Hey, you know what else is just that shocking? Virginity pledges don’t work:
Teenagers who pledge to remain virgins until marriage are just as likely to have premarital sex as those who do not promise abstinence and are significantly less likely to use condoms and other forms of birth control when they do, according to a study released today.
The new analysis of data from a large federal survey found that more than half of youths became sexually active before marriage regardless of whether they had taken a “virginity pledge,” but that the percentage who took precautions against pregnancy or sexually transmitted diseases was 10 points lower for pledgers than for non-pledgers.
So in news that’s unsurprising to anybody who hasn’t been living in a cave, virginity pledges a) don’t reduce sexual activity but b) do make sexual activity more risky. Hooray!
Now, a rational person, looking at this report, would say to themselves, “Self, I’ve gotta say, virginity pledges seem like a lose-lose proposition. They don’t stop sex, they just up the chances for people to become parents with venereal diseases.” But of course, virginity pledges have never been about reducing risky behavior or reducing pregnancy. They’ve been about slut-shaming and controlling female sexually. Of course, that’s not what they’ve been sold as, because most Americans aren’t interested in our sons and daughters being chaste; we’re interested in them not becoming fathers and mothers before they want to. Crazy us.
Also, in my high-school experience, abstinence pledges serve another purpose: encouraging self-righteous assholery.
Believe me, as high schoolers, we hardly needed the encouragement.
—Myca
All mine did was give me massive amounts of guilt that took me years to work through when I did start having sex. But at least I knew enough by then to use a condom.
Of course, that’s not what they’ve been sold as, because most Americans aren’t interested in our sons and daughters being chaste; we’re interested in them not becoming fathers and mothers before they want to.
I don’t know if that’s true. If parents just wanted their kids to avoid unwanted pregnancies, the obvious choice would be to take your daughter for contraceptive shots as soon as she started menstruating, regardless of whether she thought she was likely to have sex soon.
I think most Americans alive today who are parents still would prefer that their children be chaste at least until they are legally adults, better yet until they are wholly self-supporting, and ideally until they are married. And I don’t think that’s just the “slut-shaming” impulse; a lot of people have the crazy romantic notion that sex can carry emotional as well as physical consequences. I suppose one could say that this too is just slut-shaming, but I don’t think it’s an idea that we should have a public policy to root out. (As opposed to notions that men and women are unequal, or that HIV is just God’s punishment.)
But maybe this will change soon with a new generation, and the majority of Americans, having had wholly un-regretted teen sex, will find chastity not to be at all desirable for their children and will start those contraceptive shots at 12.
Surely there’s a gray zone between these two extremes, that’s worth exploring!
I don’t know what surveys say. I certainly know a lot of parents who want their own kids to wait until their mature enough before having sex, but who don’t define that as “ideally, not until marriage.”
Especially now that many people in our culture think it’s better to wait until the mid-20s or older to get married — do many parents really hope that their mid-20s child will be a virgin?
I’m in the gray zone with Amp: generally speaking I think that sex should probably wait until some time after kids would do it on their own absent supervision (which could be as early as 10 or 11). Similarly, I hope my children will wait to get married and procreate until they’ve gotten a handle on the options the world has to offer; both marriage and kids are comparatively difficult choices to reverse.
But obviously they’ll have plenty of sex before they’re married, for chrissake.
My parents didn’t hope for it, but I did reach my mid 20s, and am still a virgin. I’m not married, but it never really mattered to them. My aunt on mother’s side was also never married, though she had a relationship of 20 years with the same man, resulting in three children (the youngest is 16 now).
I certainly know a lot of parents who want their own kids to wait until their mature enough before having sex, but who don’t define that as “ideally, not until marriage.”
Like me, for example — when my daughter’s old enough, I’m going to recommend she be patient and wait until at least college. That said, the median age for loss of virginity is 17.4 right now; am I going to roll the dice that my daughter will be more chaste than your average person? Hell, no.
The fact is that every parent has a number in mind about what is a “good time” to lose one’s virginity, and the fact is that that number is meaningless. I don’t get to decide when my daughter loses her virginity — she does. I may disagree with her decision, but if she decides to have sex, she will.
But if she decides that 16 is the right age, she’s going to know that she can come to me for support. She’ll know I’m not going to give such a decision my stamp of approval — but she’s also going to know that if she wants to go to Planned Parenthood to get on the pill, that I will open up my wallet and pay for it .
The reason virginity-pledgers have more unprotected sex is because they don’t own their decisions. Their sexuality is owned by their parents. And so when they make a decision to have sex, it’s transgressive. They have sex at the same time as non-pledgers do. But while non-pledgers can sit down and think through their decisions as far as what they mean to them, pledgers act more rashly, and more stealthy. And that leads to bad outcomes.
Ultimately, I have faith that if I give my daughter the tools to make her own decisions about sex, that she’ll make the right ones. Just as kids who are taught to think critically about drug use tend to be less likely to abuse than DARE grads, kids who are taught to think critically about sex tend to start about the same time and use protection more religiously than virginity-pledgers. I don’t expect my daughter to be chaste until marriage — I wasn’t, and indeed, 98% of Americans aren’t — but I do expect her to own her sexuality, to be able to say no until she believes it’s the right time to say yes. And that means teaching her more than just-say-no.
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You’re likely you can say something like: “They’ve been about slut-shaming and controlling female sexually.” Usually if I express any comment of a similar nature people begin yelling at me that I’m a crazy brainwashed feminist. I mean, how silly of me to think.