So it’s down to teaching lies now? Pure unadulterated lies, without any form of support or evidence backing it up?
I mean - Christ, how dense are these people? Do they really believe that every Cro-Magnon suffered harmful psychological and physical effects, or are they just spewing this tripe because damnit, they didn’t get to have sex when they were young and if they didn’t get any no-one else is getting any either?
I don’t want MY money being used to produce a new dance musical called “RAUL JAURENA’S TANGOmania.” But nonetheless, it was.
So how shall we determine who gets to decide how our tax dollars are being spent, since you and I seem to have divergent ideas about it?
I have a thought: why don’t we vote for members of some sort of group of representatives? Then those representatives could decide how to allocate our tax dollars. That seems fair to us both.
Who really gives a shit about what the gubmint will pay for in the way of education, let alone sex education? Seriously? If you’re having kids, why are you allowing anyone to talk to them (while they’re children) about sex in any capacity? That’s YOUR job. If you’re not up to it then maybe you need a course in abstinence!
Tell you what, if ANY organization hands out a pamphlet, enters my kids’ school, or knocks on my door in order to discuss any element of sexuality with my children I’ll be one extremely vocal & angry individual and I’ll do everything in my power to publically smear that person as a perv. Tell my kids they can only ball one person, ever, and only when they’re legally married? How is that much different from telling my kid to get with you in the sack in order to get decent marks in 7th grade? Apart from the backing of an obviously corrupt and immoral organization–nothing.
I’m not inclined to get pissed off at the grant requirements–hell, that’s just free money with strings attached. What smokes me is that there might be some asshole out there looking to tell my kids who to shag and who not to. That’s the nosy motherfucker who will be wishing they’d made a different career decision. Like maybe coal miner in South Africa. Fuckin’ bring it!
Ahem. I must apologize for Inigo’s previous post. he’s not been himself lately. What he meant to say was that critical thought begins at home. And that by giving this very powerful tool to the children, they can easily slay the thickest propaganda dragons with ease and identify and persecute the purveyors of disinformation.
That doesn’t sound very feasible. A better system would be one where everyone just does as I say.
Now, somebody get me a coke.
As a bare minimum, educational programs should teach the truth.
And if the choose to teach lies ?
**Inigo Montoya **, a lot of parents won’t teach their kids anything, or will lie to or outright terroize and abuse them on the subject. Letting the parents handle it won’t work.
This is a perfect example of getting the worst of both worlds. I suspect that if the Pubs had had their way in the beginning, there would be ZERO federal dollars devoted to sex education. But the Dems are the ones who would push for federal dollars for such education. Then, since the money is going to be spent, the GOP steps in and determines that only a GOP-friendly curriculum is taught. Lucky us.
Hows about we tell the federal goverment to stay the hell out of the business of sex education altogether and leave it up to the states? Then the next step will be for them stay the hell out of all education and leave it up to the states.
Right. Because the NEA generally and some specific item within it in particular are exemplars of the kind of idiocy that is abstinence-only sex ed. :rolleyes:
I don’t think the objections most are expressing to this fall under the category of “govt spending I could do without”, but rather under the category “willful ignorance about human nature causing social harm I could do without.” The sort of “sex ed” (hardly worthy of the name, really) being talked about causes demonstrable harm in the form of higher rates of teenage pregnancy and STD transmission due to the ignorance about sex it engenders. That’s not quite the same ballpark as generic poorly spent tax dollars.
Hey, that’s their call. They wanna fuck up their own kids, that’s fine by me.
And how is this different from the opinions expressed here?
Has anyone here expressed different opinions? You are smart enough to know better than to assume republican-arrived decisions are automatically good due to the magic conferred upon them by the res publica but yet you always question why people simply express their opinion here in this forum rather than…actually I have no idea what your preferred alternative is. Seems to me that free speech is a perfectly good part of a functioning democratic republic.
And if they decide to sacrifice their kids to the Spider God ? Why do parents have a right to abuse their children, in your eyes ?
