Age of consent is 16 here. I realize that is high and most of our neighbors have lower ages of consent. But it works for us. We’ve put in a legal discretionary clause for younger couples in a consensual relationship as long as the age difference is small.
Theres’ only sexual tension if they are not having sex.
As for teen pregnancies, they’ve not been an issue for generations. Teenagers that age really, really don’t want to have babies.
Its hardly an aspect of their lives you’d want to stick your nose into. When my niece had her first boyfriend, he moved in with her and her parents in her room. Decades ago, the parents of one of my friends moved away for a new job and rather than uproot him from his school, girl and social circle at 16, it was agreed that he moved in with his girlfriend. ( Ironically, he had been an accidental teen pregnancy himself, he was born int he 60s. )
I mean what are you going to do, run around like you are in some kind of sitcom, with the Benny Hill tune in the background trying to prevent people of consenting age from having sex?
I am old enough to remember it happening in Norway. I know several people who were the results of accidental teen pregnancies. But I don’t know of it happening after 1970. It is a 60s and earlier issue. Grandparents remember it, but I don’t think a lot of parents would ever have met anyone who had a baby as a teen pregnancy. Maybe in certain highly religious groups.
I am of course only referring only to accidental pregnancies resulting in a baby. People in their late teens do sometimes decide to have a baby in stable relationships. Or because they think it’ll repair a failing one. Something which seems to me to have a success rate of about 0.
I can certainly remember thinking about sex often at 17. But, that didn’t stop me from having a regular teenage life. I have a hard time thinking that just because you’re having a sleepover with people of your preferred gender means that sex will automatically happen. Both people have to find each other attractive, and want to be sexual with each other, and also find a separate space to engage in the activity.
As a gay teen (not out) I must have had over 100 male sleepovers from age 13-18. The idea of having sex during any of them would have been absurd. Most of my friends were fellow band geeks and not my type anyway. The only ‘sex’ that occurred was the typical teen habit of taking care of business in the shower.
Depends on the kids and the level of supervision. I experienced a few in high school. They typically involved alcohol and minimal or no supervision. Some pretty bad shit happened at one. So my gut reaction is “no way!” If you remove the alcohol and add some chaperones, it could be fine. But still, better safe than sorry. I’d have to say no unless I’m personally there supervising and that probably wouldn’t be any fun.
We’ve always been very open with the kids about sexuality since they were preteens and we did what we could, within the bounds of decency, to demystify it. WHY we took that route is probably it’s own thread. But the practical application was 1) my two daughters and three sons were aware of what was happening to their bodies as they went through puberty, 2) the kids knew what was happening to the bodies of their peers, 3) they knew what went where and why, and why consent matters, 4) they were comfortable coming to us for birth control options. They range in age from 17 to 22 and so far there have been no unplanned pregnancies and no sign of criminal activity (perpetrated by them, anyway). Those who got active were able to do so in a safe environment and with safe practices. To approach the matter as though parents have any meaningful way to control kids’ behavior that doesn’t also cause harm strikes me as silly.
Ok, I can see if alcohol gets involved, it could get messy. But it can also get messy if alcohol involved in a same gender sleepover.
I didn’t use alcohol much in high school. There was a Christmas party during my senior year which also had some people that had returned from their first year in college and there was alcohol at the party. I quickly learned that drinking vodka straight up was a bad idea and also that those Bartyles and James wine coolers tasted awful.
I had a graduation party at my house and my parents provided champagne. I think there was enough for everyone to have two glasses and most of the people stayed over at my house anyway. Even for inexperienced teen drinkers, two glasses of champagne isn’t going to make anyone too rowdy.
Yeah, there are plenty of teens for whom it is totally normal (and quite healthy) to have platonic friends of both sexes. Which doesn’t guarantee that sexual activity will never happen between them, but at least it means they’re comfortable hanging out together without thinking about having sex with each other.
How much do you think still being in the closet impacted your experience? If you had been out & accepted & many other young men were out…do you maybe think you might be inviting them to the sleepovers?
