Inspired by mpinkeyes’ Wake Up America blog and a recent Wisconsin press release, I have decided it’s time to address sex. Ok, so maybe not about sex in the way that I would ordinarily like to; rather I want to talk about sex and children.

I have been watching mpinkeyes’ chronicling of recent events in his home state of New Hampshire with some interest. Specifically, his recent topics on abortion and Planned Parenthood have caught my attention, because I think that the direction they’re going is appalling

His first posting was in regards to the repealing of the law that requires parental notification before a minor can have an abortion. If this isn’t an absolutely brutal slap in the face to parents, I don’t know what is. Of course, we all know that Planned Parenthood has been doing this sort of thing in secret for a long time, but now the state has removed the secrecy and now flaunts it right in front of the parents who are helpless to do anything about it. Is it right for the state government to tell parents that they don’t have the right to be involved in their minor child’s life when it comes to a medical procedure being done? Absolutely not! Yet this is the direction that the democrats in New Hampshire intend to take.

His second post covers the actions of a group called STAY that took middle school students on a field trip to Planned Parenthood. Since this was a school event, this has raised a great deal of controversy, but the question that comes to mind is how this sort of thing could happen? This happened without the parent’s knowledge, and even the school system claimed not to have detailed knowledge regarding the field trip, yet it happened. Is this the direction that things are going? It’s not hard to see how this can happen when the state’s own government is working to ensure that minor children can have abortions without a parent’s consent.

His final post covered some of the recent statistics regarding Planned Parenthood. He cites that during the 2005-2006 fiscal yea, Planned Parenthood performed 263,943 abortions and received $345.1 million in clinic revenue, $305.3 in taxpayer funding and $212.2 million in donations. After expenses, the group made a profit of $55.8 million. The number of abortions and amount of taxpayer funding are at record highs while clinic income and donations are down. So this means that more abortions are being done on the taxpayer dollar, presumably for low-income patients. Or… Underage children?

So what is going on out there? I have a theory, and many people won’t like it.

To start with, let me point my finger at parents. I think too many parents are shrugging off their responsibilities and passing them on to government organizations like schools. I don’t pretend to know why this sort of thing is happening, but more and more it seems that parents are allowing school to teach their children about life values. Maybe it has something to do with the fact that so few families sit and have family time or dinner conversation any more. I don’t know. Either way, children today are learning “all they need to know about life, love and the pursuit of happiness” from sources other than their family.

So, the problem doesn’t just stop there. A major flaw in passing the duty of teaching their children life lessons on to the schools is that the schools may not be doing the job that parents think they’re doing. As to why anybody would trust the school system to do the right thing is beyond me, but that’s beside the point. Yet, now the truth is coming out, and it’s alarming.

The Wisconsin Family Council and the US Department of Health and Human Services has recently released information regarding sex education in schools, and the findings are disturbing to say the least. The study looked at “comprehensive” sex education programs in schools, and found that “the most commonly used sex education programs do not keep teens from having sex but rather contain a number of sexually explicit lessons for students as young as 13. The abstinence message is virtually non-existent.”

The report goes on…

“This report demonstrates what pro-abstinence supporters have been saying all along: ‘comprehensive’ sex education, which the National Institutes of Health defines as ‘teaching both abstinence and the use of protective methods for sexually active youth,’ all but ignore abstinence and actually promote sexual activity among teens,” said Appling. “Among the five curricula evaluated in the study that are in the DPI resource packet, ‘condom/condoms’ were mentioned 183 to 650 times; ‘pregnant, pregnancy’ occurred 8 to 348 times; and ‘protect (s, ed), protection’ occurred between 24 to 314 times. The word ‘abstinence’ was mentioned 5 to 90 times. Two curricula did not mention marriage at all and the other three mentioned the word ‘marriage’ one to four times. ‘Emotional consequences’ is mentioned once in one curriculum, twice in a second curriculum, and not all in the other three curricula the Wisconsin DPI includes in its resource packet.”

Sounds pretty ugly. What happened to teaching children about marriage and relationships? What happened to teaching children about “emotional consequences?” We all knew that, in the age of giving out free condoms in school, sex was taking priority over relationships, but the schools should not be teaching to the trend, they should be teaching what is right.

Moving on…

“The curriculum with the most balanced discussion of abstinence still discussed condoms and contraception nearly seven times more than abstinence. The curriculum content focused on ways to lessen the risk of sexual activity; abstinence was a ‘non-trivial component.’ Most of the curricula did not discuss condom failure rates in context and every curricula contained misleading statements on contraceptive use.”

So once again, it sounds like the curriculum is teaching to the trend. It almost sounds like the education system has given up and conceded that children will have sex, so they might as well teach the children how to use condoms…

So let’s put all these pieces together. Abortion on demand. Sex education that doesn’t focus on abstinence or emotional factors of sex and pregnancy. Legislation that allows for minors to receive abortions without a parent’s consent or notification…

Is it of any surprise that Planned Parenthood is making record profits and performing a record number of abortions? Not when you look at what’s going on with our youth out there. We aren’t teaching our children that there are consequences to their actions, and the government is stepping in to help make sure that there aren’t any consequences either. This is not a good road to go down… So my question through all of this is:

PARENTS!! WHERE ARE YOU?

Passing the buck isn’t working any more, and your children are going to be the ones who suffer in the end. There are consequences, and it’s up to the parents to teach their children what those consequences are. The same way that I was taught, the same way my parents were taught… It’s funny, when you look throughout recent history, the problem didn’t really reach epic levels until parents started passing off their responsibility on to the government.

Parents, it’s time to reclaim your kids. Stop shrugging your responsibility. Sit down and have family dinners. Talk frankly with your kids about life, love and the pursuit of happiness. Nobody else is going to. It’s up to you.