Friday, May 27, 2005
The secret lives of Christian school boys
Posted: May 27, 2005
1:00 a.m. Eastern
By Kevin McCullough
© 2005 WorldNetDaily.com
A new study has found that boys who attend Christian schools view sex before marriage as morally wrong, that pornography is too widely available, and that abortion is nearly always wrong.
What? How can this be?
Aren't all Christian students, particularly hormone-driven young men, hypocrites? Even if they have been told by clergy that it's wrong to do, won't they just give in to their lesser selves and shag anyway?
The study, produced by Professor Leslie J. Francis from the University of Wales, found that only a handful of boys attending non-faith-based schools overwhelmingly believe that sex before the age of consent (not to mention marriage) was immoral vs. the nearly three-fourths of boys who attend Christian schools. The study also found that 62 percent of the boys surveyed believed that porn was too available in society, and that 73 percent disapproved of abortion under any circumstances. 13,000 boys participated in the survey, all aged 13-15 years old.
This type of statistical data defies the likes of the girl I rode with on the train from New York to Washington, D.C., just days ago. The young woman, we'll call her Tina, spent close to three hours explaining to me that as a future medical practitioner – and someone who would take great pride in providing abortions and condoms to women – she did not believe kids could be convinced to just not "do it."
Tina had traveled abroad and had spent some time in Uganda where the work of abstinence groups had seen quite effective drops in the rates of the spread of HIV and other sexually transmitted diseases. She was curious to now actually be sitting next to someone who also believed in abstinence. She asked me about my belief and what it was about the abstinence message that seemed to work.
My response was simple. Kids want to know the truth. Tell them what's truly at stake (like STD's, HIV and death) in risky behavior (like sex before marriage, or infidelity afterward). Tell them what works (like abstaining until marriage and remaining faithful until death). And then encourage them to do it.
It was like someone had turned a light on for her. I thought it was pretty simple. But I guess I underestimate just how much the "give 'em a condom, cause their gonna do it anyway" message has penetrated the public conscience.
I received my copy of Ben Shapiro's new book today, titled "Porn Generation." It deals in pretty graphic detail with the kinds of things the "give 'em a condom" mentality is bringing to our kids. I haven't finished it yet, but I now know new terms like "sexiling" and "dormcest." (And for you moms and dads who have kids going to well-known "good schools" like UCLA and Harvard, it is just as bad as those words sound.) Ben also deals with the reality that if kids speak up against such behavior, often they receive the scorn that used to be reserved for people behaving badly.
One example too recent for Shapiro's book (which you need to buy, read, and pass on to a friend) came this week from the City University of New York, where a Brooklyn professor called Christians "moral retards." (Whatever happened to liberal political correctness where we don't use the word retard anymore?)
So back to my new friend Tina on the train ... she turns and asks me, "Don't you think that simply teaching kids to say no puts them in greater danger?"
My answer was, "No!"
My theory is kids will give us back what we expect of them. Educating young men in sound logical and moral standards has led Professor Francis to some very telling conclusions. The biggest of which may be that they just might live up to it.
I sure hope that future generations will be able to overcome the very low expectation that the liberals of our society pronounce over them when they say "they're just gonna do it anyway."
And evidently a good number of them in Christian schools already have.
Kevin McCullough is heard daily from 1 to 4 p.m. EST in New York City on AM 570 WMCA, and in New Jersey on AM 970 WWDJ. Additionally, you can read his daily postings at The KMC Blog. For information on how to bring "The Kevin McCullough Show" to a station near you, call Dave Armstrong at 201-298-5700.