Bad or no sex ed can kill ( AIDS ) or warp someone’s life permanently; I don’t think parents have a right to do that to their children.
What about kids without parents, kids with parents who support this tripe, or kids who have parents who simply don’t care? You are a good (hypothetical?) parent in this instance, but that isn’t always applicable.
To be hyperbolic, say all a kid is exposed to is this Government sponsered education program. Being a kid, they would not learn about contraceptives at all, possibly getting someone preggers. After all, it is easy to claim you are teaching abstinence, but anyone who has grown up at all knows just how hard it is to refrain from sexual activity.
Isn’t it just easier to have the government teach non-lies and non-biased information? “Some people refrain from sex for personal, religious, cultural, or other reasons, while others use contraceptives. If you aren’t going to refrain, here is how to help you not get a girl knocked up.” Etc.
Is that really so hard?
This doesn’t even enter into the whole issue of teaching the horribleness of homosexuality. That in itself pisses me off, although I realize it’s going to be a long hard fight for equality. Just having this government program is sickening enough.
Whether you choose to get upset over this is, of course, your prerogative. For me, and probably others in this thread, the mere thought of having the government endorsing this baseless, biased tripe is abhoring.
Ah, didn’t preview. I am in complete agreement with this sentiment and feel my prior point still remains regardless of why it was formed.
It’s a terrible quandry. Social engineering fiascos of all ideological stripes tend to have me leaning towards Federalism myself, but the problem is folks in other states are free to roam about the country. Bad sex ed., from a public health persepctive, is probably worse than no sex ed., and contagions don’t respect state lines.
I think the fundamental problem here is our Govt. is clearly inclined to ignore evidence-based anything when it conflicts with ideology. This can be a deadly problem. If we’re compelled to share the Republic with total freedom of access to all (I don’t see the secessionists winning anything), it’s a fearful approach to public health we’re embracing.
Excellent plan! But let’s not end there: let’s keep an eye on these “representatives” of yours, and when they do something god-awful stupid, let’s let other folks know about it. Maybe we could make a place on the Internet where we could let folks know, some kind of place to exchange messages? I’m still working on the details, but I think it could work…
Daniel
Hey, if that solution ends up being computer based, be sure you use some really good servers and some really good software, OK? 
Hey, if their god needs a sacrifice, better their kid than mine.
Interestingly close to asking me “Inigo, Why Do You Hate America?” Go that direction then we can get into a ridiculous esoteric argument that any kind of “teaching” is manipulative and, therefore, abusive. Some folks believe in this “morality” bullshit just as strongly as I don’t. So who’s right?
Devil’s advocate checking in: But bad or no spiritual guidance can kill a child for all eternity. Which is worse: human disease and suffering which are the creation of Our Lord, or eternal damnation?
ZebraShaSha, I knew about rubbers and what to do with 'em before I even knew there was something besides pee gonna be coming out of my little fellah. I didn’t get that knowledge from school and I didn’t get it from mom & dad. Now there are condom ads on TV, radio and, inadvertently, in the news in the way of various controversial bith control methods. You’d have to live in a box to not get the message. Involved parents or none.
I dunno . . . I think some sort of rodent might work better.
Daniel
They do, but studies show that it’s not true. There was actually an overview of several studies about this on Slate. Married people have better and more frequent sex than single people do. Don’t use guys’ jokes as an indicator, unless you don’t drive and have no straight daughters.
Which may do no good, but does no harm, except to those unwise enough to participate in the program as audience members.
Yes but even if the majority wants to promulgate lies, they still can’t. Well, strictly speaking they can, but not without perverting the idea of public good.
The ones who believe things that are factually correct have a chance to be right; the others don’t.
You ask this question of someone who thinks religion is the greatest evil in human history ? If I believed in God, I’d be advocating his execution, not following his rules. I’d certainly not support pushing religious values.
Even less in the real world, where there are no gods, and the seperation of church and state is supposed to be the law.
Quite a few kids do live in a “box”. What about the kids who are home schooled, not permitted TV or “unChristian” books, or visits wth children who might “contaminate” them ?