Religious group teaches unusual sex-ed lessons in Maryland PUBLIC schools
 

A non-profit religious based pregnancy counseling center in Maryland was invited into Maryland PUBLIC schools to teach sex education. As part of their presentation, they encouraged teenagers to abstain from sex to avoid contracting sexually transmitted diseases. To demonstrate how diseases are spread, the speaker from the Rockville Pregnancy Center asked students to share gum that had already been chewed, passing it from student to student. The speaker also offered squares of chocolate to students, but told them one of the squares was actually a laxative. In both exercises, no students were forced to eat/chew the candy, but many did. These presentations were done at multiple public schools.

It's outrageous that a religious group was brought into a public school in the first place. I don't know what the schools were thinking. With their religious slant, it's not surprising that the group was pushing abstinence. I've got no problem teaching teens that having unprotected sex can lead to diseases. I strongly encourage that. But the teaching methods are really kind of crazy. Hundreds of kids participated across the county, and nobody knows for sure how many actually shared the chewing gum but it was a lot of them.

The most amazing thing to me though is that even when the students were told some of the chocolate was really a laxative, they ate it anyway. And even though they knew it was the height of cold and flu season, they still swapped the gum between scores of students. Teens clearly don't make good decisions. Apparently neither do school officials.

The story.

Edit: Be sure not to miss the link on the Rockville Pregnancy Center's website. "Take a test to see if you're going to Heaven!"

This doesn't seem so "omg" to me since my public high school pushed abstinence above all methods of birth control. Their methods seem a little sketch though.

Now that right there is the understatement of the year

My first reaction to the "Gum Game" was disgust and dismay the kids would do this. Ooh yucky! But thinking on it a bit, is it really more risky than kissing... not kiss Mom goodnight...teens chewing each others faces?

The school board is so pathetically typical. This has been going on for what, 9 years, before they get wind of it? But when they do, mount the high horses, we'll stick it up the bottom of this, heads will roll, scapegoats will be sacrificed. Asshats. :rolleyes:

all religions should be left out of schooling.

"as long as there are exams there will always be prayer in school" :haha:

Not that there's anything wrong with that. :lol:

far better than no sex ed at all, and I bet they'll always remember it

If I remember H.S. correctly... I think the students are sharing more than gum!

sex ed when i was at school consisted of a diagram of an alien (fallopian tubes and uterus) and an embarrassed teacher who didnt like the word "sperm".

I'm a bit baffled as to what they intended to prove:

"Chewing other people's gum is putting yourself at the risk of infection, just like having multiple sexual partners. So don't do it kids! Oops, you just have, in this class, at my suggestion...... Erm....."

"Having unprotected sex is like playing Russian Roulette with a square of laxative chocolate. And let face it, if you wouldn't take a chance on the health of your bowels then why.... Eh? You mean you've eaten it anyway? So you're willing to risk the shits because chocolate is just sooooo good, what would you risk to dip your wick? Ah. An STD. I see, return to your seats please."

But then I'm not going to heaven. Officially. So what do I know?

people who chew gum are destined to become junkie - sluts?

Interesting theory, and I agree with some of the other posters. Most teenagers spend a lot of their spare time sucking face with other teenagers, so they're swapping spit anyway. I guess the fact that they obviously swapped gum etc with no visible effects doesn't really demonstrate the dangers involved with unprotected sex though does it? I'd suggest that it only reinforces the teenage ideal of being 10 foot tall and bullet proof.

Or else people who chew gum are destined to blow pink bubbles.

Be warned: bubble gum and mustaches don't necessarily mix well.

Nor does bubble gum and long hair which is unrestrained.

Separation of church and State... it is so easy, if you are not an idiot I guess.

rkzenrage, for religious people it's as easy as you separating your illness from your profession. :right:

I really got a good laugh from the part where the kids ate the chocolate anyway, any way to pump up both the scale of this and the strength of laxitive? Could become very good entertainment. I don't think anyone would feel sympathy for someone who would risk shitting themselves just for a few seconds of a pleasent taste.
Maybe we could substitute the lax with something that would stain their lips blue for a few days or something like that. Sort of a badge saying "I'm incredibly stupid"

I guess that is why the AU is run by religious organizations?:rolleyes:
An intelligent religious person wants separation more than the secular.
The state is as much as a threat to them as they are to the state... separate is the only rational person's system.

pick-a-post
 

I need a smilie of a referee throwing a penalty flag.

#1: Illness is not voluntary, religion is. If you choose to adhere to a religion, you still have the responsibility to behave according to the standards of the society you live in. If certain people have an excuse to break the rules, what you have is anarchy.

#2: Religion is not analogous to an illness...bet you never thought I'd say that!

#3: An illness is not analogous to religion, neither is homosexuality.

That's all well and good but not that easy. 30% is black and white, but 70% is a broad range of gray. The gray areas will be lighter or darker depending on perspective. Saying it is easy, doing it is not.

Actually I'd prefer the schools to be teaching real subjects, but historically, we know the parents don't/won't.

