Pre-Marital Divorce?

The Clarion-Ledger picked up an AP piece written by Shelia Byrd on May 3, titled “Teens pledge to ‘just wait’ at Capitol rally.” The story, which takes the style of straight news, is a showcase of sloppy journalism verging on the absurd.

Take, for instance, the fifth line: “Today, teens wearing white T-shirts that read ‘Just Wait’ were warned about the dangers of premarital sex: disease, unplanned pregnancies and possibly divorce.”

Divorce? You cannot get divorced if you are having premarital sex.

Is it that several years into marriage one partner will confess to having had premarital sex long before the wedding? I hope that most marriages would survive the revelation.

Or is it that just one taste of sexual freedom might turn you into a depraved sex maniac, forever incapable of fidelity?

Byrd herself apparently accepts the wisdom of Bailey Magnet High School teacher Alisha Johnson, who is quoted: “I want (students) to understand the risks of going out there having sex before marriage, not just disease, but what it does as far as morals go and as far as divorce.”

As far as morals go? Is it appropriate for a public school teacher to shake the morality stick when almost every adult in the U.S. has premarital sex? Young people are repulsed by hypocrisy, and they will not be convinced by such zany rhetoric. When they do have sex, they will be in more danger from STDs and unwanted pregnancies.

Don’t take my word for it. Sociologists at Columbia University found that 88 percent of students who pledge chastity still engage in premarital sex. Pledge-takers were less likely to use contraception, less likely to seek STD testing and suffered similar rates of infection as non-pledgers. Volumes of research on comprehensive sex ed, as opposed to abstinence-only education, show that such programs do not lead to earlier sex, more sex or more partners among youth. When students receive comprehensive sex ed, they are likelier to use condoms (and use them properly) if they do have sex, and they suffer lower rates of teenage pregnancy. Both the American Academy of Pediatrics and the American Medical Association support comprehensive sex ed. Byrd mentions none of this information.

Byrd does note Mississippi’s progress in reducing teenage pregnancy from “21.3 percent in 1996 to 15.7 percent in 2004,” and she mentions that the national rate has fallen by a third over that period. She does not explain to readers that this means Mississippi is behind the national trend, nor does she mention that DHS is only able to hold such “rallies” through more than $1 billion in abstinence-only education funding from the Bush administration.

Johnson is bound by state law to teach abstinence, though that does not excuse her evangelical rambling. Byrd, however, has an obligation to at least attempt the truth. Instead, she helped conservative zealots at DHS write a press release.

By the way, kids, if you do have sex, use a condom every time. There, I said it.