People Are Still Having Sex...

A collection of surveys of youngsters indicates that 1 in 5 kids is having sex before age 15. Worse, a study dated from September of last year shows that half of all mothers of sexually active teens think their kids are still virgins. One doesn't know whether to laugh or cry.





NEWS FLASH TO PARENTS: You're going to have to strictly control what your children do to keep them safe. Unsupervised teens do dumb things, especially at night. Don't let them go out with their friends if there isn't going to be adult supervision. Especially don't let them go to parties where there's going to be alchohol. Be uncool. Be a tyrant. It's your job.





On the brighter side, it seems that more high school students are virgins than not nowadays. Leaving aside the instant rejoinder that states sexual status and actual sexual status can differ, this would seem to give the lie to the more socially liberal who endlessly parrot that abstinence education doesn't work. It may not bear immediate fruit, but social trends take time to change. I think its safe to say that 1 in 5 teenagers weren't having sex before 15 back in the 60's. I think it's also safe to say that these kids didn't decide to keep their virginity from anything they learned in condom classes.





All of which begs the question of just how long we can reasonably expect youths to stay chaste, especially in a society that is baroquely overflowing with sexual imagery and content. A few hundred years ago, these teens would have been no less horny, instead, they would be getting married and starting families of their own. Of course, most of them would be illiterate and starting out into a wonderful career in subsistence farming, too. Yet in our infinitely wealthier society, a sixteen-year-old getting married nowadays is considered to be throwing his/her life away. Why, the kid won't even finish school, won't go to college, will make minimum wage in a series of dead-end jobs to support the family.





I can see this entry running away with me already, but I think I can safely conclude it with a thought: What purpose does it serve to extend the period during which a person is essentially unproductive, a boiling pot of energy stifled through years of half-labor in our various schools?