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RSS Feed2007 study cites that teenagers are less sexually active
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| Agree | 30% | 198 votes | Total: 657 votes | |
| Disagree | 70% | 459 votes |
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Add to FavoritesI have two teenage daughters, one currently in Grade 12 and one in Grade 9. Through their education their school has conducted sex education, which they keep going throughout their highschool life. My girls and myself have quite an open relationship and discuss their school day, normally every afternoon or evening. They keep themselves quite busy with sport, music and the internet, so we have to make certain times each day to talk about their day. My eldest and myself hadn't got to talk for about three days, so we decided to get up early and take the dogs for a walk to catch up with what's been happening in our lives. In telling you this you can see that I am able to share with you a point of view from both sides of the table - the teenager and the parent.
My belief is that keeping open the communication with your children and the school education system putting in their cents worth, has had a great impact in changing the way my daughter's opinions about sex and related issues are, compared to the way myself and my husband felt when we were teenagers. They have more understanding about not only being sexually active, but the more serious side of sexually transmitted diseases, drugs and other things which weren't a worry to us, because pregnancy and cigarettes were the worst thing I can remember any of my teenage friends had to deal with. Now it's aids and death from drugs.
There is also alot of advertising these days that makes you more aware of the number of people in the world now suffering from aids and other ailments alot of these being teenagers. This advertising has also affected the way we think, making our teenagers think before they act. A good example of this is a recent conversation with my 14 year old who, by the way has got herself a boyfriend. She came home and told me that her boyfriend was coming over to meet me and was it alright if they went shopping and could I give them I lift. He seemed like a nice enough young man. They rang me about an hour later to go and pick them up. I arrived a little early, as my children know element of surprise is mum and dads greatest gift (or maybe in their eyes not so great) and they were sucking face as teenagers put it these days.
Anyway after the boyfriend went home I asked my daughter if she was getting too serious and be careful not to give in to temptation if the opportunity came up.
Her reply was mum, do you think I'm an idiot, I don't want any diseases, I'll wait till I know someone well enough.
Another example is with my older daughter. She has had her couple of boyfriends and our conversations have told me exactly the same thing. Mum, don't be so stupid, I know enough not to be that much of an idiot and I've nearly finished my school life and I'd rather go to the BMX track and ride.
In saying all the above, I do truly believe unless my girls and their close friends are an exception to the fact that teenagers of today are definitely less sexually active then their elders and I do thank the education system for their input into this subject. On signing off I like to say, I was able to be more open with my children because I feel that my parents weren't, it seemed to be taboo to talk about it back then and their are certain things we learn from our parents that we seem to want to turn around and do for our children what they didn't. Be open with your kids and hopefully their trust in you and "the system" has or will hold off their want to be sexually active early.
Learn more about this author, Queen of Motivation.
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Disagree
I personally believe that a "survey" on teen sex is a serious waste of time. How many teenagers would actually feel comfortable being honest about that subject? What's worse are the parents who say; "No, my little Susie is not sexually active, she tells me everything". What do you call this parent; naive, stupid or just hopeful?
First of all, it is impossible to know what another person is doing while not in your presence therefore whatever they tell you, you can only trust and hope that they are being honest, but there is no way of being 100% certain of the truth.
I am in my mid-thirties and I remember very vividly my sexually active and "semi-active" friends from middle and high school. What I mean by semi-active is going to second and third base but hadn't gone all the way quite yet, but we all knew it was coming soon. The TRUTH is; I don't remember anyone talking much about sex in the 6th grade but by 7th grade there were a few girls that I knew for sure were sleeping with boys at the neighboring high school. Yes, 7th grade (12 years old) for all the naive parents out there.
As for the middle school boys in my day, they always claimed to be doing something but we couldn't tell who was really still a virgin or not because they weren't getting "it" from any of us. It was always a girl from their neighborhood, a friend of the family or someone from another school but I do remember that it was usually an OLDER girl that they had their FIRST experience with. Girlfriends don't typically lie to each other to get points about sex so I'll stick with what I know for sure about the secret lives of high school GIRLS.
By the eighth and ninth grade the number of people having sex increased but not everyone was active. In the tenth grade sex was so common it wasn't even a big deal anymore. Our junior and senior years in high school were a bit scandalous because by then bad reputations had been formed, there were love triangles, hurt feelings and broken hearts over sex. High school students are experiencing the same things that we experience as adults the only difference is that they don't have to divide any assets when they break up.
I have a son that's currently in middle school and from what I've learned first-hand as well as from other parents is that everything we were doing in the 9th grade they are now doing in the 7th. In this day and time of raunchy music videos and Paris Hilton & Lil' Kim wannabes, girls are a lot more comfortable expressing their sexuality to the point of it almost being "the in thing" to do. I know someone that works for a local healthcare facility in Atlanta and she tells me that many teenage girls these days just give oral sex in order to remain virgins. Wow! Times have changed.
My guess is that sex amongst teenagers has increased by staggering numbers in the past 10-20 years alone. Just use the way we (as adults) conduct ourselves in the media, use what we could/couldn't say on the radio & television a few years ago as a guideline. Our teenagers are just younger versions of "oh my gosh" us!
I'm married and hold myself to high standards (trying to set a good example for the kids), I'd like to think that my 12 year old hasn't had sex but I have found notes in his book bag from female admirers and I can see that the girls are very aggressive, the boys don't even have to "try" real hard to get it anymore.
Once you've raised them and instilled positive values all you can do is open the lines of communication as much as possible, keep them busy, informed, around positive role models and pray that they'll make the right decisions. By no means am I suggesting that a parent's job is done by the time they reach high school but I'm not naive enough to believe that a teenager can't find a few minutes in the day to do something that they really want to do. Parents you don't know everything!
Learn more about this author, Kennedy Malone.
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Difference of opinion? Debate now.
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