Free Republic

Obama, Congress Cut $ for 176 Abstinence Programs Despite New Study Washington, DC -- More than 176 abstinence education programs will lose funding for their outreaches to youth and young adults on September 30 because Congress and the Obama Administration canceled all grants going to abstinence-centered programming in their FY2010 budget. http://LifeNews.com/nat6659.html

The Obama administration is, once again, entangled in controversy over sex education.Yet this time, it is not about what the administration is trying to implement, but about what it is withholding – and apparently for political reasons.A taxpayer-funded study that indicates parental and adolescent support of abstinence education is not being released by the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS), as it does not support the administration’s objective – or that of vocal “safe sex” activists – of eliminating all abstinence-education funding.The Administration for Children and Families (ACF), a division of HHS, funded a survey of 1,000...

Analysis shows need for increased focus on sexuality, not social skills, in study and treatment of young sex offendersWASHINGTON – Adolescent sex offenders are often stereotyped and treated as socially inept, but new research negates this image, finding that they are more likely to be characterized by atypical sexual interests -- such as desire for prepubescent children, coercive sex with peers and adults, and exposing their genitals to strangers. Adolescent sex offenders are also more likely to have a history of sexual abuse themselves, been exposed to sexual violence in their families, and experienced early exposure to sex or pornography....

From his Greene County home, Rich Wyler has spent eight years organizing private weekend camps throughout the country to rid men of sexual attraction to other men. Wyler, the founder of the nonprofit People Can Change, has hosted camps throughout the United States and in England, including several in the Charlottesville area. More than 1,300 men have attended. Many participants in the Journey Into Manhood camps blame their gay feelings on childhood experiences. Some were molested. Others felt shunned by male adults or peers. Like Wyler, most of Wyler’s volunteer staff members have fought same-sex attraction. Some participants believe bad...

The former Freeland High School teacher charged in connection to having a sexual relationship with a student appeared in the Midland County District Court this afternoon to be arraigned on eight charges of third-degree criminal sexual conduct. Marcie Lynn Rousseau, 33, Freeland, was arraigned by Judge Stephen P. Carras, who set bond at $80,000 cash or surety. Other bond conditions are no contact with the victim or children under the age of 18 who are not related to her unless the youngster’s parents are present and no use of the Internet social networking website FaceBook. She is represented by Saginaw...

www.LibertyJuice.com I was surprised and delighted to read that many college girls are finally learning that they hold value, that their bodies aren’t little playthings for slobbering and sweaty young men, and that giving themselves over for one night stands comes with an emotional price that often lingers for a long time. It’s not been a popular message these days in high schools or college campuses, as more often than not, we’ve seen young people tossed candy-flavored condoms and sent off with a wink. The songs, shows and movies our youth watch and listen to glorify sexual promiscuity without consequence....

Bristol Palin is joining the speakers circuit and will command between $15,000 and $30,000 for each appearance, Palin family attorney Thomas Van Flein says. Van Flein confirmed a report by celebrity news website RadarOnline that said the daughter of former Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin has signed with Single Source Speakers. He added that her exact fees will depend on factors such as the group she's addressing and what she must do to prepare. Briston Palin, now 19, was thrust into the spotlight as a pregnant teenager during her mother's unsuccessful vice presidential campaign in 2008. She gave birth to a...

MAUSTON, Wis. (AP) -- Mike Taake has taught sex education for 30 years, and he says he knows what doesn't work: just telling kids to wait. The Mauston High School health teacher has used abstinence-only and comprehensive curriculums, and he said students need all the information they can get about sex to make the best choices. But teaching them about contraceptives could land him and other teachers in court...

Teen Birth Rates Fall in 2008 After Two Year Increase, Abstinence Credited Washington, DC (LifeNews.com) -- Teen birth rates fell in 2008 after increasing during the two years prior, the Centers for Disease Control said today, and backers of abstinence education credit their programs as making an impact. The CDC's National Center for Health Statistics reported today that the full birth rate fell two percent in 2008. http://www.LifeNews.com/nat6225.html

Not So Fast Malcolm A. Kline, April 5, 2010 Recently we reported that the health care bill made funding available for abstinence education. Well, apparently, the feds are looking for something more “comprehensive” to bankroll. “Today the Office of Adolescent Health released a funding announcement for the $75 million in competitive grants to be awarded to ‘evidenced based’ programs under the new Teen Pregnancy Prevention Program,” the National Abstinence Education Association reported Friday, April 02, 2010. “NAEA reviewed the announcement and provides a summary here.” “The announcement makes clear that all grantees must select from a specific list of curricula...

