~ Foreword ~
The following was written by Dr. Michael Brown and published by OneNewsNow in December of 2012. The two-part series no longer appears in their archives, nor have we been able to locate it elsewhere. There is a reason that we have kept columns of just such importance. Dr. Brown was far ahead of the curve on this issue – the Public FOOL System has stooped to even further depths since Dr. Brown’s commentary was published – nearly six years ago. ~ Ed.
Caution: Contains descriptions that some may find offensive.
Did you hear about New York City’s comprehensive drug education program for all students in middle school and high school? The teachers inform the students that abstaining from drug use is best, but since it’s impossible to stop them from doing drugs, the teachers give out cards that list the most common drugs, explaining which are the most dangerous. They also distribute needles to kids who are involved in shooting drugs to help them avoid getting contaminated needles, thereby reducing their chances of contracting or passing on communicable diseases.
You haven’t heard about this? It sounds almost criminal to you? Well, the truth be told, I made it all up, but I did so to illustrate a point — namely, that much of the current sex-ed curricula in our schools borders on being criminal and, in many ways, it is just as irresponsible as my fictitious scenario.
Consider what’s happening in some of our nation’s schools…
In October of this year, New York City announced an aggressive, comprehensive, and quite graphic curriculum that would consist of one full semester of sex education in 6th or 7th grade (meaning, beginning with kids as young as 11) and again in 9th and 10th grade. Yet the age of consent in New York is 17.
This means that these schools (along with thousands of other schools throughout the nation) are giving children practical instructions on having sex even though it is illegal for them to do so. (If my suggested drug analogy doesn’t work for you, then think in terms of the schools teaching 12-year-olds about responsible drinking of alcohol, since later in life, it will be legal for them but to do so at their current age is currently illegal.)
It can even be argued that, on some level, these schools fail to do everything in their power to prevent statutory rape, since in New York, it is “second-degree rape for anyone age 18 or older to engage in sexual intercourse with someone under age 15,” and that is certainly what is happening with many of these kids. Either way, the activities are illicit, be they consensual acts between 13-year-olds or consensual acts between an 18-year-old and a 14-year-old.
How, then, can the schools teach anything other than abstinence? Why are they teaching our children about “safe sex”?
A New York health department report in 2005 revealed that one in ten youngsters reported having sex before the age of 13. As shocking as that statistic is, it also means that 90 percent of these kids did not have sex before that age — begging the question: Why introduce them to all these sexually charged (and often sexually titillating) issues?
I am fully aware that many of these kids are anything but “innocent,” being exposed to sexual issues a hundred different ways every single day, among their peers, through the media, and online. But I have no doubt that many of our schools could do a much better job of pointing them towards morality more than encouraging then to have “safe sex.” (If you say that the schools have no business teaching our kids morality, why then are they teaching them immorality, or at the least, condoning immorality?)
Returning to the new curriculum being introduced in New York City, the New York Post reported that some of the workbooks include these assignments (as you read this, ask yourself if this will encourage or discourage teen and pre-teen sex; what follows is extremely graphic, even for adults):
– High-school students go to stores and jot down condom brands, prices and features such as lubrication.
– Teens research a route from school to a clinic that provides birth control and STD tests, and write down its confidentiality policy.
– Kids ages 11 and 12 sort “risk cards” to rate the safety of various activities, including “intercourse using a condom and an oil-based lubricant,” mutual masturbation, French kissing, oral sex and anal sex.
– Teens are referred to resources such as Columbia University’s website Go Ask Alice, which explores topics like “doggie-style” and other positions, “sadomasochistic sex play,” phone sex, oral sex with braces, fetishes, porn stars, vibrators and bestiality.
Is it any comfort to parents that the Department of Education still encourages abstinence as the best choice? As noted by child and adolescent psychiatrist Miriam Grossman in the NY Post article, “Kids are being told to either abstain or use condoms — that both are responsible, healthy choices.” She also notes “that the [text]books minimize the dangers that pregnancy can still occur with condom use, and that viruses such as herpes and HPV live on body parts not covered by a condom.”
According to a staggering report released by the Centers for Disease Control in 2008, at least one in four teenage girls has a sexually transmitted disease, which means that, at best, the schools are teaching the students how to have less risky sex, similar to playing Russian roulette with fewer bullets.