To me what’s weird is that so many Americans feel the need to add “platonic” to what everybody else calls “friends”, or that so many think it’s impossible between grown-ups of compatible sexes/genders. It’s like when you say “cook from scratch” to refer to what the rest of the world calls “cooking”*, one of those little details which carry behind whole mountains’ worth of cultural differences.
I’m really of two minds here. No, teens don’t want babies, but teens are also astonishingly stupid. In high school, my girlfriend slept over at my place all the time. We had sex every chance we got.
“Holy shit, RR! This bloody thing came out of me!”
“Wow, what the fuck is that?”
“I dunno!”
resume fucking :smack:
Then again, I was having plenty of (astonishingly public, in retrospect) sex outside the house, too. I’d rather have my (non-existent) kid fucking in the house than all of the places I’ve done it.
We definitely did co-ed lock-ins and even supervised sleepovers as a kid, and it wasn’t that big a deal. What we did notice was that there were some kids who could be a problem, but most kids were fine, and you just watched the problem kids. We even went off into rooms to play video games, and the most that happened was that one girl sat in the same seat with one guy.
I did, however, hear of parties where other stuff happened, usually involving drinking. I was invited to parties on occasion but I was a “good Christian boy” and didn’t go.
I think there are coed friend groups where it’s normal and natural to have sleepovers, and others where it would pretty clearly be a bad idea. Some kids don’t HAVE opposite gender friends . . .they might have an SO and they might hang out with their SO’s friends sometimes, but that’s not the same as a mixed gender “gang” of 3-6 who hang out all the time and who are not romantically involved. If you or your kids are the first type, a mixed gender sleepover would be ridiculous: the latter, it seems like a non-isse. Those people crashed on the couch aren’t “boys”, they are Chris and Alex.
That said, a really significant difference between Scandanavia and Beckdawrecksl’s country kids is whether or not abortion is considered a last-resort form of BC. Country kids don’t just have more bavues because they are dumb about contraception . . .It’s also because abortion generally isn’t considered an option by teens or parents.
I’ve no doubt that teens in Scandinavia are much better about using BC because that’s the culture, but I strongly suspect that if every teen that got pregnant carried to term, there’d be some mothers at high school graduation.
Teens are also extremely interested in sex. I can’t imagine how someone who didn’t know where babies came from (and how to avoid them) would escape being mercilessly mocked by their entire peer group.
Also, they must have slept trough sex ed classes for seven years before they became teenagers.
I thought that interesting enough to look up stats. The number of abortions has been declining in Norway, and in 2014 it was 11.8 abortions per 1000 women. Abortions peak in the 20-24 age group.
According to the CDC, the abortion rate in the US in 2015 was… 11.8 per 1000 women. Identical to the decimal point. Abortions peaking in the 20s age group.
The only difference I can find is that US abortions seem to average very slightly later in the term. Also, the US registered 9.8 % of abortions in the 15-19 age group, and 0.3 % below 15.
Norwegian numbers for the 15-19 ages, years 2015, 2016 and 2017 was 8.3, 7.6 and 6.3 %. No abortions registered below the age of 15.
So the numbers seem very even, but with Norwegian teens markedly less likely to need abortions.
I think the calculus is still different if you are adamently oppossed to abortion. Grown adults miss a pill, miscalulate, or just have BC failure. If pregnancy for you basically demands you take a series of actions that will effectively derail all your plans and goals . . .It’s a whole different risk/reward analysis.
Does that include chemical abortions at like 8-10 weeks? Genuinely asking.
I don’t doubt that Scandanavian teens get pregnant a lot less than American teens. I’m suggesting that when they do get pregnant, they are supported if they chose to get an abortion. And that’s true in a lot of America, as well. But there are also a lot of places where an abortion is difficult or impossible to get, and where the teen herself is much, much less likely to feel like it’s an acceptable option.
So, what’s the teen birth rate in Norway? I’m not arguing that Norwegian teens are getting pregnant left and right–just that once a girl is pregnant, she’s more likely to abort. If the abortion rate is similar but our teen birth rate is much higher, I think that means that our teens are more likely to get pregnant, and once they are pregnant, are much more likely to carry the baby to term.
Let me guess, did they ban dancing in your town?