The saga of abstinence-only continues

The Daily Texan has a really good article on the abstinence-only push, focusing on the Bible Beltiest of cities in Texas--Lubbock. The teeth-grating stupidity from the abstinence-only side is really bothersome. It's telling that the people that they interview who actually have jobs educating young people are the people who say the program is foolish. The rah-rah abstinence people, as usual, are everywhere on the scale from naive to fearful to foolish to vindictive, but all of them are firmly dedicated to a pipe dream.

The story starts out at one of those prisons, I mean homes, for dirty teenage whores, I mean for expectant mothers. Particularly telling is this moment where we find out that "pro-life" really is just a euphemism for "anti-choice".

The worst part, she said, resting her chin in her hands, is that she isn't keeping the baby.

"My mom made up my decision," Kate said.

Once you commit the crime of fucking, you see, you lose your rights.

The article deals with the kids who take abstinence vows, an extremely new trend that thankfully swept West Texas after I left. I cannot believe that things have gotten worse there since I left, but there it is. If they had tried to get us to take abstinence pledges in high school, most of us would have just laughed in their faces. But apparently all these kids are eager to do it. And completely delusional, like this one couple they catch cuddling at an arcade.

Shaun Torres, 15, and girlfriend Stephanie Kenyon, 16, sit in the arcade of Cabose Restaurant in Lubbock. The began dating one month ago but have vowed to abstain from sex until marriage.

If you can last a month, you can last a decade after all! Actually, these kids will either break up soon or learn that dry humping just doesn't cut it after awhile. And when they do, I hope they use protection, but who knows what they will do when no one has told them how.

Apparently you can get contraceptive information in one Lubbock high school, though--the high school they set up to deal with the huge numbers of teenage mothers in the school district.

She said Matthews can talk about condoms and other forms of birth control because "if they've already 'done it,' it doesn't matter anymore."

Just more evidence that the abstinence-only crowd is more obsessed with the concept of virginity than anything. These girls are being treated like an aspirin bottle with its seal broken--alright, already spoiled so you don't have to worry about it anymore. This birth control information might have been useful to these girls before they got pregnant, but the mentality is that girls are not capable of handling that kind of information until they become women through marriage or motherhood.

And of course, they have the one obligatory quote from a know-nothing "Christian":

Ricky Poe, a youth pastor at PromiseLand Church in Austin who supports abstinence pledges, said television glamorizes sex and that popular TV shows never push abstinence.

"It's an uphill battle if we're trying to be in the majority," Poe said. "The fact of the matter is that the majority of teens find the liberty to have sex before marriage."

Fact: Teenagers did not have sex before television was invented. Ignore your English teacher with all those lying Shakespearean plays about dead teenagers in love. Back then, people barely knew what sex was. And people didn't hit puberty until 25. It's a fact. I'm sure it's in the Bible somewhere.

Anyway, I don't want to just copy every tiny outrageous thing about this story. Read it and enjoy!