Are we just going to sit idly by?
As outrageous as it is to hear about the new sex-ed curriculum for New York City schools, beginning with middle schools, there are some school districts for which the program does not start early enough. And so, in June 2010, the Provincetown, Massachusetts, school board voted unanimously to begin distributing condoms to elementary school children upon the student’s request, beginning in first grade and without parental knowledge or consent. (What possible use could a 6-year-old have for a condom?)
After a public outcry, the district agreed to consider restricting condom distribution to grades five and up, meaning, to kids as young as 10. According to the official policy, “the school nurse is to give counseling and abstinence information to a student prior to handing out the condom,” although without parental knowledge or consent.
Is this so far removed from my fictitious account of a school handling out needles to kids shooting drugs?
As for the question of criminality, the age of consent in Massachusetts is 16 (under certain circumstances, it is 18), and in answer to the question posed by a 16-year-old boy who was having sex with his 13-year-old girl girlfriend, the SexLaws.org website explained that, “Any sexual conduct with a child age 13 [is] a very serious matter in Massechusetts [sic] whether you are a minor or an adult” (their emphasis).
Doesn’t that mean that this school’s condom distribution is contributing to criminal behavior, not to mention to dangerous and harmful behavior? How can this be allowed?
In a recent article for American Thinker, family activist Linda Harvey notes “that America as a whole is still horrified by child sexual abuse” yet she points to books recommended by GLSEN (the Gay, Lesbian, and Straight Education Network — better named the Gay, Lesbian, Sex Education Network) that recount the sexual experiences of boys as young as 13 with men more than twice their age. How is this not criminal?
Think about it. We are rightly outraged when we hear of the alleged acts of child rape by trusted adults (such as Jerry Sandusky at Penn State), but is there not a rape of a different kind — at the least, an assault on innocence — when schools show virtually pornographic movies in sex-ed classes or conduct lessons in which girls put condoms on boys’ fingers? (For a shocking report, see this article by Laurie Higgins of the Illinois Family Policy Institute.) And in the countless cases where these kids are anything but innocent, at the least, these schools are condoning, if not actually encouraging, immorality.
One mother posted this on my Facebook page: “I visited the sex-ed teacher at the high school our children were going to attend in 1992. I had heard stories about some of her techniques and was very concerned. When I asked her about modesty, she told me that is something she tries to get the kids over as quick as possible. My daughter brought home the curriculum from the class and I was appalled. There were several pages of vocabulary they would have to know, including every perversion I had ever heard of and some that I never heard of. The definition they had for virgin was someone who had never had the opportunity to have sex. The list included polygamy but not monogamy. It even said that sometimes it is beneficial for a marriage if there is an affair.” And that was back in 1992.
On November 30, a high school teacher from New York City called into my radio show, wanting me to know that things were far worse in the schools than I could imagine, from the way the kids dress and act to the fact that many of them spend far more time playing terribly violent (and often sexually charged) video games than reading books.
He also told me that in his school, there is a table in the hallway with condoms and lubricants. The students can take them freely, as desired. (Does this surprise you?) The other day, a student put a pile of Gideon’s Bibles on the table, also for the students to take freely. As a result, there was outrage in the school — outrage over the presence of the Bibles, not the presence of the condoms.
Is it an exaggeration to say that we need a massive moral and cultural revolution?
During that same broadcast, I received another called from a man in New York City who was involved in teaching sex education to high school students. As part of the program, he tells these students which condoms work best, among other things.
When I asked him, “Then shouldn’t you also teach the kids about responsible drug use and give out clean needles to intravenous drug users?” he responded, “Yes, we also teach about them drug use as well as where they go for clean needle exchanges.”
It looks like my fictitious scenario was not so fictitious after all.
We need a revolution.
December 2, 2011
~ The Author ~
Dr. Michael Brown, a Jewish believer in Jesus, is a biblical scholar, apologist, worldwide speaker, and activist. He is the host of the nationally syndicated, talk radio program “Line of Fire,” and he serves as president of FIRE School of Ministry in Concord, NC, as well as adjunct professor at a number of seminaries. He is the author of 20 books, including “A Queer Thing Happened to America.”