Most of us here think the message being taught by Rockville Pregnancy Center is at best incomplete. I'd have little problem with it, if the school brought in another group next week, like Planned Parenthood, to teach contraception. That would give the kids the whole ball of wax.

But, and it's a big but, what do the parents want taught? What do the parents want the schools to give their kids besides the book learnin'? I think they deserve to be consulted of this.

You might be able to make a case for contraception and STDs in Biology class, but not everybody takes Biology. So what subject heading does this fall under, for the whole school? Very gray. ;)

That would seem logical but not always true. Some people have no control over their religious belief, for anyone of a multitude of reasons, primarily youth indoctrination but there are more. You may think they're irrational because you can't fathom they could be right. They can.
My comparison is, that for many it permeates their life and effects everything they do and say, just as rkz's illness effects every aspect of his life. If he thinks I made an unfair comparison, he can say so. Quite right, but who sets the standards for social behavior? The majority. Prevailing community standards have been mentioned quite often in legal precedents, when social legislation is attempted. Not rights of the individual, or even the minority, prevailing community standards set by the majority. Bet you never thought you'd say that.Well duh. :rolleyes:

S-what private school is for.

Incompetent and possibly dangerous, not incomplete.

Keep in mind, if you don't want your kids in sex-ed, you can opt them out. I have never heard, or read, of a school system, and it was this way when I was in school and teaching (we taught it in Science where it belongs).
If parents did their job and taught their kids about sex and contraception this would be a non-issue.

Everyone, once they are old enough to read & think for themselves and access to a library has control over their religious beliefs.
Now wait a min. Many of the religious say that homosexuality is an illness, perhaps...

Why should it be up to the parents what gets taught to their kids? The single purpose of an education is to create a productive adult. Tainting the facts that make up a good education with emotion produced maladjusted adults. Take the trend of sheltering students from the uncomfortable aspects of life as an example of bad teaching. Teachers are told not to use red to grade papers because it can cause 'emotional stress', students are later unprepared for rejection and expect other adults around them to continue sheltering them. P.E. is removed from the list of mandatory classes, students stop seeing physical activity as part of an everyday routine. We tell every student that they are gifted and special without any connection to their achievements, students go on to expect any half-assed effort on their part to be highlighted and praised as if it was acceptable. This is why America is dividing into two populations, and the opposite trend has turned Japan into a powerhouse with the rest of Asia soon to follow.
My point is that parents don't make decisions based on the real best interests of their children. Many parents are nothing more than bloated children themselves. Scientists will decide the science background that every highschool graduate should have. Doctors will decide what they should do to stay healthy, and how they should protect themselves from disease. Historians will decide what history they should learn, and economists will teach them how to make smart financial decisions to name a few catagories. If a parent is not one of these things, then they do not have the prerequisite knowledge to say what parts of it are important for their child to know.
Leave these decisions to the respective professional communities already well developed in this country, not politicians and people with no basis on which to make them.

You have got to be kidding with that? Really, you think so?
The purpose of education is to Educate, that is it. Because the role of doing more by slacker parents and hippy governments has tried to thrust more upon educators does not mean it is, or should be, so.
Parents are to P-A-R-E-N-T not me, my job was, and sometimes now, to teach my subject.
Part of that will be to give life lessons, withing the context of the lessons of my subject but ONLY within that context.

No using a word to define itself rzkn. An education is about imparting useful knowledge, not stuff that makes us feel good. Besides, we're way past the point where most parents can be trusted, and it takes a hell of a lot more than life wisdom imparted my mom and pop to make a kid successful in life.

Yup, reading, writing, humanities and arithmetic.

We live in a free society, not one where we are wards of the state.
It is not the state's place to make those decisions for the parents, if the parents want that, they will put their kids up for adoption.

The 'state' is not the one making decisions for the parent, it is other individuals who are better qualified to make those decisions. Within reading, writing, and arithmetic very few parents can make a well informed decision about what specifics are important for their children to know. As a society we benefit from our collective knowledge, most people happily accept advice from professionals at other times. Why is this different?

I would not want you within a thousand yards of my kid.

Why is it different? I say again... we are not wards of the State. What about this confuses you?

I don't want someone with a degree in philosophy deciding whether my kid needs calculus in highschool any more than you do, that's mismatching professions. However we are suffering from parents who are holding their kids back because they have no idea what it really takes to thrive in the world as it is today, not as it was when they were in highschool. You won't answer my question though, what makes the majority of parents qualified to make these sorts of educational decisions??

Not educational decisions... administrators and teachers decide curriculum for classes. I don't think those classes should teach kids how to think and believe. They should be objective.
If you don't want your kid to be in an objective system, send them to private school, as I have stated before.

Ok, I kept getting confused on what you meant by the comments about 'wards of the state' and stuff to that effect. I was talking about factual content, not ideas, all along. When you disagreed I thought you meant that parents should control the content of their child's education.

Not at all, I think we were having two different converstations... I was talking about your comment about education being about creating "productive adults".
Education is about informing kids about the world, it is about the act of education and nothing else.
Not raising kids into adults for parents in any way.