A cardinal seen as a future candidate for the papacy has broken a Vatican taboo by raising the possibility that priestly celibacy is among the causes of the sex abuse scandal sweeping the Roman Catholic Church.

ROME, MARCH 8, 2010 (Zenit.org).- Priestly celibacy is not psychologically dangerous, and in fact, sexual behavior based on "anything goes" is what is truly destructive to the personality. This is the affirmation made by Dr. Aquilino Polaino Lorente, a physician and psychiatrist who teaches courses on psychopathology at the University of St. Paul in Madrid. The psychiatrist -- best known for his work in children's and family psychology -- was a speaker at the two-day conference held last week at Rome's Pontifical University of the Holy Cross. The conference, "Priestly Celibacy: Theology and Life," was sponsored by the Congregation for...

A group that thinks an ad celebrating Tim Tebow's life is bad news for women might be a little out of touch with what women really want. That helps explain why the National Organization for Women and other feminist groups have vehemently opposed abstinence education while failing to notice that a culture of casual sex hasn't been so liberating for women. Just ask the 29-year-old Briton living in America whose anonymous account appeared in her country's left-wing Guardian newspaper. "(M)y sexual liberation was perversely trapping me in destructive relationships, while intimacy had become something elusive, insubstantial, disappointing, surreal," she writes....

Gender and sexuality have caused divisions in the Episcopal Church and the Anglican Communion. Same-sex unions are upheld in some churches and not in others; the same is true for gay clergy. While there are more than 3,300 churches that affirm lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender congregants, 57 percent of Protestant clergy hardly ever discuss issues specific to the gay and lesbian community. But according to "Sexuality and Religion 2020," a report released this week, they probably should. The report was published by the Westport, Conn.-based Religious Institute, a national interfaith network of more than 5,000 clergy and religious leaders....

Alarmed by a recent well-publicized study showing that abstinence education succeeded while “safe sex” and “comprehensive” sex-ed programs failed, the Left has abandoned its “abstinence doesn’t work” claim and drawn up a new line of defense. Consider what the New York Times had to say. According to its editorialists, the newly evaluated abstinence program succeeded because it was “freed from the moralistic overtones and ideological restrictions” of prior abstinence education. You can bet that anyone who pontificates about “moralistic overtones” in abstinence education has never held an actual abstinence curriculum in his hands, let alone read one. Why does abstinence...

Stimulated Avatars of Abandon Malcolm A. Kline, February 11, 2010 With evidence mounting that abstinence education helps prevent all of the maladies that government and school officials claim that they want to protect us from, these worthies are doing their utmost to give us…even more of the same policies that produced those outcomes in the first place. “Finally, why is it that public school students, who know so much more about sex than those dunces in the parochial schools, are precisely the ones walking around with the highest rates of illegitimacy, abortion and herpes?” Bill Donahue, president of the Catholic...

Dramatic new evidence that abstinence-only sex education can succeed in public schools ought to be good news for Texas, right? After all, state law requires an emphasis on abstinence, and most school districts stop there. But education experts caution that the program tested is very different from the curriculum offered in many Texas schools. And while elements can be found in some North Texas classrooms, not even the researchers can say for certain which parts of their specially designed program made it work. Advocates of abstinence-only classes praised the study, published last week in the latest issue of the Archives...

Surprise (to some)! Abstinence education actually works. According to a new University of Pennsylvania study published in The Archives of Pediatrics and Adolescent Medicine, abstinence only education helps to prevent teen pregnancy even if it does not include a religious message. The study showed that 33 percent of sixth and seventh graders who took an abstinence-only course had sex within two years of the course compared to 52 percent who were taught only "safer sex" and 42 percent who were taught both abstinence and safer sex.

This week, the media gave us what appeared to be startling news: Research, appearing in a journal published by the American Medical Association, showed (shock!) that abstinence programs dramatically reduced teen sexual activity. No one knowledgeable about abstinence education, however, would find this startling. In fact, eleven previous sound studies showed strong positive effects from abstinence programs. The mainstream media simply ignored them. Unfortunately, the most recent story came too late — President Obama and House Speaker Nancy Pelosi have already terminated the federal government’s abstinence programs. What other story has the mainstream media ignored? The big one concerns the...

Abstinence-only sex education has been a favorite target of the cultural elite, who argued it was naive at best and dangerous at worst. Now, a new study published in the Archives of Pediatric & Adolescent Medicine suggests that encouraging young teens to just say no to sex may be the most effective method at delaying early sexual activity. The study, the first of its kind to employ rigorous research methods in a controlled setting, showed that programs that encouraged 12- to 14-year-old students to refrain from sexual activity "until they are ready" were more effective than other approaches. The study...