Persuasive Essay On Abstinence In Schools

For many years abstinence has been regulation among the united states for teaching teens about sex. Students are not taught how contraceptives work, where to buy them, how to get checked for stds and other valuable information that people who have sex should know. Instead, the educators decide that just telling the student body not to do it would cause some magical thinking upon the kids, creating them not to participate in sexual activities. What these schools fail to realize is that it is not about what they want the teens to do, its about what the teens are going to feel obligated to do. The schools fail to see how poorly abstinence really works, how poorly it teaches sexualy active teens to be protected, and how poorly it prepares students for potential STDs and pregnancies.
What is

abstinence? Abstinence is known as a type of birth control to many people. This is where a person completely gives up sexual intercourse and remains a virgin until marriage. Abstinence gained government support in 1982 with small funding from the Adolescent Family Life Act (Howell). Abstinence is also traditionally taught inside of schools instead of actual sex education. This is slightly infuriating because it’s not preparing any singular person for the world of sex, if that person chose to enter it. All those people are learning how not to have sex, and that’s not helpful. Some abstinence programs have even been caught giving out false information. Some examples include, HIV being spread through sweat and tears and that condoms don’t protect against HIV thirty one percent of the time. (The Truth About Abstinence-Only Programs).The truth behind this is on the online website for HIV. It has been stated on there that it is not transmittable through tears or sweat and that condoms actually have an eighty percent success rate for preventing HIV (HIV Transmission Risk).
Although abstinence is the only form of birth control that completely protects a person from all sexual diseases and pregnancy, it still requires people to stick to their pledges for it to be effective, clearly. When saying that, the efficiency of abstinence sounds excellent, however more people than thought seem to be unable to wait for their first sexual encounter. In fact, fifty three percent of the kids who pledge abstinence end having premarital sex. Eighty two percent of the people who pledged do not even remember taking the pledge five years later (Ostrow and Randall).
When thinking of all the teens who were once abstinent and not planning on having sex, how prepared could those people be in a last minute decision? How likely are they to be protected? Chances are very little, or not at all. Actually, its been said that around one third of abstinent pledged teens are less likely to use protection (The Truth About Abstinence-Only Programs). This should not be considered shocking when remembering that abstinence only teaches a person not to have sex, instead of how to protect oneself which is the more important information considering everyone knows how not to have sexual relations. Also, without knowledge of protection, other problems such as STDs and pregnancy come to surface.
Mississippi is the state with the highest pregnancy rate in teens at fifty five out of a thousand births in the united states. Mississippi also has an abstinence only program and does not teach sexual education at all. The state with the fewest births is New Hampshire at sixteen out of a thousand births. New Hampshire is required to teach sexual education as well as contraceptives, but still touches up on abstinence for those who really do want to wait (Peterson-Beadle). Based on these results it is clear to see that sexual education is actually more effective in preventing pregnancy than abstinence was thought to be.
One more thing teaching sexual education would teach a teen is how to receive help.

If that person was to become active, that class would tell them all about condoms, birth control, different clinics, and so much more useful information. According to Brigid Mckeon, youth under twenty-five experiance about nine point five million STDs. Whats even more sad is that people that do abstinence pledges are way less likely to seek help in suspicion of STD because they do not know where to go, and feel to ashamed to ask. Then of course, when they do not seek help they develop long term problems from their untreated STDs like infertility.
However, many people will argue that abstinence is the best situation for teenagers. Many believe that teenagers are not ready for the responsibility and mental feelings that come along with having sex. This is an okay thing to think, but, because of this, some people stopped wanting their children to learn about the topic altogether. Kids need to learn about sexual education so they are prepared for when it does happen. Kids get curious and then do as they please. Our job is to teach the next generation how to be safe, not how to live their

life.
Almost everyone is aware of how much sexual activity is going on between teenagers today. Forty seven percent of high school students reported having sexual intercourse (statististics). One thousand four hundred of these teens do not use protection of any form (Why Teens Don't Use Condoms). Why is this? It is because we are not giving them the information they need. We need to teach each student more accurately about sexual education to make sure they know the repercussions of not using a condom and if for some reason they do not use one, they will know where to go and what their other options are. Abstinence is not teaching today's teens to be safe, and it won't teach the next generation either. Abstinence should always be a choice to teach and do, but sexual education in the classroom has to be a must.