A productive adult is someone who has both the knowledge to make a decision, and the skill and prowess to act on it. A deficiency in either skill or understanding is what turns people into cogs. I tend to omit the understanding part on the first pass because you have to build an understanding out of facts.
Also, I don't think it's possible for someone to understand the world in any real scope or context with what passes for a highschool education in most areas. Kids just aren't taught enough information to make that leap. You can't understand current foreign policy without a solid history background that spans WAY more than the typical U.S. 40's - Present that is most highschool history coursework. You can't understand issues like Stem Cells without knowing embryology, and you can't understand why healthcare costs so much without knowing what it takes to care for a patient. This is all part of the reason why I'm a bit of an extremest when it comes to pushing for more post-highschool education.

I have no issue with telling students they "should continue their education if they want to" and what it could do for them. I went to college... but remember I was a schoolteacher when I was telling them this. Kids are not stupid. They look-up to people like actors, athletes, Warren Buffet and Bill Gates too.
It often falls flat.

You want someone with common sense deciding whether your kid needs calc in High School. I am planning to get a degree in engineering and I still want my kids to learn history, pyschololgy, chemistry, and english.

Then you tell them if they can get a 99% on a college level economics final without going to a single class then they can do it.

I think the State/Religion gap can be bridged, insofar as sexual education is concerned, anyway, by a compromise.

The Church can teach sex ed in the public schools, while laypersons teach self-gratification technicques in the churches. After all, self-gratification *is* a form of abstinence, right?

No els...self gratification is a form of self gratification when there's no one else around to do the job for you. ;) If you're gratifying yourself you're not abstaining are you?

As a current high-schooler, both in the states and at TAS, I can assure you we're taught (coughforce-fedcough) history from the Greeks and Romans to the 90's. Not very well, but it's there if the kid has the slightest inclination to learn.

The problem is not the schooling. The problem is the kids. I'm nuthin' special, just an average kid by objective standards... but compared to most people my age I'm a hyper-mature, very literate, knowledge-hungry, brilliant prodigy. All the fuckers my age care about is their cell phones, their illegal liquor, and their homogenous, boring friends who are all exactly like eachother. They fight and fight for good grades and do their homework like good little slaves of the system and forget it all the moment they dont need it.

Ibram, I agree with everything except the last line. Yes, it is true, but it’s something that you just can't rebel against and hope everything will go for the best later. There are times when you should rebel against the system, but getting good grades is something, no matter how much you hate it, you should join the system with.

A wise quote from a black man (yes, I intentionally put black in) on a different forum, "once you get a master's degree, you run the world".

I am still young and may be wrong but I noticed that to be taken seriously in this world you only need two things, respect and connections. A master’s degree will help you very much with both.

Why a religious group? How is that preferable to the school system itself or a secular group?
Since when do churches get secular groups to teach masturbation?
Even if they do, that is their choice... kids have to be in school, they do not have to be in church, and our taxes are not used for church. The difference is choice.
Again, if one wants their kid taught by a church, they should send them to a religious school.
BTW, most Christian denominations believe that masturbation is, or leads to, a sin.
As with all groups that wish for influence, allow them one "in" and more will follow, as we have learned and are now having trouble regaining the way it is supposed to be with separation of church and State, like getting our pledge back to the way it was originally written and the way the author (a preacher) wanted it, god off of our money, out of our courts and government buildings, etc.

Naw, dancing leads to sin. :D

I say we just take a lil Jesus doll an a lil Barbie, strip em' down for tha kiddies, lower tha lights a bit, put on some Barry and let em' have at it!
Well, around it, as it were...
Jesus never calls Barbie back, we pretend that her friends won't speak to her and she now works at a crappy clerical job and only goes to a "special" high school that is really just a glorified co-op day care for other knocked-up teens.
Then lil down syndrome strawberry shortcake pops out (Jesus was on tha' crystal don't cha' know) and the state has to help her and her mother raise her.
This ends-up giving her purpose in life and she gets her degree in ten years but marries an abusive ex-Gi Joe who drinks all her savings and eventually, money, away... the saga continues.

ROFL!

I thought it was having sex standing up that leads to dancing. :confused:

Dancing is the devil's favorite thing... Notice I did not have Jesus dancing with Barbie, I'm not evil or nothin'.

You're right.......but only face to face. :notworthy

dont forget you can go blind from masturbatinng too.
and if rock music is the devil's music, why are so many christians turned on to it?!

a) masturbating f***s up your typing
b) you can't call that thing they call "christian rock" actual rock music.

You've inadvertently proven your own point here. Most children do not learn effectively in a stressful environment, but you are not a professional educator so you didn't know that. The feel good bullshit is intended to ensure we don't live in a world dominated by the personality type which is comfortable oppressing less hardy individuals. One man's feel good nonsense is another's guarantor of individual freedom of action.

Why not?

I am not a Christian but I listen a number of Christian bands, usually metal. Its funny how Christians get so up tight when they hear about a Christian Death Metal band.

Meh, there's been a whole thread devoted to this very subject. I don't care if Jesus backs it or not, it sucks. ;)

ir tjat so?:rolleyes: