The elimination of the funding for abstinence-only sex education is one of several cuts proposed by President Obama in the 2017 budget. The funding for these programs comes in the form of a $10 million dollar grant each year.
This is seen as a necessary cut due to the ineffectiveness of abstinence-only sex education. Abstinence-only program’s curriculum typically does not include information on contraceptives but supposedly teaches positive sexual behavior for teenagers. However, statistics and research show that any positive effects this kind of sex education has are short term and that the bad outcomes of this teaching outweigh the good. The program usually does not teach information like sexual health and orientation. The program can also shame individuals in same-sex relationships and those that have or are partaking in pre-marital sex. Implementers of abstinence-only education state the program delays sexual initiation. This is disproved by a federally-funded evaluation of several specific programs in 2007 showing that the adolescents in these programs were no more likely to abstain from sex than those that are not in the program.
Abstinence is a personal choice usually driven by religious reasons or personal moral standards. It is not an ideal that can be taught in a classroom for it cannot ensure the prevention of unwanted pregnancy and the spread of STDs and STIs. For example, say an adolescent pledges to abstain from sex until marriage due to an abstinence-only program’s influence, but later changes his/her decision. Most abstinence-only programs do not teach the importance of different kinds of contraceptives, so this adolescent is more prone to the contraction of STDs and STIs as well as pregnancy.
Abstinence-only programs also do not teach the legitimacy of orientations besides heterosexuality. This causes youths from the LGBTQA+ community to miss out on sex education tailored to their needs. It also creates feelings of segregation as well as inadequacy.
Eliminating the funding for abstinence-only education would remove the incentive to teach it and hopefully better programs will be issued in place of the ineffective ones. Programs that will teach the dangers of STDs and STIs and how to prevent the spread of them other than abstaining from sex, the multitudes of contraceptives, as well as sexuality is what needs to be in schools.
I personally took two health classes in a small conservative school, one in middle school and one in high school. In both classes, I learned limited information about male and female anatomy and was never taught anything about specific STDs or STIs, sexuality or contraceptives. Students should not have to resort to trying to find this kind of information elsewhere and should be encouraged to talk about it and ask questions in a professional manner in a classroom.
