A Perfectly Cromulent Blog

"What am I talkin' about? I'm talkin' about sex, boy. What the hell are you talkin' about?"

Pardon me while I slap my forehead repeatedly in mock surprise:

Abstinence-only sex education programs, a major plank in President George W. Bush’s education plan, have had no impact on teenagers’ behavior in his home state of Texas, according to a new study. Despite taking courses emphasizing abstinence-only themes, teenagers in 29 high schools became increasingly sexually active, mirroring the overall state trends, according to the study conducted by researchers at Texas A&M University.

“We didn’t see any strong indications that these programs were having an impact in the direction desired,” said Dr. Buzz Pruitt, who directed the study.
...
The federal government is expected to spend about $130 million to fund programs advocating abstinence in 2005, despite a lack of evidence that they work, Pruitt said.

“The jury is still out, but most of what we’ve discovered shows there’s no evidence the large amount of money spent is having an effect,” he said.

You tell 'em, Dr. Buzz.

We had this thing called Students Against Drunk Driving (SADD) when I was in high school. As I recall, just about every student in the school signed up to be on it. Though that didn't stop several of the signatories from going on to drive home at 3 AM after a 12-pack of Schaefer without even so much as a faint hum of guilt over their actions. Same with the smokers who joined Youth Against Cancer.

Or me, for that matter, who was Vice President of the German Club, never mind that I couldn't speak the language, or that at no time in high school was I enrolled in German class.

Of course, these were all social organizations, not official state-sponsored curricula with gobs of taxpayer funding behind them. You tell me which is worse.

The study showed about 23 percent of ninth-grade girls, typically 13 to 14 years old, had sex before receiving abstinence education. After taking the course, 29 percent of the girls in the same group said they had had sex.

Boys in the tenth grade, about 14 to 15 years old, showed a more marked increase, from 24 percent to 39 percent, after receiving abstinence education.

Abstinence-only programs, which have sprouted up in schools across the nation, cannot offer information about birth control and must promote the social and health benefits of abstaining from sex.

That's because telling them how to protect themselves from disease and unwanted pregnancies would only lead to more of them having sex, you stupid liberal media.

Well, more than a 15% increase among 14-15 year-old males anyway, which you could probably explain by pointing out that WWE Monday Night RAW was in reruns during the time in question.

Pruitt said he hoped the study would bring about changes in the content of abstinence-promoting programs.

“These programs seem to be much more concerned about politics than kids, and we need to get over that,” he said.

Where the hell have you been, Buzz? Children are politics in Texas. Especially if you're on a school board, or if you're the Governor.