not her choice to have sex before marriage (LastWeekTonight, 2015; Avery et al. 2015). Before signing off with a celebrity filled sex education video, Oliver articulates another quote that is difficult to argue against; “Human sexuality, unlike calculus, is something you actually need to know about” (LastWeekTonight, 2015; Avery et al.
Thesis statement: In order to explain why contraceptives are becoming such a necessity in schools today, I will share how teen parenthood is being glorified, reasons for such an increase in teenage pregnancies, and how effective distributing contraceptives would be.
Over the last few decades the rates in teen pregnancy have been a debate; did they rise over the past few years or did they actually decline? Contrary to some doctors and politicians the numbers associated with teen pregnancy have decline over the last couple of years. Although there are still people out there who believe this to be an issue it’s made more of an issue than it actually is. The ads and commercials are set out to scare teen-agers into believing that were at an all time high for this issue, but realistically its actually the exact opposite. Teen pregnancy rates haven’t dropped on there over the course of the years. There are a few major factors that have contributed a great deal to this change. Those changes include but are not limited to: more resources being available to these teenagers to prevent themselves from becoming pregnant, society is more open to talking about this issue as well as the religion and culture change aspect of families today. Despite the beliefs of others, teen pregnancy rates are at an all time low for the first time in decades.
In Quindlen’s essay she talks about when she was sitting in a clinic in the poorest neighborhood in New York City. She sat with a group of young teenagers who amazed her with their knowledge of sexuality. Quindlen talks about someone mentioning the thought that sex education in school would lower or prevent teen pregnancy, but students will do whatever they want to do. Even though it is good to teach young teenagers about sex and possible risk of the act, it could create confusion in students, wondering the class is teaching them about contraceptives or abstinence. The essay explains how half dozen young teenage girls show off that they are having sex, getting pregnant, and having babies.
Many believe the children are solely responsible for their carelessness that results in early pregnancy. Looking at this problem more broadly, one can see all of the social changes that influence teen pregnancy. For example, the media promotes sex and relationships. According to the RAND Health researcher, Jeffrey Wasserman, children ages 12-18 who saw the most sex on television were twice as likely to initiate intercourse within the next year as to those who saw the least amount of sex in the media (2017). Many television shows and movies contain sexual scenes, but most of them don’t explain the risks of sexual activity. Moreover, teen pregnancy has become more widely accepted. While many still believe it’s wrong, this problem has become unfortunate but acceptable. With shows like 16 and Pregnant and Teen Mom, the mass media even rewards these teenages for their early pregnancies. The acceptance of early pregnancy has increased, but people are still embarrassed to talk about sex to children and teenagers. Teen pregnancy can be prevented, and it starts with a change in
In our society today, the topic of birth control and other contraceptives for teens is a stirring debate. Teens are more promiscuous and sexually active than ever before; as early as middle school, we are seeing more teenage pregnancies, STD’s, and abortions than ever. Teenagers are not comfortable discussing their sexual activity with their parents and as a result they are seeking out other ways to gain access to birth control and other forms of contraceptives without parental consent. Access to birth control reduces the number of unintended teenage pregnancies and abortions each year, and access to birth control also fuels teenage promiscuity and encourages sex outside of marriage.
In the early 90’s, studies have shown that teen pregnancies occur on a regularly basis and has been severely increasing (Newsweek: Birth rates in U.S, 1991-96). As a result, this brings out a wrong impression of women to society.
While many people are inclined to express indifference regarding this concept, teen pregnancy is one of the most controversial topics in the contemporary society. This experience can be devastating for some individuals, as the fact that they are raw makes it difficult for them to effectively deal with the problem. Society becomes more stressing and most teens who become pregnant come to express feelings related to shame and fear. The fact that these individuals are hesitant about letting their parents know that they are pregnant contributes to their problems and finding help sometimes becomes an impossible mission. Lack of life experience materializes into a more severe type of stress, endangering both the mother and the child.
There are four perspectives on the teenage pregnancy problems, which are wrong-girl, wrong-family, stigma-is-wrong, and wrong-society perspective (Luttrell 3). The commonality between these four perspectives is the center of blame when it comes to teenage pregnancies. In Juno’s case it was the “wrong- girl perspective” in which she did not follow the
A topic in American society that has proved to be an ongoing, and growing issue is that none other than teen pregnancy. In recent years, teen pregnancy rates have been increasing, which ultimately led to the topics increase of public and media attention. In American society teen pregnancy is often associated with negligence, as well as being irresponsible. In American society sex education for children is underdeveloped and instead society tends to use fear and shame to highlight/combat the dangers of unsafe or underage sex. American society uses fear to instill the idea that if you become pregnant as a teenager you are a burden to society. Along with fear society loves to shame its young women who have unfortunately stumbled upon the
Many teenagers are now becoming parents these days. In fact, from the ages of 15-19, there were 249,078 babies born in the United States. (1) Many of these unwanted pregnancies can be prevented with the help sexual education. Yes, in some schools there is sexual education. But, if it was in every school many of these could have possibly been prevented. At the school I attend, sexual education is not offered. We are faced with several unwanted pregnancies, and with sexual education, I think these could be prevented.